by Sara Orwig
The space between them had narrowed some more. She glanced at his hand holding the reins. His fingers were long and blunt, his hands well-shaped, strong. A scar ran across the back of his hand and she wondered what had happened to him. He glanced at her and then down at her hand still resting on her revolver. Again the flicker of amusement showed in his expression.
“I’m not going to give you trouble and I can outdraw you, so why don’t you relax?”
“I’m fine,” she snapped, knowing most any man could outdraw her and outshoot her. She needed to get back to the wagon, and it would take all day to catch up at the leisurely pace they were taking, yet she didn’t want to ride ahead of him where she couldn’t see what he was doing. She wanted to get rid of him. At least to get more space between them.
Jerking on the reins, she drew the revolver. With a swiftness that was startling, he turned his horse beside her and his hand closed on her wrist, yanking the revolver up so it pointed toward the sky.
“Don’t fire,” he snapped, his voice low and commanding. “You’ll draw too much attention. The sound will carry for miles and frighten your family.”
He was inches from her, his eyes filled with sparks. Frightened, yet feeling a burning fury with him, she tried to yank free. His grip tightened, his fingers closing around her wrist like a steel coil. Their gazes locked, his dark ruthlessness revealed in his determined expression.
He reached up, taking the revolver from her hand. The horses were close; her leg was pressed against his; his hand was tight around her wrist, and his face was only inches away. She felt a battle of wills with him and something more—an undercurrent of tension that rubbed her nerves raw, made her aware of his closeness, his maleness, made her aware of herself as a woman. Her breath caught in her throat, and she felt captured in a struggle that had little to do with their traveling across the plains.
Looking into his eyes, she felt as if she were being drawn down into a pool where she was caught in current that carried her against her will. He blinked, and a look she couldn’t fathom passed over his features. Breathing heavily, they gazed into each other’s eyes. Her breast rose and fell as she inhaled and let out her breath.
His eyes lowered, looking down where her blouse strained tightly over her breasts. Her nipples became taut, pressing against the soft cambric shirt. She twisted in anger and embarrassment because she didn’t want to react to his gaze.
“Calm down, Red,” he ordered. His voice was soft, husky, compelling. He released her wrist, and his horse pranced away. Still watching her with a heated intensity, Dan Overton held her revolver out with the butt toward her.
She yanked it up and thrust it back into the holster. Furious with her reaction to him, she hated the hot blush she felt in her cheeks. “We don’t want your help. Stay away from us!” She flicked the reins, and the black gelding surged ahead.
Leaning over the horse, she raced toward the wagon, her heart pounding with fear that she would look over her shoulder and see Dan Overton charging after her.
When she glanced back he rode at a slow pace, heading her direction, but making no effort to stop her or catch her. Her heart pounded as if the devil were after her. She kept remembering gazing into Dan Overton’s dark eyes while he held her, a moment that made all her nerves tingle.
She didn’t slow until the black was lathered and the wagon only yards away. When she rode beside the wagon, she glanced over her shoulder. No one was in sight. She looked up to see her father gazing down with a questioning arch of his brows. She shook her head and shrugged.
She rode the horse until they stopped for the night. She didn’t want to worry Abigail, so she waited until she had a moment alone with Pa.
“The men are several miles behind us. And that Dan Overton is behind us. He wants to ride with us, but I told him we didn’t want his help.”
“We should accept his offer, Rachel. I think we’re pushing our luck every mile,” Pa said, a pleading look in his eyes that put her in a quandary. She didn’t want to go against his wishes, but she was afraid of what Dan Overton really was after. She was afraid he would arrest Pa.
“Pa, we’ve been out here two days and nothing’s happened. I don’t trust Overton for a minute.”
“Whatever you think.” He went back to building a fire.
“Pa, he said we shouldn’t have a fire,” she said.
“Who? Dan Overton?” Eb Kearney glanced at the stack of twigs, branches, and dried buffalo chips in front of him and stood up, brushing his hands off. “He probably knows what he’s talking about. I wonder if we’ll have to keep running even after we reach San Antonio,” he added.
“Course we won’t. We’ll be so far from Mississippi and trouble, no one will care or ever find us,” she said with a firmness that contradicted the cold fear she rode with constantly now because of Overton. He had to be after something.
“I hope you’re right, Rachel.” Pa turned away to walk back to the wagon. His shoulders were slumped and his wavy brown hair was thick with gray. She felt a twist of hurt when she looked at his coat hanging loosely on his big frame. He looked defeated and weary and she wished she could protect him from worry and harm. All spark was gone from his blue eyes, and he always yielded to her decisions now. She hoped she was making the right choices—taking them out of Fort Worth, traveling alone, refusing Overton’s help. She felt more certain about the decision to leave Mississippi—to go west where men didn’t ask questions and they could start over.
“Mam, carry me,” Lissa said with a tug on Rachel’s hand. Thinking Lissa was one of the good things to happen to them during the war, Rachel smiled and bent down to scoop up her cousin Caroline’s child.
“How’s my baby?” she asked, kissing Lissa on the cheek. Tiny fingers fiddled with the brim of Rachel’s hat. Lissa pulled the hat off Rachel’s head and placed it on her own, mashing tight ringlets around her face and laughing. She smelled sweet, and Rachel knew the loving care Abigail gave the baby. Lissa’s father, Elwood Parsons, had been killed in the war at Petersburg, her mother, Caroline Benton Parsons, had died six months later. The Benton set of grandparents had been displaced by the war and no one was able to locate them. Uncle Paul Benton had been killed, his wife, Aunt Nola had fled Mississippi as a refugee and no one knew what happened to her or the other cousins.
Elwood’s parents didn’t want another mouth to feed, even their own flesh and blood. Rachel hugged the baby, feeling thankful they could give her love, knowing that Lissa regarded her as her mother, because she had been too young to remember Caroline. In turn, Rachel adored her, wanting to give Lissa everything to make her happy.
“Look at Lissa’s hat!” Abigail exclaimed, laughing while Lissa preened and made a face. Abigail held out her arms. “I’ll take her.”
“Her feet never touch the ground,” Josh said while he peeled an apple.
“Look who’s talking,” Abigail retorted. “You carry her around more than we do.”
“I might,” he said and grinned. “Come here, Lissa, and I’ll give you a bite of apple.”
Abigail set her down, and Lissa toddled to Josh to lean against his knee while he cut a piece of apple into tiny bites. Rachel watched Josh, locks of straight brown hair falling over his forehead, his slender fingers deftly carving the apple. He was only nine years old, yet he wasn’t a child any longer. Sometimes he was as much help as a man and he shouldered burdens without argument. Abigail cooperated with her, but it was Josh who did more than his share and who faced trouble squarely.
“The men are still following us, aren’t they?” Abigail asked softly, her eyes filled with anxiety.
“Yes. And so is Dan Overton. I think he’s after Pa.”
“Please, Rachel, let’s go back to civilization. Go to Nashville or Memphis or Atlanta. I want to go back where there are people and towns and it’s safe. I don’t like it here.”
“If we get far enough west and we live out to ourselves, Pa will be safer than in a city where there are lots of fo
lks to meet and see us constantly.”
“We could go clear to Charleston or Savannah. We’d be safe there and comfortable. I don’t want to live out with cows. How will I get married?”
“Married?” Rachel felt startled. Since Vicksburg she had constantly worried about their safety, and it surprised her to find that Abby was worrying about meeting a beau. “You’re only sixteen; you’ll get married!” she exclaimed with a smile.
“That’s easy for you to say! You don’t care, and you don’t worry about not marrying. You’re past the marrying age. You’re ready to go through life without a man.”
“I suppose I am,” Rachel replied, thinking about Robert Chandler. “I always expected to marry Robert.”
“I’m sorry, Rachel. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
“Robert is beginning to seem a long time ago. It’s been five years since he was killed. Five years is a long time.”
“Well, I want to marry and I don’t want to live out in a place like this where there isn’t a decent man for the next eight hundred miles!”
“We can place an advertisement in the San Antonio newspaper,” Josh said, setting Lissa on her feet and shifting the basket of apples out of his lap.
“You hush your mouth!”
“Or we can run an advertisement in the Atlanta paper: Manhungry spinster stuck eight hundred miles in the wilderness needs a husband—”
“Josh, you stop it!” Abigail rushed toward him and he jumped and ran, looking back over his shoulder.
“Wanted,” he called, raising his voice, “man to live with cows and bad-tempered wife—”
“You hush!” Abigail snapped, chasing him.
Rachel started to call a reprimand, but as the two raced around the wagon, she closed her mouth. For a few minutes let Josh be a boy again. Abigail always shrugged off his teasing or gave it back to him. He circled the wagon and ran past Rachel again and Lissa gave chase, all three of them disappearing around the wagon. In minutes they returned, Abigail’s good humor back, and Josh carrying Lissa. Rachel glanced into Josh’s twinkling green eyes. When he was grown, he would charm the ladies, because he already knew how with his sisters and little cousin.
“Let’s get supper,” Rachel said. “Abigail, find Pa and I’ll get the basket.” She wasn’t going to worry about a husband for Abigail now. Abigail was only sixteen. It seemed a hundred years ago since her own sixteenth birthday, standing on the gallery at Green Arbor and watching company arrive for her party. She shoved memories from mind. No need in looking back. Life in Mississippi was over and it hurt too much to think about how things used to be. Lifting the basket out of the wagon, she got out utensils and their tin cups and plates. In minutes they sat around a cold repast of biscuits, apples, dried beef, and beans.
At two in the morning Eb Kearney took the watch and Rachel stretched on a blanket, staring up at the stars and feeling tension knot in her shoulders. She was twenty-two years old, a grown woman, but she didn’t know if she could protect all of her family enough to get them to San Antonio and start a new life. She felt terrified for Pa, scared Overton was a marshal or a bounty hunter, scared of the six men trailing them. They had lost so much during the war. She couldn’t bear to lose Pa now. Lissa needed them, all of them, Pa, Abigail, Josh, her.
As tears stung Rachel’s eyes, she rubbed them away, feeling angry. She wasn’t going to cry and she wasn’t going to let fear take hold of her. They needed another rifle and at the next town she would get one. She would insist Abigail learn to fire a pistol. And Josh might as well start practicing. He could hold a pistol with both hands.
Looking at twinkling stars, she shifted while Abigail’s words came back about marriage. Rachel placed her hands behind her head. She was a spinster, and she was thankful to have Lissa, but she wished she could have a family. She and Robert had been children when they had been pledged and then when he became eighteen, he went to war and was killed. So many of the boys she knew were killed. She had been too busy trying to survive and take care of her family to worry a great deal about it, but she wished she could marry and have her own children and a home and a man to love. She didn’t want to be vulnerable; Dan Overton caused her to physically react to him as a man. What would it be like to kiss him? Why was he so disturbing to her?
In the distance a coyote howled, and Rachel turned her head. The Colt was hanging in the wagon. While she debated getting her weapon, tension eased and she closed her eyes. It was only a few hours until dawn, and she was exhausted. She remembered Dan Overton holding her wrist, looking at her. When she had looked into his eyes, he made her feel afraid, but beneath the fear was a heated undercurrent she had never experienced before. The disturbing feelings faded as sleep came.
“Rachel!”
Josh’s cry roused her. Disoriented, she sat up. Sounds bombarded her, men yelling along with the unmistakable sounds of bridles jingling, the thud of hooves against the ground. Terrified about what was happening, she came to her feet.
Abigail’s scream pierced the night and brought Rachel fully awake, sending an icy chill down her spine. Men and horses milled around. Her first thought was the Colt hanging in the wagon. She had to get her revolver.
As she lunged for the wagon, a man on horseback loomed in front of her. He jumped down and caught her, hands locking on her waist to swing her up into his arms.
Chapter 4
“Come here. You’re going for a ride, Mrs. Johnson,” came the unmistakable gravelly voice of Lyman McKissick, one arm circling her waist and holding her off her feet easily. She was crushed against him, fumes of whiskey and tobacco assailing her.
“No!” Terrified, hearing the roaring of her pulse as her heart raced, she beat against a chest that felt as solid as oak. “No!” she screamed in protest, realizing what a mistake she had made in sleeping without the pistol.
His arms were tight around her and as he carried her, he laughed. “You’re a little tiger. You and I are going to have a wild night, sugar.” He wrapped his other arm around her across her breasts, pinning her arms to her sides as he strode toward his horse. She hated his touch. Her blood thundered in her ears while panic engulfed her.
Abby’s screams shut out all other sounds until a man clubbed her father with a rifle butt, the blow making a dull whack. With a groan Eb sank to the ground.
“Pa!” Rachel’s voice sounded to her as if it came from a distance. A man hauled Josh from the wagon. Lissa’s wails added to Abby’s shrieks as men and horses circled around beside the wagon and stirred a cloud of dust.
Terror and rage churned in Rachel while tears streamed down her cheeks. “My baby! Please!”
Laughing, a man carried Abby who was dressed only in her white cotton gown, her bare legs showing as she kicked him.
“We’re just taking the women,” Lyman yelled. “Leave the kid.”
“My baby!” Rachel gasped. “Please, don’t hurt her! She needs us!” Why hadn’t she kept the revolver at her side! Abigail’s sobs tore at Rachel, and Lissa’s wails were like blows to her heart.
“The old man can take care of the kids. I want you, tiger, and I’m going to have you,” Lyman said, tightening his arms until her breath was squeezed from her lungs. Enraged by a man who would attack a family with small children, she kicked and twisted uselessly while he grinned and ran his hand over her breast.
The touch was a loathsome invasion. Rage wiped out the last shred of fear, a burning hatred consuming her that made her want to claw him with her hands.
Josh kicked his captor in the shin. Swearing, the man hopped on one foot, and dropped Josh who kicked the other leg. The bandit backhanded Josh, knocking him off his feet.
“Damn you!” Rachel said, feeling tears burn her eyes. Twisting around, she tried to bite Lyman McKissick’s throat, wanting to tear out his jugular with her teeth.
He pulled back, and she sank her teeth in his ear. With a bellow of pain, he yanked away.
“Dammit!” He tossed her up on his horse. She fell ac
ross the saddle and struggled to sit up, sliding her leg over to sit astride as he reached up.
“Don’t move!” came a deep voice that was low, filled with a murderous rage that carried like a deadly snake slithering into the cluster of people. Then the double clicks of a rifle being cocked could be heard above all the other sounds, bringing silence, everyone freezing instantly.
Dan Overton stood yards away, a rifle in one hand aimed at Lyman McKissick and a pistol in his other hand. Dan’s feet were spread apart, his hat pulled down over his forehead.
Feeling as if he emerged out of the dark and the dust and might disappear as swiftly, she stared at him. Her heart thudded against her ribs, and she felt weak with relief. Dan Overton looked formidable. And all that virile male power was aimed to help her family. Reacting, knowing he was outnumbered badly, she swung her leg and dropped off on the opposite side of the horse, running for the wagon and her revolver.
When she moved, the man near the wagon reached for his pistol, jerking it up to fire at Overton.
A blast shattered the night, and the man staggered back, holding his arm and dropping his pistol. Dan held his Henry rifle still aimed at McKissick.
“Don’t anyone else move,” McKissick ordered his men. Rachel scrambled to get the Colt, her fingers closing on the smooth wooden grip.
“I got a woman. Drop your gun or I kill her!” snapped a man while Abigail sobbed. He held a pistol pointed at her head.
“Go ahead,” said Dan Overton in a voice so cold Rachel shivered. In that moment she knew Dan Overton was as dangerous to them as Lyman McKissick. And just as cold-hearted. “But when you do, I’ll kill McKissick,” he added.
“No!” Rachel cried out, terrified for Abby.
“Let the woman go, Jake,” Lyman snapped. “She’s not worth this.”
The man released Abby. Sobbing, she scooped up Lissa and ran to the wagon, disappearing inside.
