by Martha Hix
“We’re both in a bind,” she reasoned. “You’ve fallen to kidnapping, and I’ve fallen out of grace with my family as well as the law. We need each other.” Not giving him an opportunity to comment, she rushed on. “You could go with me to Europe... Why, you’d be the toast of Gay Paree, an attraction amidst the swank salons of the grand republic.”
“Being an oddity doesn’t interest me.”
The insulted pride in his voice and eyes took her aback. “Gads, you’re touchy. I meant no offense. As handsome as you are, all the ladies would be swooning at your feet.” On second thought, maybe that wasn’t such a bright idea; Charity found herself jealous at the thought of his being admired by other women. “I’ve been thinking–”
“Always a frightening concept,” Hawk cut in wryly.
“Now, now, don’t be testy. Listen up. You probably don’t know it, but I’m a master horsewoman.” She waxed exuberant. “I can ride and rope and do all kinds of bareback tricks. So–”
“Bareback tricks?” he said, his eyebrows arching. “Don’t tempt me to ask for an explanation.”
“All right. I’ll just show you sometime.” Confidence building inside of her, she continued. “About my idea–let’s form a Wild West show. Perhaps you could learn to shoot straight. Hmm. Forget learning to shoot. You could do knife tricks, though you might want to work on your aim. It’s quite off.”
His laughter filled the air as he patted the knife he had collected from the ground a few minutes earlier. “If you’re talking about divesting Blyer of nothing more than his hat, all I set out to do was scare him. Killing doesn’t interest me. I come from a peaceful people.”
“Hawk, Comanches scalped my aunt years ago.” She searched his expression. “You aren’t a Comanche, are you?”
“No.”
“What are you?”
“A man.”
She needed no reminders of that! Her eyes filled with the sight of Hawk under the moonlight, she shortened the distance between them and placed her palm high on his solid chest. “And I am very much appreciative.”
“Careful. The virgin is beginning to sound like a wanton.”
“And that distresses you?”
“Yes.”
“I–I thought you wanted lovemaking.” Her voice faltered as she gazed into his dark eyes. “Was I wrong?”
“By totem! There are things you don’t understand. And now is not the time for explanations.”
He hadn’t said he didn’t want her; and from the sound of his voice, she knew it was simply a matter of time before his mighty arms held her. A satisfying feeling, to say the least.
Hawk faced the pair of horses Ian and Grande had abandoned in their dispatch. “From the looks of that gelding, I’d say it’s lost a shoe.”
“Yes, I think so, too. And Syllabub–she’s Ian’s mare–can’t pull the buckboard. She’s too noble a chestnut for that kind of work. Looks like we’ll have to abandon the wagon.”
“Which means we’ll have to ride double.”
Charity entertained a mental image of them, bodies locked tight atop a horse. She blinked. Quite a brazen scene. So what? She wanted to be brazen for Hawk.
“All right. We ride double.” Charity leaned down, grabbed the hem from the back of her dress and brought it forward to tuck into her waistband. “I’m ready.”
Hawk’s eyebrows arched. “Not too uncomfortable with that show of legs?”
“No.”
“You never cease to amaze me.”
Amazement worked both ways. She hadn’t figured Hawk for priggish. Well, I did demand respect. It seemed as if years rather than days had passed since she’d made that demand.
“Where are we headed?” she asked.
“Uvalde.”
“Why there?”
Hawk wheeled around to march toward Syllabub. “Because I said so, that’s why.”
Charity stared at his retreating form. He repacked his knapsack, gathering the items most necessary for their journey, then hooked them as well as her small valise over the saddlehorn.
Why Uvalde? she wondered. Did he have an accomplice waiting there? What did it matter, an accomplice? She considered herself no longer his captive. This time on the prairie was her opportunity to change Hawk’s mind about what the future would hold. So why worry about a sleepy burg lying west of San Antonio and southwest of Fredericksburg?
Chapter Fourteen
High noon.
In the far northern distance, Hawk saw the promise of hills, the beginning of the Balcones Escarpment that heralded the edge of Hill Country. Between there and here lay Uvalde.
On the mare Blyer had abandoned, Hawk rode forward with Charity behind him, his grip and her valise secured at their sides. With only a trio of hours sleep since deserting the buckboard last night, they were riding double toward the powwow with Maisie McLoughlin.
To keep his mind off the upcoming meeting, as well as the feel of his virgin angel so near yet so far away, Hawk damned saddles. A white man’s folly, they were uncomfortable things. And this one’s horn ate into his groin, what with Charity’s weight pushing forward with each clomp of hoof, yet no doubt about it he liked the feel of her legs cupping his backside.
He glanced to the side and downward. And got an eyeful of one of those exposed legs. Did she know what she was doing to him–what she had been doing to him!–showing her calves like that? He had run his tongue along many well-turned ankles, but Charity’s beat all.
Come on, Uvalde.
Quickly.
Squinting at the Columbia blue sky, Hawk exhaled and rested the side of his hand on the pommel. He ached to get their relationship on an honest basis, yet he had lied time and again. She didn’t like liars. Hawk knew her father; McLoughlin neither abided nor forgave speakers of false tongues. And Charity was his daughter.
Tell her, you lily-livered coward. Just get off this mount, sit Charity down, and tell her the truth. Unacceptable. He hadn’t brought her this far to jeopardize his assignment on a lonely stretch of Texas. He had given his word to take Charity to the Old One, and he felt that was the best thing for his angelic hellcat. Case closed.
But there was a case quite unclosed.
It was never far from his thoughts, Charity’s crime. Somehow they must convince the authorities of the truth, that she hadn’t known Gonzáles’s true intentions. First, he must get her promise that she’d let him represent her. If she allows me to defend her, Hawk corrected after his conscience reminded him about all his lies, bald and of omission.
Once she and the Old One had smoked their peace pipe, then this man and this woman could work on their own peace.
“It sure is hot today, isn’t it, Hawk?”
“In more ways than one,” he mumbled, her tight hold getting to him in a thousand ways.
“When will we reach town?”
“Not soon enough,” he replied in another mumble. “Probably by tomorrow night. Got to ford the Nueces first.”
“Hawk . . . have you given any consideration to the Wild West show? I really think we could take Europe by storm. Don’t worry about a thing–I’ll do the promoting and riding. Of course, you can do whatever you do best . . .”
Right. Argue torts in front of an assemblage of thrill-seeking Europeans set on watching a performance of daring and oddity. On second thought, Charity’s idea wasn’t much different from a courtroom.
She leaned her cheek against his back, and he was of a mind to throw good sense to the wind and let his sable-haired hellcat show him a few bareback tricks right here and now. Wah’Kon-Tah. I am only a man!
Attempting to shake off his lustful thoughts he asked, “Aren’t you forgetting something? The case of the State of Texas versus Charity McLoughlin.”
“Don’t worry about a thing. I’ve got that all figured out. Now back to our plans. I want you to promise me–”
“I am not interested in any Wild West show.”
“What are you interested in?”
“Uvalde
.”
“What’s so unique about that place?”
“Every place is unique.”
The afternoon of the twenty-sixth found Charity more impatient than usual. She and Hawk were nearing Uvalde, yet after all his growls and innuendos and blatant bids for lovemaking prior to her handcuffing the now-dead team, he hadn’t even lifted a finger in an effort to take her virginity.
And, drat him, he was certainly keeping his own counsel about his plans.
She might drat the man, but each minute, each hour, each of their two days together atop one horse, Charity thought him all the more intriguing and attractive. And he smelled nice, too. Yesterday and that morning, he had allowed them to take baths in the river.
And his knapsack did hold a change of clothes. More than one. Today he had dressed as a cowboy, sans hat and shirt. He’d said he wanted the “feel of the sun on my shoulders.”
As Syllabub plodded toward Uvalde, Charity leaned her cheek against Hawk’s naked back. She felt the taut pull of his muscles. Why didn’t he want her?
What do you expect? You don’t know a thing about loving a man, you ninny. What would it take to excite him? She recalled the kisses they had shared. Her lips pressed against his shoulder blade.
“Don’t.”
“Why?”
“Because it hurts.”
“This isn’t your injured shoulder. Which is, by the way, looking ever so good.” Deliciously good.
“Don’t you understand one damned thing about a man? You touch me anywhere and I hurt.”
She frowned. What did he mean? She seemed to recall Olga having written something on the subject. Something about a man’s universe being centered between his legs. “Ignore it,” her sister had said. Well, Olga wasn’t here right now. Charity’s arms tightened on Hawk’s waist. In another intrepid move, she ran the tip of her tongue along his salty flesh.
“Wah’Kon-Tah’s mercy! Don’t.”
“You certainly are sensitive.”
“Yes.”
“If you reach a sexual peak, will you quit hurting?”
“Jesus, Lord of the paleface.” Hawk’s mouth had pulled into a grim line when he twisted around to eye her. “Who schooled you in such talk?”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Again he faced forward. “Charity . . . you’re asking for ravishing with talk like that.”
“I know.”
His hand froze, the reins suspended in midair. “I thought you were saving yourself for some special man.”
She had two choices, to advance or to retreat. Her fingers moved up to his chest, pressing against his flesh. “I have found a special man. You.”
“Charity . . . you don’t even know me.”
“You could change that. You could be honest.”
“I’m not going to be telling you anything. And I want you to cease with that wanton talk of yours too.”
Momentarily crushed, Charity told herself that time would change his heart. She felt confident of this. Hawk might not be talkative, but he was a darned good listener, most of the time. And she trusted him. Gads, she realized, I really do! And there was a closeness between them that she had never before experienced.
She fidgeted on the saddle–so what if Hawk tried to evade her touch? “What’s it like living in an Indian village?”
“Like hell.”
He said no more.
The mare plodded onward. The Texas sun was unremitting. If hell had a name, Texas was it. Of course, the brush country was behind them, having given way to the rugged terraces of the Nueces River valley. But what about the place where Hawk had been reared? Was it Texas?
Fearing another rebuke, she stated cautiously, “I imagine it rather wild, Indian living.”
He finally spoke. “Wild? Not in a long time.”
“My mother said Indians love dancing.”
“That’s part of our culture, but dance is only a diversion in these times. Life on a reservation is government agents shouting orders and doling out rations. It’s being told where to live and where not to hunt. It’s hearing the Great White Fathers tell you where you can go. And where you cannot. And whom you cannot fight.”
It must be quite an oppressed life, the nature of which she had never gathered from the tales of red men told her by Papa and Mutti. Charity surmised aloud, “I think you were born a hundred years too late. That was a time for red men to fight other red men, with your own set of rules. Back then, you could’ve ridden bareback across the plains, your war lance at the ready for any brave or buffalo having the misfortune to cross your path. I think you would’ve been a lot happier, Hawk. I don’t think kidnapping for ransom would’ve ever entered your mind.”
He glanced over his shoulder once more, and his fingers patted the hand holding him tightly. “Funny you should say that. Sam Washburn said almost the same thing.” A moment lapsed. “You don’t know me at all. Yet you know as much about me as a friend of long-standing.”
So, she surmised, he’d known that reprobate for some time. That had to mean Hawk hailed from Texas. Perhaps he was an Apache. No. She knew enough about Apaches to know they hadn’t the size and stature of Hawk.
“I’d like to know more about you, really I would.” She recalled the night he’d captured her, when he had said that Indians revered children. “What’s it like, life for an Indian child?” she asked.
“Difficult.”
“It must have troubled you to see that. Will you use the ransom money to feed and clothe them?”
“I’ve done what I can for the young ones. And they will know my generosity in the future.”
“Then I hope you get some money from Papa. He can certainly spare a bunch of dollars. It’ll be a worthy cause.” She laughed. “How much are you going to ask for me?”
“How much do you think I ought to ask?”
“Oh no you don’t. Don’t make me put a price on my worth.”
“I think you’re worth at least twenty dollars.”
For that, he got a swat on the thigh. “Stop that! You wouldn’t go to all this trouble for a gold piece.”
He mumbled something under his breath, which she could have sworn was, “I’d go to Timbuktu and back for your golden piece.”
She shivered with excitement. “How do you know about Timbuktu?” she asked.
“I’ve been in the white man’s world long enough to know about the lands across the seas,” he answered smoothly. “Tell me, Charity, do you like children?”
She wondered why he was changing the subject. “I love children. I used to dream of having a dozen papooses.”
“So did I.”
“Did you ever think you’d found the woman who you’d want to give you those babies?”
Hawk chuckled low in his throat. “As a youngster I spoke for a wife. But she hasn’t accepted my bid. Not yet.”
He might as well have slapped Charity. Why hadn’t she considered that he might be in love with another woman? She consoled herself. He wasn’t with his adored, and anything could happen. She’d make it happen!
She had no wish to hear him expound upon the woman of his dreams. “What about buffalo hunting and scalping settlers? Did you ever do those?” she asked teasingly.
“Charity, I’ve never scalped anyone in my life.”
“I’m disappointed.” She decided to give him a dose of what he’d just given her. “I thought you were as brave and courageous as Fierce Hawk of the Osage.”
“F-Fierce Hawk?”
“Yes. He hails from Indian Territory. Fierce Hawk was the brave of my girlhood dreams.” But no more. “You know what? Before my sisters and I were even born, he asked our mother for one of us in marriage. Isn’t that romantic?”
“Touching,” he replied hoarsely. “I, uh, I never imagined you had such ideas.”
“I most certainly did.”
She told him about the Osage boy who she’d heard had grown up to be a respected lawyer and lobbyist in the capital. Hawk didn’t comment o
n her tale, holding himself still, quiet.
She figured she knew what was troubling him. “You’re jealous of Fierce Hawk.”
“Why . . . why would I be jealous?”
“Remember the café? Remember those nights when you wanted to have your way with me? You are interested in me as a woman, though you’ve been doing your best to make me think otherwise. So why wouldn’t you be jealous of another man?”
His shoulders tense, Hawk dropped his head backward ever so slightly. His hair brushed at her mouth. She heard his ragged intake of breath as he demanded, “Tell me more about this Fierce Hawk.”
“I always thought him terribly noble and clever.” She brushed her nose against his black hair. “And wildly handsome. My mother said in a letter that he is wildly handsome–naturally I pressed her for a confirmation as soon as she arrived home last April. Mutti thinks the world of him, that he’s smart and awfully diligent. He’s the sort, like you, who could and would outwit Ian and Grande.”
“Imagine,” he said in wonder. “As a girl, my whimsical hellcat was daydreaming over a red devil.”
“I’m not a girl any longer. And they were more than daydreams.”
“You mean you fantasized about bedding this warrior?”
“I have.”
“What did he do to you in your dreams, this Fierce Hawk?”
“All the things you’ve done to me. And more.”
Again, Charity felt as well as heard Hawk’s sharp intake of breath. He said, “Like what? Did he kiss you and love you till you were bruised and aching, truly ravaged? I’ll bet he never ripped your clothes off in haste to have you. I’ll bet he never tossed your legs apart and thrust his shaft into you before you knew what was happening.”
“Well, no. I figured him a gentle and considerate lover. Are you gentle and considerate?”
“I’m capable of being.”
“I yearn for such. Like the night you caressed between my legs–you didn’t know I knew what you were doing, did you? I want you to touch me that way again. Will tonight be the night?”
“No!”
A jackrabbit darted across Syllabub’s path, and the mare reared her head and pitched her riders to the side. Charity momentarily lost her grip on Hawk’s waist; when she regained her balance, her grip had fallen a couple of inches. His man-thing pushed at the placket of his britches, and her breath caught in her throat at the swollen feel of him. She jerked her hand upward. Why did you do that? Being brash of voice somehow hadn’t extended to her actions.
