WANTED (A Transported Through Time book)

by Amber Scott

  He didn’t move. Couldn’t until his pulse slowed and his senses verified she was alone. Sure, if he thought hard enough, he could come up with possible explanations for a woman stranded, unescorted, miles from any small town or ranch. None came immediately to Jesse’s mind. Not even a decent trail near enough to account for some disaster or attack having befallen her.

  If she wasn’t a trap, he was a fool. Crying? If he were setting bait, he’d have her cryin’ good.

  He went to her slowly, careful not to step on any other noisy twigs, placing his steps so the grass didn’t hiss over his boot soles.

  The closer he got, the quicker his heartbeat picked up. Not from trepidation, but from a strange anticipation and awareness.

  She lay unmoving on the ground, eyes closed, and when she whimpered again, Jesse nearly jumped. The campsite’s conversation echoed far behind. The fools took themselves to be safe before he’d even come back ... but they were not alone.

  She was here. Gingerly, Jesse knelt next to the prone young woman, either fast asleep or fast acting. Her bare calves gleamed like milk in the dark, her frame slight, but likely tall.

  Twice, he’d heard her cry. Was she dreaming? Having a nightmare? Blonde tresses covered most of her face. What he could see was streaked with black and pinched. He reached out to move the hair aside and better discern if she was hurt. Or acting.

  Her breathing failed to spark his suspicions. She didn’t flinch. Black drips painted her cheeks but not the likes of any tribe he knew, and he’d come across southern and western Indians over the years. He’d seen a few yellow-haired ones, too, but none so pale as she. Nope, she wasn’t native.

  She might be stranded somehow out here. Surely she’d be grateful to have his help. Jesse chewed his lower lip and fingered the stubble on his chin. If he woke her, if she truly was out here alone, he’d have to bring her back to camp. Bait or not, she’d never be safe with those two jackasses.

  All the same, he couldn’t leave her and have her demise on his conscience. Among all the other things to feel guilty over, he didn’t have room for her innocent face. So he had to do something. Fast. One of them, more likely Joe than Mick, would surely wander from camp, thoughtless of the risk, to tell him supper was ready. For all Joe knew, Jesse might be lynched in a tree, another rope waiting for the next straggler from the herd.

  He moved to shake her awake. Her eyes flew open, and her gaze met his. Even in dark and shadow, unmistakable fear shone in them. Jesse went still, seeing no act at all. She lurched up and scooted back, her body rustling the foliage loudly enough to feel like a shout.

  Hurriedly, she glanced about, and Jesse found himself wondering if she had any idea where she was or how she’d gotten here. Perfect. She was a damned damsel in distress, and if he wasn’t mistaken, she was about to make the distressed part absolutely clear. Her eyes widened. Her lips parted to loose a scream.

  Jesse sprang on her, clamping his hand over her mouth. “Shhh. Don’t scream. Whatever you do, don’t scream. I’m not going to hurt you.”

  He meant to soothe her with his low voice, but she wriggled even harder against his hold, making so much shrill noise beyond his hand gag, he suspected they’d be discovered. He held his arms about her like a vise, pressing her face into his chest.

  “Two very bad men are sittin’ at a campfire just past that cluster of trees. You don’t want them to hear you. If they hear you, I’ll have no choice but to claim you as a hostage. Now settle down, or you’ll soon wish you were dead.”

  She went quiet but made up for the lack of noise with renewed thrashing of her limbs. Jesse stood, dragging her up with him. Damned feather-brained females. A man could spell a thing out, and still they did whatever fancied them. If it weren’t for a certainty Joe and Mick would have some foul and ugly acts in mind for the beauty, he’d let her go and walk away.

  He was certain. He knew Joe and Mick. While she struggled, his brain raced to piece together a way to get her to safety without risking either of their necks in the process.

  Nothing. Not a damned thing came to mind. His name echoed through the dark. From Mick.

  Jesse twisted the painted beauty around, wrapping his arm over hers, and couldn’t help but notice her small waist and ample bust. Hell. Of all things to be thinking of. Jesse pressed his mouth near her ear. “Shhhh.” She fell still.

  Was it Mick’s voice that froze her up? Or were his words finally making sense to the girl? Either way, they had to get her hidden. Well, he had to. She likely wouldn’t prove helpful.

  He spun on his heels, swinging her around with him, and searched the shadows for safe cover. Mick called out again. Closer. Jesse considered calling back, but that would betray their position, and probably wouldn’t satisfy the man.

  The best he could do was hide her, and the only place he could figure was behind the nearest good-sized sagebrush. If he hurried, cut off Mick and rebuked him, he might be able to keep the Irishman away.

  That left only her. He had to be sure she wouldn’t bring attention to herself or wander off and die, or worse, wander into camp. Could be she wasn’t completely sound-minded.

  “Hide here. I’m warnin’ you, don’t you make a single sound. Not a sneeze, do you understand?” When she nodded her head against his palm, he realized he still had her gagged. He had to be sure, though, before he let her go. He turned her so as to see her eyes better. “They’ll violate you, use you up, and save you for later, and I won’t be able to stop them.”

  Her eyes a clear blue, even in the shadows, filled with fright when she’d awakened, and paled even more.

  Satisfied, Jesse pushed her to the shrubbery, shoved down on her shoulders, making her squat, and pressed his finger to her lips. He bore his gaze into hers until she nodded her understanding.

  Mick’s voice reverberated within ten feet behind him, but calling in the wrong direction. Jesse’s chest tightened. He had moments, at most, to get away from her.

  “I’ll come back for you.” Slowly, willing luck to cushion his path again, he backed away.

  ~~~

  Chapter Two

  Samantha shook. Panic prickled up and down her insides. Where in the hell was she? Better yet, how in the hell did she get here? Nevertheless, she stayed as still as a rabbit—a scared one—in winter, like she was told. Her mind hunted for a plausible explanation for waking into what she no longer thought of as a bad, scary, vivid dream.

  If not for the fact that she felt cold sober, she’d blame the whiskey. Not even a trace of tipsiness or hangover fogged her brain, though. Could she have gotten drunk so quickly she’d blacked out? Passed out? Despite her focus on the present unexplained mess she’d landed in, images of her nightmare lingered. Swirling, pulling sand. Drowning, but dry. Even now, she touched her hand to her throat and breathed, the choking feeling all too fresh.

  The nightmare explained nothing, not without Freud on hand.

  Had she sleepwalked? She’d heard stories of her dad sleepwalking all the way down to the train tracks on hot summer nights. In all her life, she didn’t know of a single instance of her doing so. Not even talking in her sleep. (Or anything else, for that matter.) She kind of credited those stories about her father as a well-spun teenager’s lie, caught sneaking out, embellished over the years by supposed witnesses wanting to believe him.

  “Oh, yeah,” Grandma Jean would say. “It was the darnedest thing. ‘Henry,’ I’d say to him and then give him a good shake when he just stood there. Once, I woke him up. He nearly pummeled me. Never do that. Sleepwalkers are in a deep sleep, like a trance. If you wake them up, you can give them a heart attack.”

  It felt like a heart attack. Shards of glassy alarm had shot through her chest when she opened her eyes to a devilish face hovering above hers. Her first thought was of Charles—that one of his boy toys had wandered into her room in the middle of the night, being nosy. She remembered she wasn’t at home and saw where she was—wherever here was.

  Peering about, Samantha r
ecognized a stream, lots of scraggly trees of various types, most with speckled white trunks. She had to be miles from her father’s home, which meant even farther from her own in California.

  She huddled over and breathed on her shaking hands. It wasn’t only the chill making them tremble. As the minutes passed, her mind delved deeper. Whoever that man was, if he was going to harm her, he would have by now. She was safe. She had to be. A person didn’t get orphaned only to disappear and turn up murdered. That wasn’t how life worked. Her rescuer was not a murderer. He had eyes too warm for killing.

  Unless he was saving her for himself, a shrill interior voice scolded her. One of those creeps who made a victim wait, wanting her unsoiled for him alone. She’d seen those shows. She knew the kind of crazies out there. Not even a small town could protect a person from creeps.

  All she had to do was calm down, figure out which end was up, and go there. Or she could wait out the sunrise and leave then. Or maybe wait until the man’s camp quieted long enough, and she could be absolutely sure they wouldn’t hear her. Pick a direction and walk until she hit civilization.

  Who was she kidding? She was going to stay right where she sat—squatting—and hope for the handsome stranger’s help. Samantha blew a wisp of hair off her forehead and flexed her toes. Her legs were falling asleep.

  If he was a real hero and came back to rescue her, he’d bring a blanket and have a nice warm vehicle nearby she could climb into to thaw out her limbs before frostbite set in. Could frostbite occur in summertime? It certainly felt like it. At least she wasn’t in pajamas. Now that would be embarrassing. The dark wool skirt and long-sleeved cotton blouse had been muggy in the funeral home. Now, she wished she could take off the skirt and make it into a teepee-shelter-blanket sort of thing. Should have kept her hose on. If not for the pinching control top, she’d be warm ...

  “Damn it, Dad. This is all your fault.” She blinked against the sting in her eyes.

  The trees. Focus on the trees. The sound of the water. Breathing. Blanket.

  The minutes crawled by. By turns, she carefully stood to get some feeling back into her legs then crouched back down until they fell asleep again. Maybe Handsome was no hero at all. Maybe he went to sleep, or left her here to expire from terror. Maybe he was getting raped. Yeah, right. He didn’t look like the kind of man anyone could take alive. Too tall for that and nothing scrawny, either.

  Oh, well. At least she wouldn’t have to explain to him what in God’s name she was doing lying in the dirt out in Timbuktu. He’d be weird not to ask. She would ask. So what did she tell him? Claim amnesia? That she was camping up here and got lost in the dark?

  That blanket idea kept her going this long. But minute by minute, she started feeling like no one would come at all. Her spirits sank like a stone in an icy lake. A very icy lake.

  Figured. Leave it to a man to forget about Samantha Hendricks, even when she clearly needed a rescue, or at the very minimum, some decent and charitable assistance from a handsome stranger. Hollywood handsome. Dark stubble, light eyes, a nice, full mouth ... kissable.

  Kissable? Where had that come from? Yes, the man’s devilish features were nice, a little familiar, even, but kissable? The first symptoms of hypothermia must be setting in to have her thinking along such lines. She needed kissing like a hole in the head. Men, sex, love were nothing but trouble. The kind of trouble she’d been in too many times to count, and vowed not to be in again.

  If only it were a dream, and she were actually lying in her father’s bed in his bedroom. Yes. The creaky trailer letting in some cold air, and because it was such a lucid dream, she was somehow unable to wake up, to roll over and pull a blanket over her freezing cold—

  “You all right?” His breathy whisper startled her, and yet she didn’t jump. Though he’d come up from behind, she knew it was him.

  All she could think about was the blanket. Samantha stood, spun, and faced kissable Handsome—only to find him completely, utterly, empty-handed.

  Samantha gasped. No blanket? Her hands rose and fell to her sides. No blanket. No jacket. Not even a towel. Not even a friggin’ paper towel.

  He hadn’t even brought an article of clothing for her. What kind of friggin’ rescuer didn’t notice a girl shivering, particularly one whose nonexistent virtue he was supposedly keeping safe?

  “No,” she hissed, her teeth clenched to stop their chatter. “I’m not okay. I’m fucking cold.”

  He flinched, scowling, and shook his head, too. He turned away, and for a moment, she thought she’d pissed him off. Was he going to leave her freezing ass here where he’d found it? She regretted her tone and colorful vocabulary. Her mother’s frown of disapproval flashed in her mind. If she talked that way, no one would ever take her seriously, and a woman needed to use every tool she had available in order to be taken seriously. The credo had been drilled into her from girlhood.

  Samantha swallowed against the urge to spit out another expletive. If a man spoke that way, the words would enforce what he wanted. But out of the mouth of a pretty, young, blonde woman, the words screamed ignorant and trashy. Who wanted to rescue trash?

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  He turned back around. “No, I’m sorry. Here.” He unbuttoned his shirt, yanking the edges out from his tight, dusty-looking jeans. Dustier cowboy boots peeked out beneath the jeans’ hem.

  The cowboy was peeling the shirt off his back to keep her warm?

  Samantha balked, feeling like a brat. “No, no. I can’t.” She pushed out her hands. “You’ll freeze.”

  “Bullshit,” he said in a terse voice.

  Did she also detect some amusement? Or was that bemusement? As he moved to her, shirt in hand, ready to wrap it around her shoulders, his features were strained. Even his movements seemed stiff, and if Samantha didn’t know better, she’d say this cowboy was uncomfortable. She had no doubt she was what made him so.

  Warmth rushed through her. She blamed it on the thin flannel fabric, still warm from his body, he draped over her. As she tugged the flannel tighter over her arms and looked up, his spicy, earthy scent enveloped her. The lingering, smoky, smell of campfire somehow comforted her. In the moonlight, she couldn’t miss his rigidly contoured, naked muscles. His skin prickled in goose bumps.

  It took everything in her not to stare. But the image filled her mind, even when looking away. Those abs weren’t painted on. Unless she’d stumbled into a Hot Hunk calendar photo shoot, they were real.

  Another wave of warmth rushed through her, and this time she blushed as well. She didn’t want to stare, but she couldn’t help it. He crouched down, and his abdomen rippled a washboard line like none she’d ever seen in person. Those hip handles right above the jeans’ waistline. Oh, good God.

  Bad. Very bad ideas formed in her mind.

  Samantha shook her head.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  She met his gaze. Moonlight showed light green eyes, heavy-lashed and brooding with something unfamiliar. She couldn’t name or describe it, but it made the warmth rush hotter.

  Samantha shook her head again. Charles would tell her to ice herself and remember her goals. The pressure, the funeral. She’d gone crazy; that was all. Not a smart thing to say to any would-be rescuer, shirtless and hot or not. So she said nothing. She shook her head instead.

  He searched her eyes, and his hand reached out. The world hung very still for a moment. Spellbound, her breath caught. Was he going to touch her? Prove he was more than a dream?

  No. He pulled a twig from her hair, showed it to her, and tossed it. He didn’t touch her cheek or glide his finger down to her jaw, or stroke her chin. No, but she’d wanted him to. That is what was crazy. There had been third-date heavy petting and possibly, in early years, a guy in a bar for some nooky, and then there was this.

  This was not Samantha. She did not swoon or flutter.

  Tell that to her stomach rapidly filling with pretty winged creatures. Those butterflies suddenly fel
t even more dangerous than the two men back at his campsite. Never. She had never been the needy type who longed for a man to caress her cheek. Never. Well, almost never. At least, not since age fifteen. She was not going to be one now.

  Samantha stood up.

  “Thank you for your help,” she whispered, ignoring his quizzical frown. “Can you please possibly take me home?”

  He eyed her a moment. “That depends. Where’s home?”

  “San Dieg—Winnemucca,” she corrected herself. “My father has a place on East Sunny Drive. Well, he did. I guess it’s mine now.” No. It was hers until the bank took it over.

  “Don’t know the place.”

  “It’s off of Grass Valley Road. Not as far as Star City.” That threat of his cohorts still loomed in the back of her mind.

  He shook his head, his eyes squinting. “I can get you close, but I can’t take you all the way.”

  She almost demanded to know why not, but remembered how acting spoiled and desperate probably wouldn’t get her out of this predicament. Close would have to do. Besides, anywhere was better than this, even her dad’s place. She couldn’t even see a single city light. Well, town light. Strange. Even as small as Winnemucca was, there should be some sign of it.

  How far had she blacked out and sleepwalked? A mile? Two?

  It didn’t matter. The longer the drive meant the longer a vehicle’s vents blasted her with hot air, the better. Handsome would be too busy driving to do any cheek caressing her or any other of her similar fantasies.

  “Sounds good,” she said quietly, avoiding his eyes. “Lead the way.”

  He nodded, and after staring at her several long seconds (or did time just suspend for that long?)—during which she glanced about, ever aware of his stare—he walked away.

  When she followed, he stopped. With a finger to his lips and a stern look from those penetrating eyes, he warned her. Samantha remembered. Right. Evil dudes. Be quiet. She nodded emphatically and tiptoed the rest of the way.