by Amii Lorin
Then Laura heard the slow, muffled sound of approaching hoofbeats and Jake’s low voice behind her.
“I’m coming up alongside you. Be ready to grab my hand and mount.”
Even before he had finished speaking, Jake moved the horse forward, between Laura and her would-be attacker.
“Hey, what do you think you’re doin’?” the man snarled, as Jake heaved Laura onto the horse behind him.
“I don’t think I’m doing anything,” Jake answered, moving his hand to the butt of the special-issue weapon, strapped to his waist. “I’m doing it.”
The heat coiling her wrist intensified, but still Laura gave it scant notice. Mesmerized, she watched the man stagger toward them.
“Well, if it ain’t the two-bit rancher. Whatcha doin’ off yer land? Got somebody keepin’ an eye on that gold mine of yers?” he asked, a sneer twisting his lips.
“I should have known. It’s Fancy Frank Finnegan,” Jake murmured, his slitted eyes glued to the other man as he approached Jake’s horse.
“I know thar’s gold on your land and I aim to find it. So ya better not sleep, Wilder, ol’ boy.”
“Really?” Jake drawled cynically, keeping his gaze steady on Frank’s gun hand. “Well, I’m gonna tell you only once. Stay off my land, because if I catch you on it, you won’t live to tell about it.”
Frank’s hand moved toward his pistol, and Jake said, “Hold on,” then yelled, “Ya-hah,” and slapped the reins against the horse’s rump.
The horse leapt forward, and in the same instant, searing blue heat emanated from the turquoise stone in Laura’s bracelet and shot out in a crackling, radiating arc at Fancy Frank. With a startled cry, he backpedaled in the dirt street in a frantic attempt to get out of the way of both the animal and the whip-like tongue of sizzling turquoise fire.
Jake kept the horse at a gallop all the way back to the ranch. Hanging on for dear life, her heart thumping in time with the horse’s hooves, Laura was immune to the bouncing ride.
“Goddamn!” Jake turned to stare at her the minute he brought the horse to a shuddering stop in front of the house. “What in hell happened back there?”
Shaking, Laura gasped for breath before trying to answer. “I don’t know,” she finally managed to reply, and raised her arm to stare in fascinated amazement at the bracelet. “The Indian told me this would protect me, but—”
“I thought you said the Cherokee wasn’t a person, but a wheeled vehicle.”
“Not the Cherokee,” she said, shaking her head. “That is a vehicle. But on my way here there was an Indian with a stand by the side of the road selling hand-crafted jewelry. I bought this bracelet from him. He said it possessed magical powers. I—I didn’t believe him.”
“And now you do?” Skepticism laced his voice and stamped his face.
“I...” She shifted a quick glance from him to the bracelet then back to him. She swallowed, then blurted out, “I don’t know. After what happened back in town, and two weeks ago, after I fell into that hole, I—I just don’t know what to believe.”
“Wait a minute.” He held up his hand. “What do you mean?”
She frowned. “I don’t know how to explain it. It was so strange.” She ran a hand around the back of her neck; it came away wet with sweat, “Look, could we go inside, out of this heat? I need a drink.”
“Yeah, sure. You go on in,” he said, dismounting then turning to help her. “And sit down before you fall down again. I’ll be in as soon as I take care of the horse.”
Laura was seated dejectedly at the kitchen table, staring fixedly at the bracelet, when Jake entered through the back door.
“Is it possible, Jake?” she asked in a tremulous whisper. “I mean, what that Indian said about the bracelet having magical powers? Could something like that really be possible?”
“I don’t know, and right now I don’t much care,” Jake said in a hard-edged voice. “What I want to know is what you were doing in Sage Flats, and what you and Frank were cooking up together.”
“Cooking up?” Laura blinked. “What are you talking about?”
“You know damned well,” he shot back. “Were you giving him directions to the mine entrance?”
“No!” she cried. “I couldn’t have even if I wanted to. I don’t know where it is.” She paused, taking a shuddering breath, then rushed on. “Jake, will you think! You saw the situation when you arrived. I was terrified of that man. Besides, if I was in league with Frank, wouldn’t the bracelet have zapped you instead of him?”
“Well. . .” Jake frowned and stared into her eyes. He sighed. “I suppose so. But that doesn’t explain what you were doing there.”
Laura inhaled deeply. “I went looking for my Jeep so I could go home. But it wasn’t there. It’s disappeared.”
He gave her a searching, wary look. “Are you really who you say you are?”
“Yes, Jake,” Laura answered wearily. “I really am. Do you believe me now?”
‘‘Don’t know yet,” he muttered, turning toward the sink. “I just don’t know what to think anymore.”
She trembled, and gratefully accepted the cup of water he got her from the tap. Though it quenched her thirst, it was ineffective against the chill permeating her overheated body. She began to shake in delayed reaction to the recent shocks to her system: her tumble into the hole; her subsequent rescue and surprise at the primitive house; the sexually and emotionally tense, altogether wonderful two weeks she’d spent with Jake; and then the ultimate shock of the town and that crude bully, or gunslinger, or whatever that awful man was.
“Laura?” Jake came around the table to stand beside her. Bending, he stared into her face with concern-filled eyes. “You’re as white as a ghost. What’s wrong?”
“I’m scared,” she whispered. Panic curled through her, bringing a wail from the depths of her being. “I don’t belong here. I’m a botanist, not a pioneer! What am I going to do?”
He pulled her from her seat and into his arms. He stroked her back in a gesture meant to calm her, but it only intensified her shivers.
She raised her head from his chest to peek up at him. “Do you enjoy holding me like this?” she asked, really needing no answer, for she could feel the bulge pressing against her lower abdomen.
“Yes,” he said, meeting her wide-eyed gaze with an expression of heavy-lidded desire. “Unless you tell me no and push me away right now, I’m going to kiss you, Laura.”
She chose not to heed his warning. Instead, filled with her own desire, she boldly parted her lips in blatant and hungry invitation.
Slowly, enticingly, he lowered his head to touch his hard male lips to her soft female ones.
Never before had she felt anything quite like the riot of feelings exploding inside her. She wanted, needed, ached for... Jake. She made a moan of protest when he lifted his mouth to look down at her.
“Sparks?” he asked in a tone laden with hope.
“No,” She shook her head.
“No?” His frown was fierce.
“A raging inferno,” she confessed, parting her lips to be consumed once more.
A growl of satisfaction rumbling deep in his throat Jake lowered his mouth.
Clinging to him, returning his ardor in equal measure, she purred acceptance when he swept her off her feet and carried her into the front room, to the bed. Then, feverish with a raging desire she would not have previously believed herself capable of, she reciprocated in kind when he began to remove her clothes.
Her senses on fire, fanned by flames of need, she caressed his muscle-ridged body as he lifted her onto the narrow bed and eagerly parted her legs.
Not once did she give thought to the wantonness of her response to him, or to the fact that he was still a stranger. Entering her, possessing her, Jake didn’t feel like a stranger to her, he felt like a part of her, an integral part that had been missing all her life.
As his gliding hands learned all her curves, and his lips fed greedily on the tightening
crests of her breasts, she forgot all her fears and concerns about being in the wrong time. For the moment, time stood still, as she explored the. hard angles and hair-roughened “textures of Jake’s body.
And all the while, Jake thrust into her, igniting within her a fiery tension that grew steadily until it snapped, flinging her into a world that knew no time at all.
Chapter 8
The desert’s cool night air drifted through the window and feathered Laura’s exposed back, waking her. She curled into Jake’s warmth,
“Cold?” He drew her closer.
“Ummm.” She nodded and rubbed her cheek against his chest.
“We’re lying on top of the blanket,” he said, reminding her of their avid rush to make love.
“I know.”
“Are you sorry?” A hint of worry shaded his tone.
“Sorry? For what, lying on top of the blanket?”
“For what we did ... on top of the blanket.”
“No.” She craned her neck to look at him. “Are you?”
He smiled; and though it was all the answer she needed, he replied anyway, if wickedly. “I’d be happy to play stallion any time and keep you warm by covering you with my body.”
His teasing renewed her desire, and reminded her of something Fancy Frank had said.
“Jake, are you what that dreadful man called you, a two-bit horse rancher?”
“For now, yes,” he answered, obviously not bothered by the question.
“For now? I don’t understand.”
His smile held equal parts shrewdness and loving concern for her.
“For the present, it suits my purposes to let that no-account bunch in town believe I’m nothing more than a flat-busted, down-at-the-heel horse rancher.”
“But you’re not?”
“Well, I’m not exactly rich.” He smiled at her. “But the little money I have I keep in a bank in Virginia City, away from the prying, avaricious eyes of the local crook who calls himself a banker. And, while I’m waiting, I keep tending my small herd of horses, trying to make a go at ranching.”
Laura pushed herself up onto her elbow to look at him. “Waiting for what?”
“For the inferior-grade gold to peter out in those half-assed mines they’re working.” He sneered. “When they leave off drinking long enough to work.”
“But I don’t understand,” she said, her brow wrinkling. “What happens when the gold does run out?”
“Why, honey, those scum-of-the-earth claim jumpers will clear out in search of better pickin’s, and Sage Flats will become the ghost town you said it will.”
“Jake, really.” She rose to a sitting position, just so she could glare down at him. “I don’t care what happens to them, or to that ugly town. I was asking what will happen to you when the gold runs out”
His smile grew blatantly smug. “I’m gonna be a very rich man, because there’s gold in my mine, and it won’t peter out for a good, long time. I’m just waitin’ for them to go before I start mining it.”
Her eyes grew wide. “There really is gold in that hole in the ground I fell into?”
He nodded. “A wide, deep vein of almost pure, high-grade gold. And that mine is on my land.”
“Geez!”
“Yeah. And now I think we should get dressed.” He sat up beside her. “I don’t know about you, but I’m hungry enough to eat one of my own horses.” He grinned, rising from the bed.
As he dressed, Laura felt a grumbling in her stomach. She could eat two horses, she thought as she got up and pulled on her clothes.
* * * *
While she and Jake were clearing away the supper dishes, they discussed Jake’s plans to eventually begin his own mining operations. But Laura couldn’t help remembering that nowhere in her historical guide had there been so much as a passing mention of a rich vein of gold being discovered, let alone mined, anywhere near Sage Flats.
Which suggested that Jake never did get to mine the gold on his land, and the reason was Fancy Frank.
Jake’s life was in danger. He would die before the town did.
“No!” she cried.
“No, what?” Jake asked, turning from the sink to frown at her.
“Er ... No, you don’t have to wash the dishes,” she said, pulling herself together. “I’ll do that. I’m sure you must have some chores to see to outside.”
“Sure,” he said. “But I don’t mind washing up.”
“No, you go on.” She made a shooing motion with her hand while nudging him away from the sink with a sideways swinging of her hips.
When he had finally left, Laura’s mind raced. She frantically searched for a way to prevent Jake’s death. But all she concluded was that panic was not conducive to clear thinking.
And time was of the essence; she felt it in every cell of her body. The very air around her seemed to vibrate with approaching danger.
She longed to go home to the more familiar dangers of the twenty first century. And she wanted to take Jake with her.
Now, she mused, making short shrift of the dishes, all she had to do was figure out a way to get herself and Jake out of there, before danger descended upon them.
* * * *
Just past dawn, Laura came awake to the sound of a taunting call, and the certainty that time had run out for her and Jake.
“Hey, Wilder,” Fancy Frank called from somewhere beyond the side of the house. “Come on out with yer hands up and bring that gal with ya. You’re gonna show me where that mine is or I’m gonna burn ya out.” His laughter rang harsh and nasty on the morning air. “If ya don’t give me no trouble, I might just let ya live to watch me have some fun with yer pretty piece,”
The bedsprings squeaked as Jake rolled off the edge. “Go to hell, Finnegan!” he shouted, stepping into his pants. “Laura, are you awake?”
“Yes,” she answered, scrambling off the bed to stand trembling and uncertain beside him.
“Get dressed and get your things together. I want you ready when I return.”
“Return?” She grabbed his arm, “Where are you going?”
“To get our horses. We won’t escape on foot.” Jake didn’t pause in stuffing his shirt into his pants.
She shuddered, and not just at his words. He was strapping on his gunbelt.
“What are you going to do with that?”
He flashed her a determined look. “Defend us, if I have to. Now get ready, I’m going for the horses.” He strode out of the room. In another second she heard the outside kitchen door open and close.
Laura stood immobile for a moment, frozen with fear for his safety. Then another jeering call came from outside.
“Hey, Wilder, git yer and that gal’s pretty rump movin’, or you’re gonna fry.”
Laura hurriedly got dressed. Slinging the backpack over her shoulder, she grabbed the Peacemaker then ran for the back door. Flinging it open, she ran toward the lean-to and nearly collided with Jake and the horses.
“Are you all right? Think you can ride?” he demanded.
Breathless, she nodded and took her horse’s reins from him.
“Okay,” he said shortly. “Let’s move. We’ve got to ride hard and fast to get the jump on him.”
“I understand,” she said, mounting with his assistance.
At Jake’s signal, she snapped the reins and followed him as they galloped away from the back of the ranch house.
They had not been riding long when Laura turned to glance behind them and saw a cloud of dust rising in the distance. “He’s coming, Jake!” she screamed above the thundering of the horses’ hooves.
Jake didn’t answer, but urged his horse on to even greater speed. Then, to Laura’s amazement, he pulled back on the reins, bringing the animal to a shuddering halt. She followed suit.
“Jake, what—”
“Don’t ask questions.” He dismounted and helped her off her horse. “Run for that pile of brush over there, and take another tumble into that hole in the ground.”
&
nbsp; “But…”
“Dammit, woman, we gotta move!” As he barked the order, Jake slapped both horses on their rumps. The animals took off at a gallop, and grabbing Laura’s hand, Jake dashed for the mine entrance. .
They plowed into the brush, and all at once the earth disappeared under Laura’s feet. She dropped several yards into the hole, landing on her backside on the hard ground. Only this time she wasn’t alone in the dark.
“He’ll... find us,” she said, panting for breath. “We must have made a gaping hole in that brush.”
“Maybe not. Maybe he’ll be too busy following the horses to notice.” But even as he spoke, they heard the unmistakable stomping and whinnying of a horse being brought to a halt.
Without thinking, and grasping his hand, Laura drew Jake into the bright shaft of morning sunlight streaming down through the mine opening.
“Laura...”
“Quiet,” she whispered. “He’s coming. Listen, I can hear... Thank God! It’s working,” she cried, watching wide-eyed as crackling blue light radiated from the bracelet. The light swirled out, coiling around their bodies from head to foot.
“What in hell!” Jake said, jolting back.
The light intensified, then as quickly dissipated and disappeared. When it was gone, neither the sound of a horse nor Fancy Frank’s footfalls disturbed the early-morning peace.
And suddenly Laura knew. Shaking, certain, yet afraid she might be wrong, she turned to Jake.
“Can you get us out of here?” she said with barely suppressed excitement.
“Are you crazy, woman?”
“Jake, listen, do you hear anything?”
“No ... but...”
“Frank and the horse are gone,” she said with more conviction than she actually felt. “I’m sure of it. Now, can you get us out of this damned hole?”
“Yes, of course, but...”
“Please, Jake, don’t argue. Just do it.”
Though he looked doubtful, he turned to walk farther into the mine tunnel. He returned moments later carrying a rough-hewn, rickety-looking wooden ladder. “Damn,” he muttered, “this thing looks as old as hell all of a sudden.” He gave her a wry look. “All you had to do before was explore a little.”
