by Thea Devine
"She never wants to see me again, but that's of no moment. When I tell her my plans, she'll forget about you like a shot."
"Really," Kalida said sardonically. "So what are these famous plans?"
"Deuce has got private detectives out ransacking the county to find evidence of who stole the Santa Linaria bulls —and looking for me, particularly. And the herd. I had to spirit them away before he branded them, you understand."
"Where are they?" she asked curiously. "Where does a fugitive hide five hundred head of cattle?"
"There's a remote little canyon hard by the Crazy Mountains; I got them there, and I've got to get them to Virginia City. So you've got to convince Deuce to call off his men."
"Tell me just how I'm supposed to do that? Ellie's got me locked up and Deuce feels like killing me on sight."
"No, honey, he won't. He loves you, Kalida."
"He loves being King of Sweetland."
"Yes, well, that he is. I'll take care of Ellie. All I want is the chance to drive the herd down to Virginia City— with Ellie, mind you; there's a buyer. Arid we'll take the money and live off the proceeds. We'll never come back to Montana again, I promise you. I have had quite enough of this godforsaken place. And I know you love it. And you love Deuce. Now, Kalida, consider. We'll 'arrange' an escape for you, and you get back to Sweetland. Tell him
Ellie kept you against your will. . . ."
"He didn't believe that," Kalida interrupted harshly.
"Tell him / kept you against your will. . . ."
"He'd send a posse out after you."
"Yes. I guess he would. Tell him you escaped. Tell him-"
"I don't know what I would tell him; anything I would say would either betray you or him. How can I do that?"
Her father looked at her meaningfully. His eyes were hard, his face drawn. It was the same face that commanded her obedience about the question of marrying Deuce at the beginning. He wanted it. It was his last chance. He wouldn't beg, but he was commanding her obedience once again. He couldn't do anything to make her obey, but she would have to live with her conscience. And who could bear the betrayal better—him or Deuce?
She turned away from him. She didn't know him any more. But she did not want him to spend his remaining years in jail. The more she thought about it, the more it seemed he was taking his own punishment on himself if he meant to include Ellie in his plans. They deserved each other. She would make his life a living hell.
All she cared about was escape; the rest could take care of itself.
"All right, Papa," she said. "I'll do what you want."
Joe Slim's news wasn't any too good either. He saw Deuce riding up slowly into the valley that separated the Ryiand rangeland from Sweetland, and he shivered with apprehension. Deuce had been a bastard lately, and he wsSflt too happy to be the bearer of bad tidings. But it was his job. He was foreman now; he directed the operation. He had chosen which men to station at the Godown pasture. He was responsible.
But as Deuce drew abreast of him, he could see he had
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already divined what Joe wanted to say. His face was set in a way Joe didn't like, with new hard lines etching either side of his mouth. "They got another one." It was a statement, and Joe nodded.
"Damn hell, I just can't figure out who the hell is going around thieving one or two bulls at a time like this. And how the hell did they find Godown anyway?"
"Don't know," Joe said, shaking his head. "I'd of sworn we had them boxed in as sweet as a railroad car."
"One of our men is passing information somewhere," Deuce snarled. "Damn him, whoever he is, when I get my hands on him. We're down ten percent because of this. I'm losing money, and I have to adjust the syndicate payout because of it, damn it; blast it. Joe, you've got to get a line on who's giving out information. The men last night, you handpicked them. You question them. You find out something."
Joe nodded. He didn't like the way Deuce was looking at him. He didn't like anything that was going on around Sweetland these days.
Neither did Deuce; as he slowly moved away from Joe to check up at Morgan field, he was feeling as if he didn't give a shit about any of it. And he knew what it was. Goddamned Kalida, in his mind, and in his blood, and he couldn't stop thinking about her inert body under his the night before.
To be in love with a bitching whore like that; he marveled at how she had duped him. Ardelle had never liked her. But his aunt had said, and he had seen it, that she was willing to make the effort to welcome her and teach her how to run Sweetland. And Ardelle had detailed very graphically all of Kalida's hoydenish little tricks she had played during her stay. Ardelle just washed her hands of Kalida Ryland.
"Blood tells," Ardelle had said to him. "Look at who her father is—the biggest huckster you'll ever want to
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meet. You're well rid of her."
He wished he felt that way. He wished his groin didn't tighten whenever he thought of her gorgeous response to him, her beautiful wanton body, her hands that had just been learning to please him ... Or did she know that already and had she just been pretending?
He just couldn't convince himself that she had been
pretending. She had been a virgin when she came to
Sweetland after the fire. He had shown her what her body
was meant for. He had been the first to elicit those
glittering spasms from her. God, and he remembered
, every last one of those sumptuous culminations. She was
I a sensual animal. Born for him. Meant for him. And he
had determined this so long ago that it was in his blood
and impossible to exorcise.
He still wanted her.
He pushed his mount slowly over the ragged back fields of the Ryland ranch, the pasture that Hal Ryland had never developed because it was becoming increasingly clear that he had never intended to ranch a minute longer than he had to. Deuce knew, in spite of her father and whatever she might or might not have done with Jake and at Ellie Dean's, that he still wanted her. It was unimaginable that she would not be a part of his life when he had wanted that for so long. And yet . . .
That was why he had paid Ellie so much money—to keep her safe for one more night, and perhaps another until he could figure out how to save her. Ellie knew he would come after her if she abrogated her promise. She knew it. There was no possible way she could mistake his feelings last night.
I
He didn't rest any easier because of it. Kalida didn't want his help now, and he was further hampered by this new wrinkle of another theft, just when he thought the Linaria were safe for this season. 393
He rambled through Morgan field, barely aware of anything that was going on, and then back to the house. He hated the summer, as it didn't impose any work. The summer just entailed caretaking.
And then there was Prestina with her reproachful eyes, ever since he had forced Kalida to leave. It was obvious she did not agree with Ardelle's assessment. But Prestina was a romantic. And it wasn't his family that had engendered that in her, unless it was Camilla's seemingly successful marriage that she looked to, rather than his parents'. He supposed that he was a romantic too, that he wanted to believe there was someone who could share the rigors of ranch life and build a dynasty and not fall to pieces in the process. He had thought that woman was Kalida.
He knew that woman was Kalida.
There was no changing that: She was what she was, what he had always perceived in her, the perfect complement to himself, the exact opposite of his fluttery sickly mother and the pampered, self-centered Camilla, who now lived on some great estate on the moors in England.
Kalida was of the earth, as dazzling as the sky, as hot as the sun. God and God again, he had to get her back to Sweetland somehow.
Her father's plan was simple and rather ironic, Kalida thought. He was going to occupy Ellie's attention and Kalida was going to break the window and escap
e. He would approach Ellie as late at night as possible, and Kalida was to have no doubt of his ability to charm Ellie and make her listen to him. So therefore, he would knock twice on her door at about eleven-thirty, and she should prepare then to make her escape.
"Why don't you just give me some money and let me walk out the door?" she asked him caustically.
He looked horrified. "Ellie can't have an inkling that I've even spoken to you or seen you. And she's got someone guarding the whole house. And I don't have any money to give you. So you'll have to do it this way, Kalida. And that's the only time when the street is fairly noisy because of the saloon across the way, and the noise you make won't be all that obvious."
"What if I kill myself on the drop?" she said, curious as to what his response would be.
He waved her question away. "You wouldn't let me down," he said with a downright surety that made her want to smack him. "It's all up to you, Kalida." He smiled at her brightly, his eyes as innocent as the blue sky, confident now of her cooperation.
And so now she waited for the signal at the door. The hours crept by at an alarmingly sluggish pace.
She figured her father had left her about eight o'clock, but where he was concealing himself was anyone's guess. He would wait until Lorena and Charlotte were suitably occupied, and then he would creep back up to her room, knock on the door, and then accost Ellie and make his peace with her.
It was almost funny; he wanted her to do what Deuce had thought she had done for him. She choked back a strangled laugh. The whole damned situation was too damned amusing for words. She whirled as she heard a hard rapping at her door. And waited. The signal!
They had even planned what she would use to crack the window — the leg of a chair. And she was to take her time. If «h* hurried, she would lose her nerve and spoil everything.
Not likely, she thought, her mind clearing miraculously and a cool, calm purpose descending over her. Not likely in the least. She would foil the lot of them. She would get
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away on her own terms, and her father and Ellie could go ( hang.
She picked up the chair—a small wooden side chair j that had been pushed next to the bureau —and walked to | the window.
It was very dark outside; she would punch the legs of that chair right into the darkness. Fitting, she thought, and swing the chair dead center into the window pane.
The glass shattered instantly, but not with the loud impact she had been expecting; the screening muffled it and the shards fell against the screen. Carefully and slowly she picked them away one at a time, removing the last little piece from the window frame as well.
And then she stood still and listened.
Nothing.
She picked up one of the larger shards of glass and pushed it against the screen. Nothing happened. The screen was a fine wire mesh; glass wouldn't cut it. Her hopes sank. What would?
The chair! She could push the chair legs against the framing, probably enough to loosen it. Her desperation lent her an uncommon strength as she lifted the chair again and poised its legs against the screen frame. With a tremendous trust, she heaved the legs against the wood. And again, and again.
Nothing moved. And again. And again. A creak. Another shove. She couldn't lose her control now. She had to take it slow. Slower. It was going to work. It was working. Another push. And another. It was giving. The frame was giving, she felt it loosening, the nails pulling from the window casement. Good, good, slowly now, with patience. Assume no one was watching, that no one had heard the noise.
Assume her father was pleading with Ellie and that she was so intent on making him pay for his perfidy she wasn't even thinking about what Kalida Ryland might be
doing. Slowly now . . .
She put all her strength behind this last push, and with an aching creak, the screen angled out from the window and fell, with a resounding little crash, onto the ground below.
Her heart was pounding like a drum, her hands shaking violently. She closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. The way was clear. Almost. She put her hands on the windowsill and looked down. A ten-foot drop.
Her father was insane to think she could just jump out. She needed . . . what? Don't panic, she told herself. Sheets. She could tie the sheets, slide down the sheets. Wouldn't someone notice a woman dangling from a sheet out of Ellie's house in the middle of the night? She was getting hysterical. Her nerveness fingers grabbed at the sheets and covers. Not much to work with. A couple of pillow cases, two sheets, a thick quilted cover . . .
She knotted the pillow cases together and tied them to the foot of the bed closest to the window, and then the two sheets to the pillow cases. Good, she told herself, her nervousness escalating by the second; now move the bed to the window. God, it was heavy. What if she strained herself pushing it? What a fitting ending to her father's schemes! The bedframe moved, grudgingly, as if it were trying to prevent her from taking the last precarious step, and she managed, with some difficulty, to jam it up right against
the window.
The next thing ... the next thing . . . She threw the rope sheet out the window. It looked dazzling white to her ir tie darkness. Darkness . . . darkness . . .
She whirled and doused the gaslight, and then ran back & the window. The sheet dangled, looking impossibly fragile. It could never support her weight, she thought frantically. Time suddenly was speeding by. She had no
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idea how much time she had spent in these machinations. She only knew that now —or never—she had to climb over the windowsill and hope that the length of two thin sheets would bear the bulk of her body long enough for her to attain a height from which she could, with some safety, jump to the ground.
The other alternative was unthinkable. And time was passing. She jerked hard on the sheet and it pulled firmly against the bed. Now or never. She climbed onto the sill and looked down. And turned her back. She couldn't look, and she had to thrust the strength of the muscles in her arms —pathetic arms at best, she thought wryly, grasping the sheet and swinging herself out of the window.
There was nothing to grasp onto, and she felt like she was falling into thin air. And then her hands pulled and grasped desperately, involuntarily, and the headlong slide of her body stopped abruptly, and she dangled crazily over the ground for the space of time it took to gather her addled wits together.
She was out, successfully; she hadn't fallen. She had only to get down those few more feet and then she could drop down —and run. It seemed to her that her hands acted independently of her body. Her hands knew to release their clawing hold just that little bit, experimenting, so that her body dropped downward again, sicken-ingly but with some control. She thought her heart would beat right out of her chest. She thought she would hang there forever. And then her hands let go again and she slid downward; they grasped, she stopped, they released the sheet again, she dropped; they grabbed the sheet again, and then she heard an appalling little sound —a tear, as her weight pulled the much-laundered fabric to its limit.
She let go and dropped, falling with a nauseating thud onto dirt, feeling as though every bone in her body had
been jolted out of place and the breath knocked out of
her. , .
She looked up. The sheet still dangled, looking ghostly
white and ominous.
She couldn't stay there. Painfully, she got herself to her feet, limped around the corner of the house, and began to run.
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Chapter Nineteen
She never quite remembered what happened next. She thought maybe, somewhere in the shelter of a woodshed or a barn, she might have passed out. Or fallen asleep from the sheer exhaustion of executing her escape and her fraught nerves. She woke up very early in the morning, when it was gray and dank outside, and she was cold. She thought the cold had awakened her, as well as her overwhelming hunger.
The light wa
s just enough for her to take stock of herself and determine she did not exactly look presentable. Her shirt was dusty and torn on one shoulder, her skirt was covered with dirt, her inky hair was a wild tangle of knots, and she knew her face must be smudged and scraped. Altogether an unprepossessing picture who couldn't hope to cajole anyone out of anything.
She hadn't the faintest idea what she was going to do next. Presumably her father had made Ellie reasonably happy this night. Perhaps Ellie hadn't yet discovered that she had escaped.
She felt so weary and trapped. It seemed as though one way out led to a different pitfall, a different direction she had to go in order to untangle herself, and that proved to be just another snare.
What to do? Where to go?
She wondered if it wouldn't be a bad idea to do what her father expected. She could return to Sweetland, and she could ... try to entice Deuce so that her father could make good his escape. Throw herself on his mercy, rather.
The sardonic idea appealed to her. After all, what could he do to her other than throw her off Sweetland once again?
Could she take that?
Supposing he actually listened to her.
Oh really, and when had he done that before? He wouldn't believe her.
She felt like the wind had been taken out of her. She watched the sun come up, and her stomach growled. At the very least, Prestina would feed her, she thought. She'd have to get there somehow. A horse. A wagon. Something. She might faint before she did. It really seemed like the only thing she could do.
She got painfully to her feet and began walking.
Ardelle was sitting on the porch, feeling extremely pleased with herself. Everything was fine. Deuce was in the fields; Kalida and that whore Ellie Dean were long gone. Everything seemed ordered exactly as she liked it. She was her own mistress, with no uppity bitches with plans to take her place at Sweetland. She was in control, and there was no one to poke a nose into her business.
