by Thea Devine
Ardelle nodded, complimenting her deduction. "The very reason for the whole thing. Every other hit was a blind, designed to draw attention away from the piecemeal decimation of the herd. I wanted a good stock of bulls, and that was all. They're worth a fortune, you know, and with the other stock, I can breed my own now. So you see ..."
Oh yes, Kalida saw. Who would suspect infirm Ardelle? Who would suspect a woman? Who would even conceive of her having ambitions in that direction? But why?
"I don't see," Kalida prompted. "Why?" "Why? Why? Don't you know the years I spent caring for my brother. And do you know what he left me in the end? The wherewithal to be his son's pensioner in my old age. He gave me nothing but a place at Sweetland should I wish to have it — not a share, not a piece, not money, not a life. Just a bed in a room in his son's house. And I wouldn't take charity from Deuce, Kalida. I rather suspect you wouldn't either, were you in the same position. But I wanted to do something; I wanted revenge, and I wanted independence.
"And just at that time, Deuce begart experimenting with crossbreeding, the result of which were the Linaria. And I thought if I could siphon off some of the growing herd, a little at a time, I could build a future for myself away from Sweetland. "So I had a convenient little accident —yes, I see by
your face you are acquainted with that kind of ploy, eh Kalida—and I pretended to willingly stay and take care of the house, and when Jake came, we discovered we had similar interests and we went into a partnership.
"It was he who suggested that we begin raiding surrounding ranches periodically to draw attention away from the Linaria thefts and to build our herd. It was brilliant, just brilliant. No one could catch us because we always knew when the stockmen's patrol was riding.
"And then Deuce decided he was going to give your father a share in the syndicate in order to get you. Well, I knew what you were like, Kalida. You're not a homebody. You'd be out in the cow chips every day; you'd be in the account books and the tally books, the breeding books. You would eventually have found irregularities. You would have seen me without my cane or riding, as you did the day of the calf drive, and Deuce would then tell you I never ride because of my injury, except in dire emergencies. . . . Well, the odds were against my getting away with anything else while you were in the house.
"And Deuce would-^iave you. About as much as you pretended not to want him. Really, Kalida. But even that would not have been enough to stop him, you see. And actually, it might have been amusing to keep watching us work at cross-purposes, Kalida, but I needed to convince him that you weren't worthy—and quickly. I needed something that would destroy his trust in you. So I suggested to Jake that perhaps there might be a situation or a time he could put you in a compromising position in Deuce's eyes. He said he would be happy to. I didn't know how happy—then. And it worked beautifully. How fortunate for me that over and above that, your father had the good sense to steal his cattle back. A stroke of genius, Kalida. I really commend him for that. Especially because it cemented Deuce's feeling of distrust for you."
"I'll tell him," Kalida murmured cuttingly. This was so
412
413
incredible. "If only you'd just left things alone . . ." she started to say.
"Really, Kalida, how could I take the chance?"
"How many of Deuce's men were in on this?" Kalida asked curiously.
"Four others," Ardelle said airily, as if this were nothing. "And now you know everything. Do you feel the better for it? Or do you feel threatened by it? You see what I meant about your unholy curiosity, Kalida. Something would have piqued it, and you would have been after me like a hound. I promise you, I read the situation correctly, and there was only one thing for me to do. And now it's all worked out perfectly, because Jake got to you before Deuce could. And now / have the power to make you go away forever."
The import of her words struck Kalida like a blow. Ardelle had just pronounced her death sentence in the most conversational tone possible.
Chapter Twenty
It all came down to power, Kalida thought wearily, who had control over whom. And right now it was Jake who had the power over her, and she had no idea what he intended. Ardelle had gone in order to waylay Deuce and calm his suspicions. Everything seemed to be working against her, particularly the gleam in Jake's eye. Jake liked seeing her like tln%. Jake seemed to feel this gave him some kind of edge over her, that her helplessness would make her correspondingly weak. Jake didn't know her at all.
But she watched him warily as he paced the room, his bulk and his shadow on the wall making him seem suddenly larger than life. He carried his rifle almost as though it were an extension of his arm. There was an edginess about him; he couldn't quite make up his mind what to do about her. He didn't want to kill her, she perceived. Yet. He wanted something else from her—the something she had promised to give him on the riverbank thai afternoon that now seemed years ago.
Yes, his eyes glittered with that speculative light that vas so dangerous. She couldn't play with him this time, and she had no idea what his demands would be.
But he must be thinking, she reasoned, that he could
414
415
force her to do whatever he wanted. Her gorge rose at the thought, but to defy him, though that was her first instinct, might be the worst mistake she could make. She couldn't let herself panic. Nor could she try to talk him out of anything. Her only weapon was him—to use him and what he wanted to her own ends. If only she had an inkling . . .
Or maybe she did. The way he looked at her with that cunning, supercilious little sneer ... He still remembered the afternoon by the stream. He still thought she was a tease who liked to show off her body.
"What are you going to do with me?" she said finally in as neutral a tone as possible.
"Play with you, of course," Jake said lightly, sneeringly, meaningfully to her. Her heart plummeted; she had surmised his state of mind correctly. She gathered her wits. She had to get away from him, although trussed up as she was now, the idea of that seemed ludicrous. Although she thought her feet might be possible. Jake had tied the boots, with one loop around her calves, and she could move her feet. But she could not get purchase against anything solid to pull. Yet. The crates around the table might do, would have to do since the table had no stretcher. If she could get on her feet. . . .
"What can you mean by that?" she asked archly, her mind a fury of possibilities.
"We haven't nearly finished what we began," Jake said slowly, painstakingly. He wanted to make sure she was in no doubt what he wanted. He had the night to fulfill his desire. Tomorrow . . . Ardelle would come early, and tomorrow he could begin his future.
"You have the gun," she said flatly.
"Oh, but Kalida, I'm sure I don't need to coerce you. If you were honest about it, you would admit that day on roundup you were just aching to do what I made you do by the stream."
"But now," Kalida interrupted with a goading sweetness in her voice, "you don't have to make me do anything. You can do it yourself."
He looked at her strangely, as if this permutation had never occurred to him. Like he was turning it over in his mind and picturing it, and what it might make him feel. And then he shook his head. "No, no, that wouldn't be the same."
"But my hands are tied," she said plaintively, with a dawning hope, awed-by the fact that her cooperation was really and truly what he wanted. She supposed she could have thought of worse things to do to save her life than undressing before this unprincipled thief who looked like he was salivating at the thought. But his eyes scared her. His eyes told her he took all of this very seriously. Too seriously for her own comfort, her own safety. He had not hinted before, or now, of wanting anything of a sexual nature from her. But that didn't mean . . . She shuddered at ^he thought. Whatever it meant, she couldn't see herself going that far. She would goad him into shooting her first. She would.
"Yes," he repeated thoughtfully. "Your hands are
tied."
"And you have the gun," she added helpfully, hoping that would convince him to release her hands. She never would have believed how impotent a person could feel without the use of his hands. She prayed he would untie her hands, as her lightning cobalt gaze swept the room surreptitiously, seeking something she could use as a weapon if her hands were free. The coffee pot! The still-simmering hot coffee pot.
Jake got up from the bunk and came to squat down beside her. He rested the rifle on his knees as he reached forward to lift her chin so he could look into her deliberately bland cobalt gaze. His own eyes took on a menacing glare, and he shook his head again. "No, I'm not going to untie you, Kalida. I just will have to forgo the delights of
416
417
watching you expose your body." His tone of voice was adamant; she hadn't deceived him for one moment. His and Ardelle's plans were more important than his desire to see her fulfill his daydreams.
She felt frantic as he levered himself upward and turned back to the bunk. Almost involuntarily her feet jutted out to trip him, and he fell with a curse and a violent thud.
And then he didn't move.
Oh my God, Kalida thought, her eyes widening. Awkwardly, she shifted her body forward to get a better look at him. He had hit his head on one of the crates; there was blood on his forehead and he lay supernaturally still.
Oh my God. He could regain consciousness at any minute, she thought frantically, trying to decide what to do next. Her legs! She wriggled and snaked her body sideways so she could avoid him and come closer to one of the crates. Then she lay down on the floor, with her fear-glazed eyes still riveted on Jake, and lifted her tied legs onto the crate, moving her body forward until her boots were dangling over the edge. She manuevered the crate against her bottom, bent her knees, and aligned the edge of herboots against the edge of the crate. And then she flexed her knees so that the rim of the crate pushed her boots forward and she could slide her feet —with no little difficulty — out of them.
The rope around her calves tangled around her feet, and she kicked at it impatiently until it finally shimmied off.
Jake lay still, his blood staining his shirt and flowing onto the dirt floor, which hungrily absorbed it.
She couldn't believe he was still out cold. She had to get calm. She had only accomplished the first step in escaping. The next was to find something to cut the rope from her hands. It was too much to hope there might be a knife in the cupboard, she thought wryly, as she tried, backward, to open the doors and search it.
Jake stirred.
Panic overwhelmed her, and she froze, paralyzed by the inadequacy of dealing with him with no hands. Her frantic eyes lit on the coffee pot again, and she edged over to it, turning around so that her hands could get a grasp on the handle, which was uncomfortably hot. She took it and walked sideways around Jake's body, which was starting to stretch its way out of the cramped position in which he had fallen. He mumbled her name and lifted his head weakly.
Kalida took a deep breath and knelt down next to his head so that her body was side by side with his, and her hands holding the coffee pot were above his head.
"Kalida? . . ." His voice was hoarse, groggy. For fully one long second she had a guilty feeling of sympathy for him. And then her body twisted and she rammed the coffee pot against his head.
And dropped it, looking away as she saw his limbs go limp.
Her heart was pounding wildly and she couldn't calm herself down. He could have grabbed her and subdued her just then if he had had just an ounce more strength. He could have killed her if he had been angry enough.
Had she killed him?
She turned to look at him finally and was sickened by what she had done. Cofjfee stained his shirt and hair and dripped down from his collar. His face was scalded from the heat of the pot, and a bluish lump had already developed on his forehead.
She didn't know if he .were dead or alive.
She had to get out of there. Slowly she got off her kn^ca, and then back down on them. Jake might have a knife. Jake might . . . She recoiled at the thought of truching him, but she had to. She had to do it backward, too, by feel, rummaging through his pockets, her hands spastically groping to feel an edge of hard metal.
418
419
And nothing.
She collapsed wearily against the table. She was almost ready to give up. She could lie there until daylight, and then get out and start walking. That was one easy solution. But Ardelle could be gone by then. Ardelle would have won. She would thwart Ardelle, she thought, or die in the attempt. The resolution gave her strength and she climbed onto her feet, searching the shack once again for something sharp — something dull even, she didn't care —just something she could use to work against the rope that tied her hands.
It seemed hopeless.
And then a burnished gleam caught her eye in the corner by the cupboard. She scrambled onto the floor and began digging frantically in the dirt, her back bent at an injurious angle and her thigh muscles screaming at the unjust pressure of her whole body weight pulling on them.
"Damn!" she screamed, as her fingers found what she surmised was there—an empty tin that Jake, or some long-ago range rider, had buried there instead of in a refuse pile outside the house. Maybe it had been snowing or . . . Who cared? Her frenzied fingers ripped off the circular top as she shifted to her knees and began turning it to feel the sharpness of the edge and position it at exactly the right angle.
And she cut herself. She felt it, and she ignored it. Damn her wrists that didn't bend inward far enough. She could only use her thumb and forefinger, not nearly enough grasp to be efficient, but all she could do. She might be at this all night, she thought hysterically. She might cut her wrists and bleed to death.
Oh no, she wasn't going to die this night, she resolved,
working steadily «vay at the rope with the sharp-edged
circle of tin. *
But after a while it seemed like hours had passed, and
then it could have been days in her mind as time began to blur and she felt the rope fraying strand by strand, and her hand cramping strand by strand. She switched to the other hand, which was weaker and therefore less efficient—and slower—and she sliced that rope apart, strand by strand, until she felt her hands would fall off, and then suddenly, thankfully, she could wriggle her numbed hands free, dropping the tin in the dirt next to Jake's inert body. She grabbed her boots and slid into them, snatching up Jake's rifle almost as an afterthought. Then without consciously considering what she was going to do next, she ran for the door and flung it open.
Ardelle was standing there.
Kalida reacted instinctively, with all desire for self-preservation propelling her arms, lifting them with the rifle butt end out, ramming it right into Ardelle's midriff. Watching her go down on the ground as if everything were moving slowly and out of time.
And then suddenly Ardelle's voice broke the silence of the night as Kalida ran for Jake's horse, which was tethered right in front of the shack. "You bloody bitch!" Ardelle screamed, levering herself upright with a huge effort.
Kalida's nerveless fingers unwound the reins from the hitching bar, and she swung onto the horse. The horse disliked the unfamiliar weight, and as she guided him out, he bucked her, almost sending her into the dust. Behind her, she could hear Ardelle making for her own mount, and her urgent hands wrenched on the reins to gain control of the unruly animal.
He reared backward one more time before her commanding thighs pressed him forward. And just in time. Ardelle was right behind her, screaming imprecations into the night.
420
421
Kalida gave the horse its head and let him run. She had no idea where he would go; she only wanted distance between herself and Ardelle. Distance. Crouched low over the horse's neck, hanging onto the rifle and the reins with one desperate grasp. The horse felt her fear. And he was well-rested and eager. He spurted forward like a
racing horse and Kalida let him go.
The hoofbeats on her heels receded, and after a while, she thought they had veered off. She surmised Ardelle might have gone back to the shack to tend to Jake.
But what if she hadn't? What if she were going back to Sweetland?
I've got to get to Sweetland before her, she thought in the same moment. But how? It was dead dark, and only the damned horse knew where he was going. She didn't know. She thought she might look for some landmark, something familiar as a guide back to Deuce. But in the dark every tree, every fence looked the same; every tree look menacing, every shadow looked as if it were alive. Only the horse's motion could save her, and she hung onto him as if her life depended on it.
It did.
Ardelle knew she was free. Ardelle would not rest now until she was dead because Kalida knew all about her.
She was locked in a race with Ardelle to see who could reach Deuce first and convince him of the truth. Her truth. God, how deadly. Who would he believe—assuming she herself could even make it to Sweetland sometime tonight?
Calm yourself. Think! she told herself .harshly. Ardelle had obviously just arrived at the shack when Kalida broke out. That meant she had been riding for at least an hour before to even get there.
Which meant her mount couldn't possibly sustain the pace that Kalida's horse was going.
But she was lost; she was sure the horse was running
422
r
wild. It would take time to ascertain her direction, time to find her way to Sweetland.
No matter where she was, she thought, she ought to keep on going. Just keep on going—away from the Ar-delles of the world, and men like her father, like Jake, like Deuce.
