Jeremiah Macklin frowned as he ripped open the envelope and read the contents, then looked up at Zack. “Tell your employer that I’m not interested.”
Jeb Braden, standing beside Zack on the wooden sidewalk and looking bored up to that point, snapped to attention. “He said to bring you back with us.” Macklin stiffened. “And I said, I’m not interested. You will have to convey my regrets to Mr. Diamond for me, I’m afraid.” Sneering, Braden let his right arm fall to his side, a scant few inches from the butt of his pistol. “And I said, he’s expecting you.”
“That’s too bad.” Macklin paled a little, his beefy face creasing with anger, but stood his ground. His clear gaze shifted between Zack and Braden.
“My services were already retained by another, and I cannot violate my client’s rights or confidentiality.”
“Looky here,” Braden snarled, “maybe you don’t understand something—Mr. Diamond wants to see you first. You can tell him whatever you damn well please, but I ain’t gonna go back without you.” When Braden took a step forward and Macklin took two back, Zack moved between them.
“Leave it alone, Braden.” Surprised, Braden shot him a narrowed glance. “You’re supposed to work for Diamond, Banning.”
“I never agreed to kidnapping, and that’s what it will be if you force him to go with us. Back off.” Jeb Braden had been on edge ever since they’d left the Double D that morning, making caustic comments designed to draw Zack’s anger. So far, he hadn’t been able to get so much as the flicker of an eyelash from him. Until now. Now Braden turned his anger on Zack, moving away from the stunned Macklin a few steps, his posture tense. People on the sidewalk scattered, and a few shop doors slammed shut behind them. Braden rocked back on his heels, hands hovering over the holsters strapped to each thigh.
“You’ve been a rock in my craw since you stepped onto the Double D.
All I heard was how fast you are, how good you are, and the only damn thing I’ve seen you do is break a kid’s arm for callin’ you a half-breed. You don’t seem so hot to me, Banning.”
“Care to test my temperature?” Zack drawled softly, and saw Braden’s eyes thin.
“You callin’ me out, Banning?”
“No. But I won’t walk away if you feel frisky.” He could see Braden thinking, considering his chances. The world had narrowed down to the two of them, everything and everyone else forgotten.
All sounds of wagons and dogs and horses and gawking townsmen faded into a distant, indistinct rumble. Zack waited and watched.
A trickle of sweat slid down Braden’s face, and his mouth tightened. His leather vest hung open, and double gunbelts gleamed dully in reflected light from the hot, dusty street. Zack could almost taste the dust. And Braden’s fear. He wasn’t surprised when Braden’s hand whisked down for his gun.
And he wasn’t surprised when Braden pitched backward from the force of Zack’s bullet, then slid down the wooden storefront to sprawl bonelessly on the sidewalk. The shot still echoed in the air. It had taken only seconds.
Straightening from his half-crouch, Zack punched out the empty shell and replaced it with a bullet from his belt, listening to the pounding of running feet. He knew what to expect. He’d been through this before. As he slid his pistol back into the leather holster, he heard a gun click behind him.
Zack turned slowly to face the sheriff, and was stunned to see Deborah Hamilton only a few yards away. She looked shocked. And terrified. She must have seen the whole thing, and he regretted the loss of his temper. He shouldn’t have let Braden’s needling push him into a showdown, not here in town, anyway. But experience had always taught him that the best way to settle with an enemy was in front of witnesses, and he had acted on that. Now Deborah had seen it.
“Sheriff,” Macklin was saying shakily, “this man acted in self-defense. I saw the whole thing.”
Sheriff Roy Carpenter snarled, “And just who the hell are you?”
“Jeremiah Macklin, attorney at law.” Zack’s gaze snapped back to him. He wasn’t surprised to hear Macklin explain that he had been hired by a local rancher, and just arrived from Abilene. And Zack had a good idea who the local rancher might be when he saw Don Francisco Velazquez standing just behind Deborah. It was beginning to form a pattern.
“Come along, Mister Macklin,” the sheriff said, then held out his hand for Zack’s pistol. “You too, mister. I’m gonna check and see if there are any posters out on you before I let you go free on this one.” Zack slowly slid his pistol from the holster and held it out butt first. As the sheriff motioned for him to walk ahead of him, Zack saw Deborah’s face again, a pale cameo of worry. It made him feel good that she seemed to care.
“Did you see that?” Judith whispered in Deborah’s ear, her fingers digging into her cousin’s arm. “I told you he was little more than a bloodthirsty savage.”
Deborah shook free, irritated by Judith’s remark and still reeling from what she’d seen. Zack, faced by a man intent on killing him. She’d watched from only a few yards away, and had not been able to tear her eyes from the chilling spectacle.
Everything had happened so quickly, almost a blur, though at one point when they had faced each other in tense silence, it had seemed to stretch for hours. She’d heard of gunfights being glamorized, but she’d not seen any glamour in this, only the ugly reality of death. So much that had been romanticized by the dime novels had turned out to be harsh and dirty instead of exciting. The novels had not made mention of the constant dust, the monotony of endless chores just to exist, the long days that melded into one another without change. Nor had they managed to convey the horror that ofttimes awaited on moon-bright nights.
“Deborah,” Judith said, and Deborah realized that she must have been saying her name before, because there was a tension in her tone that made her aware. “Don Francisco asked if we would like to await him in the hotel lobby while he sees to his business.”
“Yes. Of course.”
Tía Dolores clutched at their arms, her face pasty and pale beneath the yards of stifling black lace mantilla. “Do come along. I must get out of this heat. I must sit down before I faint.”
“By all means, sit in the lobby,” Don Francisco was saying with obvious annoyance. “But go nowhere else. When I return, you may do your shopping.
Comprendé?”
“Sí, sí,” Tía Dolores moaned. “We wait.” Even in the cool shade of the hotel lobby with a glass of lemonade in her hand, Deborah could not forget that frozen moment in time when she’d thought Zack was about to be killed. It had terrified her, and she didn’t know why. In the past weeks without seeing him, she’d convinced herself that he truly was the savage Judith named him. It would seem that witnessing the brutal act that had just occurred would only seal that impression. Yet somehow, the sight of his tall, lean body and animal grace had only made her realize how much she’d missed him. She was definitely mad. A lunatic. And she ached to hold him again. To hear the husky rasp of his voice in her ear, to see his face hard with passion above her, to smell the musky male scent of him and to taste his mouth on hers.
A flush heated her face, and she looked up from the small slices of lemon in her glass to see Judith watching her.
“Isn’t that right, Deborah?”
“What? I’m—sorry. I wasn’t listening.”
“’Tía Dolores said that it was a shame Mr. Diamond has such vicious men working for him.”
“Did she.” Deborah sipped her lemonade, silently sighing.
“Yes. I agree. It can only mean trouble to have men like that running around loose. See what’s happened already? And they’re supposed to be working together, from what I heard.”
“Who?”
“Zack Banning and the man he killed. That’s what a man behind me said. Said they both worked for the Double D. They were friends.”
“If there is any evidence of wrongdoing, I am certain Sheriff Carpenter will take care of it,” Deborah said with more assurance than she felt. She h
oped that Zack would not be charged with anything, and did not see how he could be. Too many people had seen the other man draw first, but then again, only Mr. Macklin had been close enough to hear the words exchanged between the two men. Zack’s life hinged on Jeremiah Macklin’s account of what happened.
Deborah fought back a rising sense of dismay. Macklin had been hired by Don Francisco, which was the reason they had come into Sirocco today.
“Here,” Tía Dolores said, thrusting a small plate of cakes at her, “eat, and you will feel better.” Deborah managed a smile. “I feel fine. Just hot and tired. And glad to be away from the hacienda.”
“Sí, so am I. When Francisco arrives, we shall see what new things Mr.
Potter has in his shop, eh?” The thought of shopping was far from what Deborah really wanted to do, but she nodded quietly as Dolores began reeling off a list of items she’d needed for some time. Her days had begun to meld into one another without change, so that this outing was a real treat. Though she and Judith both had been brought up to be familiar with the running of a household, Don Francisco had his own retinue of servants, and did not want Deborah’s help.
The only release she had was reading and sewing and visiting with her cousin, and lately Judith had been acting very strange.
Their stay in the Comanche camp had been much harder on her than Deborah, and as time passed, she’d noticed Judith’s increasing anxiety. Judith had seemed content to allow Hank Warfield to visit, even to court her, but when the young man mentioned marriage, she had refused to see him again.
“I’m just not interested,” she’d said in answer to Deborah’s puzzled query.
Several young men from neighboring ranches had visited, and though outwardly pleased at first, Judith had found fault with every one of them.
Don Francisco still gazed at her with hot, interested eyes, but nothing had been done or said since the evening Tía Dolores had confessed his real interest. The atmosphere in the hacienda had become one of tension and expectancy, as if waiting for an inevitable explosion.
This excursion into Sirocco should have eased the tensions, but now Deborah wondered if they would only increase. She certainly felt worse.
The image of Zack standing there so calmly, with a faint, amused smile touching the corners of his mouth, his eyes a deep, icy blue, haunted her.
She’d seen him as soon as she’d stepped out of the carriage, recognized his easy grace and lethal stride, and had watched as he and the man with him approached Macklin. Don Francisco had sworn softly in Spanish and begun walking toward them. Then the man with Zack had backed off in a peculiar, lazy glide that made Don Francisco swear again.
How strange, to watch with the blood pounding so loudly in her ears she heard only a roar, to see their mouths move but hear nothing said, and all that followed seemed to move as slowly as molasses in winter. And all the time, her fear for Zack had been almost a tangible thing, alive and curling inside her like a ravenous beast.
Would he even care?
She doubted it. He’d made it plain enough that he would use her, but never love her. No promises.
No, no promises. Only heartache.
She felt betrayed by his desertion of her, the way he’d made love to her then taken her back to the hacienda without so much as a hint of a future together. Once she’d thought a future impossible, but that was when he was Hawk and lived with the Comanche. Knowing she couldn’t live in his world, she’d assumed he’d never live in hers.
Yet he did.
Perhaps not in the same social structure, but then, she no longer lived in the same society she’d been accustomed to in pre-war Natchez, either. Her entire life had been changed by the war, as had everyone’s. Only her father seemed to have escaped the radical changes, and from his last letter, he was doing better than ever.
The Hamilton Shipping Lines were doing a booming business, and the money he’d received from the Velazquez estate had been invested in diverse businesses. Don Francisco was reaping some of the profits from those ventures too, she’d learned.
It was the way of the world, Deborah told herself, for a young woman to be given in marriage to seal family ties. Yet it rankled still that John Hamilton had not cared enough about her to ask her opinion, give her a choice, or even try to rescue her after she’d been taken by the Comanche. No, he’d stayed in his safe home in Natchez and written Don Francisco of his displeasure in his daughter’s kidnapping, and contacted a few influential military acquaintances, but that was that. It was disconcerting to realize that the only person who truly cared about her was her cousin Judith.
And since Deborah had fallen in love with Zack, Judith had withdrawn from her. She was alone, truly alone.
Deborah looked up, blinking when she realized that Tía Dolores was speaking to her in an agitated voice.
“Señora, señora, do not allow that man to compromise you by publicly accosting you—oh Madré Díos!” Judith’s voice came out in a hoarse whisper. “Don’t turn around!” Faintly puzzled, Deborah half-turned, and dropped her glass of lemonade when she saw Zack Banning striding toward her across the hotel lobby. It splattered with a loud crash and sent sticky liquid over her dress and that of Tía Dolores, who was mumbling something in Spanish that sounded like a prayer. Deborah stood up.
“I want to talk to you,” Zack said without preamble, and took her by the arm to lead her to a window alcove framed with potted plants and faded draperies. He turned so that he stood with his back to the light streaming in from the windows, facing the room.
“You’re not in jail,” Deborah said, then felt foolish for stating the obvious.
His mouth quirked. “No, I’m not. It was a fair fight. Macklin swore to it.” She stood, afraid to look at him yet aching to memorize every line of his face. Tension vibrated in the air between them, a different kind of tension than that which she’d become accustomed to in the last weeks. This was sexual, a strong, driving attraction that made her pulses race and her throat tighten and her heart pound so hard she felt she would shatter with the force of it. Zack had to notice; he had to feel it. She couldn’t be the only one affected.
Deborah cleared her throat with an effort. She was aware of Judith’s hostile glare and Tía Dolores moaning in her chair and gazing at them helplessly.
“What do you want, Zack?”
“I want you to be careful.” The blunt warning startled her. She thought of herself in danger only in connection with him. Was that what he meant?
Apparently her confusion showed on her face, because he growled,
“There’s liable to be trouble—shooting kind of trouble—and I want you to guard yourself.”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Deborah’s confusion was being rapidly replaced by irritation. He was so abrupt, and if anyone should be warned of trouble, surely it should be him. Hadn’t he just shot a man?
“Deborah, take this at face value. I don’t mean anything other than there’s going to be trouble between Don Francisco and Diamond before too long. You’re liable to get caught in the crossfire. Do you understand?” His voice was rough, quick, as if he wanted to say what he’d come to say and leave. She had no intention of letting him get away that easy.
“No, I don’t understand. Why should they have trouble?”
“Diamond wants the Velazquez lands. I’m sure of it. He’s made Don Francisco an offer, but it was refused. He’s liable to try something else next.” She stared at him incredulously. “And you’re working for a man like that?”
“Can you think of a better way to find out what he’s doing?” Zack snapped impatiently. “I don’t think he’d want to spread his intentions around unless they’re good, and I can promise you, they’re not.”
“So you do make promises after all,” Deborah heard herself say, then froze. That was not at all what she’d intended. She’d had no intentions of letting him know how he’d hurt her.
He looked surprised, then his eyes narrowed, dark and hot and blue, shadow
ed by his lashes.
“On occasion,” he drawled. His gaze dropped, and in spite of the sunlight behind him, she saw the way his eyes lingered on her mouth. “If half of Sirocco wasn’t watching right now,” he husked, “I’d kiss you silly.” Deborah didn’t say anything. It wouldn’t have taken much kissing to get her to silly, she decided. She was almost giddy now just at the thought of it.
Zack hesitated, and for one, heart-stopping moment, she thought he intended to throw common sense and caution to the wind and kiss her, but he didn’t. Instead, he said softly, “Braden drew first. I just want you to know that.” “Yes. I know.”
He slid a palm down her arm to her wrist, then turned her and walked her back to the chair next to Tía Dolores as if they were at a dance and he was returning her to her chaperon.
“Ladies,” he said, his gaze flicking to Judith for an instant before moving back to Deborah. “I hope you have a more peaceful afternoon.” With that bit of mocking gallantry, he was gone, back out the double doors of the hotel and into the hot sunshine before anyone else could speak.
Deborah felt both her cousin and Tía Dolores looking at her, but did not offer a comment. She was afraid her voice would crack, or that she would burst into unrestrained tears.
Silly. She was a fool. If he wanted her, he would have said so. He would seek her out, not give oblique warnings whenever he chanced to run into her.
Not once since her return had he sought her out for himself. Not once.
She was a fool to think he ever would.
But she couldn’t help hoping he would come for her.
Chapter 19
In the week since the gunfight in Sirocco, Deborah had found herself more closely watched than before. She hadn’t thought it possible, but apparently, it was. The continued surveillance precipitated a disagreement between her and Don Francisco, and she had not emerged the victor.
Restless, angry, and frightened, Deborah prowled the small adobe-walled patio off her bedroom and watched the moon rise in the eastern sky. It hung, a silver ball in the dark sky, silvering the ground around her. Her nightgown swayed gently in the soft breeze that made the heat more bearable, and she breathed deeply of sweet-scented blossoms.
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