The Cowboy’s Hidden Agenda

by Kathleen Creighton

  “Time to move on,” he announced, giving the cave wall a slap as he squinted into the sunlight, gauging the length of the shadows along the canyon wall. He knelt and began rolling his blanket, glancing up long enough to inquire with exaggerated diffidence, “Want anything more to eat before I pack it away?”

  She shook her head, as carefully polite as he was. “I’ve had enough. I would like to, um, freshen up a little, though, if that’s okay.” Her eyes looked past him, shielded and distant; impossible to know what she was thinking.

  “You’ll have plenty of time to do whatever you need to do,” he said stiffly, “while I’m saddling ol’ Red.” He rose and waved her ahead of him. “After you.”

  She obeyed in hostile silence. As he followed her down the steep and rocky trail, Bronco was thankful for her anger, or whatever the torment was that was occupying her mind, keeping it too busy to notice that what had just passed between them was another very odd exchange for a kidnapper to be having with his prisoner.

  After relieving herself-remembering to check first, very carefully, for rattlers-and wetting her face, Lauren felt better. Though it would have taken a lot more than a splash of water to wipe the memory of Bronco’s voice from her mind, saying so softly, so gently, “I found out she’d died.”

  She’d died. As she made her way back along the creek to where she’d left Bronco and the horses, she took deep breaths and shook her head sharply, like someone fighting off drowsiness. But the voice persisted. She’d died.

  And just as stubbornly, she denied it. Not my mother. My mother is healthy as a horse! And, she reminded herself with a bitter little spurt of laughter, she takes very good care of herself. Oh, yes, she still had time. Plenty of time.

  Yes, but time for what? Time to forgive? Ruthlessly Lauren pushed that thought aside. She didn’t want to forgive. She wasn’t ready to forgive. Not yet.

  The stream that meandered along the canyon floor was tiny, almost nonexistent in places. But the sand was moist and cool, and near the shaded banks beneath the willows, watercress grew green and lush. Through a copse of young willows Lauren could see Bronco working with the horses, rubbing them down with handfuls of willow leaves. They’d obviously been rolling in the damp earth near the creek; she could hear singsong cadence of Bronco’s voice scold ing, pretending exasperation as he brushed away dirt and foxtail. And she found herself smiling.

  When she realized what she was doing, the smile faded and, instead, she felt lost and confused, too confused even to feel frightened. She stood and watched him, recalling the way she’d felt this morning, waking up with his scent in her nostrils and the remnants of erotic dreams still pounding in her veins. And then seeing him, shirtless and so intensely male… Watching him now from a distance, she didn’t know what to feel. The lines between fantasy and reality were blurring. It was becoming harder and harder to determine what she should feel, what she did feel…even what she wanted to feel. And it seemed too great an effort to try. Even the attempt made her feel weary, defeated.

  “Best if you ride behind again,” Bronco said, glancing at her as she joined him. “We can move faster that way.”

  He’d put on a shirt, an old one of blue cotton, softened and faded almost to white by countless washings. The contrast of that fragile fabric with the powerful body beneath it seemed a gourmet treat for the senses. She wanted to touch him.

  She watched him pause to test the tightness of the girth and run his hands once more along Cochise Red’s neck and withers and under the edges of the blanket, checking for nonexistent burrs. “Can’t one of us ride bareback?” she asked, tearing her eyes away from his hands and looking past him to where the mares were idly grazing, nibbling delicately at the sparse grass.

  “You can if you want to.” He tilted his head and squinted at her from under the brim of his hat. “It’s a hot day-horses sweat. Personally, I’m not big on sitting all day in salt water. And you with those sores…”

  She nodded, looking past him, silently acquiescent though her heart pounded mockingly against her ribs. Only when the silence had grown enough to become awkward did she drag her reluctant gaze back to him and found his eyes already there waiting for hers, resting on her face, studying it. But to what purpose? She had no idea what he might be thinking; his eyes were like darkened windows, giving her back her own reflection.

  Then, as he had once before, he took off his hat and reached out to place it on her head. She reared back reflexively and put up her hands to intercept it, but he was too quick for her and pulled it away before she could. He made a clicking noise with his tongue-a scolding noise-and his eyebrows tilted into a frown, those fierce upward slashes like a raven’s wings.

  “You’re gonna burn,” he said flatly. “You need a hat.”

  “So do you!”

  He shook his head; his features seemed carved of stone. But for once, for one moment, she thought she saw-could it possibly have been?-hurt in his eyes. “I told you-I don’t burn. You do.” He reached toward her again, and this time she didn’t try to stop him.

  Stop him? She had all she could do just to stand erect and still. The simple vital functions of her body suddenly seemed like complex tasks, requiring all her concentration to perform. Breathe…relax…don’t blink, don’t tremble…oh, please don’t sweat…breathe… And all the while her heart was pounding thump-thump-thump, rocking her with the force of its concussions, like an overzealous drummer.

  She was horrified to hear herself whimper; she absolutely could not hold it back. Closing her eyes, she felt his body heat, more intense even than the Arizona sun, the momentary coolness of his sweat on her brow, then the perceptible shadow of the hat’s brim across her eyelids.

  Bracing herself, she opened them again and saw that he wasn’t there any longer, that he’d already turned from her and lifted himself without apparent effort into the saddle. He was reaching down, waiting to give her a hand up, and his face-his eyes-wore no expression at all. She felt unbelievably foolish. Childish and weak.

  She lifted and resettled the hat to suit her, then placed her foot in the stirrup he’d vacated for her and her hand in his. A moment later, safely up on Cochise Red’s back and inordinately pleased at having accomplished that with a modicum of grace, because she felt a need to redeem herself for her momentary loss of poise, she said lightly, flippantly, “So what if I do burn? What’s it to you?”

  She felt his body jerk with that sardonic little grunt that wasn’t quite laughter. “It’s in my best interests to keep you in undamaged condition.”

  Cochise Red danced sideways, impatient to be off, and Lauren had to grab for the back of the saddle. “Oh, right- I’m so valuable to you.”

  Instead of answering, Bronco clucked softly and signaled the stallion with barely perceptible movements of his hands and body, and they moved off at a brisk walk, heading upstream.

  Lauren drew in and then exhaled a slow and careful breath. Desperate for a distraction, she fixed her gaze on the canyon wall, watched the ever-changing pattern of layered rock and scrubby vegetation flow unevenly past as she said in a faintly ridiculing tone, “Might I ask where we’re going?” When he didn’t reply, she persisted with growing acidity, “Is it too much to ask, to be told where you’re taking me now?” His silence drew her unwilling gaze like a magnet. She stared at the back of his neck, furious with the failure of her will and wishing devoutly that her eyes had the ability to shoot forth fire. “I mean, it looks to me like your-what do you call them? Sons of Liberty?-are pretty much his-to-ry.”

  She was sorry the moment she said the words, hearing that smug and vindictive voice coming from her own mouth. Justified or not-and the man had kidnapped her-she felt small and ashamed. As she sat slumped behind him on the back of her bloodred stallion and watched the shadow cast by the hat he’d given her bob up and down across his broad shoulders, she was thinking of last night and the way he’d come charging to her rescue in the nick of time-yes, just like the cavalry!-and the way he’d ridden
like the wind through darkness and gunfire, shielding her with his own body while he carried her away to safety, not even knowing what fate might have befallen his friends and comrades. She hadn’t even thanked him for that. He certainly didn’t deserve her sarcasm and ridicule.

  Before she could apologize, Bronco said in a quiet oddly uninvolved voice, “History? I don’t think so. That was only a small part of the group-just a training camp for the militia, actually. The Sons of Liberty have cells-subsidiary groups-and bases of operation all over the country. They’re not finished yet-far from it.”

  “Well,” Lauren retorted, “your leader certainly is.”

  “You know for a fact?” Bronco asked, and then was silent.

  Oh, Lord, Lauren thought, and miserably closed her eyes. He didn’t deserve that, either. Who would have supposed she possessed such a mean streak? Rocked by the motion of the horse’s unhurried gait and wrapped in a blanket of dry desert heat, she let her mind drift, carried along on streams of memory through all the conversations she’d had with Bronco, about Bronco, reprises of her own thoughts and observations and discoveries…

  He’s a half-breed Apache-kid never had a chance.

  Helped him straighten himself out after he got kicked out of the military.

  I do owe Gil McCullough a lot. He gave me a chance when nobody else would.

  I owe more to him than I do to the government that’s been cheating, killing, starving, stealing and lying to my people.

  Hunted to the last man…

  Ol’ Gil looks out for me.

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured, then cleared her throat and repeated it in a louder voice, but stiffly, too, self-conscious all of a sudden. “I’m sorry-I know how close you are to Gil McCullough.” Bronco didn’t reply, and his rigid back gave nothing away. After a moment she went on, haltingly at first, then warming to her theme as the words he’d spoken in her daydream came vividly to her mind. “I can understand why you feel such a strong loyalty to him, after everything he’s done for you. I mean, as you said, he was there for you when nobody else was. And I can see why you’d be attracted to a group like his. From your perspective, considering all the terrible injustices committed against your people over the years, why would you feel allegiance to the United States? In a way it’s surprising there aren’t more Indians involved in these antigovernment organizations. I’d think it would even be understandable-”

  “We tried it on our own, remember?” Bronco cut in roughly. “We got our asses kicked.”

  He added a grudging, “Hang on!” just barely in time to warn her before Cochise Red erupted into a gallop.

  Chapter 11

  He might have let the stallion have his head, anyway, just for the hell of it, here where the upper canyon opened onto a highland plateau, like a grassy blanket thrown across the shoulders of the Scared Mountain, shimmering in a haze of sunlight beyond the screen of timber. But Bronco’s heart was black and heavy, his thoughts as turbulent as the thunderheads piled up around him on all horizons. Instead of riding for the enjoyment of the speed and power of the great animal under him and the unexpected and forbidden pleasure of a lithe and slender woman pressed against his back, he raced to keep the demons of his own thoughts at bay.

  I understand…why would you…why…

  But he held them off, those thoughts, fought them as if his life depended on it. And maybe it did. Self-doubt had always been his mortal enemy; early in his life it had nearly destroyed him. Now, at the first hint of its return, he was determined to vanquish it with any means at hand.

  He blamed that self-doubt, along with its distractions-the confusion in his mind and the fear in his heart-for what happened next. So focused was he on outrunning the anger and the fear that he didn’t see trouble coming until it was almost too late. Until he felt the powerful body between his thighs tense and gather itself and a moment later felt the shuddering expulsion of a stallion’s battle scream.

  Like an echo the reply came, and then Bronco saw them, too. Wild horses!

  Damn. This was trouble. Trouble he should have been able to avoid. He’d known the herd was apt to still be in the area. He should have been on the lookout for them.

  “Uh-oh,” he said under his breath, and then to Lauren, “Hang on!” as the two mares galloped by in helter-skelter confusion, ears pricked and eyes wild, and Cochise Red flattened his ears and lowered his head to charge. He heard her sharp gasp, felt her hands clutch at his belt, then almost convulsively wrap themselves tightly around him.

  Then he was too busy to think of anything except how he was going to bring that crazy horse back under control before he got them all killed. Red was well trained, but instinct was stronger than any training. Right now the stallion was oblivious to the presence of a saddle and two human beings on his back, didn’t know or care that his ability to fight was going to be limited by the steel bit between his teeth. The bloodlust had taken him; adrenaline was pumping, he was spoiling for battle, and nothing Bronco could do was going to stop him.

  He could only hope the wild stallion had more sense.

  Bronco could see him now, up ahead and off to the left, a rusty battle-scarred black just emerging from the dust cloud thrown up by his fleeing herd. As the stallion came racing out, head down and ears flattened, to meet this threat to his dominion, Bronco braced his thighs against the pommel of the saddle, rose high in the stirrups and gave forth with a bloodcurdling yell, at the same time waving both arms wildly, like someone hell-bent on flagging down a bus. The black veered suddenly, slowing his charge, then circled around, shaking his head uncertainly. Bronco yelled again and waved his arms, and the black wheeled and went galloping off after his herd.

  After that, it took only some gentle words and strong hands to bring Cochise Red back under control. Bronco elected to let the big bay run himself out, burn off his unspent adrenaline, before he pulled him up, blowing and trembling and drenched with sweat, in the shade of some pines at the meadow’s edge. A moment later the mares joined them-to be met with an angry squeal, lashing hooves and flashing teeth. Bronco laughed out loud, full of a strange kind of euphoria, now that the crisis was over. He bent to stroke the stallion’s sweat-slick neck, murmuring reassurances as he prepared to dismount, but halted, body tensed and half-turned in the saddle, when he heard a faint sound.

  Lauren. His heart leaped guiltily into his throat. In the excitement he’d all but forgotten her. Recovering, he inquired with no more than understandable gruffness, “You okay back there?”

  Instead of answering, she asked in a high angry voice, “Why did he do that?”

  “Red? You mean, just now, with the mares?” Bronco chuckled, pretending nonchalance. “Aw, he was just chastising them, keeping them in line-reminding them who’s their lord and master.” He swung his leg over the saddle horn and dropped to the ground, then turned to offer Lauren a hand.

  That was when he saw how set and pale her face was, and the fear and confusion in her eyes. The euphoria left him, and he felt chastened and ashamed. “Come on,” he urged gently as he reached for her and eased his arm around her waist.

  For a moment more she resisted, refusing to look at him and clinging obstinately to the saddle skirt. He gave her an encouraging tug; she made a small sound-a furious whim per. Then suddenly she changed her mind, transferring her hands from the saddle to his shoulders, and allowed him to ease her down and into his arms.

  He pulled her into a one-armed hug-taking no chances, he still kept a firm grip on the stallion’s reins-and she laid her head against his shoulder and hid her face in the curve of his neck and jaw. For a long time they just stood like that, he with his cheek resting on her hair and his heart beating like a jackhammer, Lauren breathing unevenly and trying not to tremble. He wanted to stroke her, pet her, comfort her with soft words and hard kisses. But he couldn’t. Didn’t dare.

  After a minute, calling up all the reinforcements he could muster of will, responsibility and honor, he gave her sweat-damp head a nudge wi
th his chin. “Hey, what’d you do with my hat?”

  She gave a sharp sniffly laugh and pulled away from him, briefly swiping her nose with the back of her hand. She didn’t say anything-didn’t have to; the tears shimmering in her eyes were punishment enough. Then, since he felt lousy and sorry and full of yearnings he couldn’t assuage, and because he didn’t know what else to do about them, he got angry.

  “I don’t know what you’re so upset about,” he muttered, irrationally wounded. He turned his back on the woman and her accusing eyes and began to walk the stallion into the trees. Behind him he heard the crashing noises the mares made as they followed at a discreet distance and, after a suspenseful interval, the sound he’d been straining his ears for-the crunch of human footsteps in pine needles, hurrying to catch up.

  “I’m not upset,” Lauren said as she stumbled into step beside him. But her voice was breathless, tense and trembling. “Try terrified. As in, scared out of my wits.”

  Bronco glanced at her. His heart began to beat faster. “What for? You weren’t in any danger.” It was a bald faced lie and he knew it. Nevertheless he felt entirely justified in adding bitterly, “I’d think you could trust me just a little.”

  Her bark of laughter made him wince. “Trust you? This from the man who kidnapped me?”

  He swung around to face her, blocking her way. “I’m also the man who saved your life,” he retorted. “Don’t forget that.”

  As she was staring at him, eyes wide and incredulous, cheeks flushed, seething, it occurred to him that it was probably the dumbest, most asinine conversation he’d ever had with a woman in his life. That it was making him feel-and act-about eleven years old. And that he didn’t have any idea in the world how to fix it.

  All he seemed able to do was stare back at her, with his heart thumping and his breath like fire in his lungs, while thunder rumbled way off in the distance and the muggy monsoon heat rolled in around him.