To keep himself too busy to admire Suzannah’s long bare legs poking out from the blanket, he rubbed down the horses with dried tule grass, unpacked the coffeepot and boiled up some double-strength coffee, and sliced off some jerky for lunch. Then he checked the bedrolls and repacked both saddlebags.
When he finished he turned toward the fire and allowed himself a good long look at her. Her braid had come undone and her hair was beginning to fluff around her face. In the late-afternoon sunlight it looked like spun gold.
He clamped his jaws tight and looked away.
Suzannah sat on the log in front of the fire for as long as she could stand it, then sprang to her feet. “Stop pacing around like that! Come and sit down by the fire.”
“Can’t” came his terse reply.
“Why can’t you? It’s not going to make my clothes dry any faster if you keep walking about. Watching you is making me dizzy.”
“Then don’t watch.”
“Oh, for mercy’s sake. Why are you so bad tempered? You would think I fell in the river on purpose.”
He didn’t answer. Maddening man! That’s what he always did when he was angry about something and she was being logical—he answered in monosyllables and refused to look at her. Finally he paused in his pacing to run his hand over the shirt and jeans he’d draped over the bush.
“Are they dry?” she called.
“Dry enough. Get dressed.”
She gritted her teeth. Brand issued orders just like an army officer. Well, of course he was an army officer, or he had been one. She guessed the military discipline never rubbed off.
He snatched her outer garments off the bush, stalked over to where she sat enveloped in his blanket and dropped them at her feet. Then he strode off to the other bush and, with just his thumb and forefinger, lifted off her muslin drawers and camisole as if they were red-hot. These he carefully laid on top of the pile in front of her.
She shrugged out of the blanket. “I’ll just go over behind that bush and—”
“I’ll turn my back.”
She bent to gather up her dry clothes. “How do I know I can trust you?”
Very deliberately he faced away from her and propped his hands at his waist. “Trust is a funny thing,” he said. “Takes time to build it, and it can all crumble in a split second.”
She had no answer to that. She moved behind the largest bush, stepped into her drawers and hiked them up. “Is your back still turned?”
He snorted at that. “I may be a lot of things, Suzannah, got rough manners and not much book learnin’, and I have a healthy dislike for most people, but I’m not dishonest. Sometimes I wish to God I was.”
“Yes,” she said quickly, “I understand. I truly do understand.” She drew her camisole over her head and tied the ribbon.
“We’ve been on the trail together for over six days now. Ridin’ together. Eatin’ together. Even sleepin’ together, in a general sort of way. I haven’t done one damn thing to cause you to distrust me, have I?” He was addressing the horses, tied up opposite the bush she was dressing behind.
“N-no,” she said uncertainly. She pulled on her almost dry jeans. The cloth belt with all her cash had been dried right along with her jeans. She’d forgotten about it, and now she prayed her money was all there.
“Brand, did you find—?”
“Yep. It’s all dry and none’s missing. Kinda thought you’d ask about it before now, Suzannah. Kinda careless of you.”
She bit her lip and buttoned up her shirt. “I did not ask you because... I...I guess I do trust you. Otherwise I suppose that would have been uppermost in my mind.”
“You decent yet?”
“Yes, except for my boots.”
He pivoted, snatched her boots off the sticks propping them before the fire, then snagged her socks off the hot rocks and tossed them to her.
The socks felt deliciously warm. The boot leather still felt damp and the fit was so tight she couldn’t tug them on. This must be why cowboys out west preferred riding to walking; the thought of another set of blisters made her stomach tight.
Brand squatted next to her. “Give me your foot.” He massaged her cold toes with his strong, warm hands, then slid her foot into the boot and yanked it up tight. After he drew on the second one, he stood up.
“Stomp around some, see if they’re on right.”
She laughed. “I have not ‘stomped around’ since I was seven years old.”
“Do it anyway.”
She made a quick circuit around the fire pit. “They fit all right, but they feel a bit tight.”
He nodded and handed over her money belt, which she tied around her waist. Then she turned away to retuck her shirt in to hide it.
Yes, she did trust Brandon Wyler. And that was “perplexin’ strange,” as Hattie used to say. He was as different from a Southern gentleman as dawn from midnight, but she did trust him. After all, he carried four hundred dollars’ worth of her gold, wrapped up in a sock in the bottom of his saddlebag.
Chapter Sixteen
Brand reined in and stopped. He felt someone watching him; couldn’t say why, just that for the past two hours he’d been aware of prickles along the back of his neck. He pulled up and sat studying the winding trail ahead.
“What’s wrong?” Suzannah called.
“Don’t know, exactly. Maybe nothing.” He surveyed the clear blue sky overhead, where a buzzard soared over the treetops. As he watched, it gradually circled lower. The air smelled of pine and something else he couldn’t put a finger on. Something sharp and raw. Smoke? An Indian camp?
He started forward again. It didn’t help that they were riding into the sun. Ahead was a stand of thick woods, and as they moved into it he thought he heard something. He reined in, motioned for Suzannah to stay silent and listened.
Crows screamed overhead. “Must be a rabbit or something,” he said at last. “Suzannah, ride ahead of me.” He didn’t want her behind him where he couldn’t keep track of her. It was bad enough being out here in the wilderness with nothing but his instincts and a rifle, but Suzannah added another dimension. He felt responsible for her. He wanted to protect her.
Face it, Wyler, you’d die to keep her safe.
Well, hell. When had that happened? When had her well-being become more important than his own?
They rode for some time without talking, and little by little he realized she was as wary as he was. Did she also feel like somebody was watching them?
He stared hard at every clump of bushes and shady spot under the alder trees until his eyes burned. Nothing. When night fell he wanted to be out of these trees.
“Let’s move a little faster,” he called.
She nodded and nudged the mare into an easy canter. When they stopped to water the horses, he snared a trout in the brook and after another hour of traveling he called a halt.
“We’ll camp here.” They were almost out of the trees, just coming into a long valley dotted with camas and sprangly wild roses. Dusk sent gray shadows across the trail and the sky turned red-orange and then purple as the sun sank behind the hills to the west. Pretty, but it sure was cold.
Suzannah slid off her horse and immediately made for a copse of leafy ash trees while Brand unsaddled both horses and started a fire. He’d just gutted the fish and knelt to set the coffeepot on the fire when he heard an odd sound.
He cocked his head. “Suzannah?”
No answer.
Didn’t take a woman that long to... He stood up and moved slowly toward the trees where he’d last seen her.
He jerked when he saw her, butt down in the dirt, pinned between a scruffy-looking man’s knees. A dirty hand was clapped over her mouth, and her eyes were wide with fear. Automatically his right hand twitched toward the Colt on his hip, then he felt the hard barrel of a gun at his back.
“Don’t do anything sudden, mister.” The voice came from his left. So there were two of them. He studied the man holding Suzannah. The same fat guy he though
t he’d sent off to Texas. Then he remembered there had been three of them.
Someone lifted his revolver out of its holster and shoved him forward. “We was just askin’ the lady ’bout all that money.”
“What money?”
“The money the lady brought with her from Missouri.”
“She doesn’t have it any longer. Left it with the sutler at Fort Hall.”
“Nah, she didn’t.” The man on his left, the one with the bristly chin, nudged him down beside Suzannah. “She’s payin’ you with something, ain’t she?”
“Nope. Let her talk, she’ll tell you she’s not payin’ me anything.”
The man removed his meaty hand from her mouth. “That right, honey? You ain’t payin’ him?”
She wiped her hand across her lips. “That is correct. The major was...was ordered to accompany me to Oregon. Payment was not included.”
“That right?” Quick as a flash he twisted her arm behind her back and yanked upward. “You sure that’s right?”
She cried out and Brand clenched his fists.
“That is correct,” she repeated. “I told you that before.”
Another yank on her arm, and her breath hissed in.
“Let her go!” Brand shouted. “Only a coward would hurt a woman.”
He twisted her arm higher. “Yeah? Well, I guess I’m a—”
Brand launched himself sideways at the man, but the other two pounced on him and dragged him off, then pinned his arms behind him.
“I asked you where it is, honey. It’s only gonna get worse if you don’t tell us.” He tightened his grip and she gasped.
“All right, I’ll tell you,” she cried. “It’s...it’s hidden in my saddlebag.”
Brand blinked. It was no such thing. He’d dropped all her gold coins into a clean sock, knotted the top and shoved it in his saddlebag. In a special secret rawhide pouch he’d personally stitched into the lining before they’d left Fort Hall. So why...?
Because, you idiot, she wants to distract them.
Fatso released her and stood up. “Okay, lady, let’s go get it. You first.”
Suzannah stumbled to her feet and took a step forward. Brand leaped up and grabbed her shoulder.
She looked straight into his eyes. “I’m sorry, Brand. I didn’t want to tell them, but...” She gave a convincing sniffle.
He snaked his arm around her shoulder. “You couldn’t help it,” he said loudly.
She leaned into him. “Get ready,” she breathed.
In answer he tightened his fingers about her shoulder and squeezed once.
They emerged into the clearing where the horses stood waiting, and suddenly Suzannah’s legs buckled and she sank to the ground directly in Fatso’s path. When her knees connected with the spongy forest duff, Fatso checked his stride to avoid stepping on her, and in that instant Brand reached behind him, closed his hand around the barrel of the rifle pressing at his back and jerked it forward. Off balance, the man stumbled forward.
Brand then swung the barrel wide and rammed the butt backward into the man’s belly. He doubled over, and Brand yanked the rifle out of his hands, spun and leveled the weapon at his chest.
In the same instant Suzannah reared backward, knocked Fatso’s revolver out of his hand and pounced on it before he could recover. She fired a shot at him, but it went wide and just nicked his upper arm. Fatso backed off, hands raised, and she fired again. This time she hit his shoulder.
“What the—?”
The third man, bringing up the rear, went for his holster, but Brand put a bullet into the pine needles at his feet and he froze. Suzannah stepped forward and lifted away his gun.
“Turn around,” Brand ordered. “If you want to ride out of here in one piece, keeping moving toward your horses.”
“You gonna shoot us?” Fatso panted.
Brand spit off to one side. “Maybe.” He herded the three men into a tight knot. “Take off your boots and your pants, all of you. Throw them over here.”
“Hell, we cain’t go nowhere half-nekkid! Cain’t ride with no boots, neither.”
“Should have thought of that before.”
Hesitantly Fatso unbuckled his belt, let his jeans drop to his hips, then turned away from Suzannah. Brand had to laugh at that. The other two men stripped in front of her, and the pile of clothing at his feet grew.
“Now, mount up.”
The three half-dressed outlaws lumbered awkwardly to their horses and dragged themselves up into the saddle, where they sat nervously eyeing Brand’s rifle and the revolver in Suzannah’s hand. Fatso leaned down and suddenly made a grab for it, and she fired a bullet into the meaty part of his other shoulder.
“Keep movin,” Brand snapped. “If you’re real lucky that band of Indian braves won’t pick up your trail.”
“I-Indians?” Fatso stuttered.
“Yep. All painted up like Christmas,” Brand observed thoughtfully. “Might be a war party.”
“C’mon, boys, let’s get outta here!”
“I wouldn’t go anywhere near Fort Hall if I were you,” Brand said, his voice lazy. “Soldiers are out lookin’ for whoever shot Mr. Monroe.”
“You ain’t sendin’ us out there with no weapons, are ya?”
“Damn right,” Brand snapped.
Suzannah watched the dust puff after the three pounding horses and all at once she got the shakes. Brand lifted the revolver out of her grasp, stashed the extra rifle across her saddle pack and slid both revolvers into his saddlebag.
“Feel like some supper?”
Chapter Seventeen
All through supper, while they ate the fish Brand fried and drank the coffee he made, he studied the woman across the campfire as if he’d never seen her before. Finally Suzannah couldn’t stand it any longer.
“Would you mind telling me why you keep staring at me? Is there dirt on my face?”
“No, there’s no dirt on your face. It’s what’s on the inside I’m puzzling over.”
“Well, what? What is on my inside?”
He tossed the dregs of his coffee into the fire. “Not sure. Thought I had you pretty well figured out, but now I’m kinda puzzled.”
“I would venture to say that no man is ever sure what a woman is really like on the inside.”
He blinked. “Works two ways, doesn’t it? Does a woman ever know what a man is really like on the inside?”
“Why, of course she does! Girls learn those things practically from the cradle. At least Southern girls do.”
One eyebrow quirked. “First you fake a fainting spell and grab Fatso’s revolver, then you put a bullet into his arm. And then you do it again. Are all Southern girls that brave?”
“I was not brave,” she admitted. “I was frightened to death.”
“Can’t imagine how the South lost the war,” he murmured.
She grimaced. The war. No Southerner would ever forget the War Between the States, the men who would never come home, the women who starved and made do with scraps of food and rags on their backs.
“Well, to be honest, I was frightened. That does not mean I was helpless.”
He just looked at her, then shook his head. “You know something? If you think you’re frightened, you’re lyin’ to yourself, Suzannah. Either that or you’re lyin’ to me.”
She was quiet for a long moment. “I want to tell you something, Brand. About the war. About me. We call it the War of Northern Aggression. Did you know that? We, the women at home, had to learn to be strong. We had to, otherwise we would have died. We learned how to endure—that is different from being brave. We lived with fear every minute of every day for four long years. We did it because we had to.”
Again he shook his head, but there was an expression in his eyes she could not read. It didn’t change when he rose and stowed the supper plates in his saddlebag, or when he rolled out his bedroll beside the campfire and shucked his boots. He stretched out with his hands locked behind his head and kept looking at her.
Brand watched her smooth out her blankets on the opposite side of the fire and arrange her saddlebag to use as a pillow. Who was this woman? She was slim and delicate looking. Only came up to his chin, and he would swear her hands had never done a day’s work in her life. But when push came to shove, she sure stiffened her spine. She’d showed real ingenuity, too, faking a fainting spell and snatching Fatso’s revolver. And guts.
He couldn’t stop thinking about it. Sure was glad she was on his side; he’d hate to think how fast she could tie his spurs in a knot.
In the morning he stirred up the coals, made coffee and waited for the sun to come up. The sky turned pink before Suzannah woke up; by the time she sat up and yawned, it was like a big blue bowl over their heads.
She was rumpled and her hair tumbled haphazardly about her shoulders, but God in heaven, she was so beautiful it made his throat ache. Sure hoped the man waiting for her in Oregon appreciated what he was getting. And he’d better be something special enough to deserve her.
“Coffee?” He set a mug near her elbow. She gulped it down while he rolled both bedrolls, fed the horses and packed up the coffeepot.
Then he started toward the saddled horses. “Let’s mount up and—” His words stopped and he looked beyond her, his eyes narrowed.
A puff of gray dust rose across the wide valley before them. Brand swore and ran for his rifle.
“Get over there behind that bush,” he said sharply.
Hoofbeats drew close, and Suzannah peered out between the branches. A very young man, too skinny to fill out his blue army shirt, hauled his winded horse to a stop and bent over the saddle horn, panting audibly.
Brand lowered his rifle. “Where ya goin’ in such a hurry, son?”
“In-Indians,” the kid gasped. “Lots of ’em. Moving south and heading this way.”
“What kind of Indians?”
“Kind? Whaddya mean, kind, mister? Indians are Indians.”
“No, Indians are not just Indians. You think all white men are the same? I mean what tribe,” Brand said calmly.
Dreaming of a Western Christmas: His Christmas BelleThe Cowboy of Christmas PastSnowbound with the Cowboy Page 9
