by Tess LeSue
“I’ll help.” Tom followed her outside. “Thank you,” he groaned once they were clear of the Storr. “I hate possum.” He squinted at the patchy woods. “Reckon I can get a rabbit or something?”
“Depends. How good a shot are you?”
He gave her a disgruntled look and she laughed. Men and their pride.
“I guess by the size of you, you’ll do just fine. You must eat something to get that big.” She fluttered her eyelashes dramatically.
He laughed. “You’re sassy for a nun, ain’t you?”
It was a knack, she thought with a grin, getting him to laugh. When he laughed, he relaxed. His eyes were bottle green in the late-afternoon sun, and his dimples flickered as he met her gaze.
“All nuns are sassy,” she assured him loftily. “You clearly ain’t known many or you’d recognize that for a fact.”
“I ain’t known any before you. Least not that I remember.”
Was it her imagination or was there a flash of admiration in his eyes? Whether it was her imagination or not, it caused a very real quickening of her heartbeat.
“Well, I’m standard for a nun. You can take my word for it.” She had a sudden urge to go hunting with him. Corn bread didn’t take no time at all; she could make it when she got back. “You know what else is standard for a nun?” she said.
He shook his head, looking simultaneously manly and also like a shy little boy.
“Marksmanship,” she announced.
“Marksmanship?” Up went his thick black eyebrows.
“Marksmanship is standard for a nun. All nuns are excellent shots.” She placed the heel of her hand on her holster, which was slung from the leather belt around her hips.
“They are?” There went those dimples again.
“It’s one of the tests they give you before they hand you your crucifix.”
“Is it? And what do they get you to shoot at?”
“Arks.” It was the first thing she thought of, and the sheer ridiculousness of it almost had her giggling.
He laughed. “And why would they want you shooting arks?”
“I think the real question is why wouldn’t they want you shooting at arks?” She glanced at the low sun. “We should get moving before we lose the light.”
“Wouldn’t want to miss those arks,” he said dryly.
“Bet you a dollar I shoot something before you do.” She set off out of the town. It took her roughly ten strides to be at the town limits.
“I didn’t know nuns were allowed to gamble.”
“And why not?”
“For a start, it don’t seem fair. Since you have God on your side and all.” He led her into the sparsely wooded area ahead.
“I’ll make it fairer.” She turned her face to the sky. “God? It’s Sister Emma. Remember me? That’s right, the one with the ark-shooting record. Sorry to trouble You, but would You mind stepping aside for this one? Just to even the odds?” She offered Tom her hand to shake. “Happy now? A dollar for first catch?”
Oh, his dimples gave her such a light-headed feeling. He was sexy enough when he was a volcano, but this smiling version of him was devastating.
Emma gave him an angelic look and drew her Colt. She wanted to win the bet.
10
“YOU’D THINK A place called Second Carrot would at least stock a carrot,” Emma said as she sucked the last of the meat off a quail drumstick. Quail might not be the most filling game, but it tasted a damn sight better than possum. Shame there were no carrots, as they would have gone perfectly with quail, and God knew they could all do with some fresh vegetables. But even though it was late summer, the men of Second Carrot had no fresh greens or squash or summer fruit; there wasn’t so much as a vegetable garden or a field to be seen. They seemed to subsist entirely on meat and fried dough. Emma couldn’t bear the thought of it, so she’d gone and foraged in the woods and had found some fennel, goosefoot and sorrel growing wild. She would have loved to have a cucumber or a carrot or two to toss through the leaves. It was utterly criminal that they didn’t have a kitchen garden, considering how fertile the land was around here.
“It’s plain misleading to call a town Second Carrot when there are no carrots,” she said, licking her fingers.
The men shared a confused look. “Why would there be carrots?”
She paused. “I assume there must have been carrots here once? At least two of them anyway.”
She saw Tom Slater just about choke on his corn bread.
What was so funny? Why was he laughing? An idea itched at the back of her mind. Dear God, surely not . . .
“Why exactly did you settle here?” she asked the men suspiciously.
“For the gold,” Stu told her, mopping the grease off his chin with his sleeve.
Oh, for the love of . . . Second Karat. Emma groaned. God save her from illiterate miners. It didn’t even make sense. Two karats: did gold even come in weights that small?
“I didn’t think there was gold this far south,” Calla said.
There wasn’t, Emma thought, exasperated. Look at the place. If there’d been so much as a sniff of gold, it would be clogged with miners.
“In the streams there is,” Stu said. “It washes down from the goldfields.”
“It does?” Emma didn’t believe him. “Rich pickings, is it?”
“Look.” He dug in his pocket and brought out a vial. It seemed to be filled with water. “See the gold?” He held it up to the lamplight. Tiny flecks sparkled in the water.
Emma bit her tongue. He looked so proud of his glittery water, and who was she to shatter a man’s illusions? She doubted he’d ever seen proper gold dust, let alone a nugget. She was sitting on a fortune in gold herself. Quite literally. She had it stitched into the waistband and pockets of her breeches, where it would stay until she used it to buy herself a house by the bay. Some of the nuggets were as big as her knuckles and dug into her something fierce.
“It’s very pretty,” she said, trying to sound admiring. She was aware of Tom Slater in the corner of her vision, hiding a smile as he sawed off another hunk of corn bread. She sure did love the way that man ate. It was a shame they didn’t have any butter; a nice slathering of salted butter was just what corn bread needed.
After the food was finished and everything had been washed up, the men milled around awkwardly. Emma had a fair idea of what their problem was. They were itching to break out the moonshine but weren’t keen to do it with the nuns present. Stu offered them private use of his room for the night, but Emma politely declined. She didn’t fancy sleeping in the dust, worrying about rats the size of possums; she also didn’t fancy being within hearing of their late-night drinking session. Especially considering the sneaky little looks a couple of the men were already giving Anna and Winnie. Particularly Winnie. It would never cease to amaze her how many men wanted to poke at a child. It was something that turned her stomach; she’d never countenanced it in any place she’d worked, and certainly not in the ones she’d owned. She took note of which men snuck looks at little Winnie and resolved to sleep with her Colt close by.
Tom had similar thoughts, clearly, because while they were busy cooking, he’d snuck off and pitched their camp a fair piece from town, over an embankment and hidden in a thicket of cottonwoods next to a creek. The tent was screened by thick brush, and he’d backed the wagon behind a stand of trees, with the animals pegged farther on, where they could feed on the dry summer grasses. When he led the women through the scrappy woods to the camp, Emma gave him a curious look. He’d gone to an awful lot of trouble to make sure they were well hidden. It was an informal kind of fort, with the banks and trees and creek acting as natural barriers. They had to descend a fairly sharp slope to reach the campsite. Clearly, he’d made it as difficult as possible for someone to creep up on them. She doubted a drunk could navigate it without waking everyone i
n the camp, especially in the dark. It was difficult enough to get down the slope now, sober and with the lingering summer twilight still offering enough light to see by.
“How on earth did you get the wagon down here?” she asked, astonished, as she held on to a tree trunk to keep from sliding down the hill.
“With difficulty,” he said with a quick grin. He held out his hand to help her down the last of the slope. His fingers closed around hers. His skin was warm and, oh my . . . Sparks shot through her. Cascades of sparkles, like pinpoints of fire in her blood.
Oh dear. She hadn’t felt sparks like that in years. Sparks like that led you smack bang into trouble. Those sparks got you all dazzled, and by the time you got clear again, some man had gone and chipped away at your heart. Men like Rory Baker, who’d run off with her when she was fourteen. She’d been desperate to get away from Duck Creek, and just the slightest glimmer of sparks from Rory had sent her off and away. She’d taken nothing with her but her late mother’s starter dough and the clothes on her back; she’d held on to the starter all these years, but lost Rory within a couple of weeks. He’d abandoned her in Paducah, Kentucky, leaving her high and dry. He hadn’t paid the bill for their lodging, and she hadn’t had a cent to her name, so the landlord had taken payment roughly, and against Emma’s will.
She pushed that memory away quickly. There was no point dwelling on it. You couldn’t change the past.
She certainly wouldn’t change the good bits, like the sparks when she’d met Mr. Aaron Nash, who was from the east and talked fancy. Oh, hadn’t he swept her right off her feet . . . and right onto her back. He’d been full of pretty dreams, promising to marry her and take her to New York. By then she was working in a whorehouse in St. Louis; she’d colored her hair and was going by the name Seline. She still remembered Mr. Nash’s pretty stories about New York: about snow falling on gaslit streets; about riding in horse-drawn carriages; about theaters and restaurants, dancing girls and lecture halls; about the sunlight glancing off the harbor on hot summer days and sailboats racing to keep the wind. Those stories were the only thing Mr. Nash had left her with when he’d run off. Well, those and a baby in her belly.
There were half a dozen other spark-causers who had turned her head when she was still young enough to hope for better. Each and every one of them talked sweet, enjoyed her body and then left her with nothing but a sore heart. Rory, Mr. Nash, Gerd Schultz, Ennio Salvi, Luke Slater . . . Although if she was honest, Luke had been the only one who’d never promised her the moon: he’d only ever been a nicer-than-normal paying customer; anything more had all been in her imagination. She’d led herself astray that time. And what woman didn’t, when it came to Luke Slater?
And that had been the last time. She’d been done with men after Luke. They were customers and that was all. Anything more hurt too bad. None of them wanted a woman; they just wanted a body. They certainly didn’t want the person who came with the body. The minute she started hampering their fun, they were off like a shot. And she couldn’t take another chip in her heart. It wasn’t even the men who made the worst chips; it was the babies they left her with. The babies who also left her, one by one, some before they’d finished growing, others during childbirth and, worst of all, the ones who lived a day or a week or a month and then succumbed to coughs or fevers or simply died in the night. A heart took a beating from losing babies. It might even get a little twisted, a little crippled. So she’d started taking Dolly’s contraceptive concoction and decided to banish the sparks from her life. They weren’t worth the pain.
Only now here they were again . . . fountains of them swirling through her every time Tom Slater smiled.
Still. What harm could a few sparks do in this situation? Tom Slater thought she was a nun. If you thought about it, it was actually the perfect time to enjoy some sparks. There was no risk. She could tease and flirt, admire those dimples and those shoulders . . . and those eyes . . . and those hard, muscular thighs in those tight dark pants . . . Well, now, there was no harm in it, was there? she thought as her gaze lingered on his legs. She was a nun. The very nature of her nunhood meant everything would stop at a little innocent flirting. There wouldn’t—couldn’t—be any touching, any kissing, any taking things further than darting glances and some teasing. And he sure was fun to tease.
She watched as he helped Anna down the slope. Her heart gave a girlish little skip at his chivalry. She bit her lip. She’d never had much chance to be a regular girl, she thought with a stab of longing. She hadn’t had the chance to sweetly flirt like real girls did, like good girls did. No one had cast cow eyes at her in church or walked her home or asked her daddy if he could come visiting. No one had brought her fresh-picked flowers or written her love notes. No. There hadn’t been youthful courtship for her. Instead, from the age of thirteen, she’d had a sweaty hand shoved over her mouth and a searing pain between her legs.
Don’t think about it.
She wouldn’t think about it. Because once you started, you couldn’t stop. And she wouldn’t let him ruin one more thing in her life. Especially this. Because she was a nun, goddamn it, and nuns were safe. And why the hell shouldn’t she enjoy a spark or two while she was safe?
“I was thinking we should skip the campfire tonight,” Tom suggested softly, so only she could hear. He was squinting back up at the embankment. “We’ve already eaten, and we certainly don’t need it for warmth.”
She frowned, all thoughts of sparks and flirting flying from her. “You’re really that worried about the men?”
“Just a couple of them. I didn’t like the way . . .”
“They were looking at Winnie? Me neither.”
“Winnie?” His eyebrows shot up. “I didn’t like the way they were looking at you. You and Calla both.”
“What?” she squeaked. “But we’re nuns.”
“You thought they were looking at Winnie?” It was getting difficult to see his expression in the gathering purple darkness, but she thought there was a look of pure horror on his face. “What the hell is wrong with people?” he muttered.
Emma thought she should probably say something nunlike there, something about sin or the devil. Jesus had probably said something on the topic of what the hell was wrong with people. If she’d been a proper nun, she might have known what it was.
“Some people are just sons of bitches.” She doubted Jesus had said that. But he should have.
“I’ll stand guard tonight,” Tom reassured her. “I doubt they’ll do anything; they were probably just looking. But you never know. Stu’s moonshine could stir them up. Especially as there ain’t no women in Second Carrot, and I’d bet none of those men have seen a real one in a good long while.” He sighed. “I’m afraid it can be rough out here for women, Sister.”
“It’s rough everywhere for women, Mr. Slater,” she said tartly. “And you can’t keep guard all night. You’ll need to sleep eventually. We can take turns keeping watch.”
“No,” he said shortly. “It’s my job to get you safely to Mexico. I’ll stand watch.”
“Yeah, well, it’s me they’re looking to violate.”
He flinched. By now, he was merely an indigo silhouette in the gathering darkness, but she saw how his silhouette jerked at her words.
“I’m a good shot—you saw me earlier.” She tried to lighten the mood. “I got the silver dollar to prove it.”
He was silent.
“Tom?”
“I’m thinking,” he said shortly. “Fine. You can stand watch. But we’ll do it together. We can keep each other awake. Can you talk to Sister Calla and Doña Anna? They’ll need to be absolutely quiet tonight. And we can’t use lanterns.”
His seriousness gave her a chill. Hell. She didn’t fancy fighting off a bunch of drunken fools. “Maybe we’re worrying for nothing?”
“Maybe. But I’d rather worry for nothing than be caught unawares.”
>
So would she, she thought with a shiver as she made for the tent to warn the others. Calla clearly already had an inkling, as she’d grabbed the shotgun from the wagon and had it loaded and resting on her lap.
“Guess none of us are planning on sleeping tonight,” Emma said mildly.
* * *
• • •
EMMA WAS WOUND tighter than a clock spring for a good couple of hours. Every snapping twig and rustling leaf made her finger tighten on the trigger. And there were noises aplenty as darkness drew in and the nocturnal wildlife foraged by the creek. It was enough to make a girl a nervous wreck. Calla and Anna had Winnie sandwiched between them in the tent, the shotgun in easy reach. They’d all slipped off to sleep pretty quick, despite the tension. Tom had planted himself in front of the tent and was facing the embankment. He leaned against a tree trunk, his revolver resting on his thigh. Emma joined him, perched anxiously on a rock. Distantly, they could hear voices from the direction of Second Carrot; the sound carried clearly through the hot summer air. Even though she couldn’t make out words, the voices sounded fractious.
“Men always sound like they’re arguing when they’re drunk,” Emma whispered.
“That’s because they often are.” There was a smile in Tom’s voice.
“Why is that, do you think?” She was twitchy as all get-out.
“It’s the same with all animals,” he said softly, adjusting his position to get more comfortable. He didn’t seem twitchy at all. “You should see what happens when you get a couple of bull steers together. Especially when there’s females about.”
Emma rolled her eyes. “You reckon they’d stop if they knew the lady cows thought they were stupid for doing it?”
