Sagebrush Bride

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  Alone with a man.

  A strange man, she clarified to herself.

  And an obvious rogue, at that.

  Good night, what would her father have said?

  He’d never have let himself die if he’d thought, for even one second that she’d be so witless! How many times had he warned her to “trust no man unless he’s loaded with ether or dead”? He’d never said as much, but she suspected Angus Bowcock preferred the latter if a man was alone with his daughter. It had been her father, after all, who’d encouraged her lamentable state of dress. At least he had in the beginning. Later, in the last months of his life, he’d insisted that she rid herself of the shapeless garments she’d always worn.

  Gripping the reins progressively tighter, until they whitened the flesh of her palm, she recalled that he’d even bought her a beautiful calico print… so that she would make herself a dress from it. She’d not understood then. But she did now. He’d known then that he was dying, and he’d wanted her to set about finding a man to care for her. Why hadn’t she been able to see it at the time? The sadness in his eyes when he’d come home that day to find the calico neatly quilted, and gracing his own bed. It was all so clear to her… but only now.

  Oh, Papa, she thought, if only you were here. She sighed wistfully. The fact was that he was gone. And he wasn’t coming back. But she thought he might be proud of her, anyhow.

  She’d not even cried when he’d died.

  Dauntlessly she’d stepped into his shoes, and even when the townsfolk had balked because it wasn’t fittin’ for a woman to tend them, she’d not relented. If they preferred to die, then that was their concern. But she’d informed them boldly when their children were ill, but she’d not let their little ones suffer because she wasn’t a man doctor. And in the end, when a man or his loved ones were ailing, it didn’t take much persuasion to make them see things her way. Survival was the name of the game, and if it took a woman to accomplish the task, then so be it.

  Gaining their acceptance had taken quite a while, yet it had been well worth it. Now most everyone in or about Sioux Falls came willingly to her, whether their ailments were big or small. And not for the first time, she felt a pang for leaving them without medical aid. Yet, that she could recall, there were none so sick just now that they couldn’t survive her brief absence. She’d had no choice in the matter, after all, but even if she had planned when she would leave, it was doubtful she could have found someone to replace her in such short time. Still, she would have tried. And then worried when she couldn’t—and in the end, would have wasted precious time.

  She did have that much to thank Cutter for, she reflected, and stole another glance at his back. He had, at least, taken that weighty decision out of her hands. And that led her to another thought entirely.

  How was it that he had gotten her to thinking this was all her idea? And worrying when she thought he’d left her stranded? She wouldn’t put it past him to have planned the entire thing! Right down to the last detail!

  Lost in thought as she was, she was completely unprepared when a bird swooped down before her, spooking her mare. Instinctively her hands tightened on the reins, startling Cocoa. The mare edged backward, huffing and snorting mutinously. Before Elizabeth could even scream for help, she was tossed headfirst. Landing with a squeal on the ground, she rolled and lay unmoving where she fell.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Intending to catch her mare before it trampled her to death, Cutter snatched her reins and calmed Cocoa. That done, he leapt off his own mount and rushed to where Elizabeth lay, skidding the last two feet on his knees, halting at her side.

  Her eyes were wide open, but she didn’t so much as bat a lash. Anxiously he passed a hand over her eyes. She blinked suddenly and turned to him, her eyes misting, and his heart jolted back to life. Releasing the breath he’d not realized he’d held, he asked softly, “You all right, Lizbeth?”

  Elizabeth nodded, taking the hand he offered. Using it for support, she hauled herself upright.

  Seeing that she wasn’t injured, Cutter didn’t bother to conceal his displeasure. “What is it with you and horses that lands you square on your ass every time?”

  To his alarm, a solitary tear rolled down her dusty cheek, leaving a dirty, wet trail in its wake. “Well, hell, you are hurt!” he growled. “Show me where!”

  With her throat parched and too thick to speak, Elizabeth shook her head helplessly, sniffing back tears. “I’m… I’m not,” she insisted. But her lip began to tremble traitorously, and then, to her dismay, she broke into sobs. It was as though all the pain she’d been harboring in the months since her father’s death surfaced in that miserable moment as Cutter glowered down upon her. Mortified, she hid her face in her hands.

  Obviously awkward with her tears, Cutter sat firmly on his backside, and placed a hand to her back, rubbing soothingly. “Come on, now, bright eyes, don’t go sheddin’ tears on me now,” he told her, urging her closer, into the space between his legs. She didn’t need much prodding. With a smothered sob, she leaned into his arms, burying her wet face against his shirt, and driving him backward with the impact of her delicious little body. Teetering with her weight, Cutter pulled her into his lap as gently as though she were a china doll.

  Grateful for the comfort Cutter was giving, but ashamed of her disgraceful outburst, Elizabeth concealed her face against his chest and wept silently, her shoulders quaking softly.

  She clutched at his shirt as though it were her salvation, and Cutter could do nothing but sit and soothe her while she unwittingly tugged his shirttails out of his denims.

  He wasn’t quite certain why she was weeping so passionately, and felt a stab of guilt for worrying about his shirt. The thing was, if she pulled any harder, it was like to rip in two, and he didn’t have but the two—this one and the one in his saddlebag.

  Moving closer, he tried to ease the fatal tension on his favorite shirt. Wrapping his arms around her, he stroked her back reassuringly, and despite his resolve not to yield to his baser instincts, his britches grew snug as his body responded to the woman leaning so intimately into his arms.

  Damned if she didn’t smell good.

  Clenching his jaw, he fought the urge to lift her face up, kiss her tears away, because he knew exactly where it would lead if he did. It didn’t matter where they were. His body didn’t know the difference between a feather-fluffed mattress and the dirt-hard ground. But she would. And somehow, it mattered.

  He’d promised her nothing last night, and he sure as hell didn’t harbor any noble sentiments, but he wanted it to be right between them when it happened. And it would happen, without a doubt, but first he wanted her trust.

  And her unconditional surrender.

  Swallowing with difficulty, he pressed his lips down into her hair, while his hand caressed her. Moving up her arm, his fingers tightened around her shoulders, and then he froze, forbidding himself to go any further.

  “Lizbeth,” he said hoarsely. “Are y’ hurt, gal?”

  Her tears continued to flow into his shirt, but she managed to shake her head in answer. Cutter took a deep breath, dismissing the warm female scent of her. “What is it, then?” He glanced over his shoulder, catching sight of their horses a few feet away. Turning back to her, he assured, “There’s nothing to be ashamed of, bright eyes. Everyone takes a fall now and again. Hell, I’ve even done it once or twice.” So what if it wasn’t true? he argued with himself. She didn’t have to know, did she? He stroked the back of her head as he would a child, his fingers sliding down the length of her braid. He’d been disappointed this morning to find her once again withdrawn behind her prudish mask.

  She nodded, and he could tell that she’d opened her eyes as well, because he could feel her lashes fluttering through his wet shirt. It was then that he realized she wasn’t wearing her specs any longer, and he immediately searched the ground for them. He grimaced when he found them only a few inches away, one lens cracked and the frames bent beyond re
pair.

  “Next time,” he apprised her, not knowing how to break the news, “don’t keep such a death grip on the reins. If you hadn’t been strangling the damned Cayuse, she wouldn’t have spilled you.”

  Still clutching at his shirt, Elizabeth tilted her face up suddenly to look at him with watery eyes. She didn’t know what to say to that. “I wasn’t strangling my horse!” But even as she said it, she wasn’t certain it was the truth. Her fingers still ached from holding the reins. “Good lord! Jo was right!” she snapped. “You are an insensitive oaf!”

  Cutter’s brows lifted. “That so?” he asked dispassionately, but he reached out to wipe her damp cheek with his thumb.

  At once, Elizabeth recoiled from his touch. Catching his hand, she turned it toward her to see what had chafed the sensitive skin beneath her eye. Confusion first, then horror, accosted her as she examined his severely scarred fingers.

  His brows collided violently as he snatched his hand out of her grip. “Don’t ask,” he warned, before she could.

  Elizabeth only stared at him.

  A peculiar look stole into his eyes, shuttering his emotions. “It ain’t none of your damned business!” he told her. “Chrissakes, you want something to worry over, worry over your specs.” Reaching out, he scooped them up, and without preamble, dropped them into her hand. “They’re broke.”

  “Oh noooo!” Elizabeth swiped at the wetness on her face with the tips of her fingers. “Nooooo!” she moaned. “Do you realize how long I’ve had these?” she cried in panic. Forgetting everything else for the moment, including her chagrin, she squinted while she inspected them anxiously.

  Eyeing her skeptically as she labored over the frames, Cutter shrugged, giving her a wry twist of his lips. “No,” he said, “but reckon I could take a wild guess and come damned close.”

  Desperately Elizabeth tried to straighten the wire framework, but try as she might, they wouldn’t be forced. “They were my father’s before me,” she explained as she worked.

  “No kidding?”

  Elizabeth gave him a sharp glance—her mistake, because once she looked into his deep, dark eyes, she couldn’t look away. She felt snared. Lord, he was handsome. Too handsome for words. Those lips of his… those eyes… Heaven help her, every time she looked at him, he grew more striking. No man had a right to look that way. Had she hoped for one moment that he would look at her with anything more than pity? Her heart plummeted into her stomach. Her shoulders slumped. She hadn’t realized the pressure she was putting on her spectacles until one slender arm came off into her hand. “No!” she cried. “Oh, no… What am I supposed to do now?”

  Cutter snatched them from her. “Frankly, I didn’t think you needed ‘em all that much,” he told her.

  Elizabeth’s brow creased with worry as her gaze reverted to the specs in his hand, and Cutter felt a sudden inexplicable urge to smooth her distress away. But recalling the look of revulsion she’d given him when she’d discovered his fingers, he refrained from touching her again. “Seems to me you see well enough without them,” he said curtly.

  “Up close I see as well as you,” she conceded, watching his efforts with growing concern. “But not distances… and I can’t read long without getting a headache.”

  Elizabeth gasped.

  It was as though she suddenly became aware of the impropriety of their position, because she immediately detached herself from him. The fact that she couldn’t seem to get away fast enough burned Cutter’s gut.

  He shoved the spectacles back into her hand, meeting her gaze. “I can’t do a blamed thing with them.”

  She was sitting on her knees, her skirt caught beneath her, hands on her thighs, her expression ashen. For the longest instant their gazes held. She wet her lips nervously, her pink little tongue darting out to moisten her bottom lip, and desire clawed at Cutter from the inside out. Despite his anger.

  “You sure you’re not hurt?” he asked.

  Elizabeth nodded quickly.

  “Good.”

  Her brows drew together at his tone. “You don’t have to sound so displeased over the fact.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Cutter shouted suddenly, throwing his hands up. “What the hell do you want me to say?”

  Elizabeth flinched at his tone, but didn’t back down. “And you don’t have to curse at me, either!” she shot back, her voice rising.

  “Damn me, if you ain’t as contrary as that cow-eyed Cayuse of yours!”

  “Well! Then why do you wanna help me if you hate me so much?” she wanted to know.

  “I’ve been asking myself that same question!” Cutter told her. “Over and over! Hell, I dunno! Maybe I was lame brained enough to think you’d appreciate it. Maybe I did it for Jo! She seems to care for you so friggin’ much I thought you cared right back! Reckon I was wrong.”

  “No!” Elizabeth retorted. “No!” And then composing herself, she said more calmly, her expression pained, “You weren’t wrong. I do care about Jo. She’s my best friend.” A little softer now. “The closest one I’ve ever had.”

  A thick silence fell between them. As they stared at each other, something passed between them, a connection neither understood, much less felt at ease with.

  Elizabeth was the first to break eye contact. Nervously, catching her lower lip between her teeth, she glanced down at her trembling knees, then back up again to see that Cutter was still watching her intently. His expression was thoughtful, as though he were questioning her somehow, or himself, and didn’t like the answers he found.

  Well, she didn’t care if he didn’t like her, she told herself. She didn’t like him either! Unsure what to say in that moment, she only knew that she couldn’t take his cutting looks and cantankerous disposition any longer. “For Jo’s sake,” she began sourly, “do you think… do you think that perhaps we could call a truce? At least until St. Louis?” Puzzling as it was, she wanted the other Cutter back—the man he’d seemed to be when she’d first met him. “You’ll be rid of me then,” she appealed when his eyes narrowed slightly.

  As she reminded him of the fact that she planned to hire someone else once they reached their destination, Cutter’s jaw tensed, but he nodded slightly in response. Rid of her? He doubted he ever would be, but yeah, he could, and needed to, for the sake of the journey, call a truce.

  “All right,” he agreed, his voice hoarse. “Truce it is. But you’re gonna have to carry your weight, Doc, and you can’t be fighting me at every turn. When I tell you to do something, you do it. Trust me to know what’s right. Agreed?”

  “Agreed.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  It was an uneasy truce at best, Elizabeth realized by the following day. Little enough had been said between them as they’d set up camp that first night. Yet that had more than suited her at the time. There had been far too much on her mind for idle chatter.

  And despite his charge that she was to carry her own weight, Cutter took care of every last detail, from hunting down a meal to setting up the bedrolls, making her do nothing but sit like a ninny on her backside. She was certain that he’d done so as a consideration to her, because of her fall. But his manner had been brusque the entire evening, never inviting conversation, even had she considered it. She did not, however, and had thought little of it until now.

  By late afternoon she began to suspect that Cutter was regretting their arrangement, and she felt like sending his brooding self to blazes for making her feel so guilty. This had certainly not been her idea! It had, in fact, been his. And now that he had managed to convince her that it was the best solution, she wasn’t about to let him off so easily. How dare he even consider it, anyway? She was not, she assured herself, about to feel guilty!

  As of yet, there had been few words spoken between them. And then only out of necessity. Such as when she’d asked to stop so that she could relieve herself—another thing she’d not anticipated. She doubted she’d ever get used to having to share that embarrassing detail with another human being, mu
ch less a man—less Cutter McKenzie!

  True, she was a doctor, and such things were supposed to be familiar to her, but for some reason, even the thought of Cutter knowing of that very private… act discomfited her. Especially since he seemed to be particularly amused by it. What he should find so entertaining, Elizabeth was sure she didn’t know.

  In his defense, he had, upon several occasions, asked after her comfort, and she took heart in that. And then her lips twisted as she recalled the first time he’d inquired. In spite of her sore bottom, she’d promptly assured him that she was just fine, but the crimson stains on her cheeks had given her away. Noting them, Cutter had smiled his very first smile of the; day, and then had offered his hat… saying with false gravity that the sun was burning her skin even as he watched. The rat! Certainly he was no gentleman for pointing out her blushing, that much was certain.

  But then he’d never claimed to be, had he?

  Grudgingly she’d accepted his offer, gritting her teeth as she snatched the confounded hat out of his grasp. The only other time she tried to encourage conversation, he practically bit her head off. She merely asked him why his horse only had half a right ear.

  “Someone’s idea of a practical joke,” he snarled.

  Elizabeth’s face contorted. “Well, I certainly don’t think that’s very funny,” she assured him.