Daisy jolted awake and sat up in the bed, forcing her bleary eyes to focus on her surroundings. She frowned, disoriented in the darkening room.
Her gaze flicked to the windows, the curtains pulled back. Dusk had fallen and washed the barren landscape in a burnished hue. Not the Circle 46. Not her room at the JDB.
She pinched her eyes shut and hung her head as the past day’s events came rushing back. Just yesterday morning she’d slipped from Trey’s arms so she could have a few moments alone at her daddy’s grave.
Her intentions had seemed so harmless then. Her decision whether to marry Trey so great.
He didn’t love her. That hadn’t changed. But her feelings for him were far stronger. However, he’d never know as long as she was being held on the Lazy 8.
She had to get out of here. If Jarvis wouldn’t let her go, she’d have to take her chances and escape.
Daisy crawled from the bed and padded to the window, the tiles cool on her feet. There was nothing on the horizon but a vast expanse of mesquite and scrub. Which way should she run?
The knock on her door startled her. She whirled and stared at the carved wood, but it remained closed.
“Yes,” she said at last.
“I’ve drawn you a bath,” Ava said. “I laid out clean clothes for you as well.”
The gesture touched her. She did want to get clean, but she was still leery of stripping to the skin.
Daisy ran a hand over her knotted hair and crossed to the door. She opened it to find Ava standing there, her face serene. The little boy hid behind her skirts again.
“The bathing chamber is this way.” Ava started down the hall and Daisy hesitated a moment before following.
The house was quiet except for the clack of heels on the tiles again. But the scent of meat roasting drifted on the air, teasing her appetite awake.
She’d eaten little the past twenty-four hours. When she left, she’d have another long stretch with little to nothing in her stomach. So she’d better get her fill now and shore up her strength.
“Will you need help?” Ava asked after she led Daisy into the small room set off for bathing.
“I can manage fine.”
This room was as antiquated as the one at the Circle 46, with only a copper tub and water hauled in. But the door had a lock, and Ava had scented the water with roses.
“Supper will be ready in an hour,” Ava said.
She closed the door and Daisy quickly turned the key. An extra bucket of hot water sat on a stool near the tub, likely for her to rinse her hair. In this drought that was an extravagance she looked forward to enjoying.
Though she would’ve liked nothing better than to soak her aching body for an hour, she made quick work of her bath. She couldn’t afford to get too comfortable here. Couldn’t let herself be lulled into thinking she was a guest at this ranch.
When she was clean and dressed in Ava’s gaily woven skirt and peasant blouse, she returned to her room. She crossed to the windows and sat in the dappled light to brush her hair dry, then wound it in a knot.
The smells coming from the kitchen were more intense, so she knew supper must be ready. Might as well play along with this charade for now. Her time for escape would come later.
Besides, she needed to know exactly where this ranch was so she’d know which way to flee.
She found Ava in the dining room setting colorful plates on the trestle table. The clatter coming from the kitchen confirmed they had a cook who was busy at work.
“It smells wonderful,” Daisy said. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Ava smiled and shook her head. “I’m done here, and Manuela is ready to serve.”
Daisy noted places set for three people. “Who will join us?”
“Just you, me, and Egan. Might as well take your seat. He’ll be in directly.”
“Oh, I just thought ...” She bit back the words and shook her head, not wishing to cause Ava embarrassment. “I didn’t mean to pry.”
“You didn’t,” Ava said. “I’m not married. In fact my son’s father is dead.”
“I’m sorry.” And she was for broaching this subject no matter how lightly.
The less she knew about their personal lives the better. She took the chair on the side of the table and eased onto it.
Ava slid onto the chair beside her and looked at her then, but instead of lingering grief, anger darkened the young woman’s eyes. “He died the month before I found out I was with child, but he’d have married me. Egan would’ve seen that he did.”
Just like her daddy would’ve jabbed a shotgun in Trey’s back and made him do right by her and the baby she’d carried. In his stead, she feared Dade would try to do the same thing.
She shook her head, because much had gone wrong from the start for her and Trey.
If she hadn’t lost her child—if Ned had succeeded in killing Trey—she’d have been just like Ava. A single mother living under a relative’s protection.
“Have you ever lost someone you loved?” Ava asked.
Daisy nodded. “My daddy just died this spring.” She toyed with the linen and blinked at the sudden moisture stinging her eyes. “I lost my baby the month before.”
“What about your man?” Ava asked.
She shook her head. “I thought he was lost to me thanks to Ned’s treachery. But he survived and came back.” She lifted her gaze to Ava’s and the anger had been replaced with empathy. “He doesn’t know about the baby. I meant to tell him yesterday morning but ...”
Ned had abducted her. And now she was in the hands of his killer. A mysterious rancher with a dark past, she feared.
Ava slid her hand toward Daisy’s, her touch comforting as nothing else had been in ages. She turned her hand over and accepted the younger woman’s friendship, commiseration. Bond.
That was it. They shared a bond that only they understood. That sparked another memory of her being on a train, clasping hands with another girl. Was her name Maggie? Yes! She was sure of it, just as sure as the name Dade had felt right to her.
“How did you end up with Egan?” Ava asked, popping the fleeting memory that had come close to forming this time.
Daisy blew out a shaky breath. “It’s a long story.”
“We’ve got time.”
And so she told Ava a shortened version of waking early. Of her decision to visit her daddy’s grave and of Ned surprising her. The rest was a blur of fear and agony rolled together.
Ava didn’t comment about her brother’s actions. Didn’t bat an eye that he’d killed a man.
“I wish that I could have visited my man’s grave,” Ava said. “But he died outside of Cimarron and was buried there.”
“He’s gone, Ava,” Jarvis said, startling them both. “Best thing you can do is put it from your mind and move on.”
He pulled back the chair at the head of the table and sat. Daisy found it difficult to look away from him. Gone was the growth of black whiskers that had made him look like a desperado.
Clean-shaven and wearing a suit coat and trousers, he looked every inch the gentleman rancher. He’d even donned a bolo tie fashioned with silver bobs and a large turquoise set in silver.
“He’d still be here if you hadn’t hired on as detective cowboys for that big outfit. And for what? You didn’t even get paid in the end.”
“Enough, Ava,” Egan said. “Miss Daisy doesn’t need to know every detail of our lives. However, now that you’ve apprised her on your personal life, perhaps she’d be good enough to tell us about herself. Starting with her real name.”
He was right. It was only fair that she divulge that.
“I was raised in an orphanage,” she said.
“What happened to your kin?” Ava asked.
She thought back to the story Trey had told her. It still seemed as if it had happened to someone else.
“After my mother and her baby died in childbirth, my father couldn’t care for me and my brother, so he took us to the orphanage.�
�� Daisy worried her hands and frowned, Trey’s rendition casting a window on her own failed memory of the big brick building that always seemed cold.
“The Guardian Angel’s Orphan Asylum. That’s where my brother and I got separated,” she said.
“Never heard of it before,” Egan said.
She looked at him, expecting to see doubt instead of interest. “It’s in Pennsylvania, not far from our home in Kentucky.”
That explanation tumbled out, surprising her. Could it be true? Had she remembered more about her past?
Maybe that was the shack she sometimes saw herself huddled in, scared and crying.
“Were you one of the children sent west on the orphan train?” Egan asked, his knowledge of such another surprise.
“Yes.”
She pressed her fingertips to her temples, trying to focus on that memory. If only she was alone ...
“What was your birth name?” Egan asked.
“Logan,” she said, trying to hold on to that old memory.
To her surprise, Ava’s gesture of friendship had jogged that memory buried deep in her. She remembered Maggie. Remembered their girlhood vow that when they each held their own hands tight together when they were alone, it was like holding onto a friend.
Whatever happened to her? Had Maggie ever thought of her? Or had she forgotten Daisy?
The cook bustled into the dining room with platters laden with food. Yet Egan continued to stare at her.
“That brother of yours in Texas?” Egan asked.
She shook her head, feeling sad that her life continued to be a series of upsets. That she’d been removed from the one she loved again.
“I haven’t seen Dade since I was six or seven.” And sadly she still couldn’t bring his face to mind.
Egan pushed back in his chair, a dark scowl drifting over his features. “Dade Logan. I’ve heard of him. Crossed paths with your father and his gang once.”
She wasn’t surprised, since he was in that deadly brotherhood of outlaws as well. But she kept that opinion to herself. Insulting him would get her nowhere.
“What do you know of Dade?”
He commenced filling his plate, saying nothing. Ignoring her, she thought. He’d found out what he wanted to know and nothing else mattered to him.
“Heard he’s the sheriff up in a little town in Colorado.”
“Is that far from here?” she asked, hoping her curiosity came off as just that instead of an attempt at judging which distance was shorter—returning to Texas and Trey or running to her brother for help.
He rocked back in his chair and stared at her—looked through her, really. “It’s a good day’s ride from here over rugged country.”
“Where is here?” she asked, wanting him to pinpoint it, to give her an idea where she was at.
His mouth pulled into an amused smile. Even his dark eyes gleamed.
“New Mexico, Miss Logan,” he said. “You don’t know about your real father, then?”
“I’ve been told he’s an outlaw,” she said. “I’ve no interest in the man.”
He bobbed his head. “Just as well. A bounty hunter rounded up his gang a while back. Clete Logan got away, but not for long.”
So her real father was dead. She went still, waiting a moment for some emotion to touch her. But she couldn’t feel anything for him, not even pity.
Her only living blood kin was Dade, and he was a stranger.
“Must you be so callous?” Ava said, breaking the tense silence. “Daisy has suffered enough without you adding to her woes.”
“Life is full of suffering,” he said. “You ought to know that.”
Ava glared at her brother, clearly at odds with him. Would she have had to deal with something similar if she’d not been separated from Dade?
“Daisy recently lost the father who raised her. She’s been ailing too,” she added, sliding Daisy a knowing look.
He turned to Daisy. “What’s wrong with you?”
She was not about to tell this man that she’d lost her baby. She wasn’t going to tell him anything of her personal life, for he’d be the type to use it against her.
But Ava seemed intent on standing on her own soapbox of discontent. “She’s pining away for the man she was taken from. He’ll be looking for her, Egan. Mark my words he won’t give up on her.”
“Shit! Is that the truth?”
Daisy nodded, her eyes watering and her throat thick with emotion. “I was with my beau when Ned Durant abducted me.”
“You have to let her go,” Ava said.
Egan shook his head. “Can’t risk it. She knows too much.”
“I’ll never tell a soul,” Daisy vowed. “Please, let me go home.”
But the rigid set of his jaw told her he wasn’t about to relent.
“What will you do when he tracks her here?” Ava asked. “Shoot him? Is that what our lives have come down to?”
“Would you rather see me hang?” Egan asked her. “Would you want your son taken from you because the law decided you were an outlaw as well?”
“No,” Ava said, then more softly, “I’d never do anything to harm you or Cory.”
Nor would Daisy want her to. But the helplessness of her situation sparked anger deep inside her.
She’d always been the one put upon. Taken from her home, her family, from her loved ones. Shuffled amongst strangers who looked her over like an item the storekeeper would put on sale. Something to get rid of, that had outlived its time. Something—someone that nobody else wanted.
They’d even taken her memory so her past was a dark fog that she couldn’t see through.
A black cloud of doom shrouded her when she thought of Trey losing his life trying to rescue her. She’d sooner get shot herself escaping than witness his murder.
Which would likely be the case, because it wouldn’t be easy to escape this prison.
“What you do away from the ranch is one thing,” Ava said, her voice surprisingly strong. “But I don’t want Cory seeing bloodshed. I don’t want him knowing what you do.”
A ruddy flush streaked across Egan’s cheeks. “You move into town and people will ask questions.”
“Then I’ll take Manuela and go to her village.”
“You would choose to live in squalor because you want to coddle your son?”
“I’m protecting him from men like you. As for squalor, they live honestly, Egan.”
“Fine. I’ll have the buggy hitched in the morning. When it’s over, I’ll send a man to the village.”
“Thank you,” Ava said, her features emotionless.
Daisy wanted to protest, but there was no use. She didn’t even blame Ava for wanting to get her child out of here. Didn’t fault her for not wanting to see her brother kill a man and maybe a woman as well.
If Trey was dead, killed because of her, she didn’t know if she could go on.
With Ava leaving the ranch, it would be twice as hard for her to escape. That left her one choice. She’d have to risk it tonight and hope she found Trey before he tracked her here.
Daisy sat in her room in the dark, waiting for the house to go silent. Even when the lights were all out and Ava and Egan had taken to their rooms, she continued her vigil by the window.
She couldn’t make a mistake now. She had to leave soon, before Trey tracked her here. Before he walked into certain death.
The first rumble of Egan’s snoring brought a smile to her face. He was finally asleep. She could slip out the window and disappear into the night. But before she could make a move, her door opened, and a slender, shadowy figure slipped inside.
Ava. If she’d come a moment later, she’d have discovered Daisy gone.
“We have to talk,” Ava said in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Is something wrong?” she asked, keeping her voice pitched low as well.
“Yes, my brother’s way of thinking,” Ava said. “Tomorrow morning, you’ll leave with my son and Manuela. Her family’s village is s
outh of here up in the mountains. But once you get to the village, you are free to head to Texas and your home.”
The plan sounded like a godsend with one exception. “Everyone on the ranch will know it’s me instead of you leaving.”
“No, they won’t. My buggy will be waiting outside with one of the younger Mexicans tending it. Manuela will take Cory and get in, and you’ll take my place.” Ava grabbed her upper arms. “You do know how to drive a buggy?”
“Yes, that’s no problem.” It could work. She could get out of here with relative ease. “Manuela knows the way?”
Ava nodded. “She’ll guide you. All you have to do is drive the buggy.”
The troubled snoring next door ceased, and both women went silent. Time seemed to stand still before Egan resumed the discordant snoring.
“I’ve packed a valise with the outfit you had on when you arrived and a few items to make do until you get back to your home.”
Daisy took Ava’s hands in hers. “Thank you for doing this. Your brother will be furious when he discovers what you’ve done.”
“That he will, but I won’t feel as if I betrayed a friendship. You’ll be safe and with your man soon.”
And right back to trying to decide what to do. Marry him on his terms or walk away.
“As soon as Egan leaves in the morning, I’ll hurry in here so we can exchange clothes. All right?”
Daisy nodded. “Yes, I’ll do exactly as you say.”
Chapter 17
Trey crouched on the rocky bluff overlooking the Lazy 8 and studied the layout of the ranch. The first tracks had petered out on him, and he had ended up on a ranch in the next county.
When he’d told the old rancher he was tracking a good half dozen men who’d taken a woman, the man had told him about this place tucked back here in this valley. Warned him to be careful too if he decided to pay the owner a visit.
According to him, Egan Jarvis wasn’t at all sociable. The place was well guarded. Too guarded for a run of the mill cattle operation.
The ranch was a fine spread, but the mix of beeves was a sure sign that the owner wasn’t choosy about what breed he ran. Or maybe it was because he acquired them by less than legal means.
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