by Stacey Kayne
He broke away from her kiss and practically had to peel her off him.
“Salina,” he said, easing back on the settee, feeling rather suffocated. “I’m not one for mincing words, so I’m going to come right out and ask.”
“Yes?” she said, licking her lips as her face lit with a smile.
“Are you looking to be courted or do you just want a quick tumble?”
Her eyes widened. A flush rose into her cheeks as she eased away from him. “To be courted.”
“I’m no expert on the matter, but I’m pretty sure that starts with some talking.”
“Well, I suppose I’ve never truly been courted.”
“Ol’ Jameson didn’t woo you with candy and flowers?” he asked, amused by the notion. He’d only met Harlan Jameson on a few occasions. The weathered rancher had struck Chance as a tough hombre if he’d ever known one.
“Harlan rode into the yard where I was hanging the wash and said he was looking to take a wife. He asked. I accepted. We were wed that afternoon.”
“Love at first sight, huh?”
“He did ride in like a savior,” she said, her lips quirking with a smile. “I’d never been off the farm, much less had the opportunity to meet any suitors.”
“You were raised on a farm? I wouldn’t have guessed.”
“My mother was a school teacher before she birthed enough children to fill a schoolhouse. We were well educated, and dirt poor. I might have only been seventeen when I met Harlan, but I knew freedom when it knocked on my door.”
“Freedom? That’s not a term I’ve ever equated to marriage.”
“It was for me. I grew up in a sod house with eleven other siblings. I always knew I was meant for better things. Harlan gave that to me. I intend to hold on to it.”
She didn’t hide her motivation for wanting his name. “I can respect that,” he said, thinking this might indeed be the solution he needed. She wasn’t looking for love, and neither was he. If he was going to take a wife, he didn’t need a mess of emotion to go along with it.
He stood, picking his hat up from the floor. “I should be going.”
Salina surged up beside him. “So soon?”
“I think we’ve made a good start, and work comes early.”
“Am I to assume we’re courting, then?”
He stared into eyes the color of mud, and couldn’t help but think of Cora Mae. If she wanted reassurance, he’d give it to her. “I suppose so,” he said, tucking a finger beneath Salina’s pointed chin, tilting her face up as he leaned in to kiss her. He touched her lips lightly with his, then backed toward the door.
“Can I expect to see you again soon?”
“Doubt it.”
Disappointment darkened her eyes. “Do you intend a long courtship?”
“I’m not one for rushing into things, and we’re in the midst of spring roundup. This is a real busy time for us.”
She nodded, her brow pinched in a frown. “I understand. Things are quite busy for me as well.”
Taking that as an agreement, he turned to leave. As he opened the front door, a sudden question sprang to his mind. “Salina,” he said, glancing back, “what’s Wyatt to you?”
“He’s my foreman,” she said, smiling gently.
“Should things work out between us, he’ll have to go.”
The instant tension in her delicate features wasn’t an agreement. “He’s the most experienced cattleman I have.”
“There are men on my ranch who’ve worked cattle longer than he’s been tugging on his own boots. Men I trust. If we merge our land I’ll likely put a couple of them in charge of ranging while we smooth out a system.”
“But…we’d live here, wouldn’t we?”
He glanced around the Victorian-style house that suited him like a summer rash. “None of this needs to be decided right away,” he said, sliding his hat over his hair. “You have a good evening.”
Chance made his way down the front steps, trying to assure himself he was doing the right thing for everyone. Stepping up into his saddle, he glanced around the quiet yard. Could he live here, over an hour away from his own ranch?
His gut burning, he guided his large buckskin toward home.
As Star ambled through Lazy J pasture, toward the canyons leading to his valley, Chance couldn’t shake another truth. Sitting in that house only emphasized everything he admired in Cora Mae. The way she felt wrapped in his arms, how she fit so easily into their family, the way she smelled of sweet scents from the kitchen. Not to mention how pretty she looked coated in mud. She’d certainly been a worthy opponent in the mud fight.
He grinned at the thought. If he wanted to be honest with himself, he’d realize Cora Mae as a woman wasn’t so different from the Cora Mae he’d loved as a kid. Maybe he had been letting his hatred toward her mother sour his perception.
Soured perceptions didn’t have a damn thing to do with his attraction to her. Every time he felt himself getting close to her, his mind and body went haywire. Having an attraction he couldn’t control was playing havoc with his temper.
Star sidestepped and nickered, the warning jerking him from his thoughts as something landed around his shoulders.
Oh, hell.
A rope cinched tight, yanking him straight back out of the saddle. He pounded against the ground. His stomach lodged in his lungs, a dozen hands descended upon him.
Son of a bitch!
An ambush.
Chapter Eleven
P inned down, the rope around his shoulders tightened over his neck as another burned the skin of his wrists.
“Light the torch!”
Even with his face pressed to the grass and a ringing in his ears, Chance recognized Wyatt’s voice. A torch hissed, the flash of light blinding him.
Released, Chance sat back on his heels. Squinting against the orange glow, mindful of the rope chafing his neck and trailing down his back, he tested the binding around his wrists. Four wide-eyed cattlemen stood around him, their bandannas still pulled over their mouths and noses like a bunch of bank robbers.
“Ah, hell,” one muttered. “He’s a Morgan.”
No wonder Salina’s place had been so quiet. Her crew had been out playing cowboys and bandits. And he’d been the fool strolling through the moonlight with his head lost in the stars.
Wyatt stepped into the circle of light, his expression nothing short of gleeful. “Well, well, well. Look what we have here.” He glanced around at his crew, who didn’t seem to share his excitement. “Told you boys we’d catch us a rustler.”
“Rustler?” Chance shifted up, onto his feet.
The group before him took a step back. Cowards, the lot of them. He continued to tug discreetly at the rope binding his hands, checking for weakness. Unfortunately, Wyatt’s cowhands seemed to have a talent for tying secure knots. No doubt the noose around his neck had been tied to perfection.
“How do you like being attacked without any warning?” asked Wyatt.
“What are you talking about? When I found you in town, I called you by name before I knocked you on your ass.”
“You’re not so tough now,” Wyatt scoffed, taking a step toward him.
“Yeah?” Chance growled through clenched teeth. “Keep walking and we’ll find out.”
Wyatt didn’t take another step. “Maybe we should drop you from a tree branch and test that noose.”
Chance glanced at Wyatt’s confused crew.
“He’s not the rustler, Wyatt,” one of them said, still hiding behind his bandanna.
“He’s on Lazy J land,” said Wyatt.
“No kidding. How else am I supposed to get to Salina’s ranch? Even if I was out here looking for cattle, they’re likely to be mine! You’ve been skimming off our herd for months.”
Wyatt’s eyes narrowed. “Why would you be at the ranch?”
“That’s between me and your boss.”
“You went to see Salina?”
“I did.”
A stilln
ess came over Wyatt, one that Chance recognized immediately. The cold rage in Wyatt’s eyes told him what Salina hadn’t.
She had lied to him.
“Put him on a horse,” Wyatt ordered.
With a noose still tight around his neck and trees rooted all around? Like hell! “Save them the trouble and cut me loose.”
“I don’t think so.” Wyatt shook his head, a slow smile tilting his lips. He strolled forward, keeping his voice low. “So goddamn smug. Riding around these hills like you’re God’s gift to the world.”
Chance didn’t know what he was talking about. He rode around these hills trying to make a living, just like every other man.
“I’ve enjoyed it, you know. Getting paid to knock you down a few notches. If you think you’re going to ride in and just steal my woman, you’re sadly mistaken.”
“If she’s your woman, why’s she hunting me down like I’m the last man in Wyoming?”
Wyatt stiffened as though lashed by a whip.
“She still won’t want you, you know. Killing me won’t make you any less of a penniless cowpoke.”
“She can’t get enough of me! Hope that’s a comfort to you while you’re burning in hell.”
“Don’t fool yourself into thinking I’d be going alone. My brother wouldn’t rest until he’d killed every last one of you.” The truth in those words sent the pain crashing through Chance. Tucker didn’t deserve to have more bloodshed on his hands. He didn’t deserve to continually suffer because of Chance’s mistakes.
“I said put him on a horse!” Wyatt shouted.
The men standing behind him in the circle of light didn’t rush forward.
Ira Preston, son of a shopkeeper in Slippery Gulch, pulled his bandanna from his mouth. “Wyatt, he’s a Morgan.”
“I know who he is! Get him on a goddamn horse!”
Chance tensed as one of the men followed his orders and fetched his Palomino. Wyatt wasn’t the first man eager to stomp Chance into an early grave, but as four men closed in on him, this was all starting to feel too damn close for comfort.
“I don’t know about this, Wyatt.” Ira stood back, holding the torch, his frantic eyes searching the darkness for signs of backup Chance dearly wished had been there.
“You won’t get away with this,” Chance said with exaggerated impatience, carefully watching the men circling him like a pack of wolves. He twisted his wrists, fearfully aware of the pile of rope near his feet and trailing down his back. “We’re on Lazy J land.”
“It’s a big ranch,” said Wyatt. “We get all kinds of trespassers through here.”
Watching the men at his sides close in, Chance shook his head. “Your inexperience is gonna get you all killed.”
“His brother really was a man hunter,” said Ira.
“And nothing’s easier to track than sloppy vermin.”
“Shut up!” Wyatt shouted.
Two sets of hands closed over his arms. Chance stood stiffly in their grip. One of Wyatt’s men, Nigel, led a tall palomino toward him.
Seeming confident his cronies had a hold on Chance, Wyatt stepped close. “Mount up.”
Chance shoved back with his feet, letting the men beside him support his weight as he planted his boots in the center of Wyatt’s scrawny chest. Wyatt flew back and landed flat on the ground. Twisting in the grip of the others, Chance slammed his forehead into the nose of the man on his right, rattling his own skull as the man’s nose cracked. Blood gushed as he yelped and staggered back.
With his next step, Chance slammed his knee against the third man, doubling him over as his family jewels ricocheted into his gut. His hands slid from Chance’s sleeve as he fell to the ground, coughing and gasping.
Chance stumbled back. Three men on the ground, the fourth trying to calm his skittish horse, Chance glanced at Ira.
The cowhand threw the torch into the grass. “I quit!” The flame hissed in the damp grass and went out, leaving them in darkness. “I don’t get paid enough for this,” Ira shouted, his boots beating a hard path toward their horses.
Chance stared into the darkness, listening to the groaning of one man, the faint whispers of another.
Something jerked him back, yanking him upward. The coarse fibers of the noose burned into his throat, pinching off his windpipe.
“Tug, damn it!” Wyatt shouted, and he realized Wyatt had gotten hold of the rope and tossed it over a branch. “There’s more than one way to hang a man.”
Chance’s body strained up, his heels leaving the ground. Blood pounded in his ears as he tried to draw a breath, but couldn’t.
He couldn’t die like this, his throat slowly crushing, the ground just beneath his feet.
Somber brown eyes and shimmering red curls flashed in his mind. He couldn’t believe their last words would be ones of anger. More than anything, he wished he had treated Cora Mae differently, had treated her better.
His lungs were burning for air, his heart was filled with nothing but regret.
An explosion sounded in his ears, and suddenly the tension released. His boots hit the ground. His hands bound and the noose cinched tight, he fell forward into the grass. Unable to breathe, he couldn’t do anything but fight the darkness steadily closing in around him.
Fingers dug into his neck and tugged at the rope cutting off his windpipe.
Chance sucked in a wheezing gasp of air. His cheek against the cool, wet grass, he felt the vibrations of retreating hoofbeats as each blessed breath eased the burning of his lungs.
Frantic to get the noose from around his neck, he pushed up and realized his hands had been cut free by someone. His gaze landed on a pair of fur boots barely visible in the pale moonlight as he released the noose. Maggie Danvers’s black pelt coat blended her with the night. He was surprised to see the reclusive mountain woman.
“Mag,” he croaked, clutching his burning throat. He tossed the rope to the ground in front of him.
“Morgan.” Crouching low, she struck a match. She held it high and leaned close. The hiss of breath through Mag’s teeth confirmed what the ring of fire around his neck had already told him. The noose had burned a bloody trench into his skin.
He tenderly fingered at his throat, each breath coming in a bit easier. “Good thing I have a thick neck,” he wheezed, his rattled throat still rebelling against the vibrations of his voice.
Mag shook out her match and stood. “Might want to keep it out of a noose for a few days. Let those burns heal up.”
Her dry tone forced a laugh through the fire. As his breathing improved so did his sense of smell. Maggie’s odor made him wonder if she’d gutted the bear before slinging its pelt onto her back.
“You reek.”
Her smile was another surprise. Shining white teeth revealed a cleanliness he knew she hid beneath the smell of rotted carcasses. “I should think it a pleasant scent, considering you were a second away from breathing nothing but brimstone.”
“Can’t argue with that.” He pushed to his feet, rotating his stiff shoulders as he stood. “I owe you, Maggie.”
“No. Now we’re even.”
He didn’t see how. The first time he’d come across Mag in the high country she’d guided him through the passes and led him to the valley Tucker had described to him. That was after he’d helped her bury her husband.
“Well, you have my gratitude,” he said.
“I’ve got no use for gratitude. You can keep it.”
Just because they’d helped one another out didn’t mean they were friends. “Fair enough.” Spotting his hat a couple of feet away on the grass, he went to retrieve it. “I suppose I should have suspected Wyatt would be waiting for me.”
“He wasn’t waiting for you,” Mag said with certainty.
“You?” he asked.
Her laugh was quick and cold, much like the rest of her. “Wyatt McNealy tracking me? That’ll be the day. It’s taken him six months to pick up the trail of the man stealing his cattle.”
“Someone’s b
een stealing Lazy J cattle?”
“Like the Pied Piper led rats from a village. Your little rendezvous probably cost him his best chance at catching the man who deserved that noose. Stroke of bad luck for everyone.”
Story of Chance’s life. He and Tucker had been sure the men taking their stock had come from the Lazy J, and Tuck was one of the best trackers around. “We were certain Wyatt was the one stealing from us,” he said to no one in particular.
“He was,” Mag called back from somewhere in the darkness. “But not as fast as he’s losing ’em.”
Chance glanced at the spot where Mag had been standing. How the hell did a mountain shrew know so much about the local livestock? And why hadn’t Salina told him she’d been having a problem with rustlers?
He whistled for his horse. A moment later, Star trotted toward him, her coat breaking free of the shadows. She nudged his chest as he reached for her halter.
“I’m fine. Let’s get home.” He shifted into the saddle, and noticed his rifle was missing from the scabbard. Thieving bastards! The light breeze stinging against his neck, he spurred Star toward home.
As he rode back, he recalled Salina’s comment from a few weeks back:
“The highwaymen who call themselves a cattle association.”
He hadn’t given it too much thought. It was common knowledge that the larger outfits taxed the stockyards and controlled the railheads.
No wonder she’s so set on merging their ranches. As with most anything, the bigger beasts of the industry tended to run roughshod over the more vulnerable ranchers. With Jameson gone, Salina was vulnerable.
Hopefully her foreman could handle the heat, if he lived long enough. Once they’d finished with the roundup, Chance would even things up with Wyatt, right after he got his rifle back.
Chance dismounted and led Star into the stable. By the time he’d climbed the back steps, his energy had been sapped, his body ached and his neck blazed like the fires of hell. He pulled his heel against the toe of his other boot and stepped out of the stiff leather.
Leaving both boots on the porch, he eased the door open. The last thing he wanted was for Tucker to see him in such a state, covered in grass stains, a ring of blood around his neck. He stepped lightly inside and carefully shut the door. The rush of warmth and sweet-scented air dashed his hopes that everyone would be upstairs sound asleep. The oven door clanged shut.
