Bounty Hunter (22 page)

“To keep you safe, little sun. Always, you will be with me, Eyes of the Hawk,” he
intoned, repeating it in Shoshone. He pressed a hot, sweet kiss to the pulse at the
side of her neck, then turned her toward the men who’d jumped out of the helicopter
and were heading toward Dobs’s store.

It was past dawn when Kane boarded the first helicopter. They’d both been questioned
thoroughly by the two agents and were finally being allowed to leave. He’d offered
to go on the first transport, thinking she wouldn’t want to ride back with Lucheck.
Or with him.

He wasn’t certain what her reason had been, but she’d quietly agreed. After determining
that Sam had been picked up, Annie had asked if it was all right to go back to her
brother’s apartment for the time being. Plans had also been implemented to locate
and contact Matthew. They’d had no more time for private talk. But then, there was
nothing else to say.

Kane stared out the domed front of the helicopter as they lifted off. He saw the second
chopper circling in the distance, waiting for them to leave so that it could land.
As his helicopter reached enough altitude to head out, the pilot tilted the bird,
allowing him one last glance at Annie, standing in the doorway of the store.

“Good-bye, Elizabeth Ann Lawson,” he whispered as they moved off toward the distant
peaks. “Good-bye, little sun.”

TWELVE

Elizabeth dug her heels into the side of the big bay mare, wishing she’d paid more
attention to Brody during his incredibly patient attempts to teach her how to ride.

“Come on, old girl, we’re almost there.” Her words sent white puffs into the crystalline
winter air. She patted the horse’s neck, wishing she’d trailered the animal up this
mountain instead of giving in to her foolishly sentimental idea of riding into Kane’s
life as he had ridden into hers the summer before. She reached up and tucked behind
her ear a lock of once-more blond hair. Then, tugging the brim of her Stetson lower
on her forehead, she prayed he wouldn’t make her walk back down the mountain when
he saw her.

She halted the horse as she crested the next rise on the snow-packed trail. Oh my.
Brody hadn’t
been kidding. The land Kane had purchased three months earlier was definitely a slice
of heaven.

She smiled. She hadn’t known who’d been more surprised; her at hearing Kane had bought
land, or Brody for actually telling her about it. She admitted she didn’t have Kane’s
tracking skills, but for an ex-secretary she wasn’t half bad.

She scanned the valley before her. It was stunning. Beautiful wide, open fields, marked
only by the skeleton rows of fence posts poking up through the snow and the occasional
stand of aspens. The Bitterroot Mountains provided an awe-inspiring backdrop only
Mother Nature could have created. Nestled in the middle of it all was a modest log
cabin, or at least most of one. There were also several corrals, a large barn, and
the framework of several other buildings.

But instead of the hive of activity such construction should warrant, only the sound
of a single hammer cut through the cold winter silence.

She prodded the horse and covered the final distance. There was a four-wheel-drive
truck parked in front of the main cabin. She looked around. Brody had said Kane mentioned
rounding up the horses he had stashed all over Idaho and western Montana, but she
didn’t see any sign of them. Well, he had one now.

Nerves on edge now that the moment of truth had arrived, she dismounted, biting back
the groan at the twinge of protest from her inner thighs. She tied the horse to the
railing of the finished front
porch. As she’d managed the last stair up, quietly stamping snow from her boots, a
loud thwack rang out. It was immediately followed by a string of words that made her
smile in a way she hadn’t been able to for five long months.

She stepped inside without knocking, leaning on the doorframe. Her breath escaped
on a soft whoosh. Dear Lord, she’d missed him. She drank her fill of him. His hair
was longer, she thought, though it was hard to tell the way he had it tied back. His
flannel shirt was damp from his labors, his chest straining at the worn fabric as
he pulled in a deep breath. He was as glorious as she’d remembered. She swallowed
against the memories of how close she’d once been to that warm, powerful body. She’d
never felt as safe and secure since.

She banished those dangerous thoughts and slid the small ladylike knife—it was only
five inches long—from the sheath she had strapped to her belt. With all his swearing
and cussing, he still hadn’t noticed her. She balanced the weight carefully, then
tossed it so that it landed, pointdown, in the piece of wood Kane had just dropped
back onto the bench so he could hold his throbbing thumb.

“Might as well cut it off now and save yourself the trouble later.”

He went completely still. It was another long, mind-wracking moment before he looked
up.

“Annie?”

She nodded, damning the burning sensation that had come from nowhere at the unguarded
leap of
emotion in his eyes when he’d first seen her. It was gone now, a carefully guarded
look in its place. But she’d seen it, and it gave her hope.

“I have something that belongs to you. I brought it back.”

“Annie,” he repeated, as if still unable to believe she was actually there.

Elizabeth kept talking, not wanting to give him the chance to throw her out yet. “She’s
a little worse for the wear, you were right, she’s a tough old—”

“What are you talking about?”

“Sky Dancer. I found her. With Brody Donegan’s help. She was up in the Selkirks. We
tracked her after the first snowfall. She was a bit banged up—”

“Is that why you came here? To return my horse?”

She didn’t know what she’d expected, but it certainly wasn’t the flat, expressionless
response she’d gotten. She knew how much that horse had meant to him. Knew he’d almost
killed himself trying to find her. It had been her one tie to Brody. She’d been banking
on it being her tie to Kane. If she was wrong, then maybe she’d been mistaken about—No.
She’d come too far to question her actions now.

“No,” she repeated out loud. “You also have something that belongs to me.”

He didn’t say anything, but she noticed his hands were now tightly clenched into fists.

She knew convincing her dark warrior that he was worth fighting for was going to be
tough. The
fact that he’d bought land had renewed her hope. She’d been preparing for this showdown
for months. Only now did she realize she hadn’t known the half of it. Maybe that was
just as well.

“What?” The single word seemed to have been forcibly wrenched from somewhere deep
inside him. “What do I have of yours?”

So he wasn’t as unaffected by her as he seemed to want her to believe. Please Lord,
let her be right about this.

She swallowed hard and looked him straight in the eye. “My heart. I gave it to you
over five months ago. I came here to find out if you still needed it.” She took a
deep breath. “If not, then I want it back. I’m—” Her voice broke. “I’m having a hard
time going on without it.”

He cleared the construction rubble in one graceful leap, and in the next second she
was where she’d wanted to be every second of every day since the moment he’d said
good-bye.

“Oh God, you feel so good,” she said against his wonderfully hard, broad chest. Her
tears fell unchecked. Everything she’d kept bottled up inside her for months came
tumbling out in one long rush. “I tried to go back to my life after Sam was arrested,
after the trial …”

She remembered how abandoned she’d felt when Kane’s deposition had been read but he
hadn’t appeared. She looked up at him. “I tried, Hawk, but I … I found out I didn’t
have one.” She didn’t
want to take her hands from his shoulders even long enough to swipe her tears from
her cheeks.

As if he’d read her mind, he reached up and rubbed them softly away with his thumb.
The tender gesture, even while his expression was still so wary, made her cry even
harder. “Nothing I did seemed right. Matt tried to help me. He found an apartment
for me, bullied me into looking for a new job. He even tried to find you for me.”
She sniffed, a watery smile on her lips. “He swore he was going to drag you back and
do anything short of killing you to get you to take me off his hands.” Her attempt
at laughter was a choked failure. “I knew I had to see you again. Matt and I both
tried to find you, but we had no luck. I even went to the reservation …” Kane’s eyes
widened in shock, but she kept on, there was no stopping now. “It was fascinating.
I learned a lot.” Such as how special the amulet was he’d given her and how hard his
life must have been as a child, she thought. But they could talk about her experience
later. “No one there knew where you were either. Then I remembered Brody Donegan …”
She looked up at him, “I found his card. I … I called him.”

“He sent you here?”

“In a manner of speaking.” Brody had become her friend and ally in a time when she’d
needed both desperately.

“I knew from Dobs that you hadn’t found Sky Dancer. I … tried to get Brody to tell
me where
you were. All I found out was that you’d bought this land.”

“That was several months ago.”

“I know. I sort of struck a bargain with your friend. He’s very protective of you.”

“What sort of bargain?” He didn’t comment on the rest.

“He told me you’d decided to give horse ranching a try. So in exchange for helping
him track down Sky Dancer, he’d teach me everything he could about horse ranching.”

She’d surprised him with that one. Good.

She hurried to finish her explanation before he could say anything. “Only when I’d
proven myself to him—and trust me when I say he’s not an easy man to impress—would
he tell me where you were.”

“How long ago did he tell you?”

Kane’s quiet question jerked her thoughts to the present. “Five days.”

Again he was silent. Damn the man and his unreadable face. Despite his physical show
of welcome, she had no idea what he was thinking. Her nerves were frayed almost past
the snapping point.

“You went to all that trouble to find me. Why?”

His expression was one of cautious need, like that of a kid who’d been told Santa
really did exist, but was waiting for the proof in case it was all a horrible joke.

“Because the night you said good-bye to me, you didn’t let me say good-bye to you.”

“Is that why you’re here, then? To say goodbye?”

“I’m here to tell you that I love you. The goodbye part is up to you.” She held her
breath. He didn’t exactly look overjoyed.

“Would you say that again?”

She squared her shoulders, locked her rocking knees together, and looked him square
in the eyes, pouring everything she had into her words, knowing this was her last
chance. “I, Little Sun, love you, Eyes of the Hawk.”

The fierce look that entered his eyes should have made her turn tail and run. And
she might have if he hadn’t yanked her tightly against his body and brought his mouth
down to hers for the hardest, longest, sweetest kiss she’d ever experienced.

He took her mouth again and again. It went on and on, and she didn’t think she’d ever
get enough. Finally they both had to break for air. It was then that she realized
she hadn’t truly tested her courage. She looked up at him, taking comfort from the
fire of desire flaming in his eyes.

It was the other emotion she saw there that had her reaching deep inside for the unwavering
faith and trust she had found she still had in him. “You weren’t ever planning on
coming back for me, were you?”

The pain etched in his face sliced at her. “No.”

“You know, I was really angry at you for a long time after you left. But not for the
reason you might think. Your role with Sam was the easy part to deal
with. Your actions spoke loud enough, and after thinking about it, I understood why
you couldn’t tell me. What I don’t understand is, if we shared something that was
as wonderful and unique as I think it was, why didn’t you have enough faith in me
to let me be part of the decision about any future we might have?”

“Your life was in Boise. Mine … I didn’t have a life.”

“What about this place? The ranch?”

“I didn’t plan this. I guess I understand what you went through. I took on several
more jobs, but my concentration was shot.” He lifted his hand to her face. “I kept
seeing brown freckles and hearing this soft laugh.” He let his hand drop, soft color
blooming on his bronzed cheeks. “I missed you, Annie. Every day.”

“Then why—?”

He placed a finger against her lips. “I bought this land as a test. Of myself, of
my life and what I had or hadn’t done with it.” He gazed deeply into her eyes. “I
have no idea if I’ll last the winter here, much less make a go of this. I might be
as miserable staying in one place as I was …” His voice drifted off.

“As you were?” she prompted, her heart thrumming at what she swore he’d been about
to say.