Dark Torment (8 page)

Gallagher regarded her steadily for a moment, then shrugged again.
“Anything you say. Miss Sarah.”

Sarah ignored that, watching with a small measure of triumph as
Gallagher let the man sink to the ground. He lay unmoving, looking so pathetic
that Sarah moved closer to get a better look at him. Perhaps he really was ill.
Though why she should be concerned, she didn’t know, she thought,
reminding herself that only moments before he had dragged her off her horse and
into the brush with intentions she didn’t want to contemplate. If
Gallagher hadn’t come when he had . . .

“Get back!” The warning was Gallagher’s, but it
came too late. The man thrust himself up from the ground, his legs bunched
under him to give him greater momentum He shoved Sarah, who hovered near him,
eyes widening with surprise, backward with all his might. She reeled, and would
have fallen if Gallagher had not caught her, his arms sliding around her waist.
The feel of his hands gripping her rib cage with such intimacy, even though she
knew that his action was nothing more than an instinctive response to keep her
from falling, caused her to leap away from him. Her sudden, violent recoil sent
Gallagher staggering backward. He tripped over a fallen branch and fell
heavily, cursing harshly as his back hit the ground. Sarah winced, hurrying to
his side as the other man ran off through the trees as fast as his bandy legs
would carry him.

“Dammit, woman, see what you’ve done.” Gallagher
was glaring up at her. He had turned over and lay flat on his belly in the
bracken, his eyes mere slits of pain as he regarded her with acute dislike.
“If you’re expecting me to go running after him, you can think
again. I may not be able to move for months.”

“I’m sorry,” Sarah said automatically, before
she remembered whom she was addressing. Her brows slanted together to form an
irritated V over her eyes as she matched glare for glare with the man who lay
sprawled at her feet. “Don’t you dare swear at me!”

“Why, you ungrateful . . .” Gallagher bit off the next
word, then appeared to remember her saying much the same thing to him not many
days before. He smiled, reluctantly, wryly. Sarah, who was remembering too, had
to smile back. The whole situation was ridiculous. And he looked so funny,
lying there on his stomach with a frond of fern decorating his black hair, his
big body framed by more feathery protrusions of greenery, a mingling of pain
and amusement on his face. It was the first time she had seen him smile without
nastiness or mockery; the effect was dazzling. “I beg your pardon. Miss
Sarah.”

The warmth of his smile did much to rob the deliberate needling of
its bite. Sarah extended a hand to help him up. When he made no effort to
respond, but merely lay there looking up at her through narrowed eyes, she
frowned. Was he hurt more badly than she had imagined, or was he determined to
keep their feud going despite its senselessness? Biting her lip, she decided to
give him the benefit of the doubt. She crouched beside him, her eyes meeting
his with concern.

“Are you in pain?”

One corner of Gallagher’s mouth twisted up wryly. “No
more than usual. I think I’ll just lie here for a while. I have a sinking
suspicion that moving is going to hurt like the devil.” He paused,
shifting a shoulder experimentally, then grimaced. “I suppose our friend
is long gone?”

Sarah looked around the copse, devoutly hoping that the man was
indeed gone. With Gallagher out of commission, she didn’t fancy her
chances of dealing with him. But there was no sign of him. All about them the
greenery continued undisturbed, and as if to settle the matter a pair of
rosellas chose that moment to settle into a nearby tree fern. Besides the
flutter of their wings, the only sound was the gurgle of the spring not far
away.

“I think so.” She hadn’t intended to sound so
hopeful. He smiled again, eying her. “Don’t worry. If he comes
back, I think I can undertake to defend you.”

“Why should you?” Sarah didn’t mean to say it
aloud, but the words escaped before she could stop them. His hand lifted
automatically to the gash she had made in his cheek. She winced at the gesture.

“Why did I, do you mean?” He fingered the cut, which
had formed a narrow crust. “I don’t know. I came after you meaning
to pay you back for this with interest, and then head out for the bush country.
I can only suppose my innate chivalry overcame my good sense.” This last
sentence was laced with self-mockery. Then, softly, “Or maybe I just
wanted to make us even.”

“Even?”

He inclined his head. “You saved me that day on the
Septimus;
now I’ve saved you. We’re quits.” There was a curious
satisfaction in his words.

Sarah’s brows knitted as she looked at him. He had moved so
that he was lying more on his side now than his belly, and she had a
three-quarter view of his face. She hadn’t been mistaken about the
satisfaction in his words, she saw; it was there in his face as well. But, try
as she would, she could not understand why it should please him so enormously
to know that he no longer had to feel himself under any obligation to her. To
her knowledge, it had not affected his behavior in the least. No one could
accuse him of having been so much as commonly civil to her.

“Well, whatever your reason, I thank you,” Sarah said
formally. “I shudder to think what that man might have done to me if you
hadn’t come when you did.”

He very slowly levered himself into a sitting position, wincing
and flexing his shoulders as he moved. Sitting in the bracken with his knees
bent and his bare forearms resting on his knees, his white shirt unbuttoned so
that Sarah could not help but notice the soft whorls of black chest hair at the
base of his throat, he exuded so much sheer masculinity that Sarah
involuntarily drew back. She was still crouching beside him, but it suddenly
occurred to her that now that he was sitting up, he was far too close. She
stood up abruptly, making a little business of brushing off her skirt with one
hand while the other self-consciously clasped together the ripped edges of her
shirtwaist.

“Oh, I doubt that he would have done anything much to
you,” Gallagher said, regarding her with a grin. Sarah was piqued to
notice that her nearness seemed not to have bothered him at all, if he had even
been aware of it. But of course, she was plain, while he was far, far too
attractive. Gallagher continued, “He was most likely after your
horse.”

Sarah could not stop herself from feeling, and looking, she had no
doubt, affronted. “Well, thank you very much,” she said before she
could stop the words. Gallagher looked up at her, frowning, then as the reason
for her obvious indignation occurred to him he laughed.

“Wounded vanity, Miss Sarah?” he jeered softly, rising
to his feet with a lithe movement that gave no quarter to the pain she guessed
he must be suffering from his half-healed back. Standing up, he was alarmingly
tall—a good head taller than she was, while most of the men of her
acquaintance were at best just an inch or so above her height—and
alarmingly close. She had to tilt her head back to see his expression, and she
didn’t like the sensation at all. It occurred to her that here was one
man whose strength she could come to fear. . . . “Would you prefer to
think that he meant to have his dastardly way with your person before murdering
you?”

Sarah flushed. It was all she could do not to let her eyes drop.
Put that way, it sounded ridiculous, but yes, it did hurt a little to realize
that Gallagher thought she was so unattractive that a man could have no other
motive for attacking her than her horse.

“Don’t be absurd,” she said shortly, turning
away. To her surprise, she felt his hand close over her arm. His callused palm
seemed to burn her bare skin. Stiffening, she looked at him over her shoulder,
her expression as off-putting as she could make it. With all that had happened,
she had forgotten for a moment that he was a convict and she his mistress. So,
apparently, had he. It would never do to allow him to think that this intimacy
could continue. He must remember his place, and so, she told herself fiercely,
must she.

“Take your hand off me, Gallagher.” Her eyes were
steady as they met his. He frowned at her, his eyebrows meeting in a thick
black line over his incredible blue eyes.

“And if I don’t?” he asked silkily.

Sarah half-turned to face him, her eyes widening. Now there was a
question, she thought. What would she—could she—do if he elected
not to obey her? She was hardly in any position to enforce her commands
physically. A ghost of a smile flitted at the corners of her lips as her eyes
moved swiftly, involuntarily over him. He was so big, so tall and
broad-shouldered with steel-muscled limbs, that the very thought of
overpowering him was ridiculous.

“I have no idea,” she admitted frankly, her smile
still flickering. “But I should think of something, I assure you.”

He laughed, looking suddenly relaxed. “I’m sure you
would,” he said with humor, and his hand released its grip on her arm to
finger the gash in his cheek. “The prospect terrifies me.”

Her smile vanished. “I’m really very sorry about
that,” she said, her eyes earnest. “I just lashed out without
thinking. I’ve never done such a thing before.”

His hand fell from his cheek. “Don’t worry about
it,” he said curtly. “It’s little more than a scratch.
I’ve been hurt more, with less reason.”

“Yes,” she agreed, remembering his back.

He frowned suddenly, darkly. “Hadn’t we better be
getting back?” His words were brusque. “I don’t know about
you, but I have work to do. I doubt that your overseer will be pleased if he
comes by the stable and finds I’ve disappeared. I don’t fancy being
strung up and beaten again.”

His hand was on her arm again, quite unconsciously, she thought,
while he urged her in the direction he wished her to go. Deciding that so small
and obviously unthinking a familiarity was not worth angering him with another
reprimand, she glanced up at him.

“Don’t worry, if any question arises I will tell him
that you very likely saved my life,” she promised.

His mouth quirked derisively. “Thank you, but I prefer not
to shelter behind your petticoats.” His response was short. It occurred
to Sarah that she was again in danger of forgetting their relative stations in
life. He was addressing and handling her as if they were equals—no,
rather as if he, as a man, was for that reason entitled to direct her actions.
He was clearly used to being very masterful with women. She sighed.

“Gallagher, I don’t mean to offend you,” she
began carefully, meaning what she said. “But you are going to make life
difficult for yourself if you don’t learn to behave properly.”

They had stopped walking; Max, her father’s big black
stallion—typical of what she had seen so far of Gallagher’s
character that he should boldly choose the best horse in the stable—was
just behind Sarah as she turned to look at Gallagher. The horse was placidly
stripping what few leaves he could reach of the eucalyptus branch he was tied
to. Gallagher’s hand left Sarah’s arm as she finished speaking, but
not, she realized, because of anything she’d said. He was merely untying
the horse.

“Are you listening?” she demanded, impatient. And
there it was again: she was addressing him as he had addressed her, as an
equal. A state of affairs that she would have to put a stop to, no matter how
secretly pleasant she might find it. For his sake, if for no other reason. She
shuddered to think of what her father’s or Percival’s reaction
would be if either should witness such familiarity.

“You were telling me I don’t behave properly.”
He led the horse forward as he spoke, then turned back to Sarah with the reins
looped casually around one hand. Before she could do more than sputter a
protest, he caught her around her narrow waist and lifted her into the saddle
as he had once before. Sarah again had to clutch his forearms for balance;
involuntarily her fingers spread, absorbing the hard, warm strength of him and
the coarse abrasion of the hairs that roughened his skin. Her palms ached to
explore further, to stroke the male flesh beneath them. As soon as he sat her
in the saddle, she snatched her hands away as if his flesh had suddenly
scorched her.

“That’s just what I’m talking about!” she
exclaimed wrathfully. Anger was the first of the jumble of emotions swirling
through her, and she welcomed it. She refused to acknowledge how the feel of
his skin under her hands had affected her. . . . Of course, she was still
shaken from her recent harrowing experience. Her responses were quite naturally
out of kilter. And that, she told herself firmly as she unconsciously clasped
her still-tingling hands together, was all there was to it! Certainly she was
not physically attracted to a—a convict, be he ever so handsome!

Gallagher lifted one eyebrow at her as she stared down at him in
perturbation, then put a booted foot in the stirrup and swung himself up behind
her. Alarmed, Sarah lost her balance, nearly sliding sideways off the saddle as
she felt the strength of his big body so close behind her. He caught her, his
arms encircling her waist and hauling her back into position to sit
precariously sideways in the man’s saddle, her shoulder butting into his
chest, her bottom nestled snugly between the hard muscles of his spread thighs,
her legs draped over one steely thigh as both feet dangled to one side. She was
practically sitting on his lap! The hem of her skirt had caught on the pommel,
revealing her plain white cotton petticoat with the single flounce at the
bottom from the knee down. Hurriedly she bent to free it. The movement made her
even more excruciatingly aware of her position. His body heat enveloped her, as
did his musky male scent. His strong thighs hugging her derriere unnerved her
to the point where she lost her head.