Each Time We Love (19 page)

His eyes softened for just a second, and then he was looking
beyond her and she was freed from the mesmerizing power of that hard
blue gaze. Astonishing herself, she stood docilely, her head almost
cradled against his shoulder as they waited tensely.

The minutes passed and still Adam could detect no sign of what
had disturbed the horse. Suddenly there was a rustle to their left, and
a smile swept across his face as a small black-and-white creature
bustled out of the brush, avoided them by less than six feet and
continued on its way.

Together they watched as the skunk waddled away, and Savanna
found herself grateful for the animal's timely interruption—the skunk's
arrival had completely shattered the amorous intentions of her captor.
The creature had hardly disappeared before Adam removed his hand from
her mouth and said in clipped tones, "We'd better get some sleep for
what is left of the night—I intend for us to be gone from here by first
light."

"Gone where?" Savanna asked sweetly. "Nacogdoches?"

Adam shot her a dark look. "None of your business," he
growled. "And I think I should warn you—I'm bone-tired and not in a
mood to be baited."

A tiny ray of hope sprang into her breast. If he slept soundly
enough…

Almost as if he had read her thoughts, he smiled thinly and
drawled, "Forget it, sweetheart. You're not getting free of me until
I'm damn good and ready to let you go."

"And while you're asleep, how precisely do you intend to make
certain that I don't, um, just slip away?" she asked innocently, her
eyes very wide with suspect guilelessness.

Adam didn't reply, but walked over to his horse and yanked out
the slave-shackles, oblivious of Savanna's indignant gaze. Before she
had fully comprehended his actions, she found her ankle shackled to
his! Smiling with what Savanna could only feel was fiendish glee, Adam
waved the iron key under her nose and
then promptly
hung it on a tree branch well beyond
her reach.

Ignoring
her, he
continued to
move about, forcing her to follow quickly in his wake if she didn't
want her ankle jerked out from under her. Leaving the horses saddled,
he fed them some of their precious ration of grain, then passed Savanna
a handful of the shelled corn and said, "This will have to do for
dinner tonight—we're not advertising our presence by lighting a fire."

Savanna was so famished that she gratefully accepted the corn
without a scathing comment. Chewing hungrily on the hard yellow kernels
as Adam busied himself with laying out the bedroll, she glanced
occasionally but with great longing at the key which dangled temptingly
out of her reach.

Adam noticed the direction of her gaze and smiled nastily.
"Won't do you any good, spitfire. You won't be making a move tonight
that I don't know about, so resign yourself—and hope I don't die in my
sleep. Otherwise you're going to be out here all by yourself,
leg-shackled to a corpse."

She glared at him and snapped, "I find the idea of your being
a corpse very appealing!"

He snorted and walked away, the shackle that bound them
together automatically jerking Savanna after him. Stumbling behind him,
she cursed viciously under her breath, considering all manner, of ugly
fates for him. He continued to move about, double-checking the horses
and the gear and ignoring Savanna's fulminating presence behind him.
Once he was satisfied that everything was in order, he ambled back to
the bedroll.

It was infuriating and humiliating for Savanna to be dragged
along behind him, to be ignored and treated like some dog on a chain,
and her temper finally got the better of her—again. Staring bullets
into his broad back as he stood unsuspecting in front of her, she
suddenly bent down and grabbed the chain that united them and gave it a
savage tug, yanking his ankle out from under him.

With a startled oath, he fell into the bedroll face-first.
Savannah's moment of triumph was short-lived, however; swift as a cat,
he spun over and, from his supine position, stared consideringly up at
her. A smile she didn't like crossed his mouth, and a second later, the
side of his foot hit her knee and knocked her down.

To her embarrassment and fury, she fell on top of him, and
there were several undignified moments in which she struggled to put as
much distance between his hard, muscled length and herself. Eventually,
she was lying on the bedroll beside him, and her fury only mounted when
she realized that his chest was rumbling with laughter as he lay beside
her.

"You're a despicable, murdering gringo bastard, Jason Savage!"
she spat wrathfully.

His laughter vanished and, to her bewilderment, he suddenly
loomed up over her, his features dark and dangerous as he snarled
softly, "Don't call me that!"

"Why? Don't you like the sound of your own name—black though
it may be?" she taunted.

Adam was almost angry enough to tell her the truth, but
realizing the danger, he exerted control over his temper and threw
himself back down beside her. "Adam," he muttered. "Call me Adam—most
people do."

Savanna frowned. "Is that your full name—Jason
Adam
Savage?"

"Yeah," he replied coolly. "But all you need to remember is
that I answer only to
Adam!"

Uneasily
Savanna mulled over his words, puzzled by his angry
reaction. Why had he been so
adamant
about what
she'd called him? And it hadn't been the ugly epithets she had hurled
at him that had provoked his outburst, but the fact that she had called
him Jason Savage… Was he ashamed of his name?

Lying stiffly beside him on the bedroll, she waited in great
trepidation for his next move. To her astonishment, he fell asleep
almost immediately. His doing so only added to the puzzle and she
continued to think about his odd behavior until exhaustion claimed her.
Yawning hugely a second later, she decided sleepily, her eyes closing,
that if he wanted to be called Adam, it was fine with her—but it didn't
change the fact that he was
still
a murdering
scoundrel!

It seemed that she had barely shut her eyes and slept for only
a few minutes before "Adam" was shaking her awake again. Sleepily she
blinked at him, hardly able to discern his features in the shadowy
light.

"Time to get up, sleeping beauty—we're going to be leaving
soon," he said briefly before moving away.

It was still dark, dawn still several minutes away, but it
seemed that Adam wanted to be riding before first light. Savanna sat up
quickly, rubbing her eyes with a grubby fist. She glanced around,
surprised to discover that the shackles that had chained her to him all
night were already gone, the key no longer hanging so temptingly just
out of her reach. Silently she watched her captor in the dawn gloom as,
almost ignoring her, he fed the horses with swift, economical movements.

Grimacing wryly, Adam passed her a handful of the corn and
commented, "It'll fill our stomachs until I can find something
better—which, hopefully, won't be too many hours from now."

Savanna shrugged and ate her corn, too tired and hungry to
really put her heart into an argument. For just a minute she let
herself dream of hot, fragrant coffee, warm, tender biscuits dripping
with butter and crisp bacon… oh, and a bath, she added blissfully,
since it was only a dream, and a bed—a featherbed with clean white
sheets…

Sighing, she glumly swallowed the rest of her corn and stood
up and stretched. She ached in every muscle; her gown and her body were
filthy, and as for her hair—well, it was so tangled that she'd probably
have to cut it all off to ever get it unsnarled. This morning there
wasn't even the luxury of cold stream water to splash in her face and
wash her arms and neck with, and Savanna decided that if she ever got
home again she'd spend at least four hours of every day sitting in a
tub of hot, soapy water! Her mouth twisted ruefully; it would no doubt
take a month of such a regime to wash away the weeks of dirt that she
had accumulated thus far. And as for the plain brown gown she wore…
burning was too kind a fate for it!

Thoroughly miserable, her stomach growling in complaint about
the meager breakfast it had been offered, she stooped over and rolled
up the bedding. She handed it to Adam and he quickly tied it to the
back of the saddle.

He flashed a glance around to make certain nothing was
forgotten and then turned back to Savanna. She appeared as disreputable
as he felt and it occurred to him that if she could arouse him now,
looking as she did, Lord help him if he ever saw her clean and gowned
properly!

Scowling at his thoughts, he roughly ordered her into the
saddle and once again tied her hands to the horn. There were no words
between them, Savanna watching him stoically, Adam working silently,
ignoring her. Swiftly he mounted his own horse and with the reins of
her horse held securely in his hand, he kicked his weary animal into
motion.

Adam had no clear idea where he was headed—he only knew that
he had to keep moving and that his familiar haunts were closed to him
for the time being. He also knew that they needed better horses, food
and clothing and more weapons and ammunition than they possessed at the
moment—if they were to survive very long in the vast wilderness of
Texas.

They plodded steadily westward. Beyond knowing that he had to
lure Micajah away from Jason's haunts before heading back to Natchez,
Adam was still uncertain of his immediate destination as he grappled
with the more pressing needs of food and supplies. The horses they rode
had been poor specimens at the beginning of their journey, and by now
they were sorry nags indeed! He doubted that he could trade the pair of
them for even one fairly decent animal, and without sound horses, any
attempt to elude Micajah and Jeremy was doomed to fail. Adam knew that
Micajah had horses and more supplies waiting for him at Nacogdoches,
but even as the thought of those precious commodities crossed Adam's
mind, he dismissed it. Too risky, and he had no way of knowing if
Micajah, discouraged by the rain, hadn't decided to head to Nacogdoches
first and then, with fresh mounts and supplies, try to pick up their
trail.

There hadn't been much conversation between Adam and Savanna,
but her curiosity finally got the better of her and she asked
waspishly, "Since we're obviously not going to Nacogdoches, where
are
we going?"

"Away from your friends, that's for damn sure," he replied
laconically.

Savanna's teeth gritted together and she tried again. "You
have to have some destination in mind-where are you taking me?"

He glanced over his shoulder and, blue eyes dancing with
mockery, he drawled, "Well, I'd like to take you to bed…"

She glared at him with impotent rage, deliberately ignoring
the funny little leap her pulse gave at his words. Since it was obvious
he wasn't going to tell her where he was taking her, she decided to
lapse into sullen silence.