Outlaw (26 page)

She'd sent him on a merry chase. Rounds of
parties and balls, all in the hopes of seeing Ellen, of stealing a
kiss on a veranda corner. Of persuading her to come home with him
to the Territory. At the time, it had seemed what she wanted—what
they both wanted.

"After we got married," Mason went on, "we
came back here to live. To the farm on the Gila."

He glanced at Amy. She nodded without
meeting his eyes, frowning at a spot just over his shoulder. At
some point she'd grabbed the quilt again. She held it to her chest
like a shield.

"The army was no life for a lady," Mason
said, rubbing his palms along his thighs. "I thought we'd be
happier on the farm. I figured I could make a good living, selling
grain to the express stations and military posts nearby."

"I built a home for us," –he flexed his
fingers as though still feeling the gritty adobe bricks in his
hands— "and before two harvests had come, Ben was born."

Amy's head turned. Tears glittered in her
eyes. "You have a son?"

He nodded, his throat tightening at the
thought of his boy. Where was he now? Did Ben believe his father
wasn't coming for him, that he didn't care about him? Frustration
roughened his words. "He's six years old. I—"

"Where is he now?"

Unblinking, barely breathing, she waited for
his answer, watching him with eyes gone wide and horror-filled. Did
she think he'd hurt his own child?

"Tucson," Mason ground out, pushing away
from the bed.

Away from her.

He strode across the small room, his
footfalls noiseless against the packed-dirt floor. "What did you
think I was going to Tucson for? I risked hanging to leave Maricopa
Wells. I've been hunted and shot at since the day I went on the run
from the sheriff. I risked everything to get there."

He leveled a hard look at Amelia. "What the
hell did you think I wanted?"

Her mouth opened, but no sound emerged.
Clutching the quilt closer, she tried again. "T—treasure," she
stammered. "Or, or, revenge against somebody." Her voice rose,
beseeching him. "You're an outlaw! What was I supposed to
think?"

"Not that I'd endanger you for the sake of
money," he told her. "Or revenge."

Mason rubbed his jaw, trying to staunch the
sense of betrayal her words engendered. He'd been relying on her
faith in him more than he'd known. Believed in it more than he'd
wanted to.

"I didn't see it at first," he said
woodenly, "but Ellen wasn't the kind of woman for life out here.
She was...lonely." The word choked him, now that he knew the depth
of her sadness, now that he knew what it led to. "Lonely without
her friends and city life. She wanted to leave."

"Leave you?" Amy whispered.

Pacing, Mason paused beside the bureau,
turned down the lamp. Shadows deepened in the corners of the
bedroom. "Leave me, leave the Territory."

"But she had...had a child. Ben. Why—"

"It wasn't enough." Mason's fingers dug into
the scarred bureau top. "I couldn't give Ellen more children, the
children she wanted. Couldn't give...give her the life she wanted."
He gulped for air, starved for breath. His chest squeezed, hurting
him.

He couldn't face Amy, couldn't bear to see
her face when she learned the truth. His throat felt gravelly,
aching. "I promised to take care of her. Promised to give her all I
could. And she...she believed me."

"Mason, I—"

"When Ellen died, part of me was relieved.
Relieved!" He whirled to face her at last, unable to stop the
choked sound that came from his throat. Damn, but it felt weak to
say the words. "And the rest of me knew I could have stopped
her."

Mason slammed his hand into the bureau,
welcoming the fresh pain that roiled through him. At least this was
pain he understood, action and reaction that made sense. Ellen's
death was a waste, a sickening waste, and the knowledge that he
might have prevented it ate at him.

"How?" Amy asked quietly, her eyes clear now
and her posture straight and motionless atop the mattress.

Her composure baffled him. Mason stared at
her, hardly able to believe she hadn't shrunk into the corner
already, hefted a gun from his gun belt to protect herself with,
screamed for Manuel and James to help her.

"How, Mason? Stopped her from doing
what?"

He stared, groping for words. Images of
Ellen rose in his mind—Ellen pleading with him to move to the city,
to go back east, to find out why, month after month, another child
never came to them. And then, after enough years had passed,
begging him to leave her alone.

And eventually, he had. Anything to escape
her sighs, her accusing looks, her mouth pinched with
disappointment. Nothing short of a good horn of whiskey had
fortified him enough to risk trying to love her again. Nights of
reaching for Ellen, only to feel her shrink away, turn her face to
the wall.

"
She was my wife
," he said, pacing
again. "I promised to take care of her." He stopped and glanced at
Amy. "I didn't."

"It's not your fault she wasn't suited for
this life. She must have known before you were married that your
life was here, in the Territory."

"She told me she was unhappy. I...thought it
would pass. I promised to move as far as Tucson, once I'd made
something of the farm. To me, it was over with then."

He raked his hand through his hair, only
half-feeling the jaggedly shorn strands through his fingers. "But
not to Ellen. Not long after, she stopped waiting. She...swallowed
a vial of laudanum she got from a drummer passing through, and by
the next morning she was gone."

Ben had run through the fields to fetch him,
his little legs pumping as fast as they were able. His eyes had
been so scared in that round, babyish face.

"Mama's sleeping! She won't wake up today,"
he'd cried, trying to drag Mason home again. Looking half-sure he
was in trouble for bothering his Papa at work in the fields, but
too afraid for his Mama not to try, Ben had been the only one with
Ellen at the end.

Mason pushed the heel of his palm against
his closed eyelids, hiding the damned shameful tears that burned at
the memory.

"I should've seen the laudanum. Should've
listened to her more. Moved to the city sooner. Dammit, I could
have done something to help her." His voice broke, wavered. "She
trusted me."

From behind, Amy's arms came around his
waist. She leaned against him, holding him tightly. He didn't know
when she'd moved to comfort him. More, Mason couldn't imagine
why.

Roughly, he wrenched her arms from around
him and stepped out of reach. Keeping his back to her, he took a
deep, shuddering breath.

"I drank my way through the morning Ellen
died, and I didn't quit all through her funeral. At her wake, the
whole house smelled like whiskey. Ben wouldn't even come near
me."

He remembered his son's wrinkled nose, his
red, tear-blotched face turning away from him, and his soul ached
at the loss.

"Mason—" Amy whispered, but this time she
didn't come near. This time she held herself rigidly apart from
him. The span of earthen floor and rag rug might as well have been
a valley a thousand miles wide. And Mason knew, at last, that he'd
driven her away, too.

"God help me, but by then I don't even know
if I loved her anymore," he said, his fists clenching
uncontrollably at his sides. "I didn't want her to die, but I swear
I don't know if I mourned her true at the end and at least she
deserved that." A sob tore from his throat, and fresh grief
shuddered to life within him, too much to be contained.

"Mason, dear God—" Amy grabbed him, hurled
herself at his chest, and the hot wetness of her tears burned his
skin. "You can't go on like this," she cried. "Please, please—"

"No—" He tried to push her away, tried to
hold her apart from him. But somehow his arms wouldn't obey his
mind, and his heart stayed there with Amy. Convulsively, Mason's
hands buried in her hair, holding her closer instead.

"Don't you see?" Amy cried, the words
muffled and tear-choked. "Ellen didn't trust you too much." She
raised her face to his, her eyes begging him to listen. "She
believed in you too little."

"No!" It was an anguished cry, a denial of
something Mason couldn't believe. Beneath his hands Amy moved
closer and closer, and everything in him knew he should push her
away.

"You gave her so much," she said, squeezing
his shoulders as she tried to make him hear her. "A home, a child
to love...your love. How could you have known she'd leave all that
behind?"

Her hands roved higher, stroking his jaw,
his cheek. Mason closed his eyes against her touch, tried to steel
himself against believing her.

"You couldn't have known," she went on. "You
couldn't."

He swallowed hard, dared to open his eyes
and meet her gaze. It shimmered with tears, wavered and leapt—or
did his own tears only make it seem that way? His weakness shamed
him. The last thing he wanted was her pity.

"I should have known," he said, clenching
his jaw as he stared past her. "All the signs were there,
after—"

"After!" Amy cried, her fingers gouging into
his shoulders. "Afterward you knew, but who could have known
before?"

"The laudanum—"

"Every household keeps it on hand. I did,
back home."

Through her tears, she smiled faintly at
him. "Forgive yourself, Mason. For your own sake. For your son's.
This is tearing you apart, and I—"

"It cost me my son." His eyes burned. Mason
swallowed hard, but the ache in his throat wouldn't quit. If he
never did anything else, he'd get Ben back. This time, he'd keep
him safe. Keep him loved.

"You'll find him," Amy said.

Her arms hugged his neck, and she touched
her forehead to his. He wanted to close his eyes again, to hide his
damned weak tears. Something in the way she looked at him wouldn't
let him.

"You found me, didn't you?" she asked. "If
not for you, who knows what would've happened to me after the
stagecoach drove away?" She smiled, softly. "You saved me, Mason.
Over and over again. I know you can save Ben, too."

"But Ellen—"

"It wasn't your fault," Amy said, stroking
his hair back from his temples.

Her touch felt warm. Good.

"How anyone could think so is more than I
can understand. You weren't even home when it happened."

She straightened, smoothed her hands down
his chest. Her fingertips whispered over the wiry, dark hairs
there, then fluttered across his ribcage to wrap around his
waist.

"Poor little Ben," she murmured, frowning as
she laid her cheek against his chest. "I was so young when I lost
my mother, I only barely remember her. But this—oh, Mason, it
must've been so sad for him...."

Her words whispered away, lost in the
darkness cast around them by the barely lit lantern. She hugged him
tighter, fiercely, like she could push her belief in him straight
through his chest and force him to listen. More than anything she'd
said, Amy's willingness to hold him close spoke truly. Mason's
breath eased, and the tightness in his chest slowly lessened. Her
trust in him was like a balm for his soul, no matter how he tried
to resist it.

She wavered against him and blinked. Too
weary, he supposed, to stand any longer. Still her arms around his
middle didn't loosen.

"Curly Top," he murmured, steadying her,
"you've been too long on the road and too long without sleep for
all this."

"I want to help you."

She scooted closer. Her underclothes brushed
his pants legs, and the frilly lace edge of her borrowed white
underdrawers against his knee reminded Mason of exactly how little
she had on.

"I want to help you find Ben."

"Tomorrow."

Mason hefted her into his arms. No
complaints about letting her walk came from her lips, no squeals of
protest or panted demands amidst her struggles that she put him
down. Instead, Amy laid her head on his shoulder and smiled as he
carried her to the bed.

"I hope he likes me," she said as he laid
her onto the rumpled quilts.

"Ben?" An image of his boy's face, round and
sun-browned beneath his stubborn dark hair, rose in his mind. Damn,
but missing him hurt.

"Yes." Amy slid across the sheets, then sat
up and pulled the quilts hip-high, bunching the thick patchwork
fabric in her lap. "Is he like you?"

Wiping tears from his eyes for the last
time, Mason smiled and willed himself to give her something easy to
sleep on. His troubles with Ellen and Ben and the Sharpe brothers
were just that—his. Not hers. Once he'd gotten Ben and headed for
the Mexican border as he'd planned, Amy's life would go on without
them.

"Except for the haircut," he said, rubbing
the rough-shorn hairs sticking up from his scalp.

She smiled, sniffling. "You should've let me
finish."

Finish...finish tempting him, finish testing
every bit of damned resolve he had in his body. At the memory of
their closeness on the rock at sunset, Mason's mood sobered. The
way he wanted this woman was a danger to them both.

"No." He turned, fists clenched, making
ready to leave her for the night. Maybe tomorrow he'd ask Manuel to
take her to Tucson himself. Without an outlaw by her side, Miss
Twirly Curls would probably be safer, anyway.

"Mason—"

"I asked Manuel to return the wagon we took
from Maricopa Wells," he said. "And explain to the station master
that I forced you to come with me. The gun and the way I dragged
you out of there ought to be proof enough of that."

He winced, remembering the bruises he'd left
on her throat, then made himself go on. "The only reason they
locked you up in the first place was because you were with me.
Manuel's already left, hours ago. He'll set it straight and you'll
have your life back again."