Samantha James (7 page)

Todd’s eyes lit up. “I know the one. Big shiny black named Midnight.”

“That’s the one, son.” Kane reached out and clapped the boy on the shoulder. One corner of his mouth curved up in a wicked smile. “Since I’m leaving at the lady’s summons, I guess it’s up to her to take care of the bill. I’ll just go on back and get Midnight saddled up.”

“Sure thing, mister. He’s in the last stall on the right.”

Abby’s eyes tracked his weaving gait to the rear of the barn. Kane was certainly no gentleman, that was for certain! Her lips compressed. She wondered scathingly if he was always so inclined to tip the bottle—if that was the case, he’d soon learn she wouldn’t stand for it.

It didn’t take long to take care of the charges. Abby began to pace restlessly, anxious to be on the way. She wasn’t sure if it would be possible for them to travel the night through, but she planned to ride as long as they could. Five minutes later found her chafing and fuming. What the devil was taking Kane so long?

Todd sensed her impatience. He sent her an uneasy glance. “I’ll just go see if he needs a hand,” he muttered.

Abby followed right behind. Had Kane run out on her? There was only one entrance, so she knew his horse was still here. But what if there were a back window and he’d slipped out that way?

She was on Todd’s heels all the way, fury marking every determined step. At the last stall, he swung open the gate and started to step inside. Then he stopped so abruptly Abby barreled into his back with a very unladylike grunt. She recovered quickly and stepped out from behind him.

A horse whinnied softly, raising his long graceful neck from where he’d been munching oats to regard them with wary curiosity. He was sleek and muscled, his coat a glossy black, his eyes keen and intelligent. In a far corner of her mind, Abby knew a distant flicker of appreciation for such a prime piece of horseflesh. But the stallion didn’t capture her attention for long … With a sharp inhalation, she followed Todd’s stunned gaze.

Kane was sprawled face-down on the hay, passed out cold.

Kane was dreaming. Of warm, feminine hands stroking over his shoulders and arms, smooth and soothing. Of long, ebony tresses teasing his chest, scented like roses and soft as velvety petals, brushing over skin that was taut and acutely sensitized. A low melodious voice poured over him like liquid honey; breasts full and vibrantly lush pressed against him, softness melting into hardness. Snug in the arms of his dream lover, he sighed, eager to retreat into such a pleasant netherworld once again.

But something abrasive and prickly poked at his cheek. The pungent aroma of straw—and something else, something infinitely less pleasant—assailed his nostrils. As if that weren’t enough, a hand like a claw roughly grasped his shoulder. He testily batted it away like a pesky fly, his subconscious rebelling at such a rude awakening.

The sudden movement was a mistake. He promptly discovered his entire body ached as though he’d been kicked from one end of a corral to the other. There was a blacksmith hammering away inside his brain that wouldn’t go away. He tried to swallow, but his tongue felt thick and clumsy, as if a wad of cotton had been shoved in his mouth. Belatedly he recognized the source of his misery. He rolled over with a groan. Why, he hadn’t been this drunk since the night he’d come home and found Lorelei …

Lorelei. His woman. His wife. The only thing in his whole miserable life that had ever had any meaning. The only person on earth he had ever really loved … and who had loved him. When he’d met her, he’d thought he could finally make something of his life. For the first time ever he’d been … truly content, even happy. But then she had died …

She didn’t just die
, a voice inside mocked.
She was murdered
. And that was when it all started …

The pain that scored his gut was agony, fiery and burning like acid, clear to his soul.

“Kane,” sniped a voice that sounded nothing at all like the dulcet tones in his dream. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get up right now!”

He winced. “Be a good girl, sweetheart,” he mumbled. “Keep it down, all right?”

“I am not your sweetheart, nor am I ever likely to be! And I’ll thank you to stop calling me that!”

He dragged his eyelids open, first one and then the other. A woman stood over him, looking for all the world like an enraged virago. A lantern dangled from one slim hand. Jesus! he thought incredulously. What on earth had possessed him to bring a woman to a smelly barn when there was a perfectly good bed at the hotel?

The light from the lantern trapped him in its center. He flung back an arm and shielded his eyes from the yellow glare. Inky-dark sky was reflected in the window behind her head. “Get up?” His voice was a hoarse croak. His throat felt as if it had been stripped raw. “Cripes, what the hell for? It’s not even daylight!”

“It will be by the time we leave!”

Abby’s mood was anything but tame. She had just spent what was probably the longest night of her life. She’d tried for nearly an hour to wake Kane but he was dead to the world. Adding insult to injury was the fact that it had cost her another five-dollar gold piece before Todd agreed to let them spend the night here. By now, she was frustrated and angry, but most of all disgusted—Kane was tousled and bleary-eyed. He smelled like a brewery and needed a shave. God knew she’d expected neither a hero nor a gentleman, but she hadn’t expected a drunk either.

“We’d better get started,” she said sharply. “Thanks to you, Stringer Sam is a good twelve hours ahead of us—and so is Dillon!”

Dead silence met her pronouncement.

Kane had risen on one elbow to stare at her. One lean hand came up to absently rub his whiskered jaw. Beneath the lock of black hair that tumbled on his forehead, his brow was furrowed in concentration … or was it puzzlement?

She slapped her riding gloves against her thigh; not sure whether to laugh or cry. “My God,” she said numbly. “Don’t tell me you don’t remember!”

It was less a question than an accusation. Snatches of memory invaded Kane’s brain. He recalled her turning his gun on him—that, he decided grimly, was unforgettable. But most of what he remembered was
her
—the lush feel of her body against his. And he remembered the taste of her mouth trapped beneath his—her lips were like crushed fruit, damp and moist and dewy.

But Stringer Sam … all at once the name jarred something inside him. He sucked in a harsh breath. It came back in a flash—she wanted him to take her to Sam’s hideout.

He lumbered to his feet none too steadily. “Lady,” he said very deliberately, “who said I was going anywhere with you?”

Abby gritted her teeth. “My name is Abigail—Abigail MacKenzie. And we had a deal, Kane, so don’t try to weasel your way out of it now.”

“A deal?” His harsh laugh set her on edge. “That’s not the way I remember it.”

“Then think of it this way.” Abby was too desperate to heed her words. “You’ll be saving a man’s life—maybe it’ll ease your conscience a little.”

His conscience! A fiery mist of rage swam before his eyes. Who the hell was she to judge him anyway? Kane thought furiously. Why, she was an uppity little brat who’d probably never wanted for a single thing in her life! She didn’t know a damn thing about him—who he really was … the reasons behind all that he’d done … Oh, he knew her kind, people who had their noses in the air, who’d convinced themselves they were so much better than their fellow man—they thought they could push everyone else aside and no one would be the wiser. Well, to hell with people like her, he thought savagely. To hell with
her!

He stared at her coldly. “You’re a fool if you think I’ll take you to Sam,” he stated flatly. “Good Lord, woman, I don’t think you realize what kind of man Stringer Sam is!”

“Oh, but I do! I told you last night, Kane. He came to the Diamondback after Dillon—but he killed my father instead.” For just an instant, pain gouged a gaping wound in her breast. Tears stung her eyes, but she blinked them back, not wanting this man to see her cry.

But Kane didn’t see. His mouth compressed into a thin line. Dillon again, he thought scathingly. She’d talked about someone named Dillon last night—Dillon and some kind of vendetta.

His lip curled; he spoke in a flat, staccato rhythm. “Listen,
Abigail
, and listen good. A woman with your looks shouldn’t have to look far to find another man primed and ready to warm that sweet little behind. Just because you don’t like sleeping alone doesn’t mean I’m willing to risk my hide to save
his
.”

Abby gaped. What was he saying? Why, it didn’t bear thinking about! But all at once her spine went ramrod straight. It was just like a man, she thought furiously—just like
him!
—to think with that part of his anatomy.

“No, Kane,” she began heatedly. “
You
listen. It’s not like that at all, do you hear? I don’t know what hole you crawled out of—I don’t care to know! But I’ll thank you to keep your crude little judgments to yourself. I’ll do whatever I have to in order to save Dillon, is that understood? Furthermore, any other woman would do exactly the same if Stringer Sam were after her—”

She never knew exactly what halted her speech. Perhaps it had something—everything?—to do with the knowledge that Kane was under a grave misconception about her and Dillon.

“Her what?” Kane’s eyes had narrowed suspiciously. “Exactly what is this Dillon to you anyway?” His hand shot out and wrapped around her arm, jerking her close.

Abby bit her lip. She’d told Kane last night that Dillon was her brother, hadn’t she?
Hadn’t she
? Maybe not, or he wouldn’t be making such outrageous insinuations …

Her breath came jerkily. He frightened her, she realized dazedly. Oh, not because he was an outlaw. Simply because he was so—so overwhelmingly male! So close to him, trapped against the heat of his body, her mind displayed a vivid recall. She remembered the way he had looked at her last night, his eyes glittering with heat. She remembered the intimate glide of his tongue against hers, the shocking sensation of lean, plundering fingers shaping themselves to her breast.

She swallowed, unable to tear her gaze from those dark features that hovered so closely above her own. A bristly shadow hazed the hollow of his cheeks and jaw. His lips were thin and cruel. She was tall for a woman, her body sleek and toned and far from weak, but Kane made her feel that way. And it was then that the craziest notion spun through her mind … If Kane helped her find Dillon, they might be alone for days on end … somehow she had to protect herself.

“Well?” His voice was rough with demand. His lips twisted into a sneer. “I admit, I’m curious now. What the hell is so goddamned special about your precious Dillon? What’s he got that every other man doesn’t have?”

Abby’s heart was thudding with thick, heavy strokes. She felt her lips move, though she’d have sworn she spoke not a word.

“He’s my husband,” she blurted.

H
er husband. Her
husband
. Kane stared at her, stunned, dumbfounded and then deeply, furiously angry, not only with himself but with her.

His blistering curse scalded her ears and made her jump. She struggled to free herself. He let her go only to snatch back her left hand at the last instant. “Where’s your ring?”

Abby prayed he wouldn’t feel her quaking. As a child, she’d discovered she was a horrible liar. When Pa and Dillon had laughed at her display of the bonnet Emily Dawson had given her, she’d promptly thrown it into the horse trough. When Pa found it, she’d lied and told him she didn’t know how it got there. Pa hadn’t scolded or thrashed her, but Abby was aware that he knew she’d lied. She’d felt so utterly guilty that she’d never lied to him again.

But Kane wasn’t Pa. If his forbidding expression were anything to go by, bodily harm was a definite possibility.

“I—I had to get you out of the Silver Spur somehow. I didn’t think you’d go upstairs with me if you knew I was married. I took it off last night so you wouldn’t see it!” Her cry was wild. She tugged furiously at her hand.

He let her go so suddenly that she stumbled and fell to her knees. “You scheming little bitch,” he said through clenched teeth. Her half-shy, tentative manner last night—it was all an act! Fire blazed within him. What a fool he’d been! He’d actually believed the story she’d concocted—that her father had died and she was alone in the world, with no one to turn to, nowhere to go. He had believed and sympathized. He was convinced she was an innocent—a virgin!—brought low by life’s vengeance.

Two long strides took him past her into the stall. He spared her no glance as he heaved his saddle onto Midnight’s back.

Abby lurched to her feet. “Kane! Wh—what are you doing? Where are you going?”

“Ought to be pretty damn obvious, even to you,
Abigail
. I’m leaving, something I should have done the minute I set eyes on you.”

His tone was icily distant. She interpreted all too accurately the iron cast of his profile, the rigid set of his shoulders.

Inwardly Abby was devastated; outwardly she was as determined as ever. “You can’t!” She clutched at his arm, as if that alone could keep him there.

He shook her off easily, pausing only to slant her an infuriatingly superior smile. “Lady,” he drawled, “you can’t stop me.”

Later she would wonder what possessed her. Later she was aghast at her own daring. But one second her hand trembled slightly at the waist of her riding skirt. The next her delicate little chin came up … and so did the barrel of his Colt.

“That’s where you’re wrong, Kane.” She raised the gun praying he wouldn’t test her. He might be an outlaw—he might be the scum of the earth!—but God alone knew she couldn’t shoot him in cold blood.

He half-turned. The flicker in his eyes told her he’d spotted the gun but his arrogant smile never wavered. “Go ahead, sweetheart. If you’re so god-damned anxious to show me how well you shoot, here’s your chance.”

Grabbing Midnight’s reins, he jammed his hat on his head and walked past her, bold as you please.

It was a moment before Abby’s sagging jaw clamped shut. She followed him outside where dawn’s shimmering sunshine heralded another glorious day. Abby alternately cursed and prayed as Kane mounted his horse and set off down the deserted street. The blast of gunfire shattered the early-morning air, whizzing over his left shoulder.