Scotsman Wore Spurs (44 page)

Once, when she'd worried aloud about Drew's safety, he'd stared her straight in the eye and said, “Don't ever underestimate Drew Cameron. He's a survivor.”

At last, the Kingsley ranch came into view. Gabrielle ached to dig her heels into her mount's side and race ahead, but fear held her back. What if Drew was furious that she hadn't stayed in Denver? What if he didn't want her here? And what was she going to say to him? The news that he was an earl still rankled, filling her with foreboding.

What would she say to an earl who wanted to be foot-loose and fancy-free, who demanded her secrets but withheld his own?

She wanted to punch him in the stomach. Right after she made sure he was safe. Right after she kissed him.

Further evidence she was no lady.

As she and Ben approached the ranch, they heard a single gunshot. Ben was instantly alert, his rifle out of the scabbard and tucked under his arm. But they saw no one, nor were there more shots forthcoming. They stopped near the corral in time to see Drew come out of a barn with a rifle in his hand. When he saw them, he immediately dropped the rifle to his side and waved an arm at a man perched in the open door of the barn loft. She then realized that the gunshot must have been an alarm, established to warn of approaching riders.

She had no time to realize anything else, nor did she have eyes for anything but the tall, lean figure who squinted at her against the sun as he strode over to them.

“Gabrielle! What in the bloody hell are you doing here?” Drew exploded.

“Now, that's no way to greet a lady who's ridden all this way to see you,” Ben growled.

Only then did Drew shift his gaze to her companion, and his eyes narrowed. “So,
you
tell me, Ben, why did you bring her?”

“Because, like you, she doesn't take no for an answer,” Ben replied comfortably as he dismounted. “Your manners have certainly deteriorated since you left Denver. It's the last time I'll suggest you go to Texas.”

While the two men were glaring at each other, Gabrielle slipped down from her horse, feeling a little sick inside. She'd dreamed of being grabbed up and hugged and told how much she was missed, followed by declarations of love.

Ha!

She held her spine stiff as a rod and did some glaring of her own. “You're a bloody fraud,” she told Drew.

Both men turned and stared at her. “Earl of Kin-loch, indeed,” she said, fury coloring her voice. “I'm almost regretting trying to save your sorry hide.”

She grabbed the reins of her horse and started toward the barn, aware of the sudden silence behind her. She got inside the barn before her shoulders drooped and the magnitude of her despair socked her in the stomach. He didn't love her. He'd never loved her. She'd merely been a plaything to a titled rogue. But this time she wouldn't cry. She would die before she cried for him again.

Yet she found herself burying her face in the mane of her horse. She would leave for Denver tomorrow. Then she would find a home of her own where she and Ha'penny—and Honor and Billy and Sammy—could build a future together.
Without
the maddening Scotsman.

A sob escaped her throat. And she got madder.

Then a hand touched her shoulder, and she whirled around, ready to flail out. Instead, Drew caught her in his arms, and somehow her arms ended up wound around him.

She looked up at his ravaged face. She'd never seen so much longing in a man's eyes.

She didn't want to be moved. Didn't want to be mollified. She didn't want to reach out and touch his face.

But she did, with her heart thundering like a cattle stampede. And her anger turned into another kind of ache that lodged in her throat and made it difficult to breathe.

“Gabrielle,” he said raggedly. “I've missed you so.”

“You glared at me like I was the pox,” she said, unable to keep the pain from her voice.

A groan came from deep inside his chest. “I wanted you to go to Denver so you wouldn't be in danger.”

Emotions were roiling through her so fast that she didn't know which way to turn. She couldn't think when she was this close to him. Her mind ceased functioning when he looked at her with so much tenderness. Her anger was rapidly cooling. Nothing else was, though. The air between them had turned decidedly steamy.

Torrid.

Blistering.

And then his mouth descended on hers, and she didn't care about anger or sanity or truth or lies or anything else. She cared only about the man in her arms.

Drew had never been so glad to see anyone in his life. He didn't even mind the sparks of anger in Gabrielle's eyes. He loved everything about her, particularly that independent and indomitable spirit that thumbed its nose at all things safe and comfortable and conventional.

Contrarily, though, the very qualities that attracted him to Gabrielle worried him bloody near to distraction. He didn't want to change her, but he
did
want her safe. He wanted her here with him, but he didn't want her exposed to any violence that might ensue.

But such thoughts fled his mind the moment their lips met. The kiss was like spontaneous combustion, their responses to each other frantic and desperate and needing. Somewhere in the back of his mind he'd registered her hurt but furious reference to his damnable title. Despite her fevered passion he knew her well enough to realize that her wounded anger was probably gunpowder to the explosion happening between them. It would have to be dampened, her feelings salved. But later.

Right now, he buried his hands in her hair, so soft and sweet, as his lips tried to tell her how much he cared. He should have told her in words, rather than leaving as he had, but he hadn't known how. Not then. Not even now. So he just held on for dear life, binding her to him with his arms, with his lips, with his body.

Then he heard the clearing of a throat, a not-completely-polite interruption. Gabrielle stiffened, and he fought the sudden urge to kill his brother-in-law. He reluctantly straightened and glared at Ben, who was grinning at him.

“This young lady is under my protection,” Ben said smoothly, “I would like to know your intentions.”

“My intentions?” Drew said dangerously. “Maybe to make my sister a widow.”

“Now is that any way to greet a brother-in-law who's come to lend a helping hand?”

“I don't need a helping hand.” Drew turned his glare on Gabrielle, who looked up at him defiantly.

“Well, then, I'll just take care of my horse,” Ben said. “And Gabrielle's,” he said pointedly. “They've earned a rest.”

“Did you have to bring her?” Drew demanded.

Ben shrugged. “She was coming one way or another. I thought you would prefer she had an escort.” He shook his head in mock sadness. “Such ingratitude!”

Drew hesitated a moment. He was bloody unused to friendship, to generosity. When he'd sent Gabrielle to Ben and Lisbeth, he had never meant for him to travel to Texas on his behalf. And his brother-in-law's trail-weary appearance, unshaven, dusty, had come as a shock. So he responded with the irritable challenge that characterized their relationship.

“Shouldn't you be home with Lisbeth?” he grumbled. “What about the baby?”

“Not due for several more months, and Serena is with her,” Ben said. “She insisted I come. She was worried about you.”

“So now she'll worry about you, too,” Drew countered.

“She knows I can take care of myself.”

Now Drew really wanted to throw a punch. “And I can't?”

“As Gabrielle said, you're not a gunman.” Ben was suddenly serious, all amusement gone. “Drew, I have experience that you don't. And contacts with other law officers.”

Drew couldn't deny that. Still, the interference rankled.

Ben held out his hand. The banter was over. “It's good to see you again, Drew.”

Drew swallowed his pride and took Ben's hand. “I
do
thank you for coming.”

It was a solemn moment, but neither man could countenance deep emotion for very long. Amusement soon crept back into Ben's voice.

“From what Gabrielle said, you've turned into a real-live hero. Again.”

Drew winced, even as his heart lurched crazily. Gabrielle wasn't entirely angry with him, though he'd given her reason enough to be.

Ben chuckled at his discomfort. Then the smile disappeared. “You going to tell me what's going on?”

“Kirby and I have a plan,” Drew said.

“I can imagine,” Ben replied, a gleam in his eyes. “Let's take care of the horses and talk about it.”

Drew glanced at Gabrielle. She looked exhausted and stunned and not a little frustrated at being left out of the men's conversation. Devil take it, but she was beautiful. Stubborn and beautiful and reckless and wonderful.

“I won't go away,” she said quietly to him.

“I know,” he said gently. “I know.”

They waited for Kirby. One week. Ten days. There was no telegram, but then Drew expected none. Kirby would come his own way, in his own time. He wanted to leave no clues for Killian until they were ready.

Ben spent some time in San Antonio, using the telegraph, querying law enforcement friends about Philip Thorpe. He learned that the man had come to Texas five years earlier at the end of the war, one of the many Northern businessmen descending upon the state to plunder the Confederacy. Though Drew knew that Ben had fought for the North, his brother-in-law expressed only contempt for the carpetbaggers, especially, he said, after making friends with a Rebel renegade who had saved his life. He had fought as fiercely for the man he called Diablo as he'd once fought for the Union.

Drew received his brother-in-law's help with mixed feelings. Though he had often been reckless, he'd never considered himself a fool. He'd known the risks he and Kirby were willing to make. Still, Ben's arrival had narrowed the odds considerably. A former U.S. marshal and now a lawyer, Ben Masters was formidable indeed.

But Drew had never asked for help in his life, had taken pride in his ability to handle himself in almost any situation. But it wasn't his life that was at risk. It was Kirby's and Gabrielle's and Jon's. He'd become embroiled in these people's lives, was no longer responsible only for himself, and he was edgy, nervous, and distinctly uncomfortable having to depend on others and having others depend on him.

It also made him sullen, irritable, and impossible to get along with. As much as he loved having Gabrielle near, he withdrew into himself. He was grateful that she seemed to sense that he was like dynamite on a short fuse, ready to explode at any moment. She gave him his distance, but he often caught her looking sad, which made him feel even worse. Maybe it was just her loneliness for Ha'penny, he told himself. Hell, he was missing the little bairn, too.

Drew frankly didn't understand what was happening to him, didn't begin to comprehend the new needs that were tugging his emotions every which way. And until he
did
understand it, he concluded, he had no right to speak—or even to trust—his heart.

So he waited. Gabrielle waited. They all waited.

Gabrielle sensed how impatient Ben was growing, how much he must want to return to Lisbeth. And she saw how irritable Drew was becoming. She had never seen an irritable Scotsman before; she didn't think she wanted to again.

She tried to persuade herself that it was the waiting and not her that made him so moody. After all, his eyes still lit when she came into a room, and they followed her every move. She decided he simply wasn't willing to admit the strength of his feelings yet, and she didn't want to push him. Ben had taken her aside one afternoon and told her that he had been much like Drew himself, afraid to believe in love, afraid
to
love. It took time, he warned her, to overcome a lifetime of distrust.

Kirby and Damien arrived two weeks after Gabrielle and Ben. Terry and the other hands would follow in the next week or so with Billy Bones, Samson, and the string of cow ponies.

Finally, the men and Gabrielle sat down to refine their plans for drawing out Killian's employer. Ben had discovered a great deal about Philip Thorpe. He was very rich, and he owned a huge amount of land around Austin. He had also helped pay for a new school. But dark rumors about his past business practices abounded. Some claimed he was a war profiteer, other claimed that he had sold weapons to anyone with cash, including rifles to warring Indians. Witnesses to these activities always seemed to disappear, however, and open gossip had subsided since his arrival in Texas.

“Keeping his nose clean,” Ben said.

Puzzled, Gabrielle asked, “But why would he run for governor and risk exposing himself?”

Ben's lips thinned with cynicism. “Contracts,” he said. “Railroad contracts, road contracts, building contracts. All available with bribes, substantial bribes. And power for power's sake draws many men to politics. He probably thought he'd long since outrun his past. Something—or someone—must have jolted him out of his complacency.”

Kirby took a sip of brandy. “We know James Parker wasn't the cause,” he said. “And until now I didn't even suspect Thorpe was Thornton. That leaves Sam Wright.”

Ben leaned forward. “Tell me everything you know about Sam Wright.”

Kirby shrugged. “He followed Cal Thornton around like a puppy. Didn't have much in the way of brains. Easily influenced. Drank a lot.”

“What did he look like?”

“Back then, he was tall and skinny, regular features, black hair.” Kirby narrowed his eyes, remembering. “He had a small finger missing. Something happened when he was a kid.”

Ben nodded. “I'll wire a friend in Austin, see whether anyone with a missing finger has turned up dead.”

“You think …”

“This Sam Wright doesn't sound bright enough to make it on his own. He probably never left Texas,” Ben said. “Maybe he tried to blackmail Thorpe.”