To Wed in Texas (21 page)

No explanation. Daniel felt like a child being left out of conversation. He could hear movement and voices. Something
had
happened.

Bracing himself against the frame of his prison, Daniel-tried to make out voices. Wolf’s was easy. And Allie’s crying drifted to him. And Adam’s authority.

Several minutes past. Daniel could hear Wes swearing a few times. Then only shuffling, movements with no one talking above a whisper.

If Adam were back, Karlee could be also. Willow’s baby must have been born by now. Daniel frowned.

Willow was like a little sister to him. Why hadn’t someone bothered to let him know if she were all right?

Daniel gathered his strength and moved slowly along the shadowy hallway. He’d be kept in the dark no longer. He was tired of being pampered and ordered
around. His leg had healed enough to take a little weight. Daniel could stand.

As he touched the kitchen door he heard Allie’s soft crying and Wes promise to return in a few minutes as the back door closed.

Slowly, hesitantly, Daniel opened the door to the kitchen. A bright light from the window slashed through his skull. His eyes watered and closed. He almost wished for the blindfold back.

When he forced them open once more, three figures stood before him in fuzzy shades of shadow.

One, a tall woman, near the sink. Karlee. Another woman, smaller, stood at the table. The third, very near, was …

Daniel blinked and tried to focus. The third was a man with very little clothes.

He tried to pull the picture before him from the haze of fuzziness. The throbbing in his leg almost buckled him as he realized the form closest to him had to be the savage Wolf said was always tied in the kitchen.

The savage took a step forward, his movements almost as unsteady as Daniel’s. The boy headed toward the tiny woman standing in the center of the room.

“No!” Daniel cried, realizing she was his sister-in-law, Allie, and fearing she would be harmed.

“Wait!” Karlee’s order came from across the room. “Daniel, wait.”

But it was too late. Daniel had already turned loose of the door frame and was moving at full momentum toward the savage.

Allie screamed and ran between the two. “No! John don’t hurt him! He’s blind, John. Don’t hurt him.”

John’s movements were faster than Daniel’s. As he swung to deliver a blow to the blind man, Allie grabbed his arm. She seemed to travel with the punch.

Daniel tried to steady himself. He knew he couldn’t
see well enough to offer a defense. Offense was his only chance. With a mighty lunge, he shoved into the intruder.

Like marbles in collision, they struck and spun away from one another with equal force. Daniel slammed into the table, almost blacking out from the sudden pain in his leg. He opened his mouth, but it was Karlee’s scream that filled his ears.

The savage entangled Allie in his flight. Together, they hit the floor with a thud and rolled, their arms and legs twisting together.

Daniel fought the blackness, willing himself to stand.

Suddenly, Karlee’s arms were about his waist, holding him up as she cried his name. Her strength kept him from falling.

Wolf’s footsteps pounded across the porch like rapid gunfire.

“What’s going on?” The huge man brought the sunlight as he shoved the door open without slowing his pace. “Daniel, are you all right? Karlee? Allie …”

The screams of a moment ago had settled and now the room seemed a tomb. Everyone looked toward the corner where the boy and Allie had landed.

The savage knelt beside the tiny unconscious woman, one arm around her, the other holding the knife she’d used to free him. His teeth were bared, like a cornered animal, and his knuckles were white around the handle of his weapon.

“Don’t hurt the woman!” Wolf moved slowly forward. “It’s me you want to kill, son. She’s done nothing but be kind to you.”

John’s arm pulled Allie closer against him as his gaze darted from Daniel to Wolf.

“Come away from her, and I’ll fight you barehanded against your knife.” Wolf tried again. “But don’t hurt her.”

Daniel heard the clank of Wolf’s hunting knife on the table only inches from where he and Karlee stood. The hairy man held his hands high showing he had no weapon.

“Come on, kid. This is your chance. Fight me. It’s my scalp you want for your belt, not hers.”

“Wait!” Karlee cried in near panic. “Don’t you see, Wolf? The boy’s not planning to kill Allie. He’s protecting her.”

“No.” Wolf heaved his chest preparing to fight. “The kid’s wanted to kill all of us, including her, since the moment he laid eyes on us. She may already be dead, and he’s just an animal protecting his prey.”

Daniel slowly felt behind him for Wolf’s knife. If he didn’t think fast Wolf, or the boy, would be dead.

“Stand up and fight me, boy!” Wolf ordered.

John swept the blade across the air at belly level. Hate darkened his eyes.

Daniel’s fingers bumped into the huge hunting knife. Slowly, he gripped the handle and pulled it forward.

“Look, Wolf!” Karlee cried. “He’s holding Allie against his chest just like she told me he did in the field. Only now she’s the one knocked out. He’s protecting her.”

Wolf shook his head. “He just knows he can kill her any time. It’s me he has to worry about now. She’s done all she could to help him. His mind is Apache. And we’re all his enemy.”

Daniel straightened. “Stand guard, Wolf.”

Wolf opened his mouth to argue as Daniel pushed away from the table and, with two steps, put himself in the center of the room between Wolf and the boy.

He held the long knife in his grip as he faced the shadowy figure kneeling a few feet away. Karlee reached to pull him back, but he shoved her hand away.

“I remember the night we first saw Allie.” He talked
more to calm Wolf and Karlee than the boy. He knew the boy would wait for his chance, and the knife would give him pause. “She’s a lady now, but there were some who thought she was a savage when Wes first brought her to Adam’s place.”

Daniel held up the weapon, balancing it on his open palm. “I’ll not hurt you, John,” he said in a low slow voice. “I need no knife.”

The boy shifted his smaller knife to his left hand and grabbed the offering from Daniel’s open palm.

“Wonderful,” Wolf growled. “Why don’t we give him all the knives?”

“Karlee.” Daniel didn’t move from in front of the boy. “Get all we have just as Adam did with Allie. He has to know we mean him no harm.”

Karlee made a little sound of pure fear and turned toward the shelves. One by one, she handed Daniel the knives, big and small. One by one, he gave them to John.

The boy held as many as he could, then began to spread them around him within easy reach. Wolf moved close enough to offer Daniel a chair.

Daniel sat down without saying a word, extending his leg in front of him to ease the pain.

Allie moaned and finally moved in John’s arms. She felt her head as she regained her senses. The moment she realized it was her brother’s arm around her, she reached to hug him without the slightest hesitation or fear.

“John. You’re all right.” Tears ran unchecked down her cheeks.

“Run, Allie, run,” he mumbled words he hadn’t said in fifteen years.

She touched the scar on his chest where she’d seen blood all those years ago. “Come on, John. Let me take you home.”

All the knives surrounding them were forgotten.

K
ARLEE HELPED DANIEL BACK TO HIS BED, BUT HE
allowed her to take very little of his weight. He managed on his own, with her only as a guide. When they reached the parlor, still dark from sheets over the windows, Daniel closed the door.

“Will you put the wet cloth over my eyes for a few minutes?” He sounded tired.

“Certainly,” she answered formally.

When he was tucked into bed with the towel in place, she sat beside him and told him the details of Willow’s childbirth.

“Did you get any sleep last night?” he asked when she finished.

“No.” She removed the cloth from his eyes. “But I can manage. I have lots to do today. Would you like the blindfold replaced?”

“No.” He caught her hand before she moved away. “Rest a while. We’ve both had a long night and a harrowing morning. Allie needs time alone with her brother. The twins are gone. The house is quiet.” He pulled her closer. “Rest here.”

Hesitantly, she stretched out beside him. “I thought you didn’t want me so near.”

“This seems a practical place with the house full. Had you rather sleep somewhere else?”

“No,” she answered quickly. Too quickly, she thought. “Here is fine.”

Daniel had to ask. The question had eaten away at him for two days and her behavior might never tell him the truth. “When I touched you a few nights ago, did you mind?”

“No.” She felt the room suddenly warm. She didn’t pretend not to know what he was talking about. “I didn’t mind.”

“But.” Words stumbled from his lips. “I didn’t want you to feel like you had to allow—”

“If I hadn’t wanted to let you, I wouldn’t have, marriage or not.” She rolled on her side to face him.

“Good.” Daniel closed his eyes, worry lines disappearing from his face. “I don’t want you to ever do anything you don’t feel right about. This marriage should be an agreement we both make, not one setting rules for the other.”

“That sounds a fair bargain. I can ask for nothing more.” Karlee rested her head on his heart and snuggled into place. “Being here beside you feels right somehow.” She yawned. “It’s felt right since the beginning.”

“Sleeping next to you does take the edge off the loneliness,” he admitted. “Once your feet get warm, it’s comfortable. I see no reason we can’t continue.” He could think of two reasons pressing against his side at this very moment, but if she didn’t mind, he should forget about how they felt in his hand.

“I find you comfortable as well.” She tried to keep her voice steady.

They could have been poor actors rehearsing lines for all the meaning she heard in their words, but she didn’t know where to start to make him care about her.

He cupped his hand over her hair and kissed her fore-head.
Then, tugged at her braid, loosening the tie and pulling her hair free. “Go to sleep, my wife. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”

Her exhausted body melted into the warmth at his side. She wanted to talk to him more, but all the hours without sleep piled atop her, weighing her eyes closed.

By the time he finished unthreading her braid, she was fast asleep. Slowly, he combed his hand through her thick hair, amazed at how good the strands felt to his touch.

She was his, he thought. Whether he wanted her or not, whether he ever slept with her, even if he didn’t love her, she was his.

He bent and paused, almost tasting her lips now parted in sleep. Finally, he could resist no longer. It wasn’t a kiss, but a taste, light and thorough across her mouth. He told himself he was just getting used to her. They were no longer strangers. It was time he stopped acting as if she’d go away when he blinked. Like it or not, she was here to stay.

Karlee turned toward him as she slept, cuddling into the safety of his arms like a child. She spread her hand over his chest.

Daniel watched her for a long while. His eyes were clearing and what he saw in the shadowy light astounded him. Her hair was the color of autumn, browns and golds and reds mixed together to make a color unlike he’d ever seen.

His hand migrated down her back, then up across her shoulder, placing her arm behind her as he reached her hand. He threaded his hand through hers thinking of how strange it felt to hold another’s hand.

Slowly, very slowly, his hand crossed the front of her dress. He could imagine the softness of her breasts beneath the layers of fabric. He’d been surprised when she’d said she hadn’t minded him touching her.

“Karlee?” he whispered. How could he ask to touch her again. He’d sound like a fool. “Karlee?”

“Yes,” she answered thick in sleep.

The slow rise and fall of her chest filled his hand with the shape of her breast.

Daniel froze. All he had to do was move his fingers away. But his hand now weighed a ton. He tightened his grip slightly. She moaned in her sleep but didn’t pull away.

He told himself he was on fire because he hadn’t touched a woman in so long. But it was more. It was Karlee.

Carefully, he unfastened the buttons at her collar, hoping to make her more comfortable. When she didn’t move in sleep, he allowed his fingers to drift along the outline of her breasts once more, gently testing their fullness and shape. Then he slid his hand along her back as though she were a sculpture he had to touch to appreciate.

Brushing her lips, he wanted more of the taste of her. His hand twisted into her hair as he lightly teased her mouth with feather kisses.

She stretched in sleep, lifting up to him as though in welcome.

Moving his hand over her, his kiss deepened. He wanted more of her, far more of her. Without thought that he might wake her, he parted her lips with his tongue and drank in the flavor of her.

Her body rocked slightly, shifting beneath his touch. For a moment, he thought she struggled. But by the time he could register the thought, she’d settled once more.