Caine's Reckoning

When he got close enough, he held up a brown wad of material lying on top of a pile of leather. “Thought you might like these.”

The first “these” were woolen socks, the second, high-topped moccasins.

“They’ll be too big.”

He shrugged and tucked the moccasins under his arm. “They’ll do the job until you get your own clothes.”

“I don’t have any.” The confession slipped out before she could catch it, snapping his gaze to hers. She quickly waved to the items in his hands. “Moccasins, I mean.”

“Uh-huh.” He cupped her foot in his hands, warming it between his palms a second before bending to blow. His breath was hot and moist, scalding in comparison to the chill she felt to her bone. Before she could come up with a suitable protest, he worked the sock over her foot. As soon as he came around to the other side, she tucked her foot back against the horse’s withers.

“I can do it myself.”

“Not without risking falling off that horse, and I’d say at this point you have enough bruises.”

As if that settled that, he hooked his fingers around her ankle and drew her foot forward. She suffered through another warming before he slid the sock on. He tipped his hat back when he was done. “Admit it, that feels better.”

Even though she didn’t like the proprietary way he handled her body, she couldn’t deny how good it felt to have her flesh covered. She hated to be cold. “Yes, it does.”

He slid the moccasin on, tying the fringed top above her knee, his touch impersonal again. “Good.”

He went back around the other side, moccasin at the ready. She experimented with bending her right leg. She couldn’t straighten it all the way. She tried to flex it again as he slipped the other moccasin on. “I can’t walk in these.”

He tied the second moccasin with the same impersonal efficiency as he had the first. “But you can ride, which is more important.”

“What if we need to run?”

“If it comes to a footrace, we’re both dead.”

He pulled worn leather gloves from his back pocket. With a curl of his fingers, he ordered her to hold out her hands. She did cautiously, not liking the emotion flirting with the perimeter of his stern features. He slipped the gloves on her hands and then, before she could pull back, looped a long piece of rawhide around both her wrists, flipping the string between before she could protest. When he put her bound hands on the saddle horn, there was no mistaking the emotion tugging at his mouth. Amusement.

He tipped his battered brown hat and grabbed up the reins, leading the paint toward the black-spotted horse. “Just in case you were thinking of running from me.”

3

Well, at least she was consistent. Caine shifted Desi as she sat sideways on his lap, pulling the thick collar of his coat up over her cheeks, protecting her from chill as they rode into the wind. Adjusting his own poncho, he glanced over at Sam, and damn, he wanted to laugh all over again. Sam was as wet as Desi and mad enough to chew lead and spit bullets. Served Sam right, though, for thinking Desi had even a passing acquaintance with the word quit.

Untying her hands at the river crossing had been Sam’s first mistake. Thinking a fear of drowning would be a deterrent to trying to escape had been his second. Hell, for that much foolishness he deserved a cold ride back. Water seeped from Desi’s clothes through Caine’s denims as he scanned the countryside. They’d saved half a day by cutting through Hell’s Eight land and slipping through the cave at the back of that box canyon, but he didn’t like how quiet things were. The hair on the back of his neck was standing up straight, which always meant trouble brewing.

He didn’t have to look far for the cause. The women’s kidnapping had been too haphazard to have been carried out by experienced men, which meant they must have been hired by experienced men, meaning there were likely real Comancheros sitting out there without their income. Not good. Chaser, sensing his tension, snorted and did a quick sidestep. Desi’s fingers dug into his shirt.

“Easy.”

Both woman and horse ignored the order. A tightening of the reins brought Chaser in line, but Desi was going to take a bit more effort. She shifted on his lap, looking over his shoulder.

“When we get back to Los Santos, you’re going to be owing me a new pair of moccasins.”

Her wiggling stopped and that peculiar stillness that came over her when she was riled and hiding it froze her up. “I’m sure you can soften them up with a bit of saddle soap.”

“Now why would I be doing that since it was your harebrained idea that got them wet?”

“It wasn’t harebrained, it was…” The sentence trailed off. She tucked her head and that wealth of hair fell over her face, obscuring her expression. He tipped her chin up. She didn’t duck his gaze, just glared at him, blue eyes dark with fury and frustration. And under it all, something he was sure she didn’t want him to see.

“Desperate might be the word you were looking for.” Only desperation could drive a woman to turn her horse into deep water, clinging to the animal’s back with the same reckless courage that had the horse following the command.

Her lips set in a flat line. She jerked her chin, but he didn’t let her hide, just held her there, studying the subtle nuance of her expression as she wrestled with her demons. “The closer we get to Los Santos, the more desperate you get. Care to tell me why?”

Cold resentment pushed out every other emotion in that face that made him think of warm smiles and sultry invitations.

“I already told you.”

Yes, she had, but he’d like a bit more detail. He reached back into the saddlebag and pulled out a stale biscuit and some jerky. “Seeing as that’s the case, I expect you’d like a last meal.”

Her stomach rumbled. She held out her bound wrists, arching her hands back to facilitate being untied.

“Uh-uh.” He dropped the food onto the plateau formed by the oversized gloves. “I learned my lesson watching you teach Sam to swim. Those hands stay tied.”

She rested her hands on her lap, making no attempt to eat the food, presenting him with a clear view of her profile; small nose, pointed chin, smooth forehead and full lips that practically begged for a man to plant a kiss on them. He tapped the biscuit, knowing damn well she understood the order. Not by a twitch of those thick lashes did she acknowledge his presence. Another smile tugged at his lips.

“You keep this up and in about four miles, I’m going to start noticing you’re snubbing me and my feelings are bound to get hurt.”

Nothing. He hitched her back a bit and, keeping one hand on the reins, picked up the biscuit with the other. He held it to her mouth. Her stomach rumbled louder, but those kissable lips stayed tightly closed. She swallowed once. Twice. A person had to be damn hungry to salivate at the thought of a day-old biscuit. “When’s the last time you ate?”

Her lips barely moved as she imparted the information, no doubt worried he was going to shove the biscuit in. “A few days ago.”

Damn. “We were told you women were taken sometime last night.”

Outlaws often did their dirty work by the big Comanche moon that lit the plains like daylight.

She shrugged and turned her face into his chest, stomach rumbling, throat rippling, defying common sense.

He lowered the biscuit and shook his head. “You are one stubborn woman.”

“If you put me on my own horse, you won’t have to endure my company anymore.”

He had to smile at her persistence. “Now why would I do that? It’s not so often I get to hold a pretty woman in my arms that I’m eager to give up the pleasure.”

She rolled those big eyes and snorted indelicately. “I’m dripping wet, smell of horse, blood and other unpleasant things.”

“No arguing, you are a bit ripe.” Her outraged gasp caught on his sense of humor and gave it a tug. “But compared to that dead deer I hauled last week, you’re a clear step up.”

That fast, the steel left her spine. She shrugged down into the coat like a cake gone flat. He wondered if she’d actually been fishing for a compliment.

He returned the biscuit to her mouth. “I’m adding prickly to your list of attributes.”

She shot him a glare.

He shook his head. “Not eating won’t prove anything, and will just leave you too weak to fight.”

She snapped a bite, narrowly missing his fingertips. He waited until she got four good chews in, just enough to have the hard tack spread through her mouth before adding, “Truth be told, though, I don’t think I’ve ever had a prettier woman keep me company in the saddle.”

If looks could kill, he’d be dead. She struggled to get a retort out with the hard tack gluing her tongue to the roof of her mouth.

He dropped the biscuit into her hands and untied the canteen. Pulling the cork free with his teeth, he held it to her lips. She swished the first mouthful around before swallowing. After that, she just drank like there was no tomorrow. He pulled the canteen away, anger churning in his gut. If he’d known what bad shape she was in, he would have insisted she eat and drink back at the river and to hell with her stubbornness or the risk. “I take it that it’s been a while since you’ve had a good drink?”

“Our kidnappers weren’t overly concerned with the niceties.”

“None of us had a drink because of her,” Mavis called over the snort of the sorrel she was riding. Her dark hair was pulled back in a makeshift bun, her clothes as properly straightened as they could be after the day they’d had.

Since Tracker had seen to the other women’s needs earlier while Sam had been fishing Desi out of the San Antonio, Caine didn’t see a need for her outrage. Apparently, Mavis didn’t agree. She pointed at Desi and kept going. “She’s always causing trouble, bringing shame down on us all. No matter how often my brother disciplines her, she continues with her promiscuous ways.”

Desi’s face closed up tighter than a drum. She stared out across the rolling plains, shutting the other woman out. Shutting him out. Caine pulled the coat collar up to shield her as Sam rode up. Sam took one look at Desi’s posture, grabbed the sorrel’s bridle and shook his head.

“For an attractive woman, you sure are ugly,” he informed Mavis as he led her horse away. Mavis didn’t take kindly to that verdict and her argument was both loud and heated until Tracker shut her up by pointing out that she was drawing Indians.

Caine waited until she was out of earshot. “That woman has a belly full of hate for you.”

He didn’t think Desi was going to answer, but finally, she did. “Yes.”

“Her brother is your guardian?”

“Yes.”

“How’d that come to be? You kin?”

“No. But the circuit judge felt it was in my best interest to have one.”

“And he picked her brother?”

“Yes.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty.”

“And they thought ‘best’ was a guardian for a grown woman?”

She shrugged. “The town fathers felt I had wayward tendencies.”

“By wayward, I take it they felt you were forward with men?”

“Yes.”

“And what did you do to make them think that?”

Her expression grew tighter, more defensive. “Nothing.”

He believed her. Desi was more likely to remove a man’s balls than to delight in the fact that he had them.

“For a circuit judge to make a decision like that about a grown woman there had to be proof of a need.”

Nothing moved on her except her mouth. “They had a lot of proof.”

He didn’t miss the emphasis on they. “Who are ‘they’?”

“The town fathers,” she said with no emphasis on anything, as if reciting the facts. As if she expected him to believe the nonsense she was spouting.

“Why is it so important to you that I believe the worst of you?”

“It saves time.”

He took the canteen back and handed her a piece of jerky, settling her more comfortably against his chest. She could try until hell froze over, but he was never going to believe she was the forward type who needed a guardian to keep her behavior in check.

“Well, time I’ve got plenty of, so I guess it doesn’t matter if you waste a bit of it.”

Los Santos wasn’t as big as San Antonio, but it shared the same Franciscan heritage reflected in the fact that the church overshadowed every other building in the complex. The steeple could be seen for miles, and when the setting sun glinted off the inlaid tiles around the towers as it was doing now, it served as a beacon, drawing folk in from near and far.

Partial walls protected the town’s most vulnerable sides, but not much else stood in the way of defense. The size of the town itself was its best defense. Ten miles west of San Antonio, situated on a broad bend of the same river and boasting close to one hundred residents—all heavily armed—not many saw it as a prime target. Not when there were so many other smaller settlements and ranches cropping up on the outskirts. As they approached, the church bell rang and residents poured into the street.

“There’s Bert!” Mavis cried as a broad, hatless man came out to the middle of the street. She stood in the stirrups and waved her arms. After a second, the man shielded his eyes against the glare and then turned and shouted before running toward them, sunlight flashing off the star pinned to his chest.

Abigail and Sadie just as eagerly searched the crowd, standing in their stirrups until they, too, spotted their loved ones. Waving and crying, they yanked at their reins until Sam and Tracker turned their horses loose and let them gallop ahead to meet their kin.

In contrast, Desi didn’t even look up, just turned her face into his chest and took slow, even, very careful breaths. Caine brushed her hair off her cheek, dipping his fingers to the base of her neck, sliding his thumb around to the hollow of her throat, feeling the rapid beat of her pulse. For all that she sat calm and composed, she was terrified.

Tracker rode up beside him. He jerked his chin at Desi.

“She doesn’t look none too happy to be home.”

Caine nodded, curving his hand over her shoulder, the rounded point fitting precisely into his palm. “I noticed.”

“I don’t see anyone stepping forward to greet her.”

“It’s only been a minute.” Though he knew what Tracker was getting at. It seemed hard to believe that anyone missing Desi wouldn’t be at the forefront of the watch for her return.

“I don’t like the feel of this.”

He didn’t, either. “She’s got a guardian appointed by the circuit judge.”

Sam rode up on the other side, the same concern in his gaze as in Tracker’s.

“The padre that sent us after her?”

“No. Mavis’s brother.”

Tracker snorted. “Now, why doesn’t that make me all warm and toasty in my gut?”

Probably for the same reason it didn’t make him. The women had reached the men. There was a lot of cheering and hugging as everyone crowded around, wanting to hear the details of their rescue. A man separated from the crowd, the brightness of his white shirt against his paisley vest almost blinding as it reflected the rays of the setting sun. He stood apart from the crowd, legs spread, arms folded across his chest. Waiting.

Sam pushed his hat back off his brow and rested his forearm across the horn of his saddle. A body would have thought him completely relaxed, unless they noticed the repetitive opening and closing of his fingers. Anyone familiar with a gunslinger’s habits would recognize what he was doing. Sam wasn’t getting a toasty gut, either. “Looks like someone’s waiting on her return.”

Tracker spat his disgust. “A gambler.”

“Could just be a fancy dresser,” Sam offered, testing the fit of his revolver in the holster strapped to his leg.

“Yup.” Caine pulled his rifle from the scabbard and rested it across the saddle between the pommel and Desi’s hip. She cut him a startled glance. He squeezed her shoulder. “Is that your guardian, Desi?”

She didn’t turn her head, didn’t answer, but her respirations came two beats faster than normal. Finally, she nodded.

Tracker frowned. “What kind of judge gives guardianship of a young lady to a goddamn gambler?”

None that Caine knew. “Any chance you remember the name of the judge who heard your case, Desi?”

She would never forget. Not the way he had sat up on the church altar as though he were God on high. Not the way he’d acted the all-knowing, benevolent wise man, nor what had come after. “Judge Harvey Clayton.”

All three men swore at once.

“Well, that puts a clearer shine on things,” Sam muttered.

Caine rested his chin on her head and continued to stroke her arm with his fingers while, with every clop of the horses’ hooves on the wet ground, they got closer and closer to James. Desi closed her eyes and worked harder at getting her hands out of the gloves. By keeping her wrists apart after Sam had retied her, and letting her hair drip on the leather, she’d managed to stretch the ties some as they absorbed the water.

She risked a glance out of the corner of her eye. James was waiting and he wasn’t happy. He only stood that way when he wasn’t happy. Oh, God, she needed to get free. She worked her hands more frantically inside the gloves, pulling so hard the ties cut into her skin through the leather. She bit her cheek against the pain.

Caine’s strong hand settled over hers, engulfing her hands and wrists in the warmth of his touch. Again she got that conflicting message of threat and comfort. He squeezed, defeating her efforts with disheartening ease. She looked up. She couldn’t read a thing in his expression, partly because of the glare of the sun, and partly because he was just too good at hiding what he was thinking.

She tugged at her hands. Another squeeze and a shake of his head told her he knew what she was doing. The horse stopped. She heard James approaching. She’d sat and waited too many times like this not to recognize the sound of his tread. He always scuffed his foot on the third step.

Caine straightened. The rifle barrel pressed into her hip as he changed the angle.

“Ranger.”

James’s voice was smooth and well-modulated. Pitched to inspire confidence. He stepped into Desi’s view. His facial muscles were set in the same open, confidence-inspiring expression. His ability to charm people while hiding what he really thought was what made him such a successful gambler. He touched the brim of his hat with his finger. One finger. Her flinch escaped her control. “Desi.”

Caine’s grip on her shoulder tightened. He didn’t have to worry. She would never throw herself into this man’s arms.

James nodded to the other two men, who fanned out on either side of Caine. “I want to thank you all for bringing our Desdemona back to us.”

Tracker was the one who answered, a chill underlying his deep drawl. “It’s our job.”

James’s smile was easy and appreciative, as if he’d been longing to have her back. He probably had been, which accounted for the sincerity she sensed. “I hope she wasn’t too much trouble.”

“Why would you think she’d be any trouble?” Caine asked.

“Pretty as she is, surely you’ve noticed she’s not quite right in her head.”

As naturally as most people breathed, James slipped the lie into the conversation. Against her shoulder, she felt Caine stiffen. She straightened her spine, shifting away from the illusion that his strength was hers. It was starting again, just like it had before. The innuendo, the twisting of the truth until everything she’d done in self-defense was nothing more than another example of her instability.

She curled her fingers into fists as the rage beat against the futility of effort. Lawman or not, with her background, Caine wouldn’t listen to her, let alone believe her. What was the word of one deranged woman compared to the word of so many upstanding citizens? When push came to shove, he’d back James, the sheriff and the court who’d given her to them.

Caine’s “Can’t say that I have” caught her totally by surprise, the same way Tracker’s “Bullshit” and Sam’s “For Christ’s sake” did. Usually, when men came up against James’s confidence and smooth manner they went along with him. Caine and his men were the first who hadn’t, and she didn’t care if it was their naturally perverse nature or genuine belief that drove them to do it. She was just glad they had. It gave her a minute more of hope.

James looked her up and down, the concern never leaving his expression, but that twitch at the corner of his eye let her know that he was annoyed. He stepped in, holding his hand up to Caine. If Caine hadn’t chosen that moment to hook his foot over her ankle, she would have kicked James in his teeth.

“James Haddock. Desdemona’s guardian. And I’m glad she’s been having a good day.”

Caine made no effort to shake James’s hand. “I wouldn’t exactly call it ‘good.’”

“That probably wasn’t the best choice of words.”

If anything, the solid wall of muscle against her side got harder. Desi tilted her head back. Caine was staring at James with that impassive face that gave away nothing. To him or to her.

“What would be a better choice?” Caine asked, his finger touching her cheek, the calluses on his fingertip feeling strange against her skin before recurving his hand round her shoulder. Though it was illogical, she felt safer with it there.

“Stable maybe?” James’s sigh was sympathy personified as he stepped back. Behind him, spectators gathered. Most of them just bored townsfolk, but a few like Bert, Bryan and Carl had an interest even if they weren’t going to reveal it. She shuddered. They would never touch her again.

“Ever since her ordeal,” James continued, taking a step closer. “There’s been no knowing how she’s going to be one day to the next.”

Desi sucked in a breath and held it, pointless outrage surging. Again. Caine unhooked his leg from over her feet.

“Ordeal?”

“I’m afraid so.”

She curled her hands into fists, knowing what was coming. How it was going to end. Caine’s chin bumped her head lightly and then his lips brushed her ear. “Breathe, Desi.”

She didn’t think she was ever going to breathe again.

“Ever since she came to us her mental condition has been…delicate.”

“I am not insane.” For once she wanted to say that and have someone really believe her.

“Of course you’re not,” James agreed immediately, that smile she hated stretching his lips and that warning tic pulling infinitesimally at the corner of his eye. “You’ve just had a tough time recovering from your experience with the Comancheros last year.”

Shame and anger warred for dominance. Everyone knew what Comancheros did to captives. Everyone knew how filthy they left a woman. Forever tainted. Scorned.

“That true, Desi?” Caine asked, no discernible inflection in his voice.

“I’m not crazy.”

“I already know that. I was questioning the part about the Comancheros.”

There would be no point in denying it. The sheriff or the priest would back up James’s claim. She dug her nails so hard into her palms they ached. “Yes.”

“Damn, I’m sorry, honey.”

Honey? When had she become honey? She took one deep slow breath, then two.

“Is that how you lost your parents?”

She didn’t bother with three. Simply gave up the struggle for calm. It just wasn’t possible with the threat of her return hanging over her head and Caine bringing the pain of the past to the fore. “Yes.” And her twin sister. She closed her eyes on that memory.

James took a step forward, and the snap of a twig under his foot jerked her eyes open. This time Caine didn’t put his foot over hers as he came almost into reach. “We’ve done our best by her.”

“That’s true,” Sheriff Hatchet said, coming up. “The girl was wild when she first got here. No one could get near her. There was talk of sending her back east to one of those asylums until James here agreed to take her on.” He slapped James on the back. “Don’t know how he did it, but he worked wonders with the girl.” He shook his head in amazement. “Pure wonders.”