Catch Me (5 page)

She ground her teeth together until pain spiked into her ears. “Hey, Collier?”

“Yeah, Maggie?”

“I just thought you should know there’s only one person in the world I hate more than you.”

She heard a soft shush of cloth as he shifted, and the rope wiggled. “I kind of figured as much.”

Something was wrong.

Dean awoke with his customary swiftness. The hum of crickets filled the air. A soft breeze flowed over what little of his skin was bare. Maggie’s breathing was too soft to hear.

It was probably nothing, just a remnant of a nightmare. The dream had started well enough, with Annie kissing him goodbye as he left for work. Jack had been tucked in the crook of her arm as she’d waved to Dean from their front porch. He’d ridden into town under the sharp summer sun, his badge glinting on his chest.

But it ended as they all had. The tumbled mess of a house. The acrid tang of gunpowder and coppery blood.

He kept his breathing slow and deep, and didn’t move a muscle beyond slitting his eyes open. Years of keeping one eye on his back while hunting vicious criminals had honed his peripheral vision. He stretched it to his full capabilities now, expecting to see a sleeping Maggie putting lie to his paranoia.

Instead, he found her awake and watching him with the wide, frightened eyes of a jackrabbit. She had one hand free and was picking away at the length of rope that connected her to his gun belt.

He snatched her by the forearm. “Haven’t we been through this?”

She squeaked. Panic flashed over her face. Her toe connected with his hipbone, awfully close to his nearest and dearest. He grunted and flinched. Leave it to Maggie to take advantage—she yanked free at the same time she planted another kick in his ribs.

“Goddamn it,” he roared.

She scrambled away on her knees, but got tangled in the blankets as she tried to push to her feet. He rolled over, seized hold of her hips and pulled her flat with an
oomph
.

That didn’t stop her though. She did her damnedest to claw out his eyes.

He snatched her wrists and pressed them together. He jerked her arms up over her head, and over the curve of the saddle, the better to put them out of her use.

Her tight body stretched beneath him, ripe for the plucking. The last time he’d been in such an intimate position with a woman, face to face and so near he could smell her sweet breath wash over his mouth, it had been Annie. But he’d never been tempted to fuck Annie into submission like he was this little hellcat. His marriage had been about love and respect, not this angry, snarling lust that reared its head at the most inopportune moments.

Exhaustion trod over him like a weary horse. The fool woman kept fighting him, losing and coming back for more anyway. He remembered the way she’d stilled in the hotel room when she’d feared he was about to touch her bosom. It had been so many years since anyone had called Dean a gentleman; he wasn’t afraid of fighting dirty.

His mouth slanted over hers and he
took
. Took her lips, took her tongue, took her aggression. She tasted like fury, sweet and sharp at the same time, and—way down underneath—innocence. He poured in every bit of frustration he’d felt with her for tempting him by simply being. Her body went limp. Not with the welcoming comfort he was used to. Instead, she was limp with fear. Her lips trembled as he pushed and stroked, and the quick flash of his dying conscience made him ease up. He couldn’t resist one more teasing nip of her plump bottom lip.

But he’d learned Maggie wasn’t the type of woman to let a hint of weakness go by.

She kissed him back.

Their mouths slid together, teeth clicking with bruising force. Her tongue slicked along his and he went rigid all the way down to his soul. Somehow his hands slipped free of her wrists and moved to cage her head, the better to angle her for his assault.

This wasn’t right. Women were meant to be protected and cherished, not pinned down and abused—even if she kissed him in return.

He yanked back. His head swam and his chest billowed in and out, brushing against the pert, uprising swell of her bosom.

His grip dug into the soft flesh of her cheeks before he even knew what he was doing. “Listen to me, you little hellcat. I’ll be sheriff of Fresh Springs if I have to ride into town with your dead body slung over my horse. Do you understand me?”

She froze for a second, her mouth slack and glistening under the weak light of the moon. “I understand you’re plumb crazy. My father is Fresh Springs’ sheriff.”

“Not for much longer.” His lips pulled tight in a mockery of a smile. “You asked what Masterson’s paying me? This. He’ll put me in as lawman.”

She shook her head. The motion sent her body shimmying under his. As tightly leashed as he was, it was almost more than he could take. His fists ground into the cold leather of the saddle, even as silken strands of her hair caressed his wrists.

She didn’t even notice his torment. “He can’t do that. That job’s all Father has left. If he knows it’s gone, he’ll give up.”

He levered into a sitting position, pulling her up alongside. “Life will be a lot easier once you realize the sun doesn’t revolve around your family.”

Her lower lip trembled and she looked off at the dying fire. “It does for me. Isn’t that what family is? The center of one’s world?”

He’d once thought so. But if that were true, the world would have stopped like he’d wanted it to when Annie and Jack died.

Gripping her by the arm, he leaned over and pulled his handcuffs out of his bag. He hadn’t wanted to use them, as their weight and size would be painfully awkward on her slim wrists. They were more likely to rub her raw than the ties he’d used.

“Oh, please, no,” she said.

“You haven’t left me much choice.” He snapped them around her wrists, then pulled a heavier length of cord from another bag. He wound it around and through the links of the cuffs, then tied the only knot at the other end, around his belt and snug to his body. “Now lay down. I’d like to get a little more sleep.”

She lay down, but didn’t seem ready to sleep. She scrubbed the heel of her hand across her eyes, one at a time because of the cuffs. “What’s so special about Fresh Springs? Can’t you go be a lawman somewhere else?”

He rolled onto his side and propped himself up on an elbow. She stared up at the sky, a mulish set to her mouth. “I don’t have anywhere else. Okay, hellcat? That enough of an admission for you?”

Her lips still glistened from their kiss, their delicate shape swollen. Marked. She slanted a look out the corner of her eyes. “What do you mean you haven’t anywhere else?”

He didn’t have to answer. Any other bounty he’d have told to fuck off. But they had a long ways to go yet. And he hadn’t realized how tired he was of silence until it was gone. Anything he could do to ease up her fighting would be a blessing. “I’ve been riding a fine line a long time. Got enemies a lot of places. Fresh Springs is likely my one and only chance to make sure I stay on the right side of the law.” He rolled onto his back and rested his head on his saddle.

Her soft voice drifted over to him. “It’s a painful place, isn’t it?”

“Where’s that?”

“Being out of options.”

Dawn found Maggie still awake and still perturbed. The handcuffs weighed heavy across her stomach. Money wasn’t going to work on Collier. Escape was likely out of the question as well, unless she managed to spot some sort of golden opportunity. He was implacable and determined that she wouldn’t slow their progress in any way.

Collier wasn’t going to suddenly crumble and return her to Father.

She would be going back to Fresh Springs to face her fate. When she thought about it, she figured she’d be more ashamed to face Tim and Billy than Masterson. She’d given him no more than he deserved. Seeing Billy’s round face as he testified against her, now that would be hard. At least Father wouldn’t be there to see his only daughter’s hubris come to call her to judgment.

What did she have to lose by not fighting?

Not much. Maybe the handcuffs, and that was about it.

In fact, if she managed to turn Collier up sweet, her slim possibilities of escape might expand. He might start letting her more than an arm’s length away.

She had no delusions it would happen instantly. But they had a long way back to Arizona, a good two or three weeks at a minimum. Even if she didn’t escape until a day outside Fresh Springs, that would be enough. In fact, it might even be better. She’d be near home and near people she’d known all her life. Someone was bound to help her.

Convincing Collier to look more fondly on her shouldn’t be impossible. After all, he’d kissed her. Robert had once told her a willingness to dally with a woman didn’t always mean the man liked her, but Maggie figured it wasn’t a far stretch. After all, there was a quick jump from love to hate. Why shouldn’t it be as quick from lust to liking?

Even Maggie found herself looking just a touch more fondly on Collier’s sleeping form. Not enough to forget that he was a stone-cold bastard, but enough to make her watch him with curiosity. He was coiled tight, even in repose, with one hand only inches from the pistol butt sticking out from under his saddle. She wondered what it would take for him to rest peacefully.

The kiss he’d forced on her had nearly vibrated with furious passion. She’d been taught to be a straight shooter with herself and she couldn’t deny it had affected her in curious ways. Her skin had near itched with the craving for more. She’d been kissed a couple times, usually behind the barn after a town dance, and none of those men had roused such vibrant feelings. Such a pity that the one man who seemed capable of such was the one man she hated with such force.

A robin swooped down to perch on a nearby stump. It cocked its head at her, as if wondering what she were doing lying out on the ground, when she could have a nice and tidy nest.

“Trust me, Mr. Robin,” she said. “I’d rather be home as well.”

The bird puffed up its chest and warbled at her.

“I know. It’s downright silly, ain’t it? Don’t worry, we’ll be out of your woods soon.”

“Who are you talking to?” His voice was rough with sleep and a thick strain of irritation.

The bird flew away in a flurry of wings. One feather drifted down from his flight. She sat up and picked it up. “No one.”

“A bird?” The shift and rustle behind her said he’d sat up as well. “You were talking to a bird?”

She ran the feather between her fingers. A rich, shimmering red, it was obviously from the bird’s chest. “You didn’t seem to be up to conversation.”

“With you? Not likely.” The rope fell slack between them and he surged to his feet. “I don’t much feel like starting my day with a headache.”

“Your ability to amuse is astounding.” She tapped the feather against her chin and pretended to think. “Or perhaps I should say inability.”

“I quail and quiver under your approbation,” he responded, but he didn’t seem particularly chastised. He folded his hands behind his head and stretched side to side. First snapping his braces back into place over his shoulders, he then picked up his black vest and slipped it on. The pistol was already in its home on his belt and had been before he’d even stood. She wondered if that gun was the first thing he reached for in the morning, before his eyes were even fully open.

“Collier, I thought you should know.”

“What’s that?” He started gathering the supplies for their breakfast.

She spun the feather. “I’ve decided not to fight you any longer.”

“Is that right?” He looped a tin cup over one finger and pulled a small bag from her saddlebag. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe you straight away.”

“Hey there, that’s my coffee.”

“And bless you for having it. I’d run out about a day before catching up with you. Don’t worry, I’ll give you some.”

“Give me some of my own coffee.”
What a bastard.
She folded her legs under herself Indian style. “And catching up? You wouldn’t perchance mean before abducting me, now would you?”

He glanced at her as he filled a small pot with water. “I thought you weren’t going to be fighting me.”

She tucked the feather in her hair, above her ear. “Maybe I should rephrase that to express myself more clearly. I won’t be trying to escape anymore. I shouldn’t wish to overly tax that remarkably small brain of yours.”

Her words rolled over him like water over a duck’s back as he set the water and ground coffee on the still hot embers of the previous night’s fire. “My remarkably small brain has served me well enough ’til now. And I don’t much believe you won’t be escaping, either, any more than I believed you not fighting me.”

She shrugged. “I don’t blame you. You’ll see soon enough, I suppose.”

He sat back on his heels, knees splayed and his hands dangling between. His free hands. It was difficult not to feel irritated about that when her own still carried the weight of the steel handcuffs. She figured it wasn’t worth the effort to suppress. Just because she’d decided not to run wasn’t a reason to pretend that everything had turned up roses.

“May I ask what’s affected this change in your outlook?” he asked.

“Father’s well on his way to recovery. While I’d like to be there, his health doesn’t seem predicated on my presence.” She picked at a loose string on her pants seam. “And I’m no hardened criminal. I’m bound to be captured soon enough. I might as well go with you.”

“And the fact that I’ll be taking your father’s job?”

Her sigh gusted about their small campsite. “I still don’t like it. But the doctors have already said it’s probable Father will have to adapt to a slower pace of life, which isn’t particularly compatible with being a sheriff. And Father never could convince Robert to let himself be deputized, so Fresh Springs has gone without. It might as well be you who takes over.”

He took the almost-boiling coffee off the fire and set it on a flat rock. “Robert?”

She ran a finger over and over the smooth steel about her wrists and chewed at the tender inside of her lip. “My brother. He died in a shootout three years ago.”

“I thought Fresh Springs was supposed to be a quiet little town.”

“It is, sure enough. Much of that’s been due to Father’s reputation.”

Collier shot her a purely skeptical look, with one eyebrow raised and a quizzical quirk to his lips.

“It’s true.” She laced her fingers together and propped her chin on her fists. “Even the Wailins Gang left Fresh Springs alone, except for one nasty raid on a homestead. Awful time that was. They killed the entire Duggins family, all the way down to the littlest baby.”