Dance With A Gunfighter (14 page)

A bone-crushing guilt pulsated through her, as it had
every single night since their deaths. Would a time ever come when she wasn’t
aware of each moment that passed since she had done nothing and watched her
family die? At least two of the men that killed them were dead now, even if
neither at died at her hand. Only three to go...

She put her arm over her eyes, trying to blot out the too
brilliant, too happy stars. How was it that they still shone when all the world
had gone black?

A while later, a match flicked and burned, then the tip of
a cigarette flared.

"I thought you were asleep, Jess," she said.

"I thought the same about you."

She rolled onto her side and watched the steady glow of
the cigarette tip.

After a while, Jess spoke. "I was thinking about
something you said."

"What was that?"

"Clara wasn’t the one the one who told you about
Blackie Lane being in Dry Springs, was she?"

"Yes, and that Tanner was there as well."

He said nothing.

"What is it?" she asked.

"She and Blackie Lane go back quite a few years. When
Lane showed up, she probably saw it as a way to get you out of Tombstone--send
you on some wild goose chase, and send him after you. She didn’t know why you
wanted to find him, and probably didn’t think Lane would kill you--just scare you."
Then he added quietly, "And more. Damn! She should have realized that with
a man like Lane there’d be no controlling what he did."

"So...so you really don’t love her, then?"

"Of course not!"

"But you spent time with her. Everyone said so."

Long moments passed before he answered. "You might
remember one afternoon we had a picnic on the hillside."

"Yes."

"You were asking so many questions and looking so
blasted desirable you drove me mad. I went with Clara that night. I tried to use
her to forget about you."

Her world rocked. She’d never dreamed...

"It didn’t work, Gabe." His self-disgust was
evident in his voice. "And Clara knew it."

She twisted and turned his words every which way as the
full impact of their meaning hit her. It couldn’t be. He was close to Clara,
and everyone knew it. "How did you find me?" she asked.

"Last night, when I found out you’d left Tombstone
without even a by-your-leave, I figured you had really come to hate me. I knew
I’d been treating you badly, ignoring you--or trying to. I was busy getting
shit-faced at the Crystal Palace when Neil Dexter showed up and said he was
surprised to see me there, surprised I wasn’t heading to Dry Springs with you,
and that you were going there to meet Tanner and Blackie Lane.

"When I heard Lane’s name, something niggled inside.
I looked at Clara and she’d turned whiter than any ghost. I thought it was just
because the idea of you confronting those madmen frightened her as much as it
did me. I see now that I was wrong about her. Dead wrong."

She could feel the force of his gaze even in the darkness.
"I left to search for you based on what Neil Dexter had said. Thank God I
found you in time."

Hearing his worry, she realized how frightened this strong
man had been for her safety.

"This whole crusade of yours, Gabe, this
revenge--it’s too dangerous. You’ve got to stop."

"Please, don’t say that."

"What if I hadn’t been able to find you?"

There was no need to answer. She knew what would have
happened, and so did he. "It’s a chance we all take, isn’t it?" she
said. "Those ‘what ifs.’ But you were there, and I’m safe now."

"Still--"

"Jess, thank you for explaining to me about...about
you and Clara, and...and the day of our picnic." Back in Jackson City, she
had learned she wasn’t the type boys paid any attention to, and she had learned
to ignore them in return. But Jess had said that he cared, and that he’d wanted
her, and she clung to his words.

"I shouldn’t have spoken to you that way,"
McLowry replied. "It meant nothing."

She cringed. "Ah, I see. I should have known. God,
I’m such a fool sometimes."

"A fool? Why?"

"To have imagined that you had strong feelings for
me." She guessed it was the anonymity of the night that gave her the
courage to say the next words aloud, but she couldn’t hold them back. "I’m
not the type men find attractive. I know that. I’m twenty years old and you
know what? I’ve never even had a beau. Heck, I’ve never even been kissed.
Imagine, nearly raped and killed, and I don’t even know how to kiss a man."
She chuckled derisively, then started to laugh. Memories of the morning’s
terror struck as her laughter grew and grew until she didn’t know what she was
doing.

Desert sand crunched, then he appeared in the light of the
campfire, coming toward her. "Gabe, stop," he said, kneeling at her
side.

He touched her shoulder and in the next moment she was in
his arms, her head nestled against his chest. He held her tight as her laughter
stopped and her body trembled as the memories of the morning swept over her
with full force. "It’s all right," he whispered, "you’re safe.
I’ve got you. You’re safe." He rocked her, murmuring words of comfort,
until she grew calm once more.

After a while, she raised her head and pressed her hand
against his chest. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to show such weakness."

"Everything caught up with you, that’s all."

"I’m sorry," she repeated.

"No need to be. You don’t have to be strong all the
time, you know."

"Don’t I?"

With a wry smile, he shook his head. Then his gaze
drifting to her all-too-tempting mouth, her unkissed mouth, mere inches from
his. There was no way in hell he had the strength to leave her that way.

He leaned toward her, slowly, ever so slowly, until his
lips met hers.

His kiss was gentle, their lips barely touching her as her
head cocked, allowing his mouth to better fit over hers. She tasted good, like
desert spring water. His arms tightened ever so slightly as he touched her lips
with his tongue. Instinctively hers parted, letting him taste the inside of her
mouth. He pulled her closer, stroking her back, her ribs, her hips, as his
kisses deepened. He was like a coiled spring ready to snap. He groaned and felt
himself sinking into the kiss, wanting her, needing--

Abruptly, he broke it off, drawing in his breath, trying to
regain his self-control. His own choked groan had startled him...that this
inexperienced girl could affect a man like him. But then he remembered when
they’d first danced, how he’d stepped onto the dance floor with her, expecting
he’d want to get the duty over with quickly, but instead found she was in tune
with his every step, his every movement. So, too, were her kisses now.

 Brown, wondering eyes stared up at him. Her arms had
somehow found their way to circle his waist, while one of his was at her back,
the other below her breast, straining to reach higher, to cup her...

"I think," she said, "I think we should try
that one more time. I’m a slow learner."

"No, Gabe, that’s one thing you’re not." He
stood up and walked back to his side of the campfire.

Chapter 11

Mornings are beautiful in the desert. The sky is clear and
the day not yet hot. The rising sun casts pale shadows over the land and the
mountains to reveal their crags and niches with stark clarity. When Gabe awoke,
McLowry had already built a fire and made coffee. She watched him put flour
into a tin bowl, add a cup of their precious water, and stir them together. How
different this was from yesterday morning. She shuddered at the memory.
Yesterday morning had been a nightmare. But then there was last night.

They ate breakfast quickly, self-consciously mumbling only
a few words to each other, and soon were on their way once more.

They rode northeast in silence. Across the bleak, high
desert, buzzards and snakes were their only companions. As they skirted the
Dragoon Mountains and the Apache strongholds hidden there, they left the trail,
knowing the Apaches would be watching it.

She discovered that McLowry knew the open desert well,
knew how to read the few animal tracks in the bleak landscape that could lead a
man to a watering hole. But still, the going was slow and treacherous.
Sometimes, animal tracks led to dry holes. Other times, desert storms filled
the holes with water but washed away the tracks so a man would find them only
by chance.

McLowry liked to say the desert knew no bounds in its
perversity, and Gabe came to understand the full meaning of those words.

As the sun set, they found a dry creek bed and followed it
until they reached a deep spot that still held a couple inches of water from
the last thunderstorm. "We’ll make camp here," McLowry said. "I
expect you’re pretty hungry."

Faced with the thought of camping again with McLowry, food
was the last thing on her mind. She changed the subject. "Do you know how
much farther to Dry Springs?" she asked.

He got off his horse and began removing his packs and
saddle. She did the same. "Look, Gabe," he said. "Tanner’s got
to be long gone from Dry Springs. A man like him never stays put."

"We’ll find him," she said firmly. Without
further comment she helped McLowry make camp and eat the pathetically skinny
rabbit he had shot earlier.

After supper, she sat with a cup of hot coffee, her back
to him, and stared out at the desert, her thoughts inward.

She felt his gaze on her a long while before she heard him
stand and then rummage around in his saddlebags. She turned to see him pull out
a deck of cards. "Do you know Black Jack?" he asked, holding up the
deck.

She grinned. "I used to play with my brothers. I’m
warning you, I’m good."

His eyebrows rose. "Really?" He spread out a
blanket, sat on one end, and began shuffling the deck. "What would you
like to wager on just how good you are?"

She walked to her saddlebag and pulled out a box of
matches. "Ten matchsticks say I’ll beat the dealer." She sat on the
blanket across from him.

"You’re on, lady."

They played cards deep into the night. Gabe wasn’t above
palming an ace now and then, or rearranging the deck while he poured himself
another cup of coffee. He caught her every time. In all, she was surprised at
how many laughs they had shared as the game went on, even though his pile of
matchsticks grew and she threatened to torch the whole lot of them.

Finally, it was time for them to get some sleep. "I
guess we ought to turn in," McLowry said uneasily.

"I guess," she replied.

She got out her bedroll--they had been playing cards on
McLowry’s--and she spread it near the campfire. Memories of the prior night
were strong in Gabe’s mind.

McLowry adjusted his blanket far from hers. She guessed
memories of last night were on his mind, too.

She lay down, as did he.

She waited, looking for a late-night cigarette. This
night, he didn’t build one. She wondered if he was afraid it might lead to a
repeat of last night’s lesson in kissing.

She curled on her side, looking at his dark shadow across
the campfire. She had to admit that in the past she had often thought about
kissing McLowry, and had wondered what it would be like. She used to think
about him in those days when she was still in school and the boys seemed to do
nothing but laugh at her or ignore her, and even later, when some of the local
boys would come to call, and she would turn them away. The ones who called on
her were usually the desperate boys, the ones no other girls paid attention to
because they were awkward or had bad skin or feet that smelled even through
their shoes. They came to see her, not because they cared about her, but
because they wanted someone female to spend time with. She was their last
chance, their last hope--the weird Devere girl who wore her hair short and ran
around in men’s clothes and could ride and shoot better than most of the
cowhands in Jackson City. She didn’t want boys like that. So instead, she had
thought of McLowry--or, more accurately, her made up version of him. She had
thought of being with him, even of kissing him.

Her imagination hadn’t come within a country mile of the
real thing. She guessed that was what was meant by innocence.

o0o

Two days later Gabe saw a battered sign with the words
"Dry Springs" so sun-bleached that they could barely be read.

A cluster of stark wooden buildings, gray with weathering,
lined up to form the main street of town. No gingerbread moldings or false
fronts decorated the plain structures. No signs of life existed in the town
except for a couple of chickens and old, skinny dogs sleeping in the hot sun.
The dogs didn’t even bark, just looked up and stared as if they had never seen
anyone ride into town before.

The first place that looked inhabited was a saloon, and
the next, several doors away, was a general store. Gabe had never seen so many
boarded-up and falling-apart buildings in her life.

"What’s going on here, Jess?"

"This is what happens when the desert wins," he
said without emotion.

She shuddered.

They reined in their horses at the livery. It was almost
empty. "We’re thinking of staying a day or two," McLowry said to the
stable owner. "Is there a rooming house in town?"

"Mrs. Huckleby takes in boarders since her boys grew
up and went to California," the man replied, looking at the two of them
strangely. "She ain’t had no business lately, and I guess she wouldn’t
turn you away."

"I see. She’s a widow?"

"Naw. Her husband works at the mine. But that don’t
bring in no money anymore."

Gabe’s interest flared. "What kind of mine?"

"Silver. Some of the prettiest ore you ever wanted to
see came out of the Dry Springs mine."

At least that part of Clara’s story was true. "This
hardly looks like a mining town," Gabe added.