Lily (Wildflowers Of Montana Book 5) (8 page)

It happened quickly, too quickly, although my mind was completely distracted at the sight of Jack. It had been six damn weeks and my body came alive being in the same room with him, even with guns waving in the air. When the outlaws argued over a hostage and Jack had grabbed me, I’d been momentarily stunned. It had been Jack’s rough handling that made me remember myself. I’d feigned anger and upset, and Jack had forced me—I went willingly so there wasn’t much true force—out into the late afternoon sunshine. He’d lifted me easily, unceremoniously dumped me upon his horse and climbed up behind me. I had barely time to set my dress to rights before we were moving.

As Jack had pointed out, I liked to chatter when nervous so I intentionally bit my lower lip to keep silent. I just reveled in the feel of his arms about me as he held the reins, although I had no idea where we were going. I’d half expected the cavalry, at least the town sheriff to be waiting outside for the outlaws, but that was not the case. The street was busy, but surprisingly no one paid us much mind. I knew it wasn’t smart to bring notice to us, for I knew Benson was one to shoot people without reason.

Jack had always been gentle with me—except the second time he’d fucked me when I told him not to hold back—but he wasn’t now. I felt fury vibrating from where his body was pressed against mine. His arm shifted about my waist and he held me snugly as the horses picked up their pace at the outskirts of town. His palm was large enough so his thumb brushed the underside of my breast with each bounce.

He didn’t speak at all and I didn’t dare say a word.

Bozeman was well behind us and we’d cut across the open prairie, avoiding the trail that led from town to town and the railroad line. I looked around Jack’s solid body and didn’t see anyone following. Jack’s arm tightened about my waist, keeping me facing forward.

“Fuck her already,” Benson said as he slowed and Jack came up beside him.

Bert Benson looked just like his wanted poster, for I’d studied it the past few weeks. Just being in his presence I knew there wasn’t a kind bone in his body. Just looking into his dark fathomless eyes gave me the willies. He was as big as Jack, with a burly physique and a disgusting habit of spitting out his chewing tobacco in the grass and using his sleeve to wipe up the dribble.

Benson looked me over and I felt dirty. It wasn’t play acting that I turned my head away from the man.

“She’s a much better hostage than a man. I’ve heard redheads have a hot nature.” He pulled his gun from his holster and aimed it at us. Jack stiffened and I turned my face into his chest, but I knew that would do nothing to shield me. “Let her down and we can all find out.”

Crumb and Morgan laughed. I heard the sound of tobacco juice being spit.

“Mmm,” Jack replied noncommittally. “I agree. Redheads are usually… prickly. You have to stroke them carefully.”

I stiffened at his words, especially the fact that Jack was agreeing with Benson. Jack had told me I was prickly before, even to my face. He’d said he liked me that way. As for stroking me, well, Jack knew how to do that quite well. I just didn’t want him to do it in front of Benson and his men.

“That gun is pointed at who, Benson, her or me?” Jack growled. “Put that away before you shoot either of us. If you shoot me, I won’t be able to help you with stealing that strongbox planned for the train to Salt Lake next week. If you shoot her, I won’t be able to fuck her.”

I dared a glance at the other men. Benson lowered his gun and looked to Morgan and Crumb. “We’ll keep her alive and we can all fuck her.”

I held my breath, waiting for Jack’s response. He shook his head. “I told you, I don’t share.”

I could feel the dark rumble of his words against my back. He wasn’t happy. Neither was I, for that matter. I had no intention of fucking the other men.
That
was not part of my plan. They were disgusting in every way.

“You should know that by now, since I didn’t join your little party with the brunette back in Townsend.”

Benson chuckled and I fumed. Morgan held up his cupped hands indicating the size of the woman’s breasts and Crumb grabbed his crotch. They’d been with whores in a saloon?

“True. I bet that blond you picked got worked real hard. I just wonder… is your pecker that small then that you have to hide it?”

Morgan and Crumb howled with laughter at Morgan’s barbed words.

I knew male posturing when I heard it and while I was sure Jack wanted to rip Morgan’s head off for threatening his manhood, he remained calm.

I, however, was just downright angry. I’d only seen his, but I was sure Jack’s
pecker
was bigger than those three men’s combined. Maybe that was why they had to share a woman for it to all add up. I knew better than to mess with a man with a gun, so I didn’t offer insinuations to such.

Jack stopped his horse. “If you want me to fuck the woman, I will.”

With too much ease, he lowered me to the ground and I glanced about. He was going to fuck me out in the open with these men watching? Not a chance. I shook my head and slowly backed away from them. I didn’t have to feign fear and embarrassment. I knew Jack wouldn’t hurt me, but I didn’t know his intentions. Was it better to be fucked with the men watching than risk dying?

The other men laughed. “She’s getting away, Pike. Think she can outrun you?”

Jack slid from his horse and stalked in my direction, his eyes dark and predatory, his scruffy jaw clenched. He was going to do it. He was going to fuck me. Now. I gulped, turned on my heel and ran, the other men’s laughter following me.

I heard Jack as he followed me, his boots heavy on the hard packed ground. His legs were so much longer than mine that he should have caught me quickly, but I made it further from the others than I expected before his hand gripped my arm, tugged me back into him. I screamed and struggled as I felt his hard cock against my lower back.

“This is where we part ways, Benson,” Jack called, turning himself so I was shielded by his body. “No matter the size of my pecker, I don’t fuck with an audience.” He stroked a hand over my hair. “‘Sides, you don’t want to have any part in this. She’s a witness and can’t be allowed to blab. One less body on your hands.”

I struggled again and Jack pulled me up into him, hard. Now, I faced the others. I knew Jack wasn’t going to kill me, but I
was
scared. If Jack didn’t talk the other men into leaving, they might want to fuck me too, or force Jack to kill me. For real. Seeing the others, even at a distance, made me remember how ruthless and sinister they really were. I thought of other women they may have raped and murdered out on the prairie.

“If I didn’t know you had a dick, I’d say you were as modest as a little girl,” Crumb commented.

“His pecker must be tiny,” Morgan added and all three of them laughed.

“I told you, Pike, redheads are little wildcats,” Benson commented, with a crusty laugh. He eyed me with complete dispassion. I was looking forward to knowing the man would hang. “Do what you want with her. We never saw a thing.” He spat a wad of chewing tobacco into the grass, his arm resting on the pommel of his saddle. “We were going to separate anyway. Now’s as good a time as any. We’ll meet up in Helena as planned.”

“Good,” Jack replied, nodding. “They’re going to be following our trail, so I’ll head south. Go find your own women in Helena, you’ve earned it.”

Crumb whooped and spurred his horse to the west, clods of dirt kicking up from his horse’s hooves. Morgan followed. With one last look, Benson tipped his hat to Jack, then joined the others.

Neither of us moved as the men got smaller and smaller on the prairie. Sure they weren’t going to turn around, I said, “They’re going to get away! You spent all this time hunting them down and you’ll just have to go after them again.”

I didn’t need Jack to leave this job unfinished. I was selfish and wanted him all to myself.

“You want them to stay?” he asked, releasing me, then turning to face me. He put his hands on his hips. “They’d rape you and then shoot you in the head.”

I realized he had a valid point.

“But—”

“They’ll be in custody before they reach Three Forks,” he added. “I was able to wire the colonel with the plans and they’ll be caught with the money red-handed. They’ll be rightly punished.” He released his hold on me and spun me around to face him. My hat, which had been so carefully set on my head, fell off into the tall grass. “As for you, you’re going to be rightly punished, too.”

I took a step back, then another, for instead of the happy reunion I’d envisioned, before me stood a furious version of my husband I’d never seen before. I gulped at the intensity of him. Had he always been so big?

“Punished? Why?”

He was walking forward as I retreated, but my question had him stop. “Woman, are you insane?” His voice boomed across the valley and surely the departing men would hear.

Tilting my chin up, I replied, “I married you, didn’t I? I’m thinking it’s certainly possible.”

With his long legs—damn them—he reached me before I could move away from him any further. He grabbed my hand and lifted it up.

“Where the hell is my ring?”

He’d been angry when he first saw me in the bank, but that had been nothing compared to how upset he was now. The tendons in his neck were corded and his eyes were narrowed. He looked ruthless and lethal.

I undid one button at the top of my dress, then another, reached in and tugged out the chain about my neck. Dangling at the bottom of it was his ring. Grabbing the gold necklace, Jack tugged hard and it broke. Ripping the chain from the ring, he tossed it behind him, unceremoniously lifted up my hand and worked the ring back onto its rightful place. It felt warm and heavy.

“Never take the ring off, Lily.”

I shook my head, for I could tell that this was important to him. Crucial. “I won’t,” I vowed.

“You take it off, I will find it and I will find
you.
You belong to
me
.” 

I couldn’t have agreed with him more, so I replied with a simple, “Yes.”

He sighed, as if reassured once the ring was back where it belonged. “This ring says I’m your husband. I left you in Butte so that you would be safe.”

I tried to tug my hand away, but he wouldn’t relent. “You
left
me in Butte!” I shouted.

“To keep you safe!” he repeated. “I should have taken you back to your mothers’ ranch and let all those brothers-in-law you told me about watch you.” Dropping my hand, he walked in a circle, pacing in the tall grass. As he did so, he bumped the hat off his head and ran his hand through his dark hair, then down over the back of his neck. “Damn it, Lily. You think I
wanted
to leave you?”

“Six weeks.” I stomped over to him and started poking him in the chest. “You’ve been gone six weeks without even a word. You said you’d be gone two at the most.”

“I told you I had a job to do. I had no
idea
it would take so long. You promised you’d wait for me.”

I laughed, but my hackles were raised and it sounded somewhat maniacal. Perhaps, I was. “Yes, I promised I would wait for you because of your job. Robbing trains and killing people,
Mr. Pike
?”

“Do you honestly believe that I would do something like—”

“No,” I replied, cutting him off with that one decisive word.

My reply must have surprised him, for I saw a flicker of doubt, of fear in his eyes.

“No. I don’t believe it. I
did
,” I admitted, “when I first saw it in the newspaper, but I had plenty of time to think. Weeks, in fact.”

“What did you surmise?” His voice had lost all the anger.

“When I first saw the article, I was devastated. I thought you’d lied to me, were the worst kind of man, that you’d conquered another virgin and left her behind. God, what they wrote about you! It took me a week.”

“I married you,” he replied. “If I was going to fuck a woman and leave her, a whore at the brothel would have been the wiser choice.”

“That’s exactly what I thought as well. As you said, I’m prickly. Why would you want to be stuck with me in the eyes of God and man, if you weren’t telling the truth? You said you were a Pinkerton and I knew you were off gallivanting the countryside for some job. You
left
your bride behind, so I knew it was important.”

“Jesus, sweetness, you thought I wanted to leave you? Leave that warm bed with your naked body tucked up against me? You had my love marks on your skin, my seed sticky on your thighs. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

The turmoil and frustration in my eyes was my undoing and all the weeks of anger drained from me, like water down a drain. “I know. I missed you. So much.” I held up my hand to stop him from getting closer. “You could have told me the truth. I would have kept your confidence.”

He shook his head. “I gave my word. I didn’t know you then and I couldn’t go back. I
wanted
to tell you. Desperately.”

“And I wanted to know the truth. Desperately,” I replied, trying to get him to see why I did something so reckless.

Jack sighed, came over to me and stroked my cheek. “Don’t think that saying that will get you out of your punishment.” I tried to step back, but he hooked an arm about me. “You’re going to tell me, wife, how you found me.”

I played with a button on his shirt as I shrugged. “It wasn’t so hard.”

“Oh, really? Then tell me why the US Cavalry, the Pinkertons and US Marshal Service has yet to find Benson and his men and you knew the exact time and place of their latest robbery?”

I didn’t answer right away, so he tilted my chin up with his fingers. “Lily,” he chided.

I shrugged again, wishing he’d call me by sweetness instead. “When I realized you couldn’t have done anything listed in the paper, I started investigating.”

His eyebrows slid up underneath his hair. “Investigating? That newspaper man and those other stuck-up buffoons wouldn’t share anything with you.”

“Of course, he wouldn’t. He’s a pompous little piece of…” I sighed. “Let’s just say I don’t like the man. His wife, however, I know quite well. It turns out she had an ingrown toenail that pained her terribly.”