Liz Ireland (23 page)

Maybe he wouldn’t give either of them a chance to talk anymore, he mused. The minute she opened her eyes, he might just take her in his arms and kiss her again like there
was no tomorrow. Maybe he’d never give her a chance to talk again.

After a few moment’s consideration, he decided he wouldn’t want that either, though. Chatter was an essential part of Paulie, and he didn’t want to change a thing about her. Besides, he would miss talking to her, sparring with her. Somehow, they would just have to find a balance between kissing and talking.

Chuckling silently at his foolish frame of mind, he bent and placed a whisper-light kiss on Paulie’s cheek. She felt warm, and he moved closer to her to ward off the night chill. Their fire had never got itself built, and now they only had their two blankets for heat.

The strange thing was, he could
smell
fire. Very faintly. He glanced around, wondering if maybe Paulie had built a little cook fire somewhere, and he was smelling the ashes. But the coals were nowhere in evidence, and besides, he could swear the smell reaching his nose was smoke. Fresh smoke.

Frowning, he got up, pulled on his pants and boots, then ambled slowly to a rise in the land. His eyes squinted west, from where the wind was hailing, and could just make out a dot of light in the black horizon far, far away. A campfire.

“What’s going on?” Paulie said.

He nearly jumped in surprise. He hadn’t heard her sneak up on him, but there she was, covered only by a blanket slung over her shoulders, peering off into the distance. She looked beautiful, and his body responded instantly.

“You see something out there, Will?”

She seemed unmoved by the fact that she was standing naked next to him. He wasn’t, though. He shifted, trying to keep his eyes from straying up and down her gloriously naked figure. “Fire,” he replied. The word came out more gruffly than he’d expected.

Paulie’s breath caught. “Maybe it’s Mary Ann!”

“Maybe.” Will glanced back mournfully at Paulie, who he could tell was already caught up in the prospect of trailing Mary Ann again. Then he looked at their private little campsite. So much for kissing instead of talking. Or making love for weeks on end.

“Who else could it be?” Paulie said excitedly, oblivious to his regretful mood.

Will turned back to the pinpoint of light and drew a steadying breath. “Maybe somebody we’re not so eager to see.”

“L
ooks like we were both right,” Paulie said. But as she peered over the hillside, looking at the little camp below, there was no joy in her tone. Nor was there any in Will’s expression.

They had found Mary Ann, and her gambler. Unfortunately, at some point, either together or separately, those two had come across Night Bird and his three cohorts. Now they were his prisoners.

“Damn,” Will muttered. It was all he had said for five minutes now.

“What the Sam Hill are we going to do?” Paulie asked, looking up at him. Will studied the lay of the land with a tense, anxious expression on his face. She couldn’t believe that just an hour before they had been entwined in each other’s arms, making love on a blanket on the ground. She had never felt such happiness followed by such despair.

“We’ve got to get them out of there.”

The words made Paulie’s heart sink. How on earth were they going to do that? “We got away from Night Bird once. Do you think we’ll be that lucky again?”

Will looked at her and crooked the corner of his lip up into a wry smile. “If Mr. Bird’s in a generous mood.”

Paulie glanced back down the hillside, squinting. She had fairly good eyesight, but from the position of the prisoners, she could tell frustratingly little about what was going on. Oren’s rig had been overturned. Mary Ann was tied sitting down as Night Bird had positioned Paulie and the others during their captivity on the border. The most disturbing thing about the picture was that Oren Tyler was lying on the ground next to Mary Ann, and appeared to be hurt.

Were murdering, thieving Indians ever in a generous mood? Is that really how they had escaped before—because Night Bird hadn’t cared if they survived or not? She’d thought it was because of Oat’s ingenuity. Now she wondered. “He doesn’t seem in particularly high spirits.”

On the contrary, Night Bird was stalking around the circle impatiently. A shiver ran down Paulie’s spine. “Remember what he said, Will? That he only cared about the white man’s money?”

Will nodded, and she knew instantly that the thought had occurred to him long before she had remembered it. “He only kills for money. Large sums of it.”

Oren Tyler had made enough money to pick up and move to Colorado. To run after him, Mary Ann had cashed in Oat’s bonds, and she had Tyler’s two hundred dollars. Between them, they probably were carrying nearly as much as the men guarding the payroll had been when Night Bird decided to cut their lives short. With a price on his head already, he would have nothing to lose by killing these people. If he did kill them, they wouldn’t be able to run to authorities.

Paulie shivered. “We’ve got to attack them.”

When Will turned his head, his face bore an expression of pure incredulity.
“Attack
them?” he repeated, his voice a whispered croak. “Have you lost your mind? We’ve got
two pistols, and they have our old rifles and then some. We’re outnumbered and outgunned.”

Paulie shook her head. “We can’t just watch them be butchered.”

“We won’t,” he said with determination. “Or at least, you won’t. You’re going to ride for help.”

“Me?” She blinked. Immediately, she hated the plan. “By myself? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“It makes more sense than you and I charging down there and both getting ourselves captured.”

“What if we got in position and tried shooting them?”

Will frowned. “That doesn’t change the fact that there are four of them and two of us. The odds aren’t good, and besides, you’re a lousy shot.”

Paulie bit her lip to keep back a tart reply. Now was no time for unnecessary boasting. She could hit a target most of the time…as long as it wasn’t moving. She doubted once the shooting began the group of outlaws would kindly sit still long enough for her to take aim. Besides, Will was right about their weapons not being up to snuff. When she had bought her puny gun, she had only been thinking in terms of self defense, not leading a charge against an armed camp.

“You’d better leave now.” Will grabbed her arm and started pulling her back down the other side of the hill, toward their horses, which they had tethered well out of distance from the camp. They were just lucky to have been downwind from the Indian, or else they surely would have been caught, too. “It’s a long ride to San Antonio, and we don’t have any time to lose.”

She wasn’t about to leave Will again without a fight. “What do you intend to do here while I’m trotting around the countryside?”

“I’m going to keep watch, and try to make certain those two don’t get hurt.”

She looked at him skeptically. “What will you do if something happens?”

Will glanced back for a moment, scoping out the terrain. “There has to be a place where I can get close enough…”

“Close enough to what?”

“To shoot.”

He was going to try to kill Night Bird? Paulie shook her head. “If you think I’m leaving you here, you’re crazy! If you’re going to try to shoot Night Bird, why wouldn’t you want me here for backup?”

“I won’t fire unless it looks like something’s about to happen—or if they find me.”

She shot him a distrustful look.

He tightened his grip on her arm and hauled her close to him. “If you stay here, you might be signing all our death warrants. We need men with real guns. You need to locate the federal marshall in San Antonio.”

“What if I can’t convince them you’re in danger?”

Will obviously didn’t think there was much chance of that happening. “If you so much as whisper the name Night Bird we’ll probably have a stampede of rangers and angry citizens coming our way.”

“But I can’t just leave you here, Will. You’re hurt!” She knew that wasn’t much of an argument. Will had made it out this far, and he’d certainly engaged in some pretty strenuous physical activity without any adverse affects.

“I’m all right,” Will said.

“Why can’t I stay?” she asked. “You go to San Antonio.”

“Because you’ve probably got more stamina right now. I’ve just been laid up in bed with a fever. Besides, if one
of us has to run the risk of being captured by Night Bird, I want it to be me.”

“We don’t agree on that subject.”

He smiled encouragingly. “Just think of this as your opportunity to rescue your friend Mary Ann.”

Paulie didn’t mind admitting her fib now. “That was a lie, Will. I just followed along because I wanted to be with you.
You
were the friend I was worried about. Still am.”

He smiled warmly at her. “I know, Sprout. And I’m glad you came along—more than I can say.”

Paulie felt light-headed. If only they were somewhere else—somewhere private, and out of harm’s way. More than anything, she just wanted to crawl under their blanket and make love again. But she knew she was living in a dream if she actually thought that was going to happen. And Will was right. Given the fact that he was still recovering from a bullet wound, she would be the faster of the two.

She always did hate to lose an argument with Will, and in this case, capitulation was doubly hard to accept. What if she never saw him again? What if the first time he had taken her in his arms and showed her the joys of being a woman was also to be her last? She looked into his eyes, hoping to see some of the same desperate longing in them that she felt inside herself. But all she saw was worry—and his trying to calculate whether their plan would actually work.

He was right, of course. Their future didn’t bear thinking about, right at this moment, not when the future might be cut tragically short. She had no choice but to ride for help, and the sooner she left the sooner she would get back to Will.

“I’m leaving, but I’m not happy about it,” she said.
“You better promise not to do anything stupid and get yourself killed.”

To her surprise, he crossed his arms and smiled at her, just like in the old days. “I wouldn’t worry about me. Seems my life only comes into danger when you’re around.”

Her lips twitched into a smile, but the situation was too dire for laughing. Besides, she feared if she started laughing she would start crying, too, and she didn’t want that. Not when this might be the last time she ever saw Will. “You
would
give me your lip at a time like this, Will Brockett,” she groused as she reluctantly mounted her horse. She would have to be very quiet riding out, until she was absolutely certain that she was far enough away that Night Bird wouldn’t be able to hear her. Jeopardizing Will’s safety was the last thing she wanted to do.

Once she was on her horse, he reached out a hand and held her lower leg, then looked up into her eyes. “The only lip I’m interested in is that pouty one of yours.”

His words were like liniment to a sore muscle. She was beginning to think that he had forgotten all about the intimacy they had just shared. But if he could stand there talking about her lips, things couldn’t be as hopeless as she had feared. “Maybe it wouldn’t pout so much if you’d kiss it more often,” she said.

He grinned his irresistible grin, and still holding her leg with one hand, he brought her down toward him with the other. “I wouldn’t worry about your lips getting neglected,” he whispered. “From now on out they won’t be.”

And then he gave her a little demonstration of how well he planned to take care of them in future. At the mere touch of his mouth against hers, Paulie felt her insides melt like a wax candle in a bonfire. How could a man affect her so? She felt almost dizzy again, and her body, which had
seemed a little sore on the way over to find out whose campsite they had seen, had apparently recovered and was aching for more.

“Oh, Will…” In spite of her determination not to cry, Paulie felt tears burning her eyes. What if they never had the opportunity to be together again? What if she came back and discovered that Will had been captured, or killed? Anything could happen…

Will stepped back, his mouth set in a tense line. He gave her leg a final pat. “Ride fast, but be careful.”

She swallowed back her sob and managed a shaky smile instead. She could cry all the way to San Antonio if she wanted, but right now she was just wasting time. “I will. You be careful, too, Will.”

He nodded. “I’ll try to stay in one piece.”

They weren’t the most encouraging words she could imagine, but they would have to do until she got back from San Antonio. She turned her mount and tried to tamp down the acute feeling of disappointment as she trotted away. What had she expected, a declaration of love?

She shook her head, sending her tears, which were flowing freely now, flying away from her face. After all these years, she
hadn’t
expected Will Brockett to tell her he loved her.

She’d just hoped he would.

Waiting for Paulie was even harder than Will would have expected. After she left, he made the long walk to the crest of the hill where they had been before, to keep an eye on Night Bird and his captives. The Indian looked more agitated than Will could remember seeing him, and yet he did nothing to his prisoners. One other Mexican stood guard, and the other two seemed to be dozing, not far from Oren Tyler.

Will wondered what kind of wounds the gambler had suffered. He should have told Paulie to bring back a doctor, in case there was something seriously wrong with him, but he supposed Tyler would be lucky just to make it out of his current predicament, doctor or no doctor.

And yet, so far, Will hadn’t noticed Night Bird making a move toward his two prisoners; he didn’t seem to be paying them much attention at all, in fact. He could only imagine why the Indian was stopping in one place for so long. Maybe he wanted to keep his captives around for as long as possible, just to see their nerves become increasingly frayed as the night wore on.

Will dreaded dawn. Surely something would happen then. Night Bird would want to move before daylight, which meant that his prisoners would have to be dealt with. But what exactly would he do with them? When he had left Trip, Paulie, Oat and himself by the Rio Grande to die or escape, they had been in the middle of nowhere, a good day’s ride from being able to report what happened to them.

But now they were in central Texas, and not too far from a road. The outlaw couldn’t trust that his prisoners wouldn’t be found. Which gave him another reason to kill them.

Where was Paulie? He would have given anything for her to come riding up, for her to be by his side. Unfortunately, his side wasn’t the safest place for anyone right now.

Yet when he thought about Paulie he smiled for the first time since she’d left. Her first instinct had been to attack. He could just see what a sight she would make, charging down the hill with her rusty revolver like a crazed woman. Maybe that would have scared Night Bird after all.

He wished he had had more time to talk to her, to tell her how much their lovemaking had meant to him. He wasn’t certain he could come up with the words to really
express what was in his heart, but he could at least have tried. When Paulie rode away, she’d looked sad, as if she’d been expecting him to say more. What woman wouldn’t?

But then, what woman would land herself in the middle of a situation like this one? Just Paulie, he thought ruefully.

As the minutes went by, he felt his eyelids grow heavier. His shoulder ached, but he could ignore that. The desire to sleep, however, was a dangerous feeling right now, and he fought against it fiercely. Unfortunately, the fire around which the captives were sitting was dying, and it became harder and harder to see them in the dark. Without something to focus his vision on, his mind kept returning to the appealing idea of slumber.

Then he saw something that put any idea of sleep out of his head. Movement below. He sat up ramrod-straight and tried to make out exactly who was moving. It was one of the Mexican bandits and Night Bird, arguing over Oren Tyler. Was Tyler still alive?

A few moments later the gambler moved slightly, relieving Will no end. He didn’t want any deaths on his watch tonight. Things were bound to get much worse later, when the bullets started flying. Until then, he wanted to keep Mary Ann and Tyler in the land of the living.

That wish seemed more unrealistic when Night Bird took a rifle and pointed it at Oren Tyler’s head. Will shot to his feet and then froze in concentration, never taking his eyes off the scene below him. They were talking, but the Indian wasn’t putting his weapon down. He could see Mary Ann trying to plead with Night Bird, whose gun was still aimed at Tyler.