When The Heart Beckons (18 page)

“Everything I’ve seen about you since then,
the way you’ve taken care of me, your consideration ... even your
appreciation of this beautiful spot, convinces me that you’re not
at all like the man you would like everyone to think you are. I
think you’re a good man, an honorable man.” She rushed on
imploringly as his mouth tightened into a scowl. “I don’t know why
you want people to think you’re some kind of a monster and to be
terrified of you, but ... I’m not.”

With that, a laugh trembled from her lips.
“I guess if I was, I wouldn’t have stomped on your cigarette. That
could have been mighty dangerous.”

“It still might be.”

“No, I don’t think so.” She grinned saucily
at him. The tension and the storm were over. “You don’t frighten
me, Mr. Steele,” she informed him, “so you’d best give in and
answer all my questions. Because I am very persistent, and yes, I
can be very tiresome, and if you want any peace at all ...”

She let her voice trail off deliberately,
and studied his reaction. To her amusement, Roy Steele gritted his
teeth and looked like he wanted to strangle her. But instead he let
go of her wrist and shook his head in defeat.

“You win,” he groaned. “I’ll talk. Just stop
pestering
me. What do you want to know?”

With the setting of the sun, the air had
cooled rapidly, and now rippled down in breezy waves from the
mountains, wafting through the fluttering leaves. But despite the
chill, Annabel basked in the warmth of victory.

She took Steele’s hand and led him to the
boulder, taking a seat beside him as an owl hooted from one of the
trees. “To begin with, when and how did you meet Brett?”

Never before had he met such a doggedly
tenacious woman, Steele reflected as her skirts brushed against his
trousers and the sweet fragrance of her hair floated through the
night. Or a more fascinating one. He controlled the impulse to
seize her slender form in his arms and make her forget all about
Brett McCallum once and for all.

Honor, he thought bitterly, that quality she
so firmly believed he possessed, forbade it. He felt sweat break
out across his back as he tried to ignore the flowery scent and
delicacy of her.
Concentrate
, Steele told himself
desperately.
Concentrate on telling her what she wants to know
.and then you can get the hell away from her
.

“I met Brett a few weeks back,” he said,
shifting slightly to put more space between them. Anything to
diminish temptation. “You know the Hart brothers, the ones I shot
back in Justice?”

She nodded, intensely aware of his hard,
rugged form only a hand’s breadth away, of his eyes glinting in the
milky light of the moon. “Yes,” she murmured. “How could I
forget?”

“Apparently they had planned to ambush me
near the New Mexico border. Your Brett heard them talking about it
while he was playing cards in a saloon one night, and a day or two
later, he and I happened to cross paths.” He took a deep breath. It
didn’t feel right lying to her, but he wasn’t ready to tell her the
truth. Not yet.

“He was a decent kid,” Steele went on,
warming to his story. “He beat me and a few other hombres at
poker—and after the game, he took me aside and told me what he’d
heard.”

Annabel’s hands moved to her throat as
Steele paused. “Go on,” she whispered.

“I thanked him for the tip and bought him a
drink. The next day he went his way and I went mine. The ambush
wouldn’t have worked anyhow, because I had business in the opposite
direction from where the Harts thought I was headed, but I
appreciated the warning.”

“It’s just like Brett. He’s such a fine
person ... but ...” She hesitated before asking the question.
Go on. You need to know
. “Was he drinking a great deal?”
Desperately, Annabel searched Steele’s face. “Did he seen
drunk?”

“Why?”

She told him what Polly had said. Steele
frowned. “Didn’t seem to be,” he muttered rather hurriedly, and
suddenly stood up and wheeled away from her, pacing across the
crest of the rise. “I don’t like the sound of this.”

“Neither do I. Brett was never the type to
drink much liquor—I’ve never, ever seen him inebriated. It made me
think that something must be very wrong.... Did he mention anything
about his father ... about trouble at home? You see, I must find
out why he ran away.”

“Funny you should ask a question like that.”
Steele spun back toward her and Annabel was startled by the raw
savagery in his face. “You say you grew up at the McCallum house,
so you must know what kind of a man Ross McCallum is.”

“Well, yes ...”

“Then it only stands to reason why the boy
left—any grown man with half an ounce of self-respect would
hightail it out from under that old bastard’s shadow first chance
he got.”

Annabel shook her head, dazed by his
vehemence. “You sound like you hate Ross McCallum. How do you know
so much about him?”

“I read the newspapers. Everyone in these
United States knows about the great Ross “McCallum’s wheelings and
dealings,”

“So Brett didn’t actually tell you it was
because of his father?” she asked quickly.

He started to answer, then suddenly shook
his head and clamped his lips together. “No, Brett didn’t tell me
that. And unlike you, I don’t need to know his reasons. But I owe
him a favor. And since word has spread throughout the territory
that Red Cobb is gunning for him, it seems the only way I can repay
him is to find him before Cobb does and give him a hand. I’d take
you along for the ride,” he added, stepping closer, “but where I’m
headed isn’t safe for a woman.”

“Where exactly are you headed?”

“First Silver Junction—you’ll stay there.
Then, maybe New Mexico.”

“Don’t underestimate me, Mr. Steele,” she
shot back, rising to confront him. “I have no intention of giving
up what I’ve set out to do. Brett means much more to me than he
does to you, and nothing is going to stop me from finding him.”

“Are you just plain mule-headed—or are you
loco? Or do you really love him that much?”

Annabel flinched at the hardness of his
tone. Deep blue darkness shrouded the entire valley and all the
buttes and mountains. It was a peaceful darkness, but as she stared
into Roy Steele’s eyes, she felt anything but peaceful. There was a
strange lump in her throat. Steele had spoken those words as if he
didn’t believe in love, had never known it, couldn’t imagine it. As
if love was something that didn’t exist in the world he knew, a
world of guns and blood and death.

For a moment she tried to picture Brett’s
face and couldn’t. Dismay ripped through her. She closed her eyes
for an instant, and thought hard, and then there he was—the image
of the young boy she’d known so well flashing reassuringly into her
mind, dark-haired, long-limbed, with that wiry build and quick,
buoyant smile that could charm bark off a tree.

She’d loved Brett all her life. Adored him,
admired him, delighted in her time with him. She wanted nothing
more than to win his heart and spend the rest of her life with
him.

“Yes,” she whispered, opening her eyes. “I
love him that much.”

Roy Steele’s whole body tightened. She
couldn’t decipher the expression that flickered over his face for a
moment, but when it had passed, his features were as stony and
arrogantly set as they had been that day she’d first encountered
him in Justice in the hotel. It sent a shiver through her.

“Time we went back,” he said curtly, and
turned toward the cabin.

“Does this mean you’ll let me come along
with you?” Moving cautiously through the darkness alongside him,
Annabel was relieved when Steele took her good arm in his and
guided her down the slope. But his touch was not warm and intimate;
his fingers felt like bands of iron.

“What if I don’t?” he asked, his words
sharp, slicing like a razor through the night.

“Then I’ll have to follow you.”

They reached the cabin door. He turned and
gazed down into her face, illuminated by cold white moonlight which
flowed like mist over her delicate features.

“I’ll be damned if you wouldn’t,” he swore
softly. “You’d follow me to hell and back, I reckon.”

“I reckon.” She lifted her chin, a slight,
stubborn gesture, but at the same time she unconsciously softened
it with a smile.

Steele felt his insides twist up like a rope
full of knots. “Then I reckon I’ve no choice,” he managed to growl,
hoping he sounded properly gruff.

He did. Annabel noted his displeasure with a
twinge of unexplainable disappointment. So he was truly disgusted
by the notion that he’d be stuck with her a while longer. For some
reason, this realization filled her with gloom.
Why should it
matter? Only Brett is important
, she reminded herself. Yet she
couldn’t shake her lowered spirits even when the kerosene lantern
was glowing cozily in the cabin, or when Steele had built a roaring
fire against the night chill.

A strange mood had come upon Annabel. She
was intensely aware of Roy Steele, of his every move, his strength,
his size, his competency at all the little acts of survival out
here in the wilderness.

He’s a fascinating man, and a good man, but
he’s not the man for you, she told herself. Brett is—he is your
destiny.

What she felt for Steele, Annabel decided,
as she unfolded and arranged the blanket on the sofa, was
gratitude, pure and simple. He had saved her from Willy and Curtis
and Moss.

She owed him, just as he felt he owed
Brett.

I must take care to remember that.

Moments later, when Steele was settled on
his bedroll on the floor, and she was snuggled beneath the blanket
on the sofa, Annabel struggled to a sitting position and stared at
him through the flickering light.

“Thank you, Mr. Steele,” she said softly.
Her low-pitched voice was filled with quiet earnestness. “I
appreciate your being honest with me. I promise that I won’t doubt
you again.”

“Good.”

“You’ve saved my life, and I believe with
all my heart that you intend to save Brett’s.”

“Right.”

“In the morning, when we’re both refreshed,
we’ll discuss our strategy.”

“Strategy?”

“Yes. Our plan. We must talk things over,
figure out how we’re going to find Brett, how we’ll deal with Red
Cobb, how—”

“Damn it, woman!” Exasperation exploded in
his voice. “You like to talk things over more than any female I’ve
ever met.”

Annabel nodded. “That’s what Mr. Clyde
Perkins, Mr. Joseph Reed, and Mr. Hugh Connely used to say,
too.”

“Who were they?”

“Some gentlemen who wanted to marry me.” She
thought she heard a choking sound.

“Mr. Steele?”

“What happened to these gentleman?”

“I turned them down. I talked it over with
them and explained why I couldn’t marry them. They were most
disappointed,” she couldn’t resist adding. “But I had no
choice.”

“Because you loved Brett.”

“Exactly.”

“And now the two of you are getting married.
Touching.”

Well, not exactly—at least, not yet, Mr.
Steele
, Annabel thought sadly, but she said nothing, and only
winced at the icy sarcasm in his words.

“How mighty lucky for Brett,” he continued
darkly—
ungallantly
, Annabel felt. It was impossible to
mistake his meaning.

She wondered uneasily what he would do if he
knew that she only
wished
she were marrying Brett, that in
truth she had been hired to find him. Dear heavens, it wouldn’t be
very pleasant facing him when he found out that she hadn’t been
perfectly honest with him.
It’ll be much better if he doesn’t
discover the truth for as long as possible
, she concluded with
a grimace.

“Good night, Miss Brannigan.”

There was a short silence. The aspens
rustled outside the window and from someplace nearby a coyote
howled. Another answered and then another—the night came alive with
mournful wails.

“Do you think,” Annabel whispered slowly in
the firelit darkness, “that since we’re going to be traveling
together, you might call me Annabel? And I could call you Roy?”

“No,” Steele answered shortly. He sounded as
wide awake as she. “I don’t.”

Well, that put an end to that.
Fine, Mr.
Steele
, Annabel thought grimly.
You just be that way. I
couldn’t care less if you wish to be friendly or not—the only thing
I need to do is find Brett. And find a telegraph office, if there
is one within a hundred miles
, she reflected guiltily. Mr.
Stevenson would be livid if she didn’t maintain some regular
contact with him. And she wanted to receive a message back, as
well. She was worried about Ross McCallum—both his health and his
business empire. She couldn’t help wondering how much time she had
left.

Yet it was difficult to concentrate on all
the problems besieging her, on all the pieces of this puzzle to be
assembled and worked out. Her gaze kept shifting to the bedroll on
the floor, where Roy Steele’s tall, muscular frame was stretched
out, his holster beside him, his hat over his face.

She wondered what it would feel like to
steal off the sofa, creep quietly over toward him, and lift that
hat. To kiss his lean hard cheek while he slept. And touch his
mouth, as he had touched hers.

What a peculiar notion. Annabel caught
herself with a start. Why would she want to do something like
that?

Because I feel sorry for him
, she
told herself, and nodded in the darkness. Roy Steele might be the
toughest, most cold-eyed, and confident gunman she’d ever imagined,
but he was also the loneliest. She couldn’t explain how, but she
sensed the deep isolation beneath that harsh exterior, knew it was
there and that it ran deep, bleeding all the way into his soul. She
wasn’t sure how she knew, she just did. And her heart ached for
him.