Dreaming Of A Western Christmas. Carol Arens
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their aunt Sally in Klamath Falls until she got engaged, and then...
He closed his eyes.
His horse moved restlessly at the mouth of the cave and Suzannah stirred in her sleep. He rolled sideways to look at her, but she was facing away from him, hunched up like a kid. Watching her, something flickered in his chest, something warm and insistent, like the feeling he got when he was hungry or craving a shot of red eye after a long ride.
He guessed he’d been without a woman for too long, otherwise he wouldn’t be watching this one so closely. But he was watching her. In fact, he’d been acutely aware of her ever since they’d ridden away from Fort Hall.
A small animal of some kind made a skittery noise outside the cave and Suzannah murmured something in her sleep.
“It’s okay,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Maybe a squirrel.” Very carefully he curled his frame around hers, and when she muttered uneasily in her sleep he laid his arm across her waist and pulled her backward, tucking her hip into his groin.
Big mistake. Her warm body made his breath catch and damned if he didn’t start to get hard. Then she made things worse by wriggling her curvy little butt tighter against him.
He clenched his jaw. Don’t think about it. He shut his eyes and concentrated on taking in air as slowly as possible. And for God’s sake, don’t move.
Never should have listened to the wind. All at once he felt more alone than ever before in his life. Somewhere deep inside he understood something he’d never confronted before—being connected to someone, someone he cared about, was damn dangerous. His sister had given her heart to someone she loved and died because of it.
Not for him. He would never hand his heart over to another human being. Never. He might feel lonely at times, but that was a damn sight better than the agony of losing someone.
But God, Suzannah felt good pressed up against him.
He needed to think about something else, anything else.
Who was trailing them? And what would he do when he figured out who it was?
Suzannah dragged her tired body into the saddle and gripped the reins in her floppy-fingered leather gloves. Breakfast had been half a dry biscuit and more cold, tough slices of jerky, but no coffee. She realized with a jolt that she had started every morning since she was thirteen years old with at least one cup of coffee, and sometimes two. The absence of the brew this morning had left her headachy and short-tempered.
She wondered if Brand felt the deprivation as keenly as she did. Probably not. Nothing seemed to bother the man riding ahead of her, his wide-brimmed sand-colored hat tipped at a jaunty angle over his dark head, his broad shoulders relaxed. At least he wasn’t humming “Oh, Susanna.”
But he was setting a bone-jarring pace on the narrow path down the mountain. Only once in the past hour had he glanced back to check on her; she could tumble off the edge of the cliff and he would never know.
“Lean back in the saddle when you’re goin’ downhill,” he called. “Helps the horse keep its balance.”
She nodded, but he had already refocused his gaze on the trail ahead. She pressed her lips together and swallowed back the angry words that threatened to tumble out of her mouth.
When the trail leveled out near the bottom, Brand drew rein and waited for her to catch up. “Whoever is following us is ahead of us now,” he said. “I’ve got a plan.”
Suzannah blinked. This was the first time he had shared any information about anything with her. Why now? All at once a terrible suspicion crept into her mind.
“We are in danger, aren’t we?”
He wouldn’t look at her, and that told her more than any words he might come up with.
“Well, are we?” she persisted.
“Yeah, maybe.” His lips were unsmiling, his eyes were troubled and he had a strange, set look on his tanned face.
“What is it?” she said. “What is wrong?”
“Need to find out who’s following us. That means—” He broke off and spit to one side. “Oh, hell, Suzannah, that might mean putting you in danger.”
“How? I mean, what would doing whatever it is you propose require?”
He rolled his lower lip inward over his teeth and heaved out a sigh. “Some hard riding, and then some long waiting. We need to get around in front of them and—”
“I see.” She cut him off with a decisive nod.
But she didn’t see. For one thing, he hadn’t paid the slightest attention to her while she had struggled with long hours in the saddle, thirst, even hunger. Forcing her horse up this mountain as fast as she could ride had not caused him to slow down or even look back at her.
She studied his impassive expression. Unless she was very much mistaken, he was hiding something. Well, she was hiding something, too. Major Brand Wyler was short-spoken to the point of rudeness. He had rough manners—no, he had bad manners. But in spite of everything she was beginning to like him.
She liked the way his lips quirked when he was trying not to laugh at her. She liked the calm, steady way he went about things, making coffee in the morning or saddling the horses or even plopping her in the cold creek as he had that first night.
And she trusted him.
“What do you propose?” she repeated. “Tell me.”
He looked off across the sunbaked valley stretching before them, his gray eyes narrowed. “I propose we make a wide detour—” he tipped his head to the right “—then cut back to the trail ahead of them and lie in wait.”
“Them?”
“You said you heard three shots. More’n likely there’s more than one of them.”
“What do you think they want?”
“You. The money you’re carrying in that cloth belt around your waist. And the rest, the gold that Colonel Clarke insisted I carry in the bottom of my saddlebag.”
Her breath caught. “How do you know where I keep my money?”
“Felt it last night when I—”
“When you what?” she demanded.
“When I laid my arm over your middle. You were moaning some in your sleep. Thought you were scared.”
Suzannah stared at him. Was that a touch of color under his tan? It was. It surely was. The man was blushing!
Her insides went all squishy. The last thing she would have expected from this taciturn, hard-bitten man was concern for her feelings. She had discovered something about Brand Wyler, something she felt certain he worked hard to keep hidden. The man had a softer side. Wonder of wonders, Major Wyler wasn’t all hurry-it-up and don’t-ask-questions—the man was actually capable of human feelings.
“And,” she said hesitantly, “you were going to protect me, is that it?”
“Still am.”
Tears stung under her eyelids. No one had ever said that to her, promised they would protect her, even during the worst of the war years. Not even her fiancé.
“Very well, Brand. Do whatever you think best. I will try hard to keep up.”
They rode down into the dry, cold valley and swung a wide arc to the north, pushing the horses hard. Suzannah was as good as her word. She managed to keep up with him, how he didn’t know, since she was such an inexperienced horsewoman. But with each passing mile his respect for her grew. Sure was a fast learner. Either that or she’d