Table of Contents

Cover Page

Excerpt

Dear Reader

Title Page

About The Author

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Copyright

“You are no gentleman!

“For, If you were, you would know emphatically I am not the kind of female to invite or enjoy a man’s.”

Victoria’s words dwindled. It really was rather tricky to phrase her thoughts and not be.crude.

“A man’s…” Logan prompted, raising one dark eyebrow.

She met his speculative gaze and detected an abundance of silent laughter. She wanted to hurl the heavy book she cradled at him, but there was the matter of the ax.

“A man’s physical attentions,” she said through gritted teeth. “I may be the first one you’ve ever met, but let me assure you I am a lady.”

“Well, then.”

“Well, then, what?” she fairly snarled at him.

“Who would have guessed ladies could be so hotblooded?”

She flinched. “If my blood is hot, it’s because you have the capacity to make me angrier than anyone I’ve ever met…!”

Dear Reader,

Beloved Outcast by Pat Tracy is a dramatic Western about an Eastern spinster who is hired by a man with a notorious reputation to tutor his adopted daughter. And those of you who have read Pat Tracy would probably agree with Affaire de Coeur when they recently labeled Pat as “one author definitely worth watching.” This talented author just keeps getting better and better.

Whether writing atmospheric Medievals or sexy Regencies, Deborah Simmons continues to delight readers with her romantic stories. In this month’s Maiden Bride, the sequel to The Devil’s Lady, Nicholas de Laci transfers his blood lust to his enemy’s niece, Gillian, his future wife by royal decree. Don’t miss this wonderful tale.

Fans of Romantic Times Career Achievement Award winner Veronica Sattler will be thrilled to see this month’s reissue of her Worldwide Library release, Jesse’s Lady.

We hope you’ll enjoy this exciting story of a young heiress and her handsome guardian. And our fourth book this month is The Wager by Sally Cheney, the story of a young Englishwoman who reluctantly falls in love with a man who won her in a game of cards. We hope you’ll keep a lookout for all four titles wherever Harlequin Historicals are sold.

Sincerely,

Tracy Farrell

Senior Editor

Please address questions and book requests to:

Harlequin Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P O. Box 1325. Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

Beloved Outcast
Pat Tracy

www.millsandboon.co.uk

PAT TRACY

lives in a farming community outside of Idaho Falls. Pat’s love of historical romance began when she was thirteen and read Gone with the Wind. After reading Rhett and Scarlett’s story, Pat immediately penned a hasty sequel wherein the couple lived happily ever after. According to Pat, there is a magic to be found in historical romances that can be found nowhere else, and she enjoys reading the many popular and talented writers who share that magic with their readers. You can write to the author at the following address:

P.O. Box 17

Ucon, Idaho 83454

This book is dedicated to Sheriann Tracy, my youngest

daughter, who is funny, smart, brave, strong-willed,

independent, athletic, artistic and beautiful.

Sweetheart, you’re definitely heroine material.

Mother’s Note: A couple of months after this

dedication was written, Sheriann was killed in an

automobile accident. She was fourteen. Darling, you

have my heart—always. Love, Mom

* * * * * *

Acknowledgments:

I would like to thank Sherry Roseberry, Vicki Scaggs and Martha Tew, gifted writers and true friends. Without your generous editing efforts, I would look sooo foolish. (I’m thinking particularly of my hero being “within” instead of “without.”) And thank you, Patti McAllister, for your last-minute read of the final version. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Chapter One

Idaho Territory, 1868

“Sit down, Youngblood.”

Logan Youngblood stared at the army-issue revolver pointed at his chest. “Somehow this isn’t quite the welcome I expected, Colonel Windham.”

The mustached cavalry officer gestured with the Remington’s barrel toward the chair that faced his desk. “By your own account, you rode for two days and a night to warn us about the fort being attacked. Surely you could do with a rest.”

The only outward evidence of the colonel’s displeasure, other than the drawn weapon, was reflected in his cold blue eyes.

Logan glanced at the other three uniformed men present. They were young lieutenants, dressed in pristine dark blue uniforms trimmed with enough newly minted gold braid to make a dead man stand up and salute. From their uneasy expressions, though, he could tell they were baffled by their commanding officer’s behavior.

Logan moved toward the waiting chair. Until he found out what was going on, he would accept Windham’s not-sogracious hospitality. Unexpectedly, Logan’s thoughts turned to Madison, and what would happen to her, should the gun barrel he was staring down serve its intended purpose.

But then, Madison’s tumultuous arrival in his life seemed to herald the beginning of a series of complications, not the least of which was the necessity of securing a qualified woman to educate the twelve-year-old girl.

“Wait a minute,” the colonel ordered tersely. “Take his gun, Lawson.”

“Sir?” the young soldier queried, as if he weren’t sure he understood the order.

“You heard me.”

Logan stood perfectly still as the Colt.44 he’d taken to wearing since coming west was extracted from his holster. He didn’t know what Windham was up to, but he was fairly certain the officer wouldn’t shoot him in front of three witnesses.

Logan claimed the proffered chair.

“Tie him up,” came the next tight-lipped command.

Logan shot to his feet. “Enough is enough, Windham. I came here to warn you that several tribes are planning to attack. Now that I’ve done that, I’m going to ride out of here and—”

The ominous click of a service revolver being cocked interrupted Logan. His attention again focused on the drawn gun.

“I don’t like Indian-lovers, Youngblood. As far as I’m concerned I’d be doing the entire territory a favor by killing you where you stand. Unfortunately, because I am civilized, I have to obey the law. So, by the letter of that law, I’m placing you under military arrest for abetting murderous redskins. Now sit the hell down!”

The revolver’s nine-inch barrel remained steady. With four armed soldiers against one unarmed civilian, the odds weren’t exactly in his favor. Still, having survived countless Civil War battles and his first few hazardous months in the Idaho Territory, Logan felt reasonably calm. He couldn’t see his life ending in this room. He was grateful, however, as he eased onto the chair, that he hadn’t put off seeing to Madison’s future. Thank God his good friend and associate Martin Pritchert had already made arrangements to bring a tutor from the East to instruct the uneducated girl. Since she was now legally Logan’s ward, she would be cared for no matter what happened to him. For the time being, Martin’s wife was watching over Madison.

It took all the self-discipline Logan possessed for him to submit to having his hands tied behind the back of the chair while another length of rope was secured around his ankles.

“Your time has run out, Youngblood.” Windham pushed his face an inch from Logan’s. “I want to know where those murdering savages are camped, and I want to know now.”

Logan stared into Windham’s unyielding features. Somehow, even though he suspected the military man was beyond reasoning with, Logan had to convince him that not all Indians were “murdering savages.”

“Night Wolf’s people are at peace,” he pointed out flatly. “They had nothing to do with attacking the families on that wagon train, and they won’t have any part of assaulting the fort.”

Windham turned his back to Logan and, with careful deliberateness, laid his gleaming revolver upon the desk. Then, without warning, the officer spun around and plowed his fist into Logan’s jaw.

The chair he’d been tied to scraped stridently against the wood-planked floor. Logan’s head shot back, but the pain was tolerable. Windham didn’t pack much of a punch, which was true of most small men wrapped in gold-spangled uniforms.

“That was the wrong answer, Youngblood.”

Through a dull haze of pain, Logan noticed a loop of spittle hanging from the colonel’s curled upper lip. The frozen image of a mad dog Logan had seen once as a boy in Scotland danced briefly in his thoughts. Yet Windham’s manner remained eerily calm.

“It’s the only answer I’ve got.” Logan’s gaze went to the three other men in Windham’s office. Each soldier wore a look of distaste. Logan didn’t know whether their grim expressions were a result of their commanding officer’s violent behavior or Logan’s refusal to provide them with directions to Night Wolf’s camp.

“Leave me alone with the prisoner,” Windham ordered abruptly. Open contempt radiated from his pale blue eyes.

“Sir, do you think that’s a good idea?” one of the young lieutenants questioned, his voice notched with uncertainty.

“He’s tied up, Lawson,” Windham answered with heavy sarcasm. “There’s no danger of him getting free and doing me any harm.”

“Uh, sir—he did bring the warning about the Blackfeet and other tribes going on the warpath.”

“He won’t tell us where to find them,” Windham snarled. “I want to wipe out every heathen man, woman and child infesting the Idaho Territory.”

“But this is Mr. Youngblood here,” Lawson pointed out, his tone placating. “He’s the president of the Territorial Bank.”

“Are you questioning a direct order, soldier?”

Lawson’s cherub cheeks reddened as he snapped to attention. “No, Sir!”

The two other cavalrymen present were already filing from the room. It didn’t take the young lieutenant long to rethink his tenuous position with his commanding officer and follow them.

When the door shut behind the departing soldiers, an oppressive silence filled the commandant’s office.

“Well, Youngblood, it’s just you and me now.”

“Under the circumstances,” Logan drawled, his gaze lowering to his bound arms, “I’m sure you’ll excuse me for not shaking your hand.”

“Always the clever retort.” Windham retrieved his gun from his desk. “You cut quite the figure with the ladies, don’t you?”

“What?” Obviously he hadn’t heard the officer correctly.

“’Passion’s Pirate,’ that’s what they call you,” Windham continued, his neatly trimmed mustache tilting to one side as he made the sneering observation.

“What?” Logan repeated. This time he knew he couldn’t have heard the cavalryman correctly. Passion’s Pirate? What the hell was the man babbling about? Logan had never been to sea, and-”You didn’t know?” Windham’s tone was skeptical. “That’s what the few good women of Trinity Falls call you when they’re gossiping about your bedroom exploits with the town’s bad women.”

Logan knew his mouth was hanging open. He felt as if he’d stepped from the orderly, rational world of his daily existence into a bizarre nightmare. What interest could this pompous, Indian-hating cavalry officer have in his love life?

“Athena is one of them.”

A sense of doom gripped Logan. “Athena?”

“My wife,” Windham responded softly. “My beautiful, faithless wife. You remember her. After all, it’s hardly been a week since you bedded her.”

The accusation brought sudden clarity to the strange episode. Unfortunately, it also brought the unsettling memory of the woman.groping him when her husband’s back was turned.

“That’s what this is all about,” Logan said warily. “You think I’ve been with your wife.”

“Don’t deny it. Your guilty expression says it all. I saw how you looked at her. Every man looks at her that way. Every man wants her, but until you came along, she was loyal to me.”

“You’ve lost your senses. I haven’t touched your wife. Damnation, I’ve only seen her three times. You were with her on every occasion.”

That much was true. Except for the minor detail of Mrs. Windham damn near giving him a heart attack when she bumped against him and her fingertips rested momentarily against the front closure of his trousers. Logan had been so stunned by the unexpected contact he almost yelped.

Another memory knifed through Logan. He shifted against the ropes binding him. Six years ago, the protestations of the older brother he loved and admired had rung in Logan’s ears. Burke had denied seducing Logan’s fiancee. The difference between then and now was that Burke had lied, and Logan spoke the truth.

The officer laughed bitterly. “Am I supposed to believe the denials of ‘Passion’s Pirate’?”

“I can’t be held accountable for the gossip frustrated women spin.”

“Athena isn’t frustrated!”

“I don’t give a tinker’s damn about the details of your married life, Colonel. I came to the fort to warn you that an Indian attack is imminent. Night Wolf’s band has been beaten down to a few old men and some women and children. They are not a threat to you, but you’d better start making plans about how you’re going to fight off the Shoshones and the Blackfeet tribes who are on the warpath.”

Windham’s head snapped back as if he’d been struck. “Don’t presume to give me orders, Youngblood.”

“Think of them as suggestions,” Logan answered grimly. “Are you ready to untie me?”

“Untie you?” The man’s mouth curved mockingly. “You must be insane to think I’d do that now.”

Logan knew one of them was insane. Unfortunately for him, it was the man with the Remington.

Chapter Two

Victoria Amory wrapped her fingers around the wide leather reins and tugged with all her might. The oxen pulling her covered wagon came to a belligerent stop. She craned her head, looking in all directions, but saw no evidence of human habitation in the lush wilderness known as the Idaho Territory. Nor was there any sign of the fort she’d been told was nearby. After four days alone on the trail, she calculated that she was still sixty miles or so from the town of Trinity Falls, where her new employer and her new life awaited her.

Victoria rose to better survey her primitive surroundings.

There was no way she could have been more alone—if she didn’t count the birds trilling to each other and periodically bursting skyward in clusters of raucous mayhem. The entire forest was in a state of continuous animation as squirrels and other small animals scurried through the fertile underbrush.

“Can anybody hear me?” she called.

In response, there was only the endless shifting of pungent pine boughs and fluttering of the coin-size green leaves that graced the narrow, white-trunked aspen trees dotting meadows of mountain grass. It was foolish to expect a reply, yet she was still disappointed. She’d had such high hopes when she accepted Martin Pritchert’s letter offering her employment as a live-in tutor for his employer’s ward.

A new beginning had sounded so appealing. Her purpose in leaving Boston outweighed the little pricks of doubt that occasionally pierced her resolve. With her reputation in shreds, her continued presence at home had become an embarrassment she refused to inflict upon her family.

Not wishing to dwell on that sad truth, Victoria consoled herself with the hope that, since she was now out of the picture, her sister, Annalee, would be free to accept one of the numerous marriage proposals she’d received. No amount of arguing from Victoria had managed to convince her parents that their younger daughter should be allowed to wed before their elder one.

Victoria sighed. She was twenty-four years old and she had yet to meet a man she wanted to call husband. Still, because of her parents’ old-fashioned beliefs, the second item of business she needed to accomplish in Trinity Falls was to find herself a spouse. It seemed the least she could do for Annalee, who was the kindest, most loving sister anyone could wish for.

The wheels of Victoria’s mind turned with the same steady rhythm as those of the lumbering wagon. Perhaps she really didn’t need to marry before Annalee. Maybe it would satisfy her parents’ archaic code of propriety if she was engaged to be wed. Now that she was almost a thousand miles from home, she would be free to do a little…creative letter-writing. Naturally, an outright falsehood was beyond her, but she could exaggerate—

The right front wheel struck a deep rut, and the wagon lurched violently as Victoria was bucked upward, then slammed against the wooden seat. Just that quickly, her thoughts jerked back to her immediate circumstances.

Her great Western adventure was falling far short of her expectations. Who would have supposed that the wagon train would continue without her because she was unable to keep up? It had shocked her that the wagon master couldn’t comprehend that, even if she was slowing down the group, she simply couldn’t abandon her precious cargo along the trail.

Victoria harbored no ill feelings toward the man. He and the others didn’t understand that her treasured volumes, some of them first editions of Jane Austen and James Fenimore Cooper, were impossible for her to part with.

Initially, she hadn’t been all that alarmed at being left behind. The overland trail was wide, and clearly marked by the hundreds of wagons that had preceded her west. She had plenty of food, and the obliging nearness of the Ruby River provided all the fresh drinking water she and her team needed. Also, the wagon master had assured her that a fort was nearby. Once she reached the fort she’d arrange for a party of soldiers to escort her to Trinity Falls.

But the loneliness had begun to wear upon her nerves, and there was the matter of the fearsome Indian warriors she’d heard so much about. It would have been somewhat reassuring to have a firearm for protection. Unfortunately, she’d had a slight mishap with her rifle the fifth day on the trail, and the wagon master had confiscated the weapon from her on the grounds that she was a menace to both herself and the rest of them with a loaded gun in her possession.

Victoria frowned. Goodness, she could hardly be faulted for shooting Mr. Hyrum Dodson in the foot. The man had been prowling around her wagon in the wee hours of the morning. And he very well could have been the bear she’d mistaken him for. As far as she was concerned, it was an understandable error on her part.

Neither the wagon master nor Mr. Dodson, however, had been inclined to be understanding.

Which brought Victoria to her third reason for going west. It seemed that people in general were disinclined to be tolerant of life’s little mishaps. For instance, take the innocent incident when one of her sister’s suitors had been caught with his pants at half-mast in Victoria’s bedchamber. Had anyone been interested in hearing that the hapless man had scaled the outside trellis and was delivering a rose to Annalee?

Not that she wouldn’t be the first to admit that his romantic gesture was the stuff of foolishness. But, foolish though it might have been, the cavalier act had been conceived and executed in innocence. It had been the merest accident that he chose the wrong bedchamber.

Unfortunately, at the instant of his arrival, Victoria had been changing and had been in her chemise and drawers. She wasn’t sure which of them had been more startled when they laid shocked gazes upon each other. Before he could depart her chamber, however, a crazed bumblebee had emerged from the bedraggled rose, circled Mr. Threadgill twice and then flown up the inside of his pant leg.

Victoria had acted without forethought, tugging down the man’s britches and landing several energetic whacks upon the trapped but clearly homicidal bee with her hairbrush.

If only Threadgill hadn’t screamed.

Her mother’s afternoon guests, the Reverend Golly’s wife among them, had heard Horace’s distressed cries and come charging upstairs. It had been the most mortifying occasion of Victoria’s life to be caught in a state of undress on her knees in front of the hysterical, half-clad man.

No one had been interested in explanations that day. The scandalized women had departed from her parents’ home and spread the most outrageous gossip about the entirely innocent episode. In a single afternoon, Victoria’s reputation had been hopelessly tarnished. Poor Mr. Threadgill had vacated his Boston abode. The last she’d heard, he’d decided to visit the Continent.

No doubt he’d been afraid that he would be obligated to redeem her reputation with a proposal of marriage. Clearly, the man had no intention of making such a drastic act of restitution on the basis of one demented bee and her honor.

She still couldn’t get over the fact that an entire lifetime of prudent and circumspect behavior could be overturned by one unfortunate occurrence. The very idea that anyone could think she would try to divest a man of his britches, against his will, and assert her runaway passions upon him was ludicrous.

She shook the reins.

“Ha!”

The oxen stayed put. Perhaps they were as weary as she was and needed a good rest. She would have loved to accommodate them, but she knew they had to keep moving. Determinedly she reached for the unwieldy bullwhip and cracked it over their broad backs.

“I said, Ha!” This time they moved toward the horizon where high-peaked mountains towered. Victoria laid aside the whip and used her sleeve to wipe the perspiration from her face.

The twisting river caused the flattened thoroughfare that ran alongside it to wind around yet another bend. When she rounded the curve, a large edifice several hundred yards away greeted Victoria. She blinked several times, lest it somehow disappear into nothingness. The building remained.

She’d finally made it to human habitation. Victoria strained to discern what the distant structure might be. Then she laughed at herself. Even if it wasn’t the fort, it didn’t matter. In her present mood, even a saloon would be welcome.

People lived there.

That was the only thing that mattered.

As she drew closer, the large building miraculously revealed itself to indeed be a military outpost. Relief swept through her. She was safe. For as long as she remained at.

Victoria squinted, trying to make out the name that had been crudely burned into a wide plank of wood suspended horizontally above the great open gate.

Fort Brockton.

Seeing the giant log poles less than twenty yards ahead filled Victoria with an overwhelming sense of euphoria. One by one, the tense muscles in her neck and shoulders relaxed.

A gust of wind came up. With it came a lonely, mournful cry that made the fine hairs at the nape of her neck rise.

Despite the reality of the immense log structure, Victoria was struck by the eerie impression that she was the last woman on earth. The jangle of leather harnesses and the plodding of her team’s hooves joined the whispering screech of air rushing through and around the fort’s timbers.

Her stomach knotted, and she tried to talk herself out of the nebulous fears that scurried through the corners of her mind. Only a few feet now separated her from the wide log doors, which gaped open with a kind of drunken clumsiness.

She halted. No uniformed man stared down from the fort’s watchtowers. No concerned soldier surged forward to draw her wagon inside protective walls. No sound of occupation reached her. Tingles of alarm scraped her skin. Simultaneously, a fierce blast of wind battered her sunbonnet. Victoria flinched at the almost physical assault and peeled back the tendrils of hair the disturbance had plastered to her cheek and mouth.

“Hello?”

The uncertain greeting was plucked from her lips and swallowed up by the wind that rollicked around her.

“Ha!”

Her voice was stronger, and she again urged the oxen forward. The sinister sense of danger permeating the trembling pines and aspen trees drove her to seek the tangible security of the empty fortress. No matter how bizarre the circumstances, surely being inside was safer than being out.

Victoria studied the fort’s deserted inner courtyard. Compact buildings that were a mixture of military offices and personal dwellings shared common walls, so that it appeared she was looking at a small town enclosed by high ramparts.

Every door hung ajar.

“Hello!” she called again.

Silence answered her. She was simply unable to grasp that a fortress this size, one obviously designed to hold several hundred people, could actually have been abandoned.

Victoria climbed from the wagon, forcing back the uneasiness that continued to grow within her. The oxen were restless. She assumed they smelled the water inside the low rock cisterns that stood beside the empty corrals. Her mind balked at the realization that the huge animals would have to be unhitched in order to drink.

She was so blasted tired she was all but staggering.

And yet there was only her and the oxen. If they were going to be watered, it was up to her to do it. Their survival was in her hands. Blinking back tears of weariness, she went to the lead oxen’s giant halter. Simple wishing wouldn’t get the arduous task done. As she slid the leather harnesses through fist-size coupling rings, Victoria reflected that beginning a new life on the Western frontier was a far tougher endeavor than she’d imagined when she contemplated the contract Mr. Pritchert had sent her. Of course, she’d signed the document in the comfort of her family’s cozy parlor. How far away that parlor seemed at this moment.

When she had finally freed the animals to drink, Victoria proceeded to search every building that lined the fort’s interior. Each office and residence showed signs of urgent flight. Drawers were left open, their varied contents spilled onto the floor in wild heaps of clutter. Beds and blankets were in a state of upheaval.

In the largest office, it appeared that a whirlwind had come charging through. Papers and maps were tossed about. A chair was tipped over, and several lengths of rope lay on the floor.

No matter how exhausted she was, she had to think. What terrible menace could have caused the commanding officer to evacuate his troops?

The incredible, numbing silence of the deserted military facility heightened her already taut nerves. For the first time in her life, she didn’t know what to do next.

It seemed madness to stay in a place that an armed militia had fled. Her shoulders sagged as she turned from the doorway and retraced her steps across the military yard. Returning to the unhitched wagon, she scarcely registered the presence of a squat log stockade. She was tired and hungry—a poor set of circumstances under which to make anything but a bad decision. Perhaps things wouldn’t seem quite so bleak if she took care of the gnawing emptiness in her stomach. Who knew, if her legs ceased to tremble and she didn’t feel quite so light-headed, she might be able to make sense of her macabre surroundings?

Within minutes, Victoria had set up a campsite in the middle of the military yard. Early in her exodus west, she’d learned the subtle nuances of building a vigorous fire.

To prepare the biscuits, all she needed was some coarse brown flour, salt, water and a bit of grease. It took no time at all to knead the dough into egg-size lumps and drop them into the bubbling grease that lined the thick frying skillet. The simple action gave her a sense of being in control.

Dusk fell across the buildings silhouetted by her fire. The frying dough sent a pleasant aroma through the cooling air. She reached across the rocks she’d interspersed with pieces of wood and used a long-handled fork to spear and flip the biscuits.

“Who the hell are you?”

The husky male voice leaped from the encroaching darkness and vibrated in the very air Victoria drew into her lungs. She jumped back from the campfire, dropping her fork. She scoured the deepening shadows for a clue as to where the intruder lurked.

“I asked you…” There was a pause, as if the man were catching his breath “…a question.” The gritty voice tugged at her nerves with the same raspy irritation as the gravelly rocks that shifted beneath the soles of her shoes. “Did Windham send you to let me out?”

Out?

Her gaze pivoted to the small stockade just ten feet from where she’d built her campfire. With stomach-tightening dread, she realized she wasn’t alone after all.

The smell of frying dough drew her attention to the biscuits. They were about to burn; she refused to let that happen. With a well-aimed kick, the toe of her shoe dislodged the long-handled fork from where it had landed. The hem of her petticoats served as a pot holder as she wielded the rod to salvage the biscuits.

“Who’s out there?” came the low voice again.

Victoria thought she detected both wariness and anger in the deep, masculine voice. After she retrieved the last biscuit and set it on a china plate to cool, she approached the stockade. She wiped her palms against her skirts and took comfort in the sight of the metal beam lodged between two iron posts that guaranteed the prison door wouldn’t come flying open. Surely only the most hardened, most vile, of villains would have been locked inside such a horrible, crude cell.

Ah, but to be abandoned to a slow and painful death by starvation…

Every soft and feminine instinct she possessed urged her to set him free. What crime could have been so heinous as to warrant such cruel punishment?

Murder, came the immediate answer. A murderer might be left to such an awful fate.

Victoria continued to stare in horrified fascination at the simple but effective bar laid across the stockade’s entry.

It struck her suddenly that she was responsible not only for the oxen under her care, but also for the nameless prisoner on the other side of the rough wooden door. Unless the cavalry suddenly returned, it would be up to her whether or not this man lived or died.

“Answer me, dammit! Who are you?”

Victoria looked from the door to her shaking hands. Even though she might pity the stranger for being left to die this way, she would be a fool to let him out before discovering the crime he’d committed. She would also be a fool to let him know he was talking to a woman, she thought, reasoning that men credited other men with more intelligence than they did the weaker sex.

She coughed twice and lowered her voice as best she could.

“The question, sir, is who are you, and what did you do to land in such an awful situation?”

Chapter Three

Logan strained to hear the muffled question. Battered and hurting from the beating Windham had ordered, he’d lost track of how much time had passed since he’d been locked inside the stockade. He’d drunk the last of his water a few hours back.

“Sir, I asked you who you are,” came that suspicious sounding voice again.

Logan shook his head to clear it. He must have been unconscious for most of the day. It had been the glorious aroma of cooking food that nudged him to full alertness. He could have sworn someone had pitched camp outside his cell door.

Saliva pooled in his mouth, and his tongue seemed twice its normal size. Hot food. His stomach shuddered in sweet anticipation.

“The name’s Logan,” he growled, relieved the newcomer’s arrival hadn’t been a hallucination. “Logan Youngblood. How about letting me out of here and sharing some of that food? While you’re at it, I’d appreciate a drink of water.”

The only response to his request was more silence. Frustration, and the possibility that he was going to pass out again and never come to, snapped Logan’s patience.

“What are you waiting for? Open the damned door!”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea. The soldiers who put you in there must have had a good reason.”

Outraged, Logan couldn’t believe he’d heard the newcomer right. “You mean you’re going to leave me in here to die?”

There was another silence.

“That would make you a murderer,” Logan pressed, anger gnawing holes in his control.

“I—I wasn’t the one who put you in there.”

“When they locked me up, they took away my gun,” he pointed out, just in case the nature of his plight wasn’t clear. “I’m unarmed and ready to pass out.”

More silence.

“Even if you’re alone, you’ve got to be carrying a rifle or a shotgun or a pistol,” Logan persisted. “How can I be a threat?”

Silence.

He ground his teeth, which made his head hurt all the worse. “Say something, damn you.”

“You swear too much.”

“Say something relevant.”

“I’m not letting you out until—”

“Hell freezes over?” he said savagely.

“Are you wounded?”

The words seemed closer. For the first time, Logan thought he detected a note of concern in the stranger’s tone. His hopes rose about the time his legs gave out.

“Some cracked ribs, and a headache that’s strong enough to split my skull in two,” he admitted hoarsely. “I’m sorry.”

“Then let me out.”

“What did you do?”

Even though the question was reasonable, Logan’s control unraveled further. “What does it matter? I told you, I’m too weak to cause you any trouble.”

“You could be lying. Perhaps you have a.club. If I were to open the door, you could attack me,” came the husky voice.

“So shoot me.”

More silence. An incredible notion struck him.

“Don’t tell me you don’t have a gun!”

Silence.

Logan swore feelingly. “What kind of fool comes poking around Idaho Territory without a gun?”

“Fortunately, there happens to be a cannon nearby,” came the snippy answer.

Logan suddenly was struck by a mental flash of what the unexpected visitor might look like.

A boy.

That would explain the odd fluctuations he heard in the low voice from time to time. It would also explain why the lad had such tender ears, and why he was afraid to let Logan out of the stockade. It all fit. A wave of reluctant sympathy tugged at Logan. A lot of young men had shown up in Trinity Falls, hoping to fill their pockets with gold. To them, every stranger was a potential enemy.

“You don’t have to raise the bolt to feed me, kid. Just shove some of that food you’ve been cooking through the small opening at the bottom of the door. I’ll pass you my canteen, and you can fill it at the well.”

“Why did you call me kid?” came the definitely edgy query.

“Hit the nail on the head, didn’t I?”

“I’m no child.”

“I’m sure you’ve traveled far and faced your share of hardships,” he conceded. “Now how about that food and water?”

The metal grate came up abruptly. No light flooded through the puny opening. Logan realized night had fallen. He fumbled in the darkness for his empty canteen and pushed it through the open grate. Then he waited.

“Here,” came the gruff voice.

Logan cupped his hand beneath the slot. A fragrant, warm lump fell into his palm. When he took his first bite of the biscuit, his taste buds wept more saliva. Considering the exacting standards he expected from the hotel chef at the Prairie Rose, his starvation must be at an advanced level for him to take delight in such humble fare. Of course, when he lived with the Shoshone, he’d learned to appreciate simply cooked foods.

Moments later, his canteen rolled to his feet. He sat on the ground with his back against the log wall and tipped his head, letting the life-sustaining liquid trickle down his dry throat. Nothing had ever tasted so good, except for-”Do you have any whiskey you’d like to share, kid?”

“Certainly not! And stop calling me kid.”

“Don’t tell me,” Logan said. “Your folks don’t approve of a man enjoying liquor now and again.”

“That’s right!”

Somehow he wasn’t surprised. “I finished my biscuit. Do you have any more?”

The grate came up, and Logan held out his hand expectantly. Three more biscuits filled his palm. If he was a religious man, he might have burst into hallelujahs.

“You’re a good cook, kid,” Logan said around a mouthful of filling bread. “Do you do it for a living?” In between sips of water, Logan savored his third biscuit. “What’s your name?”

A hesitation followed his question. What else was new?

“Amory.”

Despite his desperate circumstances, Logan discovered, he could still smile. “That a first or a last name?”

“Last.”

“Got a first initial you’d like to share, or do you want me calling you Amory?”

Silence.

“You don’t talk much.” A feeling of welcome fullness coupled with incredible fatigue washed over Logan. “That’s fine with me, Amory.”

Silence.

Logan’s eyelids drifted shut.

“V.!”

The strident shout fairly rocked the stockade door. Logan chuckled. His ribs made their presence known. Grimacing, he sank onto a pallet. That he could find anything amusing in his present predicament suggested that he might live after all.

“V.A. it is.” Logan was going to have to tell him that each time he lost his temper, his youthful voice went up several notches.

Now that he had some food in his stomach, Logan’s exhaustion caught up with him. He told himself he’d rest a bit before trying to convince the youth to release him.

Victoria looked down for several moments at the small, square hole into which she’d shoved the prisoner’s food and water. Then she pushed shut the metal grate and stepped from the cell.

She bit her lip, trying not to feel guilty about keeping the wretched man inside the stockade. Yet the plain and simple truth was, she did feel sorry for Mr. Logan Youngblood. Not sorry enough, however, to risk her life by setting the foul-spoken criminal free. At least not until she’d discovered what he’d done to warrant such harsh punishment. Only a simpleton would ignore the fact that he’d been abandoned to certain death. It stood to reason that Logan Youngblood’s sins must be black indeed.

Victoria set about tidying the campsite. The familiar ritual brought a measure of peace. Later, she stretched out upon the blankets she’d spread beneath the wagon. For once, because of the smoothness of the military yard, no sharp sticks or rocks poked through her bedding and into her skin.

Even though the fort was filled with available beds, Victoria wasn’t tempted to spend the night in any of them. Too fresh in her memory was the eerie sensation of standing in empty rooms and feeling the ghostly presence of their former occupants.

“Amory, get your butt over here!”

The surly command jerked Victoria from the few minutes of extra sleep she’d tried to steal from the brightening dawn. She sat up and promptly rammed her forehead against the wagon’s underbelly. A disorienting wave of pain shot through her skull. Simultaneously, her back muscles protested the sudden movement. She pressed her eyelids shut and waited for the shocks to her body to lessen before crawling from beneath the wagon.

“Move it, Amory. We’ve got to get out of here!”

Victoria glared balefully at the stockade.

“I was asleep,” she said, her voice groggy.

“Kid, if you don’t haul your butt over here and let me out, we’re both going to be meat for the buzzards.”

In the morning light, the stockade was a small, crude building that looked both forbidding and forlorn. She steeled herself against any further sympathy for Mr. Youngblood, locked inside its dark interior. Again, she reminded herself that the man must be an evildoer of the blackest sort, and therefore was suffering only what he deserved.

Her jaw tightened. “Relax, Mr. Youngblood. No buzzard is going to get you while you’re inside your cell.”

As she waited for the prisoner’s response, Victoria’s stomach rolled over. She’d forgotten to disguise her voice as that of a man! Apprehensive, she awaited Logan’s next words.

“Kid, just how old are you?”

Victoria couldn’t tear her gaze from the small log building. She coughed once, then cleared her throat and tried to speak from the region of her toes. “Old enough.”

“Ten? Twelve?”

“None of your business.”

“I’m going to make this simple. Any time now, several bands of Indians are going to ride down upon this fort. If the United States Army didn’t care to hang around for the outcome, don’t you think you should reconsider setting up a camp here?”

At the open scorn coating the prisoner’s question, Victoria winced. She looked toward the fort’s gaping entrance. Perhaps she should have closed the gate behind her.

“Look, kid—” The man broke off. “Amory, the Indians plan on burning Fort Brockton to the ground. They don’t intend on taking any prisoners. Unless you want a burning arrow through the gut, I suggest we get the hell out of here.”

“How do you know they’re coming?” Victoria asked, her throat muscles tight.

“That doesn’t matter. What’s important is that we—”

“What do you mean, we?” she demanded, hating the new fear Logan Youngblood’s words had unleashed within her. “I told you, I’m not letting you out until you tell me what your crime was.”

“Do you honestly think you have a choice?”

“Yes, I think just that.”

“Dammit, you need all the help you can get. One snotnosed kid isn’t going to hold off a band of revenge-minded Indians.”

“I told you, I’m not—”

“I’ve got ears, Amory. You sound about ten to me. I don’t know what in blazes you’re doing running around the Idaho Territory on your own. But I do know that, if you intend to see eleven, you better haul yourself over here and unbolt this door.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this last night?” Victoria asked, wondering if Logan Youngblood was making up this new threat to scare her into freeing him.

“I was only thinking about the hole in my stomach that needed filling,” came the clearly grudging admission. “I must have passed out afterward.”

“And this morning you came to with the sudden recollection that this fort was about to be attacked?”

“That’s right, boy. We need to get to Trinity Falls.”

Trinity Falls—exactly where she wanted to be.

“Why did they lock you up, Mr. Youngblood?” she repeated, wondering if she could believe anything he told her. Obviously, it served his best interests to lie.

There was a distinct pause.

“I brought the warning of the attack.”

“And they put you in the stockade for that?” Victoria couldn’t suppress her disappointment that he would prevaricate in this dire situation.

“Not exactly.”

“Well, what was it exactly, Mr. Youngblood?”

“They wanted to know how I knew the Indians’ plans.”

“A most sensible question,” she pointed out.

“I told them Night Wolf had warned me.”

“Night Wolf?”

“He’s an. acquaintance of mine.”

“Really?” Victoria asked, intrigued that anyone should count an Indian among his circle of acquaintances. “How did you meet?”

“That’s hardly important.”

“I suppose not.” Still, she was curious about such an odd circumstance. “Why did Night Wolf warn you about the attack?”

“He realizes that more bloodshed will only make it harder for his people to coexist peacefully with the white man.”

“I see.”

Victoria knew she was in the minority in sympathizing with the primitives. To her, they seemed like beautiful and free people who were rapidly losing their home in a land that had sheltered them for generations. If only there could be an end to the violence that raged between the settlers and the Indians, and a place could be preserved for the country’s native inhabitants.

“You still haven’t told me why they locked you up.”

“I refused to lead Colonel Windham to Night Wolf’s camp.”

“Why on earth would you object to doing that?”

“I told you, Night’s Wolf’s people are at peace.”

“Then they have nothing to worry about.”

“Boy, you can’t be green enough to believe that.”

Victoria’s teeth clicked together. “I’m smart enough to stay out of jail.”

“But foolish enough to land in the middle of Indian country during a war.”

“Mr. Youngblood?”

“Yes?”

“Are you comfortable in your cell?”

“Not really.”

“That’s unfortunate, because at this rate you’re going to remain there.”

“Amory, we’re running out of time.” A pounding blow sent a flurry of dust motes flying from the stockade door.

She jumped back. “Stop that!”

“Listen to me, you stubborn brat—the Indians are coming.

“So you said.”

“And you don’t believe me?” he asked, his tone furious. “Where the hell do you think everybody went? To a barn raising?”

Victoria stood before the barred entry and eyed the heavy beam holding it closed. For the first time, she was tempted to unlatch it. If the man was telling the truth about having brought news of an attack, he didn’t deserve to die.

The sun’s rays bore down. She closed her eyes and sent a hasty prayer heavenward, asking for divine guidance.

“Kid?”

The deep voice was relentless.

No answer came to her prayer, at least not in the form of words. But as she stared at the stockade, a sense of inevitability washed over her. The plain and simple truth was that she was incapable of leaving Mr. Youngblood to rot inside his log prison.

“I’m going to open the door.”

“When?”

She struggled to lift the heavy bar lodged tightly between the metal posts. “Now.”

“Smart move, Amory,” came the approving voice. “We’ll ride hard and fast for Trinity Falls.”

“And, once we’re there, we’ll be safe?”

“Since the last gold strike, the town’s swollen to more than five thousand miners,” he informed her. “It’s in no danger of being attacked. Do you have a good horse?”

“No.” A splinter stabbed her index finger. “I’ve got a team of oxen.”

“Well, hell, what kind of time do you think we’re going to make with oxen?”

“They may not be fast, but they’re steady. And they’ve had time to rest. They’ll pull my wagon just fine.”

Victoria gave up trying to raise the bar with her bare hands and went to fetch her cooking fork. She was sure it was sturdy enough to dislodge the metal beam.

“You’ve got a wagon?”

Her efforts began to noticeably budge the crossbar. “That’s right.”

“I don’t like the idea of using a wagon.”

The heavy iron arm finally came free and toppled to the ground. The stockade door swung outward, revealing a sinister black hole.

The prisoner stepped toward the light. “Wheel tracks are too easy to follow.”

Without the barrier of the log portal between them, the deep voice sounded alarmingly close.

“We’re going to need the wagon. I refuse to leave my precious cargo behind.”

Mr. Youngblood emerged from the shadowed doorway, blinking against the sudden onslaught of sunlight.

“Precious cargo—?” He broke off abruptly. She saw his dark eyes narrow at the sight of her. “Well, hell.”

The observation was his, the sentiment hers.

Chapter Four

The man before Victoria was unlike any she’d ever seen. He filled her entire field of vision and, with every foot he drew closer, seemed to grow in stature. Her mouth went dry, and she took a stumbling step back.

The morning breeze ruffled the tattered remnants of a white shirt that, despite its torn state, managed to adhere to his muscular shoulders. She had never seen an uncovered male chest before, and thus was unprepared for the shocking sight of the lush pelt of black hair that grazed his bared flesh. Goodness, surely no American Indian roaming the western plains could appear more awesomely proportioned than Logan Youngblood.

Or more distressingly primitive.

“Where’s the kid?”

The gruff question jerked her gaze from his almost naked torso to a dark pair of glittering eyes. She swallowed. The man looked as if he’d been pummeled by an angry mob. His blackened right eye was almost swollen shut. He also sported a bruised, whiskered jaw and a split bottom lip.

The single thought that danced in her head was that, if she hadn’t released the devil himself from the stockade, she’d surely freed one of his henchmen to murder, plunder and pillage.

“The—the kid?” she repeated stupidly.

He took another step forward. She tipped her head back to keep his daunting visage in view.

“The one I’ve been talking to since last night.”

“I told you I wasn’t a child,” she answered, hearing the wobble in her voice and regretting it.

His savage gaze shriveled to a blistering slit. “You mean all this time I’ve been talking to you? A female?”

The derisive way he pronounced “female” caused a hot flush to singe her cheeks. She stood taller, digging for a measure of her normal pluck. “I should think that would be obvious to anyone of reasonable intelligence.”

Usually she didn’t approve of cutting remarks designed to wound another’s sensibilities. But in Mr. Youngblood’s case, she felt justified in making an exception. Clearly the criminal possessed no sensibilities with which to concern herself.

His glare was of sufficient scorching intensity to fry a buckwheat biscuit without benefit of fire.

“I don’t believe it.”

“It’s true.” Had his confinement addled his senses, making him incapable of grasping that she had only pretended to be of the male gender? “I can assure you I am traveling alone. There is no one with me, least of all a child.”

She couldn’t make her explanation any simpler.

His good eye, the one that wasn’t fiercely swollen, studied her balefully. “Why?”

“Why what?” She assessed the challenge of getting the confused man to Trinity Falls. Of course, there was a positive side to his apparent simplemindedness. It was possible that he was mistaken about the Indians being on the warpath. “Are you wondering why I wanted you to think you were talking to a man?”

He shook his head, then winced. “I don’t give a damn about your theatrics. I want to know why you’re alone.”

“Oh, that.” She glanced from his ruthless stare. She hated admitting to this disreputable stranger that she’d been banished from the wagon train. She attempted a reassuring smile. “I don’t have the plague, if that’s worrying you.”

A grave expression settled over his battered features. “Were you attacked?”

Victoria’s thoughts immediately went to her late-night mishap with Hyrum Dodson, the unfortunate discharge of her rifle, and his piercing howl as he’d hopped about on one foot while trying to ascertain the damage to his other one. “I wouldn’t call it an ‘attack’ so much as a misunderstanding.”

Mr. Youngblood’s good eye narrowed. “Misunderstanding?”

“You see, I thought a bear was invading my wagon.”

Confusion seemed to sweep his countenance. “A bear?”

The man really was limited in his reasoning abilities. She regretted her earlier cutting remark about anyone of reasonable intelligence being able to comprehend her explanations.

But she hadn’t known that Logan Youngblood was blighted by limited mental prowess. Her gaze made a quick foray across his virile physique. What a pity that his physical endowments were not matched by an equally keen intellect. Had his lack of mental fortitude led to an association with unsavory men who’d introduced him to a life of crime?

“Of course, as it turned out, there really wasn’t a bear.” She carefully enunciated each word so that he could grasp what had happened. “But I had no way of knowing that at the time, did I?”

His cracked lips parted, but he didn’t speak. Instead, he seemed to regard her with a kind of morbid fascination.

Since leaving Boston, Victoria had become familiar with that look. As usual in her encounters with Western men, she was mystified as to why he had difficulty understanding her.

“The point is, I didn’t mean to hurt Mr. Dodson. He just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“How did you. hurt him?”

She sighed. “I shot him.”

Mr. Youngblood retreated a step. “You what?”

“I heard something outside my wagon in the wee hours of the morning. The day before, one of the men mentioned seeing a black bear in the vicinity. He warned us to be on the lookout.”

“Couldn’t you tell the difference between a man and a bear?”

“It was dark.”

Mr. Youngblood’s good eye blinked spasmodically. “Lady, you’re the one who should be locked up.”

At the reminder of how she’d found the battered Logan Youngblood, Victoria’s gaze drifted to the stockade. “I didn’t mortally wound Mr. Dodson. I just winged him.”

“Where?”

“Does it really matter?”

“I’m sure it did to him,” Youngblood countered.

“His foot.”

“What were you aiming for?”

She licked her lips, not at all liking the feeling that she’d lost control of their conversation. If anyone ought to be answering questions, it was him. He was the one who’d been incarcerated.

Strictly speaking, even if he wasn’t behind bars, he was still a prisoner. To be more specific, he was her prisoner. And, as she saw it, she was duty-bound to escort him to Trinity Falls to answer for his ill deeds.

“Everything happened so quickly, I didn’t really have time to aim at anything in particular.” She straightened. “But we seem to have strayed from the central topic.”

“So they kicked you off the wagon train for shooting one of its members?” he asked grimly, ignoring her efforts to get their discussion on track.

“Oh, no, they just took away my rifle for that.”

The nervous tic quickened. “Then what happened? I mean, other than the wagon train being attacked and everyone but you being killed, I can’t think of a single reason for you to have been separated from the others.”

“Of course you can’t,” she conceded, striving for the patience one used when dealing with a child. The trouble was, she hadn’t been around that many children.

“Let me guess,” he interjected softly. “They tossed you off the train because you drove them crazy with your damned riddles.”

She’d heard head injuries caused confusion. Was that why he seemed incapable of understanding the simplest of concepts? “How many blows to the head did you receive?”

Logan bit back an oath. Swearing at the contrary female who’d released him from the stockade would do no earthly good. He raked a hand through his hair. The subsequent flash of pain made him suck in his breath.

He looked toward the morning sun. Time was running out for them. They needed to leave the fort. “Look, lady, I—”

“My name is Miss Amory,” she told him in that dainty, haughty voice of hers.

“Which will make no difference to an Indian with justice on his mind.”

Her greenish eyes widened. “Justice?”

“The red man’s kind of justice. It’s swift and hard.”

She looked over her shoulder, as if expecting an arrow to come flying at her. Framed by a splash of yellow sunlight, she appeared achingly vulnerable. A slim woman, with reddish hair that was in the process of escaping its anchoring pins.

There was little logic to it, but he felt compelled to protect the foolish creature.

“We need to be on our way,” he repeated.

“I wasn’t the one asking all the questions.”

He scowled. Irritating female.

He would find out later how she’d become separated from the wagon train. He was sure that when he did, he’d learn she was responsible for her predicament. As his gaze dropped to the pert curve of her breasts and the slight fullness of her hips, outlined by her dusty dark green dress, there was something else he was sure of. Mr. Dodson with the shot foot had been prowling around Miss Amory’s wagon with mischief on his mind.

The kind of mischief that had been going on since Eve had plucked that forbidden apple from its branch and offered it to Adam. The kind of mischief that would probably shock this red-haired Eastern woman to the soles of her sensible little black walking shoes.

Again he was struck by how vulnerable she appeared in her makeshift campsite in the middle of the abandoned fort. He turned again to the six placid oxen munching on the loose hay scattered around them. “I’ll hitch the wagon.”

“I’ve been responsible for my team since leaving Independence, and I’m fully capable of attending to them now.”

Miss Amory’s raised voice halted him in his tracks. He turned on his heel and glared at the contrary woman. “Are you turning down my help?”

“No, but I don’t need a felon ordering me about. While we’re on the subject, there’s something else we need to clear up.”

Her casual use of the word felon made Logan yearn to shake her. Instead, he swallowed his anger. He didn’t have time to trade insults with Miss Amory, not with warring tribes of Blackfeet and Shoshones on the verge of attacking.

Later, he promised himself, he would delight in making this overbearing woman take back every insult she’d heaped upon him.

“Do you want to live or die, Miss Amory?”

Her slender hand shot to the bodice of her simple dress. “Are—are you threatening me?”

“Hell no, but we’re in a tough spot and need to move.”

“So you keep telling me.”

He closed the eye that wasn’t swollen shut and prayed for patience. “They’re still out there.”

“I’m aware of that. But surely we have enough time to establish our…er…chain of command, as I believe it’s called.”

Feeling not one iota of increased patience, Logan opened his eye. He felt downright mean and put-upon. He’d ridden to the fort to deliver Night Wolf’s warning. His reward for leaving the safety of Trinity Falls had been a nasty showdown with Windham, a brutal beating, and being left to die.

Almost miraculously, he’d been freed. But, evidently, fate still wasn’t done having a laugh at his expense, because his rescuer was the craziest female he’d ever had the misfortune to meet. And something about her well-bred, faintly censorious voice grated on his already savaged nerves.

His gaze narrowed. A shot of pain radiated from his right eye. “Where are you from, Miss Amory?”

“I hardly think that’s relevant.”

“Boston, right?”

“Not that it matters, but yes, that is my hometown.”

He flinched. He should have known. Few good things had happened to him in Boston, which was why he’d left. As far as he was concerned, it was the hypocrisy capital of America, a place where men and women cared too much about appearances and not enough about integrity. It was where trust and loyalty fell before expediency and selfish desire.

“From your dour expression, I gather Boston is not one of your favorite places,” Miss Amory observed.

Nothing like a bit of understatement. “You might say that.”

“But where I come from hasn’t really anything to do with our present situation.”

She was speaking slowly again, as if she thought he were having trouble understanding her. Which he was, of course. But his lack of understanding had nothing to do with how fast or slowly she spoke. It was her confusing habit of talking in circles that made his head throb with more than the pain of the beating he’d survived.

Logan’s glance flicked to the stockade. He felt nostalgic about his internment there. While inside its dark interior, he hadn’t been forced to deal with a flame-haired harpy.

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Stop.”

She licked her damnably soft lips. “What is it, precisely, that you wish for me to stop doing?”

“Addressing me as if I were some kind of half-wit.”

Her already rosy cheeks flushed a brighter shade of pink.

Was that it? Did she really think he was dim-witted?

Indignation tore through Logan. That this capricious female considered herself superior to him was the last straw. Her words kept darting off in a dozen different directions. Trying to speak with her was like carrying on a conversation with a bundle of colorful butterflies.

“There’s no need to be sensitive about it.” Her Boston accent was crisp and officious. “Not everyone can boast a keen intellect.”

Astonishment popped the bubble of anger that had built within Logan. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so soundly offended. Not even Windham, with his ridiculous claim about Logan bedding his wife, had struck such a deep blow.

Logan found he disliked having his intelligence insulted more than he disliked having his honor impugned. A man could redeem his honor in a fair fight. There was no quick and final way, however, to convince this green-eyed witch that he was her intellectual equal. He told himself it didn’t matter what she thought.

“Now, about who’s in charge here,” she continued, as if she hadn’t just mortally insulted him. “As it’s my wagon, and my team, and you are now in my custody, I should be the one to decide who does what.”

“All right,” he managed to say through his clenched jaw, not wanting to waste time arguing.

She smiled. “Why don’t you go ahead and load the wagon, then, and I’ll.”

He said nothing, contenting himself with images of her being bound and gagged and tossed into the back of her wagon.

She gestured toward a row of privies. “Well, you know…”

He maintained his stoic silence.

Only after she left did Logan let out the breath he’d been holding. He stalked toward the team, each step making his ribs ache. Little Miss Boston Accent didn’t know it, but marauding Blackfeet were the least of her troubles. She would be damned lucky if she made it to Trinity Falls without him throttling her.

A short while later, with the climbing sun raising a bead of sweat on his skin after his exertions in harnessing the team, Logan looked into the back of Miss Amory’s covered wagon.

At first he didn’t believe what he saw.

When it finally dawned on him that he wasn’t imagining things, a heartfelt oath escaped his cracked lips.

“Well, hell, that’s why they left her.”

He lofted himself into the wagon, ignoring a stab of pain from his bruised ribs. He would demonstrate to Miss Amory that the West had its own code of survival. It was a lesson he’d learned, and he would see that she damn well learned it, too.

For both their sakes.

After performing her morning ablutions, Victoria felt revived as she walked back toward the wagon. She’d overcome her aversion to entering the abandoned domiciles and scrubbed her face and hands in a floral ceramic washbowl she’d found in one of the eerily silent bedchambers. She’d also borrowed a comb and refashioned her hair into a semblance of order.

Gazing into the mirror above the washstand, she’d studied her features. The freckles scattered across the bridge of her nose and cheeks were more prominent than ever. The Western sun was responsible for that, no doubt. There was one good thing about her profusion of freckles, Victoria had decided as she refastened her cuffs. Men did not find freckled women attractive, which meant that even a disreputable sort like Logan Youngblood wouldn’t direct any unseemly attentions to her.

As Victoria crossed the gravel yard, she said a hasty prayer on behalf of those who’d fled the fort. She included her own welfare on the list of those needing Divine assistance. When she added Logan Youngblood’s name to the silent litany, however, she felt that her prisoner needed a series of independently voiced prayers pronounced on behalf of his felonious soul, as well as his physical well-being.

He had already hitched the oxen and loaded up the campsite, and was hunched over, reaching into the back of the wagon. When he emerged, two things registered. The first was that he’d found a blue military shirt to replace the tattered white one that had been falling off his powerfully sculpted shoulders. Thank goodness for that.

Her sense of relief was short-lived, though, when she realized he held several of her treasured books in his broad hands.

She raced forward. “What are you doing?”

He looked up from the volumes, a narrow-lipped frown making his already pummeled features even more menacing. “I’m lightening the load so we can make better time.”

Victoria recoiled. He couldn’t have hurt her more if he’d shot her. “You will return those books to where they belong.”

“They belong in Boston.”

She shook her head. “They are my possessions and will come with me.”

“I think not, Miss Amory.”

She straightened and leveled her most chiding glare at the obtuse man. “We’ve already established that I’m the one who gives the orders, and I say my precious cargo goes with me to Trinity Falls.”

Not looking at all chastised, Youngblood’s good eye narrowed to pinpoint fury. “This is your precious cargo?”

“That’s right, and I’ve no intention of leaving it.”

“Lady, they’re not loved ones, they’re books,” he said flatly, tossing her beloved copy of The Last of the Mohicans into the dust. “And they’re certainly not worth dying for.”

At his callous gesture, outrage filled Victoria. She bent instinctively to gather Cooper’s epic to her bosom.

“How dare you!”

He startled her by kneeling across from her. “Lady, there’s lots more copies of this book around. When we get to Trinity Falls, you can order another one—of it and all the others.”

“This is a first edition!”

With an absent flick of his wrist, he discarded Louisa May Alcott’s new volume, Little Women. Victoria’s indignation grew. She hadn’t even had a chance to read it yet!

“The wagon master may have been willing to ride off without you, Miss Amory. He probably figured you’d come to your senses and lighten your load. He made a mistake I’m not willing to. The books stay. We go.”

Victoria stared into Mr. Youngblood’s unwavering gaze and knew intuitively that he would not yield to any pleas to spare her beloved volumes. Yet a spark of defiance still burned within her.

Inspiration struck. “It would take half the morning to unload the wagon. Don’t you think we should leave now?”

She forced a determined smile onto her stiff lips. Oh, there was a rational part of her that knew it was foolish to risk her life over inanimate objects. But there was another part that was convinced she could keep both her scalp and the works of Cooper, Hardy and Bronte. After all, man did not live by bread alone.

Youngblood rose to his full height. A look of frustrated resignation stamped his rugged features. Victoria held her breath as she silently counted off the passage of seconds. She truly had no idea what the barbaric man might do.

Abruptly he turned his broad back to her.

“Get into the wagon,” he ordered brusquely.

She scooped Alcott’s book from the ground, shook the dust from it, then hurried up onto the wagon’s high bench seat. She supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that her surly companion was there ahead of her, already taking his place behind the reins.

She swallowed back her protest, counting herself fortunate that he’d agreed that there wasn’t time to unload all the volumes she’d spent days meticulously organizing and arranging in the corners and crannies of her wagon’s interior.

Victoria had scarcely clambered beside Youngblood before he released the hand brake and reached for the bullwhip. In a careless gesture, he uncurled it above the animals’ backs.

A loud crack sounded, cutting through the fort’s stillness. As one, the team lurched forward toward the open gate.

With a start, Victoria realized she’d linked her hopes for survival to a total stranger. She couldn’t help wondering whether she’d just made the worst mistake of her life.

Chapter Five

From the corner of her eye, Victoria sneaked covert glances at the man sitting beside her. They had been following this fairly wide stretch of wagon-rutted roadway for close to an hour, and he had yet to address one word to her. His profile was harsh and unrelenting. As luck would have it, his swollen eye faced her. Whenever a wheel struck a particularly deep rut, the jostling provoked a tight-lipped grimace from him.

At this evidence of his pain, her feelings toward him might have softened, had he offered a friendly word or two. His continued silence, however, grated on her nerves. It seemed unfair that fate should shackle her to a companion who was no more inclined to conversation than her plodding oxen. At least the animals had never glowered at her disapprovingly.

The wilderness continued to roll by, mile after mile of lush greenery. The air was redolent with the unrestrained scent of pine. Nearby, the Ruby River splashed across granite boulders.

The sun climbed higher in the cloudless blue sky. It didn’t take long for the warming rays to intensify to an uncomfortable degree. She shifted on the wooden seat, convinced she could feel new freckles popping out on her skin. By the time they reached Trinity Falls, she would probably have a hundred more of the unattractive little devils spotting her face.

She tried to think where she’d left her sunbonnet, recalling that she’d worn it the day before. She remembered removing the bonnet when she crawled beneath the wagon to sleep. With a pang, she realized she’d left the wide-brimmed covering on her makeshift bed when Youngblood’s voice jerked her awake. Had he thought to include the bonnet when he packed up her campsite?

She turned to peek into the wagon’s interior. One of their wheels slammed into another deep rut. Caught off balance, she steadied herself by clutching at the closest thing of substance, which turned out to be Youngblood.

She let out a startled yelp. At the same time, Youngblood’s powerful arm curved around her, anchoring her to his side. Several impressions struck her. First and foremost, she was aware of the muscular strength in the arm that bound her to Logan Youngblood. Secondly, she sensed that same latent power leashed in the rest of the strong body she was pressed tightly against.

The rough fabric of his blue shirt scraped the tip of her nose. His male scent inexorably wove itself into the very air she breathed. While not unpleasant, the earthy aroma seemed shockingly invasive. Goodness, she’d never been as close to, or as aware of, any man in her entire life. Not even seeing Horace Threadgill with his trousers around his ankles in her bedchamber had seemed as intimate as being trapped in this scoundrel’s embrace.

“What in the blazes are you trying to do?”

His husky voice vibrated in her eardrum, causing a strange tingle to skip across her forearms. Her palms came up to push herself free. “I’m trying to right myself.”

He gave her a look of disgust. “You could have fooled me.”

“You may release me now.”

His mauled countenance hovered a scant inch from her upturned face. She looked into his good eye. It was the darkest shade of brown, almost black. It was also penetratingly intent. She felt as if she were caught in a beam of lantern light shining from a lighthouse on a fogbound night-which made no sense, because his glare was as dark and forbidding as a moonless sky.

“Are you ready to sit still?”

It was the kind of question one would address to an unruly child, and she resented it.

“I was trying to fetch my sunbonnet,” she informed him loftily as she struggled to extricate herself from his embrace. She didn’t want to trigger an all-out tug-of-war that would make him aware of how indelicately he held her.

Her instincts warned it was essential she keep a safe distance from a man as unapologetically primitive as Youngblood.

He eased his grip. “You should have warned me.”

“I’ll remember to do so next time.” She sank back to her side of the seat.

He pulled back on the reins. The oxen came to a dusty halt.

“Thank you for stopping,” she said briskly, turning again to look inside the wagon’s interior. “Do you happen to remember picking up my sunbonnet?”

She leaned more fully inside, scanning her dust-covered possessions for the green calico fabric. Her companion made no comment. Irritation nipped at her fragilely held patience.

She glanced at him from her ungainly position of being half in and half out of her wagon. “I asked you if—”

She broke off, disconcerted by how Mr. Youngblood’s gaze seemed affixed to that portion of her anatomy stuck outside the canvas opening. The indecorous upward thrust of her bottom was mere inches from that interested regard.

What a rude rascal he was, not to avert his glance. She scooted onto the seat, trying to regain a more orthodox pose. She blew back the strands of hair that had fallen into her eyes.

“Did you think to retrieve my bonnet as you loaded the wagon?” She refused to comment upon his impertinent inspection of her lower person. There was little point in trying to teach manners to a man who frequented military stockades.

“I rolled it up in one of your blankets.”

She let out a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I was afraid you had left it. Just give me a minute, and I’ll get it.”

“Be quick about it.”

Such a gracious fellow. She turned and entered the inside of her wagon feetfirst. It was still an awkward movement, but at least she wasn’t sticking out in all the wrong places for Mr. Youngblood’s entertainment.

She found the blanket she’d used last night and located the sadly bedraggled hat. Before returning to her seat, she took the opportunity to carefully tuck away the books she’d reclaimed before boarding the wagon.

“I’m all set now,” she announced as she climbed back next to him, shaking the winkles and dust from the muchabused bonnet.

He said nothing, nor did he make any move to proceed.

“Well, just don’t sit there and stare at me,” she muttered dourly. “According to you, time is of the essence.”

“Are you going to put that thing on?”

She looked at him in surprise. “Of course.”

“Then do it.”

“You know, Mr. Youngblood, you’re a downright irritating fellow.” She sought to untangle the snarled ribbon ties. “I wouldn’t be the least surprised to discover that’s why you were locked up—for being generally obnoxious.”

“I’m waiting for you to put on your damned hat so we can get going without you tumbling onto your sweetly shaped behind.”

He had been sneaking peeks at her posterior! A hot flush bathed her cheeks. Good grief, he was a barbarian.

Naturally, she was somewhat mollified to learn that he approved of what he’d seen. Still, the man needed the most basic of lessons on how to conduct himself with a lady. But then, criminals of his sort probably didn’t often associate with ladies, not even ones with her own somewhat maligned reputation.

“I think I can manage to put my bonnet on and remain seated,” she said sharply. “Provided, of course, that you can manage to avoid the larger holes pocking this charming road we’re obliged to follow.”

“We’re not staying on the main road.”

She stopped fiddling with the knot she’d been trying to unravel. He had her full attention now. “Why on earth not?”

“It’s sixty miles to Trinity Falls on this route. That’s a sixday journey, with a fully loaded wagon pulled by oxen.”

“So?”

“That’s six days on flat terrain that will leave us exposed to attack from any roaming Indians.”

“Which isn’t a good situation to be in,” she mused aloud.

“A better choice for us would be to leave the main road and detour through those mountains.”

Victoria looked toward the mountains in question. They loomed large and inhospitable—great granite crags stretching skyward. Caps of snow from the previous winter still covered the upper reaches. Even the tenacious pines and cedars hadn’t trespassed to those higher realms.

“You are simpleminded to think my team and wagon can scale those rugged cliffs.”

It wasn’t until the words popped out of her mouth that Victoria realized she’d spoken plainly enough for even a simpleton to realize he’d been insulted. She kept her gaze pinned resolutely on the jagged outcroppings.

“Do you plan to insult me all the way to Trinity Falls?”

There was no ignoring his tone’s stony timbre.

She decided only a coward would refuse to look at him when she answered his question. Until this very moment, Victoria hadn’t realized she had a cowardly bone in her body. She drew in a breath and ceased her futile struggles with her ribbon ties. Turning slowly, she confronted her offended companion.

“I apologize, Mr. Youngblood, for hurting your feelings.”

He stared at her hard enough with that cyclopean eye of his to raise goose bumps on her skin.

“And,” she continued gamely, “in the future, I will endeavor to control my tongue.”

At her words, his harsh gaze swooped to her lips. Her goose bumps multiplied a hundredfold.

His mouth curved. On someone else the gesture would have resembled a smile. On him, the action had a kind of carnivorous aspect. She suspected that the Big Bad Wolf had sized up Little Red Riding Hood in that exact predatory fashion.

“It’s at this point that you’re supposed to accept my apology,” she instructed.

“If it will get that damned bonnet on your head any quicker, I’ll accept your most humble apologies.”

She bit back her objections to his profanity, his reference to her “most humble” apologies and his entirely offensive manner. Instead she concentrated on unknotting the damned snarl that had—

Victoria winced. Goodness, the crude man was already proving to have a corrupting effect upon her moral character. She never swore. Not when being falsely accused of misconduct with her sister’s beau, not when an unsympathetic wagon master refused to wait for her, not when dealing with unrepentant criminals.

She governed her life by a high set of principles. And it was especially important now that she adhere to that superior code of conduct. After all, when she reached Trinity Falls, she would be instructing a young woman in the elements of being a proper lady, as well as handling the girl’s general education. It wouldn’t do at all for Victoria to show up in her new environment contaminated by her association with Logan Youngblood.

It was she who needed to exert a positive influence upon him. Surely, with a diligent effort upon her part, he could be dissuaded from his wayward ways.

The knot finally loosened enough for her to free the ribbons. She wasted no time in securing the hat to her head.

“We’re not going over the mountains,” Youngblood said. “There are trails and passes I’m hoping to get this wagon through. Once we’re shielded by the forest, I’ll feel better.”

“I suppose it does make sense for us to make ourselves less conspicuous,” she conceded reluctantly. The thought of entering the mysterious denseness of the wooded wilderness, however, was daunting to a city girl like herself. It seemed that it would be very easy to become lost among those pines that grew so astonishingly close to each other. It looked as if even the sunlight had to struggle to penetrate the lightly packed clusters of trees. “Are you sure you know the way to Trinity Falls?”

It was clear to Logan that Victoria Amory did not have the slightest confidence in his abilities to get her safely to civilization. He probably shouldn’t have been surprised by her lack of trust. She had the lowest opinion of him of anyone he’d ever met, and that probably included Colonel Windham.

She sat next to him with that pitiful scrap of mangled fabric on her head and still managed to appear as composed as a schoolmistress about to call her class to order. He supposed she was just naturally bossy.

He limited himself to answering, “I’ve lived in the West for a while now.”

“In these hills?” she asked, obviously still needing reassurance.

He raised the whip to get the team moving again. “No, I’ve lived in town.”

No doubt dividing his time between saloons and the city jail, Victoria thought.

Logan maneuvered the wagon off the road, taking an upward strip of flattened grass that wound northward through the pines. Sharp-needled branches scraped their canvas-covered canopy. The ride became rougher. Miss Amory latched on to the side of her seat like a limpet stuck to a ship’s hull.

“I’m not so sure this is a good idea,” she said, her voice a virtual squeak. “I don’t have a map we can refer to.”

“I don’t need a map.”

“Forgive me for not having more confidence in you,” she began, using that snippy tone of hers. “But I was warned most forcibly by the wagon master to remain on the main road.”

“You can bet that if he was in our situation, he would try to make himself invisible to the Indians, too.”

The wagon took another sharp lurch. Victoria almost bounced off her seat. He reached out and pulled her to him.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“Keeping you from breaking your neck,” he answered grimly. She felt so small and fragile next, to him. Again a strong sense of protectiveness surged within him. It wasn’t a feeling he welcomed, but he seemed unable to fight it. “If we were going at a slower pace, I’d let you walk. It would mean less wear and tear on your.body. But for the rest of the day, at least, we need to put as much distance between us and the fort as we can.”

She stopped struggling. One of her palms curled around his arm. Her other hand gripped his shoulder. “If we leave the river, how will we find water for the oxen?”

“There’s quite a few streams that feed into the Ruby. Don’t worry, water won’t be a problem.”

“But how will you know where to—”

“Look, Miss Amory, this isn’t the time or place to have a discussion. I’ve got to concentrate on keeping these animals on a path that’s no bigger than a cat’s behind. We’ll talk later.”

He ducked, pulling her down with him, when a lowhanging branch threatened to take their heads off. Dust and dead pine needles flew as the limb smacked the top of the lurching wagon.

She buried her face in his sleeve. When she came up for air, she was coughing. “As long as you realize I’m in charge.”

Little gasps kept time with each bump they experienced. He didn’t know whether to laugh or swear at the stubborn female. She had the most one-track mind of any woman he’d ever met.

“Oh, yeah,” he growled, feeling the jarring in his tender ribs. “You’re definitely in charge.”

He would let her think that all the way to Trinity Falls.

It seemed to Victoria that her entire twenty-four years had shrunk to this jerky passage through the Idaho wilderness. They had been traveling for hours now. And there was no outward sign from Youngblood that he meant to stop anytime soon. Because the thickly timbered landscape blocked most of the sun’s rays, it was difficult to gauge the time of day. From her stomach’s not-so-discreet rumblings, though, she assumed it was well past noon.

The grim-faced man beside her hadn’t spoken for the longest time. But then, their violent progress discouraged conversation. She had to admit he was good with her team. She doubted she could have bullied them along this wild stretch.

Victoria marveled that he managed to keep to the narrow trail. There were instances when she thought they’d taken a blind alley and would have to turn around, but despite numerous twists and turns, Youngblood always moved forward.

They came to a relatively smooth section of the path, and the sounds of the wagon’s creaking protests softened. She heard the excited chatter of darting squirrels and the lively calls of birds.

“I can’t believe how close the trees are to each other,” she remarked, feeling disoriented by the thousands upon thousands of thin-trunked pines around them. Only inches separated the tall narrow-beamed trees from one another.

Her taciturn companion looked from the trail and gazed into the immense forest that embraced them on all sides as far as the eye could see. “Lodgepole pines grow that way.”

“It’s really quite beautiful, isn’t it?” she asked, succumbing to a need to share her appreciation of the untamed splendor in which she found herself.

He turned toward her. At the sight of his rawly bruised face, just inches from hers, she flinched. His facial injuries spoke of unchecked violence and the often brutal nature of men.

“Beautiful and deadly.”

His matter-of-factness chilled her. It was as if he was deliberately trying to frighten her. His intent stare made her wonder again if she’d delivered herself into the hands of the devil. Was he waiting for the right place, away from any signs of civilization, to do away with her and steal her wagon?

She fortified herself with a gulp of pine-scented air. “Deadly because of the Indians?”

He nodded. “There’s that. But there’s also bears, rattlers, wolves and mountain lions.”

Her stomach flipped. She wished he hadn’t bothered itemizing the various menacing creatures shielded by the forest.

Before Victoria could comment, the smooth stretch they were traversing became steeper and more uneven. She held on tighter to the wagon’s side panel and gritted her teeth to keep from biting her tongue.

Harness leather groaned as the oxen lowered their heads and plodded onward. The wild ride continued for several yards, and then Youngblood pulled back on the reins.

“Whoa!” came his clearly exasperated shout.

Three lodgepole pines had fallen across the faint trail. Youngblood handed her the reins. “It looks like we’re going to be here for a while.” He stepped down from the high bench seat, his face turned toward her. A look of pain flashed across his grimly set features. “I hope you’ve got an ax tucked away somewhere among all those books.”

“It’s lashed to the side of the wagon. Are you going to try and chop a path through those trees?”

He shot her an impatient glance. “I’m not going to try. I’m going to do it.”

In light of his arrogance, her sympathy for the injured man diminished. “While you’re doing that, I’d like to stretch my legs.” She tossed the reins to him and scooted into position to descend. “If we’re going to be here for a while, I’ll build us a fire and fry us up some pan biscuits.”

“There aren’t going to be any fires.”

His harsh voice was surprisingly close. She stopped midway to the ground and glanced over her shoulder. She found herself looking into the pinpoint focus of Youngblood’s cyclopean eyeball. She blinked, feeling strangely bound by his unexpected proximity. She swallowed; any words she’d been about to utter were forgotten.

His strong hands came around her waist, and he lowered her to the pine-needled carpet that covered the forest floor. There was a buzzing in her ears. It took her a moment to realize that a fat black deerfly was responsible for the distracting hum.

“We can’t afford to reveal our presence by building a fire,” he continued, his large palms still engulfing her. “Not for at least another day, anyway.”

Victoria had nowhere to go. With Youngblood pressed up behind her and the wagon in front, she was his prisoner.

“I still need to stretch my legs,” she told him. To her own ears, her voice sounded hoarse. She stepped to her right, assuming he would let her twist free. The next couple of seconds were the longest of her life. But when she pushed against his constraining hold, he moved back and released her.

“I’ll get the ax.”

It was the kind of statement that needed no response. She walked a few feet from the wagon and inhaled the rich mountain air. A strong hint of wild mint laced the cooling afternoon breeze.

Victoria noticed several clusters of purplish berries growing in heaps of green foliage. She recognized them as a variety of wild chokecherries and decided to gather some. When she returned to the wagon to retrieve a pail, the sound of the falling ax echoed through their secluded stopping place.

In response to the discordant thwack of the ax, raucous birds took to the sky in noisy protest. Pail in hand, Victoria circled the wagon. Youngblood stood in a shaft of pooling sunlight that managed to find its way through the cover of pine boughs. He had removed his shirt for his physical exertions, and he swung the long-handled blade with an economy of motion. Each strike of sharp metal bit deeply into the wood. Bits of bark and needles billowed from the steady blows.

Standing less than ten feet from him, she read the agony on his face. His labors were obviously taking a toll on his battered body. Sympathy tugged at her. He’d voiced no complaint about seeing to the arduous task. Instead, he’d applied himself to what had to be done.

The muscles that shaped his back contracted and relaxed with each upward and downward arc of the ax. Every rhythmic slice into the bark seemed an extension of his bunched arm and shoulder muscles. Already one narrow trunk had been severed.

Victoria shrugged off the strange sense of lethargy that came over her as she watched Youngblood clear their path. She gripped the pail tighter and turned to the tiny harvest of berries that beckoned in the tangled underbrush.

It was a puny harvest indeed, only a couple of dozen bits of the plump morsels. Still, they would taste delicious, Victoria decided as she returned to the wagon.

Youngblood was drinking deeply from a canteen when she joined him. His head was tipped back, and his Adam’s apple moved with each swallow he took. A faint gleam of perspiration covered his naked torso. She knew she ought to look away, to give him a degree of privacy. Had their positions been reversed, she certainly would have wanted him to avert his gaze.

Without speaking, he finished drinking and capped the canteen. He reached for his shirt and carelessly rubbed the blue material across the back of his neck. Victoria couldn’t have been more fascinated by his actions had she been visiting a Boston zoological exhibit. For in truth, Logan Youngblood was a mysteriously exotic creature to her.

He was a man.

Without the civilized trappings of his clothing, he seemed unlike any gentleman with whom she’d previously dealt. Horace Threadgill and the male members of the wagon train had been as citified as she was, and her association with them hadn’t been the least bit as intriguing as watching Logan Youngblood. He shook the wrinkles from the shirt and shrugged it on. Again she was aware of the flashes of pain that crossed his features.

He glanced from the button he was fastening. “What have you got there?”

Self-consciously she looked at her insignificant offering.

“Some wild berries.”

His mouth curved. Had his bottom lip not been swollen, she would have called the gesture a genuine smile.

“Good for you.”

A compliment, coming from him? It was ridiculous, but she experienced a surge of pleasure.

“I wasn’t able to find that many,” she felt compelled to confess, lest he get his expectations up.

“At least you didn’t sit around doing nothing, waiting for me to finish cutting us a path through those trees.”

“That would have been pretty silly,” she returned, some of the glow from his praise fading.

“I’ve observed that, in general, women tend to be silly.” He held out his hand. “I’ll take that.”

Chafing at his condescending manner, she gripped the handle tighter. “Why should I give you the pail?”

His dark eyebrows converged over his nose. “Do you always have to be so damned suspicious?”

“Why should I give them to you?”

He leaned forward and pried her fingers loose from the metal handle. “Because, Miss Amory, you’ll need both your hands to climb into the wagon.”

“Oh.” Surrendering the berries, she turned away from him. With as much regal disdain as she could muster, she marched to her side of the wagon. As she climbed to her side of the seat, she had to admit that she did feel somewhat…silly.

Chapter Six

They ate the berries as they traveled. Sweetly tart, the juicy bits of fruit didn’t last long, yet they quenched Victoria’s thirst and temporarily took the edge off her hunger.

She smiled ruefully, recalling the wonderful meals her family’s cook had prepared. In the face of her present travails, it was remarkable that she’d taken those perfectly prepared repasts for granted, except, of course, during the horrific civil conflict that was only three years past.

At her country’s most vulnerable hour, Victoria had often thought about the Northern and Southern soldiers subjected to countless deprivations, including meager rations. Both she and Annalee had done their part to contribute to the welfare of their “boys,” by rolling bandages, sewing uniforms and donating their personal allowances to the cause. She remembered how good it had felt to be needed, to be of service.

She sighed, her glance straying to the silent man beside her. In battered profile, he was more than a little frightening. He had eaten the berries in what she was coming to view as his customary attitude of withdrawal. Because of his superior size, she’d assumed he would claim a greater portion of the plump morsels. That had not been the case, however, as he’d helped himself to only a few of the berries.

She was left to conclude one of three things: He didn’t care for the taste of the fruit; he wasn’t hungry; or he was demonstrating an unexpected degree of chivalry in allowing her to have the larger portion. None of those possibilities seemed likely.

Without warning, he turned to her. “Are my lips blue?”

“What?”

“The way you keep staring at me, I’m wondering if those berries turned my lips blue.”

A hot flush stole up her throat. He was right. She had been staring. She returned her gaze to the oxen’s swaying rumps. “Actually, your lips are a reddish color—due, no doubt, to their bloodied condition. It is your eye, however, that is the most remarkable array of hues, ranging from blue to black to purple.”

He surprised her by chuckling. “I must look like hell. That’s how I feel, anyway.”

She frowned, uncomfortable with the thought that he was in pain. “Do your injuries hurt terribly?”

From the corner of her eye, she could see that he was still looking at her. She kept her attention on the animals pulling their wagon. She was reluctant to meet his stare. Something about it disturbed her. She might tell herself that his pummeled features repulsed her, but she didn’t altogether believe that.

“Now and then I feel a twinge.”

He was being brave; she was sure of it. When she performed volunteer work at the military hospital, nursing wounded soldiers, they’d acted the same way, dismissing the severity of their injuries, even when they’d lost a limb.

She remembered the lines of agony gripping his face as he’d swung the ax. “I should have been the one to cut the trees.”

“And why is that?”

She heard the skepticism in his voice and suppressed a sigh. She was used to men undervaluing the contributions of women. Her father was a prime example of a male holding women in benign contempt. “Obviously, I could have spared you further suffering.”

“That’s quite a generous offer. Considering.”

“Considering what?” she couldn’t keep from asking.

“Considering that I’m your prisoner and you think you’re taking me to Trinity Falls to stand some kind of trial.”

She’d momentarily forgotten about that. “I don’t think I’m taking you there for that reason. I know I am.” Forgetting her earlier reservations about talking to the man eye-toeye, she turned to him. “It’s very important to accept responsibility for your actions. When you do something wrong, you must pay your debt to society. Otherwise, our country would be in anarchy.”

His stare was as intense as she recalled, but she didn’t glance away. He looked as if he had something important to say. Was he about to confess to his crimes? She prepared herself to hear anything. She promised herself that, no matter how depraved or violent his misdeeds, she would remain calm.

“You don’t believe any of the things I’ve told you, do you?”

“That you were falsely imprisoned after carrying a warning to the fort and not revealing the whereabouts of a tribe of friendly Indians?” she said dubiously.

His features tightened into a scowl. “It’s pointless for me to keep protesting my innocence, isn’t it?”

“I can’t believe soldiers of the United States Army would do anything as reprehensible as imprisoning an innocent man.”

He returned his attention to the trail. “There’s something you should think about.”

She didn’t trust the subtle deepening of his already husky voice. “What’s that?”

“If I’m such a terrible miscreant, why are you still alive?”

Her throat muscles constricted. “Wh-what?”

“If I’m as bad as you think, I would have had my way with your delectable body, hacked you up with your own ax, roasted you over a vigorous fire and made a hot meal of your tender flesh.”

Her heart pounded. That he could envision such deviltry proved he was dangerous. All her sympathetic thoughts about him rose to reproach her. She’d been a fool to release him from the stockade. And a greater fool not to arm herself with a knife.

Logan flicked a quick glance at his traveling companion. Damnation, she was as white as a ghost. It infuriated him that his careless words, words intended to reassure her, could actually terrify her. He didn’t know who he was angrier at, himself for uttering such hogwash or her for being so gullible.

I should have been the one to cut the trees.

Her gentle comment cut through his thoughts. She’d been concerned about him. And he’d repaid her generosity with a nasty remark about raping, dismembering and cannibalizing her!

“You can start breathing again. I won’t hurt you.”

“I don’t need you to tell me to breathe.”

Her bravado sparked a tug of admiration. The woman might be scared, but she wasn’t going to let him know it. The best way to deal with her so that she didn’t run screaming into the forest was to establish a rapport with her. Which meant he would have to learn more about her. He had to foster a degree of trust in this Eastern woman, because both their lives might come down to her obeying his orders without question. But he knew she wasn’t ready to hear that he was the temporary mayor of Trinity Falls and owned a bank. She’d think he was lying and become even more difficult to deal with.

“Why are you traveling alone?”

“You don’t recall?”

Her vivid green eyes looked.bewildered and, he thought with repugnance, filled with pity. Hell, she was back to treating him like a half-wit.

“Recall what?”

“I—I already explained that the wagon master was unwilling to slow his pace. And remember my books? The ones you wanted to leave behind at the fort—that large wooden structure with the big gate?”

He gritted his teeth so hard that his already aching jaw shot new waves of pam through his skull. “I meant, why were you alone in the first place? Most women travel west with their parents or husbands.” He couldn’t resist adding, “Parents are the people who give birth and raise you. A husband is a man a woman marries when she’s ready to start a family. A family—”

“I get your message.” Flags of scarlet decorated her cheeks.

Satisfaction warmed him. It was time Miss Amory understood how it felt to be treated like a simpleton.

“And?” he prompted.

“And what?” she snapped.

Logan realized he wasn’t making much headway in establishing a bond of trust between them, but at least she didn’t look as if she were in imminent danger of fainting.

“Why are you traveling alone?”

“It didn’t start out that way.” Her vibrant green eyes looked into the distance. “I was to make the trip with another family. Their oldest son was going to manage the team. At the last moment, however, their plans changed.”

Her explanation told him little. “Why did you decide to leave your home in the first place?”

Victoria’s already flushed face turned a brighter shade of pink. Logan sensed his question had struck a deep chord.

She was lying. That caught him off guard. She didn’t look like the kind of woman to prevaricate about anything. “And your parents let you go?”

“They. accepted my decision.”

There were a lot of things she wasn’t telling him. He sensed that leaving home had been painful for her.

“And your husband?” He was baiting her now, and he knew it.

She puffed up like a furious little red-feathered bird.

“I do not have a husband.”

“Fiancé?”

“That is hardly any of your business, Mr. Youngblood.”

“Call me Logan,” he commanded softly. “I intend to call you Victoria. It’s only fair I allow you the same privilege.”

She blinked at him. She’d done that before when something he said surprised her. The very feminine gesture appeared to be her way of getting her bearings.

“How do you know my first name?”

“You must have written it in every book you own.”

“Oh.” She studied him gravely. “Under the circumstances, I suppose it would be foolish not to be on a firstname basis.”

Such a well-bred, reluctant concession.

He liked the way her lips shaped her words—so precisely, so daintily. They were inviting lips—shaped with delicate fullness. Despite her mouth’s soft beauty, she didn’t look like the kind of woman to invite a kiss. Instead, she projected a directness that dared a man to cross the boundaries she’d set.

He pulled his gaze from hers before he did something totally asinine, like find out how those delectable lips tasted.

“Well, Victoria, what’s your answer?”

“My—my answer?”

“Are you engaged, married or widowed?”

Has any man been able to break through that formidable facade of yours?

“Mr. Young—”

“Logan,” he corrected firmly.

“Logan, ours is strictly a temporary association, and as I stated before, there’s no reason for you to know whether or not there’s someone. special in my life.”

“When this is over, suppose a man shows up, claiming you belong to him, and he demands to know what happened between us?”

“First of all, no such person exists.” Exasperation laced her cultured voice. “Second, the only thing that’s going to happen is that we’re going to reach Trinity Falls alive.”

It was hard to accept that the woman next to him was bound to no man. It was obvious from her independent manner that she felt no need to justify her single state. He tried to guess her age, which was no easy accomplishment.

A frown scrunched her lips. Her delicately proportioned chin was thrust at a disapproving angle. Her lashes were a golden red, reflecting the same tawny highlights that burnished her bound hair. She might have been eighteen, but her bearing was that of someone older, maybe twenty-four or twenty-six.

He scowled. She had no business being on her own, in the Idaho Territory or anywhere else. She was too attractive not to have a father, brother or husband watching over her. She was also too headstrong to be left to her own devices. Her present situation proved that. Good Lord, what if Windham had left a real hardened criminal locked up in the stockade? Victoria would have freed him and then been at the brute’s mercy.

His scowl deepened. For her own good, she needed to learn that a lone woman couldn’t go traipsing across the country as she pleased. Logan realized his sense of outraged possessiveness was illogical. Yet he couldn’t seem to help himself.

It had been this same sense of heretofore-unacknowledged protectiveness that resulted in his accepting Madison Earley as his ward. When a prospector showed up at the bank with the story that a white girl was living with the Shoshones, Logan had taken it upon himself to ride to Night Wolf’s camp and retrieve her. It had turned out that Madison’s mother had died a long time ago, and the child had been raised by her father, who’d been working a small gold claim.

Bushwhackers had murdered the man for his small cache of gold dust. Night Wolf’s tribe had sheltered Madison for a while, but dearly her place was with her own people. Logan could easily have sent her to an orphanage in the East, yet something within him had balked at casting her adrift in the world.

He shook his head. It was hard to believe he’d lived thirty years without knowing he had this lamentable streak of sentimentality coursing through his veins. It had been this same latent sense of caring, no doubt, that sent him to the fort to deliver Night Wolfs warning about the attack.

And now he was saddled with a woman who cherished her collection of rare books more than she valued her own life. She was wrong if she thought he’d yielded to her insistence to keep them. Tonight, when she was asleep, he meant to lighten the load the oxen were struggling with to get over the next small rise. By the time they reached Trinity Falls, she would be lucky to have one book left.

He leveled a hard glance at her. All right, maybe he would be selective. He’d let her keep Cooper’s ridiculously romantic yarn about the Mohicans. Louisa May Alcott was going to go, though. Little Women was a new novel and could be purchased at any bookshop.

His dark mood was appeased by the knowledge that the domineering woman would ultimately be put in her place. Logan visualized their arrival in town. He could see Victoria marching him off to the sheriff’s office, all self-righteous and determined to have him get his just punishments. It would be a pleasure to watch the entirely too smug woman discover that her prisoner was none other than the acting mayor and the president of Trinity Falls’s largest bank, along with a dozen other financial institutions.

He decided watching her eat crow would be the most satisfying thing he’d done in a long time. When the oxen seemed to hesitate cresting the next pine-covered slope, Logan reached for the whip to offer them a little encouragement.

His thoughts turned from Victoria to their immediate destination, a small tributary feeding into the Ruby River. They should reach it before dark. Once there, he might believe they had a chance of making it to town alive. They would be in Night Wolfs domain, and that much closer to keeping their scalps.

She’s not a complainer.

Logan’s mind again filled itself with thoughts about Victoria Amory. One way or another, he decided, he’d find out why she’d left Boston and what she planned to do in Trinity Falls.

Everything about her manner bespoke Eastern refinement.

There wasn’t a single reason for her to be running loose in the Idaho Territory. He knew one thing for sure; she wouldn’t be looking for work at Jubilee Joe’s or any of the other saloons dotting Main Street.

A grin caught him by surprise as he visualized the prim and proper Victoria Amory serving drinks at a local saloon. She’d probably present each glass of whiskey with a linen napkin and a severe warning about the moral dangers of intemperance.

The image of Victoria in a spangled red gown rose fully blown in Logan’s mind. The dress was low-cut, and short enough to show her knees. Her perky little breasts would be all but spilling out of the tight-fitting bodice and her ankles would be trim and well shaped. There would be a scattering of golden freckles across her creamy flesh, he was certain. Surely those impudent little spots wouldn’t stop at the high collar of her conservative green dress.

Logan swallowed, trying to curb his runaway imaginings. He couldn’t believe he was sitting next to this prissymannered female, seeing her in a flashy outfit that she’d probably rather be shot in than be seen wearing. It was the time he’d spent in the stockade, he assured himself, that was making his mind play tricks on him. That, and the fact that it had been a while since he’d been able to keep company with one of Trinity Falls’s cheerfully irreverent fancy women. Ever since Madison had become part of his life several months ago, he’d been reluctant to pursue his usual nighttime encounters with Cherry, Jasmine, or any of the other gals who didn’t demand a wedding ring in exchange for their favors.

That was definitely going to change when he returned to town. He would find a way to pick up the threads of his former life without tarnishing Madison’s world. Either that, or he was going to become a menace to decent women, because, like it or not, all he could do was think carnal thoughts about Victoria’s sensuously shaped mouth and her tidy little breasts and her gently flared hips and—

Lord, he was losing his mind. There was nothing the least bit appealing about the prudish woman. And he was going to keep repeating that small lie to himself all the way home.

Chapter Seven

Slashes of twilight stalked the day’s waning brightness. Restless shadows scuttled beyond the ever-shrinking horizon, disappearing into gaping holes of blackness. Unpredictable crosscurrents of chilling breezes cut through Victoria’s clothing. She shivered, glancing uneasily about.

When Logan finally brought their team to a halt, night’s rapid descent had transformed the mood of the dense pine woods to one of danger.

“Well, we’re here.”

“Wh-where’s here?” That the question came out in a dazed squeak didn’t surprise her.

It required a spurt of determination for her not to scoot across the seat and draw closer to Logan. She was startled by the need to seek comfort from a near stranger, especially this intimidating one. Her self-sufficiency was a trait she’d always taken pride in. Yet tonight, in this alien landscape, she battled the urge to reach out and touch Logan’s sleeve, to reassure herself that she wasn’t alone in this isolated stretch of timberland.

Valiantly she subdued the treacherous weakness. He might not be the despicable criminal she’d originally thought, but it wouldn’t be wise to become too familiar with him. It had been drilled into her since girlhood that distinct barriers must be maintained between herself and any member of the opposite sex.

The one occasion when she’d violated that stricture had been when she tried to aid Horace Threadgill in his battle against a homicidal bee. Look where that innocent act had landed her! In the middle of a wilderness, in the company of a man who’d entered her life under the most suspect circumstances!

Logan stepped down from the wagon. “This is where we will spend the night.”

She squinted into the thickening darkness. Just beyond the oxen’s shifting feet, she made out the outline of a narrow stream cutting across the nearly invisible trail they’d been following.

“I’ll unhitch the team so they can drink,” he went on to say. “We’ll be on the move again at first light.”

He was back to issuing orders. Victoria was too sore and tired, though, to make an issue of that fact. All she wanted was to stretch out on a blanket under the wagon.

She climbed down, painfully aware of the numbed but tender portion of her anatomy that had endured the jarring slap of the lurching wagon seat for their seemingly endless day of travel. Her thigh muscles trembled, and for a moment she wasn’t sure her legs would support her. It was because of the relentless pace he’d set and the rough terrain they’d covered that she was feeling so battered.

She stood beside a broad-spoked wheel, shivering as the rising mountain wind buffeted her. She knew she ought to do something useful, like find the extra pan biscuits she’d made the night before, at the fort. Her mind seemed incapable of provoking her body to movement, however.

“Victoria?”

She started. Had Logan already finished freeing the oxen so that they could drink? Surely she hadn’t been idle that long.

“What?”

She raised her head and tried to focus her blurred vision on the towering figure that had materialized before her.

“You look dead on your feet.”

She was too tired to take offense at his blunt remark. How could one argue with the truth?

“I’ll be all right. Just give me a minute.”

The mumbled request floated from her lips while she continued to stand in a stupor, knowing she should be doing something, but lacking the energy to decide what that something was.

A pair of strong hands settled on her weary shoulders. “I know I pushed us hard today, Victoria.”

She wanted to shrug off the unexpected gentleness of his tone, just as she wanted to shrug off the weight of his firm touch. She was incapable of doing either. The concern that laced his deep voice pierced a vulnerable spot within her. A sting of moisture filled her eyes. His hands massaged her sore shoulder muscles in slow, steady circles.

She tried to stand straight. She’d come this far alone. She was a resilient woman who didn’t need the respect of her parents, the loyalty of her sister or the association of friends. And she certainly didn’t need this man to offer comfort.

To Victoria’s horror, she felt the burning sensation of tears that would not be denied. The hot wetness welled up in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks in emotional rivers of release. Somehow her face became pressed against Logan’s shirt.

She hated breaking down. She wanted to be strong. Besides, he was her prisoner. If anyone should be weeping, it was him. The more she struggled to subdue her tears, however, the freer they fell. His palms stroked her back. She felt as if she’d found shelter from a fierce mountain storm within the arms of this menacing stranger.

Which wouldn’t do at all, the logical side of her mind pointed out. As the flow of tears ebbed, that inner voice grew louder. She sought to extricate herself from his surprisingly tender embrace. That was what her mind instructed her to do, anyway. Her body seemed to have ideas of its own, however, and she couldn’t quite seem to pull free.

He held her with more than the indisputable strength of his arms. He held her with the silent solace another human being could transmit to another. The powerful cadence of his heartbeat kept time with a mysterious rhythm that soothed her ragged sense of control. His earthy, manly scent permeated her senses.

The feeling that she was close to experiencing something rare, something meaningful, momentarily drifted through her numbed thoughts before dissipating into the night air.

With a final, and this time successful, lunge for selfmastery, Victoria eased herself from Logan’s hold. As before, when he’d assisted her from the wagon, she thought she detected the smallest hesitation on his part before he released her.

“I’m sorry. I can’t think what came over me.”

Glaringly aware that Logan’s shirtfront had been drenched by her tearful assault, she braced herself for the words that would reveal his male superiority at her deplorable weakness.

In a like circumstance, her father would have been coldly contemptuous of her feminine frailty. Though, when she was growing up, she’d never known for certain whether her father’s disdainful attitude toward any form of human weakness was because he was a judge and therefore immune to sentiment, or because it went against his nature to view with patience any female shortcoming.

“It’s my fault,” Logan shocked her by saying. “I drove us pretty hard. What you need is food and a good night’s sleep.”

“Those chokecherries didn’t go very far.” She took a surreptitious swipe at her eyes, striving to compose herself.

A huge yawn came from nowhere, overwhelming her. She pushed back the hair that had fallen into her eyes. Her fingers brushed her sunbonnet’s wide brim, and she reached up to jerk it off. “Did you think to bring the extra pan biscuits from last night?”

His arm came around her waist, and he guided her forward. “I not only brought the biscuits, but I made a quick search of the fort and found some jerked beef and tins of peaches. I didn’t want to take the time to dig them out earlier. Just because tonight’s a cold camp, that doesn’t mean we’re going to starve.”

Victoria yawned again, thinking that whatever Logan Youngblood’s moral flaws, he did boast some favorable qualities. Like kindness and an enterprising attitude.

He went to the unhitched wagon and entered it. It wasn’t long before he emerged with several blankets. He spread them beneath the high-wheeled conveyance, then raised his head from his crouched position. “Come here.”

She staggered forward, feeling as if she’d exhausted the last particle of her energy. As she knelt to slip beneath the wagon, every muscle she possessed cried out in distress. Again Logan’s hands came to the rescue. He absorbed most of her weary weight and drew her the rest of the way onto the blankets.

It felt so wonderful to stretch out. She closed her eyes, even as she felt Logan lay another blanket over her.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” came his low, disembodied voice. “I’m going to unhook your walking shoes. I noticed you slept in them last night. If we don’t get them off for a few hours, your feet are going to swell.”

“That’s nice…”

She thought she heard him chuckle. “You’re really tuckered out, aren’t you, little deputy?”

“Little deputy?”

“Since I don’t think you’re planning on earning a reward by turning me in to the sheriff when we get to Trinity Falls, I won’t insult you by calling you a bounty hunter.”

His words made little sense. But his tone was unusually warm, she thought. Even though she couldn’t see his battered features with her eyes shut, she suspected he might be smiling.

The blanket shifted, and a cool breeze rustled over her as he fumbled with the fastenings on her shoes. The sensation of being taken care of brought a tightness to her chest. A few unshed tears, the last of the torrent she’d released in his arms, trickled down her cheeks. His touch reminded her of her mother’s ministrations when Victoria was a child.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.