But the loathsome Garret went on, laughing at her. "Ah, well, I must admit you've got a look to you—all ripe and sweet, begging to be tasted."
Ash blanched with fury, remembering how Jones had clung to her hand, begging her, from the edge of death, to find the boy he loved so much. She'd even been weeping for Garret MacQuade, grieving for him.
Now she wanted to kill him.
She settled for the next best alternative. With strength born of anger she slammed open palms into Garret MacQuade's broad chest. For a heartbeat he teetered upon the edge of the horse trough, fighting to regain his balance, but it was too late.
He let out a stunned shout as he tumbled backward, crashing into the water with a horrendous splash. Pleasure, sharp and sweet, filled Ashleen at the sight of him as his head broke the surface. He came up cursing, clawing the wet, dark hair from his face. Ash thought she had never seen anything so infinitely satisfying.
"You little wildcat!" MacQuade roared. "No wonder you've got a damned black eye—whoever gave it to you must've been acting in self-defense!"
Ash's fists knotted at her sides, and she felt betrayal slice through her—betrayal of Kennisaw Jones's love, betrayal of her own soft heart. She wanted to hurt Garret MacQuade—hurt him as deeply as the wounds that he had dealt.
"I got this black eye from a man named Garvey," she hissed between gritted teeth, "a few hours before he killed Kennisaw Jones."
Her voice caught on a ragged sob. Hating herself for showing even that weakness, she spun on her heel and ran into the night.
Garret sat in the trough, feeling as if someone had driven an axe into his chest. He couldn't breathe, couldn't move.
Kennisaw... dead...
The words roiled through his head until he wanted to retch.
No. Kennisaw Jones had survived more perils than any man living—he was like the huge oak that had been on Garret's father's land, the towering tree that had been twice struck by lightning yet, despite its broken branches, refused to die.
"Liar," Garret choked out, feeling like the boy he had been, battling to deny a reality too horrible to contemplate.
That was it. The woman was lying.
She had to be.
Damn it, he'd shake the truth out of her once and for all. But even now the slender figure in the tight blue dress was vanishing in the shadows, only her pale hair visible in the faint moonlight.
With an oath Garret sloshed to his feet. Clambering out to the street, he snatched up his gun from where it had fallen in the dirt an arm's length from the trough's edge and ran after her. His jaw clenched until it ached, his throat seemingly crushed in some brutal noose of fear and anger.
Even so, she had reached the outskirts of town before he closed in on her, her slight frame silhouetted against the backdrop of a dilapidated wagon, limned in the light of a waning cook fire.
"Stop, damn you!" Garret bellowed.
But she ignored him until he grabbed her arm in a bruising grip and spun her to face him.
"You lying witch!" Garret saw her face pale, eyes widen in fear. He wanted her to be afraid. He wanted her damn well quivering in her boots.
"What the hell do you mean, Kennisaw's dead? The whole Comanche nation couldn't kill that stubborn jackass! And God knows they've tried. If this is a joke you and he brewed up between you, I'll break your blasted necks!"
"Sister Ashleen? Sister Ash?"
A child's voice, thin, frightened, pierced through Garret, and he glanced at the wagon to see a spindly, red-haired boy charging toward them, a knife clutched in one skinny hand.
"You take your hands off her!" Garret heard stark terror in the boy's voice and saw fierce protectiveness in his eyes.
If there was a hell, Garret thought numbly, then he was in it—hurtled back twenty-odd years into a nightmare.
It was like looking into his own face the night death had rained down on Stormy Ridge. Seeing his own terror mercilessly exposed.
A terror as sharp as the one cutting through him now.
He released the woman. Holding his hands palms up, his voice low, soothing, Garret spoke to the distraught boy. "Easy, son. Easy, now. I won't hurt her."
