But it was the woman whose image was clearest in Garret's mind, dressed in a gown of soft gray-blue that made him think of dawn high in the mountains. Her hair had been pinned in a loose knot atop her crown, short, curling wisps escaping the pins to curl in a nimbus of sunshine gold about a face lovely even in its sadness. In her hand had been a bunch of prairie flowers, their riotous colors spilling over her fingers like jeweled velvet.
He had wanted her to feel as if she were intruding, pushing her pious little nose into his private grief. But she had stood a little away from the gravesite, hovering, uncertain, until, with an inward curse, he'd motioned her to come forward.
With a grateful smile that could have melted the heart of Beelzebub she had knelt down beside the grave, laying the blossoms upon the brown dirt.
"It's so peaceful here," she had said, gazing over the tree-spangled hillock. "I wish..." Her voice had faded, soft. "If we were going to stay here, I'd visit often. Bring flowers and—" She stopped and looked up at him with a shy smile that laid Garret out as thoroughly as the Kiowa lance he'd taken in the shoulder fifteen years ago. "You probably think I'm foolish," she had said, her cheeks turning a hue more engaging than the wild rose in her bouquet.
Garret couldn't remember what he'd said in answer, only that it had been gruff and grating. More so than usual, because the picture of her trailing up the hill to Kennisaw's grave in the springtime, or in the first glittering frost, pleased him in a way that at once stunned him and terrified him.
After a moment he had turned on her, snapping out that if she had any brains she would stay in West Port Landing—or better yet take herself back east, where a lone woman with a batch of children belonged.
Hard—yes, he'd been hard on her—but the thought of any woman alone on the trail, alone in the vast emptiness of Texas made Garret's gut churn. And the thought of this woman in that situation was a thousand times worse—this fairy-waif, her vulnerable angel eyes. Her dreams would be ground to dust a hundred miles out of Missouri when a reality crueler than any she could imagine crashed down upon her.
At least he would not be there to see it.
He dragged the makings from his pocket and rolled himself a smoke with unsteady hands. No, some other idiot could stand by and watch the sun sear her delicate skin, watch her grow exhausted, disillusioned, sick with unrelenting heat and despair.
He lit the cigarette and drew in a soothing lungful of smoke. To hell with it. To hell with her. She wasn't his blasted responsibility, no matter what that crazy old coot had promised her.
Kennisaw said you would take us to Stormy Ridge, her voice echoed in his memory.
Well, Kennisaw Jones had said a hell of a lot of things in his time—a good portion of them half-truths, the rest downright lies. Garret was in no way obligated to follow through on one of the old man's harebrained schemes, especially when it included dragging a tenderfoot woman and four smart-mouthed kids halfway across the country to a place Garret had vowed he'd never return to.
What the devil could have possessed the man to promise something like that, when Kennisaw knew—knew, damn it—that Garret would never willingly go back to the site of the home he'd loved, the site of his family's deaths?
The truth struck Garret in that instant, and he would have sold his soul to have Kennisaw alive just long enough so Garret could flatten him.
"That bastard! That scheming old bastard!"
One of the dance-hall girls that had been crawling all over Garret the night before skittered back a step as she passed, eyeing him with a wariness usually reserved for customers not averse to taking hostilities out on softer, feminine bodies.
She hesitated, as if trying to get up the courage to solicit his attentions. Cursing, Garret gestured her to leave him. Alone.
The way he damn well liked it.
No, he was not responsible for Sister Mary Ashleen. Or for those children of hers. Hell, he'd never even seen her before he had kissed her in the Double Eagle.
Garret had the grace to shift, uneasy, upon the hard seat of his chair, remembering the nun's quiet explanation of how she had ended up with the dying Kennisaw. She had not known the old man, either, before she had put both herself and the children at risk helping him.
From what she had said, the woman had already had one confrontation with Eli and Cain Garvey on Kennisaw's behalf. Garret's skin crawled at the thought. Had she any idea how stupid she had been? Though twenty years had passed, Garret could still see the Garveys' faces as clearly as if the horror at Stormy Ridge had happened yesterday. And in all the countless miles he'd traveled, in all his battles with hostile Indians, savage outlaws, and merciless elements, he had never seen evil to match what had been in Cain Garvey's soulless eyes.
Had Sister Mary Ashleen known that she had been courting a hell worse than anything her fire-and-brimstone priests could have imagined? Even now, did she realize that Cain and Eli Garvey were not likely to forgive and forget her interference in their plans?
Had the woman known that when she had stepped in to aid a man she'd never seen before? Had she realized that when she had dragged Kennisaw into her wagon and made a desperate flight to West Port Landing?
She must have. Even newborn lambs instinctively knew the snarl of a wolf. But then Sister Mary Ashleen was, no doubt, a saint. Steeped in tales of martyrdom from the cradle. She'd deem it a privilege to sacrifice herself—she'd sacrificed her womanhood already, hadn't she? Embraced the cold marble of an altar instead of the body of a man when she'd taken whatever vows nuns had to take.
If there was sin, Garret thought wryly, Sister Mary Ashleen was guilty of a heinous one. She had felt so pliant, so giving, so right in his arms. It had to be a sin not to let a man taste such warmth, such perfection. A sin to tempt with lips so full and sweet. Her eyes had been smoky dark with confusion and a kind of wonder for those brief, dizzying moments....
Before she bit you.
A wry grin tugged at one corner of Garret's mouth, his fingers rising to touch his still-tender lip. What the devil would Kennisaw have said if he'd seen that? The old man would've laughed till he couldn't breathe.
For as long as Garret could remember, women had flocked around him, hungry, fascinated, in the same way a skittering mouse was fascinated with a soaring hawk—waiting for the bird to swoop down on it, afraid, yet tempted by even the briefest glimpse of flying.
Never before had his attentions been met with outrage. But then, he usually had more sense than to kiss a decent woman as if she were a dance-hall girl—usually had more finesse than to maul her as if he were starving for the taste of her.
The thought gave Garret pause, and he swallowed hard at the threading of unease that niggled at him.
