Why was she even arguing with him?Why didn’t she take his offer and escape?
“I don’t think so,” she said finally, “but why did you change your mind?”
“Why would I trust you for five minutes?”He shrugged.“It’s not very long, and I suspect you might be hungry,” he said.“Call it a little test.If you pass, I might give you more freedom.”He was holding out two prizes: food and a better chance later to escape.
Five minutes.Long enough to get a head start.Long enough to get lost.Long enough perhaps to get away from this disturbing man who sent so many conflicting emotions slithering through her, who even now made her breathless, who made her want to reach out and touch.She ached to do that, to see what she would find under that harsh exterior.
She stepped back in reaction to that last ungodly urge.
He tipped his head slightly, those sea-colored eyes regarding her steadily, as if trying to steal her thoughts.She’d thought his eyes empty when she first saw him, but now she knew that wasn’t true.They weren’t empty at all but ruthlessly controlled.
“Well?”
She nodded reluctantly, hating her own surrender, but necessity was now upon her.
“Your word?Say it.”He was insistent, demanding even more surrender.She knew then how well he was controlling her.If she did try to escape, he would never accept her word again; if she didn’t, he would take it as total compliance.
“Go to hell,” she said suddenly, surprising even herself.She hadn’t thought she would ever say that to anyone.But she was furious.Furious because a part of her had started to expect more of him.Furious because of the way he made her feel, and the way her body betrayed her.Furious because he used and twisted every private feeling to his own advantage.
“Such language,” he drawled.“I thought young ladies from Boston were raised to be more demure.”
“They never met you,” she retorted bitterly.
His lips crooked in a half-smile, then he shrugged.“Five minutes,” he said in a bored voice.“No promises required.But be assured, if you try anything, you will spend every successive moment in the cabin.If you live that long.”
Just then a mouse popped its head out of Rafferty Tyler’s pocket, looked around curiously, and then ran up to perch on his shoulder.
It washermouse.
Shea recognized it by size, by its inquisitive and unafraid nature.She watched in astonishment as her captor, her heartless, ruthless captor, very gently took it in his right hand and stroked its back with the bare fingers of his left hand.
Tyler looked up at her.“Abner,” he explained.
She stepped closer to him, watching as the mouse snuggled into his glove.She swallowed.“We’ve met.”
It was his turn to look surprised.“He doesn’t mean to frighten anyone.”
“He didn’t frighten me.”
“Does anything really frighten you, Miss Randall?”
“You do.”
“Do I?”
Before she could answer, he spoke again.“Ishouldfrighten you, Miss Randall.Don’t let Abner mislead you.I found him in prison.In prison you take anything you can find.Even a mouse.”
That didn’t explain the gentleness of his hands, the tameness of the mouse.That took a great deal of patience, a special ability.Animals, she’d always observed, were rather selective in whom they liked.They simply didn’t take to just anyone, particularly timid creatures like mice.
But Rafferty Tyler?And a mouse?
“I give animals more leeway than … troublesome women.”
Shea couldn’t stop herself from challenging him.“Me in particular, or all women?”
“Women are all the same, Miss Randall.”
“In what way?”
