Pea jerked away from the flip of the reins. The food tottered in her hand. Dinner almost fell in the dirt. “Be careful!”
“I’m always careful.”
She took a piece of jerky before wrapping up the rest of the food. “This I do not believe.”
“Why not?”
She cocked her head to the side. How much to tell? “I think you do not care much if you live or die, so you do crazy things.”
He blinked and his smile slipped. “That’s what you think?”
“Sí.”
“You think too much.”
It was either think too much or moan over the condition of her thighs. “For this you should be grateful.”
“What makes you say that?”
“If I did not think, I would have nothing to take my mind off the town we are passing. Thinking of the town would make me think of hotels and soft mattresses. Thinking of the mattress left behind would make me realize how unhappy I am. Being unhappy makes me sad. Being sad…”
He held up his hand. “Go ahead. Think.”
“Thank you.” She smiled and took a bite of the jerky. There was kindness in him.
He waited for her to start chewing before he asked, “Are you settled? Can we head on now?”
Good manners dictated she not talk until she was finished eating. If she followed good manners, they would still be standing here tomorrow night. The jerky was very tough. The only option was a nod.
“Let’s move, then.”
She couldn’t stop her groan as the horse took the first step. Sam glanced over his shoulder. “When you were evading the Tejala gang the last six months, you didn’t spend a lot of time on horseback, did you?”
“No.” She took another bite of the jerky. It was salty, and flavored with a spice she didn’t recognize, but to an empty stomach it was very good.
“Where did you hide?”
“In a cave.”
“What drove you out of hiding?”
“Men found the cave.” Vile men with rape on their minds.
“Tejala’s.”
“No. Others.”
“That must have been a bitch.”
“It was not my best day.”
With a cluck of his tongue, Sam urged Sweet Pea to pick up the pace. The horse immediately complied. Isabella had noticed that always happened. Animals liked Sam. Truth was, so did she. Sometimes for reasons she could define and others for reasons she did not understand but which were more compelling than the ones she did. She took another bite of jerky. He was a very interesting man.
“Where do we go?”
He pointed toward the setting sun.
“Another town?”
“No.”
She chewed some more and tried again. “A place that at least has a tub?”
She held the jerky in her mouth while she waited for the answer.
“No, but there’s a pond.”
She swallowed the jerky. “That will do.”
Another tug on the reins had Sweet Pea catching up. “You’re looking forward to a bath?”
“Are you not?”
The side of his mouth she could see tipped up in a familiar smile. “Are you hinting I’m getting a bit ripe?”
“I would not suggest such a thing to a man.”
“You just plan on suffering in silence?”
She opened the napkin and broke off a piece of biscuit. “I am rarely silent, especially when I suffer.”
If she thought his smile was handsome before, it was nothing compared to how handsome it was when emotion filled it.
It took her a moment to remember to breathe.
He tugged his hat down, covering his eyes, leaving only his mouth to focus on. It was a very expressive mouth, given to nuance rather than exaggeration. And right now he was amused. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
With a cluck of his tongue he went ahead, leaving her with a strange tingle in her stomach and a heat that infused her skin with a radiant sensitivity. What was it about this man? Why did he have such an effect on her? There were many handsome men on the Montoya ranch. Many men who walked with grace, fought with power, faced death with courage. Men who had a dangerous edge, but none of them had what Sam had. None of them had his bold masculine appeal that sank beneath her skin like liquid lightning. He could have any woman he wanted, be anywhere he wanted to be. But he was here. With her. That had to mean something. And if it didn’t, there had to be a way for her to make it into something. Something good.
The first time she’d seen him coming up the rise, she’d been praying, asking God to send her a solution to her problem. Folding the rest of the biscuit into the napkin to keep it from crumbling, she wondered—did that make Sam the answer to her prayer?
She bit off more jerky, chewing contemplatively. It was a strange idea, but it had also been a strange prayer. Besides, what was the point of praying if one was not going to believe that occasionally a prayer would be answered?
Even if the timing of Sam’s arrival was coincidence and not divine intervention—she was aware she might be convincing herself because she wanted it to be so—Sam was still a solution to her problem that she could easily live with. She did not kid herself that Sam was a forever man, but he was a man who could probably provide the happiness it was rumored a woman could experience in bed. He would not worry about her modesty, about offending her. About right or wrong. He would merely take what he wanted, give her what she needed. No more, no less. Exactly what she had prayed for. This could work.
Tejala wanted her as a virgin sacrifice to his power. Proof to the people of his town that he was invincible. That they owed him for their existence, and his benevolence could be counted on only as long as they submitted to his will. That’s why he hadn’t taken her by force. He’d left her lying in the dirt, vowing that before he would marry her she would crawl to him begging for the honor to be his wife—the honor she’d rejected. First he would take her pride, then he would take her home and lastly he would take her life. If she let him.
She did not feel like letting him.
Studying Sam, taking in his naturally aggressive posture, his broad shoulders that narrowed to his lean hips, the revolver that rode his hip, she saw a man designed to give Tejala headaches. Tejala would never accept being second to this man, just as she would never accept Tejala as her first man. She might not be
