“But we ain’t playing finder’s keepers.” His grin reminded Patience he had a score to settle with her. “No, sir,” he mused. “Not today, and not for a while.”
There were protests, the most vocal from Snake. A look from Blue Doggie cut them short. He had just enough beer in him to be crazy. No one in his right mind challenged the giant when he was sober, and certainly not when he was drunk and hurting.
One by one the protesters drifted away. Some to their bikes, some to Beauty to plunder and steal. Patience stood passively in Blue Doggie’s grasp, wondering what to do next. When he rocked back on his heels enough to stagger, and listed to the side as he righted himself, she realized just how drunk he’d become.
She knew then she would try to escape. Her chances of making it were slim, but she’d rather face an inevitable fate knowing she’d tried, rather than regretting that she hadn’t. And if she made it? Being lost in the desert was better than being found by these creatures. Snakes that crawled were preferable to those who walked and called themselves wolves.
Her chance came sooner than she expected. In the flush of victory Blue Doggie’s confidence bloomed, making him careless. His hand rested at the nape of her neck, his fingers curled only loosely around the slim column. As he herded her into the darkness he stumbled again, losing his tenuous hold as he fell to one knee.
A second taste of freedom spurred Patience into action. Before he could climb to his feet, she planted her feet, locked her hands in a club of flesh and bone, and swung with all her might. The double-fisted blow that shattered her watch caught the kneeling Blue Doggie under the chin, the fragile bones of his throat absorbing the brunt. With a quiet wheeze he went down face-first like a felled ox.
Patience waited only long enough to strip the chain from his wrist and cast a quick glance to be sure no one had seen. No one had. They were too interested in plundering the Corvette. She turned to run, and had taken three steps when a hand captured her arm in an iron grip.
“Leaving us so soon, Red? When the party in your honor has just begun?” a familiar, melodious voice inquired.
The seventh rider. The one she’d forgotten.
She opened her mouth to scream, then clamped it shut. Scream? For whom? Who was there to help her? Silently, counting surprise as her best weapon, she launched herself at him. Battering with her free hand, scratching, biting, she fought wildly and desperately to escape the imprisoning hold.
“Stop. You’re only going to hurt yourself.” The command was a quiet entreaty. When she didn’t obey, she found herself enveloped in a close embrace. Her captor held her surely but gently against his bare chest. His arms were taut, his body hard and lean. He smelled pleasantly of wood smoke and evergreen. For a moment Patience was lulled by a strange sense of security.
“I have you now,” he murmured against her hair as she quieted. “I mean you no harm.”
“Liar!” she snarled, rejecting the kindness she heard. She could trust no one, would trust no one. In a resurgence of angry desperation she clawed at his chest and kicked his shins, taking bitter satisfaction in his nearly silent grunt of pain.
“Dammit, wildcat.” He caught her in a rib-crushing hold. To take a deep breath would crack bones. “Do you want me to give you back to the others?”
Patience couldn’t move, couldn’t breath, still she wouldn’t surrender. Lifting her head, she glared up at her captor. In moonlight he was the most handsome man she’d ever seen. But even evil could be pretty. “Let me go,” she demanded. “You’re hurting me.”
“Only because you make me hurt you.” He bent nearer, eyes that could only be black bored into hers. “Listen to me, believe me. I mean you no harm.” He searched her face. “Will you believe me?”
She was off-balance, unsure. “I don’t know.”
“If I let you go, will you not fight me?”
Patience didn’t answer. She looked at Blue Doggie lying in the dirt, at the others squabbling over her possessions. What choice did she have but to give a conditional agreement. “Let me go, I won’t fight you.”
He didn’t release her. “Tell me your name.”
“My name?” She looked once more into the handsome face. “What does it matter?”
“Tell me your name,” he insisted softly.
“Patience,” she snapped. “Patience O’Hara.”
“Give me your word you won’t fight me, Patience O’Hara.”
“What is this? Honor among scum?”
“Honor, yes, between you and me.” His gaze was a black laser, leaving no hint of expression undiscovered. “Your word, Patience?”
Her ribs hurt, she couldn’t catch a deep breath. In another minute she would be swooning in his arms. Even a stubborn O’Hara knew when she’d lost. Patience shrugged and agreed. “You have my word.”
Once again the dark eyes searched her face, seeking the lie. “Good,” he said, and released her. “I think you’re a woman who keeps her word.”
She stumbled away from him, folding her arms around her ribs as she sucked in hungry breaths. He made a concerned move toward her. When she jerked away he stepped back, murmuring, “I’m sorry I hurt you.”
“Think nothing of it,” she flared. “I knew there were snakes in the desert, until now I didn’t realize one was an anaconda.”
He didn’t smile. She hadn’t meant it as a joke. For a long moment he stared at her, his arms hanging at his sides. A trick of the moon painted his face in sadness. “I won’t hurt you again.”
Patience straightened, her breathing an even rhythm. Her head was back, her chin tilted at an angle. “Do you have a name?”
“I am called Indian.”
“What kind of name is that?”
“Mine.”
“Indian and what else?”
“Just Indian, no more.”
It wasn’t his real name, she realized, nor his only name. But, perhaps, it was enough. Certainly it was fitting, even too fitting among this cabal who found anonymity in flamboyant and garish aliases. Custer was no soldier, and Snake no reptile that crawled. Blue Doggie was an animal, but not blue until she’d battered his larynx. This man, who walked the desert as if it were his home, looked the part of his name. With silvery black hair clubbed at his nape and his chiseled features, he could have stepped out of the pages of history.
“All right,” she said when her study of him was done. “If that’s all there is, it will have to do.” Her eyes narrowed, her gaze locked with his. “Give me your word, Just Indian.”
He smiled then, a smile that did wonderful things to his striking features even in the garish shadows of the moon. Another time, another place, another person, Patience would have been astounded, but not now. Not here. “Give me your word.”
His smile vanished. “I think you will prove a formidable adversary.”
