Frontier Woman (16 page)

So, instead of approaching the camp directly, she dropped to her hands and knees to slither through the brush and grass toward the beacon of light. She was still too far away to clearly see the faces of the men by the fire when she heard the murmur of voices. She inched closer and listened.

“You’re the only Ranger I’ve got available. Can you do it, Luke?”

Cricket tensed. She’d recognize that voice anywhere. She started to stand up but ducked back down when she heard the response of the man Creed had addressed as Luke.

“I don’t see why not. Do you think Sloan suspects we’re watching her?”

Sloan was being watched by the Rangers? What for?

“No, I don’t think she knows we’re on to her. On the other hand, she disappeared for a while during the Guerreros’
fandango
and was damned careful nobody followed her,” Creed said.

Sloan had said she was going to meet Tonio. . . .

“How deeply is she involved with Antonio Guerrero?” a third voice asked.

“If you’re asking if she’s a part of his efforts to help the Mexican government work out plans to invade Texas again,” Creed said, “I’m not convinced she’s involved at all. But they are lovers.”

They knew Sloan and Antonio were lovers?

Cricket couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Sloan, a traitor? Sloan, involved in a Mexican plot to invade Texas? Impossible! Yet hadn’t Sloan wanted to talk with her only this morning about something very important? And Sloan had met secretly with Tonio at the Guerreros’
fandango
. Cricket wished she’d taken a minute before she left Three Oaks to hear what Sloan had to say. Well, there was no help for that now. She’d have to listen closely without letting on she was here. When she’d found out all she could about the Rangers’ plans, she’d confront Sloan and get this mess straightened out.

Ever so quietly she moved close enough to make out the faces of the three men by the fire. She pursed her lips in disgust when she saw Rogue lying on the ground beside Creed, who scratched the wolf’s chin unconcernedly, and Valor picketed with the other horses. Her eyes widened in consternation when she recognized one of the other two men as the half-breed Comanche, Long Quiet. She’d heard three distinct voices, but one of them hadn’t been the broken English the half-breed had used at the corral.

“How soon do you want me to take over for you at Three Oaks?” the man called Luke asked.

“Right away. I’m supposed to be in Galveston in a few weeks. The navy’s sloop-of-war
Austin
should be rigged out and ready by then to take me on to New Orleans. I’d as soon leave now as later,” Creed said.

Creed was leaving Three Oaks. Why did she find that
such a desolate thought?

“This is awful sudden, isn’t it?” Luke asked.

“President Lamar wants to get his version of the Council House massacre to the highest-ranking American diplomat he can as soon as he can.”

“And who’s that?”

“There’s no ambassador to Texas, since the United States hasn’t officially recognized our government. The best they’d give us was a chargé d’affaires, a sort of one-man diplomatic liaison. The man Andrew Jackson appointed as chargé, Beaufort LeFevre, lives in New Orleans, which is where I’m headed.”

Luke shook his head. “So why the big hurry?”

“President Lamar’s afraid the chargé will read about the Council House massacre in the papers and use it as an excuse to curtail discussions on trade agreements between the United States and Texas. We need those trade concessions, especially for cotton exports.”

“How’d you get picked for this job, anyway?” Luke asked.

“I know the chargé.”

“Really? How’d you meet him?”

Creed grinned. “Through his daughter.”

The other two men laughed.

“I’d forgotten about Angelique,” Long Quiet said. “I’m sure you’ll enjoy seeing her again. But what can you say to Beaufort LeFevre to make the Council House massacre sound like less than the travesty it was?”

The half-breed Comanche was speaking perfect English!

“Not a thing,” Creed admitted cynically. “I’m just supposed to talk him into coming here to see the situation in Texas for himself. That’s why Lamar wants this business with Guerrero tied up in a hurry. He doesn’t want a Mexican invasion materializing in the middle of the American chargé’s visit.”

“I’ll do my part at Three Oaks,” Luke said. “Do you suppose Cricket’s done gallivanting around by now? I’d hate to get there and have Rip Stewart ask me where his daughter is.”

Creed snorted. “Don’t get me started, Luke. I’d like to wring that she-wolf’s neck. She flew out of that bandit camp on her horse and lit a shuck for Three Oaks, leaving me in her dust. By the time I made sure those two Mexicans following her weren’t going to be any threat, all I could find of her was her horse. She’s probably been home in bed—or wherever it is she’s sleeping these days—for hours.”

Cricket ground her teeth. So Jarrett Creed would like to wring her neck, would he. The feeling was definitely mutual.

“Be grateful, my friend, that your coltish filly isn’t around to tempt you into bed with her again,” Long Quiet said with a chuckle. “You were lucky to escape with your honor the last time.”

Cricket gasped. Creed couldn’t have told Long Quiet about that! She quickly covered her mouth with her hand to prevent the escape of any further sound, but it was too late to avoid discovery. The three men at the fire fanned out instantly, and in moments she found herself imprisoned in Jarrett Creed’s iron grasp.

“What are you doing here?”

There was no mistaking the fury in his voice, but Cricket snarled back, “I could ask the same thing. Who are you to accuse Sloan of plotting with the Mexicans? What does Antonio Guerrero have to do with all this? And how come that half-breed can suddenly speak perfect English?”

Creed swore under his breath.

“Now the fat’s in the fire. What are we going to do with her?” Luke asked.

“Send her home to Rip. Let him handle her,” Creed snapped.

“We can’t send her home,” Long Quiet said. “She knows too much.”

Creed dropped his chin to his chest, as though to ease the tension in the back of his neck, and sighed as he raised his head again. “I know that,” he said wearily. “She’d warn her sister in a—”

“You bet I’ll warn Sloan. Try and stop me,” Cricket cried. “Wait till Rip hears what you—”

Cricket’s tirade was shut off when Creed clamped his hand over her mouth and tucked her bodily under his arm so she couldn’t move. “Shut up, Brava, and let us think.”

Cricket struggled futilely against Creed’s strength, all the while glaring at Rogue, who sat complacently at Creed’s feet, while the Ranger held her helpless in his arms. How different from their very first confrontation. Well, she wasn’t done fighting by a long shot.

She jerked in Creed’s arms as he suggested to Long Quiet, “Why don’t you keep her with you.”

“You know I’m headed back into
Comanchería
.”

Long Quiet stared at Creed until he admitted, “All right, that was a stupid idea. But what are we going to do with her?”

“Why not take her to San Antonio?” Luke suggested.

“That’s fine for a while,” Creed replied. “What do I do with her when I have to meet Commodore Moore in Galveston?”

“You could take her with you,” Luke said.

Creed snickered. “I don’t think Cricket’s going anywhere with me peaceably. How am I supposed to explain the struggling woman under my arm to the commodore?”

The suggestions Cricket was hearing were alarming, to say the least. Surely Creed couldn’t seriously be contemplating kidnapping her. She kicked and jerked vigorously in his arms, doing her best to make sure the three men understood that Creed was right—she had no intention of cooperating with them.

“How about if I grab her by the hair and haul her after me like some fur trapper with his squaw,” Creed demanded, suiting deed to word and wrapping Cricket’s braid in his fist. “That would surely pacify the commodore and go a long way toward proving to the American chargé we’re not savages in Texas. And what do you propose I do with this—this brat in buckskins—while I’m trying to conduct my business? She’s going to stick out like a cactus in a patch of bluebonnets.”

At that, Cricket lay still in Creed’s arms, panting. She told herself she was waiting for her second wind. Creed’s words hadn’t meant a thing to her. He wasn’t saying anything she didn’t already know. She’d always been a little different. And she wasn’t ever going to change.

Her scalp hurt where Creed had yanked her hair. She told herself it was that pain that choked her throat and caused the burning threat of tears at the corners of her eyes. It had nothing to do with caring about what some wag-wit Texas Ranger thought of her. After all, she had Rip’s approval and . . . and . . .
oh, God! What good was Rip’s approval going to do her if he married her off to Cruz Guerrero?

Cricket listened, but the three men only had half her attention. She knew they’d eventually decide they had no choice except to let her go. Right now she had to start figuring out some way to convince Rip when she got home that he’d made a big mistake even thinking about wedding her to the Spanish
hacendado.

“You could take Cricket along as your sister,” Luke suggested.

Creed smiled wryly. “And keep her in the same room with me?”

“You could keep her in the same room if she were your wife,” Long Quiet said.

“My wife?”

Creed’s exclamation startled Cricket so much she shouted the same thing into his hand, but it came out “Myffe!” The three men suddenly had her full attention again.

“Why not?”

“It’s ridiculous, that’s why,” Creed said.

Cricket agreed with him wholeheartedly. She bobbed her head up and down behind his hand.

“No, it’s not,” Long Quiet said. “It solves another problem, as well, which is how to keep Rip from hunting for Cricket when she suddenly disappears.”

“It’d work,” Luke said. “You could write a letter to Rip saying you’d eloped with Cricket, and—”

“And by the time you get back from New Orleans with the American chargé we’ll have this whole business with Sloan Stewart settled one way or the other,” Long Quiet finished.

“It won’t work.”

“Then make another suggestion,” Long Quiet said.

Cricket wrenched her head up so she could see Creed’s face. He didn’t look happy. Good. Because she wasn’t the least bit thrilled by this latest suggestion, either.

“You could spend some time with your brother and his wife before you leave for Galveston, maybe smooth some of the rough edges off the girl,” Long Quiet added, to sweeten the sour pill he and Luke had offered Creed.

Creed frowned. A sham marriage was a terrible solution to the problem of what to do with Cricket, but he couldn’t think of anything better. On the other hand, it would be a marvelous opportunity to show her a life beyond the unnatural role Rip had preordained for her. They’d never actually consummate the marriage, so they could each go their separate ways with no harm done once the need to keep Cricket away from Three Oaks ended.

He assiduously avoided thinking about all those nights Cricket would be in his bed—but not really his wife. However, with Cricket’s attitude toward intimacy, he was certain she’d make sure nothing happened between them, even if his willpower wavered.

“I’ll do it,” Creed said at last.

Creed released his hold on Cricket’s mouth so she could speak, but held on to her arms, lest she flee.

“Well I won’t,” she snapped. “The sun will freeze cotton before I’ll marry you. I’m never going to be a wife to any man!”

Creed smiled sardonically. His theory on the chastity of their marriage bed was proving correct.

“As far as the law’s concerned in Texas, Brava, once we announce our marriage and start living together as man and wife, the deed’s done.”

“I’ll never let you—”

“You already have,” Creed interrupted Cricket. “Last night.” He wasn’t about to let her use the consummation of the marriage as an excuse to foil the only plan they had to deal with her.

Cricket blanched.

“I’d certainly be willing to make sure we don’t repeat the mistake,” Creed added. “Not only that, but when we get back from New Orleans, I’d be willing to divorce you.”

Cricket winced. So, she’d enjoyed herself
immensely
but “it” hadn’t been so good for Jarrett Creed. That troubled her, but she didn’t know why.

“Perhaps you need a little more incentive,” Creed said. “Unless you go with me to New Orleans, we’ll arrest Sloan now. We know enough to connect her with Antonio Guerrero, who’s the leader of a small band of Mexican revolutionaries. Even Rip Stewart won’t be able to keep a threat to the Republic—like your sister—out of jail.

“On the other hand, if you cooperate, we’ll do everything we can to exonerate Sloan if she’s not a traitor, and you’ll get a short holiday in New Orleans.”

Cricket remained stubbornly silent, thinking. She sought for a way she could help Sloan without succumbing to Creed’s ultimatum, but nothing came to mind. Furthermore, so long as she stayed with Creed, her father couldn’t marry her off to Cruz Guerrero. She was pretty sure even Rip wouldn’t be able to pawn off his
divorced
daughter on the Spanish
hacendado
. Maybe Creed was about to do her a big favor after all.

“What do you say, Brava? Will you come along with me and behave yourself?”

“I don’t seem to have much choice,” she snapped. “Do I?”

Creed dismissed the nagging feeling that besieged him when Cricket acceded without more of a fight. But he couldn’t afford to look a gift horse in the mouth. “Good, then it’s settled. We’ll start for my brother’s plantation, Lion’s Dare, tonight.”

Creed released Cricket as he turned to Luke. “I’d like you to come with us. I’ll give you a letter when we reach Lion’s Dare that you can take to Rip.”

As soon as Creed turned away, Cricket realized there was still a chance she could escape before this bizarre plan was set into action. “Rogue!” she commanded. “Watch!”