Authors: Alicia Scott
"How long was I unconscious?"
"A few minutes."
"Is the cop coming?"
"I imagine we'll have all sorts of company
shortly."
"Oh." She looked up at him miserably.
"I'm sorry," she said automatically.
His lips curved, almost tenderly. "It's
not your fault. I knew from the beginning that escape was a long shot. Do you
think you can walk?"
"Yes, of course." She could walk. She
could dance on a tightrope if he would just keep looking at her like that.
He hopped down from the Jeep, clutching the bag
of their meager supplies in one hand. She followed more gingerly, but the
wooziness was clearing rapidly. She must not have hit her head that hard after
all.
Then she realized for the first time that he
was limping.
"You hurt your leg!"
"Yes."
She scurried around to the left side of him,
and her eyes widened. It was hard to tell, given the already disreputable shape
of his jeans, but a wet stain appeared to be spreading along his thigh.
"Cain, you're really injured!"
"I checked it out. It's not much."
She didn't believe him for a minute. He finally
arched a single brow. "Do you know first aid, Maggie?"
She shook her head.
"If it is seriously injured, is there
anything you can do about it?"
Once again she shook her head.
"Then its condition is moot. Even if it's
serious, there's nothing we can do about it."
"We can sit here and rest!"
"I'm sure the police would appreciate
that." He continued walking along the floor of the shallow ravine, looking
around himself and assessing the situation with his cool gaze.
Maggie scowled at him, but she didn't know how
to make him stop.
"I wonder how far this goes," Cain
murmured out loud.
"What?"
"The ravine. My guess is that helicopters
will be brought in shortly. The land here is fairly flat. So the ravine could
come in handy, such as it is."
Maggie understood his point. The ravine was
only about six feet deep and ten feet wide, more like a gully carved out by
rushing water. But its top was obscured by thick, tangled brush, helping hide
their progress, and it did appear to be long, snaking around so that they
couldn't see the end, just rich red dirt where it twisted around another
corner.
"Do you really think we can make it on
foot?" she asked.
Cain didn't reply, but his lips got very tight.
And she knew it then, as he must have known it
all along. He wasn't going to make it. They'd been spotted and they were now on
foot. In probably less than thirty minutes the area would be crawling with
state troopers, county sheriffs and miscellaneous bounty hunters. They'd bring
in helicopters, they'd bring in dogs.
Cain was smart, probably as smart as Brandon.
And he was strong, probably as strong as C.J. But he was still just a man.
The police would find them. She would be
"liberated" and Cain … oh, Cain.
"You're not going to do anything rash, are
you?"
He still didn't reply.
"Getting yourself shot rather than going
back to jail would be pretty stupid," she said more vehemently.
"No one will know the truth if I'm
dead," he said at last, his voice perfectly expressionless.
That scared her. Tucked away in the cool
shadows of the ravine, she wrapped her arms around her waist.
"Keep walking, Maggie."
So she did.
They heard the first sound of helicopters after
twenty minutes, the pounding beat of blades almost deafening. Cain didn't say
anything. Instead, he halted and turned back to her long enough to brusquely
tuck her red braid inside her T-shirt. The black baseball cap he pressed lower
on her head, momentarily pushing loose tendrils behind her ears.
His face was expressionless, but she could see
the strain etched in the corners of his eyes and the grim set of his mouth. His
green eyes were determined, but she could see fatigue there as well and hints
of pain. His steps had grown more labored.
She reached out her hand toward his chest, but
he intercepted it in midair. His fingers closed around her wrist, gentle but
firm. He replaced her hand at her side, his gaze level on hers.
Then he turned away from her, and without ever
saying a word, raised the camouflaged hunting jacket over his own head to
disguise his blond hair.
He resumed walking and, after a tortured
moment, she followed.
The helicopters came and went. Once Maggie
thought she heard barking, but the sound seemed very far away and things were
distorted by the tunnel shape of the ravine. The barking never got closer, or
the shouts of men. The ravine led them deeper and deeper around, until Maggie
no longer knew which direction they were even headed, though they seemed to be
headed up. She had the ridiculous thought that they would miraculously emerge
in the courthouse in downtown Portland where all this madness had started.
Abruptly, she bumped into Cain. Only then did
she become aware that he'd stopped walking.
Puzzled, she peered around his arm, and her
eyes suddenly grew round.
They were on the top of a hill and beneath
them, far enough away that the people looked like ants, an entire town had popped
up in the middle of wild-running tumbleweeds. Even from this distance, Maggie
could count four cop cars and a number of pickup trucks.
She turned to Cain. "Uh-oh," she said
weakly.
His lips curved tightly. She realized for the
first time that his face was dangerously pale. Her gaze flew down to his thigh.
The stain had grown to unbelievable proportions.
"Oh, my God," she whispered. Her eyes
bounced back up to his face. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"There's nothing you could do," he
said, but then his bravado left him and he leaned heavily against the mud wall.
"Sit," she commanded, panic releasing
her vocal cords and lending strength to her hands. "Now!"
He sagged down to the ground without further
protest, and for a moment she was terrified that he'd passed out cold. But then
his head tilted back drunkenly, his green eyes definitely worn. "Now what,
Miss Nightingale?"
"A tourniquet," she determined.
"A tourniquet would cut off all
circulation and I might lose my whole leg."
She blinked rapidly. She was a marriage
counselor, for crying out loud, what did she know about these things? "Do
you know what to do then?" she asked in an agonized voice. "Just tell
me, Cain, and I'll do it."
"I want you to go down into that
town."
"And get a doctor? I'll do it!"
The silence lengthened. "Sure," he
said belatedly, too belatedly.
Her eyes narrowed. She sank back on her heels
and regarded him warily. "What's going on, Cain?"
"Maggie, I know you'll disagree, but I
think it's time for us to part company."
"You're damn right I disagree!"
"It's not your problem."
"Oh, don't give me that!"
His eyes abruptly fired to life. Color rose in
his cheeks and his chin came up furiously. She'd thought he was weakened, but his
hand snapped around her wrist with all the ferocity of a healthy,
well-conditioned male.
"I'm in trouble, Maggie. We both know
that. I'll go down, but I go down on my own. I don't take anyone with me. I
don't take you with me."
"I'm not leaving you alone. Not injured
and tired and—"
Her words were cut off as he abruptly dragged
her forward. She fell across his lap, knowing she must be hurting his leg and
trying to get a hand out to support herself. But he pinned her against his hard
chest with his arms, his lips now just an inch from hers, his eyes blazing into
her.
"This is the only thing I'll ever ask of
you," he whispered fiercely.
"And I won't do it!" she cried back.
Her eyes pleaded with him to understand, to realize just how much she loved him
and that she couldn't abandon someone she loved.
For one moment, she saw the strain again. She
saw his pain, she saw his fatigue. And then his spine stiffened and he became
relentless.
"Swear to me you'll walk away and never
look back."
"No!"
"Swear to me you'll walk away and never
look back."
"No!"
"Swear to me, Maggie, that you will walk
away and never look back."
"I can't do that! I can't leave you!"
"You have to, Maggie. It's the only thing
I'll ever truly need you to do."
And those words hurt her. They lacerated her
heart and filled her chest with a fiery red ache. The tears welled up. Her
lower lip trembled when she wanted so badly to be composed.
"Don't do this to me," she whispered.
"Don't hurt me like this when I love you so much. Cain…"
His composure snapped. The steadiness left his
gaze and for one moment, he looked furious. And then his lips swooped down. He
kissed her, he kissed her hard. And it was wild and raw and aching. It told her
everything, how much he needed her, how much he wanted her. How much she'd
managed to touch him in just twenty-four hours when he couldn't afford to be
touched.
He consumed her mouth as he wanted to consume
her, and her tears spilled over and ran down her cheeks. She kissed him back as
savagely as he kissed her and wept against his face.
Just as suddenly his hands bracketed her cheeks
and forced her head back harshly.
"Go!"
he whispered fiercely. "Run away from me and live
happily ever after. Find your brothers because they will keep you safe. Unite
your step-siblings. Be happy."
He paused, then his green eyes grew brighter.
Her breath died in her throat and she was pinned by those fiery eyes.
"Someday," he promised lowly,
"someday, Maggie, if this is all behind me, I will find you. Wherever you
are I will find you and I will throw myself at your feet and give you my life.
I swear it!"
"I love you," she cried helplessly.
"I love you, I love you, I love you."
And for his answer, he pushed her away from him
so hard she stumbled and fell against the dirt. He pointed once more at the
town, his whole arm shaking with the emotion.
"Go!"
"All right!" she agreed at last. Her
chest was laboring now, her hair red and tangled around her cheeks. She lurched
drunkenly to her feet, swaying as she fought to breathe through the tightness
in her chest. She knew what he was doing. Knew he was just trying to protect
her, and dammit, she didn't need to be protected! Not anymore.
"I'll leave. But I'm coming back and you
can't stop me. I'm going to trot right down into that town. I'm going to tell
them all you're headed in the opposite direction. And then I'm grabbing a
medical kit and coming right back up here. So don't you move. You want to talk
about trust? Well, trust me to come back to you. Trust
me,
dammit!"
"Do what you have to do." His voice
was tight, his hands clenched into fists at his sides.
"I will, thank you very much." She
spared one glance at her watch. It read eleven-fifteen. "Give me one
hour," she said curtly. "One hour and I'll be back."
Not waiting for his nod, she squared her
shoulders, focused her gaze at that town and headed straight out into the
blazing sun.
Cain remained seated on the floor of the
ravine, watching her saunter down the hillside as proud and vibrant as Joan of
Arc going to war. Two helicopters swooped down. The ant-sized officers rushed
forward up the hill to meet her.
She kept walking, her gaze forward and her
shoulders level as minutes passed until finally she, too, grew small and
distant.
God, she was magnificent.
And his gaze swept over the growing crowd of
men around her, trying hard to make out faces and identify the one face that
still haunted his dreams. The cops closed in on her, accepted her, no doubt
hammered the poor hostage with questions.
Still no Ham. Cain finally allowed himself to
breathe.
The police had her now. She was the rescued
hostage and there was nothing to indicate any other relationship.
Her brothers would probably be with her
shortly. She'd spoken highly of them. Surely they would keep her safe.
Cain needed to know that she would be safe.
The crowd grew too thick. She disappeared at
last from sight. Her twenty-four hours of adventure were over, and civilization
had swallowed her up once more.
"Remember me, Maggie," he whispered
as he sat in the red mud of the ravine. "Maybe that's the only other thing
I'll ever need you to do. Remember me."
And I'll remember you. For all
the days, weeks and months to come.