Authors: Jo Goodman
Ryder did not drop the rope, but some small movement he made indicated his intention to go for his gun.
Rosario stepped out of the shadows of the nearby mining machinery. "And I'm not going to let you do that." The Tonto scout was shielded by Mary's body. He held a knife to her throat.
Ryder's face gave no indication of the jolt that went through him. He let the rope fall back into place. "Let her go." Though Rosario had spoken English, Ryder gave his order in the Tonto dialect of the Apache tongue. "You only want me."
"I will have both."
"You will have nothing." Ryder practically spat the words. "You hide behind a woman. There is no honor in that."
Rosario recognized the ploy: attack his pride and force him to give up his captive. "It means nothing coming from a man who has no honor," he said tightly.
The blade was no longer cold on Mary's throat. The edge of it had drawn blood once, and she could feel the trickle against her skin. She was afraid and she was angry, but anyone who knew her would realize in which direction the scales of emotion were tipped. "For God's sake, speak English," she snapped. "If I'm going to die over it, then I'll damned well know what the argument's about."
Ryder didn't flinch. Rosario, he saw, was taken back by her tone and her vehemence: The knife was pressed more firmly against Mary's throat, the blade turned in just a fraction more lethally. "He doesn't want me to release the horses," Ryder told her. "And he isn't willing to release you in exchange for my promise." He looked past Mary to Rosario. "You're condemning everyone here to death."
Rosario's head cocked to one side, but he said nothing.
"You saw the raiding party, didn't you?"
He nodded. "Less than twenty men."
"You fool. Geronimo is with them. It makes them a hundred strong." He saw Rosario's confusion. "And they'll run over this camp if I don't give them the horses. No one will escape. Least of all you. You could have had the great Geronimo. You settled for the easy coup instead."
Mary felt her captor's anger rise and knew the moment she was going to be pushed away so he could face Ryder. Prepared as she was, the vigorous thrust still sent her sliding forward onto her knees. Her palms scraped the ground as she came to a halt. Catching her breath, she looked up and saw Ryder vaulting over the corral to attack Rosario.
Mary scrambled to her feet and removed the knife from her moccasin pocket. Ryder and Rosario were circling each other. Rosario's knife was darkened on the edge by Mary's own blood. Ryder was without a weapon save his Colt, and it was useless because he didn't want to fire it and precipitate the bloodbath he was trying desperately to avoid. Mary tossed her knife onto the ground between the men.
Rosario was small of stature, lithe and quick. A bandana held back his long ink black hair, but his locks swirled about his shoulder as he stabbed at Ryder to keep him from retrieving the weapon. Ryder easily removed himself from harm's way, feinted left then dove right, capturing the hilt as he somersaulted forward. He came to his feet again easily, this time on the other side of Rosario.
Now that Ryder was armed, Mary turned her back on the combatants. Nothing she could do there could affect the outcome, but she must save the camp. Raising the looped rope on the gatepost, she let the corral gate swing open and grasped the leading string of the first horse to sidle up to her. With a firm, commanding tug, she led the animal out of the corral. Tethered together as they were, the others had little choice but to follow. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Rosario's arm make a wide sweeping arc, saw Ryder duck the lethal pass. Mary pressed on.
She didn't know where she was taking the horses. She was aware of the general direction in which Ryder had gone when he'd left the corral with the four Chiricahua raiders. She supposed, correctly, that they would find her.
A band of six warriors stopped her, blocking her route with the animals. Giving herself to God's care and grace, Mary faced them squarely. She held up the leading strings in a tight fist. "These are for you."
No one moved. No one commented. They simply stared at her. Mary was a woman outside the realm of their experience. Her shirt and trousers gave her an appearance they were not accustomed to in a white woman. The upturned moccasins, similar to their own, identified her as the one Ryder had married. They wondered at her cropped hair and oddly serene expression as she faced them. She did not cower in terror or raise her fist defiantly. If she was afraid, she had learned to accept the fear and absorb its strength for herself.
One warrior moved forward. "She is One-Who-Rides-The-Wind's woman."
Mary did not understand what was said, but there seemed to be general agreement among the other warriors. "These horses are a gift for the great Geronimo. My husband and I wish to make him this gift."
The warrior who had come forward now reached for the leads and took them from Mary's hand. "What do you know of Geronimo?" he asked in English.
Mary held her ground, but it was difficult with the horse and the men towering over her. "I know he has the mark of a powerful man," she said clearly.
"How do you know this?" was the deeply graveled reply.
"He is both feared and respected by his enemies."
The warrior considered this a moment, then he translated for his band. There was another general murmur of agreement. "And would you tell him this if you met him?"
Mary shook her head. "Respect and fear would shut my mouth."
There was deep, rich rumbling laughter when this was translated. "A cunning fox would have to steal her tongue to shut her mouth," he added in Apache and laughed at his own humor.
Mary did not have to understand the language to know she was the object of their joking. It was clear they had no intention of harming her. Having made her gift, she was anxious to get back to the corral and Ryder. "I must go," she said. "My husband is—"
"Is going to turn you over his knee."
Mary spun on her heels as Ryder's voice came to her from behind. Moving past the horses, she launched herself into his arms and planted kisses over his face. Only half aware of what she was doing, she patted him down, exploring for puncture wounds.
"I swear I am, Mary," he said between kisses. "Right over my knee."
The warrior holding the horses nodded approvingly and offered his opinion in Apache.
Still holding Ryder's dear face between her hands, Mary drew back slightly. "What did he say?" she asked.
"Geronimo says I should beat you now and save myself years of agony."
Mary blinked. "Geronimo?" Her hands dropped from Ryder's face, and she turned quickly in the direction of the band of warriors. They were already moving away, the great man himself leading the captured horses. She stared after him, awed by her close encounter, amazed at her own temerity. She closed her eyes and made the sign of the cross.
Ryder lifted Mary against him in a hard, solid embrace. "I can't turn my back on you for a moment." He kissed her forehead, her cheeks, her ear. "God," he whispered against her hair. "Thank God."
"Does this mean you're not going to beat me?" she asked when he set her down.
A wash of moonlight highlighted her mouth. Ryder's decision was easy. He kissed her. Mary gave herself up to it, forgetting all her questions and losing herself in the taste and texture of that kiss. "Oh," she said a little dazedly when he lifted his head. "Oh, my."
Ryder smiled. "I'll take that as a compliment."
His dry tone was enough to sober Mary. She stepped back and turned her gaze in the direction of the mining camp. "What happened?" she asked. Since Ryder was alive there was only one answer she expected. It wasn't the one Ryder gave her.
"Rosario's trussed like a calf for branding."
Mary's forest green eyes held her astonishment. "You didn't kill him?"
"Not yet. Jarret's deciding his fate."
"Jarret! Then he and Rennie
were
in the camp."
Ryder nodded. "He'll probably never know for certain what roused him out of his cot or what made him decide to take a look around, but he had a lot more to do with saving my life than I did."
Mary tried to take it all in. "Is the entire camp awake?"
"No. Just Jarret. Even the posted guard's still sleeping. Jarret wants to kill him more than Rosario." Ryder took a bandana from his pocket and wet one end of it. Lifting Mary's chin, he cleaned the thin trail of blood from her neck. "Jarret clipped Rosario with the butt of his Colt and tossed him into one of the mining carts. We pushed it into the mine, then I came to get you. Jarret was going to keep Rosario in one of the abandoned shafts until we make our escape. If he sees the blood on your neck he may just push Rosario down it."
Though he spoke lightly, Mary knew it was the truth. She supposed Jarret's interference had a great deal to do with saving Rosario's life, too. The flinty look in Ryder's eyes told her that he could easily take the scout's life for what he had done to her. "I'm fine," she said. "Really." Mary laid her hand over Ryder's wrist and forced him to stop attending her. She pushed his hand gently away. "Rosario came up behind me," she told him. "When you went to the corral. I didn't go looking for trouble." It was important to her that he know the truth.
"I believe you." And he did. Rosario had probably been following them at some distance from the time they left the cave. Ryder blamed himself for not being more observant. "Let's go. Jarret's waiting for us." He thrust the bandana back in his pocket and took Mary's hand. "He has some place in mind for us to hide."
The hiding place turned out to be the same abandoned portion of the mine where Jarret had made Rosario a prisoner. Jarret's torchlight flickered over the unconscious scout as he led Mary and Ryder deeper into the shaft. Mary saw that Rosario, bound and gagged, was not likely to stir anytime soon. "You won't let him die," she said to Jarret. When he didn't answer her she tugged on his shirt. "Don't ignore me, Jarret."
"As if I could." He stopped because he had reached the end of the horizontal shaft. He thrust the torch into a crevice between the timber uprights and the rock wall. "No," he said plainly. "I won't let him die. But he has to stay there until we decide what's to become of the two of you." He pointed to the blankets he had already laid out on the ground. "It's the best I could do on short notice. You weren't exactly expected."
"And certainly not invited," Ryder said, giving Mary an arch glance.
Jarret said, "Oh, I know whose idea this was. It has that masterful Dennehy touch all over it. I'm only surprised you went along with it." He sighed and his voice lost the sarcasm that had marked it. "Never mind. I
do
understand." He raked back his hair in a weary gesture. "Get some sleep. There are a few hours left before sun up. You may as well rest until then. There's going to be quite a commotion in camp once I tell the miners their horses are gone."
He left the torch behind and made his way out by touch alone. Mary and Ryder heard him swear softly as he tripped over Rosario's body. To her shame, Mary had to control the urge to laugh.
"It's all right," Ryder said, quelling his own smile. "Rosario didn't feel a thing."
"I was thinking more of Jarret's toes. He was barefoot, did you notice?"
Ryder had noticed. "I don't suppose Jarret's had much cause these days to sleep with his boots on." He helped Mary down on the blankets, smoothing them out on the edges. He didn't even have his coat to lend her for a pillow. "Put your head on my lap," he said.
"No," she said. "You put your head on mine."
Ryder recognized the flat, dogmatic tone. If he argued with her they would both spend the night sleeping sitting up. He valued his own rest more than winning an argument with Mary. "Very well." He let her settle back against the wall, then lay down. When her fingers began to sift through his hair he closed his eyes. Her touch released the tightness in his scalp and the tension at the back of his neck. His mouth relaxed, then his shoulders.
Hours later Mary raised a finger to her lips as Rennie and Jarret entered the area from the mine passage. The torch Jarret had left behind had long since burned out, but Rennie was carrying another. Mary squinted to adjust to the onslaught of light. "Is it morning already?" she asked softly, loath to wake Ryder. He had slept deeply, rarely stirring.
Rennie knelt beside her sister. She touched her face as if to assure herself it really was Mary—and in one piece. "Are you all right? What are you doing here? Don't think for a minute that I believe all that nonsense Jarret reported after he found you. I know you didn't help plan Ryder's escape. You told me about finding Mama's habit, remember? You weren't pretending to be hurt or angry. It was all very real. You didn't plan that."
Mary rolled her eyes. She had forgotten how wearing Rennie's energy could be. "Of course I didn't plan to wear it, you ninny. That just came about because it was the better idea." She saw that she had momentarily confused her sister. "Stop trying to guess at things it's better you don't know. What does it matter what I've done when I'm here to talk about what I intend to do?"
Rennie's mouth clamped shut.
"That's better," Mary said firmly. She glanced down at Ryder. His eyes were open, and there was a barely suppressed smile on his lips. "See?" she told Rennie. "He's awake now, and I'm certain it has something to do with your chattering."