Authors: Sarah McCarty
“Tucker.”
“Yeah.” He leaned back around the rock.
“I’m thinking up’s the way we need to go.”
“It figures.” Tucker took out his bowie knife.
Sam snorted and pulled his normal-sized knife. “Why don’t you just go holler to the snakes that they terrify you?”
“Just because I don’t like them, doesn’t mean I’m terrified.” Tucker flipped the wicked knife with its wide blade that curved to a lethal tip.
“Then what’s a knife like that supposed to say?”
“Get the hell out of my way.”
Despite the tension, Sam grinned and waved him forward. “In that case, you go first.”
Tucker cut him a glare. “Just remember this when it’s time to escort a lady across a river.”
Sam grimaced. Desi, Caine’s wife, had gotten him good that time, tricking him with an appearance of complacency, almost drowning them both in her escape attempt. It had been a damn cold ride home and he’d yet to hear the end of it that a little slip of a thing got the better of him. He still didn’t know how anyone that delicate looking could get up to so much mischief. “Just climb.”
Tucker smiled, his teeth clenching down on the heavy blade before he started up. Sam followed, his own knife between his teeth. He wasn’t any more fond of snakes than Tucker was, but he had a lot less reason for his fear. Being thrown into a snake pit and left to die put a mark on a man.
Tucker reached the top and whistled.
“Find something?”
“A nice little hidey-hole.”
He heaved himself up over the last boulder. The back of the rocks spilled down to a cave. The opening was about five feet high and wide enough for a man to get through. “Think there’s anything inside?”
Sam took his sulphur out of his makings and started down the other side. “Only one way to find out.”
Tucker sighed. “Figured you were going to say that.”
The reason for his reluctance was easy to figure. There was a higher likelihood of snakes in the cave. He glanced over. Tucker was breathing evenly. Too evenly.
Sam cut him a glance. “I’ll go in. You keep an eye out here.”
“Like hell.”
“It’s not necessary to push like this.”
“That’s not your call.”
“You don’t have anything to prove to me.”
Tucker moved toward the entrance. “Wasn’t aware that I was trying.”
“You are one stubborn son of a bitch, Tucker McCade.”
“Yeah,” he mocked back. “And you’re the obliging sort.”
“Sweet as pie. Just ask the ladies.”
Tucker ducked into the interior. “I think I’ll just ask Isabella.”
Sam followed. “That’s underhanded.”
“Funny. I just see it as an easy way to get to an honest answer.”
Sam struck a sulphur, moving with Tucker into the cavern a few feet at a time until the weak light illuminated the far wall.
“Son of a bitch!”
Cases of dynamite lined the wall. An open crate lay on the floor, packing hay strewn about.
Tucker waved his hand and stepped back. “Put out the goddamn sulphur.”
Sam shook it out. He took a step back himself. Dynamite could be damn unstable. As the cave plunged to darkness, a dry rasping rattle filled the cave, echoing off the walls, making it impossible to locate the source. He heard Tucker’s indrawn breath. He struck another sulphur. Snake trumped dynamite as far as immediate threats went. In the wavering light, he saw Tucker staring at a spot directly behind him. Shit.
“Don’t move.”
The rattle came louder. “Wasn’t planning on it.”
Sam could see the sweat on Tucker’s forehead, knew the sound alone had to be eating at his mind, but when he sheathed the bowie knife and pulled the throwing knife, his hands were steady. With slow easy movements, he walked to the side, easing the knife into throwing position as he did.
The snake wasn’t impressed. Its rattling took up a frantic rhythm. “Hold up that light,” Tucker ordered. “When I say, ‘jump,’ hightail it to the left.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll have wings on my feet.”
Tucker’s eyes narrowed. “Ready.”
The sulphur burned almost to his fingertips. “Can’t be soon enough for me.”
“Jump.”
He jumped. The knife whizzed past his head. The flame blew out. There was a thunk and the rattling hit a discordant rhythm. Sam rolled to his feet, ripped a sulphur out of his kit, and struck it. In the wavering light he saw the snake was dead, its body severed in half. Not a surprise. Tucker never missed.
Sam retrieved the knife before Tucker could force himself to and stuck it in his belt. He prodded the dead snake with his foot. “At least we’ve got dinner.”
“Not hardly.”
In the flimsy light Sam saw a torch propped against the wall. It flared to life at the touch of the flame. The stench of kerosene followed the burst of light. Holding the torch up, Sam counted the boxes of dynamite. Ten in all. Enough to blow up half a mountain. Enough to cause problems for a bunch of soldiers. He smiled. Enough to cause problems for Tejala.
He patted one of the cases, holding the torch well away, and looked at Tucker. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Probably.” Tucker came over and motioned Sam back. “Which, you realize, only makes us both crazy,” he grunted as he hefted the box up and headed back toward the entrance.
“And what’s wrong with that?”
“We don’t have enough time to discuss it,” Tucker called back.
Sam stayed behind, holding the torch high, studying the stash. Nine boxes could do a lot of damage. Kill a lot of men. Hurt a lot of innocent people.
“Tucker?”
“Yeah?”
From the sound of things he’d cleared the top of the slide and was working his way down the other side. Sam dropped the torch in the loose hay on the floor by the boxes.
“Run!”
They made the ride back to the Montoya ranch in record time despite the dynamite tied to the back of Sam’s horse. Cresting the rise, he realized it wasn’t fast enough. The neat orderly ranch was in chaos. Ranch hands milled in the courtyard, saddling horses, some cursing while others shouted orders. Wagons were turned over as makeshift barriers. Curtains fluttered out of broken windows. The front door hung off its hinges.
“Son of a bitch,” Tucker breathed.
The sick feeling in Sam’s stomach grew. “Yeah.”
He kicked Breeze into a gallop, uncaring of the risk, needing to get down there, needing to see Bella, needing to know she was all right.
A clanging rang in his ears as Breeze ate up the distance with long hungry strides. A man to his right shouted and pulled out his gun, getting in his way. Sam drew his Colt and fired. At the last second his arm was knocked up and Tucker was between him and his target. He heard Tucker shout something. He didn’t know what. He just knew that men melted out of his way and there was nothing between him and that ominously listing front door. Breeze slid to a stop. Sam didn’t. Using the momentum to propel him forward and onto the porch in a flying dismount, he burst into the house.
“Bella!”
No one answered. Crossing to the parlor he looked inside. Shards of glass sparkled on the polished wood floor. The door to a half-empty gun cabinet swung open. A dark stain marred the cushion on the maroon settee. The stain drew him forward against his will. He reached out. Touched it, confirming what he’d already known. Blood.
He spun around. “Bella!”
This time there was a response. The scrape of a shoe on wood. The squeak of a door hinge from somewhere in the interior. Pulling his Colt, he ran in the direction. Rounding a corner he nearly ran into a short plump woman. She screamed and dropped back against the doorjamb.
He grabbed her arm and snarled, “Where’s Bella?”
She clutched her chest. Her mouth worked. He shook her. “Where’s Bella?”
“Sam?”
He dropped the woman’s arm with disgust and pushed into the room. Bettina lay on the bed, a bloody bandage wrapped around her chest, her expression as stark as her long black hair against the white sheets. She looked so much like his Bella it hurt him seeing her there because she was alive and safe while Bella…Bella might be—he cut off the thought. Leaning over he wrapped his fingers in Bettina’s hair, holding her gaze to his. “Where is she?”
She licked her dry lips, but didn’t look away. Her voice was a hoarse rasp. “He took her.”
“Who?” He already knew, but he needed to hear it. Needed to hear how he had failed Isabella. Hear how empty his promises to keep her safe had been.
“Tejala.”
He only needed to know one more thing. “Did you betray her?”
“No.”
Her gaze didn’t flinch. In it he saw pain, anger, but no fear. He straightened and let go of her hair. “I believe you.”
He turned on his heel. She caught his sleeve. He turned.
She struggled up on her elbows. “You go for her.”
“Yes.”
“He will rape her.”
The words hit him like bullets. “I know.”
“Do not tell her until you get back.”
“Tell her what?’
“That you no longer consider her for your wife. It will break her.”
He didn’t remember moving, but he had Bettina’s shoulders in his hands and he had her raised off the bed, rage pouring from him. “Did you tell her that filth?” He shook her. Her head rocked back and forth. “Did you tell her I wouldn’t want her if he touched her?”
A woman was screaming. Boots thudded down the hallway. Hands grabbed his shoulders. All he could see was Bettina’s face and the truth. All he could hear was Bella’s certainty.
I will not live with the touch of him on my skin.
“Jesus. Sam. Back off.”
More hands grabbed his wrist, jerking it free. He clung with the left as if keeping the contact could block the truth. As the third man joined the fray, he was pulled off.
He closed his eyes. Bella was strong. Strong enough to kill herself rather than be dishonored. Strong enough to defeat Tejala the way she felt she had to. He didn’t fight the men dragging him back, his attention focused inward, reaching for Bella with a desperate prayer.
Don’t do it, duchess. Don’t do it.
There wasn’t any answer. Just the never-ending echo of his own plea.
When he opened his eyes, two hard-eyed Montoya men along with Tucker stood between him and the bed, ready to leap if he went crazy again.
“We’ll get her back,” Tucker said.
Sam shot Bella’s mother a look of disgust. “When we do, she’s not coming back here.”
Dead or alive, he was not bringing her back here.
“This is her home,” Bettina gasped, holding her shoulder. “Her birthright.”
“Her home is with me.”
“You do not understand—”
The rage swelled almost beyond his ability to contain it. He cut her off with a slash of his hand. “No. You don’t. You don’t understand her, and you don’t understand me, but try to understand this. There’s nothing in this world that could make Bella anything less than perfect to me, and if anything happens to her because you convinced her otherwise…” He looked out the window at the men readying to ride and then at the men between him and Bettina. “Well, lady, you’d better hire on a bigger army because I’ll be coming for you.”
Bettina opened her mouth, closed it, struggled to sit up. Fresh blood stained her bandage. The plump woman came to her side. She waved her away. Her expression tight with pain and anger, Bettina propped herself on her elbow. Sam didn’t want to hear what she had to say. He headed for the door. Behind him he heard Tucker follow. Bettina’s threat stopped him as he reached the threshold, paralyzing him with a need to respond.
“Know this, Ranger. If you do not bring my daughter home, I will be coming for
you.
”
Tucker’s palm in the middle of Sam’s back shoved him on through the door before the rage could cut loose.
“Lady, shut the hell up.”
Outside, men waited in the twilight. They were armed to the teeth, standing by fresh mounts and they were looking at him expectantly. The dynamite lay beside the porch. One of the men walked a saddleless Breeze, cooling him down gradually from the hard ride in. Tucker’s horse was being cared for the same way. Their gear had been packed on two fresh mounts.
“What is this?”
One of the men following came around to stand in front of him. There was a tear in his shirt at the shoulder. Blood on his sleeve. “We ride with you.”
“No.” He would not risk Isabella to men he didn’t know.
The man’s eyes narrowed. “She is our
patrona.
Stolen on our watch. It is our right to return her to her home.”
“She’s not coming back here.” His hand dropped to his gun. “Now, get out of my way.”
The man didn’t budge, merely pointed to a man in his forties with gray at his temples. “That is Miguel. He has been with the Montoyas for twenty years. He picked out
la Montoya’
s first pony and cart. He taught her to drive.” He pointed to a young man still in his teens. “That is Guillermo. He and
la Montoya
were playmates, always in trouble together. When Isabella fell into the river, he jumped in and pulled her out. He was six at the time.” He pointed to three men roughly about his age. Tall, lean with a fighter’s tension. They had his hard eyes and their array of weapons was both impressive and practical. “These are my brothers. Our job has always been to protect Isabella.”
“And you are?”
“Zacharias Lopez.”
“Well, Zacharias, it’s one hell of a job you’re doing.”
“That was unfair, Sam,” Tucker interjected. “Tejala is crazy with the pox. No one could expect this.”
“Fuck fair.” He didn’t care about fair. Tejala had Bella. He’d worry about fair when he had her back. Sam grabbed up the case of dynamite and swung it up onto the horse’s withers, keeping the rough wood on the extra blanket. The chestnut snorted and pranced at the awkward weight.
“Easy boy.”
When he turned, Miguel was there with a length of rope. Calm. Capable. Determined. He didn’t let go when Sam grabbed hold. The tension stretched along the length, joining them. Miguel’s gaze caught and held his.
“Men died to protect
la Montoya
here today. More will die before we get her back. The deaths do not matter. We gladly make the sacrifice for Isabella. She is Montoya. She is family. Not you. Not Tejala. Nothing will keep us from getting her back.”