His reply had been a wink, a nod of his dark, handsome head, and then he had immediately left her and gone in search of Martay. When a half hour had passed, Regina had been in the gazebo at the east edge of the verdant garden, waiting breathlessly for Jim Savin’s kisses, hoping she could persuade him to make love to her there in the shadows while laughing couples promenaded within a few feet of the summerhouse. As she’d waited, she had grown beside herself with excitement. The danger of being caught would add such a delicious dash of spice to their heated lovemaking, she was sure it would be an incredible experience.
But Jim hadn’t come.
And when, twenty minutes after she’d ducked into the gazebo, she sensed a great flurry of activity, she hurried back to the mansion to learn that Martay Kidd was missing. Someone else was missing also, though she didn’t mention it to anyone. Jim Savin had curiously disappeared about the same time Martay was taken from the veranda.
Regina Darlington shook her auburn head. She was being ridiculous. It was coincidence, nothing more. Her savage lover was, at this very hour, stretched out on his bed at the Centennial. Unfortunately, owing to Miss Kidd’s disappearance—damn the trouble-causing little bitch—she could not go into Denver tomorrow afternoon and slip up to Jim’s room. Until the girl was found, Colonel Darlington would be in and out of the mansion at all hours. Regina couldn’t count on her husband’s sure and prolonged absence as she could when he was at Fort Collins.
As a member of a search party, he might ride in home at any minute, and if he found her gone, there would be questions. He was such a jealous fool she could hardly breathe when he was around.
Pouting, Regina turned to go back indoors, hoping to high heaven they would find Martay Kidd soon. The thought of going for a week or more without seeing Jim Savin made her feel quite tense and restless. Inside, she climbed back into her bed, stretched out on her back, and stared at the frilly canopy above, worrying.
She just could not sleep.
* * *
Martay could not sleep.
It was almost midnight. A full white moon had risen. It’s silvery light streamed in through the open door and broken windows of the small shack where she was held captive by an enigmatic Indian who had grown more mysterious as night approached.
Through the hot, still day he had behaved as though he were tolerating her presence because she wouldn’t be with him for long. He’d said as much, more than once. Said she would be free within twenty-four hours, said it as if he meant it.
When sundown had neared, he was listening, looking, with an even greater intensity than he’d shown throughout the long tiring day. As though he expected someone to arrive at any second. Long before the sun completely dropped from sight behind the western mountain peaks, he had taken up his post outdoors on the stoop, the Winchester in his hands, his black eyes scanning the dense forest below their rocky redoubt in unblinking expectation.
Watching from inside the cabin, Martay had witnessed the slow, sure hardening of his chiseled features, the angered narrowing of his black eyes, the pulling and flexing of the powerful muscles beneath the smooth dark skin of his arms.
Now, at midnight, he slowly rose to his feet; the first time he’d moved in the past two hours. Martay, seated on the cot, tensed as he filled the doorway. He stood facing her, blocking out the moonlight, casting the cot into darkness.
She strained to see his face; couldn’t. He hadn’t spoken a word since sundown and she jumped when, from out of the darkness, his voice, deep and soft, said, “Why aren’t you asleep?”
She swallowed, then swallowed again. “Wh-why aren’t you?”
He moved in out of the doorway. Moonlight again lighted her face, though his remained in shadow. He said, “Lie down, Captive.”
She stayed as she was, terrified he had notions of lying down with her. “I’m not sleepy,” she said, her breath coming in rapid, nervous little gulps.
He moved toward her. She shivered.
He stood just above, looking down at her, his black eyes gleaming like an animal’s. He laid a hand on her bare shoulder and Martay sat there, paralyzed with fear, unable to move. His face was icy cold, but his long, dark fingers were warm upon her chilled flesh as he slid them over the curve of her shoulder and down her arm to the tiny, white silk cap sleeve that had fallen.
With a touch as delicate as a surgeon’s, those fingers took hold of the slippery fabric and the stone-faced Sioux slowly pulled the dainty sleeve back up over her trembling shoulder.
“You’ll catch cold,” he said, his eyes going to the shadowy valley between her full, quivering breasts. “There’s a blanket at the foot of the cot. Cover yourself.” And he turned and walked away.
Martay anxiously snatched up the blanket, hurriedly pressed it to her bosom, and swore to herself she’d stay awake forever. She’d not dare close her eyes again in the presence of this mystifying Sioux with his warm, gentle hands and cold, brazen eyes.
The Sioux pulled his fringed shirt back on against the evening chill. He then sat down in the doorway, leaning his back against the wooden frame. He held the rifle between his bent knees, its barrel pointed up, and pulled a cigar from his pocket. A match flared, then went out, and he sat there smoking, the glow of the cigar lighting his face.
Martay watched him, baffled. He hadn’t harmed her, but he hadn’t released her. As long as she was with him, she was in great danger. He was a terrifying, forceful savage. A creature of the wilds. As cold as the mountain snows.
Determined she’d not take her eyes off him, she wet her lips and made an attempt to engage him in late-night conversation.
“My goodness,” she said, trying to sound calm, “it’s hard to believe the nights are already so chilly. At home in Chicago it’s still quite warm. Is it warm where you live?”
No answer.
“I like Colorado though. I suppose you’ve spent a lot of time in these mountains, or did you come down from the North? I’ll be honest I don’t know a great deal about where the Indians live and …” she talked on and on, pausing for his answers, answers that never came. After a fruitless half hour she was still chattering nervously when all at once his cold, calm voice interrupted.
“Captive,” he said, “be quiet.”
No one had ever told Martay to shut up before, but she wasted no time obeying his command. Feeling as though he had slapped her face, she fell silent. Sagging tiredly back against the wall, she tried to swallow the lump forming in her throat, but couldn’t manage. Afraid she’d annoy him if she cried, she let the hot tears slide down her cheeks and wept as noiselessly as possible. Still, it must not have been quietly enough because all at once he rose.
Blinking furiously, her heart thundering, Martay watched him cross to her. And when he loomed tall and terrifying before her, she defended herself like a child to a disgruntled parent.
“I … I … can’t help it,” she sobbed, “I didn’t mean to … to …”
“I know,” he answered, the deep timbre of his voice sending a chill up her spine. He took the clutched blanket from her cold hands and Martay felt herself being gently eased down onto the cot. Every nerve in her body cried out against what she knew was about to happen.
She was flat on her back now, her tear-filled eyes on his dark face. The blood was pounding in her ears. Any second she would hear the ripping of her clothes as those dark hands callously stripped her. She tried to lift her arms, to hit at him, but she couldn’t do it.
The force of his presence was too strong, too powerful. She was conquered by it as surely as if he had beaten her into submission. She could do nothing but lie here, his subdued captive, praying silently that the cruel, hard mouth would not be too punishing on her trembling lips, that the dark, deft hands would be gentle on her sensitive flesh, that the lean, lithe body would be mercifully quick in its intimate invasion of her own tense body.
12
A
look of cold determination on his starkly chiseled face, he bent to her. Martay, staring up at him from frightened tear-filled eyes, couldn’t stifle the grateful sob that tore from her lips when finally she realized his true intention. Instead of tearing the clothes from her, the Indian swiftly unfolded the blanket and spread it neatly over her chilled, jerking body. Meticulously tucking it in around her bare shoulders, he straightened, looked down at her, and said, “Night, Captive.”
“Th-thank y-you,” she sputtered, confused, relieved.
He went back to his post in the doorway and Martay, slowly turning her head to watch him, wondered for the thousandth time what this strange abduction was all about. Puzzling over it, she lay there in the moonlight, determined she’d stay awake all night. She didn’t trust the Sioux, not for a minute. Likely he found this cat-and-mouse game amusing in a dark, sinister way. She was not fooled. While he appeared to have a human side, she could not forget his true nature was that of a wild, untamed savage.
Martay was soon yawning sleepily.
She blinked, trying desperately to keep her eyes open, to remain wideawake. But she was so tired and the soft blanket was so warm and the raven-haired man was so quiet. She drifted off to sleep. At some point during the night, she awakened. The moon was still high. She looked immediately toward the door. It was empty. Her dark jailor was not there.
Before she’d had time to consider escape, she heard a step, and caught sight of him outside. He was walking directly toward the shack and he was shirtless again. Moonlight shimmered on his bare wet shoulders and the thick black hair of his head. The idle thought skipped through Martay’s sleepy brain that he had lied. Indians did bathe. That’s where he’d been. He’d waited until she slept, then slipped up to the stream for a bath. Her eyes sliding back closed, she inhaled deeply, her half-slumbering senses foggily recalling the clean masculine scent of his sun-heated flesh when they’d crouched atop the rocks earlier that day.
When next Martay awakened, bright sunlight was filling the cabin and her captor was nowhere to be seen. She bolted upright. Wary of a trap, she carefully pulled back the blanket, swung her legs to the floor, and stood up, looking all about. Hastily pushing her long, tangled hair behind her ears, she started for the door.
On the stoop she paused, looking around, unable to believe her good fortune. He was gone. The mean-faced Indian was gone! Perhaps he had fallen asleep somewhere out in the woods. Thinking of nothing but flight, Martay rushed down the steps and to the path leading from the hut. Scolding herself for forgetting her slippers, she picked her way along, carefully scaling a network of huge, smooth rocks. Topping the last skyward-pointing boulder, she stopped, looked down, and shook her head.
Tons and tons of fallen rock, pushed from higher up in the mountains, had fallen to construct a natural fortress, completely concealing the small shack and making it impossible to get down or up. The tumbled boulders, the work of a gigantic rock slide, had left room-sized stones stair-stepped down the mountain; the distance from one to the other as much as eight feet.
A hot summer wind was blowing through the mountains, scattering tiny pebbles about, pushing them down the enormous monoliths. The sound of the skittering stones striking the solid rock in their descent before soundlessly coming to rest far down the mountain made it disappointingly clear that an attempt to get down would be suicidal.
The force of the winds blew Martay’s loose hair about her face and pressed the silk of her dress against her willowy frame. A dark cloud passed over the brilliant sun and a few huge, wet drops of rain hissed on the rocks. Then the sun reappeared, brighter than ever.
Martay stood there atop the precipice, frustrated, wondering how she could possibly get to the valley below, unaware of the black eyes calmly watching her.
He stood, rigid, on a ledge just above, his moccasined feet wide apart, his arms crossed over his chest. A muscle jerked beside his full mouth. His eyes had been on her from the moment she came from the shack.
What a beauty she was, standing there barefoot, her classic profile etched against the clear blue sky, her golden hair afire in the summer sunlight. The wind was whipping the shimmering tresses about her head and molding the white dress to her slender, tempting curves. Her bare shoulders were proudly erect, her chin raised defiantly high.
The title Golden Girl fitted her. She was exactly that, with her white perfumed skin and red petulant lips and heavily lashed emerald eyes and spun-gold hair. Standing there in the sun and wind, the exquisite golden girl looked as proud and untamed, as untouched and unspoiled, as the glorious scenery framing her fair golden beauty. There was about her an appealing blend of helplessness and haughtiness that made him want to take her in his arms and protect her, yet at the same time forcefully bend her to his will. And she exuded an innocent sensuality that was far too alluring for her own good. Or for his.
His lids slid low. Suddenly he was unreasonably angry with her.
She didn’t belong here. And he didn’t want her here.
He wanted only her father.
Silently he scaled the rocks down to her. Aware that if he called out it would startle her and she might tumble over the cliffs, he made no sound as he came up behind her.
Softly he spoke at the exact instant his arms enclosed her. She screamed and briefly struggled, calling him names, before going limp against him. If Martay’s heart was beating fast, his was beating faster. Suddenly there was a different kind of tension between them as they stood there in the wind and the rain atop the rocky promontory on that hot August morning. Both felt it. Both fought it.
He recognized it for exactly what it was. Martay did not. She knew only that every time she was near this man, held in his arms this way, she felt a strange excitement that was separate and apart from her fear of him. Never had she experienced anything like it before. The hot-cold, dizzying sensation puzzled her.
It made her captor angry. Made him want to hurt her, to cast her roughly away from him. Or to roughly draw her closer. Standing there behind her, his arms wrapped tightly around her, her warm, slender body leaning against his, he shut his eyes, inhaled her sweet scent, and silently cursed her for her desirability. And himself for his damnable weakness.