Reckless Love

Chapter Thirty-Five

"My God." Ty knelt in the dirt and gritty dust of the ruins and looked up at Janna for a long moment. With hands that were none too steady, he refastened the old saddlebags. "It's gold. All of it. Sweet Jesus. When Mad Jack talked about gold, I thought he meant a few pokes, not two big saddlebags jammed full to overflowing." Ty looked at his hands as though hardly able to believe the wealth that they had held. "Pure. Gold."

Ty lifted the bags and stood with a grunt of effort. Janna watched him with wide gray eyes. His words had meant little to her. Even the sight of the gold hadn't made it seem real to her; but watching the saddlebags make Ty's muscular arms bunch and quiver made the gold's weight all too real. She had tested that male strength, seen Ty's power and stamina and determination; and she knew that it wouldn't be enough.

Man on foot carryin' gold ain't gonna do nothin' out there but die.

"You can't take it all," Janna said.

"Doesn't weigh much more than you," Ty said, "but dead weight is the hardest kind to carry." He shook his head in continuing disbelief. "When I get back to camp and get my hands on that crazy old man, I'm going to ask him how the hell he got these saddlebags into the valley."

"Maybe he's been bringing the gold in a poke at a time."

Ty grunted. "If so, he didn't leave any more tracks between here and the slot than the wind. Anyhow, it doesn't matter. I'm not taking a quarter of his gold and he's not staying behind to get spitted and roasted by Cascabel. Like it or not, that old man's coming out with us."

Janna didn't argue or point out the difficulties in taking a third person when there was only one horse to ride. She felt as Ty did about leaving Mad Jack behind.

Finally Janna had realized that staying in the valley was the equivalent of a death sentence. Mad Jack was correct: the only reason she had been safe during the past years was that she had been more trouble to track down than she was worth to Cascabel. That was no longer true. Cascabel now believed that she was all that was standing between himself and the conquest of the Utah Territory.

Unhappily Janna followed Ty as he picked his way out of the crumbling ruins that filled the small side canyon. Once out in the meadow again, the walking was easier. Lucifer and Zebra waited out in the middle of the grass. The stallion was restive. He kept watching the willows that fringed the valley as though he expected a predator to leap out. Zebra was calmly grazing, not nearly as upset by Mad Jack's presence as Lucifer was.

"We could rig a surcingle for Zebra," Janna said, spotting the mare. "That way she could carry the saddlebags and your pack while we walked."

Ty gave her a sideways look that was little more than a flash of green.

"Zebra can't carry both of us and the gold, too," Janna pointed out.

"She can carry you and the gold if it comes to that. All you have to do is get her used to a hackamore and a surcingle."

"But what about you?"

"That's my problem."

White teeth sank into Janna's lower lip as she bit off her retort. She closed her eyes and silently asked for Lucifer's forgiveness. But there was really no choice. If he could be broken to ride, it had to be done.

"Be as gentle with Lucifer as you can," she said in a low voice, "but don't hurt yourself in the process, Ty. Promise me that you'll be careful. He's so strong and so quick." She looked at the stallion standing poised in the meadow, his big body rippling with strength, his ears erect, his head up, sniffing the wind. "And he's so wild. Much wilder than Zebra."

"Not with you. He comes up and puts his head in your hands like a big hound."

"Then why won't you let me be the one to break him?" Janna's voice was tightened by fear and exasperation. She and Ty had argued about just this thing since the moment Mad Jack had pointed out that a man on foot didn't have much chance of surviving.

"God save me from stubborn women," muttered Ty. "I've spent the last half hour telling you why. That stud's big enough to buck you into next week and you know it. I sure as hell know it! You're quick and determined as they come, but that's no substitute for sheer strength if Lucifer goes crazy the first time he feels a rider's weight."

Impatiently Ty shifted the slippery leather connecting the saddlebags. When the bags were in a more secure position over his shoulder he continued his argument. "Besides, you'll have your hands full talking Zebra into a hackamore and surcingle. She's not going to like that belly strap worth a damn. I'm going to rig stirrups for you, too. She won't like those, either, but it's the only way you and that old man stand a chance of staying on if we have to run for it. One of you has to be stuck on tight enough so the other has something to hang on to."

Janna opened her mouth to object but didn't. She had lost this argument, too, and she knew it. She hadn't wanted to put restraints on Zebra, yet there was little rational choice. If their lives were going to depend on their mounts, the riders had to have more than intangible communication with their horses. Particularly if she and Mad Jack were going to be riding double.

"Once we get to Wyoming, you can go back to riding Zebra any way you want," Ty said. "Hell, you can let her run wild again for all of me. But not until then, Janna. Not until you're safe."

Closing her eyes, she nodded in defeat. "I know."

Ty gave Janna a surprised look. He had expected a fierce battle over the necessity of introducing any real control over Zebra. Janna's unhappy expression told him just how much the concession cost her. Without thinking about his vow not to touch her again, he took Janna's hand and squeezed it gently.

"It's all right, sugar. Even with a hackamore and surcingle, you aren't forcing Zebra to obey you. You aren't strong enough to force an animal her size. Anytime Zebra lets you up on her back, it's because she wants you there. All the hackamore will do is make sure Zebra knows where you want her to go. After that, it's up to her. It's always that way, no matter what kind of tack the horse wears. Cooperation, not coercion."

The feel of Ty's palm sliding over her own as they walked was like being brushed by gentle lightning. Janna's whole body tingled with the simple pleasure of his touch.

"Thank you," she said, blinking back sudden tears.

"For what?"

"For making me feel better about putting a hackamore on Zebra. And-" Janna squeezed his hand in return "-for understanding. It's frightening having to give up the only home I've ever known."

Knowing he shouldn't, unable to prevent himself, Ty lifted Janna's hand to his face. The long weeks during which he hadn't shaved had softened his beard to the texture of coarse silk. He rubbed his cheek against her palm, inhaled her scent and called himself twelve kinds of fool for not touching her in the past four weeks-and fifty kinds of fool for touching her now.

She wasn't a whore or a convenience. She was a woman who appealed to him more witfe every moment he spent in her company. Her sensuality was like quicksand, luring him deeper and deeper until he was trapped beyond hope of escape. But she didn't mean to be a trap any more than he meant to be trapped. He was sure of it. That was what made her feminine allure all the more irresistible.

With aching tenderness Ty kissed Janna's palm before he forced himself to let go of her hand. The loss of her touch was a physical pain. The realization appalled him.

God in heaven. I'm as stupid as that damned unicorn being drawn to his captivity and not able to pull away to save his life, much less his freedom.

Abruptly Ty shifted the heavy gold to his other shoulder, using the saddlebags as a barrier between himself and Janna. She barely noticed. She was still caught in the instant when his hand had been sharply withdrawn. It had been like having her sense of balance betray her on a steep trail, leaving her floundering. She looked at Ty questioningly, only to see a forbidding expression that promised unhappiness for anyone asking questions of a personal nature, especially questions such as Why haven't you touched me? Why did you touch me just now? Why did you stop as though you could no longer bear my touch?

"Will you take the gold on Lucifer?" Janna asked after a silence. She forced her voice to be almost normal, although her palm still felt his caresses as though Ty's beard had been black flames burning through her flesh to the bone beneath.

"He's strong enough to take the gold and me both and still run rings around any other horse."

"Then you'll have to use a surcingle on him, too, either for stirrups or to hold the saddlebags in place or both."

"The thought had occurred to me," Ty said dryly. "First time he feels that strap bite into his barrel should be real interesting."

Ty shifted the gold on his shoulder again and said no more. In silence they continued toward the camp beneath the red stone overhang. Janna felt no need to speak, for the simple reason that there was little more to say. Either Lucifer would accept a rider or he wouldn't. If he didn't, the odds for survival against Cascabel were too small to be called even a long shot.

"We have to talk Mad Jack into leaving the gold behind," Janna said finally.

Ty had been thinking the same thing. He also had been thinking about how he would feel in Mad Jack's shoes-old, ill, eaten up with guilt for past mistakes, seeing one chance to make it all right and die with a clean conscience.

"It's his shot at heaven," Ty said.

"It's our ticket straight to hell."

"Try convincing him."

"I'm going to do just that."

Janna's chin came up and she quickened her pace, leaving Ty behind. But when she strode into camp, all that was there of Mad Jack was a piece of paper held down by a stone. On the paper he had painfully written the closest town to the farm he had abandoned so many years ago. Beneath that were the names of his five children.

"Jack!" Janna called. "Wait! Comeback!"

No voice answered her. She turned and sprinted toward the meadow.

"What's wrong?" Ty demanded.

"He's gone!"

"That crafty old son of a bitch." Ty swore and dropped the heavy saddlebags with a thump. "He knew what would happen when we found out how much gold there was to haul out of here. He took our promise to get his gold to his children and then he ran like the hounds of hell were after him."

Janna raised her hands to her mouth. A hawk's wild cry keened across the meadow. Zebra's head came up and she began trotting toward them.

"What are you going to do?" Ty asked.

"Find him. He's too old to have gotten far in this short a time."

Ty all but threw Janna up on top of Zebra. Instants later the mare was galloping on a long diagonal that would end at the narrow entrance to the valley.

By the time they arrived at the slot, Zebra was beginning to sweat both from the pace and from the urgency she sensed in her rider. Janna flung herself off the mare and ran to the twilight shadow of the slot canyon.

Heedless of the uncertain footing, she plunged forward. She didn't call Mad Jack's name, however; she didn't want the call to echo where it might be overheard by passing renegades.

No more than fifty feet into the slot, Janna sensed that something was wrong. She froze in place, wondering what her instincts were trying to tell her.

There was no unexpected sound. No unexpected scent. No moving shadows. No sign that she wasn't alone.

"That's what's wrong," Janna whispered. "There's no sign at all!"

She went onto her hands and knees, but no matter how hard she examined the ground, the only traces of any passage over the dry stream course were those she herself had just left.

Zebra's head flew up in surprise when Janna hurtled back into the valley from the slot.

"Easy, girl. Easy," Janna said breathlessly.

She swung onto the mare. Within moments a rhythmic thunder was again rolling from beneath Zebra's hooves. When she galloped past Lucifer, he lifted his head for an instant, then resumed biting off succulent mouthfuls of grass, undisturbed by the pair racing by. In past summers, Zebra and Janna often had galloped around while he grazed.

"Well?" Ty demanded when the mare galloped into the campsite.

"He's still in the valley. You take the left side and I'll take the right."

Ty looked out over the meadow. "Waste of time. He's not here."

"That's impossible. There's not one mark in that little slot canyon that I didn't put there myself. He's still here."

"Then he's between us and Lucifer."

Janna looked to the place where the stallion grazed no more than a hundred feet away. There wasn't enough cover to hide a rabbit, much less a man.

"Why do you say that?" she asked.

"Wind is from that direction. Lucifer stopped testing the wind and settled down to graze about ten minutes ago."

Janna's urgency drained from her, leaving her deflated. If the stallion didn't scent Mad Jack it was because Mad Jack wasn't around to be scented.

Grimly Janna looked at the heavy saddlebags, an old man's legacy to a life he had abandoned years before. It was too heavy a burden-but it was theirs to bear. Her only consolation was that Ty's share, plus her own, should be enough to buy his dream. She didn't know how much silken ladies cost on the open market, but surely sixty pounds of gold would be enough.

Ty's expression as he looked at the saddlebags was every bit as grim as Janna's. His consolation, however, was different. He figured that Janna's thirty pounds of gold, plus his thirty, would be more than enough to ensure that she would never have to submit her soft body to any man in order to survive.