Elizabeth Lowell - Only His

The fire that hissed and licked over the wood was no hotter than Caleb’s thoughts. Using a knife as long as his forearm, he sliced bacon with a swift savagery, wanting only to get out of camp and find Willow some decent clothes.

Willow watched in fascination as the wicked blade flashed like lightning, leaving behind a pile of evenly sliced meat. She had never seen such skill.

«You’re very good with that knife.»

Caleb’s mouth curved in an ironic smile. «So I’m told, honey. So I’m told.»

Uncertainly, she smiled in return.

«Make yourself useful,» he said without looking up. «See if the coffee water is hot.»

The coolness in Caleb’s voice made Willow remember his cutting comments about not being her personal slave. Shifting the blanket to allow movement, she came to her knees and leaned toward the coffeepot. A lock of her long, bright hair fell forward as she bent over. The curling ribbon of hair came dangerously close to the flames. Before Willow could realize anything was wrong, Caleb’s hard arm had yanked her over onto her back in a tangle of blanket and legs.

«Don’t you know better than to bend over a fire with your hair loose?» he said scathingly. «I swear, fancy lady, you’re more trouble than a fox in a hen house.»

«I’m not a fancy lady, my hair is too wet to burn, and I’m tired of you belittling me!»

Caleb looked at the angry hazel eyes so close to his and the soft lips trembling with outrage. The rest of Willow was trembling, too. She was furious at his contempt and was making no effort to disguise it.

«You’re tired, period,» Caleb said, releasing Willow abruptly. «As for the rest, wet hair burns just fine and I’ll stop making comments about your uselessness when you start being useful.»

With unnerving swiftness, he stood and went to the place where the pack saddles were. A few moments later he returned with a blue wool shirt that was so dark it was almost black. The shirt was cut in the cavalry style, with a wedge-shaped front opening that could be unbuttoned down either side. Most of the shirts Willow had seen made like that had sported shiny brass buttons. Caleb’s did not. Buttons of dark horn gleamed dully in the firelight.

It occurred to Willow that nothing of Caleb’s was bright or shiny. Saddle, bridle, clothes, spurs, even thegunbelt he wore — not one item had any of the silverconchas or other decorations men often used to catch the eye. She doubted that it was lack of money that kept Caleb’s gear plain. Nothing that he owned was second class or shabby. All of it helped him to pass over the wild land without attracting any more notice than a shadow.

«I know it isn’t very fancy,» Caleb drawled, holding out the shirt to Willow, «but it will save you having to pretend modesty when the blanket slips.»

Not understanding what Caleb meant, Willow followed the direction of his glance. The blanket had slipped until only the taut rise of her nipple prevented the cloth from falling completely away from her breast. With a gasp, Willow snatched up the blanket with both hands and turned her back to the fire. Golden light flickered and danced caressingly over her skin, making her look as though she were a carving made of luminous amber.

Caleb’s fingers tightened around his shirt. He dropped the piece of clothing on Willow and went back to work on dinner, trying to forget the sensual promise of her breast and the elegant beauty of her back rising from the dark folds of his blanket. But he couldn’t forget. He could only remember again and again.

Angry because he couldn’t control his thoughts — much less the hard, unruly response of his body — Caleb cooked bacon in a silence that wasn’t broken even when Willow awkwardly began preparing biscuits one-handed. The other hand was fully occupied hanging onto the blanket to make certain it stayed wrapped around her waist and legs. His shirt fit her like a greatcoat, with the neck sagging down to reveal the delicate lines of her collar bones and the hollow of her throat.

Between shirt and blanket, Willow was largely successful in keeping herself covered. The moments when the blanket opened to reveal curving legs and velvet shadows were few, but they went into Caleb like knives, reminding him of the beauty that lay concealed beneath wool folds.

After dinner, Caleb added more wood to the fire, threw a tarpaulin down on the ground, and turned to Willow. She watched him warily, sensing that he was angry and not knowing why. A more experienced woman would have known the source of Caleb’s raw temper, but Willow wasn’t experienced. All she understood was that Caleb was riding the fine edge of his self-control.

«Can you use a shotgun?» he asked abruptly.

«Yes.»

Caleb’s long arm reached past Willow to the big log, where he had placed both his repeating rifle and his short-barrelledshotgun within easy reach. Willow flinched in the instant before she realized that he wasn’t going to touch her. His mouth tightened at her retreat, but he said nothing as he lifted the shotgun. With the quick, expert motions of a man who has done something countless times before, he pulled the shotgun from its protective buckskin scabbard.

«Take it.»

Willow took the shotgun. Despite its shortened barrel, it was heavy, but she had been expecting the weight. She braced herself and made certain that the barrel didn’t cover anything but the night sky. Caleb nodded with satisfaction. Her actions told him more clearly than any words that she had handled a big gun before.

«It’s loaded,» he said curtly.

She smiled oddly. «Not much use otherwise, is it?»

«Do you know how to reload it?»

«Yes.»

He tossed a small box into her lap. «Forty shells. If any are gone when I get back, I better see a carcass or blood on the ground.»

«Get back? Where are you going?»

«There’s a settlement a few miles away. I want to find out if anyone’s on our trail.»

«How could they be? We’ve done nothing but ride in darkness and rain.»

Caleb looked at Willow through narrowed golden eyes. «Everyone in Denver knew we were headed into the San Juan region. Everyone with the sense to tell up from down knows that the SanJuans are south and west from Denver. The country is damned empty, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to move in. There are only a handful of good passes and all the trails lead to them.»

He waited expectantly. Willow said nothing.

«There are only two good ways to get where we’re going,» Caleb continued, his voice rough. «One is out of Canyon City up a branch of the Arkansas River over a pass and down to the Gunnison River. That gets you to the northern edge of the San Juan country. Or you can go about seventy miles farther south down the front of the Rockies, then cut through the Sangre de Cristo range and pick up the Rio Grande del Norte around Alamosa and head northwest. That brings you to the southeast edge of the SanJuans.»

Caleb waited again. Willow watched him intently but offered no comment.

«Are you listening to me, fancy lady?» he demanded impatiently.

«Yes.»

«If I know where we have to go, so does anyone who wants to follow us,» he said impatiently. «So which route should we take — Canyon City or Alamosa?»

Willow frowned as she visualized again the map that had come with one of Matthew’s letters and now lay within the lining of her big carpetbag. Canyon City had been mentioned. So had Alamosa. So had other cities. None had been preferred. All had been suggested as possible routes, depending on where the Moran brothers started from. Matt had knows that his letter probably would have to be forwarded to wherever his brothers had gone, so he had shown routes to the San Juan country beginning everywhere from West Virginia to Texas and California to Canada.

But Matt hadn’t shown where his gold mine was. He had simply marked five mountain peaks in the San Juan country and trusted his brothers to find him.

«Matt lives on the western watershed of the Great Divide,» Willow said slowly. «The Gunnison is the major river draining the part of the watershed where Matt is.»

Caleb grunted. «That river drains a lot of country. Canyon City is closer to the northern watershed of the Gunnison, but the Alamosa route takes lower passes.»

«Shouldn’t we just go the quickest way?»

«Hell of an idea,» he said sardonically. «If I had a fortune teller’s crystal, I’d know just what to do. But I don’t, so I’ll go on down south a bit and see if anyone knows what the passes are like between here and there.» Caleb turned away, talking as he went. «Let the fire go out. I’ve picketed Ishmael up the ravine and the mares below us. You hear anything stirring up the horses, you grab that shotgun and fade into the nearest thicket. I’ll signal before I come in.»

«How will I know it’s you?»

As Caleb turned back toward her, his right hand moved to his back pocket and then to his mouth with a swift precision that Willow found unexpected in such a big man. Suddenly a haunting chord was breathed into the night, a harmonic shivering as eerie as the howling of a wolf. The harmonica vanished with the same speed that it had appeared.

Before Willow could speak, Caleb had been swallowed up by the night. She heard thehoofbeats of two horses fading down the ravine, then silence.

After a few minutes the normal sounds of the night resumed, smallscurryings and insects rasping. The crackle of the fire seemed very loud, the flames too bright. Gingerly Willow pulled branches back from the fire. Flames shrank, then vanished but for occasional incandescent tongues flaring over coals. In time, even those died to bare gleams against the ashes.

Willow curled up on the tarpaulin, the shotgun next to her, her head resting on the sidesaddle. Despite her reluctance to let down her guard, she quickly fell asleep, too exhausted to fight the needs of her body any longer.

Carefully Caleb guided his horse through the blustery pre-dawn landscape, knowing that a settlement was nearby and men might be about. It was doubtful anyone would be stirring in this weather, but he couldn’t afford to take chances. He had no intention of going all the way to the nearest settlement, but he had to reach Wolfe’s home without attracting attention.

Thank God that Wolfe isn’t the sociabletype, Calebtold himself as he rode along a small watercourse that led to the loghouse. Iwon’t have to worry about him having talkative company staying over.

No light showed in the window of the log house. No one was moving around the corral or outbuildings.

«Looking for someone?»

The voice was cool, clipped, and came from behind Caleb.

«Hello, Wolfe,» Caleb said, holding his hands where they would be clearly visible in the rising light of dawn. «Friendly as ever, I see.»

There was the sound of a gun beinguncocked. «Hello, Cal. Couldn’t tell if it was you, Reno, or some other oversized white man.»

Caleb smiled. «Could have been an Indian.»

«Not damned likely. Indians have better sense than to be abroad on a night like this.» As he spoke, Wolfe walked out from the cover of a tall cottonwood. He moved with the lithe, silent stride of a man accustomed to surviving in wild country. «Get down and stay for a fewdays, amigo. Deuce could use the rest, from the look of him. So could Trey.»

«So could I. Can’t do it, though.»

Silently, Wolfe watched Caleb with eyes as dark as obsidian. In full sunlight Wolfe’s eyes were indigo, betraying the British heritage of his father. At night, however, he looked every bit his Cheyenne mother’s son. At all times he was a man other men walked carefully around.

«Getting close to Reno?» Wolfe asked finally, his voice neutral. He had met both Caleb and Reno separately, and liked both men. He didn’t know why Caleb was hunting Reno. Caleb had never said and Wolfe had never asked.

«Right now I’ve got other cattle to brand. I left a woman in a ravine a few miles north of here. She needs dry clothes.»

«Might her name be Willow Moran?» Wolfe asked mildly.

Caleb hissed a curse. «Word travels too damned fast.»

«A lot of folks were glad to see Johnny Slater get his comeuppance.» Wolfe’s smile was like an unsheathed knife. «Kid Coyote. Hell of a moniker. He’ll never live it down. He’s gunning for you.»

«If he’s lucky, he won’t find me.»

«He’ll find you if you go up through Canyon City,» Wolfe said flatly. «He’s lying in wait at the trailhead with half of Slater’s bunch. The other half is raising dust for the Rio Grande.»