Before she could apologize, Bronco said in a quiet oddly uninvolved voice, “History? I don’t think so. That was only a small part of the group-just a training camp for the militia, actually. The Sons of Liberty have cells-subsidiary groups-and bases of operation all over the country. They’re not finished yet-far from it.”

“Well,” Lauren retorted, “your leader certainly is.”

“You know for a fact?” Bronco asked, and then was silent.

Oh, Lord, Lauren thought, and miserably closed her eyes. He didn’t deserve that, either. Who would have supposed she possessed such a mean streak? Rocked by the motion of the horse’s unhurried gait and wrapped in a blanket of dry desert heat, she let her mind drift, carried along on streams of memory through all the conversations she’d had with Bronco, about Bronco, reprises of her own thoughts and observations and discoveries…

He’s a half-breed Apache-kid never had a chance.

Helped him straighten himself out after he got kicked out of the military.

I do owe Gil McCullough a lot. He gave me a chance when nobody else would.

I owe more to him than I do to the government that’s been cheating, killing, starving, stealing and lying to my people.

Hunted to the last man…

Ol’ Gil looks out for me.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured, then cleared her throat and repeated it in a louder voice, but stiffly, too, self-conscious all of a sudden. “I’m sorry-I know how close you are to Gil McCullough.” Bronco didn’t reply, and his rigid back gave nothing away. After a moment she went on, haltingly at first, then warming to her theme as the words he’d spoken in her daydream came vividly to her mind. “I can understand why you feel such a strong loyalty to him, after everything he’s done for you. I mean, as you said, he was there for you when nobody else was. And I can see why you’d be attracted to a group like his. From your perspective, considering all the terrible injustices committed against your people over the years, why would you feel allegiance to the United States? In a way it’s surprising there aren’t more Indians involved in these antigovernment organizations. I’d think it would even be understandable-”

“We tried it on our own, remember?” Bronco cut in roughly. “We got our asses kicked.”

He added a grudging, “Hang on!” just barely in time to warn her before Cochise Red erupted into a gallop.

Chapter 11

He might have let the stallion have his head, anyway, just for the hell of it, here where the upper canyon opened onto a highland plateau, like a grassy blanket thrown across the shoulders of the Scared Mountain, shimmering in a haze of sunlight beyond the screen of timber. But Bronco’s heart was black and heavy, his thoughts as turbulent as the thunderheads piled up around him on all horizons. Instead of riding for the enjoyment of the speed and power of the great animal under him and the unexpected and forbidden pleasure of a lithe and slender woman pressed against his back, he raced to keep the demons of his own thoughts at bay.

I understand…why would you…why…

But he held them off, those thoughts, fought them as if his life depended on it. And maybe it did. Self-doubt had always been his mortal enemy; early in his life it had nearly destroyed him. Now, at the first hint of its return, he was determined to vanquish it with any means at hand.

He blamed that self-doubt, along with its distractions-the confusion in his mind and the fear in his heart-for what happened next. So focused was he on outrunning the anger and the fear that he didn’t see trouble coming until it was almost too late. Until he felt the powerful body between his thighs tense and gather itself and a moment later felt the shuddering expulsion of a stallion’s battle scream.

Like an echo the reply came, and then Bronco saw them, too. Wild horses!

Damn. This was trouble. Trouble he should have been able to avoid. He’d known the herd was apt to still be in the area. He should have been on the lookout for them.

“Uh-oh,” he said under his breath, and then to Lauren, “Hang on!” as the two mares galloped by in helter-skelter confusion, ears pricked and eyes wild, and Cochise Red flattened his ears and lowered his head to charge. He heard her sharp gasp, felt her hands clutch at his belt, then almost convulsively wrap themselves tightly around him.

Then he was too busy to think of anything except how he was going to bring that crazy horse back under control before he got them all killed. Red was well trained, but instinct was stronger than any training. Right now the stallion was oblivious to the presence of a saddle and two human beings on his back, didn’t know or care that his ability to fight was going to be limited by the steel bit between his teeth. The bloodlust had taken him; adrenaline was pumping, he was spoiling for battle, and nothing Bronco could do was going to stop him.

He could only hope the wild stallion had more sense.

Bronco could see him now, up ahead and off to the left, a rusty battle-scarred black just emerging from the dust cloud thrown up by his fleeing herd. As the stallion came racing out, head down and ears flattened, to meet this threat to his dominion, Bronco braced his thighs against the pommel of the saddle, rose high in the stirrups and gave forth with a bloodcurdling yell, at the same time waving both arms wildly, like someone hell-bent on flagging down a bus. The black veered suddenly, slowing his charge, then circled around, shaking his head uncertainly. Bronco yelled again and waved his arms, and the black wheeled and went galloping off after his herd.

After that, it took only some gentle words and strong hands to bring Cochise Red back under control. Bronco elected to let the big bay run himself out, burn off his unspent adrenaline, before he pulled him up, blowing and trembling and drenched with sweat, in the shade of some pines at the meadow’s edge. A moment later the mares joined them-to be met with an angry squeal, lashing hooves and flashing teeth. Bronco laughed out loud, full of a strange kind of euphoria, now that the crisis was over. He bent to stroke the stallion’s sweat-slick neck, murmuring reassurances as he prepared to dismount, but halted, body tensed and half-turned in the saddle, when he heard a faint sound.

Lauren. His heart leaped guiltily into his throat. In the excitement he’d all but forgotten her. Recovering, he inquired with no more than understandable gruffness, “You okay back there?”

Instead of answering, she asked in a high angry voice, “Why did he do that?”

“Red? You mean, just now, with the mares?” Bronco chuckled, pretending nonchalance. “Aw, he was just chastising them, keeping them in line-reminding them who’s their lord and master.” He swung his leg over the saddle horn and dropped to the ground, then turned to offer Lauren a hand.

That was when he saw how set and pale her face was, and the fear and confusion in her eyes. The euphoria left him, and he felt chastened and ashamed. “Come on,” he urged gently as he reached for her and eased his arm around her waist.

For a moment more she resisted, refusing to look at him and clinging obstinately to the saddle skirt. He gave her an encouraging tug; she made a small sound-a furious whim per. Then suddenly she changed her mind, transferring her hands from the saddle to his shoulders, and allowed him to ease her down and into his arms.

He pulled her into a one-armed hug-taking no chances, he still kept a firm grip on the stallion’s reins-and she laid her head against his shoulder and hid her face in the curve of his neck and jaw. For a long time they just stood like that, he with his cheek resting on her hair and his heart beating like a jackhammer, Lauren breathing unevenly and trying not to tremble. He wanted to stroke her, pet her, comfort her with soft words and hard kisses. But he couldn’t. Didn’t dare.

After a minute, calling up all the reinforcements he could muster of will, responsibility and honor, he gave her sweat-damp head a nudge with his chin. “Hey, what’d you do with my hat?”

She gave a sharp sniffly laugh and pulled away from him, briefly swiping her nose with the back of her hand. She didn’t say anything-didn’t have to; the tears shimmering in her eyes were punishment enough. Then, since he felt lousy and sorry and full of yearnings he couldn’t assuage, and because he didn’t know what else to do about them, he got angry.

“I don’t know what you’re so upset about,” he muttered, irrationally wounded. He turned his back on the woman and her accusing eyes and began to walk the stallion into the trees. Behind him he heard the crashing noises the mares made as they followed at a discreet distance and, after a suspenseful interval, the sound he’d been straining his ears for-the crunch of human footsteps in pine needles, hurrying to catch up.

“I’m not upset,” Lauren said as she stumbled into step beside him. But her voice was breathless, tense and trembling. “Try terrified. As in, scared out of my wits.”

Bronco glanced at her. His heart began to beat faster. “What for? You weren’t in any danger.” It was a bald faced lie and he knew it. Nevertheless he felt entirely justified in adding bitterly, “I’d think you could trust me just a little.”

Her bark of laughter made him wince. “Trust you? This from the man who kidnapped me?”

He swung around to face her, blocking her way. “I’m also the man who saved your life,” he retorted. “Don’t forget that.”

As she was staring at him, eyes wide and incredulous, cheeks flushed, seething, it occurred to him that it was probably the dumbest, most asinine conversation he’d ever had with a woman in his life. That it was making him feel-and act-about eleven years old. And that he didn’t have any idea in the world how to fix it.

All he seemed able to do was stare back at her, with his heart thumping and his breath like fire in his lungs, while thunder rumbled way off in the distance and the muggy monsoon heat rolled in around him.

And then, as he stared at her, it came to him gradually that the anger inside him had gone, and in its place was a great quietness. It was the quietness, the peace, that comes with certainty. Suddenly he knew, absolutely knew, what was going to happen-what had to happen-if he didn’t find some way to stop himself from kissing her.

Stop himself? It would have been easier to stop his own beating heart.

In the instant when he knew for certain what he was going to do, he sucked in a breath-and panic knifed through him like an Arctic blast. It was something like the way he’d felt-oh, long long years ago-the very first time he’d prepared to hurl his warm body into water deeper than he was tall. When he reached for Lauren, when he felt her body, lithe and resistant in the curve of his arm, he knew the same moment of utter certainty that he’d just done something incredibly foolish and possibly fatal. When he looked into her shocked eyes, felt her breath flow hot across his lips, he knew he was going to drown.

But then, as it had happened to him all those years before, just when things seemed farthest beyond recall, he knew an almost overwhelming sense of relief, redemption and joy.

Forgive me, he prayed, to no one, to everyone. And then he kissed her.

She did resist a little at first, breath gusting in a small shocked gasp, hands fisting against his chest, spine arching backward in the automatic but futile attempt to postpone the moment of contact with that unyielding body. But he must have known it was only instinctive, a reflex, like a horse shying away from the first touch of the saddle. Because he ignored it and, instead, pulled her lower body hard against him and swooped forward to claim her with a swift and fluid grace, like a cougar springing.

She felt the heat of his body, the coiled tension in his muscles, and the bottom dropped out of her stomach. She felt the strength ebbing from her own muscles, and instead of pushing against his chest, found herself clutching his arms, his shoulders, his neck, sure they were all that kept her from falling. She had one stunning glimpse of his warrior’s eyes, fierce and hot and black as coals, before his mouth came down and covered hers, and then, like a patient slipping under anesthetic, her mind simply left her.

Off it drifted, with its questions and confusion, its troubled doubts and self-disgust, leaving her in a state of utter peace and profound relief, where the only thing that mattered was what she felt, right now, this minute. No more asking herself, why? How could she feel this way about this man? The very last man she should feel anything for at all! For some reason she would probably never understand, her heart had chosen him. That was enough. In that single moment when his mouth claimed hers, she knew it was exactly what she’d wanted-had been wanting, des perately wanting-for a very long time. Probably from the first moment he’d touched her, there on the dance floor in Smoky Joe’s Bar and Grill.