Winter Fire (25 page)

“Conner could—” she began.

“No,” Ute and Case said as one.

“Whoever guards you will be a target,” Case explained. “Conner hasn't had much practice at that.”

Ute nodded. “Good boy, but he lacks seasoning.”

“I don't want Conner put in danger because of me,” she said tightly. “I don't want anyone put in—”

“I'll see to Sarah,” Case interrupted, looking at Hunter, “except when you need me to scout Spring Canyon.”

“I'm not bad on the stalk,” Morgan said to no one in particular. “Particularly at night.”

Ute grinned. “You almost got me over to Mexico.”

“I came real close,” Morgan agreed.

“You still hunting me?”

Sarah stiffened and stared at Morgan.

“I sure did love that pony you stole,” Morgan said wistfully. “But no, I'm not hunting you anymore. Unless I find you near my ponies…”

Ute chuckled.

“Plenty horses now,” he said. “Conner and Sarah sweet talk them wild ones. Mustangs take to them like flies to jam.”

Hunter looked between the two men and nodded, satisfied that there would be no trouble.

“I take it you know the country best,” he said to Ute.

The old outlaw grunted, swallowed the last drop of his coffee, and stood up. “I know it.”

“Show me the best lookouts around the ranch,” Hunter said, “the best ambush sites near Spring Canyon, which canyons are blind and which can be climbed by a man afoot.”

Ute looked at Case.

“If Hunter had been a general,” Case said, “the South would have won the war.”

“Doubt it,” Morgan said.

“So do I,” Hunter muttered. “Tactics are one thing. Repeating rifles are another. Those Yankee rifles were a blazing wonder.”

He stood and looked at Ute.

“Afoot or on horseback?” Hunter asked.

“Ride now. Walk later.”

“When are you due on the rim?” Morgan asked Ute.

“Noon.”

“I'll take noon to sundown,” Morgan said, standing.

He looked at Sarah.

“Thank you for breakfast, ma'am. A man misses a woman's hand at the stove.”

“You're welcome,” she said. “Feeding you is the least I can do. This isn't your fight.”

“Where there's a Culpepper, it's my fight.”

She looked at the suddenly hard lines of Morgan's face and wondered what the Culpeppers had done to him. De
spite her curiosity, she didn't ask. After hearing about Hunter's family, she didn't really want to know anything more about the Culpeppers than where to bury them.

She turned and looked at Hunter.

“Why don't you just shoot them from ambush?” she asked bluntly. “There are ‘Wanted Dead or Alive' posters out on every last one of them.”

“If it were that easy, the Culpeppers would have died in Texas,” he said. “They're real canny when it comes to surviving.”

“I been to their camp,” Ute said. “Next time I kill some.”

“No,” she said. “Not if Conner is with you.”

“You can't protect him forever,” Case said.

“I'll do whatever I have to,” Sarah said coldly. “Conner has the whole world in front of him. I want him to have every bit of it.”

“If it's all the same to you,” Hunter said, looking at Ute, “I'd rather you didn't kick over the beehive until we've had a chance to lay some traps.”

Ute shrugged. “Today. Tomorrow. Next week. Makes no never mind. Them Culpeppers is dead men walking.”

“Are you riding a particular grudge?” Hunter asked.

“They shot Sarah's jacket to rags. Thought it was her. Dead men walking, every last one.”

Surprised, Case looked into Ute's clear black eyes. Before the ambush in the canyon, Ute had simply played pranks on the raiders for the hell of it.

Ute was through playing.

“Ride now?” Ute asked Hunter.

“Ride now,” he agreed dryly. “Walk later.”

“I'll take a look around out back,” Morgan said.

“Don't trip over Conner,” she said. “He's sleeping near one of those clumps of big sage.”

Morgan grinned and headed for the cabin door. “I'll be real fairy-footed, ma'am.”

Hunter and Ute followed Morgan out. The door shut behind them.

Sarah was intensely aware of being alone with Case. Without warning she turned toward him.

He was watching her with smoky green eyes.

“Set some beans to soak,” he said. “I'll saddle Cricket and Shaker.”

“For what?”

“Hunting silver.”

She told herself that the odd little lurch her heart gave had to do with looking for treasure, not with the veiled hunger in his eyes.

“All right, I'll set out the beans,” she agreed.

“Will three packhorses be enough?”

“For all the silver?”

He made a disgusted sound.

“For all the firewood,” he said. “It burns a damned sight better than foolish dreams of silver.”

T
alons of
icy wind raked over the canyon country.

Low, pewter-colored clouds boiled overhead. Where the clouds had stacked up against peaks or plateaus, gray became a blue-black mass concealing the land.

“Smells like snow,” Sarah said.

“If it is, we'll be hunting deer instead of silver tomorrow.”

Case turned up his collar against the wind.

She started to argue but thought better of it. There were extra people to feed. Animal tracks would show clearly against new snow. It was an opportunity they couldn't pass up.

“No argument?” he prodded.

“I like to eat as well as the next person.”

“Wouldn't have guessed it lately. I've had to shove every bite down your throat.”

She ignored him.

He was tempted to bait her. He could handle her anger better than he could the way she avoided looking him in the eye.

Or the way she stepped aside to prevent even the possibility of brushing against him in the small cabin.

What am I so touchy about?
he asked himself grimly.
I told her not to tempt me. She's doing everything she can to avoid it
.

And me
.

Yet, short of vanishing, she couldn't help tempting him unmercifully.

Every moment he was awake, something reminded him of the incandescent sensuality he had discovered beneath her fear. The shine of lamplight on her hair, the scent of roses on her skin, the whispering of the spindle as she made yarn, the curve of her chin as she watched a hawk flying free across the sky…everything about her called to him.

And the natural sway of her body as she rode ahead of him aroused him to the point of pain.

“Come on, you stubborn beasts,” he muttered, pulling on the lead rope.

Very reluctantly the first mustang speeded up. The three packhorses were tied together, and all were of the same mind. They wanted their rumps instead of their heads pointed into the winter wind.

Case looked around the rapidly narrowing canyon. From what he had seen of similar canyons so far, he guessed that the head of this one would be a wall only hawks could get over.

It wasn't a comforting thought. This was the same canyon where the raiders had shot holes in Sarah's jacket.

Another blind canyon
, he thought.
Hope the damned raiders have given up on ambushes
.

Sooner or later, even dumb, bone-lazy outlaws figure out that ambushing me just isn't smart
.

The back of his neck was prickling. He had a clear feeling that someone was watching them. Carefully he examined every high point for the flash of metal or glass that would give away the presence of raiders. He also watched the horses for any sign that they scented more than rock and piñon ahead.

Wonder what Sarah saw while she was dragging fire
wood out of here
, he thought.
Nothing looks promising to me
.

Just one of hundreds of similar canyons. She would have a better chance looking for a horseshoe nail in a haystack the size of Texas
.

Not that the silver mattered to Case. There was plenty of wood to be gathered, and that was all he cared about.

Sarah finally reined in when they were well past the place where they had been ambushed. A barrier of dead trees, boulders, and rubble lay across the canyon like jackstraws.

“I'll just be a minute,” she said, dismounting.

He kicked free of the stirrups, landed running, and caught her arm before she had taken two steps away from her horse.

“Where do you think you're going?” he asked.

His voice was rough with the hunger riding him. The sound of it sent a small shiver through her.

How can I not tempt him when his need is working on my nerves like a file?
she asked.

And so is mine
.

Lord, I never expected to want a man inside my body, and now I can't think about anything except holding Case just as close and hard and deep as I can
.

Nothing ever felt like that. I didn't even know anything could
.

A thrill of heat shot through her that made her breath catch. She wondered if she would ever again know that astonishing, almost frightening ecstasy.

“If you tell me what's on your mind,” he said, “I can help you find it.”

She laughed raggedly and hoped she wasn't blushing.

“I want to climb up that for a better look at the sides of the canyon up ahead,” she said huskily, gesturing toward the mound of rubble.

“If you can see the canyon clearly, a man with a rifle can see
you
clearly.”

“Do you really think—”

“Hell, yes, I really think,” he interrupted impatiently. “You should try thinking too, or you'll end up as full of holes as your damned jacket.”

She swallowed.

“Riding into the wind the way we are,” Case said, “the horses can't scent anyone following us. But I'm betting someone is doing just that.”

Sarah licked her suddenly dry lips.

His hand tightened on her arm as need sank its talons deeply into his body. Then he caught himself and eased his grip.

Even through gloves and heavy clothes, she felt good. Warm and sleek and female.

“What are you looking for?” he asked almost caressingly.

Her mouth went dry. She had seen his eyes like that before, green fire barely banked.

And then he had pressed into her, filling her completely.

“I'm looking for different ruins,” she said huskily. “Not real rooms, but little stone caches built in cracks that are too small to stand upright in.”

“Where?”

“Up canyon. On the south side. I thought I saw something when I was pulling firewood out of that mess.”

Slowly he released her arm.

“I'll look,” he said. “You wait here. If the horses hear something behind us, get under cover and stay there.”

Case began scrambling up the mound of debris. It was a jumble of shattered logs, rock of all sizes, and dirt. The higher he climbed, the more obvious it was that a flood had cleaned out the upper reaches of the canyon sometime in the last few years.

Maybe it was the year Hal tried to pistol-whip Conner once too often
, he thought.

Then he wondered if this might not be the same canyon where Hal had died.

What was it Sarah said?
he asked himself.
Something about the side canyons being full of water and Lost River turning into a muddy flood
.

Using every bit of cover he found, he went to the top of the mound and flattened himself in a crevice. Carefully, thoroughly, he looked at the upper canyon through his spyglass.

Nothing moved but the wind.

He looked again, this time concentrating on the walls of the canyon, where pockets, crevices, and small overhangs had been weathered out of the solid rock.

Finally Case spotted something he thought might be ruins.

Not much to speak of
, he thought.
More like a hunter's cache than a real shelter
.

No matter how carefully he scanned the narrow head of the canyon, he found nothing more impressive. He shifted his focus back to the modest ruins. When he was satisfied that he had found a route up to them, he turned toward the lower canyon again.

Methodically he quartered the middle and lower reaches of Ambush Canyon with the spyglass.

Something flashed down in the mouth of the canyon.

Spyglass, likely
, he decided.
Everywhere we go, someone is watching us
.

Or trying to kill us
.

Case came off the debris pile faster than he had gone up.

“Well?” she asked. “Did you see anything?”

“There's at least one man watching the mouth of the canyon.”

“How close is he?”

“Out of rifle range,” he said succinctly.

She lifted her head and smelled the wind like a wild
creature. Then she smiled. It was a baring of teeth rather than a sign of amusement.

“They'll be real cold down there,” she said. “Storms scour the canyon mouths something fierce.”

“There are some ruins up along the south side of the canyon,” he said. “Nothing much to speak of.”

“Can we get to them from down here?”

“It won't be easy.”

“But we can do it?”

He sighed. “Yes.”

Eagerly she went to one of the pack animals and untied the shovel.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked.

“Are you sure you wouldn't rather—”

“Yes,” she interrupted impatiently. “I'm sure.”

“Hell's fire.”

He went to his saddle and untied two rolled-up blankets. With a few quick slashes of his knife, he made them into thick wool ponchos.

“Put this over your jacket,” he said, holding out one of the ponchos.

“But—”

“Do it without arguing. Just for the hell of it. Just once.”

He jerked the poncho over her hat before she could object again. Their breath mingled when he bent and tugged the poncho in place.

It hung down below her knees.

It was warm.

“Thank you,” she muttered.

“You're welcome,” he said mockingly.

“How anyone can tell me to go to hell and never actually say the words is amazing.”

“Shouldn't be. You manage it with a look.”

With that, Case yanked his own poncho over his jacket, grabbed the shovel, and set off up the jumble of debris once more.

Sarah was right on his heels.

Snow began to fall. The first flakes were soft and airy, swirling like apple blossoms on the wind. Then the wind quickened. The flakes came thicker and faster, clothing the land in a clean white silence.

“We should go back,” he said as soon as he reached the top of the mound.

“What for? Only rain is dangerous in these canyons.”

“What if drifts pile up?”

She shook her head. “Not here. Maybe on up in the high country.”

“What about freezing to death?” he asked sarcastically.

“It's warmer now than it was before it started to snow.”

“Hell,” he muttered.

“At least we won't have to worry about an ambush,” she said matter-of-factly. “You can't see more than twenty feet in front of your face.”

“For these small things, Lord, we are grateful. I think.”

Case turned on his heel and looked up the south side of the canyon again. Though falling snow blotted out most landmarks, he remembered how the wall had looked through the spyglass.

“Stay off my heels,” he said. “If I fall, I don't want to knock you down.”

“Does your leg hurt?” she asked anxiously.

No, but my dumb handle sure does
, he thought.

He could still taste the heat of her startled breath when he had bent over her to pull the poncho in place. Like her scent, her movements, her simple presence, the knowledge of her warmth haunted him.

“Just stay clear of me,” he said through his teeth.

Twenty minutes later he levered himself up over a chest-high lip of stone. The ledge he found beyond was less than six feet deep. The overhang barely gave a man room to sit upright.

More a crevice than an alcove, the ledge ran for about thirty feet before tapering away into a nose of rock. At one time the nose had been a tall red finger of stone, but frost and water had eaten through the softer rock at the base and tumbled the pillar into the canyon. It was impossible to say whether the pillar had tumbled yesterday or a thousand years ago.

A low wall and several storage compartments were built into the crevice with native rock. At first glance, and even at second, it was hard for Case to be certain that the remains of the walls weren't just random debris. The native stone naturally broke into roughly rectangular shapes that required little finishing by man to become small building blocks.

“Are we there yet?” Sarah called up from just below him.

“Such as it is.”

Kneeling, he set the shovel aside, turned, and reached down to help her up onto the ledge. As he did, he spotted what looked like a twisted piece of wood poking out from behind one of the low walls. Turning his head, he looked more closely.

The remains of a buckle were attached to the oddly shaped scrap.

He gave a soft, soundless whistle.

“Grab hold,” he said. “It's warmer up here out of the wind.”

“Are they really ruins?” Sarah asked impatiently. “Sometimes it's hard to tell at a distance.”

“Judge for yourself.”

Saying nothing more, he lifted her onto the ledge.

She crouched on the cold rock and looked around eagerly.

“Watch your head,” he cautioned.

The first thing she saw was something poking out from behind a crumbling wall. She reached for it so quickly
that she banged her head on the low ceiling despite his warning.

She hardly noticed. Her fingers were curled around an ancient leather strap. It had been dried to the consistency of wood by the alternating fire and ice of the stone desert.

“Is it as old as I think?” she asked, her voice awed.

“I don't know. I do know that no Indian left it here. They didn't have metal.”

She turned and looked at him with wide, radiant eyes.

“The Spanish did,” she whispered.

“So did a lot of others since them,” Case said. “It's a long way from a scrap of harness to three hundred pounds of silver.”

But the heightened gleam of his eyes told Sarah that he was excited, too.

She started forward to see what else might be behind the low, crumbling wall. Then she hesitated.

Be there
, she prayed silently.
For Conner. He deserves better than life has given him
.

“Sarah?” Case asked, touching her arm. “Is something wrong?”