Mountain Laurel Read online

Now I’m an object of ridicule, Maddie thought, and wondered how in the world her life had come to this.

  It was at that thought that she decided to stop this charade. She turned to him and gave him her sweetest smile. “Captain Montgomery, I’m hungry.”

  “But you just ate.”

  What happened to men who were eager to do the bidding of a woman? “Yes, I did, but I’m hungry again. Couldn’t we find someplace to eat?”

  He looked over her head. To tell the truth, he was very hungry. He had been living on dried beef and hardtack while everyone else ate fresh meat and, even better, fresh vegetables. But after the opium in the whiskey, he wasn’t going to trust eating at her table. “There’s a wagon over there, and I think they’re selling food.”

  Within minutes she had both his hands loaded down with plates of food and a loaf of fresh bread to take back to Edith. She smiled up at him. “Could you please hold this for me while I make a trip to the…you know?”

  He looked at the food, steam rising from it. Beef. Potatoes. Corn bread. Peas. He hardly heard what she was saying, but nodded and went to sit on a bench at the side of the wagon. He was so hungry that he’d finished his plate of food and was halfway through hers before he realized she hadn’t returned.

  “Damn her,” he muttered. “Damn me,” he amended, and set off to find her. There was no way to track her in a town, but she was distinctive enough to cause people to notice her wherever she went, so he asked questions. There didn’t seem to be a man in town who hadn’t seen her, but their directions were all contradictory.

  It was nearly an hour before he found her, standing in a group of Ute women and laughing. He had only a moment to wonder how they were communicating before he bore down on her.

  The squaws saw him first and warned Maddie. She started to run straight into the camp, with ’Ring behind her, yelling at her to stop. The Indian women, always ready for a laugh, did everything they could to block ’Ring’s progress, until he had to pick one of the women up and set her aside.

  Maddie ran through the village as fast as she could, dodging children and dogs, once bumping into a brave and apologizing profusely, but not slowing down her run. When she reached the end of the camp, she doubled back and ran toward town.

  As soon as she reached the edge of town she slowed to catch her breath and smiled. She’d outwitted him as well as outrun him.

  A few seconds later she felt a hand on her shoulder, and when she looked up and saw him with something akin to triumph in his eyes, she gave him an I’ll-show-you look, then screamed. “Help me! Help me! Please don’t hit me again!”

  Eight men leaped on ’Ring at once, and she went scurrying away. Twenty minutes later he was close on her heels again. Looking over her shoulder, she saw that his usually perfectly combed hair was mussed, there was a red place on his cheek and dust all over his clothes. She grinned and kept running.

  She wasn’t sure when she began to enjoy the game, but enjoy it she did. She hid in an empty barrel and nearly giggled aloud when he stood not a foot from her and looked around. She ran into a group of men who were rolling dice on the ground, grabbed the hat off one of the men, and crouched down into the group. The men swarmed closer to help hide her. In fact, one of the men crouched much, much too close and she gave a squeal of protest when, she wasn’t positive, but she thought he pinched her thigh. She jumped, then saw Captain Montgomery turn and see her, so she started running again.

  She ran into one of the many saloon tents, paused at the high, rough bar, her head on her hand, and whispered, “Whiskey.” She downed the shot in one swallow, held out the glass for another shot, then saw Captain Montgomery in the doorway. “He’s payin’,” she said, and ran toward the back. The bartender and a couple of men held the captain while he dug money out to pay for her whiskey.

  Outside, she quickly asked two men to give her a boost to the top of one of the few buildings in Denver City that had a roof. The men did so gladly, but with a great deal of fumbling hands all over her body.

  She stood on top of the building and watched Captain Montgomery looking for her. She had to put her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing out loud. She took a deep breath, put her arms out and her head back. It was the first time she’d enjoyed herself in months. How precious freedom is, she thought.

  When she opened her eyes, Captain Montgomery was standing below and watching her.

  “Oops,” she said, laughing, and ran to the far side of the building and started scrambling down a stack of barrels and old wagon wheels. Just as she reached the ground, Captain Montgomery was there. She started to run but he caught her skirt and pulled her to him.

  She fought him. Oh, heavens, she fought him, but he kept her hands away from his face, and at last he grabbed her around the waist and slung her over his hip.

  “You bite one part of me and you won’t be able to sit down for a week. You understand me?”

  She felt rather like a sack of feed as she was slung across his arm, but she could tell he was very angry, and angry men sometimes did unpredictable things. So, instead of fighting him, she went limp so that he had her full weight tucked under his one arm. But it didn’t seem to make any difference to him as he stomped away from the town and into the woods with her.

  At last, when they were some distance from the noisy town, he dumped her onto a soft, grassy bank.

  “Captain Montgomery, I—”

  “Don’t you say a word, not a word! I have been ordered to protect you and I damned well plan to do it. You may think your little escapade was clever, but you have no idea what’s going on. These are people you know nothing about. They—”

  “You’re the one who knows nothing,” she said calmly, and lay back against the grass. The exercise in the clear, thin mountain air had made her feel wonderful. It was the first time since she’d heard Laurel was taken that she hadn’t felt as tense as a violin bow. “Oh, Captain, don’t you have any sense of humor? Any at all?” she said languidly. It was the first time in a long while that she’d noticed wildflowers and trees and blue sky high above her head.

  He didn’t say anything for a while, and she didn’t look at him, but then he lay down on the grass about a foot away from her. “I have a rather well developed sense of humor, actually. But in the last year I seemed to have lost it.”

  “Oh?” she said in an encouraging way, but he said nothing. She took a breath of the clear air. “I can’t imagine a man who names his horse Satan having a sense of humor. As far as I can tell, you are all business and no play. Your idea of dealing with women is to frighten them, to intimidate them. I’m sure some women like that, but you couldn’t have had much success.”

  “You know nothing about me,” ’Ring said with some anger. “Nothing whatever.”

  “Then I guess we’re even, for you know nothing about me.”

  He turned on his elbow to look at her, but she kept looking skyward. “Now, there you’re wrong. The truth is, Miss LaReina, I know a great deal about you.”

  She gave a derisive little chuckle. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

  He rolled to his back. “Shall we make a wager?”

  “More of your go-to-bed-with-me deals?” There was some bitterness in her voice.

  “No,” he said softly. “We’ll wager for something more important.” He didn’t acknowledge the glare she sent his way. “For twenty-four hours you won’t run away. For twenty-four hours I can sleep knowing you won’t do anything foolish.”

  “And you get to define foolish?”

  “Yes.”

  “What do I get?”

  “For twenty-four hours I’ll stay away from you.”

  She smiled up at the trees. “All this is to see whether you know anything about me or not, is it?” She didn’t think she was wagering much. First of all, she was supposed to meet someone about the letters that night right here in Denver City and she had no doubt she could do that under his nose. And second, from her observation, he was a man who couldn’t see beyond