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At his callous gesture, outrage filled Victoria. She bent instinctively to gather Cooper’s epic to her bosom.
“How dare you!”
He startled her by kneeling across from her. “Lady, there’s lots more copies of this book around. When we get to Trinity Falls, you can order another one—of it and all the others.”
“This is a first edition!”
With an absent flick of his wrist, he discarded Louisa May Alcott’s new volume, Little Women. Victoria’s indignation grew. She hadn’t even had a chance to read it yet!
“The wagon master may have been willing to ride off without you, Miss Amory. He probably figured you’d come to your senses and lighten your load. He made a mistake I’m not willing to. The books stay. We go.”
Victoria stared into Mr. Youngblood’s unwavering gaze and knew intuitively that he would not yield to any pleas to spare her beloved volumes. Yet a spark of defiance still burned within her.
Inspiration struck. “It would take half the morning to unload the wagon. Don’t you think we should leave now?”
She forced a determined smile onto her stiff lips. Oh, there was a rational part of her that knew it was foolish to risk her life over inanimate objects. But there was another part that was convinced she could keep both her scalp and the works of Cooper, Hardy and Bronte. After all, man did not live by bread alone.
Youngblood rose to his full height. A look of frustrated resignation stamped his rugged features. Victoria held her breath as she silently counted off the passage of seconds. She truly had no idea what the barbaric man might do.
Abruptly he turned his broad back to her.
“Get into the wagon,” he ordered brusquely.
She scooped Alcott’s book from the ground, shook the dust from it, then hurried up onto the wagon’s high bench seat. She supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that her surly companion was there ahead of her, already taking his place behind the reins.
She swallowed back her protest, counting herself fortunate that he’d agreed that there wasn’t time to unload all the volumes she’d spent days meticulously organizing and arranging in the corners and crannies of her wagon’s interior.
Victoria had scarcely clambered beside Youngblood before he released the hand brake and reached for the bullwhip. In a careless gesture, he uncurled it above the animals’ backs.
A loud crack sounded, cutting through the fort’s stillness. As one, the team lurched forward toward the open gate.
With a start, Victoria realized she’d linked her hopes for survival to a total stranger. She couldn’t help wondering whether she’d just made the worst mistake of her life.
Chapter Five (#ulink_0c98bd6a-b1b7-58d2-8411-052b62019a9b)
From the corner of her eye, Victoria sneaked covert glances at the man sitting beside her. They had been following this fairly wide stretch of wagon-rutted roadway for close to an hour, and he had yet to address one word to her. His profile was harsh and unrelenting. As luck would have it, his swollen eye faced her. Whenever a wheel struck a particularly deep rut, the jostling provoked a tight-lipped grimace from him.
At this evidence of his pain, her feelings toward him might have softened, had he offered a friendly word or two. His continued silence, however, grated on her nerves. It seemed unfair that fate should shackle her to a companion who was no more inclined to conversation than her plodding oxen. At least the animals had never glowered at her disapprovingly.
The wilderness continued to roll by, mile after mile of lush greenery. The air was redolent with the unrestrained scent of pine. Nearby, the Ruby River splashed across granite boulders.
The sun climbed higher in the cloudless blue sky. It didn’t take long for the warming rays to intensify to an uncomfortable degree. She shifted on the wooden seat, convinced she could feel new freckles popping out on her skin. By the time they reached Trinity Falls, she would probably have a hundred more of the unattractive little devils spotting her face.
She tried to think where she’d left her sunbonnet, recalling that she’d worn it the day before. She remembered removing the bonnet when she crawled beneath the wagon to sleep. With a pang, she realized she’d left the wide-brimmed covering on her makeshift bed when Youngblood’s voice jerked her awake. Had he thought to include the bonnet when he packed up her campsite?
She turned to peek into the wagon’s interior. One of their wheels slammed into another deep rut. Caught off balance, she steadied herself by clutching at the closest thing of substance, which turned out to be Youngblood.
She let out a startled yelp. At the same time, Youngblood’s powerful arm curved around her, anchoring her to his side. Several impressions struck her. First and foremost, she was aware of the muscular strength in the arm that bound her to Logan Youngblood. Secondly, she sensed that same latent power leashed in the rest of the strong body she was pressed tightly against.
The rough fabric of his blue shirt scraped the tip of her nose. His male scent inexorably wove itself into the very air she breathed. While not unpleasant, the earthy aroma seemed shockingly invasive. Goodness, she’d never been as close to, or as aware of, any man in her entire life. Not even seeing Horace Threadgill with his trousers around his ankles in her bedchamber had seemed as intimate as being trapped in this scoundrel’s embrace.
“What in the blazes are you trying to do?”
His husky voice vibrated in her eardrum, causing a strange tingle to skip across her forearms. Her palms came up to push herself free. “I’m trying to right myself.”
He gave her a look of disgust. “You could have fooled me.”
“You may release me now.”
His mauled countenance hovered a scant inch from her upturned face. She looked into his good eye. It was the darkest shade of brown, almost black. It was also penetratingly intent. She felt as if she were caught in a beam of lantern light shining from a lighthouse on a fogbound night-which made no sense, because his glare was as dark and forbidding as a moonless sky.
“Are you ready to sit still?”
It was the kind of question one would address to an unruly child, and she resented it.
“I was trying to fetch my sunbonnet,” she informed him loftily as she struggled to extricate herself from his embrace. She didn’t want to trigger an all-out tug-of-war that would make him aware of how indelicately he held her.
Her instincts warned it was essential she keep a safe distance from a man as unapologetically primitive as Youngblood.
He eased his grip. “You should have warned me.”
“I’ll remember to do so next time.” She sank back to her side of the seat.
He pulled back on the reins. The oxen came to a dusty halt.
“Thank you for stopping,” she said briskly, turning again to look inside the wagon’s interior. “Do you happen to remember picking up my sunbonnet?”
She leaned more fully inside, scanning her dust-covered possessions for the green calico fabric. Her companion made no comment. Irritation nipped at her fragilely held patience.
She glanced at him from her ungainly position of being half in and half out of her wagon. “I asked you if—”
She broke off, disconcerted by how Mr. Youngblood’s gaze seemed affixed to that portion of her anatomy stuck outside the canvas opening. The indecorous upward thrust of her bottom was mere inches from that interested regard.
What a rude rascal he was, not to avert his glance. She scooted onto the seat, trying to regain a more orthodox pose. She blew back the strands of hair that had fallen into her eyes.
“Did you think to retrieve my bonnet as you loaded the wagon?” She refused to comment upon his impertinent inspection of her lower person. There was little point in trying to teach manners to a man who frequented military stockades.
“I rolled it up in one of your blankets.”
She let out a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I was afraid you had left it. Just give me a minute, and I’ll get it.”
“Be quick about it.”
Such a gracious fellow. She turned and entered the inside of her wagon feetfirst. It was still an awkward movement, but at least she wasn’t sticking out in all the wrong places for Mr. Youngblood’s entertainment.
She found the blanket she’d used last night and located the sadly bedraggled hat. Before returning to her seat, she took the opportunity to carefully tuck away the books she’d reclaimed before boarding the wagon.
“I’m all set now,” she announced as she climbed back next to him, shaking the winkles and dust from the muchabused bonnet.
He said nothing, nor did he make any move to proceed.
“Well, just don’t sit there and stare at me,” she muttered dourly. “According to you, time is of the essence.”
“Are you going to put that thing on?”
She looked at him in surprise. “Of course.”
“Then do it.”
“You know, Mr. Youngblood, you’re a downright irritating fellow.” She sought to untangle the snarled ribbon ties. “I wouldn’t be the least surprised to discover that’s why you were locked up—for being generally obnoxious.”
“I’m waiting for you to put on your damned hat so we can get going without you tumbling onto your sweetly shaped behind.”
He had been sneaking peeks at her posterior! A hot flush bathed her cheeks. Good grief, he was a barbarian.
Naturally, she was somewhat mollified to learn that he approved of what he’d seen. Still, the man needed the most basic of lessons on how to conduct himself with a lady. But then, criminals of his sort probably didn’t often associate with ladies, not even ones with her own somewhat maligned reputation.
“I think I can manage to put my bonnet on and remain seated,” she said sharply. “Provided, of course, that you can manage to avoid the larger holes pocking this charming road we’re obliged to follow.”
“We’re not staying on the main road.”
She stopped fiddling with the knot she’d been trying to unravel. He had her full attention now. “Why on earth not?”
“It’s sixty miles to Trinity Falls on this route. That’s a sixday journey, with a fully loaded wagon pulled by oxen.”
“So?”
“That’s six days on flat terrain that will leave us exposed to attack from any roaming Indians.”
“Which isn’t a good situation to be in,” she mused aloud.
“A better choice for us would be to leave the main road and detour through those mountains.”
Victoria looked toward the mountains in question. They loomed large and inhospitable—great granite crags stretching skyward. Caps of snow from the previous winter still covered the upper reaches. Even the tenacious pines and cedars hadn’t trespassed to those higher realms.
“You are simpleminded to think my team and wagon can scale those rugged cliffs.”
It wasn’t until the words popped out of her mouth that Victoria realized she’d spoken plainly enough for even a simpleton to realize he’d been insulted. She kept her gaze pinned resolutely on the jagged outcroppings.
“Do you plan to insult me all the way to Trinity Falls?”
There was no ignoring his tone’s stony timbre.
She decided only a coward would refuse to look at him when she answered his question. Until this very moment, Victoria hadn’t realized she had a cowardly bone in her body. She drew in a breath and ceased her futile struggles with her ribbon ties. Turning slowly, she confronted her offended companion.
“I apologize, Mr. Youngblood, for hurting your feelings.”
He stared at her hard enough with that cyclopean eye of his to raise goose bumps on her skin.
“And,” she continued gamely, “in the future, I will endeavor to control my tongue.”
At her words, his harsh gaze swooped to her lips. Her goose bumps multiplied a hundredfold.
His mouth curved. On someone else the gesture would have resembled a smile. On him, the action had a kind of carnivorous aspect. She suspected that the Big Bad Wolf had sized up Little Red Riding Hood in that exact predatory fashion.
“It’s at this point that you’re supposed to accept my apology,” she instructed.
“If it will get that damned bonnet on your head any quicker, I’ll accept your most humble apologies.”
She bit back her objections to his profanity, his reference to her “most humble” apologies and his entirely offensive manner. Instead she concentrated on unknotting the damned snarl that had—
Victoria winced. Goodness, the crude man was already proving to have a corrupting effect upon her moral character. She never swore. Not when being falsely accused of misconduct with her sister’s beau, not when an unsympathetic wagon master refused to wait for her, not when dealing with unrepentant criminals.
She governed her life by a high set of principles. And it was especially important now that she adhere to that superior code of conduct. After all, when she reached Trinity Falls, she would be instructing a young woman in the elements of being a proper lady, as well as handling the girl’s general education. It wouldn’t do at all for Victoria to show up in her new environment contaminated by her association with Logan Youngblood.
It was she who needed to exert a positive influence upon him. Surely, with a diligent effort upon her part, he could be dissuaded from his wayward ways.
The knot finally loosened enough for her to free the ribbons. She wasted no time in securing the hat to her head.
“We’re not going over the mountains,” Youngblood said. “There are trails and passes I’m hoping to get this wagon through. Once we’re shielded by the forest, I’ll feel better.”
“I suppose it does make sense for us to make ourselves less conspicuous,” she conceded reluctantly. The thought of entering the mysterious denseness of the wooded wilderness, however, was daunting to a city girl like herself. It seemed that it would be very easy to become lost among those pines that grew so astonishingly close to each other. It looked as if even the sunlight had to struggle to penetrate the lightly packed clusters of trees. “Are you sure you know the way to Trinity Falls?”
It was clear to Logan that Victoria Amory did not have the slightest confidence in his abilities to get her safely to civilization. He probably shouldn’t have been surprised by her lack of trust. She had the lowest opinion of him of anyone he’d ever met, and that probably included Colonel Windham.
She sat next to him with that pitiful scrap of mangled fabric on her head and still managed to appear as composed as a schoolmistress about to call her class to order. He supposed she was just naturally bossy.
He limited himself to answering, “I’ve lived in the West for a while now.”
“In these hills?” she asked, obviously still needing reassurance.
He raised the whip to get the team moving again. “No, I’ve lived in town.”
No doubt dividing his time between saloons and the city jail, Victoria thought.
Logan maneuvered the wagon off the road, taking an upward strip of flattened grass that wound northward through the pines. Sharp-needled branches scraped their canvas-covered canopy. The ride became rougher. Miss Amory latched on to the side of her seat like a limpet stuck to a ship’s hull.
“I’m not so sure this is a good idea,” she said, her voice a virtual squeak. “I don’t have a map we can refer to.”
“I don’t need a map.”
“Forgive me for not having more confidence in you,” she began, using that snippy tone of hers. “But I was warned most forcibly by the wagon master to remain on the main road.”
“You can bet that if he was in our situation, he would try to make himself invisible to the Indians, too.”
The wagon took another sharp lurch. Victoria almost bounced off her seat. He reached out and pulled her to him.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
