Jessie's War (Civil War Steam) (23 page)

She didn’t want to be angry anymore.

Cheveyo gestured in Luke’s direction. “Looks like it’s time
for you to go.”

“I guess so.”

“He’s a good man, and he cares about you. Try to remember
that.”

She followed Luke with her eyes. “I will.”

Her cousin wrapped her in his arms and pulled her into an
embrace. He leaned close to her ear and said in a stage whisper, “Don’t tell
him I like him. I have appearances to maintain.”

She laughed. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.”

Cheveyo handed her over to her husband.

The moment Luke took her hand, electricity arced from him to
her, her blood rushing hot in her veins. He helped her onto her horse and
kissed her palm.

She closed her eyes as his lips scorched her skin and seared
her soul, and she felt a rush of tenderness for this man so overwhelming she
nearly doubled over. Reaching out, she touched his cheek, and the roughened
texture of the stubble on his face made her shiver all over again.

The look Luke gave her was hot and hungry and openly carnal.
He turned abruptly and mounted his horse.

Cheveyo’s eyes followed Luke. “Take care of her.”

“I will.”

Something passed between the two men, like they were seeing
one another for the first time, and each recognized something in the other. “Thank
you, Cheveyo.”

Her cousin gave him a strained nod.

Luke clicked to his horse and began riding toward the dark
cloud clinging to the southeastern mountains, in the direction of Fort Clark. “Come
on, Jess. It’s time to go.”

As he led her away, she turned in her saddle and looked back
at her mother’s people, at the women as they went about their work. She missed
them already.

You’re looking in the wrong
direction
. Her
grandfather’s voice rang in her ears.

She closed her eyes ever so briefly before she put heels to
horse and took off in the direction of Fort Clark.

For the rest of the long day’s journey into Fort Clark, they
didn’t speak of anything more than superficial things. They shared a light meal
of dried meat and barely spoke. Luke remarked on the weather, and Jessie
responded with something equally innocuous. Safe topics.

So when she brushed against him accidentally, and heat arced
between them, a jolt so powerful it made her shake, she ignored it.

Luke didn’t meet her eyes and didn’t mention it.

By the time they reached Fort Clark, the last rays of light
had disappeared beyond the western mountains. The city was squat, the buildings
shorter and more compact than they were in Virginia City. Virginia City had
been built of the timber from the Sierra Nevada, a town that had gone up in a
matter of days, a boomtown in the truest sense of the word. It had burned and
been rebuilt more than once. In a few months, it wouldn’t bear the scars of the
shelling it had received the other night.

Fort Clark’s buildings made of red brick and granite spoke
of permanence. Low roofs covered the elevated wooden walkways, and unlit gas
lanterns dotted the road. The only structures in the entire town standing over
two stories tall were the lookout towers and their massive, anti-airship
cannons, rising into the sky like minarets, enormous creations of red brick and
steel.

Trains rumbled in the distance, a noise that never ceased in
Fort Clark. Trains—passenger, military, and commercial—ran through
here twenty-four hours a day. The tracks only fell silent on Christmas and
Easter Sunday.

The city was dark, the only
light that which bled from beneath the shuttered windows and elegant French
doors. No booming ore crushers or groaning crawlers. No raucous laughter as men
drank and fought and propositioned women. No cheering as miners brought in
their bounty to have it weighed. No jaunty music or people dancing in the
streets as they so often did in her hometown. Where Virginia City was bright
and shiny, the young belle of Nevada, Fort Clark was the dark, spinster sister.
The contrast was unnerving.

“It’s so quiet.” The watchtowers rose high in the desert
sky. Even they were dark, but she felt eyes watching her, and her heart drummed
a little faster.

Luke pushed his hat back on his forehead. “With the shelling
of Virginia City, there would be a mandatory blackout at sunset. A precaution.
Happens all the time back East.”

She didn’t want to think about that, about all the places he’d
been and all the shells he’d dodged. Didn’t want to think about the war that
raged back East and what they’d both lost because of it.

All she wanted was some food and a long, hot soak.

The thought of rose-scented soap and a good scrub in
scalding water was heavenly.

Luke watched her for a moment, and his lips twisted into a
lopsided scowl. “I’ll check us into a hotel,” he offered. “We can relax for a
bit before we catch a transport.”

“Do you think we could get something to eat? I’m starving.”

He pointed to the shuttered buildings. “Nothing will be open
except the mess hall in the fort proper and the saloons.”

“Can we eat there?”

“Mess hall’s too bright, and soldiers are too poorly paid.
Half of them would sell you out for a penny and a drink. The other half would
try to proposition you, and then we’d have words.”

“Well, we can’t have that,” she laughed, hearing the
irritation in his voice. She pretended for a moment his irritation meant he
cared. “What about a saloon?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he retorted. “I want to take
you to a room and lock you up until it’s time to go.”

Tired and hungry, Jessie felt entirely too brazen for her
own good. “I’m sure you do. But you’ll have to feed me first.”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you just propositioned
me.”

“Feed me and let me have a bath, and maybe I did.”

Luke turned surprised eyes in her direction, but his lips
were tight. “Careful, Jess. Girls who play with fire tend to get burned.”

“Already been burned, Bradshaw. You gonna do it again?”

He stopped his horse, right in the middle of the dark and
empty street, and turned to face her. “Don’t tease me.”

She offered him a faint smile even as she shivered from the
hungry look he gave her. “I would never.”

“Yes you would,” he said. “I was there eight years ago, too.”

She wanted to touch him, but she kept her hands folded in
her lap. “And I’m not a child anymore. I’m starving, and I’ve got to change my
bandages. I need a bath. A bed. Take me to a saloon. Get me some food, at
least. C’mon, Bradshaw.”

“Not on your life.” He looked own the dark and dusty road
for a long time. “I’ll check us into a hotel and maybe I can convince the
kitchen to send something up. We’ll catch one of the first military trains out
of here. We should be safe enough.”

“I’m fine with that.”

He stopped his horse and clicked to Jessie’s. “I’ll see to
the horses once you’re settled.” He tied his horse to a nearby post, and
reached his hands up to help her from her saddle. “C’mon, White.”

She grinned at the echo of her earlier retort. Leaning into
him, she allowed him to take her off the horse, and she slid down the length of
his body as he held her entirely too close. As she grasped his strong arms, and
he pulled her flush against him, her body ached from nothing more than his
proximity.

Too close. Too tight. Just right.

She wanted him to kiss her and knew that would be a mistake.

Lifting her chin, their eyes met. She gave him a small smile
and the desire in his expression shifted as tenderness crept into his eyes.

His jaw tightened, and he set her away from him. “Shit.”

“What?” She tried to ignore how the space between them vibrated
with lust, and struggled against the urge to reach out, pull him to her, and
kiss him.

He awarded her with a rueful smile, and placed her hand in
the crook of his arm. “This is gonna be harder than I thought.” Without further
explanation, he led her into the hotel parlor. He scanned the room. “Stay with
me. Don’t make eye contact, but I want you to be aware of everyone around you.
Hiram’s friends must be here in town, if they’re anywhere. We have to be
careful until we’re safely away.”

“All right.”

His smile did something funny to her heart. “What, no
arguments?”

“No sense in arguing at this point,” she answered. “I might
not like your methods, but you’ve kept me alive so far, so…” She trailed off,
letting her words hang in the air.

“So you thought you’d go ahead and throw in your lot with
me?” he asked. “Guess you don’t hate me so much anymore, huh?”

Jessie turned her face away, and for a long time, she
studied the hotel lobby, with its low, gentle lighting. A large Oriental rug
covered the red oak floor. In the far corner, a pianist played one of Mozart’s
piano sonatas, and men in evening attire drank while quietly lounging on
cushioned chairs, their women beside them. Not loud and raucous like she was
used to, but more muted and staid. Businessmen taking meetings rather than
miners looking for a diversion.

The women reflected
that—they were dressed in bustled silk dresses and feathered hats, not in
traveling clothes like Jessie, and she realized how badly she stood out in a
place like this, an Indian woman in the clothes of a peasant.

Luke’s arm tightened, and the tension in his posture gave
her a sense of just how on edge he was.

She touched Luke on the arm. “Luke, I don’t hate you. It’s
just…”

“Don’t get all tender and serious on me, Jess.” He glanced
over his shoulder.

Her face flamed at his admonishment, but she held her
tongue.

“Right now, I need you to hate me so I can get us through
the next few hours. It’s easier that way. Safer, too.”

“I don’t hate you,” she repeated. Then she did as he asked
and turned from the emotionally charged topic. “But you do smell like a horse,
which makes it easy to dislike you.”

He laughed. “That’s my girl. Way to save that one.” His arm
tightened on hers, an embrace that really wasn’t one.

It took all of her strength to not look up and memorize the
planes of his face, the dark stubble of a beard that graced his chin, the dark
eyelashes and pale, gray eyes. The full mouth that made her think of his kisses
and the smile that turned her inside out.

She had missed him more than she had missed anyone in her
life, more than she missed either of her parents, more than her grandfather and
her tribe. More than she’d even missed Gideon.

Judge me on what I do now
, he’d said.

If she did that, she’d admit she was falling for him all
over again. Not the girl she had been remembering the boy she’d once loved, but
the woman she had become falling in love with the man he was now, wounds and
all.

“You all right?” he asked, his hand on the small of her back
as he guided her up the stairs toward the room.

He didn’t look at her, but she got the sense there was
nothing he didn’t see.

“Of course,” she lied.

“Good.” He opened the door, pushed ahead of her, and scanned
their room before he allowed her inside.

The room was large, with a big, brown bed in the middle. A
small sofa stood against one wall, and a wardrobe and a mirrored dresser with a
white ceramic washbasin stood on the other. Catching his eyes, she said, “Bath?”

He frowned. “Down the hall. But you can’t think you’re going
in alone.”

“And you can’t think you’re coming in with me.”

He put the pack he carried on the floor. “Water is scarce in
these parts. We could bathe together and save some. Not to mention, it’s safer
if I’m with you.”

“Safer for whom?” she asked. After all, she’d seen him naked
too, and remembered all too vividly what it felt like to have his big body
pressed against hers, the lust that spiraled through her at his touch. “Not on
your life, Bradshaw.”

“I’m teasing.”

“No, you’re not.” She meant to be serious, but a smile tugged
at the corners of her mouth, nonetheless.

“I guess we’ll never know,” he returned. “How about this? I’ll
check the washroom and make sure it’s clear. I’ll wait for you outside.”

“What about the horses? And you? You can’t be with me all
the time.”

He arched an eyebrow in response.

“How about I lock the door and you take care of what you
need to?” she suggested. “I’ll stay inside until you come back for me.”

Luke scowled. “I don’t like it.”

“The horses need tending. We need food. You need a bath and
so do I. What’s not to like?”

The corner of his mouth twitched, as if he were fighting a
smile. “I’ve already offered to bathe with you. Since we both need it.”