The Ruination of Essie Sparks (Wild Western Rogues Series, Book 2) (9 page)

They both could have drowned, because his next move would have been to jump in after her. Should it surprise him she was ungrateful? "You're lucky I caught you, or right now you would be heading over that waterfall below." He sat up, feeling dizzy.

"
Lucky
?" She shoved the hair off her face. "I suppose you expect me to thank you for that? After putting me in harm's way in the first place? Bringing me to the middle of nowhere and—"

"No need." Slowly, he pushed himself up to his feet, then extended a hand down to her. "Just don't do it again. Next time, I will let you drown."

She scowled at him. "Probably your plan all along."

He shook his head as the pain in his leg roared back to life now that the rush of danger had passed. He pressed a hand against it, feeling a wave of nausea swell over him. "You should watch your back with a man like me. You never know what I'll do."

She agreed with a silent glare, but wasn't fool enough to refuse the hand he offered to help her up. They navigated their way off the fallen log. But as soon as they were on dry land again, she shook him off. She was shivering with cold and probably fear.

In truth, fear had his insides tumbling around as well. Nor did he miss that every soaking wet bit of her was exposed, from the slender shape of her hips to the pink, puckered discs of her nipples and the outline of her small, upturned breasts.

The moment she caught his gaze on her, she brought her hands up under her chin to block his view. "Stop looking at me."

When he reached his discarded gun and shirt he tossed the shirt at her. "Put that on."

For a moment, she just stared down at it. She held up her bound hands. "I cannot. Just as I could not swim, bound this way."

He shrugged the gun across his back and untied her long enough to pull his shirt over her head, then he retied her. The woman might do any fool thing, like bolt into the woods like a scared deer, given half the chance. He was obligated not to let her die, since he'd been the one to take her, but this incident with the river only confirmed his determination to be shed of her as soon as possible. Somewhere safe. God knows where
that
would be.

Billings, perhaps. Or some other nearby town.

But that kind of future looked a long way off right now. And the distinct possibility existed that neither one of them would make it that far.

He tugged her along back to their spot on the riverbank where Náhkohe waited and tied her to a tree, away from the dangers of the water, then dropped to his knees, suddenly finding it impossible to stand. Feeling a wave of nausea roll over him, he retched into the river once, twice, before collapsing back against the boulder.

* * *

Only then did Essie notice that his bronze skin had gone pale and he looked terribly unwell. Pulling her from the river had spent the last of his strength. For which, she supposed, she should have been more grateful. But she was still too mad at him.

Leaning her forehead against the aspen sapling he'd tied her hands around, she said, "How long do you think you can go on this way? With that bullet in your leg? You need rest and a doctor."

"
They
won't rest," he said with a tip of his head in the direction of the men chasing them. "And I don't see a doctor anywhere, do you?" He surprised her by passing her the water skin to let her drink next. As she'd just drunk her fill of the river, she handed it back to him. He didn't drink. Instead, he slammed his eyes shut and leaned back against the rocks.

Essie rubbed her damp mouth against the shoulder of his shirt. His scent lingered on it and it was, surprisingly, not unpleasant. So he had saved her life. And perhaps spent the last of his strength doing it. It was his fault she'd nearly drowned in the first place. What was she doing trekking across these mountains like a barefoot goat? She belonged in her world of sensible expectations and consequences she could anticipate.

She held her hand out. "Give me your knife. I'll take the bullet out." For the briefest of moments, those steely gray his flicked up to hers. He seemed to actually consider her offer, whether out of desperation or, more unlikely, hope, she couldn't tell. She could not read the man, which was probably just as well because she had no desire to understand him. Or, worse, to care about him.

He laughed. The sound was peculiarly without humor. "I give you my knife so you can finish what the bullet didn't?"

Essie snorted and looked away. Of course she wouldn't have
killed
him. She was not a murderer, no matter the circumstances. Unlike... possibly,
some
people she knew. But, heaven help her, the chance to make him pay, in some small measure—with the sharp tip of his knife—for all the torment he'd put her through since the day began wouldn't break her heart, either.

Ugh.
That she'd even contemplated such vulgar anticipation shocked her almost as much as finding herself tied to a tree in the middle of the Montana wilderness. It was all
his
fault. He had brought her to such low imaginings.

"
Séaa...
" he murmured with a condescending grin."I came a little too close to the mark there, didn't I? What say you? Surprised you're only human, Essie Sparks?"

Ooh! How she hated him!

She leaned forward, leveling a look at him that made her feelings plain. "Do you know what I say? I say that you'll die here from stubbornness. From thinking you can somehow keep me as your hostage when I'm no good to you at all! They could care less about me. It's you they're after. Because they won't let some... some misguided—" She faltered, searching for the proper word.

"Half-breed?" he supplied, eyes closed.

She made a frustrated noise. "Some misguided
renegade
best them by taking what they think belongs to them.
And
I say that if you don't take that bullet out and stop bleeding, you won't have to worry about saving your leg." She leaned her head on the sapling between her arms. "
I say
with my hands tied here we will both die in this godforsaken place, sooner rather than later."

With surprising effort, he had rolled a look at her, mid-rant, and was studying her in the fading afternoon light. Against all common sense, she was struck again by his beauty, his rugged, effortless beauty—of which, she was quite sure, he was completely unaware. In fact, if anything, she supposed he considered himself without appeal, a conclusion with which she
should
heartily agree.

But nothing about this man was simple. Not the way his instinct to protect her seemed almost the equal of his instinct to ruin her today, nor the way he seemed able to crawl in her mind to know what she was thinking before she did. His complexity drew her and offended her at once. But when he looked at her, as he was doing now... despite the sudden sallow color of his skin, the awful scar bisecting his cheek or the bitterness in his eyes, she couldn't deny the effect he had on her. On both her heart and her female parts.

Then, as if he'd made some decision, he slid the knife from the sheath at his hip and, with an effort, crawled closer to the tree she was tied to. The blade glinted dangerously in the thin sunlight.

Instantly, she feared she'd gone too far, said too much. There was a darkness in his eyes that hadn't been there before—a warning.

She might have imagined the wounded look in his eyes when she flinched as the blade drew near. Yes, most certainly she had. Still, when he slid the blade between her hands and slit the rope that tied them, she couldn't quite believe he'd done it.

For a moment, she simply stared at her hands before scooting entirely out of his reach on her backside.

He gestured with his knife at the trail below. "Go."

"
What
?"

"Run back to them. Back to your pretty life."

"My pretty life? What would you know about my—Wait. You... you're letting me go?" Was this a trick? If not, he wouldn't have to tell her twice. She shoved to her feet and backed up a few steps, glancing over her shoulder down the mountain, at where she supposed the searchers were now, so far away. It had taken the whole day to get this far uphill. How long would it take her to go back down? What if the men gave up looking and disappeared? Could she find her way back on her own? On bare feet?

"Night comes quick up here," he said, his words beginning to slur. "Maybe you'll find your 'friends' before a cougar finds you. Or a grizzly bear."

She stopped in her tracks.
A bear?
Or a cougar?
She glanced through the thick stand of trees surrounding them.
A million places for an animal to hide.

"Then," she said, "I'll need a weapon."

"And I need a good leg," he said. "Seems we're both... out of luck."

She blinked. "You'll send me off with nothing to protect myself?"

Gesturing with his knife, he said, "Count yourself lucky I didn't take that pretty scalp of yours." He was still watching her, but through half-lidded eyes. "Savage that I am."

When she didn't move, he warned, "Sun's going down. What you waitin' for?"

She stepped closer to him, tearing the remains of the rope from her wrists. "Not that I care, but... what about you?"

A questioning look furled his brow, as if he couldn't imagine what she meant.

"You're... you're still bleeding."

He glanced down at the fresh blood seeping against his leggings. "So?" His gaze rose to meet hers. She opened her mouth then closed it again. He slammed his eyes and nodded. "I'll take care of the bullet myself. So I need the knife. Get out of here."

Essie frowned, uncertainly. "And you're not even going to tell me who you are to Daniel, or... or what this is all about?"

"Learn to live with disappointment, Essie Sparks. Like the rest of us do."

"Fine." Disgusted, she turned in an uncertain circle. "Fine. I'll go. Now that I've missed my train, and now that I'll... I'll have to buy myself a new ticket East." She glanced back at him, but he seemed not at all interested in her petty problems. "I hope you're happy. What was the point of all this? Did you always mean to release me in the middle of nowhere? As if it were all just a game to you? To leave me defenseless?"

"We are all defenseless without our courage,
vé'ho'á'e.
" Allowing his eyes to slide shut, he dismissed her with a flick of his hand. "I set you free. The choice to stay... or go... is yours
."

Turning toward the vast mountains behind them, she felt suddenly overwhelmed. Find her way out alone? Her eyes stung, but she refused to cry. Heaven knew she'd managed not to cry this whole awful day. She wouldn't start now.

But of course she would go. Regardless what awaited her on the way down that mountain; leaving was a thousand times better than staying here, willingly, with him.

Turning back to tell him so, she was just in time to catch him pitching sideways onto the ground beside the river. Out cold.

Shocked, she stared down at him for a few long heartbeats, half expecting him to sit up, tell her his ploy was just a test. But he didn't. She couldn't even tell if he was breathing. Her stomach plunged. She'd never wished him
dead
, for heaven's sake. Dropping down beside him, she pushed her fingers against the side of his throat, paradoxically relieved to feel a quick, thready pulse.

An unladylike curse escaped her and she sat back on her heels.

Now what?

She tossed a look around at the darkening forest. It was not lost on her that she was officially on her own now, here, in the middle of nowhere. Or that leaving him here, in the forest... amidst the grizzly bears and cougars and other prowling predators she couldn't name, would mean certain death for him.

On the one hand, he'd gotten himself into this situation. This mess was not of her making.

On the other hand, he'd saved her from the river.

Something unreasonable twisted inside her. Concern? For a man like him?

She argued against such a possibility, but those arguments did nothing to diminish her feeling of responsibility. If she left him here, he would certainly die. If she stayed, the odds were just as good that she would.

She studied him for a long moment. The dark sweep of lashes that brushed his cheek. His face, savagely handsome, somehow looked less fearsome without his ever-present scowl.

Don't be a ninny! You just got lucky.

She tugged at the rifle, pinned behind him, but couldn't pry it free.

Take the knife for protection. Take it and get out of here. Now.

She reached for it, prying it from his lax hand. The feel of the thing, the heavy heft of it against her palm, troubled her somehow as she remembered how he'd held it against her throat. How he'd said he needed it for his leg. But the beginnings of panic scrambled inside her, shoving away any protests from her conscience. This was her chance to escape and she would take it. What fool wouldn't?

A few feet away, his horse lifted his head from cropping grass and snorted at her. And with that, her decision made itself. She would take the knife.

She would take the horse.

She would s
urvive.

Catching the animal, she pulled herself up into the saddle, shushing the dissenting voices in her head. Any sane person would do what she was doing. Any woman with a lick of self-preservation would run as far and as fast as she could away from a renegade like him.