Trail of Kisses (7 page)

She moved the lamp across its stack of boxes
so that it could shed light on her hope chest. Her box of hair
ribbons and pins should be near the top. Braid in one hand, she
opened the lid.

Cade hadn’t answered. She twisted toward where
she knew he was sitting outside. The light of the lamp reflected
off of the canvas of the wagon cover, giving her a closed-in
feeling.

“
Is there some reason my uncle
wouldn’t keep you on?” she rephrased her question.

“
Well,” Cade began
slowly.

Lynne turned back to the open hope
chest.

“
The thing is,” Cade went
on.

On top of her things, turned so that it faced
her, Lynne found a photograph of her father, splattered with blood,
his throat slit.

She screamed.

Chapter Four

Cade shot to his feet at the sound of Lynne’s
scream, letting his coffee tumble to the ground. He reached to his
waist, but he’d laid off wearing his gun belt for the last few
days. A few of their closer neighbors glanced up, wondering what
was going on. Cade tore around to the back of the wagon, reaching
the opening in the cover at the same time as Lynne backed toward
it. For half a second, she teetered as if she might fall, her long
hair coming undone.

“
What’s wrong?” He reached to pull
her out of the wagon, looking to see what had startled
her.

His arms slipped around her and he held her
close as he lifted her down. She leaned heavily on him, clutching
something. The press of her weight, the feel of her body trembling,
had him tightening his grip, cradling her close. Even at the end of
a hard day on the trail, panic rippling off of her, she smelled of
sunlight and life. He touched his lips to the top of her head to
comfort both of them. Then he peered inside the wagon.

It was empty. The sunset was fading fast, but
Lynne had lit a lamp which still sat atop a pile of boxes in the
wagon. With its light, all he could see were the supplies they were
carrying with them and the bedroll he’d laid out for her when he
set up camp. At the far end of the wagon, Lynne’s hope chest stood
open, but that was it.

“
Was it a spider or something?” he
ventured, knowing no spider could have made Lynne scream the way
she had.

She shook her head against his
chest.

“
You folks all right over there?”
one of their neighbors called.

“
We’re fine,” Cade answered. “Just
a little spook is all.”

He turned his attention back to Lynne as she
lifted her hands.

His heart skipped a beat. She held something
up to him, a photograph. Reluctant as he was to let go, he loosened
his hold and stepped away so that he could see. Her face was pale
and her eyes were large as she handed him the ruined photograph. It
was a picture of her father, but a slash had been made across his
throat and a line of something resembling blood had been drawn
across it.

Cade saw red. “I’ll find who did this,” he
growled. Find them and string them up by their toenails.

“
No,” Lynne whispered. She brushed
a hand over her face as if to cool it and smoothed her hair
back.

“
This is clearly a threat, and I
won’t have anyone threatening you in any way,” he said, more
determined.

“
No, no, it’s nothing.” She
cleared her throat when her voice cracked.

Cade gaped at her. She smoothed her skirt now
and did her best to stand taller. He couldn’t fathom her fragile
calm.

“
This is not nothing,” he told
her. Fire was running through his blood now and he would fight
anyone to keep her safe, even her. “This means that someone—and I
think we can guess who—is here, in this wagon train with us, trying
to do you harm.”

Lynne shook her head, breathing deep and slow.
“It’s probably just an accident. I may have left something sharp
sitting against my father’s portrait and accidentally cut the paper
when I lifted it.”

“
Lynne,” he scolded, stepping
closer to her.

She backed away, twisting the ends of the
half-untangled braid that drooped over her shoulder. “Yes, that’s
the most likely explanation. I…I took Papa’s portrait out of the
frame for some reason and it was accidentally damaged.”

Cade couldn’t believe what he was hearing. She
couldn’t possibly be so blind as to think this was all an
accident.

But that was the point. She
wasn’t
that
blind.

“
I know you don’t want to think
about the danger you’re in,” he began as if soothing an upset
child.

“
It was an accident,” she
insisted, suddenly as stubborn as a mule. “Now give me the
photograph. I’m going to bed.”

Cade wouldn’t be put aside. He handed over the
photograph, but rested a hand on her shoulder as he did.

“
Look, I know you’re scared,
but—”

“
I am
not
scared,” she
snapped. She pulled herself to her full height, tipping that pretty
chin of hers up high. It trembled in spite of her declaration. “I’m
not afraid of anything. I’m Papa’s brave…. You’re the one who’s
making this molehill into a mountain.”

For a moment, Cade could only stand there and
gawp at her. “You may not take this threat seriously,” he
began.

“
It’s not a threat, it’s an
accident.”

“
But I do.” He leaned closer to
her. “I swore that I would protect you, keep you safe, and I intend
to do it. Whether you like it or not.”

“
You’re a fool then,” she said,
but her threat didn’t mean much when her bottom lip
quivered.

He stared at that lip and its mate, wanting
nothing more than to kiss them. The urge rose up in him, powerful
and sudden as a thunderstorm. He could feel the energy of her
emotions in her body, and stepped even closer to her. She leaned
into him as if she could do with a kiss to calm her down. She would
taste like wildfire and honey. And he would get completely carried
away when he had a job to do.

He took a step back and a deep breath. Lynne
gasped, losing her balance, her soft lips pressing shut in a tight
line. It was just his luck that she’d been willing to let him kiss
her. He couldn’t be distracted.

“
I’m going to find who did this,”
he said, cursing the fact that his voice was full of
gravel.

He cleared his throat and marched around the
side of the wagon, searching for clues.

“
Ben?” he called. The boy would be
the first one who would have seen anyone tampering with their
wagon. “Ben? Where are you?”

A scuffle and snort sounded from the front of
the wagon. As Cade reached the driver’s seat, Ben scrambled to his
feet, rubbing his eyes.

“
Huh?” he mumbled as Cade put a
foot up on the wagon wheel and looked up at him. “Sorry. Must’ve
dozed off.”

Cade narrowed his eyes. “You been drinking
with the miners again?”

“
Psht, no.” Ben swayed where he
stood, losing his balance and bumping against the buckboard. For a
second, Cade thought he would fall off the wagon
completely.

“
You see anyone interfering in the
wagon recently? Anyone in there who shouldn’t be?” Cade pressed
on.

“
This is unnecessary.” Lynne
strode up to his side. She’d regained her color and more than a
little of her vigor. “Ben, go back to sleep. And please don’t
associate with the miners anymore. You’re too young.”

“
I’m fifteen,” Ben declared with
pride, then sank to sit on the driver’s seat. A moment later he lay
down and passed out.

“
If he can’t keep his eyes open
and watch out for you like he should, then I have half a mind to
find another driver,” Cade grumbled.

He marched back down the length of the wagon,
searching the growing darkness for anyone else who could have seen
or had a hand in any mischief with the wagon. Everyone was getting
settled for the night. A somber mood still hung over the entire
wagon train after the deaths that morning.

“
My Papa hired Ben to drive the
wagon.” Lynne chased him. “You can’t—”

“
Your father hired a boy, not a
man,” Cade argued.

“
Ben has performed his duties
exceptionally so far.”

“
Ben let someone get into the
wagon to vandalize your property.”

“
It was a mis—”

“
It was not a mistake, Lynne.” He
stopped and rounded on her. She nearly smacked into him when he
did. “The Briscoe Boys sent an agent along with this wagon train to
make good on the threats they made to your father.”

“
They did not.” She sighed as if
he had told her the Briscoe Boys had sent a giant sea serpent
wrapped up in ribbons along with the wagons.

Cade ignored her protests. “I intend to find
this bastard and deal with them.” He walked on. At the very least,
he would have to tell Pete Evans, the trail boss. “We should reach
Ft. Kearny in a couple of days. I’m going to talk to the regimental
commander there and ask for more escort.”

“
Really, Cade,” Lynne scoffed.
There was a spark of real fear in her eyes as she went on. “This is
nothing. I can take care of myself. I don’t need a regimental
anything looking out for me. I don’t need you looking out for
me.”

He stopped and faced her. This time she pulled
herself up in time to glare at him, clutching the ruined photograph
in front of her. She looked like determination itself. She looked
like trouble with long dark hair.

“
I think you do need someone
looking out for you,” he said, feeling his heartbeat all the way
down to his groin. “I think you need it far more than you
know.”

For the next few days, as they traveled the
flat, sunbaked miles to Ft. Kearny, Lynne kept her fear locked up
tight in her chest. She couldn’t be in danger, she just couldn’t.
She was miles away from home, from her Papa or anything she knew.
The idea that she was exposed and vulnerable to anyone who wanted
to threaten her was simply too much for her to bear. She was brave,
and brave people faced their fears with their heads held high. So,
rather than dwell on the terrifying message of her Papa’s
photograph, she tucked it away in her hope chest and spent all her
time helping Callie wherever she could.

“
Callie’s made the decision to
marry John Rye,” she told Cade. They walked from the field where
their wagon train had parked into the cluster of buildings and
corrals that made up Ft. Kearny. “I think it’s as good a decision
as any, all things considered.”

“
Uh-huh,” Cade answered without
glancing back at her. He marched on toward the fort’s command
building, brow furrowed, strides long.

“
I’ve offered to loan her a lace
shawl that used to belong to one of my aunts.” Lynne jogged to
catch up to his side. “It’s the nicest thing I can do under the
circumstances.”

“
Yep.”

He wasn’t listening to her. A pair of miners
leaning against a hitching post with Reverend Joseph talking to
them were forced to jump out of the way as Cade stormed past. They
hopped up onto the porch in front of the supply depot to avoid
being plowed into.

Ft. Kearny not much of a military
installation. It was more like a much needed store of goods along
the trail. It had built up over the past decade and a half as more
and more wagon trains headed west. The closest thing it had to
walls protecting it was a barrier of cottonwood trees around the
perimeter. It looked as though it could house quite a few soldiers,
but at that moment Lynne noticed only a few people in anything
resembling a uniform.

“
I thought it would be neighborly
if you attended the ceremony with me later this evening,” she
pushed on as Cade stepped up onto the porch of the military
headquarters.

“
Sure,” he said before striding
through the open front door. “I need to talk to someone about
hiring a few armed men to come with our wagon train,” he announced
to the middle-aged man behind a desk in the center of the
room.

The man and a few others in worn out clothes
and dusty boots stared at him, their conversations
interrupted.

“
Excuse me?” the man behind the
desk said. He wasn’t rude or unkind, but Lynne felt her face flush
nonetheless.

“
This isn’t necessary,” she hissed
at Cade.

“
I’ll say what’s necessary,” he
murmured to her before facing the man at the desk. “Half a dozen
men with rifles and pistols will do.”

“
As an escort?” The man behind the
desk split his confused look between Cade and Lynne.

“
I was under the impression that
the army offered armed escort to pioneers traveling west.” Cade
took a few steps closer to the desk.

The man behind it stood and came around to
hold a hand out to him.

“
Sargent Waters,” he introduced
himself.

“
Cade Lawson.” Cade nodded. “And
this is Miss Lynne Tremaine. Threats of a serious nature have been
made against her life.”