Relentless

Chapter 5 #2

Shea watched him as he moved restlessly around the cabin. She sensed he didn’t like being in here, and she supposed it was because of her presence. She looked nervously at the one cot in the room, and she wondered what he was planning for sleeping arrangements.

Tyler paid no mind to her as he quickly chose several cans of food and unsheathed the knife at his belt. He had opened the window, but it was dusk, and he was wrapped in shadows, which made him seem even more distant and enigmatic than ever.

She wished she could read him better. She had never seen anyone so contained, so infernally elusive.

Very little showed in his eyes or face or expression, and she had always been good at ferreting out qualities and feelings of those she met.

A couple of times she thought she’d seen a wisp of humor, but then he had tamped it immediately.

She wondered whether she’d just imagined it because she wanted to see some lighter emotion in him to temper that deep, seething anger he made no attempt to hide.

He was certainly making no attempt to mask it now.

She had the impression of an angry wounded tiger, just waiting to turn on a victim, as he knifed open the cans, then set them down much too softly, as if he had to keep himself from doing it in a more violent way.

He produced a spoon for her, offering it to her with a mocking bow.

He then took a couple of additional cans in his hand and whirled around, stalking outside.

The cabin still seemed full of his presence, and she felt dwarfed by it, by the anger that surrounded him. A part of her wanted to follow him, to keep loneliness at bay, but her pride wouldn’t let her.

To brighten the darkness, both real and emotional, she lit a candle and placed it on the table, and then sat down. He had opened two cans of peaches and a can of beans for her. There were also some dried strips of jerky.

She loved peaches and would normally have found them wonderful, but now she ate merely to keep up her strength so she could ultimately outwit and outmatch her captor.

But she felt sick inside, wondering about tonight, wondering about him.

So much had happened in the past twelve hours, so much had changed since the time she’d thought she was on her way to see the man who had fathered her.

She wondered where the mouse was. Maybe she would just leave the food here for him. Or was it a her?

Shea went to the open door and looked out. Only a pink glow remained of the sun, which had already set. She didn’t see her captor, but she did see her valise and drawing case. The door to the other building was open, and she wondered whether she should try to escape now.

She moved to the valise and picked it up, still undecided.

The day had turned cool. It would get even colder tonight, and she would need something other than the lightweight shirt she wore.

Just as she thought she might make a dash for it, no matter what, he sauntered out of the other building, as if he had been waiting for the moment when she would make up her mind.

“Going someplace?” he drawled.

“I’m cold,” she said. “Do you object to me wearing my own clothes?”

“Not if I see what’s in there first.”

The thought of him riffling through her undergarments was intolerable, but she knew better than to wage a war she couldn’t win.

“If it gives you pleasure,” she said, and this time she was taunting him, though she knew she shouldn’t.

His brows arched together with displeasure, but then he shrugged. “Think what you want.”

“I don’t carry guns with me.”

“A mirror could be just as dangerous,” he said.

“In your hands, perhaps,” she said acidly.

“You don’t like violence, Miss Randall?”

She wished he wouldn’t purr like that, like a full-grown tiger ready to spring. She always had that impression of him, that sense that he would pounce at any moment.

She set her jaw. “No.”

“Then we shouldn’t have any problems,” he said.

“But you still intend to … invade my clothing.”

“As I said, I have a difficult time believing a Randall.”

“Why?”

He leaned back on his heels. “Do you really not know your father?”

Shea hesitated. She didn’t know whether the truth would hurt or help her case, make her less or more of a weapon to Tyler.

If he thought Randall didn’t care, didn’t even know she existed, perhaps he would let her go.

But then, that wasn’t why he was keeping her.

He was keeping her because of that foolish sketch of Ben, and nothing was going to change that fact. But perhaps it was worth a try.

“No,” Shea said.

“No, what, Miss Randall?”

“No, I don’t know him. I’ve never known him, and he doesn’t even know I exist and probably cares less.”

“Would you like to explain that?”

“No.”

“Oh, yes. You don’t start something like that without finishing the tale. An old law of the West.”

“But you don’t believe in laws,” she snapped back.

“I do when they benefit me,” he said lazily. “Now tell me more.”

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“I think there is, Miss Randall. A daughter who’s never seen the father she claims, who travels thousands of miles to see him.”

“I don’t even know he is my father,” she said desperately, very sorry she’d opened this Pandora’s Box. She didn’t want to explain her life to him, or her mother’s. “I just think so.”

“Why do you think so?” He was relentless in his questioning, just as he obviously was in his hatred.

She felt helpless before it. “Because of the letters. And you’ve seen those,” she added with no little resentment.

“That’s all?” he asked incredulously. “You traveled that far just on the basis of a few letters?”

“There was money.” At the sudden narrowing and hardening of his eyes, she regretted saying those words.

“How much money?”

“It doesn’t make any difference.”

“It does to me, Miss Randall.”

“Why? I don’t have it with me. You can’t steal it.”

“I can steal other things if you continue to try me,” he said in that hoarse voice again, his lips barely moving.

Shea knew she had gone too far. She leaned down and picked up her sketching case. His hand stopped hers midway. “There are a few rules, Miss Randall.”

She looked up at him. She wished he weren’t so tall. She wished he didn’t have those vividly colored eyes. She wished he didn’t make her feel like a … a wanton. She wished she knew where these odd, heated feelings were coming from. Fear, she fervently hoped. It had to be fear.

“What rules?”

“No more sketches of the men who come here.”

“What about you?”

“You want a remembrance?” He grinned at her.

“I want to see you hang,” she said recklessly. “Maybe a picture will help.”

“A few moments ago you wanted to see me in prison,” he mocked.

“That was a few moments ago.”

“I thought you were against violence.”

“You’re making me reconsider.”

He shook his head. “Such fragile principles.”

“At least I have some.”

“You lose principles in prison, Miss Randall.”

“I think you lost a lot more than that,” she said. His jaw set, and a muscle throbbed in his cheek. He was reacting as if she’d dealt him a body blow.

“Very perceptive, Miss Randall. Tell me more about myself.”

That was the quickest road to hell, and Shea knew it. So she remained silent.

“Caution again?”

He said it in such a smug way, she wanted to slap him. He was waiting for that, waiting for a reason to retaliate. She didn’t know why he felt he needed an excuse, but apparently he did.

“Isn’t that what you want? An obedient prisoner?”

He scowled at her. “I don’t think you’re a damn bit obedient.”

“Why is that?”

“Because I’ve been where you are, lady. You’re thinking of escape. Every moment you’re thinking of it, and you’ll risk everything for it.”

“Did you?”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. She already knew enough about him to know he had. It must have been devastating to him to fail.

“You’re comparing me to you. I’m not like you.”

“Aren’t you?” he asked. “Don’t you feel a little bit desperate?”

She did. More so than before, because he apparently knew everything she was thinking. “Does that give you pleasure?”

“Like going through your belongings? Not much. I like my pleasures more direct.”

Her face flamed again at the innuendo. Other parts of her were also on fire, and she had no control over the sudden surge of heat. The air between them was magnetic, full of storm winds blowing temptation.

He felt it too. She knew he did. He didn’t move, seemingly locked in place as she was. A muscle throbbed in his cheek, and she felt a throbbing of her own deep in the most private part of herself, a throbbing she’d never known before.

The longing it created in her was bittersweet. And terrifying. Of all the men in the world, this one should be the least likely to stir such vivid and exotically painful feelings.

He reached up and touched her cheek with his left hand, and the feelings magnified, the longing more compelling.

She wanted to touch him, too, to see whether she could ease the harsh, bitter lines on his face, but she knew she couldn’t or she would be lost. It would be an invitation to him, and there were only the two of them up here in this mountain clearing.

No safety anywhere. No one to interfere. No one to tell her how unwise she was.

She had to tell herself, and nothing in her life had been more difficult. Using all the willpower she had, she wrenched away from his touch.

He dropped his hand quickly and stepped back, his face still impassive, but there was a brilliant glitter in his striking eyes. She didn’t know whether it was from anger or desire. She didn’t think she wanted to know.

“Ex-convicts not to your liking?” His body was tense, and she had the sudden impression that she had wounded him. Which was ridiculous.

“Kidnappers are not to my liking,” she retorted.

“I didn’t kidnap you.”

“But you’re holding me here against my will.”

Some of the tension seemed to fade from him. “Let’s just say I don’t want anything to happen to you in these mountains.”

“You don’t care what happens to me,” she charged, terribly confused by her own mixed emotions, that moment of regret that she might have caused him pain. She ought to cause him as much pain as she could, as he had done to her.

He hesitated at her charge, started to say something, and then clamped his lips together. He finally shrugged. “Continue to believe that, Miss Randall, and we’ll get along just fine.”

“I don’t want to get along with you.”

“You’ll have to. Unless you want to stay in that cabin day and night. I don’t intend to waste time arguing with you. You do exactly what I say or you stay in that cabin … without that sketchpad.”

She looked down at her case, still clutched in her hands. “You didn’t say whether I could sketch you.”

“I don’t give a damn. I want Randall to know I’m here. And,” he added with a careless shrug, “as you know, there are other pictures of me.”

“Will you pose for me?” Shea asked. She had gone this far. She might as well go further.

“Now that, Miss Randall, is asking too much.”

“You have an interesting face.”

“Really?” he said wryly. “And how is that?”

“I don’t know,” she said slowly, thoughtfully. “Which is why it’s interesting.”

“I’m sure you’ll tell me when you know.” He turned away, as if weary of the conversation.

“I …”

He turned back to her. “What?”

“I don’t know what to call you.”

“Mr. Tyler will do,” he said. “Or sir.”

She looked him in the eyes. She had lost some of her fear of him, knowing she had goaded him and had survived. “Go to …” She stopped, unwilling to finish what she had started to say, not out of fear but propriety. “Hades,” she finally finished.

“You asked. That’s what I called the guards in prison. Now I’m your guard, Miss Randall, and I think we should observe the proprieties of such an arrangement.”

“Fine,” she said. “Mr. Tyler.” She made it sound as obscene as the way he said “Miss Randall.”

He smiled mirthlessly. “Now you have the idea.” He turned to leave again, and this time he didn’t stop until he disappeared into the other building.