Chapter Thirty-Nine
He groaned.
He opened his eyes and tried to focus. The room was blurred, indistinct at first. He closed his eyes again against the bright, streaming sunlight, and felt the stab of pain in his temples, the unnatural thudding of his heart, the nausea welling in his abdomen.
He needed water, desperately. As if he had been traveling across the Sonora Desert for days without a single drop.
He opened his eyes and attempted to sit.
His head thundered between his ears.
Jack reached automatically for the pitcher on the floor next to the straw mattress, pouring a mug of the clear, cool liquid, then draining its contents.
He drank another glass, then looked around.
He was in a partitioned area of what was probably a one-room adobe house.
A dirty blanket enclosed the small space he was in.
He was lying on a filthy mattress. It was the only item in the room other than the cracked earthenware pitcher, the tin mug, and a looking glass that was propped against one wall.
He had on his pants, but that was it. Where was he and how had he gotten there?
He didn’t remember retiring—in fact, the last thing he remembered was watching the moon rise through the open saloon door, while he drank himself senseless.
He must be in a back room of one of the houses near the saloon. God, did he have a headache!
The blanket moved and Jack tried to sit up. He stared with shock at the familiar face of the half-breed girl who worked in the saloon. She was so pitifully thin and dirty, so lifeless and young. He didn’t remember bedding her. He prayed he hadn’t.
She didn’t say anything, but she smiled slightly and offered him a cup of steaming coffee and a fresh pastry. He wondered how she had gotten the money to pay for it, and felt sick as he understood what must have occurred between them last night—for her to offer him food, for her to smile.
Jack groaned and grimaced, filled with self-loathing. “Do you have any whiskey?” he said, as the pain he had been trying to escape yesterday came flooding back. “What time is it?”
She made signs with her hands, and he remembered that she couldn’t talk—someone had cut out her tongue—and he felt nausea rising hard and fast. She set down the coffee and doughnut and turned to go. He grabbed her wrist, his fingers closing over skin and bone. “Wait.”
She stopped and looked at him.
“Last night,” he said slowly, making sure she understood. “Did we …?” He motioned to the bed. “You and me, did we sleep together?”
She smiled again, and for that instant he thought he couldn’t bear himself, not for using some poor abused child, but then she shook her head. She made signs that he had been sleeping next door, his head on the table. She was telling him that he had passed out.
“Thank you,” Jack said politely, flooded with relief. He wondered how he had gotten there, to her bed. She left and he rubbed his face. When the blanket moved again, he looked up into the eyes of a heavy Mexican woman.
“You pay for last night,” she said in broken English, holding out her hand.
“I didn’t bed her.”
“No matter. You too drunk is not my business. You sleep here, you pay.”
“How much?”
“One bit.”
Jack reached into his pocket for a coin and found it was empty. “Damn.”
The matron folded her heavy arms across her even heavier bosom. “You have no money?”
“Apparently not.”
She scowled, furious.
Jack got to his feet unsteadily. He was sick with a hangover. But at least this novel situation was keeping him distracted. “Look,” he said. “I’ll bring you a deer.”
She stared, unbelieving. “No stupido, senor.”
“You obviously could use the meat. I’ll bring you a deer,” he repeated.
She narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
“I give you my word,” he said, looking into, her eyes.
She smiled. “I believe you. My daughter tell me with sign—you are not bad like the others in that saloon. When?”
“Tomorrow.”
She nodded, satisfied. “Maybe a chicken too?”
He almost smiled. “If I can. How did I get here?”
“We wake you with water. You try to walk. You talk loudly about Candice Carter. You are the breed she left Kincaid for, eh?”
“What?”
“I know the story, don’t worry, senor. It is all over town. She elope with Kincaid, but she come back with you. She leave Kincaid when she meet you, eh?” The woman laughed. “Now she leave you for Kincaid. The woman cannot make up her mind.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, confused. “What do you mean that she left me for Kincaid? He’s dead.”
“Oh, no, senor. Kincaid ride in a few days ago looking for his wife. Very upset.”
Jack leaned against the rough wall. “What? Kincaid’s alive? Here?”
“Here, sí. With his wife.” She jabbed her thumb behind her.
“They’re here now, together, in town?”
“Waiting for the stage,” she said.
He was reeling despite his numbed mind. Jack felt his heart pick up a heavy, thudding beat.
She was here, in Tucson. With Kincaid. Could he never escape her?
Where were they going? It was none of his business, he didn’t care.
She was no longer of any concern to him.
Were they leaving on the noon stage west, or the 3 P.M. stage east?
Both lines ran late—sometimes by a few hours—but usually by half a day, or even days.
Damn! Where were they going?
And why did he care?
He reminded himself that she had made her choice.
He thought of her in Kincaid’s arms.
Had their reunion been joyous? Had she wept with ecstasy because her husband was alive? How would she explain her loss of virginity? Viciously he hoped Kincaid would make her suffer for it.
“You have any whiskey around here?” he managed, focusing on the woman, who was watching him with careful interest.
He tried not to think as he belted down the shot she brought him. He was getting drunk again. After last night, it wouldn’t take much. Where were they going?
Why couldn’t he stop thinking about that heartless bitch?
He had been a fool to think she would stay with him.
Damn her! Why did he have to keep thinking about how she looked, how her eyes flashed when she was angry, how they glowed when she was aroused, how they softened when she smiled?
How she felt, beneath him, sheathing him, how she responded to his passion in a way that no other woman had, and never would …
how when they were together, there was something so fulfilled, it was beyond the actual physical act of copulation, giving her a part of himself, and becoming a part of her. …
His body moved of its own volition. It wasn’t until he stepped out of the shack and onto the dusty street that he realized he was barefoot and wearing only his pants—not even his gun.
Candice sat alone on a bench at the stage depot, right across the street.
His gaze moved over her. She was dressed for travel in a blue serge jacket and skirt, a matching bonnet in blue straw.
The outfit revealed rather than hid her lush curves, and he felt the stirring of forbidden desire.
Her hair was out of sight, except for golden wisps that escaped the bonnet and drifted around her face.
She was dark—golden-tanned from all the time she had spent in the sun without protection, much darker than when he had first found her on the desert, dying.
For a brief instant he was brought back to that time, when it had all started.
She sat stiff and straight and did not look like Candice. Where was Kincaid?
Jack was halfway across the street, mindless of passersby, when she saw him. Their gazes locked.
He stopped by her side, smiling mockingly. “Well, well,” he drawled. “If it isn’t Mrs. Kincaid. Going on a trip, Mrs. Kincaid?”
“Jack!” She was staring at him, her face paling, her eyes huge dark pools, and something in their depths, something he hadn’t expected to see, struck him, pulled at him. Why was she sad? Surely his eves were deceiving him. He shook off the compassion—he didn’t care.
“Where is Kincaid?” he taunted, pulling her to her feet.
She didn’t shrink away from him, even though he knew his grip had to be hurting her. Instead she stared into his eyes, searchingly. He tightened his hold until she grimaced.
“Aren’t you going to beg me to leave you alone?” He sneered. “Aren’t you afraid of being seen with me in public? What’s wrong, Mrs. Kincaid, has the cat got your tongue?”
He yanked her. Still, she didn’t protest, didn’t cry out. “Well? Are you happy now, Mrs. Kincaid, with your white husband?” His face was very close to hers. Why did she just stand there and take his abuse? “Can you even tell the difference in the dark?” He threw her off.
She stumbled against the post, then straightened. Her eyes never left him. “Jack, you don’t understand …”
“Oh, I understand, Candice, I understand perfectly the bigoted little bitch that you are,” he said disgustedly, grabbing her shoulders again.
She whimpered.
“Get your hands off my wife!” Kincaid rasped, striding down the street toward them.
Jack dropped his hand and stepped aside instinctively to move away from Candice, so she wouldn’t be hurt in the gunfire that followed. His hands were already tensed at his sides when he realized he had no gun. Not even his knife.
Which was unfortunate, because he itched to kill the man who was Candice’s white husband.
“No, Virgil,” Candice cried with panic, rushing to him, grabbing his arm. “He’s drunk. We were just talking. Please.”
“Is this the one?” Kincaid demanded, livid. “Is he the one?”
“No!” Candice lied, clinging to him. “No, I swear it, no!”
“Step aside, Candice.”
“No!” Candice shouted.
“Get away,” Jack said to her, fighting to clear his head. He wasn’t frightened, but he knew he was in trouble. He was hung over and drunk, and Kincaid could kill him with such an advantage. He fought to sharpen all his senses, concentrating with an effort fed by adrenaline.
“Virgil, he’s drunk and unarmed.” Candice clung to him. “Virgil, please.”
Jack watched as Kincaid glanced at her. She was pressing against him, her breasts crushed against his side, one of her hands on his chest, her lips parted, her look partly seductive, partly pleading.
She lowered her voice and was speaking rapidly.
Jack strained to hear her words. He knew he would have been able to discern them if he weren’t so numb from alcohol.
And then Kincaid relaxed, placing his arm around her, and with a last warning look, he pulled Candice away.
Not once did she even look back.