Cowboys 08 - Luke Read online

  Valeria fought off the stupor that threatened to swallow her. "I will not be hauled around like a sack of turnips. You're fired."

  Luke crossed the room in the space of a single breath, his face, taut and angry, only inches from Valeria's. "We played that game once. Now you've got me whether you want me or not."

  "I don't want you," Valeria said.

  But she spoke to ambient air. Luke had left the room. She heard the sound of his boots on the stairs.

  For a moment no one moved. Valeria felt weak, powerless. The chef stared at his feet, the breakfast tray still in his grasp. Elvira might as well have been a statue. She hadn't moved-or breathed, as far as Valeria could tellwhile Luke had been in the room.

  Then the enormity of what had happened swept over her. Luke had invaded her bedchamber, stripped the covers from her, and dragged her from the bed in her nightgown. He'd emptied half her wardrobe and strewn her clothes over the floor. But worst of all, he'd put his hands all over her as though he was studying the conformation of a horse he was about to buy. She checked the desire to hurl damning epithets down the stairs after him. She stifled the yearning to scream in helpless frustration.

  "Don't stand there like a dolt," she snapped at Elvira. "Everything must be ready in an hour. Everything."

  Elvira shuddered and came to life. "I locked the door," she said. "I don't know how he got in."

  "There's nothing we can do about that now," Valeria said. "Just start packing."

  "But you're not dressed."

  "Forget me. My possessions are more important. All I have in the world-everything that can make life bearable in this wilderness-is with me. I don't want to leave any of it behind. Put that tray down," she said to the chef. "Find Otto and Hans and send them to me immediately."

  "You can't see them dressed like that," Elvira protested.

  "Luke has seen me like this," Valeria snapped. "Nothing can be worse than that."

  But by the time Hans arrived, she had put on a dress and gotten the worst tangles out of her hair. She didn't look like a royal princess, but she wasn't half naked.

  Hans looked as though he been dragged out of bed, aimed at his clothes, and thrust into the hall.

  "I'm terribly sorry, your highness. I never-"

  "What's done is done," Valeria said, cutting off his almost tearful apology. "I want you and Otto to make sure everything I brought is packed in one of the wagons and ready to go."

  "The wagons are loaded," Hans said. "We're waiting only for your personal belongings."

  Valeria didn't understand. Her possessions filled several train cars.

  "He had men working all night," Hans said. "He said if he'd waited for us, it would be December before we got started."

  "What men?" Valeria asked. There were no men in her entourage other than Otto, Hans, the chef, and his helpers.

  "He emptied a saloon of miners and offered them free drinks if they didn't break anything."

  Valeria thought of the priceless heirlooms she'd brought from Europe and her skin crawled. If he and his ruffians had ruined anything-well, she didn't know what she'd do, but she'd think of something. Her ancestors were famous for their dirty tricks. She must have inherited some of their ability.

  Luke frowned at the six wagons lined up in the middle of the street, each loaded with enough stuff to furnish a house. He glanced at the sky, which was beginning to turn gray just above the horizon. The sun would be up in fifteen minutes. He wanted to be out of town before the residents began to stir out of doors.

  The heavily loaded wagons cut tracks into the packed dirt of the street. It would be worse in the desert, impossible on ground softened by rain. Dishes. China. Flatware. It didn't matter what you called it, it was plates, cups, and saucers, literally thousands of them, packed in crates and barrels. The land above the Mogollon Rim was practically deserted. Valeria wouldn't find anyone to sit down at her table but rough cowboys who'd rather eat off a tin plate than one painted by hand and decorated in gold.

  Then there was the furniture. He'd ordered most of it stored in Bonner. She had brought enough to furnish a small palace. He supposed that's what she expected to do with it. Instead she'd find a rough log house. She wouldn't have a staff of servants to clean and polish her silver, dust the priceless ornamental clocks, mirrors, statues, and whatever else she considered a necessary part of her life. She certainly wouldn't find any use for heavy dresses made to be worn in stone palaces in a cold climate. She should have gone to Canada, not Arizona!

  She was either a stupid woman or very ill informed. Either way, she was remarkably stubborn. And he'd obligated himself to protect her!

  He was the one who was remarkably stupid, and he couldn't blame it on any lack of information. He'd known what he was getting into from the moment she walked into that hotel room. He should have gotten on his horse and ridden as far and as fast as he could after she fired him. Instead he'd let an absurd little man convince him he'd forfeit his honor if he deserted this princess.

  Princess! Who the hell did she think she was? Someone should have told her most Americans had left Europe to get away from that kind of nonsense. Nobody would consider her special just because some ancestor a thousand years ago had conquered the people in a tiny corner of Europe and set himself up as king. They were more likely to ostracize her.

  Then there were the horses. Beautiful, hot-blooded horses. Why hadn't someone told her she might as well have dangled gold before a bunch of thieves!

  Sandoval joined Luke. "You'll never get them wagons through the desert if it rains," he said.

  "I'm more worried about her horses."

  "You should be," Sandoval agreed. "They've been attracting attention ever since they arrived. And not the best kind, either."

  Knowing that did nothing to improve Luke's mood.

  "Everybody knows you haven't hired guards," Sandoval said. "They've been talking about it all morning. I give you two days before you're ambushed."

  Out of the corner of his eye, Luke saw two horsemen appear around the corner of the bank. They paused, looked up and down the street, then turned their horses toward Luke's caravan.

  "Maybe," Luke said, his mood lightening considerably, "but my chances just improved."

  "You've decided to leave the horses here?"

  Sandoval's expression lightened so much, Luke wondered if his friend had designs on Valeria's priceless mounts.

  "See them?" Luke said, motioning with his head. "They're worth a dozen gunmen."

  "Who are they?" Sandoval asked.

  "You might say they're my brothers."

  "The hell I would," Sandoval replied. "I ain't blind. One's a half-breed and the other is black."

  "We were adopted."

  Sandoval grinned. "And all this time I thought you was brought up by a mountain lion."

  "I was sired by a mad coyote and nursed by a rabid bitch," Luke muttered. "A mountain lion would have been better."

  Luke's irritation increased. He rarely spoke about his adopted family, but he never mentioned his true parents. He had done his best to erase all memory of them from his mind. It irritated him that he was so riled up about Valeria he'd spoken without thinking.

  Which was another problem. He wasn't thinking clearly these days. He usually avoided jobs involving women. He liked clean, neat jobs he could walk away from without having to look over his shoulder. Nothing about women was easy. There was always some kind of complication. He'd only accepted this job because of the money. He'd considered the princess only a small part of the job. More fool he.

  Still, that didn't account for his staying after he'd been fired. Otto had even paid him for his time and inconvenience. Yet despite Valeria's objections and the insanity of carrying so much useless stuff through the desert, Luke felt obligated to honor his promise.

  He hoped honor had been the deciding factor. He didn't want his decision to have anything to do with Valeria.

  "I wouldn't turn my back on them for five seconds," Sandova
l said.

  "You shouldn't," Luke said. "Zeke can kill you in two seconds. Hawk can do it in one."

  Sandoval shuddered. "And you grew up sharing a bunkhouse with those two?"

  "And seven others, including my real brother."

  "It's a good thing you had somebody to watch your back."

  Chet had always watched Luke's back. He'd become a gunfighter so he could continue looking after his younger brother. But Chet had given up guns seven years ago, gotten married, gone back to Texas, and bought himself a ranch next to Jake and Isabelle's place. Last Luke heard, Chet had two boys and Melody was expecting again. Luke hadn't seen his brother's kids. Respectable women didn't want a man like him around. He couldn't fault them for that. He didn't think much of respectable women, either.

  "Glad you could make it," Luke said when Zeke and Hawk brought their horses to a halt.

  "When did you start helping settlers?" Hawk asked. "And why in hell would they go into the Rim country? Those ranchers will bum them out."

  "They're not settlers," Luke said. "I'm taking a woman to her future husband's ranch. She was a princess, but her people threw her out, and his people threw him out. They decided to settle in the Arizona Territory."

  "They've got to be crazy," Hawk said.

  "That's not my worry," Luke said. "I'm just supposed to get her there."

  "Are those horses going with us?" Zeke said, indicating the six blooded thoroughbreds.

  Luke nodded.

  "You trying to get us killed? That's what's going to happen if we travel nearly four hundred miles with those horses."

  "I expect they'll be something of a problem," Luke said, "but it wouldn't be any safer to leave them here."

  "It would have been safer to have left them where they came from," Zeke snapped.

  "It's a little late for that."

  "It's not too late for Hawk and me to turn around and ride out."

  Luke didn't respond to Zeke's burst of temper. Jake and Isabelle had pounded the same belief in honor and loyalty into Hawk and Zeke as they had into their other adopted sons. Once committed, Hawk and Zeke wouldn't turn back. Unlike him, they hadn't put a price on their honor. Luke wondered why Jake and Isabelle had failed with him.

  "Get acquainted with the drivers," Luke said. "Maybe you'll feel a little better after that."

  "Hired some of your gun-toting friends, did you?" Hawk asked.

  "I found me a full-blooded Apache and a couple of half-breeds."

  Hawk's black eyes glowed, but his face remained impassive. He turned his horse and walked it toward the wagons.

  "Why the hell did you have to go and say something like that?" Zeke demanded.

  "I want him mad. Nothing gets past him then."

  "You made me mad, too."

  "Good. You're a better fighter when you've got the prospect of spilling some white man's blood."

  Zeke jerked his horse around and trotted after Hawk.

  "You're crazy," Sandoval exclaimed, "baiting those men like that. They're liable to put a knife in you."

  "They'd die before they'd let anything happen to me. Jake and Isabelle taught them nothing is more important than family."

  "You ain't part of nobody's family," Sandoval said. "You're like a lone wolf. You'd eat your young if it would get you anything by it."

  "They don't know that."

  "They're liable to find out before this trip's over."

  Hans, dressed exactly as he must have dressed for court in Belgravia, came out of the hotel and started toward Luke with mincing steps.

  "What's he going to do up on the Rim?" Sandoval asked. "I'll bet you fifty dollars he can't stay on a horse more than ten minutes."

  "I doubt any of them can ride worth a damn. I don't know why Valeria wanted to bring these horses."

  "Maybe her husband wanted them, though I don't know what use he'll find for them on the Rim."

  "Probably fox hunting," Luke said. "I expect somebody showed him a picture of a coyote."

  Sandoval burst out laughing, glanced at Hans, and headed off to his saloon.

  Luke pulled a watch from his vest pocket. "Your mistress has two minutes to be downstairs," Luke said when Hans toddled up.

  "The princess is ready," Hans said. "Please get all these people off the street so she can enter her coach."

  Luke jammed his watch back into his pocket. "Did she ask you to say that?"

  "No, but she'll naturally expect it. It's nearly impossible to enter a carriage without exposing a limb to public view."

  With a muttered curse, Luke headed toward Valeria's hotel. "I haven't got time for such foolishness," he said over his shoulder to Hans, who was practically running to keep up with him. "Before this journey is done, she'll expose more than that."

  "She's a royal princess. She can't be expected to appear in public like an ordinary person."

  "This is America," Luke said. "As far as people here are concerned, she is an ordinary person."

  Luke reached the hotel and pushed through the door way to find Valeria and her maid waiting in the lobby, luggage piled up behind her. She looked like a queen, regal and distant, waiting for her subjects.

  "You've got about one minute to get yourself and all your belongings into the coach," Luke said. He turned to her maid. "Get some of the drivers to load this stuff. Now!" His imperative command caused Elvira to jump, and run from the hotel as through pursued by a dangerous animal.

  "Don't shout at my maid," Valeria said.

  "I expect I'll shout at everybody, including you, before this trip is over. Why are you standing here instead of getting into the coach?"

  "I'm waiting for you to clear the street."

  His temper stretched by the circumstances of this absurd journey and his being stupid enough to take responsibility for it, Luke had no tolerance left for this kind of arrogance. "This is a Western territory, not a medieval kingdom."

  "Hans said-

  "It's desert," he said, interrupting her. "It's hot, dirty, and dangerous. Men kill each other for gold, silver, cows, horses, or a cup of water. Some kill just because they like it. If they see something they want, they take it. If anybody tries to stop them, they shoot the fool or put a knife in his heart. The only thing standing between your being raped and probably having your throat cut afterward is me and those two men outside."

  Hans tried to insert his pudgy body between Luke and Valeria. "You can't talk to her highness like that." He was so upset he could hardly articulate the words.

  Luke didn't bother looking down at him. He just picked him up and set him aside. "Now you either get into that coach on your own," he said to Valeria, "or I'll put you in it."

  "In case it's of any interest to you-and I doubt it is since you appear to be interested only in your own opinions-it was not my idea to wait here," Valeria said. "I was quite prepared to climb into the coach in full view of everyone in this town. Hans stopped me, certain you'd be glad to accord me this sign of courtesy."

  "I'll accord you courtesy when you earn a little," Luke said. "So far you've done nothing but sit back and wait for servants to do everything for you."

  "If I had any such expectations of you, Mr. Attmore, I assure you I have them no longer. Now if you will remove yourself from my path, I would like to enter my coach. I don't want to be accused of being the one to hold up your departure."

  Looking furious enough to use a knife herself, she started past him. Luke reached out and caught her by the arm. "Why aren't you wearing one of the dresses I bought you?"

  "Because I despise them." She looked down at Luke's hand, apparently stunned he would do anything so shocking as take hold of her. "Release my arm."

  Luke kept his grip. "Where are those dresses?"

  She attempted to pull away but Luke tightened his grip.

  "I asked you a question."

  He thought for a moment Valeria would refuse to answer. He also thought Hans would expire of a heart attack on the spot.

  "Elvira put them in th
e bottom of my truck," Valeria admitted grudgingly. "You can't make me wear them."

  Luke glared at her for a moment longer before he released her. "I won't have to," he said, his voice dropping lower. "Before long you'll be begging me to let you wear one."

  "I'll never-"

  "Never make rash promises," Luke said, as he moved to one side to allow her to pass. "It's so much more difficult when you have to swallow them and your pride."

  Valeria started to speak, changed her mind, and strode toward the door.

  "Buck up, Hans," Luke said. "Arizona isn't like your fusty old court, but it's not half bad once you get used to it. You might even discover you have two thoughts in your head that have nothing to do with Valeria. It'll do her good to have to take care of herself. She's been indulged too-"

  A scream from the street caused Luke to turn on his heel and race from the hotel.

  Chapter Five

  Luke found a white-faced Valeria supporting Elvira. The maid had fainted.

  "It's those two men," Valeria said, indicating Zeke and Hawk.