Sagebrush Bride

chapter TWENTY SIX





No sooner had Elizabeth stepped off the train when Colyer lifted Katie out of her hands. “Here,” he offered graciously, “let me help. She looks awfully heavy for you.”

“No—really!” Elizabeth protested, her hands flying out to bring Katie back.

Colyer gave her a look that sent another shiver of apprehension coursing through her. “I insist,” he told her firmly, and then he bent to whisper into her ear so Katie couldn’t overhear. “Walk or I slit the kid’s throat.”

Elizabeth came to an abrupt halt, too stunned to believe that she’d heard him correctly. Her chin fell and she started to ask him to repeat himself, but the look in his eyes as she turned kept her from it. She shook her head.

“Walk,” he instructed, shoving his jacket aside to reveal the leather sheath where his knife was buried.

Icy fear gripped Elizabeth at the sight of it. The color drained completely from her face. Her heart racing with terror, she considered screaming for help, but Colyer gave her a look that chilled her to the bone, paralyzing her momentarily, and she wondered how she ever could have thought him handsome. The look transformed him completely.

“Walk,” Colyer snarled, when Elizabeth only stared. “And just in case you’re thinking to scream, just remember that we have your husband trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey ready to be spitted.” He snickered maliciously, letting her know that he knew, without a shadow of doubt, that Cutter was nothing more to her than her lover. He shoved her forward abruptly, and she stumbled over her feet. But she turned and managed to do as she was told, her mind racing frantically.

“At least let me carry Katie,” she said quickly, her voice wavering slightly.

Colyer chortled, nudging her forward again. “Think I’m stupid?” he asked viciously. “Get a wiggle on it, dove... before my fingers get itchy.”

Elizabeth needed no further urging. She walked blindly through the crowd, aware of the fact that Colyer was directly behind her, ready to thrust her forward when she didn’t move quickly enough. Aware, too, that he held Katie’s fate at his will. And Cutter’s?

What could he want with him? With Katie? She couldn’t fathom. Biting into her lower lip to stifle her cry of panic, she shook her head in denial, for there was no reason she could determine.

The buildings Elizabeth passed became a blur, the people faceless. Her heart hammered with fear. Unexpectedly Colyer thrust a hand on her shoulder, shoving her abruptly into an alley, where two men waited, one mounted, the other not. Both she recognized at once. But there was no sign of Cutter, and she knew at once that Colyer had lied. The knot tightened in her stomach as she looked frantically about for some means of escape.

There was none—not while Colyer still held Katie.

“She’s frightened—please! Let me hold her now!” Elizabeth said anxiously, and tried to take Katie from his arms. “We’ll do as you say,” she swore. “Just let me hold her!”

Colyer dodged her, boosting Katie up into the arms of the youth Elizabeth remembered only as O’Neill.

The look on O’Neill’s face mirrored the horror in her heart.

“Y’ didn’t say you was bringing the kid,” O’Neill objected, his Irish brogue coming out with his agitation. “I won’t be havin’ nothin’ ta do with killin’ a babe!”

Katie began to whimper in his arms. Elizabeth tried to take her from O’Neill, but Colyer snatched her by the waist and dragged her away, lifting her up onto his own bay. He mounted behind her.

Magnus nosed his horse closer to O’Neill’s, and the hostile set of his shoulders made Elizabeth’s breath snag. “You got a problem with this, Blue-boy?” he asked, borrowing the epithet Cutter had used for him. “If so... you can just take off right now.” He made a motion with his head for O’Neill to leave, but his hand went to his revolver in a clear warning. “Just turn that yellow tail of yours around and ride.”

O’Neill’s gaze shifted from Magnus to Colyer to the child in his arms, and then back, narrowing shrewdly on Magnus. “I’m no’ stupid, man. I turn this horse about and you shoot me in the back. Is that how it works?”

“Well, now,” Magnus said, baring his teeth in some semblance of a smile, his tone taunting. “Why don’t you try and see?”

O’Neill shook his head slowly. “No’ bloody likely!” And then, as though suddenly realizing his tenuous position, he told them. “I’m with ya now—don’t ya doubt it. I just don’t ken ta killin’ the girl, is all. It’s no’ right! Besides, you said it would just be the woman—you said she didn’t matter because she was a breed-lovin’ whore!” He gave Elizabeth a quick, assessing glance, and then his eyes reverted quickly to Magnus, but Elizabeth noted the fact that he was unconsciously petting Katie’s back, soothing her. In spite of his comforting, Katie’s eyes were wide with fright, and Elizabeth’s heart cried out for her.

Magnus noticed, as well, and gave O’Neill a narrow-eyed scowl. “Yeah?” He flicked a look to Colyer, then back to O’Neill. “Well, don’t shit yourself over it, kid. Let’s just get the hell out of here before McKenzie finds us. This ain’t the place for what we got in mind.” He turned to wink at Elizabeth, and then motioned for O’Neill to move ahead of him, before he fell back to ride momentarily beside Colyer.

“Thought you said the boy would go along with anything,” Colyer hissed at Magnus. “Thought you said he had stars in his eyes. All we need is for him to go causing trouble for us now!”

Magnus gave Colyer a cold-eyed glance that shifted to include Elizabeth. “We’ll take care of it,” he said simply, and then he moved to take the lead.

Elizabeth stiffened with the import of those words, but Colyer only snickered at her response, nuzzling his nose into the back of her hair. It sent another chill down her spine. “You’ll never get away with this,” she hissed, shrugging away in disgust.

Colyer lunged forward abruptly, pressing himself against her, flattening Elizabeth against the horse’s mane as he dug his heels into the mare. The saddle horn dug painfully into her stomach, but Elizabeth resisted the urge to cry out in pain, sensing that it was what Colyer wanted.

“Already have, dove,” he informed her contemptuously. “Already have.” His tongue snaked out suddenly, flicking the back of Elizabeth’s neck through her hair, and she surged forward as far from him as was possible, cringing against the revolting feel of it.

Colyer chuckled nastily. “Hafta wonder, dove... if you lay as good as you taste.”





With a sense of foreboding wringing his gut, Cutter vaulted onto the railcar in which Elizabeth and Katie had boarded. In his recklessness, he cleared the steps completely. Racing blindly, he tore open the door and hurried down the aisle, ignoring the stares and curses flung at him for inspecting each and every occupied seat like a man possessed.

She wasn’t there. Christ, she wasn’t there—she wasn’t anywhere!

“Elizabeth! Katie?” He grabbed a small child who dashed out into the aisle and into the seat directly across, where a woman was drowsing, her face to the window. Blond was all Cutter saw in that instant. The woman in the seat was blond. And the child was dark-haired, but the little girl he swung about to face him definitely wasn’t Katie, and she started to squeal in fright.

The blond woman sat up in her seat with a start and began to shriek at him. She lunged forward, her eyes wide with terror, and seized the child from him, clutching her protectively.

Cutter didn’t linger to soothe her.

“Did you see that?” the woman shrieked at his back. “He tried to steal my baby!”

“I think he’s insane!” yelled another.

Cutter’s brows knit as he deliberated his next move. Christ Almighty, he felt insane! The train jerked forward in that moment, taking the decision from his hands. His gut twisted. Having no choice but to examine each and every railcar, he bolted toward the back of the train at a dead run, ignoring the pain that burned through his left leg.





After two exhausting hours of riding before Colyer in the saddle, every muscle in Elizabeth’s body screamed from the awkwardness of straining forward.

From the snatches of conversation she’d overheard, she’d been able to conclude that it was Cutter they were after, and not Katie or herself. They clearly despised him; Jack Colyer, for some injury done to his person. What, she didn’t know, but she was sure she’d find out soon enough. Magnus’ reasons were less a mystery. The simple fact that Cutter inhaled the same air he did seemed to provoke him. Every other word out of his mouth was either “breed” or “half-breed”—or some other less-than-flattering epithet.

Of the three, O’Neill seemed to be the least embittered. He said nothing as they rode, but the care he gave Katie spoke volumes. In him, Elizabeth sensed their greatest chance for escape. But she didn’t dare meet his gaze for long to confirm it. Nor did she speak to him for fear of drawing attention to his regard for Katie. Because of his solicitousness, Katie’s fear seemed lessened considerably, and Elizabeth was thankful for that. Yet, in spite of it, Katie’s eyes seemed perpetually wide and on the verge of tears, and it tormented Elizabeth that she couldn’t reach out and take her niece into her arms, couldn’t comfort her. Her eyes glazed every time she happened to catch the stoic expression on Katie’s beautiful little face.

Still, seeing was better than not.

Every once in a while O’Neill would ride out of her field of vision, and Katie’s face would become nothing more than a shadowed blur. It was in those endless moments that Elizabeth’s heart cried out the most, for she wanted so desperately to know that Katie was holding up. Her ears strained to hear even the slightest whimper, but there never was any, and Elizabeth had to conclude finally that Katie had been right.

She never cried.

They didn’t stop until late afternoon, and then only to water the horses. Without explanation, Magnus shoved Elizabeth down onto a fallen log to wait. After a moment, a fitfully sleeping Katie was thrust into her arms.

Watching her abductors with a knot in her throat, Elizabeth sat, rocking Katie and feeling her anger mount with every blasphemy Magnus heaped upon Cutter’s head. But she said nothing, only listened, and tried desperately to keep her fragile control. For Katie’s sake, she suppressed her anger under the appearance of indifference. But had she been alone, she might have clawed Magnus’ eyes out for the insults he hurled at Cutter in his absence. How bold of him to insult a man who wasn’t even present to defend himself! The more she heard, the more difficult it became to keep silent in the face of his bigotry.

When Magnus insulted Cutter yet again, saying that he was no man, that he was an animal fit only to be skinned and worn like the buffalo his kind hunted, Elizabeth couldn’t keep herself from speaking up any longer—in spite of her resolve not to draw undue attention to themselves for Katie’s sake. She flashed Magnus a look of disdain and, as instructed, handed Katie back up into O’Neill’s arms before turning to face him again. Her legs wavered slightly.

“I don’t recall you being so vulgar and insulting to Cutter’s face,” she taunted in a low voice, taut with anger. “Perhaps you aren’t so much a man yourself, Mr. Sulzberger?”

Magnus only smiled, his eyes slitting cannily, and then he turned to address Colyer with a belligerent grin. The look they exchanged infuriated her. “She’ll ride with me now,” he said with relish, and then he turned back to leer at her.

Colyer sniggered. “ ‘Bout time you showed some emotion, dove. I was beginnin’ to worry I’d nabbed the wrong woman.”

Her gaze snapped back to Magnus as he spat a wad at her feet, but Elizabeth stood her ground, ignoring his crudeness.

Magnus nodded in agreement. “Ain’t seen no sign of that bastard trailing us either,” he added. “For a while I was thinking that worthless half-breed might not even care enough to come after her.” Excitement flared in his eyes as he turned to face her. He grinned. “Anyhow, you just set my mind at ease, darlin’. He’ll come. And when he does... I’m gonna take real pleasure in showing you, while he watches, just how much a man I can be. Now,” he barked, “you just get that pretty little butt of yours up into my saddle.”

His grin widened, his gaze roving up the length of her, lingering at her fully concealed breast, yet making Elizabeth feel stripped before him. She shuddered at his look.

“We’re gonna do some powerful riding, you and I,” Magnus vowed.

A frisson of panic rippled down Elizabeth’s spine and the color drained from her face as she recalled Cutter’s passionate plea—Ride me, Lizbeth, ride—the rawness of his voice. She closed her eyes momentarily, wishing to God that she’d had no notion what that word meant between men and women, but she did, and by the look on Magnus’ florid, self-satisfied face, he knew she understood, as well.

Cold fingers swept over her as he sniggered, and she swallowed convulsively, shuddering inwardly, her stomach turning with revulsion at the merest thought of his touching her. Averting her eyes, she glanced over her shoulder at Katie. She was still sleeping—thank God! She couldn’t bear for Katie to hear.

“Well, whattaya know, ‘pears that savage trained you real good.” His eyes shot her with cold contempt as he gripped her by the upper arm, forcing her into motion. She gave a startled little cry, her throat closing up with fear. “Now,” he mocked her, “why don’t you just mount up so we can see what kind of moves you learned for us.”