Rising from the settee, Amy grabbed her shawl and draped it around her shoulders. Maybe if she spoke to him one more time, he would reconsider. She stepped to the door and stared at the bolts, heart in throat, well aware of what she was about to do and the possible consequences. If she left things as they were, there was every possibility Swift might leave Wolf’s Landing and return to Texas. She would be a hundred times a fool if she did anything to stop him. And yet, how could she not?
Decision made, she slid the bolts back and, gathering her shawl against the crisp autumn breeze, stepped out onto the porch. As she did, she caught movement from the corner of her eye. Turning, she came face-to-face with Swift, who had just planted a black boot on the bottom step of her porch. Their eyes locked, sending messages neither of them seemed able to voice, his angry, hers relieved.
“You came,” she said at last.
Making no reply, he stomped up the steps, swept by her, and went inside the house. Amy stared after him, her mouth suddenly dry. He made her nervous enough when he was acting nice. She followed him inside, closing the door behind her, but not bolting it, just in case.
He went into the kitchen. Jerking out a chair, he turned it, straddled the seat and folded his arms across its back. Amy moseyed toward him, pretending with little success to be unaffected by his stormy behavior. He angled her a sharp glance and inclined his head at another chair. Heart pounding like a kettledrum, she sat down, settled her navy blue skirts around her, and opened her lesson book. Having him here was what she wanted, wasn’t it? She was getting her second chance to teach him something, and she wasn’t about to let it be spoiled. He couldn’t stay angry forever, after all.
Determined, Amy began the lesson with some two-sided letter cards she had made with this exercise especially in mind. She held up the A, explained what he was to do, and then waited while he regarded her in sullen silence.
“Swift, I know you recognize this letter,” she admonished him. “Are you going to apply yourself to this challenge or not?”
“Which of us is the biggest coward, Amy?” He leaned forward slightly. “You called me a coward for giving up on book learning, so here I am, willing to let you teach me. Now I’m calling you a coward, for giving up on life. Do you have the guts to let me teach you a few things?”
Amy stared at him, the card still held aloft.
He reached over and snatched it from her taut fingers. “That’s an A, as in ass.”
Clinging to her composure, she watched him lay the card on the table. “It also has a long sound, as in plate.”
“Or as in waist.” His gaze dropped to her middle. “I could span yours with my hands, if you’d ever let me get close to you.”
Amy set her jaw and held up the next card. He gave it a lazy perusal and said, “That’s a B, as in bottom or breast.” He trailed his gaze to her bodice and arched an eyebrow. “Nice, very nice.”
“It’s also a B as in bastard!” Amy shot up from the chair, disappointment, embarrassment, and anger warring for supremacy. “I can see you didn’t come here to learn anything. If you think I’m going to sit here, suffering your verbal abuse for an hour, you’ve got another think.”
“Have I made a mistake? B, the buh sound, breast. I think I got it right.”
She slapped the cards down on the table, so furious that she dropped several on the floor. He bent over to sweep them up. “That’s an H, as in honey, and I’ll bet that’s how you taste.” He flashed her an infuriating grin. “Honey, from one sweet end to the other.”
“That is quite enough.”
“No, sweetheart, that’s life.”
“Maybe in your books. But I can do without that particular facet of living, thank you.”
“Because you’re shaking-in-your-boots scared, that’s why. The Amy I knew was a fighter. You ran out and faced a war party of Comanches when you were twelve, toting a rifle bigger than you were. Do you remember that?”
“Loretta’s life was on the line. I had no choice.”
“And now it’s your life on the line, and mine. And you still don’t have a choice. Because I’m not going to give you one, damn it! The Amy I knew didn’t jump at her own shadow and run from what she knew she wanted. Are you willing to let what Santos did to you ruin your whole life? It’s been fifteen years. And he’s still torturing you every day and every night. Fight back, Amy. Bury him.”
Chest heaving, she retreated a step. “How can you claim to know what I want? I have what I want, Swift.” She gestured at the house, her hand trembling. “A home, a job I love, friends. And you want me to give it all up? For what? So you can tell me what to say and when to say it? What to do and how to do it? Maybe my life isn’t what you think it should be, but I’m happy.”
“Are you? Do you even know what you’re missing? Let me give you a taste of what you could have. Haven’t you ever looked at Hunter and Loretta and wanted? A home, with a fire in the hearth at night, and kids, and laughter?” He laid the cards that he had gathered on the table. Nodding toward the top one, he said, “That’s an L, as in love, and I love you more than I’ll ever be able to tell you with words. I want to tell you in other ways. In the way I kiss you. In the way I touch you. In the way I hold you. Won’t you let me say it my way, just once?”
She glared at the upturned card. “That’s not an L. It’s a T.”
He gave a soft laugh. “I don’t believe you sometimes.”
“The feeling’s mutual. You need your mouth scrubbed with lye soap.”
“Look at me, Amy.”
She knew she shouldn’t, that he was in a dangerous mood and that she was feeling particularly vulnerable, but the gentle plea in his voice compelled her. She immediately regretted complying. The moment her gaze met his, a rush of dangerous emotions swept through her.
“I promised you I’d try to change, because I’m in the white world now and I want—” He broke off, looking deep into her eyes. “I want to live. Really live. And you’re my last chance. Wolf’s Landing is my last chance. Can you understand that? If I can’t make it here, among friends, where in hell can I make it?”
“Oh, Swift, don’t . . .”
“Don’t what? Tell you the truth? Don’t make you feel sorry for me? By God, I’ll play on your sympathy if I have to.”
She squeezed her eyes closed. “Don’t.”
“Do you think I rode two thousand miles on a whim? I was running, damn it, running for my life!” He half rose from the chair, hands braced on its back. The sound of movement brought her eyes open. “And when I got here, I found you—alive and so beautiful it was like finding a dream. I can’t turn my back on that. I can’t! Not because I’m a stubborn bastard, but because there’s nothing else. Nothing. Do you understand?”
The heartbreak was that she did.
He gestured at himself. “No conchae, no guns, no spurs, no poncho. I’m clean-shaven. Loretta trimmed my hair last night. And I’m here to try, one more time, to learn my letters and numbers. What have you done to fulfill your part of the bargain? You said you’d try to meet me halfway. What have you done?”
“Nothing,” she admitted. And then in a rush she added, “I don’t know how to fulfill my part. Every time I think about it, I feel—”
“You feel what?”
“Trapped,” she whispered.
“You promised to try,” he reminded her. “And I’ve waited patiently, which isn’t in my nature. I want equal time, Amy.”
“What?”
“Equal time. I’ll learn my letters and numbers, but in return, you have to make an effort to learn to trust me again.”
Amy’s first inclination was to say no. But then uncertainty hit her. These last two weeks Swift truly had made an effort to change, trying every way he knew to please her. But more important was what he hadn’t done, which was to throw her across his horse and run off with her, as she had at first feared he might. Because he hadn’t, her attitude toward him was changing already, which tantalized her and made her wonder. W
as the Swift she once knew lurking under the hard, dangerous facade of Swift Lopez? If he was, Amy yearned to find him. For, hesitant though she was to admit it, she had never stopped loving him.
“Equal time,” she ventured hesitantly. “What exactly do you mean by that?”
“Just how it sounds. For every hour I spend on book learning, I want you to spend an hour with me.”
She nibbled her lip, watching him, trying to read him. His expression gave nothing away. “Would you promise not to . . .”
“Not to what?” he asked softly.
She gathered her courage and plunged ahead. “Not to touch me while we’re together.”
His eyes warmed on hers. “No promises, Amy. The whole idea is for you to trust me.”
“I thought the idea was to get reacquainted.”
He smiled. “Exactly. And I don’t want a bunch of rules muddying the water.”
She made the mistake of looking directly into his eyes again, and an electrical feeling charged the air between them, making her skin tingle.
“Say yes,” he urged. “Trust me, Amy—one more time. You did once, a long time ago. Remember? And I never broke faith. Can’t you take another gamble on me?”
Her heart began to slam.
“I’ve already promised you I’ll never hurt you,” he reminded her. “If you stop and think about it, doesn’t that pretty much cover most of the things you’re afraid might happen?”
In Amy’s experience, it covered them all. Her fear was that she and Swift had different definitions of hurting. “Yes.”
“Well then?”
She licked her lips, feeling reckless, as if something wonderful just beyond her line of vision awaited her and she had only to step forward to see it. “If I say yes, will you give me the option of calling the whole thing off if I’m not comfortable with it?”
He hesitated a moment, as if thinking that over, then grinned. “That sounds fair, as long as you don’t call it off when you still owe me time. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
For a long moment, he looked up at her. Then, so softly she almost couldn’t hear him, he said, “You won’t regret this. I promise you that.”
Legs atremble, Amy perched stiffly on the chair and gathered up the cards again. Swift watched her, looking smugly pleased with himself. She hoped that didn’t bode ill.
Amy had planned an hour’s lesson, but Swift somehow managed to stretch one hour to two. She suspected that he did so with an ulterior motive, which became apparent the moment they finished working. He demanded his two hours of equal time, right away.
“Now?” She glanced up at the small window above them. “But it’s dark. Loretta will be waiting dinner on you. Besides, what could we possibly do to pass two hours?”
“We can take a walk—and talk. I told Loretta I’d be late.”
Amy liked the hesitation in his voice before he said “talk” even less than she did the mischievous twinkle in his eye.
“I can’t go walking after dark. It’s out of the question. If people saw us, you know what they’d think. I have my teaching position to think of.”
“Who’ll see us? Do you think people peer out their windows at your front porch all night?”
“But they’re bound to see us walking. People do come and go around town after dark.”
“I have no intention of walking around town.”
Her eyes widened. “Where do you plan to go walking, then?”
“In the woods.”
“What?”
“Trust me, Amy.” He draped her shawl around her shoulders and steered her toward the door. “That’s what all this is about, remember? Trust. Do you really believe I have anything other than your best interests at heart?”
“I’m just afraid you might have an entirely different idea of what’s good for me than I do,” she admitted.
He laughed and pulled the door closed behind them. Amy peered into the gloom, liking this idea less by the moment.
“Swift, it’s going to be pitch dark any minute, and you know how blind I am at night.”
“I can see fine.” His hand closed around her elbow. “I won’t let you fall, Amy. Relax. Remember when we were kids, running wild along the river after dark? You’d grab my belt and trail along behind me when you couldn’t see.”
“I remember you tripping once, too, and both of us falling down a bank.”
He led her across her yard toward the trees. About two hundred yards away, the schoolhouse loomed like a ghostly specter.
“I tripped on purpose.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did.” He angled her a warm look. “I stole a hug at the bottom of that bank, if you’ll recall.”
Amy squinted to see ahead of them. “Swift, the woods are so dark. Let’s walk along the boardwalk.”
“Nope. I want you alone with me, out of shouting distance of everybody.”
Her heart leaped. “Why?”
He drew her closer as they circled a tree in their path. Taking advantage of the moment, he released her elbow and slipped his arm around her. His hand, large and warm, stole under her shawl to settle on her side, his fingertips staking claim just below her right breast. Amy stiffened and grabbed instinctively for his wrist.
“Trust, Amy,” he reproved. “That hand’s not going anywhere.”
She shot a glance over her shoulder toward town, her heart sinking when she saw that they were already beyond shouting distance. Her throat tightened. Against her better judgement, she relinquished her hold on his wrist.
The two hours loomed ahead of her, promising to be the most nerve-racking of her life. She began to wish she never had sought Swift out yesterday, that she had used her head and encouraged him to leave for Texas instead of challenging his pride. More fool she, for here she was, traipsing toward the woods with him, half his size, blind as a bat, and undeniably stupid for ever letting him talk her into this insanity in the first place.
Swift led her toward Shallows Creek, led being the operative word, because it soon grew so dark inside the timber that she couldn’t see. An owl hooted and swooshed down at them, nearly scaring her out of her skin. She instinctively pressed closer to Swift, and once he had tightened his hold on her, he seemed loath to loosen it. Her hip bumped his thigh as they walked.
Soon she could hear the rushing of the water. They came upon a clearing, bathed in bright moonlight, the trees gilded silver, the shadows cast into frightening blackness. Swift led her to a huge fallen log and, seizing her by the waist, swung her up to sit on it. She braced her palms on either side of her, gazing down at him nervously, unsettled to have her feet dangling so far above the ground when she couldn’t see what lay below her.
A looming shadow dressed in black, he hopped up beside her, looping his arms around one knee. The moonbeams shone upon his face and glistened in his ebony hair where it curled across his forehead. Looking over at him, she could only wonder what in God’s name she was doing out here alone with him.
After gazing at the water for a long while, he turned his head to study her, his eyes black splashes against the dark planes of his face. “Well, Miss Amy, this is the moment you’ve been dreading, isn’t it? You’re completely alone with me. There’s no one to come if you scream. What’s supposed to happen next? I’d sure hate to disappoint a lady.”
She swallowed and toyed nervously with the fringe on her shawl. “I, um . . .” She glanced over at him. “I guess that’s up to you. That was the whole idea, wasn’t it?”
His teeth shimmered in the moonlight as he grinned—a slow, smug grin that sent her heart into a skitter. “I was thinking about doing something you never expected, something that would take you totally by surprise, now that I’ve got you out here, completely at my mercy.”
“L-like what?” she asked in a small voice.
“Like talking.” His grin widened. “That is the last thing you expected, isn’t it?”
Relief made her feel giddy. “Yes,” she admitted with an
airy little laugh. “What shall we talk about?”
“I don’t know. Anything about me you’re dying to know?”
Her smile faded. “Yes. What made you start carrying a gun? You never were one to kill merely for the sake of killing or for fighting without a cause. How did it happen that killing became a part of your daily life?”
“It wasn’t exactly daily, Amy. Sometimes I went weeks, even months, without using my gun.” He sighed and shifted his position slightly. “As for picking up a gun in the first place, it was fate, mostly. You know me and weapons. Rowlins, my boss, taught me to shoot a revolver.” He shrugged. “It’s a necessary skill when you’re a cowhand. And once he taught me the basics, I practiced every day, until I felt I could handle it well.”
She remembered how accomplished Swift had been with other weapons, how important that had been to him as a warrior. “So, of course you became excellent.”
“Fair.”
“Swift, I read the news story. They say you’re the fastest gun in Texas, maybe the fastest anywhere.”
He scowled into the darkness. “After the first gunfight, I had to be fast. Once you kill a gunslinger, there’s no end to it. Your reputation follows you everywhere you go, and there’s always someone who wants to test his skill against you. You either draw or die. In my first fight, I had the misfortune of killing a man who had a name. I went to town with the fellows one Saturday night, he saw me, didn’t like my looks, and challenged me. From that night on, my life became a nightmare.”
“What if—what if someone follows you here?”
He sighed. “I hope no one does.”
“But if someone does?”
He turned to regard her, all trace of a grin gone. “The coward in me will draw on him. Remember what I said to you about wishing you could die, and it not being that easy? I know firsthand. I’ve tried not to go for my gun at least a dozen times—promised myself I wouldn’t—but when the smoke cleared, I was still standing.” He studied her for a long while. “You’re not the only one to ever feel afraid, you know. We all do sometimes. Unfortunately for the other fellow, the more afraid I am, the faster I can draw.”