Mary McBride - Forever And A Day

His lips quirked into another grin and one eyebrow lifted rakishly. “Thief?”

“No-good, degenerate snake!”

Gideon Summerfield laughed out loud. “Plenty of folks would agree with you, darlin’, but none of them would have the vinegar to say it to my face.” Gray eyes skimmed her face, her throat, the lace frills on the bodice of her dress. “Vinegar,” he murmured huskily, “and lace and honey. Sweet, warm honey.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

His gaze jerked up to her face and the remnants of his smile disappeared. “You should be,” he ground out from between clenched teeth, thinking if she had even a glimmer of the fire blazing in him right now this little girl would run screaming from the bank, whether he held a gun on her or not.

“Well, I’m not.” What she feared right now was facing her father’s rage when he discovered his bank had been robbed while his daughter was in it. If she had ever hoped to impress him with her responsibility, this incident would dash those hopes irreparably. He’d never let her even visit the bank again, much less work in it.

Damnation! She wanted to reach across the counter and just choke this desperado for the way he was messing up her plans and her life. Her hands clenched into fists at the thought, and then Honey realized she was still wearing half of the wrist cuffs. The legal half. Jewelry for a thief. Now, if only...

Kenneth Crane came out of the office, lugging a large canvas bag by its leather handles. “Here...here it is,” he said as he shuffled toward Summerfield on the public side of the counter.

Ignoring the gun, Honey scurried around the counter. Then, just as Gideon Summerfield extended his hand for the bag, Honey reached out and clamped the empty cuff around his wrist. At the sound of the click, her eyes blazed victoriously and her mouth settled into a smug line.

“Oh, Lord,” breathed Kenneth Crane, appearing to wither inside his suit.

Honey flicked the teller a disdainful look. She had expected that from the fainthearted wretch. From Gideon Summerfield, on the other hand, she expected curses and a battle royal with fists and fingernails and feet. She stiffened her body in preparation.

He did curse—a soft, almost whispered expletive that seemed more prayer than oath—and then he shook his head just before his free arm circled Honey and he hoisted her onto his hip.

“Put me down,” she shrieked. “Kenneth, for God’s sake, don’t just stand there gawking. Do something.”

“Oh, Lord,” the teller moaned. “I don’t know what to do.”

It was Gideon Summerfield who answered him with a growl. “I’ll tell you what to do, fella. You tell your boss to be a whole lot more careful about who he invites to his parties.”

Then, with the money bag in one hand and a flailing Honey in the other, he walked out the door.

“Here now. You drink this, Miz Kate. It’ll put them roses back in your cheeks.”

Kate Logan gave Isaac Goodman a weak but grateful smile as she took the proffered glass, then drained it.

“Better?” Isaac raised a grizzled eyebrow, watching her shiver slightly after swallowing the brandy.

She nodded. “What are we going to do, Isaac?” she asked the bear-size former slave, who had been her husband’s partner on the Santa Fe Trail as well as her own dear and trusted friend for so many years. “What in the world are we going to do?”

Kenneth Crane had come and gone from the rambling adobe house just off the plaza. The bank teller—chalk faced and trembling on the verge of tears—had told them of Honey’s return and her unplanned involvement in the planned robbery. But the news that had left Kate pale and weak had had the opposite effect on her husband. Race had exploded. His curses had thundered through the house, and even now the pounding of his footsteps and the sound of slamming drawers and doors shook the oak floors and the thick adobe walls.

“ We ain’t going to do anything,” Isaac answered, angling his head toward the hallway in the direction of Race’s resounding curses. “‘Neath all that thunderation, I suspect Horace is working out a plan. He’ll get her back, Miz Kate. You know he will.”

Kate’s hands fluttered in her lap. “I’m so frightened for her, Isaac. She’s out there all alone.”

The black man eased himself into the chair beside hers. He sighed as he reached out his one good arm to pat Kate’s trembling hand. “Well, now, she ain’t exactly alone, is she?”

Kate threw a dark glance at the beamed ceiling. “I almost wish she were. Whatever was that child thinking, leaving school without permission and then clamping herself to an outlaw like Gideon Summerfield?”

“She wasn’t thinking.” Race Logan’s voice reverberated off the thick walls of the parlor as he stomped across the threshold. “Your daughter hasn’t used her head once in her life as far as I can tell. It’s the Cassidy influence on her. Goddamn moon-faced people who couldn’t find their way out of a privy without a map and a torch.”

Isaac Goodman grinned and settled back in his chair. The mere mention of the Cassidy name always guaranteed a good ten minutes of fireworks between Race Logan and his wife. Twenty years ago in Leavenworth, Kansas, a pregnant Kate had married Ned Cassidy in desperation when she believed Race Logan had abandoned her. It never seemed to matter that the sickly, round-faced storekeeper had died before Kate’s child was born or that she’d never loved him anyway. Truth and logic never seemed to count for much when Race got heated up. Nothing could light a fire under him like the name Cassidy. And nothing could light up Miz Kate like Race. Isaac looked at her now—anticipating her fiery reaction. He wasn’t disappointed.

Her green eyes flashed like emeralds. “Your daughter inherited the Cassidy fortune, Race, not the Cassidy blood. It’s your hot blood that runs through her veins and your hard head on her shoulders. If she quit her schooling and clamped herself onto some cutthroat you hired to rob your bank, the Cassidys have nothing to do with it. Honey’s pure Logan.” She paused only long enough to catch her breath. “And just what do you think you’re doing, strapping on that gun?”

Race glared at her, then gave his belt a yank to settle the holster against his thigh. “What does it look like, Kate?” he muttered as he bent to tie the leg strap.

“It looks like you’re leaving me again.” Kate’s voice quivered and tears brimmed in her eyes.

Race straightened up from anchoring his sidearm. For a second his big hands hung helplessly at his sides. “Katie.” His voice was gentle now. “Look at me, love.”

Her lids lifted to find warmth and solace in his lake-colored gaze.

“I won’t be gone long. I promise you.” He bent on one knee and grasped her fidgeting hand, then pressed it to his lips. “Only long enough to find her and bring her back.”

“Don’t go alone,” she pleaded. “Can’t you organize a posse? Since Summerfield is supposed to have robbed the bank...”

Race’s mouth tautened.

“Too many eager guns in a posse,” Isaac said. “Horace’ll do fine by himself, Miz Kate. Besides, there ain’t no stopping him now. Leastways nothing comes to mind.”

“That’s right, partner,” Race said, straightening up and shooting the old man a hard look. “Can I count on you staying put and keeping an eye on Kate and the boys for me?”

Isaac grinned. “I’m getting too old to go traipsing off after you, Horace. But you might want to remember that you ain’t getting any younger neither. You’re carrying about twenty years that convict ain’t even seen yet.”

“He took off with my daughter, Isaac.”