Pat Tracy - Cade's Justice

“I haven’t given you anything!” She looked up at him in frustration. “You’re just acting true to form.”

He pressed a wide palm to her back. “What form is that?”

Because of the close way he held her, she was forced to notice his warmth. She refused to enjoy it. “That of a robber baron, of course.”

“Of course,” he conceded lightly, sliding a hand around her waist and securing her sideways on his lap.

She was effectively captured, her resistance limited to the hand she’d wedged between their snugly pressed chests.

“Stop shivering as if you were a kitten left on the step in January.”

His words were more accurate than he knew.

“I’ll stop shivering when you release me!” That didn’t sound right.

He rubbed his hands over her back and arms. “Hush now. There’s nothing wrong with sharing our warmth.”

His deep voice washed over her in heavy, shattering waves. Gideon Cade surrounded her. His thighs cradled her. His musky scent, at once alien and strangely enticing, teased her senses. Freeing herself from his bold trespass became of paramount importance.

She tried wiggling.

“Miss Step…Oh, hell, I refuse to say, ‘Miss Step’ one more time. Your first name is Emma, right?”

“Yes,” she answered absently. She was beginning to feel light-headed from her exertions. Nor was her corset helping matters. “But I haven’t given you leave to address me by my first name.”

“You’re a thorny little thing, aren’t you?”

Her thoughts turned to the practical logistics of gaining her freedom. There was no help for it. She was going to have to push against his chest. Before this contest was over, she intended to demonstrate he couldn’t put his hands on her every time he felt like it.

“You do realize there’s no point in trying to break free, don’t you?”

She detested his almost whimsical tone. “I realize you are indeed the bully I called you earlier.”

Her efforts to push free accomplished nothing. Desperation joined her growing sense of frustration. Being caught in his embrace against her will was too much a model of her life’s present disarray. Getting free represented gaining control over that which overwhelmed her.

“If you don’t release me this instant, I shall blacken your eye.”

His husky chuckle tickled her ear. “Better men than you have tried and failed to do so.”

She doubled up her fist.

“I’m giving you fair warning—”

The carriage stopped abruptly.

“Oof!” The involuntarily sound accompanied the air whooshing from her lungs. He took the opportunity to squeeze her more intimately against his unyielding chest.

“You all right, honey?”

His ill-mannered familiarity and his hands brushing fleetingly across her writhing person sparked a strange response from Emma. Unfortunately for her peace of mind, it wasn’t one of loathing. No, a series of alarmingly thrilling tingles now competed for her attention.

Both furious and frightened by the powerful tremors skating through her, she felt the last layer of her control disintegrate.

Without any warning—either to herself or to the thug holding her against her will—her clenched fist smacked him in the jaw. One second she was his prisoner, and the next she was…Well, she was still his prisoner, but now he held her with one arm wrapped around her, instead of two. Her fist throbbed as painfully as her toes. Good grief, by the time full daylight struck, she was going to be confined to a bed.

“I’ll give you that blow, Emma.”

Slowly he allowed her to slide from his lap and reclaim her space on the seat next to him. He might concede that she’d had every right to hit him, but Emma was horrified by her unrestrained behavior. She rubbed her aching fingers and wondered if she had been around Miss Loutitia too long and was in danger of becoming one of those females prone to hysteria.

Her only question was how this vigilante robber baron would choose to retaliate. After all, it was rumored he hunted down those who crossed him. She swallowed. From the way her fingers stung, she’d clearly struck him a vicious blow. No doubt his head was still ringing from the pain, and that was why he was staring at her as if she were a new species of mammal.

A mysterious source of light permeated the carriage’s interior. Mr. Cade’s features were cast in a reddish glow that created the sinister illusion that she was gazing into Lucifer’s harsh features, lit by the fires of never-ending perdition.

A fierce pounding assaulted the coach’s door. “The school is on fire!”

The driver’s announcement brought with it the blistering sensation of heat. The horses whinnied their distress, and the vehicle lurched forward.

“See to the team, Hennesy,” came Mr. Cade’s curt command. “Wait here, Emma, while I find out what’s going on.”

He stepped from the carriage, closing the door behind him. Sound exploded around her. A coarse litany of shouts shredded the cocoon of silence that had engulfed her and Courtney’s uncle. She looked through a small window. Clusters of men lined up in bucket brigades.

Dismissing Mr. Cade’s order that she remain inside the coach, Emma swung open the door and jumped from the carriage. The flash of pain in her foot barely registered.

Towering columns of flames held her rapt attention.

Had it not been for the recent rain, she suspected, the entire block would have been lost. She jerked herself free from the conflagration’s hypnotic spell. The sudden need to make sure everyone had escaped safely swept through her.

“Emma! Emma!”

The sound of her name being frantically screamed above the blaze’s crackling roar had her looking in all directions. Through the wild din of confusion, Jayne Stoneworthy rushed toward her.

“Thank God, you’re alive!” Jayne cried when she reached her. The fellow instructor’s smoke-blackened robe was torn. Tears and a layer of soot streaked her face. “We thought we had lost you….”

Emma accepted her friend’s tearful embrace. “I’m fine.”

Jayne straightened and rubbed her red-rimmed eyes. “We haven’t been able to find Courtney.”

At her fellow teacher’s stricken features, Emma’s heart twisted. “Courtney’s safe, too.”

“I don’t understand. Where were you, and where’s—”

“Miss Step!”

Loutitia Hempshire’s shrill shout cut Jayne off. Emma had no difficulty making out the headmistress’s plump form as she waddled purposefully toward her through the melee of men, wagons and bystanders. Loutitia’s nephew, Lyman Thornton, was having difficulty keeping up with his aunt. The leanly fit gentleman trailed a full three feet behind the redfaced, panting woman.

With her flowing nightgown and billowing robe sailing out behind her, she resembled a ship being pushed by a full gale. “Miss Step, here you are at last. We’ve been looking all over for you.” Loutitia barely stopped before running into Emma. “Where on earth were you?”

“I was—”

“Oh, never mind!” the woman shrieked. “It’s gone. It’s all gone!” She dabbed at her eyes with a grimy handkerchief. “The dreadful fire has destroyed everything. Oh, what will become of me?”

“Since you were already planning on closing the school, its loss can’t be that painful.”

The callous remark came from Loutitia’s nephew. Unlike the people milling about, Lyman Thornton was dressed in something other than sleeping apparel. His coat, shirt and trousers showed no evidence of soot or water stains. Evidently, the owner of Denver’s largest hotel hadn’t seen the necessity of assisting the water brigade.

“But I intended on taking my furnishings,” she wailed. “Oh, my beautiful French bed, my lamps, my armoire—” Her voice broke on that last treasured possession. “My armoire is ashes.”