His yell caught the attention of Camellia, helpless and vulnerable, tied and gagged in her chair.
Immediately Gabe flung himself at the front door. Fortunately for his shoulder, and a whole mass of internal organs, he turned the knob as he did so, since the lock had not been engaged. He burst across the threshold in almost a state of shock.
“Cam! What in tarnation—”
Wasting no further energy on outraged expletives, he yanked the muffling fabric away and then raced to the kitchen for a sharp knife and a glass of water. By the time a few seconds had elapsed for his return, Camellia was drawing in great gulps of air and attempting to speak.
“Hold on, honey. Drink, first. Easy, not too much at once. There, that’s better.”
“Bless you—Gabe...! I will never—ever—call you an interfering—old—busybody—again...!”
“Ahuh. Well, I won’t be holdin’ my breath any time soon on that point,” he said dryly, sawing away at her bonds. “Hmmmph. Move over here, and let me massage your wrists for a bit, get some feelin’ back.”
“Can’t...nothing—to spare. He’s gone, Gabe.”
“Gone? Who’s gone? You gotta be a mite—”
“Quinn!” Camellia wanted to grab the doctor by his coat lapels and give him a shake, but her fingers weren’t working properly so she coughed instead. “Quinn was here. He did this to me—and he stole Molly away!”
“Stole her—why, bless my soul, he couldn’t—he can’t—but, Camellia—”
She was almost sobbing with frustration, anxiety, fear, and near-hysteria. “Gabe, listen—listen to me. Get Ben. Get Paul. Get his deputies. Get everyone—you can find, send them—” a sob, and then a rush of bitter tears, “send them in—pursuit...! Quinn has her, and he means to do her harm. Please—oh, please...save her—!””
“Just a minute, Cam.” Never the most graceful of men, especially when hurried, he blundered to the kitchen and returned once more with a bottle of brandy. “Have some of this. No, Cam, I mean it. Purely medicinal. You get some of that into your system, while I chase down our rescuers. I’ll be back to check you over as soon as I can.”
They stopped at the house, one last time, these tough strong men on the trail to right a savage wrong, to garner as much information from Camellia as possible. By the time they, too, had stomped into the parlor (employing the front door mat to scrape off, even in the midst of such travail, a good deal of the mud collected along the way), she had recovered enough to set a pot of coffee to brewing on the stove before retiring with a cold cloth on her injured cheekbone.
“Oh, darlin’—” murmured Ben, ascertaining the damage.
“I know. It seems we’ve been this route before, doesn’t it? And the same side of the face, too. I do believe I must begin dealing with left-handed villains.” Treating the moment as lightly as she could would send Ben off feeling not quite so worried about her welfare. Although, as soon as the door had once again closed upon them, she intended to take to the settee and wail like a banshee.
But he was not fooled by her easy words. “That worthless son of a human howler dared hurt you—” he began, in outraged tones.
Camellia longed to cling to him for all the support and sustenance he could offer. But not now. Later. Now, time was of the essence. “Find them, Ben,” she pleaded. “Bring Molly home safe.”
Intently and without interruption, Paul had listened to her brief narrative of what had happened here, and when, and her repetition of Quinn Hennessey’s own confession as to his background. Once she had finished, he gave a brisk nod and glanced toward the parlor window that looked south.
“That way, y’ think?”
“Yes. I watched them—through the rain. But he may have—he may have changed direction, to throw off anyone following.”
“Possible. Gentlemen?”
They were all, Ben, the sheriff, and his deputy Austin, dressed for travel, wearing slickers and heavy gloves, weighted down by armaments. Gabriel, much as he wanted to join the impromptu posse, had already volunteered to stay behind so he could care for the most recent victim of Hennessey’s transgressions. Showing no signs of impatience, Paul delayed their departure long enough for Camellia to fill Mason jars with boiling hot coffee and thrust some leftover biscuits into a pack.
Then they were gone.
And Camellia’s frightened, fervent prayers went with them.
Chapter Eighteen
“QUINN, WE CAN’T GO on. Surely—surely you must see that—we can’t go on. The storm, the mud, the lightning and thunder...”
Molly had been shedding quiet tears off and on, tears that slid hotly from beneath her lashes only to mix indiscriminately with the cold raindrops falling without mercy from above. But she dared not let Quinn see that she was weeping. That might very well mean his monstrous temper would be let loose again to run amok. And, oh, how she feared his temper!
At the Forresters’ front gate, he had literally thrown her onto the back of his horse, climbed into the saddle behind her, and immediately set out upon the back road south, out of town. Had she ever felt more miserable in her life? With no gear, no hat, not even a blanket, she was helpless victim to the intermittent rain and wind, and she half-sat, half-lay, sodden and shivering, tight against him. He had spoken not a word, other than to berate her for some imagined slight—sliding out of his grip, taking too much space—or to utter a heated oath now and then, or to castigate the poor animal beneath them that was bearing a double burden.
Along this back byway, that traveled through a thick forest and plenty of underbrush, the sucking, slowing mud was not such a problem as in town, where everything stood open to the elements. Quinn might have made better speed on his journey, had he but provided two instead of a single mount. No gallop was possible; only a canter, for the most part, and, occasionally, depending upon terrain, a walk.