Lee dismounted but stayed close to his horse—and to Françoise. “What’s going on?”
“They’re after us,” Kane said, as he drank from a canteen. “My guess is that they’ll stay around until they get her back.” He nodded his head toward Françoise. “I don’t think they’re much without her.” Kane looked at the woman who was sitting on the horse with her spine straight. “I think you’d better watch her. She’s pretty smart.”
“I’ll take care of her,” Lee said. “I think they’ll look for us south, on the way back to Chandler. We’ll be safe enough, but you’ll have them on your tail. Why the hell did you take her, anyway? She’ll be more trouble than she’s worth.”
Kane stoppered the canteen and shrugged his big shoulders. “I was behind her and, at first, I thought she was some other woman they’d captured. Then she turned around, and I saw that she was carryin’ a rifle so I clipped her one on the chin. It occurred to me that she might be useful.”
“Makes sense, but I don’t relish trying to take care of her until you get back. I wouldn’t mind a dozen men, but two women?”
Kane put his hand on Leander’s shoulder. “I don’t envy you one bit. I’ll see you in a few hours, Westfield. Good luck.” He helped Blair from his horse and mounted and was down the mountain, out of sight, in minutes.
“Why aren’t we going with him?” Blair asked.
“We didn’t know how they’d treated you, so it was decided that you and I’d stay higher up on the mountain in a cabin while Taggert went to get the sheriff.” Lee’s eyes lit up and he took a step toward her. “I thought maybe we’d have some time to ourselves, just the two of us.”
Both of them seemed to have forgotten the presence of Françoise, although Lee still firmly held the reins to the horse on which she sat. The terrain around them was much too steep and wild to try to escape.
The Frenchwoman slid off the horse and put herself between Blair and Leander, who were moving toward each other as surely as magnets.
“Oh, Leander, my chérie, my darling,” she said, putting her arms around him and plastering her body against his. “You must tell her the truth. We cannot keep what we feel for each other a lie any longer. Tell her that you want only me, and that this was all planned by you. Tell her.”
Blair turned on her heel and started down the mountainside.
Leander had the dual problem of trying to untangle himself from the dark woman’s grasp and of keeping his jealous wife from running into the outlaws who were looking for them. He couldn’t release the Frenchwoman, so he held onto her wrist, and the horse, and started chasing Blair.
“Darling,” Françoise said, as Lee pulled her along, “you’re hurting me. Let her go. You know she never meant anything to you. She knows the truth.”
With every word, Blair blindly hurried faster down the steep slope.
Lee stopped long enough to turn back to Françoise. “I’ve never hit a woman, but you are tempting me. Blair,” he called, “you can’t keep running. There are men with guns looking for us.”
Françoise sat down on the solid rock that was the mountainside, put her face in her hands and began to cry. “How can you say such things to me? How can you forget our nights in Paris together? What about Venice? And Florence? Remember the moonlight in Florence?”
“I’ve never been to Florence,” Lee said, as he grabbed her by the arm and pulled her up; then, when she wouldn’t walk, he tossed her over his shoulder and went skidding down the mountain after Blair, catching her by the back of her skirt. Thanks to the expert tailoring of J. Cantrell and Sons, the fabric held. He kept pulling, as Blair did, and finally, he sat on the rocky surface and pulled her into his lap.
It occurred to him that he was a ridiculous sight, with one woman draped over his shoulder, bottom end up, and another one held on his outstretched leg. When Françoise started to move, he smacked her on her rump. “You stay out of this.”
“Whenever you touch me there, I obey you,” Françoise said in a purring voice.
Blair started to get up, but Lee held her.
“Blair,” he began, but she wouldn’t look at him. “I have never seen this woman before today. I did not meet her in Paris. I have never been in love with anyone except you, and I married you because I fell in love with you.”
“Love?” Blair said, turning to look at him. “You never said that before.”
“I have, but you never listened. You were too busy telling me that I was in love with Houston. I didn’t love her, and I certainly never loved this…this…” He looked at the ample rear end that was beginning to strain his shoulder. He shrugged her off, but kept her wrist in his grasp.
Blair was starting to lean toward Lee. Maybe he was telling her the truth. She did so want to believe him.
“You lie very well, Leander,” Françoise said. “I never knew that about you. Of course, then, you and I only knew one another one way.” She leaned toward him. “But such a way. Ooh là là.”
Blair tried to get out of Lee’s lap, but he held her firmly, and with one look at his wife’s face, he gave a heavy sigh and took the wrists of both women and led them up the mountain.
Blair followed him but only reluctantly. It was a long, hard climb. They had to walk across an area that was covered with fallen trees, repeatedly stepping high up and over. The air was getting thinner as they travelled upward, and it was more difficult to get the oxygen needed to counteract the exertion of the climb.
All the while, Lee kept his hold on Françoise and every time he tried to help Blair, she pushed his hand away.
The cabin was between two steep-sided ridges, hidden so well that they walked past it twice before they saw it, and then they came upon it suddenly, as if it had just appeared out of nowhere.