Bind Me Close: 3 (Knights in Black Leather) (2 page)

She saw his eyes slide to one side. His gaze lingered on her
thighs and she could have sworn in the fire, her skin burned right off.

He cleared his throat and squinted at the road. “You didn’t
see them get in the car?”

“Sad to say, no. I went to the ladies’ room, took a while,
bought my water and pretzels and never looked outside. I mean, who steals a
Honda in broad daylight on a country road?”

“They robbed a jewelry store in Boerne.”

“Well, they robbed me too.” She pouted. “They’ve got my
laptop. My clothes. Good thing I put my flash drive with all my research and a
draft of the book in my purse.”

“Don’t worry.” He squeezed her hand so hard that she
marveled he hadn’t crushed her bones. “We’ll get ’em.”

As he skidded around a curve at an alarming speed Willow
shut one eye and braced herself, slapping a hand to the dash. Still, the seat
was cool, slick leather and she slid against him, thigh-to-thigh.

“Hold tight.”

Another middle-finger exclamation seemed like a really bad
idea, especially since he had sympathized with her losses.

As they whizzed along the country road, she mused, “You must
go through a lot of tires in a year.”

He snorted and hit the gas pedal. “Every six months I order
a new set.”

“And do you always get your man?”

“Always.”

“Good.” She relaxed into her seat as she saw they were now
sailing on a straightaway. But one look at his speedometer told her he could
hit ninety soon and she swallowed her screech of fear. The car would only plane.
Jeez, something to write about if she ever tried to pen a cops and robbers
shoot-’em-up.

“I hear you’ve come to Bravado to do research on your
great-grandfather.”

“I have,” she said, her heart in her throat as they passed a
slowpoke doing seventy or so.

“The MacRaes and Turners are really eager to meet you.”

“Same goes.”

“Case Turner and the three MacRae men always wanted to know
what happened to Blade. The whole family did in fact.”

“My great-grandfather had left Bravado as a young man and
from what we know he never returned here. I want to know why.” She smiled at
him and when he glanced at her only for a second, she could have sworn he
focused only on her lips. Before she could enjoy it for the caress it was, he
looked away then whizzed past two other cars.

He squinted at the road. “For that, you need to learn what
happened to his mother.”

“I do.” She saw a truck approaching in the other lane and
prayed the sheriff got over to his own side pronto.

“Fancy Turner left the Comanche tribe about a year after the
chief, Bull Elk, captured her.”

“I want to know how she managed that.”

“We have the facts. Loosen up there, kiddo. Your fingers
will fall off if you clutch the seat any tighter.”

“Yeah, well, lemme just say I don’t trust your driving.” She
scrunched her whole face up at the car barreling toward them as it attempted to
pass another truck. “Blowing that horn doesn’t help.”

“He needs to get out of my way. Relax. I’m good at my job.”

“It’s not your job that takes my breath away.” Truer words
had never left her lips. He was too much man to ignore. Meanwhile his
determination to get this thief was as exciting as his driving was frightening.

He slid her another one of his scorching looks. This time he
focused for oh so long on her eyes. Then he drawled, “Told you we’d get him—and
we will. Just hang on a bit here as the road curves.”

While I simmer with the heat in your eyes.
Tearing
her attention away from him and his wild driving, she scowled out her window.
The man was incorrigible.

“See. Not bad. We’re nearing the point where my deputy will
close in on him.” He reached over and clamped her hand with a reassuring grip.
“Glad you’re here. We have lots of stories to tell you about Fancy.”

She gulped. His hand was twice the size of hers. Hot and
comforting. She tried to focus on what he was saying. “Fancy. Yes. How she was
stolen by the Comanche Bull Elk.”

“Got that right.” He checked his rearview mirror then
stepped on the gas. “How he married her, Indian style.”

“And gave birth to Blade. Then left the tribe and came back
home to Bravado.”

“No one else in the family helped except for my
great-grandmother who was Fancy’s oldest sister. And Wyatt and Cole MacRae, of
course.”

“You talk about this as easily as if these people were alive
now,” she managed. “As if all this were town gossip.”

“Surprised we know so much about the past?”

“Shocked I’m not upchucking on your spotless upholstery. But
yeah. Few people know their parents let alone further back.”

“We’re proud.” He grinned at the road before him. “We like
our family stories. Most of them are about Fancy marrying two men.”

“Right. Chief Bull Elk and Wyatt.”

He went round another corner so quickly that Willow thought
her skin peeled off.

“What do you mean? They were—oh, my god.” She gulped as they
approached a tiny town and a light that was—oh boy—red. Automatically she put
her right foot to the floorboard, compressing an imaginary brake.

“Fancy married both Wyatt and Cole.” He said it as if he
were relating the weather—and thankfully slowed the truck as they drew nearer
and nearer to the traffic light, his horn blaring.

She winced. “Both? That’s not possible.”

“Says you.” He eased off his brake as the light went green,
then grinned at her.

She breathed once more, licking her lips and fighting for
sanity. “Two men? Oh now really, Sheriff Saxon, that is not even legal.”

“Here in Bravado we have different rules. Even back then we
did.”

She stared at him, well-aware his words held more meanings
than she could unravel as they chased a thief at a disgusting speed. “I guess
I’ve got a lot to learn.”

His smile was broad, bold and perfunctory. “Welcome home.”

Bravado had been the childhood home to her
great-grandfather, son of a Comanche chief, and his wife Francine Turner. “At
eighteen Blade left Texas. Took his mother’s maiden name. He never said much
about his departure.”

“But you told Case and Samantha Turner you had his diaries.”

“I do.” Amazing what this man could talk about while driving
like a roadrunner. She clutched the door handle as he skidded around a corner.
“He didn’t write about everything. That’s why I’m here. To learn more.”

“We’ll give you that for certain.”

“I’ll start with this belief you have that Fancy Turner
married two men. I mean, how does a woman do that?”

“Yeah. Well, you need to ask Cara MacRae that one.”

“She knows?” Willow tried to match his casual tone. “How’s
that? I thought she married into the MacRaes. That her maiden name was Ford.”

“It was. She comes from one of the few families in town who
were not related to us.”

“Us? You really are a distant relative then?”

“Not so distant. Cousins. All of us.
MacRaes-Turners-Saxons.”

“So how does Cara know about Fancy?”

He chuckled, eyes straight ahead as he took the two-lane
road like a jackrabbit. “She’s not only read Fancy’s letters but Cara knows a
lot about being married to more than one man.”

“What do you mean?”

He shot her a curious look. “You don’t know? Hmm. Guess Cara
and Samantha Turner figured you’d learn a lot when you got here. Well. Okay.”
He took another one of those two-wheel turns that made her wince. “Cara is
married to the three MacRae brothers.”

Willow blinked. “You’re kidding.”

“No.”

She scowled at him. “You are! You’re pulling my leg.”

“No.”

“How can that be?”

When Maureen started to chatter at him again, Willow hung on
tight to her seat. Her mind whirled with the facts of Cara MacRae’s marital
state. God. Married to three men. That had to be heaven or hell.

His dispatcher chatted at him about the problems his deputy
was having.

“Okay, Mo. Okay. I’m coming up on the intersection with Route
46. Where is Harris? Yeah. Okay. I hear you. Hang with me here while I see
who’s on this iddy biddy road—oh, hell! There’s the Honda!”

Streaking past them going in the opposite direction was a
white flash.

Saxon did a hand-over-hand circle of the steering wheel.

Willow grabbed at the dashboard and caught no traction.
Jesus.

They fishtailed, then off they zoomed. Right on the trail of
her hijacked Honda. Then, as if the thief had put wings on her car, it sped
ahead and disappeared over a hill.

The crash they heard was mind-jarring.

Saxon rammed on the brakes. “Grab the roof handle!” he
yelled at her as they crested the hill.

As they cleared the rise, Willow spotted her car to one
side.

Tumbling over and sliding, it crumpled like an old tin can.
It teetered on its passenger side, slammed into a tree, the roof crushed. Smoke
rose from the wreckage.

Willow clamped her hands over her mouth. “Oh god. Oh god. Oh
god.”

Saxon screeched his truck to a stop, tail-spinning in the
rocky soil. He put a hand to hers and crushed it tight. “Stay here!”

As he ran toward the Honda he yelled into his dispatch radio
and Willow could imagine what he said.
Come. Get an ambulance. Where’s
Harris?

Willow just sat where she was and shook. The adrenalin
rushing through her was the wildest blast she’d experienced in years.

* * * * *

By his dashboard clock Willow knew she waited for the wreck
to clear for over three hours. Rapt, she’d just watched Saxon and his team of
emergency responders as they tried to ply the driver from the front seat of her
car with the ugly Jaws of Life. Firemen came too, in two different trucks to
put out a blaze that began in the engine. Willow sat, numb, figuring her
suitcase and her laptop were either burned or waterlogged. She counted her
blessings. She really did, happy the thief had stolen only her car and hadn’t
tried to take it with her in it. But she was at a loss for what to do without
transportation, clothing or her security blanket, also known as her laptop.

Shit. Damn. Hell!

Drained like an old dishcloth after so many hours of
tension, she stopped cursing in self-pity. She watched Sheriff Saxon talk on
his cell to god knew who. Finally he returned to his truck and climbed in
beside her. Tossing his Stetson to the rear seat, he smoothed his unruly hair
then reached for her hand and held tight.

“I know this is quite a blow to you.”

“Yeah. A big one.”

“Sorry it took so long.”

“No, no. I’m grateful he got some help. He looked alive when
they put him in the ambulance. Is he?”

“At the moment. But he’s a mess.”

I am too.
Tears scalded her eyes.

“Hey,” he said so softly that she was shocked a man with so
much timbre in his voice could speak so low. “Cry if you have to but please
don’t worry.”

“Worry?” she blurted, sad and appalled and angry. A serrated
knife was sawing at her insides. “I’m…just so…stunned! I’ve got no car and no
clothes and—oh, hell. I never blubber.”

But she did. Her eyes shed crocodile tears. Her nose ran.
Her lips quivered.

And he slid over to her and wrapped her so close in those
big, bulging biceps that she wilted like a picked flower in the midday sun.

He dug a handkerchief from his pocket and put it to her
nose. “Blow.”

She honked right into it and sniveled her thanks. Male
comfort was such a rare benefit for any of her troubles that she wound her arms
around his torso and loved the feel of his rock-hard abs. She wondered how to
stay there in his arms. Keep crying? Jump his bones? Worry about a Mrs. Sheriff
Saxon?

Hell, how could she think of such things after she had just
lost everything?

She groaned.

He cuddled her closer and ran his hands over her hair. “It’s
been a long day.”

“Crazy,” she agreed, roping in her jumpy emotions and
pushing away to reclaim her dignity.

“Look at me.” He caught her chin between two fingers and
made her glance up at him. And god, up close and very personal, he was the most
fabulous male creature she had seen since she’d watched Bradley Cooper get a
hangover in Bangkok. But this man was not on a silver screen. He breathed. He
grinned. He filled her view. Broad shoulders, sun-bleached hair, sea-green eyes
that caressed and consoled. “I’m gonna fix you up, best I can. I just talked
with Cara MacRae and Samantha Turner. Told them what happened to you.”

“Oh. That’s so good of you. Thank you. They were expecting me
tonight.”

“And they still are.”

“Oh, I can’t. I don’t have any—”

“Yes, you can go.”

“How? I have nothing! No clothes even. Look at me, Sheriff.”

His gaze flicked over her but it was no cursory exam. It was
long, lingering and—could she be right?—lusty. Her breasts beaded. Her pussy
pulsed. Her panties got wet. And every nerve in her body sang a Hallelujah
Chorus. When he caught her gaze he said, “My name is Wade and you are going
tonight.”

Why? Will you be there? How can I care if you are? What
the hell is wrong with my logic meter?
She ran a hand over her hair.
“Sorry. Stolen cars and high-speed chases and fires are not part of my usual
day. Believe me. I can’t go.”

“You will. Cara and Samantha are seeing to it you have
clothes. Cara owns a women’s shop in town and—”

“I’m hard to fit.”

“Not from where I sit.” His extraordinary dulcet green eyes
danced over her once more.

If he didn’t stop that, she’d leave a wet spot on his fine
leather seat from her soaked panties. Jazzed by his looks and his sweetness, she
had to be logical. “I am not your average—”

“Size 4?” He arched a wicked brow. “No, thank god, you
definitely are not.”

“I’m more like—”