"And whose fault is that? I wasn't the one who scared off the guard your father hired to escort us. You did that all by yourself, young man, and because it's your fault our guard isn't here to offer assistance, I think it only fair you take on the responsibility of finding someone else who can." Her gaze narrowed, and she was pleased to see he had the decency to flush and look guiltily away. Although he didn't, she noticed, look too guilty. "I mean it, Roger. I don't want you to come back here unless you've found someone who can help me."
"And if I c-can't find anyone?"
"Then don't come back," she snapped through gritted teeth. Amanda meant every word. At least, she meant them when she said them. It took a good fifteen minutes for her anger to cool, and for regret to sink in.
Dear God, what had she done? What if Roger couldn't find help? It was more than possible. They hadn't passed a soul in days; the chance of him finding someone today—someone strong enough to get her out of here—wasn't promising. And what would he do if he couldn't find anyone? Would he take her at her word and not come back? Worse, what would she do if that happened—besides rejoice in never having to see the brat again, of course.
Aside from the obvious, there was a distinct disadvantage to not being able to move. It gave a body far too much time to think. While Amanda's thoughts were distracting—they kept her from dwelling on how cold and wet and pained she was—they were also more than a little disturbing.
Dammit! She shouldn't have let Roger get her so angry. Now if he didn't return, it was no one's fault but her own. It went without saying that if Roger didn't return, Amanda was in a great deal of trouble. Edward Bannister hadn't hired her to lose his son in what could very well be hostile Indian Territory.
To Amanda's way of thinking, that only went to prove the man couldn't know Roger very well. But that wasn't the point. If she turned up in Pony, Montana without Roger, it would be to face the brunt of Edward Bannister's wrath. The thought was more hideous than spending time alone with the man's son. Amanda didn't know much about her employer, but she'd heard rumors. She knew enough. Losing Edward Bannister's son could prove hazardous to her health—especially since she was the sole person responsible for the safety and well-being of the heir to Edward Bannister's recently-acquired fortune.
That fact would have been laughable, were it not so true.
Amanda closed her eyes and groaned when she remembered the stories she'd read in the newspaper last year about Chief Joseph and his turbulent trek toward Canada. How did she know that, at this very moment, there weren't bloodthirsty savages out there slicing off Roger's scalp? Her stomach churned at the mental picture that thought conjured up! The thought that she was the one who'd sent the poor boy out to such a fate was unbearable. She didn't like Roger, but still…
There were two ways to look at this situation; Amanda, having more than enough time and a desperate need to occupy her mind, looked at it from both angles. The good news was, there was a chance—a small one, but a chance all the same—that the land they were on was as safe as what they'd left behind. The bad news was, the safety of the region had yet to be determined. She would need to know exactly where they were in order to establish how hostile the territory was... and they'd been lost for weeks.
Again, Amanda wondered how she'd gotten herself into this mess. Again, the only answer that sprang to mind was, blind stupidity. When the need was great, people resorted to desperate measures. She would have preferred to think herself above all that, but the unpleasant memory of Roger Thornton Bannister III's hateful little smirk proved she was not.
Not for the first time, she cursed the ad she'd seen three months ago in the Boston Times. The job had seemed like a godsend. She had needed to return to Seattle and the small horse ranch her father had left to her after his death, but she'd had no money for the trip. The ad had seemed like an answer to her prayers. To her way of thinking, the only thing better than immediate money was easy money. And how difficult could it be to escort a ten-year-old boy from Boston to Montana?
It had sounded so simple. Truly, she should have known better.
Being hired for the job had been part luck and part ingenuity. She'd fudged her qualifications
. A wilderness expert? Her? Not likely! Of course, she hadn't said that. She'd told the lawyer who, with obvious misgivings, had hired her, that she had vast experience foraging through the woods for months at a time. It wasn't a complete lie, although only by severely stretching one's imagination could the extensive gardens behind Miss Henry's Academy for Young Ladies be considered "woods." As for the "months at a time" part... well she'd exaggerated. But she'd been desperate.
The lawyer, whose name she couldn't recall, hadn't believed a word. That hadn't stopped him from hiring her on the spot. Apparently, the man had been as desperate to find someone to take Roger off his hands as Amanda had been to get the job and put the finishing school and city she abhorred behind her. Of course, once she'd been introduced to Roger, she knew why the lawyer bit back his reluctance and hired her despite her obvious lack of skill. The salary was more than generous... but a fortune wouldn't have made an otherwise sane person consider spending time with Roger Thornton Bannister III.
The trip had been delayed four days while the lawyer found a man as insane as Amanda to act as their guard.
Yes, she thought now, getting the job had been a blessing. Keeping it, however, had proved to be a curse that now weighed heavily on her cold, wet, shivering shoulders.
Ten more minutes passed, during which time Amanda convinced herself Roger would not be back. Ever. A worrier at heart, she decided that if savages didn't get to the boy, a wild animal would. Roger possessed no more wilderness skills than she did. It was nothing short of a miracle that they'd come as far as they had; their guard had deserted them shortly after they'd disembarked from the stage in Virginia City.
Scowling, Amanda glanced around and wondered if they had come as far as she'd thought. Without Roger to distract and annoy her, the river that kept sucking at her legs began to look familiar. The thick stand of pine trees; the way the gurgling water cut a twisting path around them; the ankle high, swaying grass and fragrant wildflowers dotting the steep but not too steep bank...
"I really wish you'd stop calling me a liar. She is out there. Right past those trees. Go ahead, see for yourself."
The voice, Roger's, was so unexpected that Amanda almost tumbled backward from the shock of hearing it. He wasn't dead? Indians hadn't scalped him? Bears hadn't mauled him? And he'd come back, which meant...
Her relief was short lived; it faded at the sound of Roger's laughter. As always, the boy's nasally, high-pitched sneer skated down Amanda's spine like fingernails raking slate. All the kind thoughts she'd wasted on him when she'd been sure he was dead evaporated, replaced by the memories of all the nasty things Roger did and said on an hourly basis.
It wouldn't surprise Amanda if Roger was out there talking to himself right now... just to make her think he'd found help. She would be furious when no real help was forthcoming, and her frustration would no doubt feed the little monster's perverse sense of humor.
Leaves crunched, a twig snapped.
Amanda scowled, her gaze narrowing on the trees where the sounds originated. Though she hated to admit it, when Roger set his mind to do something, he usually accomplished it. Since what he usually accomplished was mass destruction, it wasn't an extremely endearing trait. In Virginia City, when they'd set out on the last leg of their trip, Roger had loosened her saddle cinch... then laughed himself sick when she'd almost tumbled to her death. Oh, yes, she'd learned the hard way to be leery of any "help" the brat offered.
She balled her hands into tight fists, her gaze focusing on the trees. As she watched, one shadow thickened and separated from a particularly wide pine tree trunk.
"I swear to God, kid, if you've dragged me all the way out here for nothing, I'll..."
Amanda startled. That voice was not Roger's. The timbre was too deep, the drawl too thick and too steeped in adult masculinity for it to belong to a ten-year-old. In case she had any lingering doubts, the man who swaggered into the clearing as though he owned it abolished them in one virile sweep.
Her first instinct was to scream.