Hannah Howell by Stolen Ecstasy

like feeling as he did. He disliked worrying about where. she was and what might be happening to her. Only once had he let a woman touch his emotions. He thought he’d learned his lesson but, clearly, he hadn’t learned it well enough.
    “Don’t worry, Hunter. She ain’t been gone all that long. Couldn’t’ve gotten into that much trouble.”
    “I’m not worried, Charlie,” Hunter lied, “just furious. I’m going to strangle her when we find her.”

    Leanne used Hunter’s handkerchief to wipe the sweat from her face. She had to slow her pace or collapse. All she could do was hope she had covered enough ground to make a search for her more trouble than it was worth.
    Stuffing the handkerchief back into her pants pocket, she continued on her way. She mentally argued the wisdom of finding a place to camp for the night. Afraid someone might be following, she wanted to keep moving as long as her body could endure. However, traveling at night was dangerous in and of itself.
    A deep cry dragged her from her inner debate. She looked up from the rough ground she had been watching so carefully and cursed. So involved had she been in deciding whether to rest or not, she had come within yards of a small group of Indians. They looked as surprised to see her as she was to see them. She doubted, however, that they felt the depth of fear and dismay that she did:
    A voice in her head screamed for her to run, but her feet seemed rooted to the ground. As she struggled to break shock’s immobilizing grip, she noticed two things about the six nearly naked men before her. They were not moving too fast or too gracefully. And, judging by the bottle one held, they had been drinking. When one made a lewd gesture, she finally found the strength and wit to move.
    Even as she urged her weary body into a run, she heard the Indians move to give chase. They seemed to be having some difficulty, but she did not slow her pace. They might be drunk, but they had horses and she did not.
    She suddenly realized that she was running straight back to the outlaw camp and Hunter. Heading for the foothills of the mountains would have been wiser. There was cover in that direction, places to hide. Now all she could do was run and pray that the Indians were too drunk to get their horses under control. The sound of hoofbeats behind her told her it was already too late for that prayer to be answered.
    For a moment the shouts and whoops of her pursuers added to her terror. Then she grew angry. They saw this chase as some sort of game. She was running for her very life, and they found it amusing. She began to pray that Hunter was out looking for her, that he would soon appear, and that he would shoot every one of the drunken lechers chasing her.
     
    “Hey, hear that, Hunter?”
    “I do, Charlie, and I have the feeling I know who’s smack in the middle of that ruckus.”
    Even as he spoke, he spurred his horse to a gallop. He recognized Leanne the moment her slight, running figure came into view. Even though the sounds he heard had warned him, the sight of the half-dozen Indians chasing her caused his heart to skip a beat. Bending low over his horse’s neck, he urged his mount to its greatest speed.
    As he drew closer, his fear for her eased slightly. The Indians were not gaining on her as swiftly as they should have been. They seemed to be doing an extremely poor job of riding her down. He doubted he had ever seen Indians handle their mounts with such a lack of skill. The nearer he got, the surer he was that the Indians were not incompetent, they were just drunk.
    “Fire a few shots over their heads, Charlie.”
    “Over their heads?”
    “Yep. I want to try and chase them off if I can. They’re drunk.”
    When Charlie and Jed obeyed his order, the results almost made Hunter laugh. Frightened by the sounds of gunfire, each horse went its own way. The six Indians went in six different directions as they struggled to gain control of their startled mounts.