Love and Glory: The Coltrane Saga, Book 3 by Patricia Hagan Page B

close behind. “I’m gonna fix you good, woman.”
    The sky turned a bright yellow for just an instant, but it was long enough for Kitty to spot Nancy about fifty feet down the road, struggling to get on her horse. Kitty moved faster through the quagmire, reaching Nancy, and did not hesitate to shove her aside, ignoring Nancy’s cry of pain as she struck the ground. Then she grabbed the horse around the neck, swung herself up, and kicked him hard in the flanks.
    “No, hell, you don’t!”
    She felt hands groping for her. The horse reared on his hind legs, hooves frantically thrashing the darkness above and around him. Then Luke got his fingers into the horse’s mane. Yanking, pulling, he got the horse’s front legs down and took hold of the reins.
    “You won’t give me no more trouble, you bitch.”
    Luke sprang upwards, hands closing about her throat as he yanked her from the horse. She felt his fist smash into the side of her head, and then her face struck the cold, muddy earth and she felt herself slip away into a deep, dark void. Just before she gave way to it, she saw John’s little face floating before her.
     
    Kitty felt a sharp, probing pain from the other side of that heavy drape that was keeping her from the real world. Her head hurt. She did not want to leave where she was and go to the other side of that drape. Something inside was telling her to stay here, here in this inky black world, but pain was pulling her, awakening her, forcing her to open her eyes.
    She looked up and screamed, screamed until Luke Tate’s hand closed around her throat.
    “Now listen to me,” he said in a reasonable tone. “If you’ll notice, it’s daylight. We’re a good piece from back yonder, and we’re deep enough in the woods so’s I don’t imagine nobody could hear you scream, but I’m tired, and I just plain don’t feel like listening to you. So I want you just to shut up.”
    She made deep, rasping sounds as she struggled to breathe.
    “You’re chokin’, Kitty, honey, and I don’t want to kill you. I want to enjoy you for a long, long time. So I’m gonna let you breathe, but ifyou start screamin’, then I may just have to go ahead and shut you up for good. Bad as I’d hate to kill a fine piece of woman-flesh like you, I’ll do it. You understand me?”
    He released her abruptly, and she gasped, clutching at her aching throat. He knelt over her, watching her with glittering eyes. She glanced around and saw that they were in a thicket. She could not see beyond it. Where they were, she had no idea.
    “Now what we’re gonna do, Kitty,” he spoke as though she were a child, “is get somethin’ from my saddlebags and you’re gonna fix us some vittles. We’re gonna eat and rest a spell. Maybe even take some time for some lovin’. You like it, and you know you do.”
    He looked down at her and chuckled, reaching to pinch her nipple and laughing out loud as she cringed.
    “We’ve got a long way to go,” he continued, watching her intently. “All the way to Nevada. I’ll bet you don’t even know where that is, do you?”
    She did not answer, but lay still, staring up at him in mute terror. The anger had turned to fright. Fear, grasping as surely as his fingers had grasped her throat, was inching its way through her, taking control of her.
    He talked on, fondling her breast gently, then moving his fingertips down to caress her belly. “Well, we go up through Tennessee and then head due west. We’ll go through Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, and then Utah. It’s pretty country, Kitty, real pretty. I’ve been there once, when I was on the run after that Injun raid. Decided I’d had my bellyful of war and all that went with it. So I know the way. Now I hear there’s a silver boom goin’ on, and I want in on it.”
    His fingers slid down to her thigh. His touch was possessive yet tender, and she continued to lie there motionlessly and stare at him blankly.
    “I plan to get rich, Kitty. You’ll live