Page 81 of Short-Straw Bride

The old game trail was still where she remembered it being. Meredith urged Ginger off the road a couple hundred yards short of the main entrance. The path was almost imperceptible, completely overgrown with brush, but Ginger obediently followed her mistress’s silent instruction and plowed through the oak saplings.

Meredith followed the landmarks she recognized more than the path itself, and when she reached the pine she’d long ago dubbed The Survivor, she drew Ginger to a halt. Not long after her accident with the trap, lightning had struck the tall, elegant tree. Half of the tree turned brown and brittle, too damaged to support life, but the other half remained green and healthy, flourishing with a will to overcome the adversity thrust upon it. Meredith stared up into the glorious green boughs on the east side and absorbed the hope they had always offered.

As a young girl, the tree had encouraged her to persevere and not let her own injured limb hold her back. Today, though, it inspired strength and fortitude. Meredith breathed deeply, inhaling the scent of the pine and allowing it to solidify her purpose. Time to find Jim.

If Jim had followed the usual Archer strategy of shadowing the road, he should be somewhere in the pines to her right. She’d made up some time by taking the game trail, but there was still no way to guess his precise location. If only there were a way to signal . . . The birdcalls! Neill had been teaching her the distinctive Archer call before the last storm hit. She’d not yet perfected the warble, but she could match the swooping pitch fairly well.

Meredith licked her lips, then cupped her hands around her mouth and threw her cooing voice as deep into the surrounding woods as she could. She waited a moment and repeated the signal, aiming her call more directly toward the cabin.

The silence stretched out for long minutes. Either Jim hadn’t heard her call or he’d been unable to answer. Had he been captured? She prayed not. As she tried to determine her next strategy, a rustling to the south of her hailed a man’s approach. Only then did she realize that she might have given her position away to one of Roy’s men instead of Jim. The crunch of dead leaves grew louder, and Meredith’s pulse throbbed harder.

Gripping Ginger’s reins tightly between her fingers, she prepared to flee. The muscles in her thighs grew taut. Her heels twitched. Every instinct screamed at her to race away. But just as she began turning Ginger’s head toward home, an answering call floated to her ear, one with a beautiful, well-practiced warble.

“Thank heaven,” she whispered, releasing her hold on the reins as Jim emerged on foot between a pair of scrubby post oaks.

Her brother-in-law didn’t appear nearly as relieved to see her as she was to see him. The hardheaded man was actually scowling at her.

“What are you doing here?” he hissed.

Meredith dismounted and squared her shoulders. Jim wasn’t one to dance around a subject, so she got straight to the point. “I can help you get to the cabin unseen.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “Travis know what you’re doing?”

“I left a note.” She glared back at him in challenge.

The man let out a breath and rubbed the back of his neck, but in the end, his desire to help Cassie trumped his reluctance to defy his brother.

“I’ve scouted the perimeter. No obvious guards are posted at the cabin, but I saw evidence of at least four men at the edge of the woods near the house. I think they’re patrolling, so it’d be hard to know their exact position at any one time. I imagine Mitchell’s got even more inside.”

Meredith grimaced. It was a good thing the game trail lay deeper into the woods than Roy’s men had penetrated. “So Travis was right. It is an ambush.”

Jim shrugged. “A trap at least. Hard to know if they plan to pick us off or just ensure our cooperation.”

Which would mean either loss of life or loss of land—both options equally heinous to an Archer.

“Have you seen Cassie?”

“No. Haven’t been able to get close enough.” Jim’s gaze shifted, targeting the rooftop of the old homestead barely visible through the trees. “Heard the shrill voice of that mother of hers, though.” He twisted his head to face her again, his dark eyes tortured. “She’s here, Meri. I’m sure of it.”

Meredith touched his arm, a similar dread flowing through her own heart. “Travis needs proof before he’ll come, and you can’t take on all of Roy’s men by yourself.” She squeezed his forearm and lifted her chin. “I’ll get you to the house.”

He didn’t ask how or pester her for details. He simply nodded and pointed down the trail. “Show me.”

Thankful, for once, for Jim’s taciturn ways, Meredith looped Ginger’s reins over a low branch and trudged ahead. Lifting her skirts and folding them close to her body to eliminate excess rustling, she kept her eyes to the ground and avoided as many twigs and pinecones as possible.

The trail wound closer to the cabin before forking. The main path led to a watering hole deeper in the woods, but a narrow shoot darted toward the left rear corner of the homestead—the corner that housed her childhood bedroom.

Meredith halted and peered into the thinning cover that separated them from the house. She looked to the right, then to the left. No one. At least, none that she could see.

“Have you spotted any of Roy’s men?” she whispered to the man behind her. “I can take you closer, but I don’t want to draw the attention of one of the guards.” She stared at the foot of her weak leg and winced. “I cannot walk as quietly as you.”

“Just tell me what I need to know.” Jim came abreast of her, his rifle at the ready.

“If you stay to the left, the pines will give way to a stand of broad oaks. They shade the house in the summer, and since no one’s trimmed their branches the last few years, a few limbs stretch all the way to the roof.” She watched as understanding dawned in his eyes. His jaw hardened, and he strode forward, but Meredith stopped him with a hand to his arm.

“There is not as much cover near the house, so you’ll have to be careful. You might be able to peer through one of the back windows from within the branches of the tree, but if you need to see into the main room, you’ll have to crawl over the roof to the front of the house. It’s risky, but hopefully none of the men will expect trouble from above.”

Jim slid his arm from her grasp and took her hand in his. “Thank you.”