I sighed. "Means Montana's on the hunt by now."

"That's what I'm worried about."

Yawning again, I rubbed her back and tried to see past the bars. Only a dim, blank nothingness greeted me. "I wonder what time this place gets cracking in the mornings?"

As if in response to my query, a bank of bright lights snapped on, temporarily blinding my dilated pupils with their brilliance. As I rubbed my smarting eyes, I heard the sound of keys rattling, followed by a barred door opening and several sets of booted feet beginning their trek down the tiled corridor.

As the steps came closer, Pony's already tense back stiffened even more and I heard her gasp slightly for air.

"What is it?" I asked, feeling a tendril of fear curl into my belly.

She turned her head to face me, her eyes huge, her face as white as a freshly laundered sheet. "You know when we were talking about Montana versus spending the rest of our lives in here?"

"Yes..."

"Those..." Her throat bobbed as she took a hard swallow. "...were the good choices."

PART 6.

"WHAT'S GOING ON?" I demanded, pushing myself against the bars and craning my neck to look as far as I could down the now brightly lit hall. All I could see were shadows moving steadily closer.

"Never mind that now. Help me get everyone up and ready to move."

"But... ." Whatever I might have said was cut off abruptly as Pony grabbed my arm and yanked me away from the bars. Bowing to the inevitable, I set to waking up Critter and Nia while Pony worked on Rio.

Critter was easy. One shake, and she was wide awake and ready for action. Nia, however, was a different story altogether. Trying to wake her up was like trying to rouse a corpse. Not effective in the slightest, in other words.

Fully awake, Rio took matters into her own hands by simply hauling Nia up off the bench and plopping her, so to speak, on her own two feet, then bracing the younger woman until she could more or less stand on her own.

For awhile there, it was a toss up as to who was the more green: Pony, who looked like she'd spent the night with her head in a bottle, or Nia, who actually had.

With my back to the bars, I listened as the bootsteps came closer and closer until they stopped just outside. A jangle of keys, and then I heard the cell door being opened, its rusting hinges squealing loudly in protest.

Pivoting on my heel, I turned in time to see several large guards file through, handcuffs and belly-chains in their hands. As they entered the cell, they fanned out, surrounding the five of us, their faces expressionless.

"Jesus."

The epithet whispered by Critter took my attention from one of the guards, a brutally ugly man with a thick, red and twisted scar running from temple to jaw, and I followed her line of sight back to the cell's entrance.

If looking caused Lot's wife to be turned to salt, it caused me to be turned into rock. Everything in me froze; my heart, my lungs, my muscles, the blood in my veins. An atom bomb could have exploded from an inch away and I would never have known it.

My life stood before me; a vision in monochrome.

From the low, slanted visor of her stiff peaked cap to the tips of her highly polished boots, to the wide gunbelt which coiled around her lean hips like Eden's tempting snake, to the deep, burnished tan of her skin, she looked like every bad girl's fantasy come to life, drawn by an incredibly talented hand all in shades of charcoal brown.

Though I couldn't see her eyes, I knew they were flashing as silver as the mirrored sunglasses which covered them.

The set of her jaw and the tense, coiled power of her body fairly radiated her emotions to those with eyes to see beyond simple (if indeed anything about her could be considered as mundane as 'simple') outward appearances.

Anger. And something else. Something more.

Fear.

No, not for herself. Never for herself.

When one considers themselves as living on borrowed time, things like pain and death and captivity hold very little sway over them.

Fear for those they hold dear, however, is a major force which steers the course of their lives.

This maxim holds doubly true for the woman shares my soul. I see it in her eyes every morning when she thinks me asleep and so lowers her guard for those few precious moments. I see it each and every time we make love and her arms come up to enfold me, holding me close as if I were the most cherished object on earth. I see it, too, each night when we slide between the cool, fragrant sheets of our bed and she tenderly kisses me, then spoons against my body to keep me safe from the demons of the night.

I knew that same look was in her eyes then, hidden behind the blank lenses of the glasses she was wearing. Knew it as well as I knew my own name and the sound of my own heart as it beat in my ears. Where others looked and saw rage, I looked and saw fear and so, though perhaps I should have been, I wasn't afraid.

"Formacion y asimiento fuera de sus munecas. No intente cualquier cosa estupido o usted morira."

I marveled at the way the foreign words rolled from her lips like warm honey. Though I didn't understand a word of what she said, I was enraptured. Not so intent as I at the sound of her voice, but rather the words she was speaking and the meaning behind them, the others hastened to form a line and yanked me into the middle of it. My wrists were thrust upwards, and then cuffed, pretty as you please.

As we stood like soldiers at attention before the Queen, the prison guards wrapped the chains around our bellies and shackled our bound wrists to them. Then we were chained together, and almost before I knew what was happening, we were wordlessly paraded, single file, out of our cell and down the long, featureless hallway.

In short order, we were led through the building and out into early morning darkness. Though the air outside was quite chilly, the fear-induced body heat of my companions fore and aft kept me quite toasty. It wouldn't have mattered if my skin froze up and shattered, though. What power did the elements when the woman who held my heart stood scant feet away?

A dusty, beaten van bearing the logo of some Mexican government agency stood idling in the cool morning air. Two of the guards opened the rear doors, and with a quick jerk of her chin, Ice started us moving forward again. I stumbled a bit going in, but her strong hand on my back eased my steps, and I wore the touch of her like a brand upon my skin.

When we were finally all in and settled on the narrow bench which ran along the van's interior, the doors were slammed and locked, throwing us into total blackness.

Five sets of held breaths were simultaneously expelled.

"We're dead," Pony grumbled morosely to my left.

"Dead as dogshit," Rio agreed to my right.

"Wonderful image, Rio. Thanks," Critter chimed in.

"Can I throw up now?" was Nia's contribution.

"No!" came the reply. In stereo.

As for me, well, let's just say I was trying hard to smother my grin, as well as the fire my lover's simple, innocent touch had managed to spark in me.

And as the truck slipped into gear and pulled away with the feeling somewhat akin to being in a coffee can being shot into outer space, I slumped back against the interior wall and just enjoyed the ride.

An hour or so later (at least, that's what my kidneys and the fillings in my teeth were telling me), the van pulled to a merciful stop...somewhere. We could have driven to Timbuktu or Outer Mongolia for all I knew, trapped as I was in the back of a windowless van with four women who were trying desperately not to throw up, either from fear or from an overabundance of alcohol. Or both. The stench of it was almost overwhelming, and I found myself wishing for nothing so much as a simple breath of fresh air.

A short wait, and then the doors were flung unceremoniously open, temporarily blinding me with the brightness of the sun as it shone in on the black interior. I tried to cover my eyes, but with my hands bound to my waist, the task was a fruitless one indeed, so I settled instead for squinting.

Ice's long form cast an ominous shadow over us, backlit as it was from the brilliant sun shining over her left shoulder. I rose with the rest, relieved to finally be standing once again, and more or less followed them-not having much choice in the matter at any rate-into the outside world once again.

Stepping outside, I chanced a look around, taking in only empty desert as far as my eyes could see. Bringing my attention back to the situation at hand, I saw Ice standing in front of Rio with an expression any sane person would characterize as murderous.

For her part, Rio was standing so stiff and so straight it was as if someone had poured molten lava down her spinal canal and allowed it to harden into cement. Her normally bronzed face was ashen with fear and I found my heart, yet again, going out to her.

After a long, lingering look, Ice next moved to Pony, who looked like fainting was a distinct possibility in her very near future. Pony had known Ice longer than the rest of us, and had always held an extremely deep and abiding respect for the woman who was my lover. To disappoint Ice was a fate far worse than death could ever be for her.

Ice knew that and if only to spare her feelings, stepped past after giving her a brief, but significant, look. Nia came next, and though she was trying hard not to show it, I could feel her fear in the trembling of her body.

And then, it was my turn.

Though hidden behind the mirrored lenses of her sunglasses, I could feel her eyes rake over me. My skin tingled, feeling exposed and totally vulnerable to her gaze. Her serious expression didn't change one iota, and I felt a curious combination of fear and longing flutter through me on butterflies' delicate wings.

After a long, tense moment, her expression softened just slightly as her hand came up to brush gentle fingers against my cheek.

I felt weak with relief, my legs nearly buckling beneath me. My head tilted upward as hers lowered and our lips brushed together in a kiss of tender welcome.

Thoroughly overwhelmed, it took me a moment to realize that the sounds I thought to be bells were actually chains rattling as Nia struggled to step between us.

"You son of a bitch! What do you think you're doing? Leave her alone, damnit!!"

Three woman around me gasped as Nia managed to land a glancing blow to Ice's turned back, and Pony and Rio moved as far away from the young woman as the meager length of their chains would allow, as if she were a plague-bearer and marked for certain death.

Casually reaching behind her, Ice grabbed a handful of Nia's shirt and easily held her off without breaking the sensual tangle of our lips.

Only when she was good and ready did she pull away from me and turn to deal with the struggling Nia, peering at her over the tops of glasses which she'd lowered slightly. "Did anyone ever tell you that it's rude to interrupt?" she asked mildly.

Nia's mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.

"Something you want to say to me?"

"Your eyes... ."

A finely arched eyebrow disappeared into Ice's hairline. "Yes?"

"They're so... .so...um...blue!"

Ice just looked at her.

"And you're...I mean...um...your voice...it sounds...um... ."

Unable to help myself, I burst out in laughter, thoroughly enjoying the young troublemaker's first taste of the indomitable Morgan Steele. The others looked at me as if I'd grown a third head, which, of course, only made me laugh harder.

After a moment, I decided to relieve Nia of her misery. "Nia, I'd like to introduce you to Ice."

She turned wide eyes to me. "Ice? Ice as in your... . That Ice?"

Grinning, I nodded. "That Ice, yes. Ice, this is Nia, a...friend of ours."

"So I've heard," Ice replied, smirking slightly.

In response, Nia flushed a brilliant scarlet and looked as if she wished a giant sinkhole would conveniently appear just beneath her feet and swallow her whole.

Turning her attention back to me, Ice produced a key from her gunbelt and unlocked my shackles. Then she pulled me into a tight embrace, her muscles trembling faintly. The rapid beat of her heart against my ear told me all I needed to know about her emotional state at that moment.

I knew the one thing we both needed at the moment was a bit of privacy, so when she pulled away and placed an arm around my waist, I went with her willingly, and with a lightness in my step which hadn't been there for months.

Before we reached the vehicle's long shadow, Ice tossed the key carelessly over her shoulder. "We have some unfinished business," she said, not bothering to look behind her. "Don't even think of running."

I couldn't help but grin slightly as I imagined the expressions on the faces of the women behind me.

I had thought, perhaps, that we would step inside the van, but Ice instead turned me so that my back rested comfortably against one of the side panels. Reaching down, she clasped my waist and smiled slightly. "Hey," she whispered.

I tried for casual, at first. "Hey, yourself." Grinning a little, I bumped her knee with mine. "Come here often?"

Gifting me with a dazzling grin, she just shook her head, snorting softly through her nose as she removed her sunglasses and tucked them neatly into her right breast pocket.

Unable to help myself, I threw my body against hers, melding myself to her as I felt those strong arms wrap themselves around me, enfolding me in a living cage filled with warmth, tenderness and love. It was a place I never wanted to leave, so I wrapped my own arms around her lean muscled frame and held on for dear life. Tears came, and I let them fall, heedless of anything save for the beat of her heart in my ear, the feel of her body against my own, and the cherished scent of her skin.

"Shhhh," she whispered, pressing a kiss to my hair. "Don't cry, Angel."

"But I missed you." It was all I could get out before my sobs made words impossible to form.

"I know, sweetheart. I missed you too. So much."

"Please don't send me away," I whispered in desperation against her chest. "I couldn't bear it if you did. Being without you is killing me inside."

Looking back on these words as I write them, I suppose I should feel the flush of embarrassment heating my face. I'll be the first to admit that I sounded like a small, lost child rather than the strong adult I thought myself to be at the time.

I should, perhaps. But I don't. All I can feel, clear and sharp as if it were happening now, is and was the anguish lancing through me at the thought spending even one more moment away from her.

She didn't answer me, which was fine, because I wasn't expecting one.

After a long, quiet moment, we pulled away at the same time. Reaching out, she tenderly wiped the tears from my cheeks, the look of adoration in her eyes making me feel as tall as a Titan.