Along about dusk the monotony was broken by a thunder of horses’ hooves. Another dozen warriors rode into camp, dismounting in a cloud of dust. Loretta watched them with detachment. Surrounded as she was by so many savages, a few more or less didn’t make much difference to her. One rider had remained on his horse. She focused on him, then straightened, her pulse accelerating. Tom Weaver? She threw a startled glance at Hunter, who had been feeding the fire. After returning her regard a moment with those unreadable eyes of his, he strode to greet the newcomers.
A dozen questions sprang to Loretta’s mind. Why hadn’t Tom been killed? If those other Indians had been holding him prisoner all this time, where had they been keeping him? And why had they brought him here? To kill him? She clasped her knees and dug her fingernails into her skin. She couldn’t bear it if they tortured him in front of her. Yet what could she do to stop them? She couldn’t even save herself.
After conversing with the other Indians, Hunter seized Tom’s horse’s bridle and led both horse and rider back to his camp. Loretta studied Tom. A livid bruise slashed his cheekbone above his beard. An angry red rope burn encircled his throat. His shirt was ripped at the shoulder, the edges of the rent soaked with blood. He looked terrified—a weak, quivery terror that she understood all too well.
Hunter cut Tom’s feet free and hauled him off the horse. Tom staggered and nearly fell. Hunter steadied him, then steered him to the fire, where he pressed down on his shoulder to make him sit. Tom fastened his attention on Loretta.
‘‘You okay, girl? Have they—’’
Hunter thumped Tom low on the back with the inside of his moccasined foot. Tom bit off the words, his blue eyes searching hers. Loretta knew what he was wondering. She started to signal a reply, but Hunter watched her. Even though she knew Tom would think the worst, she bent her head. If she angered the Comanche, he might retaliate by harming Tom.
‘‘You filthy, slimy bastards!’’ Tom cried.
Scarcely able to believe her ears, Loretta looked up just in time to see metal flash. Hunter pressed his knife to Tom’s throat and crouched next to him. Words weren’t necessary. One more sound out of Tom, and Hunter would kill him.
She rose to her knees. The sound she made, slight though it was, drew the Comanche’s attention. She lifted her hands in silent supplication. The air thrummed with tension. Then, very slowly and deliberately, Hunter withdrew the knife from Tom’s larynx and returned it to its sheath.
Relief sapped the strength from Loretta’s limbs, and she sank back onto the pallet. Hunter tossed another piece of wood onto the fire, sending up a spray of live coals, a few of which fell in Tom’s lap. Tom scrambled backward and tried to shake them off, no easy feat with his hands tied behind him. In the process he lost his balance and toppled sideways.
Hunter squatted by the fire and draped his arms over his knees, his gaze fixed on the feeble flames while Tom struggled to sit back up. The Comanche’s eyes shone with that peculiar light Loretta was coming to recognize as laughter. After a long while he said, ‘‘When the sun rises, we will leave. You will be set free, old man.’’
Tom didn’t look as if he believed that.
His eyes still glowing with that somber amusement she hated so much, Hunter glanced at her. ‘‘I make no grief behind me.’’
The muscles along Tom’s throat stood out as he struggled to speak. When he finally did, the words came out in a squeak. ‘‘And what about her?’’
‘‘She goes with me.’’
‘‘I’ll b-buy her from ya. R-rifles, I can get rifles. And cartridges.’’
There was no mistaking the interest that bit of information sparked in the Comanche. Loretta’s heart soared with sudden hope. ‘‘You have rifles?’’
‘‘I—um, no. B-but I can git ’em.’’
Hunter studied Tom at length, then slid his gaze to Loretta.
‘‘Please,’’ Tom whispered. ‘‘There’s other gals you can steal. Don’t take this one. Let her go home to her family.’’ Breaking off, he licked his lips. ‘‘She ain’t done you no harm.’’
After a long while, Hunter returned his attention to the fire. ‘‘This Comanche does not sell his women. Not even for rifles. She goes with me.’’
‘‘Why this girl?’’
Hunter tossed a sliver of wood onto the flames. ‘‘Another will not do.’’
Silence fell over the three of them, as heavy as the darkness that soon descended. Loretta pressed her back to the tree and stared across the clearing. Hopelessness welled within her. Indians, everywhere she looked. Tom was as helpless against them as she. And every bit as scared. Seeing him quake in fear cemented her belief that the Comanches were not only treacherous, but impossible to escape. It would take an army to rescue them, and the army was off fighting the Northerners.
Tom was untied only long enough to partake of a meager meal of water and jerked meat. After the two men finished eating, Hunter hauled Tom to the tree where Loretta sat. Pulling his arms behind him to encircle the trunk, Hunter lashed the older man’s wrists with rawhide. Loretta was left beside Tom while their captor banked the fire for the night.
‘‘We’ll only have a few seconds, girl, so listen close,’’ Tom whispered with feverish urgency. ‘‘They be Quohadie, the fiercest and cruelest of the lot. He’ll take ya to the Staked Plains. And once he gets ya there . . . well, you know what that means.’’
Loretta nodded. Few white men ventured into that country. Few dared. Once Hunter got her that far from civilization, there would be no hope of rescue. Not that there was now.
‘‘Tomorrow when they set out, they’ll probably kill me. If they don’t, they’ll leave me without my horse. We’re too close to Belknap for them to risk me ridin’ for help.’’ He leaned against the oak and sighed. ‘‘I wish to God I had a gun.’’
Acid coated the back of Loretta’s tongue. She knew what he was thinking and threw a frightened look toward the fire to be certain Hunter wasn’t listening.
Tom made a hollow little plunking sound as he swallowed. ‘‘He’s bent on keepin’ ya. Ain’t no way in hell I’m gonna talk him outa it.’’ A brief silence settled over them. ‘‘You know what ya got to do, girl.’’
Loretta couldn’t bring herself to meet his gaze.
‘‘He’ll never let ya get near a weapon, so’s you can do it quick. That don’t figger in the games they like to play. Ya got no choice, girl. No choice at all. Goin’ without food and water is yer only way out. You know how I hate sayin’ this, but it’s better than—’’ He heaved a sigh. ‘‘Out there on them plains in this kinda heat, you won’t last more than three days without water, maybe even less. If I’m left alive, I’ll try to get help rounded up and reach ya before—’’ He peered at her through the gloom. ‘‘You understand what I’m sayin’, Loretta Jane?’’
Hysterical laughter bubbled in Loretta’s chest. Did Tom truly believe she was that stupid? That she hadn’t already considered her pitiful options and taken action?
‘‘You got no choice, girl. Don’t think ya do. He’s not treatin’ ya too bad right now, but as God is my witness, he will. Just pray you go before they start in on ya.’’ He swallowed again. ‘‘I don’t know why he’s held off. Maybe he’s takin’ you back to his village for some kinda ceremony or somethin’—to his squaws. Or maybe he just fancies a wife with golden hair. Either way, believe me when I say dyin’ of thirst will be kinder.’’
Loretta hugged herself. She understood. She understood all too well.
Moments later Hunter came back and jerked the furs out from under Tom’s legs. With his usual arrogance, he motioned for Loretta to follow him and walked away into the shadows at the far side of the fire. A flush stole up her neck as she rose to go with him. Tom was watching. That made her sleeping with the Comanche seem all the more shameful. She didn’t dare balk, though. Tom might pay with his life.
Hunter spread the pallet and motioned for her to lie next to him. Keeping her back to him, she stretched ou
t on the fur, putting as much distance between them as the pallet allowed. She felt him wrapping a length of her hair around his wrist and intertwining it in his fingers. She prayed he wouldn’t touch her—not in front of Tom.
There was no God in heaven. A heartbeat later, Hunter’s steely arm encircled her waist, and his large hand splayed beneath her breasts. The fur abraded her sunburned thigh as he slid her toward him, but that sting was nothing compared to the degradation. What would Tom think? Loretta knew well what he’d think, and she couldn’t blame him. But what choice did she have?
Chapter 11
LONG BEFORE DAWN, THE COMANCHES broke camp and prepared to ride out. Despite Hunter’s assurance to the contrary, Loretta expected Tom to be killed before they left. Once again Hunter surprised her. Relieved of his horse and boots, Tom would have to walk home—a goodly distance in bare feet, but he wasn’t harmed. Loretta was even allowed to bid him good-bye. Hunter stood nearby, ever watchful.
Tears filled Tom’s eyes, catching the first anemic rays of sunlight, as Loretta walked through the misty ground fog toward him. He touched her hair, then groaned and pulled her into his arms for a fierce hug. ‘‘Ah, Loretta, I’m so sorry. If I was half a man, I’d be able to do somethin’.’’
Loretta clung to Tom and wished she never had to let go. He smelled even worse than the Indians, but he was her only link to home, to the people she loved. She had never been so frightened.
‘‘Remember what I said,’’ Tom whispered. ‘‘No food or water.’’
Already weak with hunger and beginning to dehydrate, Loretta nodded, wondering why Tom hadn’t noticed her abstinence. Fear, she guessed. It had a way of consuming a person.
‘‘I’ll try to come get you.’’ His voice thickened, and his arms began to tremble around her. ‘‘I’ll try my best.’’
Again she nodded, even though they both knew the odds were against his making it in time.
Hunter’s voice cracked like a whip. ‘‘Mea-dro, let’s go.’’
Loretta gave Tom’s neck a final hug and eased herself out of his embrace. She tried to smile at him but couldn’t. Hunter seized her by the arm and drew her toward Tom’s horse, which was now outfitted in Comanche riding gear. When he lifted her onto the mare’s back, she wondered if he would tie her on, as he had before, and received her answer when he mounted behind her, encircling her waist with one arm.
Loretta craned her neck to keep Tom in sight as Hunter nudged the mare forward into a trot. A knot of tears swelled at the base of her throat. This was it, her last contact with home.
‘‘Do not look behind you, Blue Eyes,’’ Hunter murmured. ‘‘We go to a new place, eh? It will be good.’’
Loretta doubted that.
The Comanches rode steadily northward, fording both the Clear and Salt Forks of the Brazos within five hours, passing so close to Fort Belknap on the upper fork that Loretta could scarcely believe their temerity. The country quickly broke into high plains after that, stretching forever with nothing but rolling hills to break the monotony of the horizon. Hunter frequently offered her water, but each time she refused.
From the sun’s position, Loretta guessed it to be around noon when the Indians at last stopped to rest. Dizzy with exhaustion and thirst, she slid off the mare and stumbled. Hunter kept her from falling and led her to a spot of shade under a bush. The combined effects of her sunburn, the inadequate amounts of food and water over the last few days, and the heat were already taking a toll. She sat down and bowed her head, steeling herself for the moment when Hunter offered her more water.
‘‘Blue Eyes, you will drink?’’
Loretta waved him away. A long silence settled over them. Then Hunter grasped her chin and forced her to look at him.
‘‘Habbe we-ich-ket, seeking death, it is not wisdom.’’ He wedged the canteen between his knees and caught her hand, placing it on his muscular upper arm. ‘‘Ein mah-heepicut, it is yours. No harm will come to you walking in my footsteps. You will trust this Comanche, eh? It is a promise I make for you.’’
Loretta stared into his indigo eyes, aware of the leashed power beneath her fingertips. For an instant she believed he truly meant it, that he would protect her, always. Then her gaze shifted to the scar on his cheek, to his heathen medallion, to the images carved into the leather of his wristband. Half-breed or no, she couldn’t trust this man.
He sighed and released her hand to take a long, slow drink, calculated, she was sure, to make her yearn for one herself. He wiped his mouth and said, ‘‘We will see, eh? It is a hard path to walk, going thirsty in the sun. You will yield.’’
With that, he corked the gourd and set it beside her in the shade so she could help herself if her willpower wavered. Rocking back on his heels, he ran a finger along her cheekbone. ‘‘I must protect you from the sun, eh? So you do not burn.’’
Scooping a handful of dirt, he mixed it with a little water from the canteen to make a mud paste. It felt wonderfully cool when he smoothed it on her face. After he finished he sat back and studied her again, his dark eyes gleaming with that silent laughter that irritated her so. She must look like a blue-eyed bugaboo with her face streaked brown and her hair flying every which way. Well, he was no prize, either.
Far too soon to suit Loretta, the rest period ended and they mounted up again. Above her the sun burned like an orange orb, searing her eyelids, leeching the precious stores of moisture from her body, until the hours seemed to spin by in a dizzying, torturous endlessness.
In the early evening the Comanches took another short break at the North Fork of the Little Wichita. After climbing off the horse, Loretta sank down at the edge of the stream to bathe the cracked mud from her face. The temptation was great to take one small sip of water, but she knew she mustn’t.
When Hunter told her it was once again time to ride out, Loretta would have cried if there had been any extra moisture left in her body to wring out for tears. Her limbs ached. Her head swam. And she was weak. All she wanted was to sleep. How could they press onward like this? How could the horses?
Less than ten minutes after they left the stream, Loretta began to nod and felt herself slumping. She jerked upright and blinked. Hunter tightened his arm around her and slipped a hand under her right knee to lift her leg over the horse’s head. Gathering her against his chest, he cradled her crosswise in front of him.
‘‘Sleep, nei mah-tao-yo, sleep.’’
His deep voice sifted through the exhaustion that clouded her mind. Nei mah-tao-yo. She had no idea what it meant, but it sounded so soft the way he said it—like an endearment. The hollow of his shoulder made a perfect resting place. She leaned into him, her cheek against his warm skin. He smelled of sage, smoke, and leather, earthy smells that were becoming familiar and somehow comforting. As she drifted into blackness, she no longer thought of him as an Indian, just a man. A wonderfully sturdy man who could hold her comfortably while she slept.
Dreams haunted her. Silly, stupid dreams, about Amy, Aunt Rachel, Tom Weaver. Wonderful dreams. Dancing with Amy by the well. Running through a field of red-gold daisies. Sitting at the table with Rachel and studying the fashions in a year-old Godey’s Lady’s Book that Uncle Henry had picked up in Jacksboro.
Then once again, she was standing out on the porch in the moonlight to bid Tom good-bye. She knew he meant to kiss her and braced herself. His whiskers and wet lips touched her mouth.
Then, inexplicably, the dream altered, and the mouth that claimed hers changed to wet silk, the pressure firm but somehow gentle. Heavy folds of dark hair brushed her cheeks, forming a curtain around her. She pressed a hand against the warm planes of a man’s well-muscled chest and became aware that strong arms held her. Wonderfully strong arms.
‘‘Mah-tao-yo,’’ a deep voice whispered.
Loretta focused on the dark face above her, realizing with a shock that dream and reality had blended. The wet silk on her lips was Hunter’s fingertips, wet with water from the canteen. The curtains of hea
vy hair that brushed her cheeks were real, as were the muscled chest and arms. She stiffened.
‘‘We have reached the Oo-e-ta, the Big Wichita,’’ he told her in a low voice. ‘‘We will rest here. You will be awake now, eh?’’
She straightened and cast a disoriented look around her. The shadows of stunted trees surrounded her, brushed silver with moonlight. The rushing sound of water told her they were near the river. Crickets and frogs serenaded, a gentle, pleasant cacophony that rose from the banks and rode lightly on the breeze. A medley of scents assailed her, summer grass and prairie blossoms, their perfume so sweet that she felt drunk from it. As she tipped her head back to breathe it in, wooziness overcame her. She clutched the mare’s mane to get her balance.
Hunter dismounted and reached up to lift her from the horse. As his large hands encircled her waist, Loretta stared down at him, her senses still spinning. The Big Wichita was a good seventy-five miles from her home. She couldn’t believe they had ridden so far. Even if Tom rounded up help and tried to follow, he would never catch up with the Comanches before they reached the Staked Plains.
Hunter swung her to the ground. Her legs nearly buckled, and she staggered. He caught her arm, leading both her and the horse to a level spot near the stream. She sat on a smooth rock while he pulled his packs off the mare and unsaddled her. Before he led the horse down to the river for a drink, he spread the buffalo robes for Loretta to lie down, but she was too exhausted to walk. Instead she slid off her perch onto the dirt and hugged the sun-warmed rock like a lover, resting her cheek against its smooth surface.
A fitful sleep overtook her. A short time later she heard footsteps nearby. Hunter, she guessed. She tried to open her eyes, wondering why he hadn’t brought the horse back with him. Through the fringe of her lashes, she saw moccasins, bare legs. Not Hunter? Exhaustion weighted her eyelids, drew them closed. What difference did it make? One Indian, a dozen, as long as they let her be, she didn’t care what they did.