The Beloved Woman

by Deborah Smith

  Her hand tightened on the knife’s handle as she watched him halt his horse and sit very still, only his head moving as he surveyed the church and the dark woods on the hillsides that formed the small glen. Ghostly white mist swirled around his horse’s hooves. He climbed down, and by the angle of his head she knew he’d spotted Mary’s grave. He knelt on one knee by the roughly carved wooden marker.

  Strength and rage surged through her. Good, she thought. Let the monster read the epitaph for her child. Mary Jessica Gallatin. Beloved Daughter of Justis and Katherine. Let him enjoy one last cruel laugh before she killed him.

  His face was hidden by the tilt of his sombrero, but he seemed transfixed by the marker, even tracing the letters on it with his fingertips. Katherine moved forward quietly and raised the knife. She would wait until he heard her and jerked his head up in surprise. Then she would plunge the knife into a vulnerable spot above the neck of his brightly striped serape. Nothing would save him after a throat wound such as that.

  She crept to within a few feet of him. Still he stared at the marker. Slowly he reached up and grasped the brim of his sombrero. Now, she screamed silently as he removed it and let it fall on the rain-soaked ground.

  “Die,” she commanded in a ringing voice. She lunged at him and thrust the knife downward just as he raised his face in the twilight.

  CHAPTER 18

  KATHERINE screamed and tried in the last second to tuck the knife under so that it wouldn’t hit home. It sliced across the front of his serape as he jerked back from her assault. He grabbed her wrist and she fell to her knees in front of him.

  Wrapping his other arm around her waist, he trapped her against him from thigh to chest. Together in that tight, stunned embrace, they stared into each other’s eyes. Katherine’s hand went limp, and the knife fell to the ground.

  “You hate me enough to kill me, gal?” he demanded, his voice low and hoarse.

  The sound of his dear, deep drawl brought him to life in her shocked senses. Justis. He was no ghost conjured by love and memories. After fourteen months, after traveling thousands of miles, he was holding her in his arms. And she had nearly killed him. She saw anguish in his eyes.

  “Not you,” she whispered. “I didn’t know it was you. I swear that.”

  He searched her face for a second, then his grip slowly relaxed on her wrist. “Katie.” His tone was filled with relief.

  Finally she noticed the tears on his face. They had been there when he raised his gaze from their child’s grave. She lifted a trembling hand to the rugged features she knew by heart and caught the wetness on her fingertips. She had never seen him cry before.

  “Justis?” she asked in desperate confusion.

  “We had a daughter? And she died?”

  Katherine nodded, stunned. He had been crying for Mary. “Oh, Justis!” Her arms went around his neck. He gasped in surprise, then dragged her even closer. He held her as if he could make her a part of him. They stayed that way for a long time, clinging to each other silently, arms tightening into quick hugs, then relaxing, then holding on fiercely again.

  Darkness grew around them and Mary’s grave just beyond their feet. Justis reached out with one hand. Katherine twisted, her head against the crook of his neck, and saw him rest the hand on the mound of dirt. Tears slid down her face.

  “I was carrying her when you left for Gold Ridge. She wasn’t part of our agreement, so I didn’t tell you.”

  “My daughter.” His voice was hoarse. “And you kept it from me.”

  “I planned to tell you later. You never came back.”

  “I came back. You just didn’t wait long enough. You didn’t want to wait.”

  “You married Amarintha Parnell.”

  The silence stretched between them, full of tragedy. He held her tighter. “Yeah, I did,” he said wearily.

  She reeled inside. Hearing him admit that he had betrayed her brought all the pain rushing back. She inhaled the scent of him—tobacco, leather, sweat. Warmth. Kindness. Laughter. Good memories. All she had left. Despair caught in her throat. “Why have you followed me again?” she asked bitterly. “I thought you were done with me.”

  “You can’t rid yourself of me that easy. When was our daughter born? When did she die? How?”

  Katherine told him. Then, her voice cold, she added, “You almost sound as if you wouldn’t have been ashamed of her. As if you wanted her.”

  “Did you?”

  The question sank too deep for pretense. She groaned softly. “Oh, God, yes.”

  “But you said you didn’t want a half-breed.”

  “You said the same.”

  “But I would have—”

  “If you could only have seen her, Justis! She was beautiful! Dark, like me, but her eyes, oh, she had your eyes, the most amazing shade of green.” She dug her hands into his damp woolen cape. “I did everything I could to keep her well and safe. I tried so hard.”

  He slipped a hand under the hood made by her shawl and cupped her head gently. She felt his lips brush her forehead. She whimpered in defeat, needing his tenderness too much, and turned her face upward. He kissed her. His hand slid down her hair and jerked to a stop at the end of the braid, just a little below her shoulders. He tugged the shawl off her head and lifted the pitiful remnant of her long tresses.

  She sensed his shock and bewilderment. “It was all I could do for her,” she said, her voice breaking. “I couldn’t put her in the ground without something of myself to keep her … keep her from being so cold and alone. I wrapped my hair around her.”

  He groaned and rested his cheek on her head. His big hand knotted around the short braid, caressing it. Katherine sagged against him. “What now?” she asked. “Our partnership is over. I don’t understand your curious brand of determination. Your lack of honor destroyed even the friendship and affection we shared.”

  “Then why are you so close and quiet in my arms? Why did you hug me? Why did you want to be kissed?”

  She clenched her teeth together. “I crave a fire’s heat but I won’t ever let it burn me again.”

  He drew back and looked at her. Though her expression was hidden by the growing darkness, he seemed to sense every confused emotion running through her. “Who did you want to kill? Salazar? Why aren’t you livin’ with him?”

  She crumpled inside as the truth struck her. “Now I understand. You crossed a continent simply to punish me, because you thought I deserted you for Salazar. You had to take revenge even though you deserted me to marry a crazy woman who could barely stand your touch. A respectable white wife who had neither my intelligence nor, probably, my passion in bed. Your ambition warranted that sacrifice, I suppose. But this—this holy grail that has brought you clear to California—it is made of more vanity and pride than I ever imagined!”

  “God damn your tongue,” he said fiercely. “I came to make certain you were all right.”

  She wavered for a second. “I am quite fine.”

  “Liar! Hiding behind a shack in the wilderness with a knife in your hand, waiting like a wild she-wolf to murder somebody! Who? Salazar? What happened? Did you love the Mex sonuvabitch, but he wouldn’t have you? What?”

  She dug her hands deeper into his serape and tried to shake him. “I won’t listen to your accusations! Not by our daughter’s grave!”

  He muttered a curse and rose to his feet, pulling her with him. She didn’t have time to protest before he picked her up and strode with her to a massive black horse that looked strong enough to carry easily its heavy Spanish saddle weighted with saddlebags and other travel gear. He set her sideways on the saddle, then, holding the horse’s reins, led it close to Mary’s grave.

  He scooped the knife up and handed it to Katherine. “Your scalpel, Doc.”

  The gentle taunt loosed a flood of emotion. Her hand shaking, she slipped the knife into its sheath. Nothing made sense right now. But Justis was here, here with her. He had come thousands of miles for revenge, but he had cried for their lo
st daughter, then offered both strength and tenderness. So many questions, so much to say. She could not trust him, but for now she had to be with him. “I live in the cabin at the near end of the valley.”

  “The one off by itself.”

  “Yes.”

  “I figured the lonely one was yours. If you’ve got room, I’ll make a bed on the floor.”

  “For how long?”

  “Until you and me get some things settled.” He stood by his horse, almost lost in the darkness, but she felt his eyes searching for her reaction.

  “All right.”

  “Good. Good, Katie.” He turned and looked down at the little grave, fading into blackness now, with only the ugly stumps to keep it company. “I would have loved her. I love her now.”

  Katherine cupped her shawl over her mouth and cried silently as he led the horse away.

  HIS PRESENCE FILLED the tiny one-room cabin. Katherine was still in shock, and she was silent as she built a fire. Justis had hobbled his horse on a patch of grass outside and now arranged all his gear by the wall near her bed. She kept her back to him as she put a kettle of coffee among the flames.

  He dropped his hat and serape on the thing she called a table, though it was only a wide slab of redwood with legs made from the small limbs of an oak tree. Standing in the center of the cabin, he frowned at it, the dirt floor, and her rudimentary bed—a pile of dried grass in one corner, covered with a blanket.

  A sense of humiliation fueled her dull anger. She snatched her only mug from a nail. Goose bumps rose on her arms as he sat down on a split-log bench less than a foot behind her. She had always been able to tell when he was watching her; the scrutiny of those drooping, deceptively lazy green eyes was a searing force. She felt it now.

  “You dress like a Mex peasant,” he commented.

  “I am a peasant. And glad for it. There’s a great deal of freedom in having nothing and wanting nothing except to live and be left alone.”

  Without looking around, she tossed her shawl onto the pile of grass and blankets. She refused to give in to the urge to straighten her stained, much-mended white blouse. She tucked her bare ankles and crude leather sandals under the coarse brown material of her skirt.

  He swore softly. “You were too damned proud to take the finery I bought for you in New York?”

  “Too proud to take what Blue Song gold had purchased? Hardly. I took what I liked best and left the rest behind. I also took twenty thousand dollars from our bank account. Don’t worry—there’s many times that left.”

  He leaned forward. She felt his blunt fingers on the back of her neck. The contact made her blood race even more swiftly. She twisted halfway around and grabbed his wrist as he pulled the gold nugget from inside her blouse. “Don’t touch me again,” she warned.

  His eyes glittered with emotions she couldn’t read. He knotted his hand around the sturdy leather necklace and pulled slowly. She cried out in dismay but had no choice except to face him. She looked up with a mixture of defiance and despair. “It is mine. You gave it to me. Just as”—she winced inside—“you gave me your name.”

  Abruptly she snatched at the necklace, trying to lift it over her head. “Here. Neither was mine to keep. Take it. Give it to your real wife.”

  “No, dammit. Proud hellion.” He wound the leather thong around his fist so that it was too snug for her to remove. “Forget about Amarintha. She’s not my real wife. You are. You and me still got a lot to share—a fortune to build. I came clear to the end of nowhere to bring you back.”

  Disbelief turned quickly to fury. “One wife for profit and one for respectability! You were forced into your first marriage by the threat of jail, but the second one you chose of your own free will! Now go back to the wife you picked voluntarily! And your child! Your other child, the respectable white one. Was it yet to be born when you left on this vengeful quest to find me? Didn’t Amarintha protest your leaving her before the birth—or did you desert her without warning too?”

  He grasped her shoulders roughly. “The babe wasn’t mine! I never touched Amarintha!”

  Shaking with anger and grief, she sprang at him and slapped his face. “Don’t insult me with more lies! Tell me the truth! Even though you didn’t love me, how could you dishonor me? How could you break your word?”

  “Katie! Listen to me!” He grabbed her in a confining hug and pinned her between his knees. “There were reasons—”

  “I trusted you!” she yelled. Popping sounds echoed from somewhere in the valley. Justis’s head jerked up as he listened to them. “I believed in you!” she continued, trying to break free of his embrace. “Oh, God, God.” She groaned in defeat. “I loved—”

  “Quiet!” He pressed a hand over her mouth. His eyes alert, he tilted his head toward the noise in the distance. Breathing heavily, Katherine frowned in bewilderment as it registered in her mind. Gunfire.

  In a smooth movement he lifted her out of his way and vaulted to his feet. With two long steps he was at his gear, pulling pistols and rifles from it. The popping sounds continued, growing louder. She heard shouts and screams and ran toward the heavy log door.

  “No,” he said, blocking her way. “Here.” He pressed a pistol into her hand, then laid a rifle on the table. “I reckon you remember how to use ’em?”

  “Of course, but—”

  “I’m goin’ outside.” He tucked a pistol in his belt and cradled a rifle in his arm. “Slam the door behind me.” With no more warning than that, he flung the door open and disappeared into the black, overcast night.

  Katherine could no more hide in the cabin than he. She ignored the long rifle, knowing that she was likely to trip over it. With the pistol clutched calmly in one hand she stepped outside and pulled the door shut behind her.

  At the other end of the valley she saw the bright flare of torches carried by men on horseback. The torches threw hellish yellow light over more than two dozen vaqueros, several of whom were shooting into the livestock corraled in a large communal pen beyond the missionaries’ cabins.

  The others were setting fire to the cabins. The missionaries and their families, including children barely old enough to walk, had been herded into a tight knot at the center of a group of vaqueros, who were brandishing pistols and yelling orders in heavily accented English.

  Katherine’s heart stopped when she saw a particularly tall rider on a stallion whose coat gleamed like new gold under the torchlight. Vittorio. He had come to drive the Americans out and take her back. Even Justis couldn’t win against the mob of men he’d brought with him. Terror surged through her. Vittorio would love an excuse to make certain her “dead” husband remained dead.

  “Justis!” she called in a low, desperate voice.

  A moment later he was beside her, gripping her arm angrily. “Woman, if you ever do what I tell you to do, I’ll probably faint from shock.”

  “We have to run before they come this way!”

  “Who are they?”

  “Some of the rancheros didn’t want Americans settling here. I’m sure that’s why they’re destroying the settlement.” She turned to him frantically. “We can’t fight them—surely you see that! There are too many! We can hide—”

  “Is it Salazar?”

  She trembled inwardly. “What difference does it make?”

  “Have you got anything to fear from him?”

  “I—I don’t, but he’ll kill you!”

  “Thought he was a damned gentleman. A dandy. An educated—”

  “I haven’t got time to argue with you! Follow me!” She shoved past him, grabbed his arm, and tugged him toward the wooded hills a hundred paces away. “Please, Justis, please!”

  “All right, but move careful in the dark. Gimme your pistol.” He tucked both his and hers into his belt. Carrying the rifle, he grabbed her hand and they ran toward the woods. Already Katherine could hear the sound of horses galloping up the trail to her cabin.

  She and Justis made the edge of the forest and stopped. Wh
en they looked back they saw five or six vaqueros, led by Vittorio, stop near the cabin door. Vittorio dismounted from his palomino and strode to it, then knocked gently.

  Justis cursed softly and viciously. “Thinks he’s comin’ to Sunday tea, looks like to me.”

  Vittorio opened the door and glanced inside. Obviously agitated by her absence, he turned and yelled something in Spanish to his men. Katherine jumped. “He’s telling them to spread out and look for us. Us?”

  “He must’ve found out I was at his ranch yesterday.”

  She moaned. “I told him you were dead.”

  “Pretty damned thorough about puttin’ me out of your life, weren’t you?”

  “You were dead to me.”

  The horsemen scattered, but two started toward the woods. Justis took her arm. “Move slow and quiet.” They eased up a low rise. The two vaqueros guided their horses among the trees, their torches held high.

  “Señora Gallatin!” they called. “Por favor! Vamonos, Señora!”

  To Katherine’s right, some kind of large night bird flew out of a tree with great commotion, rattling the branches. The vaqueros urged their horses into a trot and turned straight toward the sound. Katherine ducked, but the far edge of torchlight flickered on her face.

  “Señora!”

  One vaquero spurred his horse forward. Justis shoved Katherine behind a tree and gave her a pistol again. “Don’t shoot me by accident—or on purpose,” he muttered. The other vaquero pointed his rifle upward and fired to alert the rest. Then he, too, sent his mount loping forward.

  Justis blocked the path. He swung the barrel end of his rifle into the first rider’s midsection, tumbling him off his horse in a groaning heap. The torch fell from the rider’s hand and sputtered on the wet earth. Justis turned toward Katherine. “Run!”

  “No!”

  The second vaquero quickly swung a well-oiled reata. It caught Justis around the neck as he lifted his rifle and fired. The shot went wild and the vaquero’s horse reared. Justis made a strangling sound as the rawhide lariat jerked him flat onto his stomach. The woods began to fill with men and horses.