A Wolf in the Desert

by BJ James

  “Patience?”

  “Yes?” Aware only that he’d spoken and she hadn’t heard, she pulled the blanket tighter, stuttering, “I-I’m sorry. I didn’t...”

  He stopped her with three fingers pressed lightly against her mouth. “You didn’t hear me,” he finished for her. Then quietly, his voice deep, intimate, “I asked if it is truly a good morning.”

  “Of course.” Her fingers burrowed so deeply in the blanket they threatened the fabric. She looked away, at nothing. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  He shook back his hair, impatiently. A muscle rippled in his cheek, his eyes blazed blackly. “Don’t do this, O’Hara.” With thumb and forefinger, he gripped her chin. “Don’t fence with me, don’t act as if last night never happened. You aren’t a woman who gives herself lightly, then dismisses it in the morning.”

  His fingers wandered to her throat, measuring the cadence of her skittish pulse, closing around the slender column of her neck in incredibly sensuous possession. “I won’t ask you if I was your first lover. Though the thought is sweet.” His voice roughened. “Sweeter than I could ever believe. But almost as sweet is knowing that if there have been others, they were few. And none in a long, long while.”

  Her eyes clouded, her breath was lost somewhere inside her. Her mind overflowed with memories, and her heart with love for silent, stoic Indian, her keeper, her sanctuary. For Matthew, gentle Matthew, the maker of her dreams. Her first and only lover. “How could you know? How can you be so sure?”

  “You told me.” He gazed down at her, so near and yet so far away. “You made me sure, with your unstudied innocence and unabashed delight. You gave yourself to me without reservation, without expectations, dear heart. As if every part of loving were new and wonderful, and enough in itself.”

  Patience didn’t try to pretend, she knew the answer was in her eyes. Folding her hand over his, she turned her mouth into his palm, skimming her lips over the callused flesh, before looking again into his waiting gaze. “It was new, Matthew. New and wonderful.”

  Matthew forgot to breathe then, he forgot the fish lying by the stream, waiting to be spitted over the fire. He forgot everything but Patience. Then, drawing in a long, starved breath, he asked, “Where were you going just now?”

  “To find you.” She didn’t evade or dissemble, she couldn’t. “Because I know you can only be Matthew here in the canyon, and our time is short. Because I was lonely without you.”

  “Will you be sorry? When this ordeal is ended and you’re back with your family in the lush, green world of the Chesapeake, will you regret the canyon? Will you regret me?”

  Her heart might break, and her life couldn’t be the same, but she would never regret the special moments in this special place, where, for a little time, Indian became Matthew, and Matthew her lover. Shaking her head, not trusting her voice, she managed only two assuring words. “No regrets.”

  Matthew’s hand slipped from her throat to the nape of her neck. Gently, with only that touch, he brought her to him. He didn’t take her in his arms, but pulled her head to his chest. “I wish we’d met differently. In some other place, some other time, when I could be myself and you could know who I am and understand what I am, and why.” He raked his fingers through her hair, letting it drift over her shoulders in a rain of fire. “I wonder what might have been.”

  “I know who you are. You’re Matthew Winter Sky. Part Apache, part French by blood, but pure Apache in your heart. I know what you are—a gentle man, a man of honor, and far better than those you live among. I know you have purpose, and secrets you must keep.” She raised her head from his chest to look up at him. “All that I don’t know is, why? And strangely, in the scope of all things, it doesn’t matter.”

  The weight of worry lifted from him. He’d given her so little of himself, yet as much as he dared. By some miracle, with this extraordinary woman, it was enough. “How did you grow so wise in just twenty-seven years? What gene is there in you that gives you such powers of understanding?”

  “My mother is Irish, perhaps she’s the seventh daughter of the seventh daughter, or my father the seventh son of the seventh son.”

  “Is she? Is he?”

  “No one’s ever counted.”

  “Never?”

  “Look!” With a sweep of a blanketed arm, she pointed toward the eastern sky. Purple haze had turned to rose, and the rim of the mesa wore a halo of rubies. As they watched, the color grew more intense. Rose became garnet, and garnet crimson. The sky was aflame and seething and the canyon floor seemed to vibrate with expectation. As the sun lifted like a great ball of fire over the rim, a burst of light rained down, vanquishing the lingering remnants of night. The canyon was garbed, at last, in brilliance.

  “Another day,” Matthew murmured.

  “And soon, time to go.”

  He caught the hand that held the blanket in place, and pried away her unresisting fingers. “Soon,” he said as the patterned square fell to the ground. “But not yet.”

  “The blanket,” Patience cried as he lifted her in his arms.

  “You won’t need it,” Matthew growled in waiting passion. “If you’re cold, I can warm you.”

  “Yes.” Patience locked her arms around his neck and buried her face in his throat. “You can warm me.”

  In camp, he strode past the fire that popped and sizzled in preparation for breakfast. But the only fast he needed to break was the long fast without her. Lowering her to the makeshift bed they’d shared, he paused only long enough to strip away his moccasins and breechclout before kneeling down to her. His kiss began slowly, then changed abruptly. Bittersweet yearning welled within him. He was a desperate man with desperate desires. If she’d been clothed he would have torn every garment from her in his haste. He wanted to possess her, to have her for a lifetime. And the only lifetime they had was the morning.

  “Patience, I can’t be gentle.”

  “I know.” Clasping her fingers in his hair, she pulled his mouth to her. Her lips brushed over his, teasing, taunting, sending the madness twisting through both of them. Her breath was warm on him as she muttered hoarsely, “Nor can I.”

  Then the madness was complete, and there was no need for words.

  * * *

  “Matthew, wait.” They’d come to the mouth of the tunnel. Patience was dressed in her scrubbed jeans and denim shirt, the leather and silk he’d given her were packed in the saddlebags with the camping equipment. Behind them every vestige of their stay had been obliterated from the canyon floor. If ever the people who had etched their story in the rocks and built homes high in the canyon walls could return, they would find their ancient home unsullied.

  She looked out over the canyon, remembering glittering pools and tumbling streams; the fragrance of the morning glory heliotrope, the wild four-o’clocks. And the wonderful evening primrose that Matthew had explained would have flowers of pure white on the first evening, pale pink the second, and dark rose the third morning. She remembered sunset, and twilight, and the softness of the night. She remembered sunrise, magnificent, breathtaking sunrise. She remembered Matthew. First, and last, and always, Matthew.

  She would like to come again to the canyon, yet she knew it would never be the same. Nothing in her life would be the same. But neither change nor time could take this interlude from her.

  With a tremulous smile she hitched the pack she’d insisted on carrying higher on her shoulder, and turned away from the canyon. Unhurriedly, each gesture deliberate, her back stiffened, her chin lifted, her smile faded. She gripped his arm only briefly, and called his name softly. It was the last time she would ever touch him as she had in the canyon. The last time she could call him Matthew.

  Drawing a long breath, she took her hand away. “I’m ready.”

  Matthew watched her passage through the tunnel, slow and sure-footed. As she stepped into the blazing sun on the other side, he wondered if she realized that with that step rules and identities had changed. He hadn’t ca
utioned her that she must be more than careful with her knowledge. His name would mean nothing to Hoke, but it would be a place to start. It wouldn’t lead to The Black Watch, that trail was too deeply hidden. But his history traced to the point he dropped off public records would be proof enough that he wasn’t the brigand he concocted.

  One word from Patience and everything could crumble around them. As she waited on the other side, in another world, he wondered what he could say to make her understand. The endless questions plagued him. How little was enough? How much too much for her own good? His face was dark with worry as he followed her through the tunnel and into the light.

  “I need to close the entrance,” he told her as he set aside the supplies he was packing out. “I’d rather the canyon stay hidden from wanderers like the Wolves. It won’t take long.”

  “I’ll help.” Patience set her pack with his and followed as he climbed the slope of loose shale.

  He whirled on her, a glowering frown knitting his brows. “Go back.”

  “Dammit, Indian.” She kicked a rock in exasperation. “I’m not helpless. The blasted rock is so big an elephant would have trouble moving it, much less one very stubborn Apache. It’s a miracle you moved it in the first place.”

  Indian. In all her tirade, he heard only that. A heavy weight lifted from his chest, and on the heels of relief, he felt profound regret. She called the name naturally, with no sense of strain. As if Matthew never existed.

  There was bleak anger in him when he caught her by the shoulders. “Listen to me. I understand that you want to help, I know you can. I know you’re not helpless, and I don’t doubt you can do anything you set your mind to. But not this.”

  “Tell me why.”

  Releasing her, he backed away before he shook her or kissed her. Or both. “When I levered it from the entrance of the cave, the rock rested on solid ground. Now it doesn’t. This shale is as unstable as thin ice. One unexpected shift and there would be an avalanche. The rock could become a directionless missile. If I have to move, it must be quickly, thinking only of myself. Please.” He touched the feather lying over her breast as it fluttered from the tie in her hair. “I can’t move as swiftly as I should if you’re there.”

  For long moments she searched his face, seeing the subtle changes in him as he slipped firmly back into his role as Indian. “All right, I won’t interfere,” she said at last. “But only if you promise to be careful. I don’t want the canyon left to human vultures, either. Nor do I want it protected at any cost.”

  “Worried about me, O’Hara?”

  “As much as you worry about me.”

  “Touché.” His teeth were a gleam of white against the darkness of his skin as he flashed the rare and wonderful smile that could charm anything with life left in it. “Nothing’s going to happen to me. I can’t let it, I have a promise to keep.”

  A promise to take her home, Patience thought as she retreated to a safer distance. Once that would have thrilled and pleased her. Now she simply felt bewildered. She couldn’t see the last of the likes of Blue Doggie, or Snake, and Eva soon enough. Or any of the rest, for that matter. Yet going home didn’t seem to be what she wanted anymore.

  What do you want, Patience? she mused. Something you can’t have? Someone you can’t have. “Indian,” she groaned in an undertone as she watched him work the rock. “What will become of us?”

  Contrary to his warning, the rock moved easily and as he wanted after all. He made quick work of the chore, and before she expected it the canyon was securely sealed, perhaps for the next century, the next millenium. Every trace of their trail leading to the opening of the tunnel was erased. Exhibiting little of the strain of his labor, Indian crossed the shale in a slip-sliding dash. The small avalanche that followed him buried the evidence of their passage even deeper.

  Standing back to assess his handiwork, he nodded, pleased with the final results. “No one will ever guess we were here, or what lies within the mesa. The small avalanche is common, a natural phenomena, no one will notice. There could be several more before anyone passes this way again. Who knows, there may never be anyone again.” Glancing up at the sun, he judged the time. Midmorning approached, even the laziest Wolf would be stirring.

  Catching his mood, Patience settled her pack on her shoulder. “They’ll be waiting for us.”

  “I expect so.” Taking up the pack, he walked with her through the desert.

  “What will you tell them?” She kept her attention resolutely on the trail, but as he took her along the circuitous route, her worry for the reception that awaited them increased.

  “The truth. We spent the night in the desert, what else is there to say?”

  “Will it be that simple?” A blooming century plant stood like a sentinel in their path, the tiny inflorescent flowers completing the ageless cycle of blossoms and death. Taking her arm only briefly, Indian guided her around it.

  He walked, quietly, contemplatively, for a little distance before answering. “Nothing is simple with the Wolves.” Pausing at a mass of plants that seemed to perch atop the soil rather than penetrate it, he plucked a single yellow bloom. “For courage, a reminder that there is beauty in the ugliest of times.”

  Patience took the wiry sprig from him, hiding her surprise in close examination of it. The leaves were coarse and hairy, the flower bore an uncanny resemblance to one of her favorites at home in Virginia. “This could be the desert’s version of sunflowers.”

  “I’m afraid it isn’t quite so distinguished.”

  “A sunflower is distinguished?”

  He chuckled quietly. “If your name were mule-ears, you’d think so.”

  “You’re putting me on.”

  “There’s a latin name, of course, but anyone who isn’t a botanist, or versed in horticulture, calls them mule-ears. Actually they’re out of their element here, as a rule they grow further north. But I suspect this patch will survive. If the granddaddy of them all was obstinate enough to get here by bird, or wind, or water, its descendants should be stubborn enough to live.”

  She was so successfully distracted, they reached the perimeter of the camp before she realized it. Patience wasn’t sure what she expected, but the last thing was the complete silence.

  Conversations dwindled, quarrels ceased, heads turned to watch their pilgrimage through the untidy evidence of another night of cards and drinking. Clutching her flower, she found the cold malice of silence more threatening than open hostility. It was almost a relief when Snake stepped into their path.

  “Well, now.” He tucked his thumbs into the back pockets of his jeans. A casualness given the lie by biceps flexed and ready beneath their wolf head tattoos. “What have we here?”

  “Move out of the way, Snake.” Indian’s voice was harsh, powerful, with no trace of the teasing of a short time ago.

  “Nope. Don’t think I will.” Snake grinned unpleasantly. “Not before I hear where you’ve been and what you’ve been up to.”

  “I can’t see that it’s any of your business.” Indian was calm, but unrelenting.

  “Let’s just say I’m making it my business.”

  “Let’s just say you’re not.” Indian’s tone was almost comically polite given the deadly air of his posture.

  Patience stood a half pace behind and to the side, directing her attention from one to the other, but always aware of Indian. If it were Snake alone that confronted him, she hadn’t a qualm that he could manage. But out of the corner of her eye she saw the others congregating. Six bikers and as many camp followers tightened gradually into an imprisoning circle until Indian, and she with him, were literally surrounded and outnumbered. Stiffly, she edged closer to him, wondering what she could do, how she could help.

  Tension crackled, setting keening nerves on end. One wrong move and they would stampede like cattle, erupting into violence as they went.

  It was Custer, threading through the circle, who temporarily diffused the tension. “Hey, buddy.” His tone was jo
vial and forced. “You had us worried. Leaving camp like you done ain’t right. You know the rules. We check out, we check in, and then only if Hoke okays it. That’s the way it was before you came. That’ll be the way of it when you’re gone.”

  Indian turned his cold stare on Custer. One not privy to their history would never believe the Apache had walked into the midst of a barroom brawl to knock away a bartender’s shotgun aimed point-blank at the back of Custer’s curly blond head. It would be easier to believe the tall, black-eyed man would destroy him without an iota of remorse.

  Watching him, seeing the coldness and the cruelty, Patience shuddered at the change in him. Which man was he? Matthew or Indian? The metamorphosis was so immediate, was he either, or simply a chameleon?

  “Look, man.” Custer shook his hands in Indian’s face, a strange gesture of plea and threat. If the small man possessed an admirable quality, it was loyalty and gratitude for past favors. “You don’t want to do this, you don’t want to buck us. What does it matter if you just tell where you were and what you were doing? C’mon, you can’t fight us.”

  Hoke shouldered his way to the inner circle. There was no bluster in him, no plea. Indian knew he was the truly dangerous Wolf. He waited for the leader of the pack to speak. His wait was not long.

  “Maybe our good Indian friend has something to hide,” Hoke drawled as eyes as empty as death peered up at the taller Indian. “Is that it?” he asked with a careful precision that sent chills scurrying over Patience. “There’s something you don’t want us to know?”

  Indian didn’t answer or flinch beneath the riveting scrutiny.

  Hoke’s empty eyes found Patience. “Is that it, missy? Is your boyfriend into something he shouldn’t be?”

  Patience didn’t trust herself to answer. Catching her lip cruelly between her teeth, she only shrugged.

  Hoke took a step closer. “Yes?” The word lingered on his tongue like the hiss of a snake as he gripped her cheeks brutally, lifting her bowed head to glare into her face. “Or no.”