by Beth Trissel
He smiled, hearing her whisper his name; then she fell soundly asleep and her steady breathing rose and fell against the wood crackling in the hearth and the rain drumming the roof. Supremely satisfied, he drifted back to sleep.
How long they remained like this, he didn’t know, but twitched to wakefulness as the logs settled in the hearth with a pop. He lay still for a moment, listening. Silence.
Lifting his head, he kissed Rebecca’s sleep-blushed cheek resting beneath his. “We must go, fair one.”
She stirred drowsily. “Why?”
“The rain has stopped. The storm no longer hides us.”
“But we’ve been here for so little,” she argued, her protest swallowed up in a yawn.
“More than a little. The day is swiftly passing.”
He pressed his lips to the inviting place behind her ear then rolled over and stood. She hugged the thick fur.
“Dress, Rebecca.” He pulled his breechclout up over the narrow belt he always wore at his waist.
She sat up with evident reluctance, the coverlet slipping over her smooth shoulders. “I do like it here.”
“You will also like my wikon.”
“But that’s so far away. Can’t we stay a while longer?”
Shoka picked up his newly acquired blue hunting shirt from where it lay on the table and pushed his head through the loose opening at the neck. “Do you wish to be a settler?”
“With you. If you’ve driven the English away, perhaps we could remain here for a time?”
He shoved his arms into the generously cut sleeves. “You dream. The English will return.”
Annoyance flickered in her face. “What is the use of winning battles if people just keep coming back?”
“Much more they will come if we lose.”
She drew the blanket over her head and flopped down onto her back. “You promised me a whole day.”
He bent over her and stripped away her cover. She lay in a wash of honeyed hair, gazing up at him. The shape of her eyes and the fixity in their blue depths reminded him of a cat, a ravishingly pretty one, and stubborn. He let his hungry gaze trail down over her creamy throat, full breasts rounded to perfection, and rosy nipples. Her slender, but not too slender body, flat abdomen like hammered silver between her enticingly carved hips, called to him. The wealth that lay beneath the curly mound of brown hair between her thighs held an especially potent draw, and those long legs.
“You think I prefer to journey than lie with you?” he asked.
Lifting slender white arms, she opened them wide to him. “Don’t journey just yet.”
His heartbeat ratcheted as a powerful impulse shot through him from his hungering mouth to his hardening groin. He wanted nothing more than to savor every inch of her womanly splendor and thrust himself into her over and over until he gained more than a fleeting release from this pounding desire. But a deeper wisdom spoke caution in the back of his fevered mind, like a distant drum.
“Seductress.” Clasping her outstretched hands, he towed her to her feet. “We must go.”
She pushed back the hair cascading around her and her eyes wandered the room. “Can we take anything with us?”
“My arms must be free to aid you,” he said, only just keeping himself from pushing her back down onto the fur and falling on her.
She reached her arms around his neck, pressing her nakedness against him and seeking his lips. It would take the strength of a giant to resist.
He succumbed to her captivating mouth and enfolded her in his arms. Harder and harder, he poured his lips over hers until she was weak and breathless, which only made him want her more. Would he ever begin to get enough of this woman?
Drawing on his years of rigorous training, he broke away from her. “You are more difficult to escape than an army!”
Not daring to cast another glance at her excruciating appeal, he walked to the bed where his supplies lay. “Make ready,” he said, his voice gruff with need.
She sighed, a weighty sigh, as he belted his shirt with the woven sash that held his sheathed knife and waist pouch. “I loathe going. I’ve had the strangest feeling of being kindly watched over here,” she said.
Her wistful admission seized him like a cold hand from the shadows. He spun around, more attune to the warning in his head than the lust in his loins. “A spirit?”
She seemed puzzled. “I suppose he must be.”
The warning deepened. “He? Why did you not tell me?”
“I’m not afraid. I dreamed of Uncle Henry. Perhaps it’s him.”
“Do you not wonder why he is come?” Shoka jammed the pistol into the belt at his left side and slung the tomahawk at his right.
“Shoka, calm yourself. ’Tis safe I feel here.”
“War fills these ridges. It is not safe.” Snatching up the flute, he stuck it beside the gun and slid the powder horn and shot pouch over his shoulder. “I need dry powder,” he muttered and strode to the door. He opened it to a pewter sky overhung with clouds.
“It could pour any moment,” she suggested hopefully.
He turned his head and appraised her with a long look. “So sad you are to leave this place.”
Uncertainty colored her eyes like the troubled sky. “I don’t know what living with Shawnee will be like.”
“You will be well. Make ready.”
She stood as she was, with the reluctance of a lamb summoned to lie down with the wolf. She was fair enough to be the wife of the most powerful lord in England. Clearly, she hated to go with him now that she’d had even the barest reminder of the white world. How had he allowed himself to trust a beautiful woman, again? The hurt of rejection, as painful as it was unexpected, hazed his mind in a bitter mist. It was just as he’d feared. No matter what she might feel for him, she was still English.
“I cannot give you a settler’s life. For this, you need an English husband,” he said tersely and stalked out the door and down the steps.
Chapter Eighteen
His bitter retort still in her ears, Rebecca stood in the doorway staring after Shoka as he swept past the smokehouse and log barn then disappeared beyond the chicken coop. None of the birds were in the pen, but two black hens with red combs flew up in his wake, alighting on the split rail fence that enclosed new bean leaves, sage, and broad clumps of rhubarb in the garden. The crisscrossed fence also ringed the hazy green pasture spreading in a hazy green swathe beyond the barnyard and the garden. None of the usual farm animals were present. No cows, sheep, or horses. Except for the clucking chickens, everything stood in silent witness to some family’s lost battle to tame this bit of wilderness.
For a moment, she imagined he was her settler husband and this was their homestead. They could fill it with the abundant life it had once held and keep the woods from reclaiming the land, but no amount of longing would give substance to her wish. She’d forfeited her life as a lady and could make no claim on this one. Her uncertain future lay with Shoka and she’d not trade him for the finest Englishman.
Remorse stung her. She’d wounded him. Anxiety wrenched her. His long strides swiftly carried him through the meadow. Surely he wouldn’t leave her here?
“Shoka! Wait!”
His tall figure stopped beside a clump of birch trees in the grassy field. She snatched up the coverlet. Closing it around herself, she ran down the rough wooden steps and across the farmyard, mud squelching between her toes.
She tore past the garden and through the open gate. Wet grass nodding with the weight of seed heads brushed her bare legs and slapped her bottom. She raced on, stretching out her arms. “Forgive me! I want no life apart from you!”
A smile banished the pain in his eyes. His warmth flowed into her as he caught her up and swung her around. “You are forgiven, Peshewa. Though you try me sorely.”
She clung to his neck. “I’m sorry. I’ll endure what I must to be with you.”
For a long moment he held her to him; his pulsing vitality and the call of a bobwhite filled
the silence between them. Then he spoke. “If you are unhappy with the Shawnee, I will take you away.”
She pressed her face against his chest. “Where?”
“To the North. My father’s people are in Quebec. Perhaps we can make a life there, if you no longer hate the French,” he suggested, his voice husky with emotion.
Rebecca realized her enmity toward them had lessened considerably. She lifted her face and searched Shoka’s glistening eyes. “Not so much anymore. What of your children?”
“Take them with us, if you wish to go.”
“You would do this for me?”
“Anything. Capitaine Renault has offered us a place by his fireside when he returns home. You could see your sister. I can hunt, trap. Build us a wikon.”
An upswell of hope changed to disquiet as a scolding blue jay suddenly flushed up from the thick chestnuts at the edge of the meadow. Its raucous cries struck an uneasy chord in Rebecca. “Has some animal alarmed it?”
“Nesting jays are easily provoked,” Shoka said evenly, but his eyes had hardened and scanned the shrouded leaves.
“What is it?”
“I will see. Return to the cabin.”
She hesitated.
He gave her a push. “Quickly. Dress. I will come.”
His calm voice held a guarded edge. He must suspect something. She hastily retraced her steps through the meadow then paused, glancing back over her shoulder at the hazy trees. The mist had enveloped any trace of him.
Desire swelled in her to run back and find him. It was foolish, she supposed. He’d be along in a minute. And yet, she fought the urge to turn and race into the trees.
‘Bobwhite, bobwhite,’ the bird called again.
Be sensible, she chided herself. Nothing had changed, but she couldn’t still her feeling of apprehension.
She had no weapon if a bear or any other predator were on the prowl. At that thought, she hitched up the blanket, ran back to the cabin, and pounded up the steps. She sagged against the doorway, her chest burning from fear and effort. She flung open the door. The cozy room appeared as she’d left it. She rushed inside and bolted the solid oak. Shoka would alert her when he returned, speedily, she hoped.
Taking a steadying breath, she walked to the log wall where the petticoat, shift, and stays he’d found among the hidden goods were hung. Grateful to have untattered clothes to wear, she let the blanket fall to her ankles and lifted the shift off the peg. She fingered the simply styled underdress. The soft bleached linen would feel good against her skin.
A rustling noise sounded at her back—a sound that didn’t belong.
She froze. Mice?
She listened closely. There. She heard the rustle again, more of a scraping, really.
Goosebumps prickled down her spine and warning tolled in her mind. A far greater danger than a scrabbling rodent lay behind her.
She turned slowly, as if against her will. Her shift fluttered unheeded to the floor.
The secret hatch in the floorboards was rising. Muscular arms pushed it up; then a shadowed face streaked with black and green paint emerged.
“Tonkawa.” The hated name escaped her in a breathless whisper.
The cover flung open and hit the floor with a crash. And the man who would see her dead emerged from the earthen hole.
The orange flames in the hearth danced ghoulishly over his strong painted body, bare except for his breechclout, leggings, and moccasins. His knife and tomahawk hung at his side. He propped his long musket by the hearth.
Triumph gleamed in the probing eyes he swept over her. “Will you challenge me now, Peshewa?”
She shrank back, wondering how she’d ever dared. He was nearly as big as Shoka. Her heart pounded in her ears like the driven tide. Even if she were dressed in a suit of amour, she would have been paralyzed with fear.
“No,” she forced from her tight throat.
His lips curled. “Yesterday you spoke differently.”
Her knees were so weak she could hardly stand. “I was foolish.”
“Yes.”
He glided toward her like a cat tormenting the mouse she’d feared.
“Do you also think me a fool? Settlers are driven from here, yet smoke comes from this cabin.”
Shoka knew the danger, but she’d delayed them. Oh God. Let him come soon.
Tonkawa stopped a hands-breadth away from her, and their bare chests almost touched. “Where is your Shawnee husband?”
Numbing panic sucked every thought from her mind except the wild impulse to flee. She schemed with the few wits she could gather. If she convinced Tonkawa that Shoka no longer wanted her, he might not be so driven to take her life.
“Shoka is gone. He left me.”
Tonkawa’s left eyelid twitched slightly in his impassive face. “When?”
“This morning. I wanted to stay behind.”
“Alone?”
“I have food. The settlers will return.”
His mouth tightened in a hard line. “You lie. My eyes saw you and Shoka in the clearing.”
He knew. God help her. He knew.
“I meant then. Shoka left me then,” she waged in a desperate war of words.
Tonkawa wrinkled his nose. “Shoka did not leave you. His seed fills you.”
She clasped trembling fingers together. “He’s gone.”
Tonkawa’s flinty black eyes shifted from her to the cabin. What had only minutes ago seemed a cozy shelter closed in on her, shrinking into an inescapable cell.
“Not soon enough. Where did he love you?” Tonkawa demanded.
Why did he want to know? To position her lifeless body where she and Shoka had experienced such joy? Giving a small cry, she staggered back.
He seized her shoulders and stabbed a finger at the bearskin. “There. Where I would choose.”
Blinding tears welled up. “Don’t kill me. I beg you.”
“Now you plead?” he scoffed.
“I would have before. You wouldn’t hear me.”
“Why should I hear you now?”
There could be only one reason. She pressed her breasts against his luridly painted chest, cringing at the feel of his hot, oiled flesh. “Have mercy.”
He didn’t rebuff her advance. Neither did he move or speak.
The room seemed to revolve around her in a swirl of giddiness. Her chest was so constricted she could scarcely breathe. “Spare me. Please.”
More agonizing silence.
She closed streaming eyes and slumped against him. “I’m about to swoon. If you’re bent on my life, take it then.”
He wrapped his arms around her to prevent her from collapsing. The pungency of bear grease used as a base for the paint rose around her in a sickening wave.
“It is not our way to slay one in a faint,” he said.
His knife remained at his hip. She could only wait, entrapped, every fiber of her being willing Shoka to come.
Finally, Tonkawa spoke again. “You will not swoon. You are a strong woman.” He slipped his fingers through her hair and over her neck and shoulders. Even the lightest touch revolted her, but she couldn’t move. “You haunt my dreams.”
His admission stunned her. “What?”
Grasping her chin in his hand, he forced her dizzy senses to his scrutiny. “Your face, your eyes. Always I see you before me, a fair spirit beyond my reach.”
“Will I disturb you less when I lie dead?”
“Shoka can no longer have you.”
“Nor can you, Tonkawa.”
“I will taste your lips first.”
She fought to push away from the smothering demands of his lips. He only crushed her more tightly and thrust his tongue into her mouth like a predator consuming its prey. She kicked at his legs. Her bare feet glanced off the hard muscle under the brown leggings.
It took all the strength borne of terror to wrench her head free for an instant. “Enough!”
“No. I will have more. On the skin where Shoka loved you.”
> “Will you take me then kill me!”
“If I like.”
She twisted in his grasp as he dragged her across the room. “Have you no honor!”
“Who is to know?”
She hammered his chest with her fists and drove her knuckles into his jaw. Pain flared in her hands, but her frenzied struggle had no effect on him.
He threw her down onto the bearskin and lunged at her.
She rolled to one side and grabbed for his musket.
The stock teetered in her fingers for the barest instant then fell forward and exploded as it hit the floor. The loose shot struck the cask, spewing a pungent torrent of apple brandy over the wood beneath her.
She crawled away from him, sliding in the brew, but he snaked his arm around her waist and yanked her back. She raked his cheek with her fingernails and sank her teeth into his arm then screamed as he struck her face. He shoved her back onto the bearskin.
Crying, thrashing, she tried to ram his groin with her knee. “May I haunt you to the end of your days, you godless bastard!”
He shoved her knee aside and straddled her, trapping her arms under his legs. “Never curse me again.”
“What do you care? You’ll soon still my tongue.”
He bent over her. Blood ran down his painted face from five long scratches. “If I must.”
She gasped in his relentless grip. “You don’t intend my death?”
“Perhaps I do not force a woman. I take a wife.”
“By striking me?”
“Stop fighting me. I will not strike you.”
She would in no way make this bargain. “Would you take a wife filled with her husband’s seed?”
“I will fill you with mine.”
“Shoka will return for me.”
His smile taunted her. “You think I pursue you alone? Others seek him.”
The horrible realization dawned on her. The scolding jays had been reacting to human, not animal, presence. “No!”
Her skin crawled as he slid his hands over her breasts. “If Shoka returns, one of you must die.”
