Warrior's Embrace

by Peggy Webb

  “Deborah, is that you?” Her father was having a lucid moment.

  “Will you find my bow? I have to go out and kill an elk. The children are hungry.”

  “Yes, Father, I’ll find your bow. But first, let me make you a nice bowl of soup.”

  Outside her window the sun painted the earth pink and gold, and in her imagination Deborah heard the thundering hooves of a black stallion racing across the prairie.

  Eagle, going to Kate.

  o0o

  He heard the shots long before he reached her house. Leaning low, Eagle urged his stallion to a gallop.

  Another shot rang out just as he topped the hillside. Below him Kate was silhouetted against the setting sun, coat off, red hair blowing in the wind. And in her hand was a Smith and Wesson .38. Eagle pulled his mount to a halt then sat on the hillside, watching, as relief washed through him.

  She got off two quick shots, and two tin cans kicked into the air. Eagle smiled for the first time in months.

  “Go, Heloa,” he said to his mount. Heloa. Thunder. Issue of Kate’s Mahli and Eagle’s black stallion. A magnificent product of an explosive mating.

  Kate heard him coming. She turned to him with the gun in her hand and a big unlit cigar in her mouth. Her face registered neither shock nor surprise. And certainly not welcome.

  “Got a light?” she said.

  Eagle dismounted and held a match to her cigar. It was man-size, a big Cuban variety that would stink to high heaven.

  The end of the tip glowed as she took a draw. Her eyes watered and her face turned slightly green, but she didn’t back down. Watching him, she took another draw

  “You’ve taken up smoking, I see.”

  “Yep. Today. Went all the way to Ada for these things.” She flicked an ash his way. “And you’ve taken up prying.”

  “I’m not prying.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “Black Elk called me.”

  “He asked you to come?”

  “No. That was my idea. I came to assure myself of your safety.”

  “As you can see, I’m perfectly fine, Governor.” She took another draw on the cigar then blew a smoke ring his way. “Leave.”

  The smoke curled around them, and in that veil of intimacy the physical impact of Kate screamed along Eagle’s nerve endings. He moved then, as swift and sure as his namesake, closing in on her until their thighs were touching. With one hand he took the cigar from her mouth and with the other he cupped her chin.

  “I will leave when I’m satisfied that you’re safe, and not before.” He could feel the shivers that rippled through her, and a selfish side of him exulted, glad she wasn’t immune to him, as she pretended.

  “Come,” he said, sliding his arm around her shoulder.

  She dragged her heels, resisting him.

  “Where do you think you’re taking me?”

  “To your house.”

  “Do you think all you have to do is show up on my doorstep and I’ll invite you into my bed?”

  “As enticing as that sounds, I have no intention of going to your bed. I want to see where the intruder was.”

  Kate felt her face flame, but she wasn’t about to admit her embarrassing mistake.

  “Black Elk has already investigated.”

  “You can come under your own power, or under mine.”

  Remembering how he’d manhandled her the last time he said that, she jerked her arm free and stalked ahead of him to her cottage. It was high time to go in anyhow. She’d been out with her gun all day, and she was freezing to death.

  “This is an exercise in futility,” she grumbled, mostly to have the last word. “I don’t know what you think you’ll see that Black Elk didn’t.”

  What he saw was her red silk gown tossed carelessly across the tumbled covers of her bed. The languid, exotic sweetness of her perfume permeated the air. Riveted, he stood in her bedroom, breathing in the fragrance, absorbing it into his lungs and his skin.

  “This is where he left the circle of hair?” A redundant question, he knew, but he had to say something to break the spell.

  “Yes.”

  Did she feel it, too? The insidious sexual heat that moved about the room like a living thing? If he didn’t leave, he’d break every vow he’d made, destroy everything he believed in.

  He quickly inspected her windows then moved out into the hall, where the air didn’t conspire against him. He’d found nothing in Kate Malone’s house except the past.

  “I’m sending someone to guard you,” he said when he finally made it back to her front door.

  “I’ll send him right back.”

  “These threats are serious, Kate.”

  “I understand the serious nature of the threats. What I don’t understand is how you have the nerve to tell me what to do.” Angry and frustrated almost beyond endurance, Kate glared at him. “This is my life. I make the decisions.”

  “I want to ensure your safety.”

  “No one is ever completely safe. It’s the nature of the world we live in. And I won’t give whoever is tampering with my life the satisfaction of seeing me hiding behind some muscle-bound goon sent over by the governor.”

  In spite of her stubbornness, Eagle couldn’t hold back his smile.

  “I hadn’t planned to send a muscle-bound goon; I had planned to send Gloria Running Deer of the tribal police.”

  “No.”

  She stood framed against the front door with the fading rays of sunset pouring over her hair and her skin, exotic and deceptively fragile. And he knew then the price he’d have to pay for marriage without love and passion—the memory of a woman who would steal every shred of life and joy and emotion until he was nothing more than an empty shell.

  “Kate . . .” he said, raising his hand as if he might reach for her.

  “No.” She stepped back, out of his reach, forever out of his reach. “Go to Deborah.”

  Something must have registered on his face—shock, surprise, despair—though he sought desperately to appear unmoved.

  “Don’t you think she talks to me?” Kate said. “Don’t you think I hear her sighs and see the glow in her face when she speaks your name?”

  The vast gulf of silence threatened to swallow them, and they stared at each other, bleak.

  “Go to her,” Kate whispered. “And don’t you dare break her heart.”

  “I have no intention of breaking her heart.”

  He left her standing in her doorway. Alone. As he was alone.

  Chapter 29

  Alone on the hillside, he watched Eagle leave.

  Soon. Soon.

  He began to sweat in spite of the cold wind. Drawing his coat close around his face, he waited in the shelter of the silver maples until the sound of hoof beats was merely a faint echo in the distance. Lights flicked on and off in the small cottage, showing Kate Malone’s progress through her house.

  She didn’t stay long in the kitchen. She never did. Next she sat a short time in her den. Probably reading a book. Watching, he’d learned her habits. Television shows didn’t interest her. Only the books. Fiction titles with bookmarks sticking out and the fat medical texts she brought home from the clinic.

  Rage came over him, a red, boiling rage that made his hands tighten into fists. In the dark he held out one of his hands and studied his fist. It was big and solid as a rock, capable of smashing through the white witch woman’s fragile bones.

  He could feel how it would be, the soft cushion of flesh, then the tender female bones cracking under the pressure of his fists. Sweating now in earnest, he started from his hiding place, intent upon smashing the witch woman until she was nothing but a bloody mess.

  But, wait . . .

  He’d been told ...First she must suffer.

  Forcing himself to remain calm, he waited in the darkness until she went into her bath. The stealth of foxes descended on him, and he stole into the night, silent and deadly, leaving no traces of himself for those who would keep
him from his purpose.

  Silently he laughed at the locks on her doors and windows. Would the white witch woman keep him out? Easier to keep out the north wind.

  Steam from the bathroom seeped under the door and fogged the mirrors in her bedroom. He stood in the midst of the steam, listening to the sounds of her in the shower—the rush of water down the drain, the thump as she dropped her soap, the soft sound of her muttered curse.

  Power filled him. He stole silently through her bathroom door, then stood in the steam and watched through the glass shower door as she lifted her right arm and drew her washcloth around her breast and down her rib cage.

  Such a slender rib cage. It would crack like the tender branch of a sapling.

  Watching her amused him, but he had other, more important things to do. He eased toward the door, and suddenly her head snapped up.

  “Who’s there?” she called.

  Rivulets of moisture ran down his face as he stood in the steam. Hidden. Invincible.

  “Is anyone there?”

  He held his breath as she reached toward the faucets. If she discovered him now, he’d have to kill her. A pity. It was too early for death.

  “Nerves,” she muttered, changing her mind.

  As the water cascaded around her, he slipped from the bath and into her bedroom. It didn’t take him long to do what he had to do.

  Afterward, he stole into the night and let the darkness swallow him. She would never see him now.

  Watching. Waiting.

  o0o

  Wrapped in her bath towel, Kate reached for the gun on her bathroom vanity. How sad to carry a weapon even to her bath. And yet, she’d be foolish not to.

  Someone was after her.

  Involuntarily she shivered. Some malevolent presence hovered, as if her enemy had been there, in the bathroom with her.

  That was a silly notion, of course. No one would be that bold. Or that foolish.

  Still holding her gun, she pushed open her bedroom door. The scream started in her soul and pushed its way past her constricted throat.

  Her red silk gown had been ripped to shreds and scattered about the bedroom. Jagged red ribbons hung from the curtain rods and the lampshades and the bed posts. Bits of red dangled from the doorknob and the back of her chair and the top of her armoire.

  She clamped her free hand over her mouth to stop the screaming. Then with the gun held firmly in both hands she advanced into the room.

  Light from a lamp fell across her vanity, and on the mirror was a message. The time is at hand, witch. Steam from the bathroom had made the lipstick run, so that it looked like blood.

  Paralyzed, Kate stared at the words. Then her gaze moved downward. On the vanity was a single eagle feather, its tip dipped in blood.

  Chapter 30

  “I think you should ask for protection, Kate.”

  “I won’t.”

  Headlines screamed from the newspaper in Deborah’s hand. “Dr. Malone Under Siege.” Somebody had leaked every gory detail to the press, even to the shredded red gown.

  Had Kate been wearing red silk when Eagle raced to her side? Quickly ashamed of her jealousy, Deborah made herself forget her own loveless plight and concentrate on the safety of her friend.

  “Your stubborn pride is going to get you killed,” she said.

  “If I give in to that weakness, I’ve let him win. No. I won’t accept protection.”‘

  Deborah turned slowly around.

  “Accept?”

  “Eagle offered.” A heavy silence fell between them. Kate reached out her hand then let it flutter to her side.

  “I knew he came to you.”

  “That’s all it was, Deborah, an offer for protection. Please believe me.”

  “I believe you.”

  The desperate will believe anything. Deborah had never thought of herself in that way, had never imagined that she’d end up one of those women who clung to hope no matter how faint or false.

  “I believe you because I have to,” she added.

  The alternative was too painful. All the books she’d read and all the dreams she’d dreamed were wrong. There was no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, no wizard at the end of the yellow brick road, no shining knight in Camelot. There was only the stunning reality that life had no guarantees, not of health or happiness or even friends.

  Seeing Kate now, knowing that Eagle had gone to her, not out of fear but out of love, Deborah made a bleak bargain with herself. She would sacrifice her dreams and her pride because she needed Eagle, just as he needed her. She would be the full-blood receptacle for his seed and he would be her security. With him she’d have a home, children, position, and support for her father.

  “Kate, no matter what happens, promise me one thing.”

  “Anything, Deborah.”

  “Always be my friend.”

  “Always.”

  They both got teary-eyed for a second then Kate brushed at her tears, laughing.

  “Look how maudlin we’re getting. The next thing you know, we’ll be bawling like newborn calves and there’ll be nobody to look after our patients ...if we ever have another one.”

  “They’ll soon be coming in with sore throats and runny noses and bellyaches.” Her spirits restored, Deborah gave Kate an arch grin. “And if they don’t, I’ll put laxative in the cheese at the general store.”

  “Hey, it’s good to see your sass back, woman.”

  “You don’t look too bad yourself, Doc, with that grin spread all over your face.”

  “What do you say we close this joint down and drive into Ada? I could use some real food for a change.”

  “Only if you let me drive.”

  “There won’t be a fence post standing between here and Ada.”

  “Live dangerously, Kate. You live only once.”

  “Is that an old Indian saying?”

  “I think it’s an invention of Hollywood.”

  Kate lined her arm with Deborah’s and went out the door. For one afternoon she would forget her fear, and if she tried hard enough, her laughter might become real.

  o0o

  Melissa loved the feel of silk against her skin. She flung her hands over her head and arched her hips.

  “Baby, you’re hotter than a firecracker today.” Hal drove into her with such force, she was already climaxing.

  When the hard shudders stopped, she pulled him down to her breast and tangled her hands in his hair.

  “Shhh. Don’t talk. Make me scream.”

  She’d taught him exactly what she liked. And he always did as he was told.

  As he bit down on her, she felt the frenzy building. Power surged through her, and she knew that soon she would have it all ...and Kate Malone would have nothing.

  “Yes,” she said, “oh, yes. Now!”

  He began to pump once more, faster and faster, until she was screaming his name.

  “Clayton! Clayton!”

  o0o

  Anna had learned to drive. As a matter of fact, she’d learned many things. Working in Eagle’s office, her neglected social skills as well as her forgotten secretarial skills had returned, and with them a resurgence of well-being.

  Her sister, who lived in California, was greatly supportive of her efforts, and was even urging Anna and her family to move out there.

  “You could help me in my shop, Anna,” she’d written in her latest letter. “You were always better with a needle than I. And anyhow, the change might do all of you good.”

  Change. That’s what they all needed.

  With her sister’s letter in her handbag, Anna walked into her house, calling her husband’s name.

  “Cole?”

  The house had the echoing emptiness of a deserted dwelling. On the hall table a note from Clint said he’d gone to his friend Michael’s house to study algebra and wouldn’t be back till after supper.

  Anna drew a deep breath, steadying herself. She had to let go of the fear that something terrible would befall her only chil
d every time he left home.

  “Cole!”

  Clutching Clint’s note, she raced up the stairs and checked all the rooms. Resolve almost failed her in the doorway to Mary Doe’s room. Then she pushed it open and stood with dust swirling around her. Late afternoon sun turned the spinning dust to gold, and as it brushed against her cheek, Anna thought Father Sky had sent Mary Doe down as an angel to give her comfort.

  Her feet felt heavy as she walked into the room, and dust and tears clogged her throat. A film of dust lay over all the feminine things she’d bought for her daughter, who preferred frogs to frills.

  It was time to clear the dust away. Past time. No matter what Cole said.

  She called his name once more, and the echoing silence mocked her.

  She hurried outside, filled with purpose. The sweet smell of hay tickled her nose as she pushed open the heavy barn doors. Cole stood in the center of the barn, pitching hay. He didn’t even look up, but his mare whinnied a greeting from her stall.

  “I was looking for you in the house.”

  Cole stared at her as if she were a stranger, or worse, someone he had grown to hate. Anna shivered at the power of grief.

  “I want to talk to you, Cole.”

  A wisp of hay drifted down from the loft and settled on his cheek. He continued pitching hay as if he hadn’t heard her.

  Rage built in Anna. A senseless disease had stolen her children, and now a senseless silence was stealing her husband.

  “Dammit, Cole. Speak to me.”

  Slowly he turned to stare at her, his entire body rigid and unforgiving, as if she had personally been responsible for the death of their children.

  “I can’t go on like this.” She launched herself at him, knocking the pitchfork from his hand. “Do you hear me, Cole? I can’t go on this way.”

  He caught her upper arms to keep them both from falling. A muscle ticked in the side of his jaw, and his own rage was plainly stamped on his face.

  She beat his chest with her balled-up fists. The mare whinnied and kicked the wall of her stall.

  “You killed my children and now you’re killing our marriage. I won’t let you. Do you hear me? I won’t let you.” Tears streamed down her cheeks as she caught the lapels of his shirt. “I love you, Cole. I won’t let you do this to us.”