Her throat was too tight to speak. Instead Cassandra gave her answer with her eyes. With her hands. With her hips rising against him.
She slipped her trembling fingers beneath the waistband of his underdrawers and eased them down his hips. He lifted away her heavy bed gown and fit his body to her, length to length.
She sucked in her breath at the intimacy of the contact, at the way his chest crushed down on hers, at the brush of their bellies, at the weight of his manhood nestled between her legs.
She looked up into his eyes and knew that he was here with her in a way he hadn't been with her the night before. He was letting her see his turmoil and his pain. He was giving her this chance to touch the bare, cold places where the real Drew lived.
Cass opened her arms and her heart to him.
He came to her with a kiss that crested and swirled with both dark emotions and breathless need, with a touch that set her shivering, with a love that had not been diminished in spite of him denying it.
She offered him the redemption of her mouth, the salvation in her touch, the benediction of giving himself to her. She willed him to believe that sharing his deepest self, that loving like this, could make a difference in his life. That it could help him find his way after nine long years of being lost.
She felt the fervor build in him. In her. In both of them.
She breathed his name, calling him to her.
He came, sinking deep into the succor of her woman's core. The joining of bodies was sweet beyond all bearing. She ached with the delight of being one with him, with having him give all of himself to her. She brushed her palms up his chest, contoured them to the strong, straining column of his throat, and curved them along the slope of his jaw. She drew him down into her kiss.
As their mouths merged it was as if they were completing a cycle of their lives, a sweet beginning, a time apart, and a fierce reunion. An act of welcome, of coming home.
They held tight to the moment, savoring the splendor and the sweetness, the magnitude and the magic. They sighed and shifted and settled as the fervor ebbed away.
They lay tangled together amidst a mound of tumbled bedclothes. Cassie turned her head and pressed her mouth against Drew's ear. "I love you," she breathed, the words harkening back to a time when they'd come easy, a time when neither of them had understood their magnitude, a time when they were young.
The answer seemed to rise in Drew, too swift and strong for him to deny. "I love you, Cassie. I love you, too."
* * *
Drew slept soundly, dreamlessly, as he had not slept in years. He awoke alone. The covers on the far side of the bed were tumbled, but cool to the touch. Cassie had been gone for quite some time.
Cassie.
Images of the previous night blurred in his head, of hands and hips and tumbled hair. Of kisses and caresses and promises.
Cassie. Oh, God, what had he done?
Drew rolled to the edge of the bed and sat for a moment with his head in his hands.
The nightmare had started it. In the dream he had been stretching, reaching—but not for the pistol to save Cass and Julia from the Indians. This time he had been grabbing for Meggie's small, red-mittened hands, trying to pull her from the river. He'd fought so hard to reach her, to rescue her, but in the end he hadn't been able to save his daughter, either.
When he started awake, Cassie had been in bed beside him. She had come to him with her tenderness and her warmth. She had soothed him with her touch. And when she offered him the solace of her body, he had snatched her to him and held on hard.
Drew cursed the memory and shoved to his feet, stepping gingerly on the ice-cold floor. He scrambled for his socks and underwear. He broke the skim of ice in the water pitcher and prepared to shave.
It took everything he had to face himself in the mirror, knowing he had let Cassie see his frustration and his fear, knowing he had opened himself and let her touch the raw, secret places inside him. Knowing he had given up every part of himself as they made love.
He lathered his face and skimmed the straight razor along his jaw.
He could still taste her in his mouth, still feel the imprint of Cassie's hands against his skin. He remembered every word they'd said to each other, every sigh they'd shared. He had told Cassie that he loved her. How could he have done that?
Wiping away the last of the soap, Drew reached for his trousers and shirt.
What was he supposed to say to her this morning? Could he tell her that he'd lied? Would she understand if he told her he couldn't care for anyone now?
The thought of facing Cassie, of extinguishing the light in her eyes, made him damn whatever twisted bit of fate had brought them together. Yet he knew he must find a way to make her accept that last night had been a mistake, that he didn't love her after all.
By the time Drew buckled his sword belt around his waist, he thought he had prepared himself to face her. He meant to behave as if nothing untoward had happened between them. If he did not acknowledge the weaknesses he'd shown her, she might not acknowledge them, either. If he didn't put actions to his words, she might understand how much he regretted telling her he loved her.
His resolve carried him as far as the kitchen door.
Drawn up before the hearth, his wife and child sat dozing in the rocking chair. They were bundled in a well-worn buffalo robe and the delicate appliqué quilt Laura had made for her daughter. Meggie lay lax against Cassie's chest, one arm curled around her neck. Cassie sat with her tattooed cheek pillowed on Meggie's hair.
The swell of unexpected tenderness caught him hard.
Everything that mattered was snuggled up in that rocking chair. It was all he could do to keep from kneeling beside it and gathering the two of them in his arms. He wanted to hold them and protect them and keep them safe.
As if he could.
As if anyone could.
As if he dared to take that chance.
Standing there, Drew was forced to admit how much he needed to hear the swell of Meggie's laughter. He wanted to be able to curl into Cassie's sustaining warmth. But no man could live on such thin fare as that. Nor could he endure if that warmth suddenly cooled or the laughter fell silent. Drew couldn't claim and hold this woman and child because he knew he could never protect them.
From out on the parade ground came the bugle call for reveille.
Drew straightened slowly, squaring his shoulders, raising his head. He owed his allegiance to his parents and his brothers on whose graves he'd sworn revenge. He must honor those vows or lose himself. He owed his energies to the army that was giving him his chance for revenge. And in the end, dedicating himself to those things was infinitely safer than loving a woman and a child.
Drew's heart beat thick inside his chest. He knew he had made his choice, that there was no going back. He took one last look at where Meggie and Cassandra sat curled together. Then without so much as a word of good-bye, Drew left the cabin.
Chapter 11
It's nothing, Cassie told herself, rubbing away the gooseflesh along her arms. No one is watching you.
Yet someone was. She had awakened this morning with the hum of anticipation in her belly. She felt the prickling down her back as she heated Drew's shaving water and fed him breakfast, as she kissed him good-bye and sent him off to headquarters. It was the third week of their marriage, and Cassie was doing everything she could think of to be a good wife to him.
But as she followed Drew out the cabin door, the sense of being watched became stronger. She sheltered Meggie with the wing of her cloak and looked around. On the parade ground a squad of new recruits were being put through their paces by a bawling infantry sergeant. A trio of muleteers stood smoking together. Three friendly Indians rode past, one with a mule deer across his saddle. No one so much as looked in her direction. Still, the queasy feeling persisted.
"It's nothing," Cassie muttered under her breath and led Meggie down the steps.
On the porch next door, Sylvie Noonan took one
look at the two of them and went inside, slamming the door behind her.
Or maybe it's everything.
These last weeks had been difficult. Only the McGarritys and Lila Wilcox had accepted her marriage to Drew. She and Drew had not been invited to Amos Parker's birthday party, or to the Noonans' for an evening of charades. Several of the laundresses had pointedly turned their heads when Cassie passed, and Drew had confined one of his men to the guardhouse for referring to Cassie as "the captain's In'jun whore." Even Meggie had suffered. Sylvie Noonan's children had held her down and streaked her face with mud so she'd be "just like her Indian ma."
And once the Indians started raiding, Cassie knew the resentment against her would worsen.
Trying to ignore the foreboding, Cassie and Meggie set off toward the sutler's store. Cassandra tried to avoid the place, hating to be reminded of the day she's stolen the scissors. But it was necessary to buy from Jessup now that the quartermaster's stores were down to salt pork and hardtack, rice and beans, cornmeal and flour. There hadn't been any coffee or sugar in weeks, and the entire compound was suffering through the deprivation. Even Alain Jalbert's hunting parties hadn't been able to keep ahead of the fort's demand for game. The first supply train of the season couldn't come too soon.
As she and Meggie followed the mucky path along the side of the cavalry stables, a new ripple of uneasiness chased up Cassie's spine. This time when she looked, she caught sight of an Indian woman lurking behind one of the commissary wagons.
When the woman motioned Cassie toward her, Cass hastily looked away. She could not speak to an Indian and give the people here at the fort another reason to doubt her sympathies. But as they reached the corner, Cassie recognized the woman. Only something of grave importance would bring Runs Like a Doe all this way.
Cassie gave the woman a nod of acknowledgment and hustled Meggie along ahead of her. What could Runs Like a Doe want?
Nothing that should matter to you, came Drew's voice in her head.
But it did matter. This woman and her family had befriended Cassie when Gray Falcon brought her to the Cheyenne camp, and she owed them for teaching her how to make a life there. She owed them for taking her in when her husband divorced her and removed her belongings from his tepee.
Cassie saw the wide double doors to the cavalry stable gaping halfway down the barn and knew what she must do. She dragged Meggie inside and approached the young soldier on stable duty.
"Good morning, private," she greeted him.
The wiry, dark-haired private turned from where he had been forking hay into the nearest stall. She could see right off he knew who she was.
"M-M-M-Morning, ma'am," he managed to gasp. He was looking at her as if he expected her to pull out a knife and take his hair.
Cassie smiled grimly and forged ahead. "Captain Reynolds was telling us last night at supper that you had a new litter of kittens here at the barn."
The private's expression softened.
"Meggie would very much like to see the kittens."
"The kittens," he mumbled.
"Perhaps you could show them to her while I see about something at the commissary?"
"Oh, yes, please!" Meggie begged.
The private nodded. "An' they're as fine a batch of fee-lines as I ever seen. I'll be happy to show those kittens to Miss Meggie."
"Thank you," Cassie murmured. "I shouldn't be long."
With Meggie safely out of harm's way, Cassie ducked out of the barn and hurried over to where Runs Like a Doe was waiting.
"I would hardly have known you, Sweet Grass Woman," the Indian woman greeted her, speaking in Cheyenne. "You are much changed in these last weeks."
Knowing there was danger in being seen together, Cassie caught the woman's arm and dragged her into the shadows.
"Why have you come?" she asked urgently.
"I come for Blue Flower," Runs Like a Doe answered. "I have ridden two sleeps to ask your help."
"What is it Blue Flower needs of me?" Cassie asked, already knowing she could not refuse.
Runs Like a Doe's face was lined with worry. "She has birthed a fine strong boy but has no milk. Every woman in our band has weaned her children, so there is no one who can nourish him. Though Blue Flower tries to give him what he needs, he grows weaker every day. Soon he will die if we cannot find a way to feed him."
Cassie's heart went out to Blue Flower. She had lost her only daughter at Sand Creek more than two years before, and her pregnancy had helped her recover from the loss. How deeply her friend would grieve if this child died.
"Why hasn't Sharp Knife killed a mother antelope for her milk or stolen a cow?" Cassie asked. "Why have you not given Blue Flower a brew of white baneberry leaves to increase the flow of her milk?"
"If we had not tried those things, would I have come all this way? They say that the sutlers at the forts have a kind of milk that comes in cans."
Cassie nodded, remembering the tin can of milk Sally had bought the night Drew came to dinner.
"Can you buy the white man's milk?" When Cassie nodded, the woman went on. "If you do, then Blue Flower's child will live."
What Runs Like a Doe wanted seemed simple enough. Cassie would get the milk and Runs Like a Doe would take it back to the Cheyenne village. No one need know what she had done.
"Do you have money?" Cassandra asked. "These white sutlers take money for their goods."
The Indian woman took a handful of coins from a pouch at her waist. "Is this enough?" she asked.
"I do not know," Cassie answered. "I will buy as much milk as I can with it."
Cassie's mouth went dry as she approached the sutler's trading post. She could feel Jessup's eyes on her the moment she stepped inside. She made a circuit of the big, dim room, taking note of the large stock of milk that stood on the shelves behind the counter. The milk must be expensive if Jessup put it there.
"Is there something you want?" the sutler asked, sauntering toward her.
Cassandra swallowed down her dislike and spilled the handful of coins on the counter. "I want as many cans of milk as I can get with this."
Jessup counted the money and set three cans of milk beside the coins.
"Is that all I get for this?" Cassie asked in dismay.
"Condensed milk is damned expensive."
"How much is it exactly?"
"It's not cheap back in the States," he began, "and after having someone cart it all this way, I don't think a dollar a can is too much to ask."
A dollar a can! Even Cassie realized how outrageous that was. She also knew that three cans of milk were not enough to keep Blue Flower's baby alive.
"How many more cans do you have?" she asked him.
"More than you can afford to buy," he taunted. "Unless you mean to steal them."
Heat burned in her cheeks, but Cassie ignored it. "How many more cans of milk do you have?"
He turned to look. "Fifteen."
If Blue Flower were careful, she could make eighteen cans of milk last long enough to give her son a start in life.
"I will take-them all."
A sneer lifted one corner of Jessup's mouth. "And just what do you intend to do with all these cans of milk, Mrs. Reynolds?"
Cassie stood her ground. "I don't know that that's any of your concern, Mr. Jessup."
"I s'pose it's not," he answered. "What does concern me is how you mean to pay for them."
Cassie swallowed hard. She had $2.29 in the change purse Drew had given her. It was all she'd need, he'd told her, to see to their household expenses until the end of the month. She fumbled the money out of the purse.
"You're forty cents shy of six cans of milk." Jessup was enjoying the hint of desperation he sensed in her.
What was a child's life worth? Cassie found herself wondering.
Anything, came the answer. Anything.
She looked down at her wedding ring. It was all she could offer in payment—the ring or herself. She shuddered at the thought of what it would be
like to lie beneath this horrible man.
Then Sally McGarity's remarkable phrase flashed through her head. "Just put them on my husband's account." Cassie said. It was how Sally had paid for her goods that first day, the day Cassie had stolen the scissors.
Jessup glared at her. "You sure about that?"
Cassie stood firm though she was quaking inside. "Do you want to sell the milk or don't you?"
Jessup nodded and made a notation in a big, clothbound book. "You want this in a box?"
"A burlap sack will do just as well."
The cans weighed a good deal more than Cassie expected. It took both hands to carry the bag, and the cans kept banging her shins as she hobbled toward where Runs Like a Doe was waiting.
"You got them!" she exclaimed.
Cassie nodded and handed the Indian woman the bag. "Add water to the milk to make it last," she cautioned.
Runs Like a Doe reached across and grasped Cassandra's hand. It was an uncharacteristic gesture, one that spoke of deep gratitude and abiding trust.
Cassie clasped the woman's fingers in her own, missing the friendship she'd shared with her and her younger sister.
"Take care as you ride out," Cassie admonished. "Now that the weather is better the soldiers are spoiling for a fight."
"It is the same in Standing Pine's camp. There will be blood on the earth when the summer comes," Runs Like a Doe whispered and turned toward the scattering of tepees to the west of the fort.
Cassie made her way back to the cavalry stables, where she found Meggie knee-deep in kittens. She stood watching the child and wondering how she would explain buying all those cans of milk when the sutler's bill came due.
* * *
"Meggie!" Cassie called out as she hauled the buckets of water up the riverbank. Behind her the Platte glistened like quicksilver, a soft, dawn-pink mist rising off the water, but Cassie couldn't stop to watch it. She had to be back to the cabin in time to fix Drew breakfast before first drill. "Meggie, do come on!" she shouted again.
The little girl came running, a bouquet of buttercups clutched in her grubby, mud-stained hands. "Look, Cassie!" Meggie crowed. "I picked them myself."
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