Embrace the Wild Land

by Rosanne Bittner

  His eyes glittered with the taste of vengeance. “I have no doubt that he will tell me,” he hissed. “I can make a man sell his own mother!”

  Her body surged with passion at the sight of him, tall and broad and dark, wearing the sweet-scented buckskins and the array of weapons. Never had she forgotten the one night she had spent with him. Her eyes moved over him longingly. She wanted to remember every feature, every weapon, every scar. “How did you get up here, looking like that?” she asked.

  “I am quiet. And I can climb.”

  She nodded, smiling sadly. “I don’t know why I even asked.” Pain suddenly filled her eyes, and she turned away then, her heart heavy for his sorrow and what she must tell him next. She swallowed for courage. How she hated to hurt him! But he should know. He should be prepared. “Zeke, he … he … raped her. And I don’t think he was the only one. He has two men helping watch her. The way he talked, I think they also …”

  She waited, but there was only silence. When she cautiously turned, he just stared at her, his jaw flexing, his eyes blazing. “I expected no less of such a man,” he answered. “But Abigail Monroe belongs to me. For another man to touch her is to touch a stone. They have not touched her at all!”

  Her eyes teared more and she stepped closer, reaching out hesitantly to put a hand to his side. “I’m so sorry, Zeke!” she whispered. “I can at least tell you the two men watching her are called Buel and Handy. I know them. Buel has scars on his face and neck, and Handy is a big dark man with a deformed face. They’re the only ones who know Garvey has Abigail. And even they don’t know why. If you can kill the three of them, there will be no one but myself who can link you to Garvey’s death. You would never be traced.”

  He studied the blue eyes. “And can I trust you, Anna Gale?”

  She held his eyes steadily. “You know that you can. There is nothing I want more than to be rid of Winston Garvey. I hate him! And with Garvey gone, I don’t need to do business anymore with that vile son of his.”

  Her eyes teared, and she turned away. “The boy is sadistic,” she added. “He makes my skin crawl.”

  Zeke watched her. For a woman like Anna Gale to be brought to tears of shame by a customer could only mean the Garvey boy was truly cruel and demented.

  “He sends his son to you?” he asked quietly.

  She nodded, and he put a hand on her shoulder in a sudden urge to console her. He squeezed the shoulder, thinking to himself again what a wasted woman she was. But there were some things in life that could not be changed. She turned and looked up at him for one brief moment of remembrance before his eyes changed again to ice.

  “I know the two scarred men,” he told her. “They were part of a party of men who attacked us last year in Kansas. Garvey’s son was with them and recognized us from Denver. We are the ones who put the scars on those men. And right now I regret not killing the Garvey boy. I am not a man to kill one so young, but that one is different. He is dangerous.”

  She shivered and rubbed her arms. “When he told his father he had seen you in Denver—that must be how Garvey figured it all out. Someone must have mentioned your name, and Garvey remembered you from Santa Fe.”

  Zeke nodded, struggling to ignore the screaming inside his soul at the thought of his woman being touched by other men. Abbie! His sweet Abbie! The woman whose virginity belonged only to him, whose body and soul and heart and all her private places belonged to Zeke Monroe! Anna felt his rigidness building, and she knew he was battling to stay hard and strong, not allowing his emotions to overwhelm him and make him weaker. She stepped back.

  “Garvey will be expecting you, Zeke. He had a man waiting at Bent’s Fort—”

  “I killed him,” he answered flatly. “Garvey does not know I am back.”

  Her eyes lit up and the smile returned to her lips. “Wonderful!” she exclaimed, looking delighted. “God, how I’d love to see the look on his face when he sees you and feels that big blade at his throat!”

  “How many men does he have?” he asked.

  “An army. I don’t know how you’ll ever get in there. He must have forty men working for him.”

  “That isn’t so many. I have a plan.”

  She breathed deeply, catching the earthy scent of him, feeling the excitement of his power. “I hope it works, Zeke.”

  “Don’t worry about me. When I am thirsty for vengeance, I do not die easily. And I have help—Cheyenne. We will raid the ranch. Once I get my hands on Winston Garvey, I will discover what he has done with my Abbie.”

  She stepped closer again, touching his arm. “On Tuesdays and Saturdays the maid is there. With his family gone, they don’t need a maid every day. Go when she isn’t there, then you will have only Garvey to worry about inside the house and you won’t risk witnesses.” Her eyes saddened. “I’ll worry about you, Zeke.”

  Her eyes were glassy with love. It would be easy to take her now. She was soft for him—wanted him badly. And he had not had a woman for many months. But all of his manly desires were gone, replaced by nothing but the awful hatred and vengeance. And even if he could find those desires, they could not be awakened by any woman but Abigail Trent Monroe, the little girl he had claimed in the foothills of the Rockies so many years ago.

  “Be careful, Zeke,” she told him softly. “God be with you.”

  He reached out and touched the welt on her cheek gently, then bent down and lightly kissed the cheek. “I love her so,” he whispered. He pulled back and she saw tears in his eyes. They suddenly embraced. He held her for a moment, then quickly pulled away. “Thank you, Anna. You will be free of Winston Garvey. This is a promise.”

  For a brief moment he saw what she could have been. “Your secret is good with with me, Zeke. Surely you see that. Surely you know that I love you too much to ever bring you harm. Tell me you believe me. Tell me you trust me. Give me that much.”

  He studied the blue pools in which so many men had been drowned. All but Zeke Monroe. “I believe you,” he finally answered. “I believe there is a goodness beneath your harlot eyes, Anna Gale. Before I came, I thought—” he bent down to kiss the puffy cheek again—“I’m half crazy with grief and worry, Anna. I should not have hit you.”

  She looked up at him, the fires of desire almost bringing her pain. “It’s all right.” She stepped back, surprising herself with this new-found strength he seemed to give her, for she wanted nothing more than to throw herself at him and beg him to sleep with her once more. Perhaps she could have tried using his body again as a price for giving him the information he needed. But looking at him now she knew it wouldn’t have worked. His condition now was not one to toy with. He would have killed her. This was no time for playing games with Zeke Monroe.

  But she did not want to play games. That first time was before she had slept with him—before she had fallen in love with him. She no longer wanted to tease him and hurt him. She took his hand and kissed the severed little finger that he had cut off years earlier in personal sacrifice for having betrayed his wife in order to get information out of the harlot Anna Gale. That kind of love was far above the likes of herself.

  “Good luck, Zeke,” she said softly, squeezing his hand. “I hope you find her. But … if you don’t … and you need a woman to hold you—”

  He shook his head. “Without Abbie, I’ll have no desires left.” He turned to leave.

  “Zeke,” she called out. He hesitated at the door and looked at her. “Try to get word to me, will you? Try to let me know when Garvey is dead and if you find Abbie and she’s all right.”

  He nodded, running his eyes over her sensuous body. “I will try.”

  He ducked out the door, and she hurried over to get a last look, but he had already disappeared. She ran to the open window at the end of the hall, leaning out. But she saw nothing. He had vanished as quickly and silently as he had arrived.

  She slowly returned to her room, closing the door and walking to the bed, where she sat down and wept. She no longer had a
ny desire to see the banker who was to come and do business with her. She suddenly wanted no men at all, save one. And that man she could not have. But at least she had seen him once more.

  Two days passed, and on the night of the second day, there was a restlessness in the air. The animals felt it, and even the wind felt it, for it stirred fitfully in impatient gusts. There was a chill to the darkness. And like all wild things that sense impending changes, Swift Arrow sat awake that night, praying alone near a campfire deep in the Black Hills of the Dakotas. The news that the runners had brought from Zeke, that Abbie had been stolen away by white men, burned in his Indian heart. He ached for his half-brother’s agony, but most of all he ached for Abbie herself—the white woman he loved but could not have. His deep hatred for most white men was now engraved deeper into his soul, for it was white men who had killed his half-brother’s first wife and son; and now whites had taken Abbie.

  Abbie! He threw back his head and prayed to the spirits for the beloved white woman and for Zeke. His arms bled where he had let blood in sacrifice to bring strength to his prayers. It would be easier now to continue leading Northern Cheyenne warriors in riding with the Sioux against the white settlers. Wherever a white man walked, trouble seemed to follow. It was not enough for another white to have the same color skin. Just to associate with an Indian meant insults and condemnation. Now those terrible things had come to Abbie, and if the white men had touched her wrongly, they must suffer.

  Swift Arrow looked into the flames, his eyes wild with vengeance. How he would love to be along with those who would ride against those who had wronged the white woman. But by the time the runners came, Zeke would already be at that place called Denver, and would be ready to act. There was nothing to do now but wait until another message came—one that would tell him Abigail Monroe had been found alive and was all right. He breathed deeply, satisfied that if anyone could save Abigail, it was Zeke—Lone Eagle. Of this Swift Arrow was certain—just as certain as he was that no man was as skilled with a knife. And the boy, Wolf’s Blood, would have his turn also. Yes! He was a fine warrior. Swift Arrow himself had helped train him when he was very small. Now he would get his chance at warrior ways by helping his father avenge his mother’s abduction.

  Wolf’s Blood! Zeke! Abbie! How he missed all of them—and the others: the children and his brother, Black Elk. How he would love to be riding with them against those white men! But the North was his home now—the Sioux and Northern Cheyenne his people. He had made this his home so that he would not have to be near the white woman he loved, for stronger than that love was his respect for the much greater love the woman shared with his half-brother. The impossibility of having her was something he had accepted many years ago, and living at a distance made it easier to bear.

  And so he stayed in the North. He would pray very hard for Zeke and Abbie and Wolf’s Blood. He would ask the spirits to guide Zeke this night, for he knew in his very bones that this was the night. It was in the wind. Tonight vengeance would be tasted, and it would be delicious. Zeke was the supreme master of vengeance. He had proved it in that place called Tennessee, against the white men who had wronged his first wife. He would prove it again. And it would be tonight.

  “Wagh!” Swift Arrow muttered. “It is a good night to die. But it will not be my brother or his son who die. It shall be the white men who took my brother’s woman!” He closed his eyes. “Ho-skuh, Abigail. Do not be afraid,” he spoke into the darkness. “Your man will come, and the strength of my own spirit will be with him. I shall ride with him this night, and you shall not suffer again.”

  He rose and stretched out his arms and blood streamed down toward his elbows. “Take my strength, Lone Eagle!” he shouted, using Zeke’s Cheyenne name. “I shall ride with you this night, and glory in your vengeance!”

  The moon hung quietly over the distant peaks, huge and bright. It was a good night for raiding and stealing horses. Cheyenne warriors moved in on foot, the first silent attackers who would pave the way for those who held back in the foothills on swift mounts, waiting for the signal to ride in.

  Like creatures of the night they crept among the shadows, soundless, stealthy, wild things stalking their prey. First they must kill the men riding night watch, those few who rode the perimeter of Winston Garvey’s ranch, keeping guard and watching horses and cattle. They were easy. A man could aim his silent bow well in the bright moonlight. And these men were unsuspecting. Most of the Indian trouble was to the north, not this close to Denver. In the South there was a little trouble with the Southern Cheyenne, and a lot of trouble with the Comanche and Apache. But Winston Garvey’s spread was situated in a peaceful valley protected on one side by the mountains, and on the other by the city of Denver, only five miles away. Indians did not bother him.

  Garvey himself sat before a marble fireplace, puffing an expensive cigar and writing a letter to his son, telling the boy about new telegraph lines coming into Denver and what progress the city was seeing.

  “With the new supply company I have purchased,” he wrote, “I can triple our income. Nebraska Supply carries food, tools and merchandise from Omaha to the miners in the Rockies. The miners pay incredible prices for the simplest items, Charles. Remember that. Those men are desperate for goods, isolated from the rest of the world, willing to pay anything for good whiskey and potatoes that aren’t rotten. They also pay well for pretty women. Prostitution is another lucrative operation you should consider. If you want to get rich, then serve men who are desperate for food, whiskey and women, and you can’t go wrong. Just charge a certain price and then stick to it. They’ll pay it.

  “We are still concentrating on the Indian problem. Governor Evans is trying to get the Cheyenne to put more signatures on the Treaty of Fort Wise, but I say if they don’t do so soon, the hell with them. We’ll put them in their place by force and starvation. The Indians are really the only fly in the ointment out here. I don’t understand why Washington doesn’t do more about it. Evans needs help and so do the settlers who want the land. It can’t be much longer before the treaty is deemed valid, at which time I am ready to buy up considerable properties myself, Charles. I foresee the day when the Indians will be placed behind fences and told to stay there. I would like to see them all shot myself, but some of the fine Christian people of Colorado can’t seem to go that far. They prefer to try to educate them and reform them—cut their hair and put them in white man’s clothing. I suppose that isn’t all bad. If you take away their basic way of life, you are still destroying them—but just doing it indirectly and legally. The key, Charles, is to break their spirits. Remember that. You can’t just move in and kill them off, although a raid on a camp here and there will go unnoticed. You simply have to be clever and quiet about it.”

  He put down his pen and looked toward the window. He felt restless and uneasy, but he shrugged it off, attributing it to the full moon. The night was perfectly quiet, except for the howling of wolves now and then. If anything was wrong, one of the men would come and tell him. He returned to his letter, while outside a tenth arrow silently found its mark and another ranch hand fell from his horse.

  It was all taking place quietly, without even disturbing the animals. No dogs barked, no horses whinnied, no cattle grew restless. Shadowy warriors moved ever closer, those in front using silent weapons—knives, tomahawks, arrows and lances—to eliminate their opposition. The ranch had been watched for two days. The Indians knew their targets and destination well.

  A tall, silent warrior who had waited in the shadows gave a soft, trilling call, and on that signal, more warriors moved in, those in the second group leading their mounts quietly by the reins, their well-trained animals as quiet as the men. This second group waited just beyond the corrals and out buildings, while the first group moved in even closer. Eight more men went down without a sound, their throats slit or arrows in their backs, while Winston Garvey continued his long letter to the son that he missed so much. Charles would be home soon on a break,
at which time he would join the Colorado volunteers and get some more experience in the field. The Indian problems were coming to a head. Charles should be involved, and the boy was anxious to kill some Indians himself. Besides that, his father had promised him a high position in the volunteers, a rapid move up to at least lieutenant. He would be not only rich and prominent, but a respected officer in the Colorado volunteers, where he would learn the guts of politics and get some leadership training, hone his keen sense of brutality and authority.

  But outside there crept a breed of man who could be more brutal than even Winston Garvey could imagine. The sort of brutality Garvey envisioned toward the Indians was now creeping ever closer to him, as he sat in those last hours giving his final directions to his cherished son. And while Cheyenne bucks swarmed onto the Garvey ranch, a half-breed named Lone Eagle made his own way on quiet moccasins toward the big stone house, his own cherished son at his heels.

  Another call went out, sounding like the eerie cry of an owl. Garvey glanced at the window again as the sound was cried twice more. Then there was an explosion of yips and hoots and war cries, mingled with the thunder of hoofs.

  “Indians!” the man muttered. “Goddamned sons of bitches! What the hell are Indians doing this close to Denver?”

  The man rose and stormed to the front door, where two men came running toward him. “Indians, sir!” one of them shouted. “We just found three men dead. Don’t know how many others they got, but if they’re this close, they must have got a lot of the outer guards! They’re after the horses, Mr. Garvey.”

  Garvey’s face was red and puffy with anger. “Well get the hell out there and stop them!” he fumed.