“Look how gorgeous you are, spilling out of that dress,” he said, his eyes shining greedily. “I can’t wait to get it off you completely.”
As he spoke, he held one of her wrists in a death grip, ripped the jacket off her entirely, and threw it away. Then he grabbed the neckline of her dress, jamming his knuckles into the cleft between her breasts.
She fought for control, some semblance of control so she could get out of this perilous situation. What a fool she’d been to come way out here with him!
“You’re hurting my arm, Jacob,” she said, completely amazed by the calmness of her tone. “You need to loosen up just a little.”
Immediately he let go of the arm behind her back. She pulled away.
But as she took her first deep breath for what seemed like hours, she realized that his hand had caught her elbow in a steel-jawed trap.
“I’ll loosen up, tighten up, do anything you want me to, Beautiful,” he crooned. “All I want to do is give you pleasure.”
His hand fumbled in her bosom, then he drew it out. It hovered like a bird of prey, then dipped down and touched the edge of her dress—he dragged one fingertip along its curve.
“Isn’t that giving you pleasure?” he said.
“Jacob, let me go.”
“You want more, but even you, my wild rose, are lady enough not to say so,” he murmured, and with no more warning than that, he freed one of her breasts, then the other, from the bodice of her dress.
Never, ever, not even in the hands of the bandidos, not even in the gloomy confines of Haynes’s office, had she felt so immediately vulnerable. She tried to cover herself with one hand and jerk the other hand free of his grip, but she might as well have been a dying leaf trying to defy the wind.
He tightened his grip on her arm so fast and hard it cut off her circulation and took one breast roughly into his other hand.
She screamed. She screamed her frantic fear of a man molesting her for the third horrid time in her life, and while she screamed, she slapped him, twice, three times with every ounce of strength she could muster.
“Help … me! Please …!”
Jacob clapped his hand over her mouth before she could call Walks-With-Spirits by name. But he had to come. He had saved her before, from much less danger than this. He had to be near enough to hear her. He had to. Even if she had told him to go away. He was all she could think about, he was all that could save her.
Jacob was laughing at her blows, he was dragging her down to the ground, he was talking to her all the time while he smashed his hand tight around her mouth and made her want to gag.
“Nobody’ll hear you, darlin’, so save your breath,” he said. “Save it to pleasure me, hear?”
Panic at how utterly she’d misjudged him rushed through her veins, spiking goose bumps up through her skin. She tried so hard to twist free that her wrist burned like fire; she thought the bone would come through the flesh; but he held her easily. It was truly amazing how much stronger a man was than a woman.
And then, without warning, his weight was lifting off her and she was able to pull free. She rolled away from him over the hard ground and soft pine needles, sharp twigs and rough rocks, fighting to protect her naked breasts with one hand while the other flopped useless and numb. She tried to scramble to her feet so she could run, run. Jacob was not going to touch her again. He would have to kill her first.
Awkwardly, she fumbled at the bodice of her dress, pulled it up so that it covered all of her breasts that it would stretch over, but the effort made her stumble and she nearly fell back down again; her shoulder struck a low tree branch, and she ended up sitting slumped against the base of a huge, rough-barked tree trunk. Stunned. She must have been stunned senseless because what she thought she was seeing couldn’t be real.
Somebody was fighting with Jacob, who grunted a loud, animal sound, and his head snapped back. The newly rising moon, pouring pale light down into the clearing, showed that Jacob’s attacker was Walks-With-Spirits!
She lifted her good hand, stinging now from scraping and scratching on the rocks and twigs, and pushed her tousled hair out of her eyes. Could it be? The man who had turned and walked away from a gun drawn in his face was now trying to beat Jacob to a pulp?
She stared at them in wonder, as best she could. Her vision was blurry—she was shaking all over, the moonlight was patchy, her mind was whirling—but one thing was clear: he could fight like no one she had ever seen. He never stopped, never slowed down, never gave an inch, never backed up, not even when Jacob hit him hard, not even when Jacob swung a tree limb he must’ve picked up from the ground.
Walks-With-Spirits fought like a determined bear. He drove at Jacob, caught the limb, and levered his weight against it so fast that he took it from him. Jacob cringed and curled his arm over his head to protect it, but Walks-With-Spirits threw the weapon away, tossed it over his shoulder in a gesture of great disdain, and came at Jacob again with his fists.
Jacob got a few licks in and then there was blood coming from Walks-With-Spirits’s face, dripping black in the moonlight onto the bright white of his shirt. One logical thought broke through her hazy, disbelieving brain. Was he shot? Oh, dear God, did Jacob still have his pistol? No, surely not—she had not heard the cracking report of a gun.
Suddenly, the clearing filled with more light and the glow from half a dozen torches showed people crowding into the clearing, men first, a few women behind them. Tay and Marshall Greenwood and some more men she didn’t know and Uncle Jumper and Jacob’s partner, Peter Phillips.
But none of them did anything! Her heart sank. They stood back at the edge of the clearing and watched, because this was a matter between two men that had to be settled by only those two.
Jacob swung his arm back enough to land a blow to Walks-With-Spirits’s face, grunting loudly with the effort it took. She cringed because it landed with such a crack that it must have hurt him terribly.
Her conscience whispered that Walks-With-Spirits suffered that pain because she had screamed, because she had called to him in her mind to come and help her.
After she had ordered him to go away.
She tried to squelch the thought, for she didn’t want to be beholden to him, not to a man who looked down on her and judged her a silly child whose behavior degraded herself. She could take care of herself, truly she could, this was simply a situation where she’d made a few bad judgments.
The blow rocked Walks-With-Spirits back on his heels, but only for a moment, and then he returned it to Jacob’s cheekbone with a force that drove him to his knees. When Jacob touched his face and brought his hand away bloody, he let out a great, keening howl filled with fury and pain.
“You stinking, ignorant, low-down woods skunk,” he screamed. “If my face is scarred, I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you, do you hear me?”
Walks-With-Spirits stood over him like an avenging angel.
“You are the low-down one who doesn’t deserve to be called a man. A real man doesn’t mistreat a woman.”
Jacob struggled to his feet.
“I’ll shoot you just like I shot your precious pet coyote,” he shouted, his breath coming fast and hard. “You never saw me then, and you’ll never see me when my bullet is meant for you.”
Walks-With-Spirits froze as he stood.
“You? You are the one who shot Taloa? Why would you do such a thing?”
“To show the superstitious, old-fashioned ones the truth,” Jacob shouted, panting for breath as he pulled out his shirttail and held it against his bleeding face. “I proved to the whole Nation that your animal is flesh and blood, that it’s a coyote like any other and that you are a flesh-and-blood man like any other!”
Walks-With-Spirits stayed still, terribly still.
“No, you’re not a man like any other,” Jacob cried, his voice rising to an ugly screech. “The wild animals are your brothers because you’re no smarter than they are. You don’t deserve to call yourself a man.”
Walks-With-Spirits ignored that.
“You would bring pain to an innocent animal, make it suffer and bleed for no better reason.”
It was a flat statement of surest truth. His deep, calm voice held clear menace, it held a cold, hard promise of retribution.
“The reason was good, good for the Nation!” Jacob cried. “Clinging to the old ways will do nothing but hinder us from living in a white man’s world.”
“So,” Walks-With-Spirits said, “you admit that you are a cruel coward.”
Jacob lunged at him weakly, fists clenched, then stopped and clapped his hand to his bleeding face as if the wound prevented him. He spat on the ground as if he had to clear his mouth to be able to speak.
“You can’t call me a coward!”
“I just did.”
Walks-With-Spirits still spoke in that unusual, cold way that held everyone there spellbound. He held his ground without giving an inch.
Still, Jacob didn’t quite dare to hit him.
“Well, I shot your coyote, and I’ll shoot you next,” Jacob yelled, furiously. “You don’t deserve to live, you interfering idiot!”
“You don’t deserve to live,” Walks-With-Spirits said, in a loud and taunting voice that turned from cold to hot in a heartbeat. “The Great Spirit abhors every breath you draw since you mistreat every creature that is weaker than you!”
“I’ll treat my women any way I please,” Jacob shouted haughtily. “None of that is anything to you.”
Walks-With-Spirits drew back his fist and hit Jacob again, hit him with a blow that made an awful thudding sound as it knocked him back to the ground. This time he didn’t get up.
Walks-With-Spirits extended both arms out over Jacob and in a magnificent, ferocious gesture swept them up and held them toward the sky. He spoke in a terrible voice that cracked through the woods like lightning.
“Listen! Now you walk pathways that are black.
“You will be lonely and then you will be traveling to the Nightland.
“Jacob Charley, your spirit is dwindling. Your soul is blue.
“May the next evil thought in your mind squeeze out the breath from your body, forever.”
Nobody moved. Nobody spoke.
The terrible curse was horrible to hear, magic pronounced in a spirit of vengeance was the conjury most feared.
But worse than that was the fear-stunning sight of a good medicine man doing bad medicine, that was the most evil, most forbidden magic of all. Seeing and hearing such a thing struck everyone there helpless and dumb.
Then Walks-With-Spirits bent, picked up a stick, and in the same motion scooped the end of it through the earth where Jacob’s spittle had landed. He brought it up and held it high as he straightened to his full height, his amber eyes blazing.
Now he had some of Jacob’s saliva. Now he could use it to strengthen the curse, he could take it to running water at dawn and cast the spell again. Then it would be even more deadly.
Cotannah felt her soul sink into the ground.
She was the one who had caused him to cast this bad medicine. She had started all this madness.
Walks-With-Spirits stepped over Jacob’s prone body, bent and picked up her jacket, strode straight toward her. A hard trembling ran through her to watch him come.
It stopped when he stood over her because he scared her so much she couldn’t even breathe. His eyes held her impaled on the sharp sword of his anger, his face was the fiery visage of an avenging angel. For one heart-stopping instant she thought he would strike her, too.
His eyes were like pieces of burning amber, brighter than the light from the torches that flickered on his face. Amber, awe-inspiring eyes.
His copper-colored skin stretched tight with wrath over his chiseled cheekbones, blood streaked a dark, diagonal line across his face. He looked wonderful and terrible and capable of anything.
An ache sliced through her heart like a sword’s blade: She didn’t know him, she didn’t know him at all.
She spoke before she knew she could, astonished that she could talk because she was so scared.
“I thought you only did good medicine.”
A new emotion came into his eyes, something she couldn’t name.
“So did I.”
His full lips tightened into a flat, thin line.
“Put this on,” he said.
Then he dropped her jacket into her lap, turned on his heel, and left her.
Chapter 7
Emily came running toward her, crying out, over and over again, “Cotannah, oh, ’Tannah!” Tay called to Walks-With-Spirits, who turned to walk toward him.
Then Emily was there beside her, helping her up, pushing her arms into the sleeves of the jacket. Over Emily’s shoulder, Cotannah glimpsed Peter Phillips offering a hand to Jacob, still prone on the ground.
Her fingers were trembling uncontrollably but somehow she pulled the jacket together across her bosom and buttoned it up all the way to the neck.
Then Aunt Ancie and Auntie Iola and Hattie swooped down on her.
“Don’t you think it’s a little late for modesty?” Iola said, her voice a scornful bark.
“Look here at the trouble you’ve caused, Missy,” Hattie blustered loudly. “I hope you’re pleased with yourself.”
Ancie didn’t say a word, but her face was stiff with disapproval. Her small black eyes popped furiously.
“It wasn’t my fault!” Cotannah cried. “Jacob wouldn’t let me go …”
“Oh, ’Tannah, you’re shaking all over,” Emily cried, hugging her close. “Dear Cotannah, did he hurt you? Oh, Lord, your screams are still ringing in my ears. We’ve got to get you to the house. Right now, right now!”
And so they did, to the house and into a hot bath and then her bed, with Emily chattering all the time and trying to keep the others from making reproving remarks, trying to keep her from listening to the sounds from downstairs and from the yard as the guests for the nut-gathering party gathered themselves together and shouted their opinions instead of picking up pecans. Finally, Emily dared to face down the older women bustling about the room. She shamed them for blaming Cotannah’s dress and behavior for Jacob’s boorish attempt at forcing himself on her.
“Remember what ’Tannah has been through in the past,” Emily scolded. “And remember that she was trying her best to get away from him. Why else would she have screamed like she did? She was telling him ‘no.’ Why else would he have been trying to force her?
“Look at her wrist! He nearly pulled her hand off! The poor dear can hardly use it at all!”
So Ancie, Iola, and Hattie’s recriminations subsided—for the moment, at least—to dire mutterings as they applied hot poultices to her wrist and ointment to the knot on the back of her head and made her drink an herbal tea. At last they left her, but with one last parting shot from Iola.
“You’ve stirred up the whole Nation tonight, causing this fight, and causing a good man to make bad medicine. Besides that tragedy, all we’ll hear for days and days now is those same old arguments about whether the alikchi is a witch or not. Starting tomorrow, I’m taking you in hand, young lady, just as your brother asked me to do.”
Cotannah closed her eyes against that horrendous prospect, squeezed Emily’s fingers in gratitude, and let the tea carry her off into sleep.
She woke suddenly, with her blood pounding in her ears signaling danger and her arms and legs tight, ready to run. She sat straight up in bed, eyes open, peering wildly into the darkness.
Tall Pine. She was at Tall Pine. Emily and Tay slept just down the hall, Aunt Ancie and Uncle Jumper were here.
No one was attacking her.
She breathed in deeply and forced the air back into her lungs as she pulled up the lavender-scented sheet she’d thrown off in her sleep. But still she didn’t feel safe. Something was terribly, grievously wrong.
Then the whole evening came flooding back, and guilt bore down on her like an oncoming train. She had caused a good man great
harm. She had caused him to scorn her and hate her.
Or was it hate and scorn in that last look he gave her?
Shuddering, she wrapped the sheet tight around her and closed her eyes but she could still see Walks-With-Spirits, his face terrible in fury, holding up his arms, putting the curse on Jacob. And him such a healer at heart! He was probably miserable with regret right now.
Or was he still in a fit of fury about what Jacob had tried to do to her?
Was his heart still full of vengeful turmoil? And oh, dear God, would he do even more harm—to himself, as well as to Jacob—by using Jacob’s saliva at dawn to strengthen the death curse?
He was blaming her, the same way the aunts were, she knew it. She had caused it all.
Never in her life had she felt such guilt.
Maybe she had done some bad things, like leading Tonio to think she cared more for him than she did, but she’d never before wronged someone as purely good as Walks-With-Spirits.
Suddenly, her feelings and thoughts began shifting inside her. They were like large, flat rocks moving against and on top of and under each other, starting to shape her mind and her self into a new configuration. Her breath came faster.
This had happened to her before, at the Academy in Arkansas when the lecher, Headmaster Haynes, cut her clothes off her body with his whip and soiled her skin and her soul with his greedy, lascivious eyes. It happened to her again that day on the rancho in Texas when the bandidos ran their rough, dirty hands over her skin and forced their stinking tongues into her mouth.
But this time was different. This time all the horror and all the cataclysmic changes, inside of her and out, stemmed from something she had done.
Somehow that realization strengthened her, in spite of the guilt and regret it laid on her. But why did it have to be bad that she had caused?
The old, sick feeling ran through her. Did that mean there was something wrong with her as she’d suspected for so long?
Walks-With-Spirits knew. He had looked straight into her soul the first time they met. And at the horse races, when he’d said she was degrading herself. And then, this evening, when he’d stood towering over her.
After the Thunder Page 11
