Apache-Colton Series

by Janis Reams Hudson

  The old man paused and stared thoughtfully off into space. Travis prodded him from his musings. “Then what happened?”

  “Well, then they drug her out from the middle of camp and just left her sprawled out on the ground under this big ol’ pine tree. Just left her to die, they did. And that’s what usually happened to their white captives…they nearly always died. It was a might cold up in them mountains, ‘specially at night, and her not havin’ a lick o’ clothes on. I wanted to at least take her a blanket, but them bastards wouldn’t let me.

  “Afore long, Cochise and the rest of the hunting party came in. That’s when they made me go back to my wickiup.

  “Yes sir, that’s when things started gittin’ strange. This big wind come up and it got all cloudy, blockin’ out all the stars and the moon. Thunder and lightnin’ was everwhere, gittin’ closer all the time, but no rain—not a drop. Just about time for the sun to come up, we was all woke up by this big, loud explosion—the ground shook, the air shook—hell, everthang shook. It was real spooky, I’ll tell ya that. I thought it was the end of the world, or at least an earthquake. I heard of them before.

  “Anyways, we all went out to the middle of camp to see what the hell had happened, and there the girl was, just where they left her, at the base of that pine tree. ‘Cept that pine tree wasn’t standin’ there no more, no sirree. It was split clean in two, right smack dab down the middle, layin’ in halves on the ground. That’s when somebody noticed the streak in the girl’s hair.

  “The old shaman came forward and said it was a sign. Said the Great Spirit put that streak in her hair so’s everbody would know how brave and courageous she was. Yep,” he added with an emphatic nod. “That’s what he said, all right. So who am I to say any different?”

  Tucker’s version coincided with what Cochise had said at the council that night. Anyway, like the old man said, who was he to say any differently? Besides, there was another question ticking away in the back of Travis’s mind.

  “When did all this happen, Tucker? How long ago?”

  “Ain’t exactly sure, but I’d say it was some time in February. Why?”

  “I just wondered, that’s all.” Travis looked away from the old man’s squinty gray eyes that saw too much. “I just…oh, never mind.”

  “Well,” Tucker said getting to his feet. “Since you say the girl’s gonna be all right, I’d better be moseying on home. Simon’ll be worryin’ ‘bout what happened to us. It’ll pert near be dark by the time I get there.”

  “Simon?”

  “Youngster the girl took in to look after the sheep.”

  “Sheep!” Lord, I’m starting to sound like a parrot. “You’ve got sheep up in that valley?”

  “Not me.” Tucker raised his hands in denial. “They ain’t my sheep, they’re the girl’s.”

  “Good God. Doesn’t she realize this is cattle country? She’d better keep them well out of sight, or she’ll have nothing but trouble from the ranchers in the area.”

  “She knows that, I think.”

  Travis walked out to the wagon with Tucker, and they decided the two Apache boys should stay at the Triple C, since their Spanish wasn’t too good, and Dani and Matt were the only ones who spoke their language.

  “By the way,” Travis said as Tucker was ready to pullout, “did they let you finish burying Jacob?”

  “Nope. Them sonsabitches ate him.”

  Travis laughed for the first time that day. “So long. I’ll send word how Dani’s doing. Come back anytime.”

  Tucker set the horses in motion and the wagon pulled out in the late afternoon heat. Travis watched him for a while, then turned to go back inside. Carmen met him at the door.

  “Why is he leaving the girl here?” she demanded.

  Travis walked past her and headed for his study. “She’s been shot, Carmen. She’s in no shape to travel, and there’s no one but the old man and a boy to tend her. We can take better care of her here.” He sat down behind his desk and flipped open a ledger, hoping Carmen would think he was busy and leave him alone. He wasn’t in the mood for her today. He hadn’t been in the mood for her in months.

  “You can’t mean to let her stay in this house until she’s recovered! ¡Dios! You expect me to share a home with a puta like her?”

  Travis’s head snapped up. His hands tightened on the ledger. “I don’t expect you to share anything with anyone, Carmen. I intend to share my home with a young woman who’s in need of help, to whom I happen to owe a great deal, if you’ll recall. Miss Blackwood is my guest. And in case you’ve forgotten, you and your aunt share her status. I expect you to treat each other politely. If one guest is rude to another, the first one’s welcome soon wears thin.”

  The look in her eyes told him she understood his meaning clearly, and she didn’t like it. Well that was just too damn bad. Maybe she’d finally pack up and leave.

  As Carmen flounced out of the room with an indignant rustle of silk against silk, Travis chastised himself. He should have been more patient with her. He knew she had no place to go if she left the ranch. He was good and stuck with her for the time being. Last week she sent out letters trying to locate relatives in Mexico. Until she received a positive reply, he couldn’t find it within himself to demand she leave.

  For a man who had no desire for a woman of his own, he sure had an uncommon number of them under his roof.

  On his way to find a bed for the night, Travis stopped at his room to check on Dani. When he sat down beside her, she opened her eyes.

  “Welcome back.” Travis smiled down at her gently. “Can I get you anything?”

  She looked up at him through pain-fogged eyes and lifted her hand toward his face. Travis leaned close and took her hand in his. He pressed her palm to his mouth and kissed her damp skin. When he released her hand she traced the scar on his cheek with a trembling finger, sending his blood coursing through his veins. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, fighting the sudden urge to crush her to his chest. When he looked at her again, her hand rested on the quilt once more. She was asleep.

  He leaned forward and placed a tender kiss on her brow.

  When he stood, a movement across the room caught his eye. It was Rosita, there to watch over her charge during the night.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Travis woke the next morning with stiff muscles from sleeping on the too-short sofa in his study. With Dani in his bed, and Carmen having taken a room separate from her aunt a few weeks ago, there wasn’t a bed left in the house.

  With Dani in his bed.

  The thought brought a sharpness to his breath and set his heart to pounding. He tried to squelch the idea that he should be in there with her. In bed with her.

  With a curse at his own foolishness, he threw off the blanket and got up. He didn’t shave or clean up or eat breakfast. Instead, he went to check on Dani.

  “How is she, Rosita?”

  “She was awake this morning for a few minutes, but now I fear the fever has started.” The middle-aged woman frowned.

  Travis saw Dani’s flushed cheeks and felt concern. Then he noticed the tired slump to Rosita’s shoulders. The poor woman had been in this room tending Dani since yesterday.

  “I’m going to go clean up and get something to eat, then I’ll relieve you for a while. We can’t have both of you coming down sick.”

  Twenty minutes later Travis was back, pushing a reluctant Rosita out the door, stilling her arguments with a stern set to his jaw. Rosita finally agreed to rest for a short time, saying she would be back soon.

  Following Rosita’s instructions, delivered with the tone of military command, Travis bathed Dani’s face and neck with a cool wet cloth. He didn’t quite understand why this girl had filled his thoughts so much since the instant he’d seen her, but right now it wasn’t important.

  Dani opened her eyes and looked at him, but when she spoke, he realized she didn’t recognize him.

  “But Grandfather, if there’s going to be a war n
ow that South Carolina has seceded from the Union, I must go home before travel becomes difficult, if not impossible.”

  She mumbled something unintelligible, then tossed her head back and forth. Travis fought to keep the cool cloth in place on her brow.

  “Papa, why did Mama have to die?” she asked in a little-girl voice.

  Travis ached, knowing no way to ease the suffering in her mind or body. She tossed her head again, then took on a lecturing tone as she continued speaking in her delirium.

  “Oh, no…there’s nothing to worry about. The Apaches don’t usually bother Americans. It’s the Mexicans they fight with. Those riders behind us are probably just out on a hunt.”

  Dani began tossing violently, and it was all Travis could do to keep her on the bed. When she started to moan and whimper, he felt his insides twist in dread. Her fever was rising. He remembered Rosita’s fear that Dani could lose the baby she carried.

  Travis stuck his head out the door and bellowed for someone to fetch Rosita.

  “No…no,” Dani murmured in her fever.

  “It’s all right, Dani. You’re safe now. Nothing is going to harm you,” Travis told the unconscious girl. “You’re safe now.”

  His deep voice must have reached some part of her fevered brain, for she quieted at his words, even though she continued to speak.

  “Look, Tucker…there…in the flames. It’s him! I thought he was dead, but he isn’t. See where the flames turn a pale gold around his face?” She smiled at what she saw, but her smile slowly faded. “He searches for someone. The boy! His son! The boy with the golden curls, who looks just like his father. The man’s pain is so strong I can feel it. Who is he?”

  Travis felt the blood drain from his face as she spoke. No matter what she’d said in the past, he just hadn’t been able to accept that she really had visions. Maybe he’d been wrong.

  When she spoke next, her voice was bitter. “They honor me and treat me with respect—now. But I’m afraid of them! And I hate them for what they’ve done to me!” As Travis continued bathing her brow, she began to plead.

  “But Papa, don’t you love me any more? All I did was come home.”

  Then she started to cry. “I’m not! I’m not! Papa, please!”

  Travis knew he had to calm her somehow before her thrashing reopened her wound. “Dani, hush now. Be still. Hush, love…it’s all right.”

  Once more his voice soothed her, and she quieted.

  Rosita came. She and Travis spent hours cooling Dani when she was hot and smothering her in blankets and quilts when she grew chilled. At one point, Dani’s fever was so high Rosita insisted they remove the girl’s gown and bathe her entire body with cool water. The young girl’s health, and that of her unborn child, were too important to bother with proprieties.

  When they stripped the gown from Dani’s fevered body, Rosita and Travis both gasped. They stared in horror at two angry red scars, one on the inside of each of Dani’s thighs. “Those are burns, Señor!”

  Travis’s vision blurred. He had to look away before his emotions got the better of him.

  My God, my God, Dani, what did those bastards do to you? Pity and sympathy mixed with the other feelings he held for her but couldn’t, or wouldn’t, identify.

  The wounds were healed, but how many more scars were there, unseen scars? Visions of her lying beneath one Apache after another tortured his mind. Rage and a terrible sense of helplessness filled him. He felt a huge lump in his throat and was consumed again with a desire to protect this woman from any further pain.

  For three days her fever raged. Juanita came to relieve Rosita, but Travis refused to leave the room. He caught brief snatches of sleep in his chair beside the bed during Dani’s quieter moments, but her slightest movement or murmur jerked him awake time after time.

  Rosita returned, then Juanita, then Rosita again, until Travis neither knew nor cared who helped him care for Dani. They spooned warm broth and herbal brews into her mouth periodically, and bathed her often to cool her heated flesh. Beyond that, there wasn’t much else they could do, except pray. They did that, too.

  As dawn stretched its red fingers across the sky, beads of sweat appeared on Dani’s face. Rosita and Travis breathed a joint sigh of relief that the fever had finally broken.

  A short time later, Travis locked himself in his study and sought the sofa for some much needed sleep. He woke late that afternoon and his first thought was of Dani. How was she? Before he even realized it, he was standing outside his bedroom door. He knocked softly, then entered. She was awake. He smiled down at her, noticing how much better she looked after several hours of restful sleep, and sighed in relief.

  “You had us pretty worried for a while. How are you feeling?”

  “Much better, thank you.” Daniella looked down nervously and plucked at the colorful quilt which covered her. “The boys? Are they all right?”

  “They’re fine,” Travis assured her. He sat in the chair next to the bed. “They’re with Matt. Tucker went home right after we brought you in, after we were sure you were going to be all right. He said he didn’t want Simon to worry.”

  Daniella closed her eyes in relief. When she’d awakened a few minutes ago, she couldn’t remember anything past climbing into the wagon and heading out of town. She was grateful everyone was safe. “No one else was hurt?”

  “No. Why’d you do it, Dani?”

  Her eyes flew open and searched his face. “Do what?”

  “Take on that crowd in town. Damn it, you could have been killed. You almost were.” His deep brown eyes bored into her with anger and something else she couldn’t identify.

  “I couldn’t just let Crane hang those boys. I had to do something.” She moved then, and her shoulder reminded her she shouldn’t have.

  “Be still. That wound’s going to take some time to heal. We’ll talk about this later. You just get some rest.”

  Before the pain in her shoulder subsided, Travis was gone.

  She slept the rest of the afternoon. Aside from Rosita and Juanita, who saw to her comfort and brought her a bowl of broth, she was left alone until after breakfast the next morning, when Carmen swept into the room with a swirl of silk and a fragrant cloud of rose-scented perfume.

  After taking the chair Travis had occupied only yesterday, the woman spent an eternity arranging her skirts before turning a look of pity on Daniella. “You poor child,” she said, clucking her tongue. “We’ve all been so worried about you. It’s good to see you looking better.”

  “Thank you,” Daniella said, wondering where all this concern came from.

  Carmen gave her a smile dripping with condescension. “I know we didn’t get off to a very good start that first time we met, but that’s all behind us now.”

  Daniella kept her face carefully blank, and thought, Don’t count on it.

  “We’re all so grateful to you for finding Matt. Ever since Travis brought him home, well, you wouldn’t believe the change in this household. We’re a family again.”

  We? Who was she trying to kid? If Carmen and Travis were a we, someone forgot to tell Travis. If he was in love with Carmen, would he have held Daniella in the night the way he had? Would he have kissed her the day they parted?

  Maybe, she thought with a sudden wave of weariness. If he’d held her and kissed her out of gratitude. Her heart gave a rapid flutter. Gratitude. Of course.

  “Travis and Matt both admire your strength, your courage, and I must say I agree with them. I’m sure I would never have the nerve to do half the things you’ve done. And with a child on the way, too.”

  Daniella felt the blood leave her face.

  “Oh, don’t worry, my dear,” Carmen said patting Daniella’s hand. “It’s not that there’s gossip, it’s just that I couldn’t help but overhear. It really makes me feel quite the coward. In your place, unmarried, faced with raising a half-breed bastard on my own, I’d never be able to show myself again, much less go to town the way you did. I fear I’d flee t
he territory the first chance I got. ¡Dios! I’d never have your courage.”

  The intentional barbs cut deep into Daniella’s soul. And it was intentional, she knew. The words were too smooth, too polished. She wondered how long Carmen had rehearsed them.

  “But you needn’t worry about Travis,” Carmen went on. “He is so grateful to have his son back, he can overlook practically anything. Even your present circumstances. In fact, if you did want to go away for a while, I’m sure he would help you. I have heard him say he would do whatever he could to repay the debt he owes you. And he feels so sorry for you.”

  Daniella knew Carmen was being deliberately cruel, but there was a ring of truth to her words. Travis himself had offered to repay her for finding Matt. Anything you need, he’d said. That’s why he was being so nice, having Rosita and Juanita take such good care of her. He thought he owed her.

  A sick feeling churned in her stomach. She wished Carmen would go away and let her sleep. As soon as she could sit up without the room spinning, she’d get out of here. She’d go home. She didn’t want his pity or his gratitude.

  Travis saw Juanita leave Dani’s room early the next morning, and he stopped in to say hello. He was pleased to find some color back in her cheeks.

  “Good morning,” he greeted warmly.

  “Good morning.” Daniella lowered her eyes in shyness. She struggled to sit up, and he was there instantly to help her with the pillows. She inhaled the clean fresh scent of him. When his arm brushed her shoulder, her pulse quickened.