Apache-Colton Series

by Janis Reams Hudson

  Angela had to practically run to keep up with him. It was either that, or fall down and be dragged, for he had a tight hold on her hand and his stride was long. They reached the central campfire just as two riders came in, and Angela stared at them openmouthed.

  The man was big and blond and handsome, and very obviously Matt’s father. The two men looked so much alike it was remarkable. If they were closer in age they could have passed for identical twins, right down to the scar each bore on his cheek.

  Angela recognized the woman from Matt’s description, but he’d failed to say how beautiful his stepmother was. Her long black hair fell over her shoulders in waves and hung to her waist, the white streak at her left temple glowing in contrast.

  Travis and Daniella Colton.

  Angela’s knees weakened. Her parents-in-law! Not that she really considered herself married to Matt, but everyone else did. His parents would. What would they think? Her hair was mussed, her face was streaked with sweat and freckles, her dress was soiled, and her arm was in a sling. If she’d purposely tried to make herself unpresentable, she couldn’t have done a better job.

  The two dismounted and greeted Cochise warmly, then walked together toward Matt and Angela. The four of them stood silent for a moment, the older couple looking Angela over carefully.

  “Matt, what’s—”

  Travis Colton’s words ended in a pained cough, triggered undoubtedly by the sudden impact of his wife’s elbow against his ribs.

  Startled by the byplay, Angela waited warily as Matt’s stepmother reached toward her with both hands.

  “My dear,” the woman said, “we’re so glad to finally meet you.” She grasped Angela’s cold hands in her warm ones.

  Matt’s hand on Angela’s shoulder gave Angela the courage she needed to return his stepmother’s smile. “And I, you.” Angela was proud of herself. Her voice barely shook at all, even though her knees and smile did. “Matt’s told me so much about you.”

  Angela chanced a quick glance at Matt’s father. The man’s face was carefully blank.

  A moment later the newcomers were surrounded by members of the tribe who’d come to welcome them, and there was no more chance for private talk. Angela nearly wilted with relief at having the inevitable questions postponed.

  It was later in the evening, while the four adult Coltons sat with Tom Jeffords, before any more questions were asked. Angela felt Matt tense beside her. She followed his gaze to see Captain Sladen heading directly toward them.

  Her first instinct was to run. Matt must have read or felt her thoughts, for he grasped her hand and laced his fingers through hers. She held on to him as if she were drowning and he was her lifeline.

  “Pardon me if I’m intruding, ladies, gentlemen,” Sladen said, doffing his hat and nodding to the women.

  “Not at all, Captain,” Matt answered easily. “Have a seat. What can we do for you?”

  Sladen sat on the ground with them and fidgeted with his hat while Angela held her breath. “Well.” He cleared his throat. “I don’t know how to go about this. It’s going to sound a little crazy. But, mind, I’m just following orders.”

  “Orders, Captain?” Daniella Colton asked.

  “Yes ma’am.” He cleared his throat again, then looked at Angela. “I’m supposed to try to locate a young lady answering your description, Mrs. Colton.”

  “Really?” Angela said breathlessly. She didn’t have to feign the breathlessness at all. This moment had been looming over her all day, stretching her nerves near the breaking point. At least the waiting was over. It was happening.

  She forced herself to take a deep breath in an attempt to relax and appear normal. All she had to do was repeat the story she’d made up last night for Shanta. She had to keep it straight, though, so as not to trip herself on all the lies. Matt was counting on her. He’d saved her life. She wanted desperately to be able to do this for him.

  And she could do it. She would. She squeezed Matt’s fingers for strength. What was there to worry about? Who here could contradict her story anyway? With that thought came a confidence she’d despaired of ever feeling again. She jerked her mind back to the man before her and gave him her full attention.

  “Yes ma’am. You see…“Sladen cleared his throat yet again, the sound grating on Angela’s already taut nerves. “You see, a girl named Angela Barnes was kidnapped from a wagon train by Apaches, and the tracks led in this general direction.”

  “But Captain,” Angela protested, blinking her eyes and swallowing hard. “Surely there’s been some mistake.”

  “How’s that, ma’am?”

  “I’m Angela Barnes, or I was,” she said, casting Matt a tender look. Funny how easily that came, even in spite of the fear ricocheting through her body. “And I was with a wagon train. But I certainly wasn’t kidnapped by Apaches.”

  “But your wagon was found burned, your parents dead, and you, missing.”

  “Maybe you’d better explain to the captain just what happened, Angel,” Matt suggested with a soft smile.

  “Yes, I guess I’d better.” So Angela repeated the story she’d invented last night for Shanta, telling how she was to meet Matt in Tucson, but had to turn back. It wasn’t hard to produce real tears when she told about her parents, and she vaguely heard Daniella mumbling her sympathy. “So you see, Captain, I was never kidnapped at all. Someone just jumped to conclusions.”

  Captain Sladen smiled at her. “You’re a lucky man, Colton. This little lady went through a powerful lot just to get to you.”

  “I know,” Matt said, putting his arm around her and hugging her to his side.

  “But what do I tell the commander at Camp Bowie about your wagon? What happened to it?”

  “Oh,” Angela said with a nervous laugh. “That was my fault, and I’m paying for it every day. I knocked over a lantern while climbing out over the tailgate. By the time I realized the wagon was on fire, it was too late to save anything. All my clothes were lost, and my hope chest.” She cast Matt a look of despair.

  “I told you not to worry about that, sweetheart,” Matt said, giving her another hug. “We’ll buy you all new clothes when we get to Tucson.”

  Captain Sladen shook his head. “I’m right sorry about you losing your family like that. Lucky for you you had Colton waiting for you. No telling what might have happened to you out there on the trail, all alone.” He shook his head again then chuckled. “My wife’s going to love this story when I tell her. She’ll think it’s the most romantic thing she’s ever heard. But I think I’ll skip the part about all your clothes burning. She’d probably set fire to her closet just so she could buy a whole new wardrobe.”

  Angela felt her heartbeat start to slow to a more normal rhythm. It was working! The captain believed her! She felt weak with relief. Until Tom Jeffords spoke.

  “Where are you from, Angela? How’d you meet Matt?”

  Angela’s heartbeat raced again. She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Matt squeezed her fingers gently and answered for her.

  “She’s from Memphis. I met her when I was up there last year.”

  Just then Matt’s father, seated to Angela’s left, began to cough and choke. Daniella, sitting on the other side of him, pounded him on the back. “Are you all right, Travis?” she asked. She pounded on him a few more times, frowning, until he scowled and motioned for her to leave him alone.

  “I’m fine,” he finally managed.

  When the captain left, Tom rolled himself a cigarette and took a long drag, exhaling slowly. Angela could practically see his mind ticking away. His eyes said he hadn’t believed a word of her story. She held her breath, waiting for his denouncement.

  “Well Matt, you’ve got yourself the prettiest little bride this side of the Mississippi. If you’re smart,” he said with a wink as he stood to leave, “you’ll keep her.”

  “What do you suppose he meant by that?” Angela whispered when he was gone.

  “Knowing Tom, there’s no te
lling,” Matt said easily. “Come on, Angel, let’s turn in. I know you’re tired and your arm’s bothering you. Dad, Dani, we’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Matt?”

  “Don’t ask, Dad.”

  Travis Colton wrinkled his brow in frustration and eyed his son. He started to speak, but Daniella cut him off with a hand on his shoulder.

  “Leave it for now, Travis. The night has too many ears.”

  Travis heaved a sigh and nodded. “All right. For now. Good night, you two.”

  “‘Night, Dad, Dani.”

  Before anything else could happen, Matt hustled Angela off to their wickiup. A shaft of moonlight streamed in through the smoke hole and cut a swath in the darkness. As Angela entered the streak of light on her way to the bed, Matt gently caught her arm and turned her toward him, then tilted her face up.

  Angela’s breath caught at the tender touch of his hand on her chin. Only half his face was visible, the other half shadowed. Her heart skipped a beat at the look in the eye above his scarred cheek. It was a soft look filled with many things she didn’t understand. When he spoke, his voice was scarcely more than a husky whisper.

  “Thank you.”

  She shook her head and opened her mouth to speak, but he closed her lips with his thumb.

  “You held the fate of an entire nation in your hands tonight. With one word, you could have destroyed the Chúk'ánéné, yet you didn’t. You lied for them. You kept your promise. Forgive me for ever doubting your word.”

  His callused thumb felt rough and exciting against her lips before it trailed over her chin and down her throat. He bent his head, throwing his features into darkness, making it impossible for Angela to read his face. Her lips parted. Surely he could feel her trembling, hear her heart pounding in her chest.

  A soft puff of warm breath brushed her cheek, then a softer, warmer pair of lips feathered across her mouth. Her very bones melted, but somehow she managed to stay on her feet. His lips pressed hers again, lightly, gently.

  “Thank you,” he whispered.

  When he lifted his head and backed away, Angela nearly cried out in protest.

  Later, when they were lying side by side in bed, not touching, Angela asked, “Were you really in Memphis last year?”

  “Huh uh.”

  “Then your parents knew you were lying?”

  “Uh huh.”

  Both of them spent hours staring up at the grass dome in the darkness before they finally fell asleep.

  Chapter Sixteen

  It was several days before all the other leaders Cochise had sent for finally arrived. In the meantime, the rancheria was in a constant state of turmoil.

  And Angela was in a constant state of apprehension. She kept waiting for Travis or Daniella to ask the inevitable questions, but they seemed content to leave matters alone for the time being. Perhaps Matt had spoken with them privately.

  The only good thing to happen during those days was that Angela was reassured she wasn’t with child. She’d never dreamed she’d ever be glad for that time of month to come, but she was this time. At least now she wouldn’t have to worry about that particular complication. She could put their wedding night firmly in the past…where it belonged. She shook off the strange feeling of emptiness that thought produced.

  It had been years since Cochise and Taglito had seen one another, so now they took time out to get reacquainted and caught up on the latest news. Travis and Hal-Say joined a group of hunters to provide more fresh meat for the other Chiricahua who were coming in. Matt and Daniella, sometimes accompanied by Angela (whenever Huera didn’t need her) or the twins (when they were allowed), took charge of showing General Howard and Captain Sladen around.

  General Howard was especially fascinated by the children of the tribe, and he asked Pace and Serena dozens questions. Those two immediately swelled with their own importance.

  Daniella rolled her eyes and groaned. “There’ll be no living with them after this.”

  “That’s the second dog I’ve seen today with its feet wrapped,” Sladen noted aloud. “Have they been injured?”

  Daniella smiled and shook her head. “That’s the same thought I had when I first saw them years ago,” she answered. “Those aren’t wrappings, they’re moccasins.” Sladen furrowed his brow and blinked, while Howard frowned. Daniella glanced at Matt and her grin widened. “This is rocky terrain. The moccasins are to protect the dogs’ feet.”

  The two white men looked at each other. “Well I’ll be…” Howard muttered.

  Daniella could practically read their thoughts. Thoughts about a vicious tribe of murdering savages who made moccasins to protect the feet of their puppies.

  Sladen wandered off on his own, and Pace took the general to the boys’ playing field. There the young boy showed the general the twisted grass target the boys used in their bow and arrow practice.

  There were a dozen other games going on on the field. Howard was surprised at how ordinary and universal these games were. One group of boys was playing hide and seek at the edge of the woods. There was also a foot race in progress, and teams were being chosen for tug of war. In the center of the field four different wrestling matches were under way.

  “How extraordinary,” General Howard said out loud. He ran his thumb over the pebbly leather cover of the Bible tucked beneath his belt and felt blessed at being the one chosen to bring peace to these people. “It’s absolutely remarkable that people from two such diverse cultures, Americans and Apaches, should each begin their lives playing the same childhood games.”

  His idea was reinforced when he saw young girls building their own small wickiups and furnishing them with broken pieces of pottery and scraps of hide. Some of them even had cornhusk dolls dressed in leather, with hair from a horse’s tail sewn into the dolls’ heads.

  “They’re playing house!” Howard said.

  He even saw two girls playing with a string. They were making a cat’s cradle! “My mother taught me that when I was just a youngster,” he muttered.

  Matt and Daniella looked at each other and smiled. No matter what he’d thought about Apaches and their way of life when he came here, the children of the tribe had won the general over as nothing else could have.

  Daniella blinked back the sudden rush of tears that came to her eyes. Long before the twins were born, Dee-O-Det had told her that her children would be important to The People. They would be a bridge between the white man and the Apache.

  As if her thoughts had conjured him up, she saw Dee-O-Det out the corner of her eye. She looked at him fully, but he was watching Pace and Serena with General Howard. The old shaman wore a pleased, knowing look on his weathered face. He looked at Daniella then and raised his brows as if to say, “Did I not tell you? A shaman knows these things.”

  One by one, the other Chiricahua leaders arrived. Juh came up from the south, and with him were Golthlay and old Nana. From the west there was Mangas-Chee, son of Mon-ache—Mangas Coloradas—who’d been murdered years ago after asking for peace and surrendering to the bluecoats. Chihuahua came in from the east.

  When all the leaders from the outlying camps were assembled and the negotiations were ready to begin in earnest, Travis and Daniella decided Cochise had enough on his mind without having to worry about Pace and Serena, so they decided to take the twins home.

  “We’ll see you soon?” Travis asked when they were ready to ride. “Both of you?”

  Matt put his arm around Angela’s shoulders and pulled her to his side. “We’ll stay till this treaty is worked out. Cochise has asked me to help translate. Then we’ll be home. Both of us.”

  Anyone who wasn’t needed elsewhere spent every minute possible listening to the negotiations. Several times General Howard and Captain Sladen were asked to take a walk, and heated discussions ensued amongst the Chiricahua. There were some present who were against any type of treaty with the white man. Tahnito was one of the most vocal.

  “Why should we let them tell us where we ca
n and cannot go? Where we can and cannot live? We were here first! It is our own land they want to give us!”

  “If you don’t have anything new to say, young pup, then keep quiet.” Cochise said. “We’ve already been over that trail.”

  Tahnito opened his mouth to argue further, but Bear Killer stopped him with a sharp motion of his hand. “Bíni', Tahnito,” Bear Killer warned. “Let it go.”

  The two men stared at each other, their eyes locked. What Tahnito saw in his foe’s eyes turned his anger into a boiling rage. The message was plain. The white girl was safe now. If Tahnito continued to hinder the making of this treaty, Bear Killer would expose him. Tahnito’s hatred knew no bounds. It was true he didn’t care if there ever was peace. But he could not afford to be the one to prevent it. Cochise would murder him.

  Tahnito glanced at his chief, then threw Bear Killer a murderous look before taking his leave.

  Someday, my treacherous white friend, I will kill you.

  Angela slumped with relief when Tahnito left. She saw Matt’s shoulders visibly relax.

  Poor Matt. He was working so hard for this treaty. At times it seemed as if it was more important to him than it was to Cochise or Howard. He never left a meeting in progress for any reason. When the meetings broke up, he went from group to group, helping hammer out the myriad differences and misunderstandings. He carefully measured each word he spoke, lest the words lose something in their translation.

  When he finally entered the wickiup late each night he was exhausted. One night he didn’t make it to bed at all. He’d stayed beside the central campfire with Howard, negotiating for more land for the reservation, going over each and every boundary. He won some points, lost others.

  Sometimes, when Angela set a meal before him, he was so exhausted he’d just stare at it like he wasn’t sure what it was. Last night he’d been so stiff from sitting long hours without moving that Angela knelt beside him as he lay on his face and she massaged his shoulders.