Apache-Colton Series

by Janis Reams Hudson

  “You’re not suggesting we help them escape, are you?” Serena asked carefully.

  Jessie shook her head. “Of course not. Even if they got away, the Army would just take it out on the others already in Florida, and those still on the reservation. They’d hunt them down like dogs and kill them all this time.”

  “Then what are you suggesting?”

  “I don’t know.” Jessie closed her eyes a moment. “Something to make sure that they aren’t quite so vulnerable to being slaughtered in their sleep.”

  Daniella closed her eyes briefly. “Even Geronimo is worried, and that’s not like him.”

  “Why wouldn’t he worry about being shot?” Jessie asked.

  “The promise,” Serena whispered. “I’d almost forgotten.”

  “What promise?” Jessie demanded.

  “From Yúúsń—God. Geronimo swears God has promised he will never be killed by a bullet. And he believes it.”

  Jessie snorted. “A lot of good that will do him against a knife or a noose. I still say we need some way to see that they make it to Florida, at least. Why, why were they stopped here in the first place?”

  “I can answer that,” Daniella said tiredly. “President Cleveland never intended Geronimo be sent to Florida. He wanted him hanged in Arizona. Miles apparently pulled a fast one by getting the renegades on the train and out of the territory before the order reached him from Washington. Cleveland is furious. He had the train stopped here so he could figure out if there’s a way to send them back to Arizona for trial. At least Geronimo and Naiche. He doesn’t care about the rest of them.”

  “He doesn’t care much about anything but making himself look good,” Serena said with contempt. “He has to know what Miles promised them. Not that they’ll get much, if any, of it. But Miles did promise they wouldn’t be killed if they went to Florida.”

  “Yes, and the President isn’t pleased about that in the least,” Daniella said. “I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if this plan to kill them didn’t come directly from him.”

  “Wait a minute,” Jessie said, confused. “Would Lieutenant Gatewood have anything to do with such a plan, even if he were ordered?”

  Daniella heaved a sigh. “I don’t know. He wouldn’t like it. He would probably argue strongly against it. But presidents and generals rarely listen to lieutenants.”

  “That may be,” Serena said. “But I can’t believe Gatewood would be a party to something like this. He’s worked for years gaining Geronimo’s trust, and he’s a decent man.”

  “It can be done despite him,” Daniella said. “He’s just one man, after all. One man can always be silenced.”

  “Do you think…” Serena paused and looked at Jessie and her mother each in turn. “Could we…would Blake know anything about what’s being planned?”

  At the mention of his name a giant fist of pain squeezed Jessie’s heart.

  “I already thought of that,” Daniella said slowly. “There’s something else I must tell you, Jessie.”

  Jessie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It didn’t help. The pain was still there.

  “Jessie,” her mother said softly. “Blake’s gone. He’s checked out of his room.”

  A large lump formed in Jessie’s throat. Tears threatened, and she fought them with all her strength. “I…he thought he might have to leave today.”

  “With no word?” Serena cried. “Without telling you good-bye? But I thought he…you…why, that no good, rotten, low down—”

  “Rena,” Daniella said sharply. “That’s enough.”

  Jessie closed her eyes again. “It’s…all right, Rena. We…said our good-byes.”

  “Well,” Daniella said. “Since he’s gone, at least we know he’s not involved in whatever is planned at the fort.”

  In the heat of the overly warm room, Jessie shivered. She latched on to the comfort offered in her mother’s words. The man she loved couldn’t be involved in a planned attack against unarmed prisoners. He simply couldn’t.

  But she remembered the hard bitterness that came over him whenever Geronimo’s name was mentioned. Remembered the hate in his eyes, in his voice. She remembered how he had never answered her the times she’d asked about his orders. Even last night he’d evaded her questions. The memory chilled her. She shivered again.

  “In any case,” Daniella said. “Short of standing guard ourselves over the prisoners, I don’t know what we can do.”

  Jessie forced her mind back to the matter at hand. Planning how to prevent a massacre was less traumatic than wondering what Blake was doing, where he was, if he was involved in the Army’s plans to murder unarmed men, women and children.

  Unarmed. That was the crux of the matter. The prisoners were too vulnerable. At the total mercy of their captors. Not, Jessie thought wryly, a position often visited by Apaches. They were usually the captors.

  Yet arming them…dear heaven, Jessie thought as she rose from the settee and began to pace. If the Apaches were caught with guns they’d be killed for sure. She shook her head. “No, we can’t arm them.”

  “An interesting thought,” Serena said, “but you’re right. If they were caught…”

  “Precisely,” Jessie said.

  “If only there was someone close to them who could hide weapons.” Daniella leaned back and frowned. “Someone who would keep the guns hidden and out of the prisoners’ hands until and unless something happened.”

  “Not Gatewood,” Serena said firmly. “After what he’s done to Pace I wouldn’t trust him to help a little old lady across the street without tripping her.”

  “Wratten,” Jessie said.

  Daniella sat forward slowly, her eyes lightening. “The interpreter?”

  “Jessie,” Serena cried. “That’s it! He’s perfect.”

  “Will he do it, do you think?” Jessie asked.

  “Why don’t we pay him a visit and find out?” Serena suggested.

  Daniella looked skeptical. “What are we going to do, walk up and say, ’Hey, George, wanna hang on to a couple of dozen guns in case the prisoners need them to escape?”

  Jessie turned toward the window to hide her sudden laughter. The situation wasn’t the least bit amusing, but her emotions had been swinging from one end of the spectrum to the other for days. The mood changes seemed to have grown worse since…since last night.

  Jessie’s sense of humor fled. In it’s place crept a fierce longing to once again know the feel of Blake’s hands on the intimate places of her body.

  She blinked and forced herself to stare down at the old man pushing his tamale cart across the street.

  “Mother, please,” Serena said, rolling her eyes toward the ceiling. “Give me credit for having more sense than that.”

  Daniella smiled. “You know I do. But even if he’s willing, how do we get guns and ammunition to him?”

  Jessie let the questions and answers roll over her without paying much attention. She concentrated instead on the street vendor, because that was easier than thinking of Blake.

  The old man’s cart rolled on four wooden wheels, pushed along by means of a large handlebar about waist-high. The top surface of the cart bore a railing to keep the bowls and pots and two braziers from sliding off. Beneath the top was a shelf, supported at the corners by braces, bearing an array of spices and utensils. Beneath the shelf, the lower portion of the cart was enclosed as a cabinet. As Jessie watched, the old man opened a bottom door and brought out a stack of corn husks.

  Jessie slowly straightened. It could work!

  She whirled toward her mother. “How much money do we have with us?”

  Daniella blinked. “Enough.”

  “Why?” Serena demanded. “What are you thinking?”

  Jessie smiled. “I’m thinking of going into the tamale business.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Scores of curiosity seekers filled the quadrangle at Fort Sam Houston. They’d been coming every day to get a once-in-a-lifetime, safe look at the legendar
y terror of the Southwest—Geronimo. Instead of the somber atmosphere generally associated with a place where prisoners of war were quartered, the mood in the quadrangle was more like a damn carnival. Blake stood beneath the shade of a live oak at the far end and watched. What the hell was Stanley thinking of, letting all these civilians swarm around, through, and in between the prisoners and their guards?

  And why in God’s name hadn’t the Apaches taken advantage of the situation and made a break for it? With what Blake knew of Geronimo, it didn’t make sense. In all this confusion, Geronimo and his men could easily surprise the guards and probably get their weapons. From there, grab a few civilians, a quick dash through the gate, and they could disappear into the countryside in a flash. As good as they were at making themselves invisible in the barren desert, they’d have no trouble at all in a country full of trees and rivers, gullies and hills.

  Blake didn’t like anything about the setup. Not the civilians, not the prisoners being housed in tents in the quadrangle rather than in cells or barracks that could be guarded.

  Look at that, he thought with disgust. A tamale cart. Damn thing looked like the bottom half of it was big enough to smuggle out at least half the Apache children being held with the prisoners. Several children at once, or one woman. Or a man.

  Who the hell let those three old women in to sell their tamales, anyway?

  Blake was also getting a bad feeling in his gut about the rumors he’d been hearing. Rumors of attacking the prisoners in their sleep and claiming afterward they were shot while trying to escape. The most undigestible part of the whole thing was, Blake was about to decide they weren’t rumors at all, but definite plans. And not by a bunch of hot-headed civilians, either. This was military.

  Even worse, the plans—if that’s what they really were—included the murder of not only unarmed men, but the Apache women and children, too.

  While Blake had his own personal quarrel with Geronimo, and had no personal use for Apaches in general, even he wouldn’t stoop to murdering women and children in their sleep. Geronimo, maybe. Giving a man like Geronimo a chance to defend himself was like inviting a snake to strike first.

  But women and children? No. Blake would not be a part of it. He would do what he had to do tonight. If he managed to avoid getting caught, he’d be gone.

  And if he was going to act tonight, he had to study the layout of the tents. He was going to have to walk down their long length. He was going to walk past vendors selling caged mockingbirds, fresh vegetables, lemonade, and even three old women selling tamales.

  For an instant, he stared at the cart. One of the women…the way she moved, the tilt of her head, the sway of her hips, reminded him of Jessie. Of course, this woman was dressed in a worn skirt and dirty blouse, with a plaid blanket draped over her head and around her shoulders that effectively hid her face. From head to toe she was covered in dust and grime. His Jessie would never dress like that. Not on purpose. She was too neat and clean, too much the fashionable lady. If she were out and about town, she would—

  Fool. Don’t think about Jessie.

  Jessie was…he couldn’t finish the thought. Jessie was lost to him, just as surely as if one of them had died. The gaping hole deep inside of him was something he was going to have to get used to.

  He would take his official leave from the fort. Then he would slip back tonight and free Jessie’s brother. Then he would do what he came to do, and disappear.

  But first, he was going to by God stop thinking about Jessica Ann Colton. He was going to thread his way among the curiosity seekers, ignore the woman with the tamales who was perhaps not as old as he’d thought, and he was going to look upon the face of the man he’d come to kill.

  Jessie’s pulse hadn’t slowed since she’d first conceived of the idea of using the tamale cart to smuggle weapons for the Apaches into the fort. She kept the serape pulled forward, her face down, and wrapped tamales with trembling fingers.

  They had parked their cart next to George Wratten’s tent.

  Serena had come to the fort earlier in the day and sounded George out on the idea. He had been relieved, as he’d been extremely worried by all the talk of attacking the prisoners.

  As surreptitiously as possible, Serena and Daniella were slipping out a couple of guns at a time from the cabinet in the base of the cart and passing them to George.

  No telling how many tamales the poor man was going to have to eat as an excuse for lingering before they had all the guns and ammunition transferred to his tent.

  Jessie lifted more corn husks from the steam kettle over the first brazier and laid them out, lapping one over the other.

  “I guess all that time you spent in the kitchen is paying off,” Serena muttered.

  Jessie wasn’t in the proper frame of mind for idle talk. “How much longer?”

  “We have to be careful. Maybe another half hour. We’ve just about—” Serena’s words ended in a sharp hiss. Then she started swearing beneath her breath, low and vicious.

  Jessie looked up sharply to see what had set her off.

  “Keep your face down!” Serena whispered harshly while her lips formed a smile.

  But it was too late for Jessie to keep her face down. She stared in shock as Blake strolled casually toward them, arms folded across his chest, eyes narrowed to black slits. Jessie’s throat closed, locking the breath in her chest.

  Her first instinct was to run to him, to throw her arms around him, kiss that hard jaw, feel the rasp of his half-day beard, taste the sweet thrilling power of his kiss. Her lips formed his name. Her heart yearned for some sign of tenderness from him.

  Then came the doubt, the confusion, the stark pain. And the questions.

  What was he doing here? He was supposed to be gone! He’d told her good-bye last night as though they would never see each other again. As though it mattered to him. And he’d checked out of the hotel that very morning.

  What was he doing here?

  Dear God, was he going to give them away?

  Blake came to an abrupt halt ten feet away from the tamale cart and the woman he’d been unconsciously watching through narrowed eyes. Good God. Jessie! It was her! His heart gave a sharp kick to his breast bone.

  He saw the yearning in her eyes turn to questions, to hurt. He took a step toward her, then stopped. What could he say? He’d already told her good-bye. No matter how tonight ended, he would be forever out of her life. There wasn’t a chance in hell, even if he got clean away, that he could be part of her world.

  Still, he had deliberately led her to believe he would be gone today, and here he stood. He should tell her he was on his way. Would have, except for the sudden look of panic in her eyes.

  Then came questions of his own. Like what the hell was she up to?

  He cut his gaze sharply to the woman next to her. Serena. Behind them, dressed similarly to the other two, Daniella Colton stepped out of George Wratten’s tent with Wratten dogging her heels. For a moment, all four of them froze and stared at him, identical panicked looks on their faces. If Blake hadn’t been so damned worried about what they were up to, the tableau of suspended shock on their faces would have made him laugh.

  He’d never felt less like laughing.

  Daniella was the first to recover. With a look of cold speculation about her, and a definite dare in her heavily accented voice, she stepped toward the cart while keeping her gaze on him. “¿Tamale, señor? Only ten cents.”

  Looking back at Jessie, Blake stepped forward and reached into his pocket for the price.

  Jessie tore her gaze from Blake and reached for another batch of steamed corn husks. She was shaking so badly she scalded her hand. What was he doing here? Why had he lied to her?

  Serena served Blake his tamale, while he watched Jessie nurse her scalded fingers. Her cheeks were pale beneath the remains of the soft golden tan left by her sunburn.

  Suddenly Daniella and Serena went into motion, calling out to passersby to come and taste the best tama
les north of the Rio Grande. George Wratten stepped forward and slapped Blake on the back. “Captain Renard. Hot today, after all that rain, isn’t it?”

  Blake clenched his jaw. Whatever the hell they were up to, they obviously wanted him out of the way. Wratten was practically dragging him past the cart and down the quadrangle. With one last, suspicious gaze at Jessie, Blake let Wratten lead him away.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Blake demanded.

  Wratten blinked up at him, the perfect picture of innocence. “Why, whatever do you mean? Taste that tamale. Damn good, if you ask me. I’ve already had four, myself.”

  “Wratten, damn you, what the hell are those women up to?”

  George dropped his jovial act. Grim lines etched themselves around his mouth. “Trust me, Renard, you don’t want to know.”

  Blake was very much afraid George Wratten was right.

  The night seethed with the coming of another storm, this one giving all indications of being considerably more violent than the mild one the night before. Clouds boiled low in the sky while thunder boomed and lightning crashed, coming closer and closer to the fort. Blake was thankful the rain had held off so far, but he was glad for the wind and thunder. The noise would drown out the sound of his horse and the two he led. It was time to get Pace Colton out of the guard house.

  He’d thought long and hard about what he was doing. Wondered if he should change out of his uniform. He was proud of the uniform and his rank. Was he about to disgrace both?

  After hours of soul-searching—or was it justification, he wondered—he’d decided that freeing Pace Colton was more an act of justice than disgrace. The disgrace was that General Miles had used his command authority to arrest an innocent man.