Captive (6 page)

From hating everyone and everything white …

“Jennifer is very well, I promise,” Tara said. “Come, you’ll see her.” She caught his hand, leading him toward the house.

“What news?” she asked tensely as they walked.

He was quiet a moment. “There wouldn’t be much new if it wasn’t for Major Warren,” he said.

“I heard,” Tara whispered.

Warren, gaining more power constantly within the military of the territory, was a bloodthirsty bastard. In the midst of mayhem and battle, James had usually found that most white men—even those who thought Seminole emigration westward the only solution to the “Indian problem”—were capable of reason. No man knew better than he that there were whites in the U.S. Army who would refuse to kill a child, any child. Life had taught him to be colorblind himself in judging men. Just as there were men who were innately good among the whites and the red men, there were men of both races who were innately evil.

Warren, he judged, was one of the latter, and he should have been shot long ago.

James had taken up arms against his father’s people, the whites, often enough since the war had begun—he’d been left with little choice. When his family and friends had been fired upon, he had fired in return. But he had never raided into the white world, burned a plantation— killed a white woman or child. When he had been able to do so, he had played the part of mediator. He had pleaded for his people on occasion, seeking reason. He had brought in those determined to obey white dictates and go west, and he had fought for those who were determined to stay. He had straddled a fence dangerously at times, but he had maintained his standing among the Seminoles and remained close with those whites who had always been his friends. It was a wretched existence, one he loathed. One he fought hard
to maintain now, because since Naomi and his child had died, he had felt rages so strong he feared he would rip apart anything he touched—a white man’s property, a white man himself …

They hadn’t been slain. They hadn’t been shot down and stabbed through with bayonets, like the women and children and old folks in the village Warren had raided so recently. They had died of disease.

God, but he could remember it all too well. Remember it with a clarity that robbed him of his breath, staggered him with the pain. They had contracted the fever because they had been running. Running deeper and deeper into the swamp because the soldiers were after them. Soldiers who would slay any Indians they came upon, young ones, old ones, men, women, maidens, little children. James had been gone when they had taken ill. He had been traveling in the area of Fort Brooke, engaged in negotiations for friends who were weary, admitting defeat, ready to travel to the dry, barren lands in the far west where the whites had decreed the Indians could live free. Friends had warned him that his wife had stopped her flight because she had been uanble to go farther. Then he had run himself, run hard and fast, a desperation in his soul.

He had run and run and run. But he had come too late. He had almost rejoiced to see that his brother had heard, too, and come in his stead, but his brother had come too late as well. James had come to find Jarrett kneeling on the ground, his black head bent low.

All too clearly he could relive those last few footsteps he had taken then!

When he had approached Jarrett, he had discovered that his brother held the body of his wife, and that Jarrett’s tear fell upon her soft golden flesh.
I’m sorry, oh, God, so, so sorry, I loved her, too…

Running, falling. He’d taken her body himself, cradled it there in the earth, sobs like howls shaking from his body, until there was sound no more, until silent tears streamed down his face.

Then he’d discovered that he’d lost his child as well. He’d wanted to die. He’d grieved without thought of water or sustenance, grieved the night, the day, the night, and still, with him, at his side, his brother had remained.

No, he could never hate his brother. But searing, awful fury and the need to strike in revenge had been with him ever since.

His father had taught him all the white ways; he knew the white world. He was no fool, and he knew the whites’ strength, and knew as well that he fought a desperate battle he most probably could not win. But neither could the whites beat the swamp, and therefore they could not beat the Indians. No one seemed to see that as yet.

“How many were killed in Warren’s raid?” Tara asked him, bringing him back to the present.

“Almost a hundred. He had sent out word that food and clothing and extra provisions would be given to any of those Indians who chose to move west within the month. He promised payments in gold. So many women, weary of running, of watching their children starve, were willing to believe him. I could have stopped them if I had reached them in time, but I was near Micanopy while they were south of St. Augustine. They went in ready to surrender, and Warren raided them at night. He claimed he thought it was warriors camping out, preparing to attack white farms, when an outcry was voiced by even those Floridians most hardened against the Indians.”

He decided not to tell Tara the rest. Speaking it out loud made it all the more horrible.

White soldiers had seen to the disposal of the bodies. But news leaked out. Infants had frequently died with their head bashed in—why waste a bullet? Women had been slit from throat to groin; old men had been mutilated as well as murdered.

James scowled. “So much for the cease-fire of March.”

“James, I am so sorry!” Tara said. “I beg you to remember that not all whites—”

“Are like Warren,” he agreed. “It’s just that too damned many are.”

They had come to the porch. Tara led him to the cradle that rocked gently in the breeze. His nephew, Ian, six months old now, lay within it sleeping peacefully. James smiled. The boy was a McKenzie, all right. Despite his mother’s glorious blond hair, his small head was capped with a surplus of shiny black hair. “Watch out for this angel!” he reminded Tara.

She wrinkled her nose to him. “And now—”

She didn’t get to finish. Another little dark-haired creature suddenly came flying out of the house from the back breezeway doors. His surviving daughter, Jennifer, now going on five years old, came hurtling into his arms. “Daddy!” she shrieked happily.

He lifted her up into his arms, held her tenderly against him. Her little heart beat quickly; she was warm and vital and alive. She smelled sweetly of Tara’s perfume. Nothing was as precious to him in all the world now as his daughter. She was all he had left. She had lived with Tara and Jarrett since her mother and sister had died, and she did so with the full understanding that he couldn’t always be with her. She was so very grown up for her age.

He held her still, but at arm’s length, studying her. She had a beautiful face, slim, golden. Her eyes weren’t his blue but her mother’s beautiful hazel, a shade of green and brown that sometimes seemed to haze together into a magnificent amber. She had pitch black hair that waved and curled to her waist, and she was dressed today like the most elegant of little white children. Tara made beautiful clothing for her, and showered love and attention on her.
Poor thing!
he thought suddenly,
what have I done to her?
For she was now a part of both worlds just as he was, torn between them, aching for them both, as he had always done.

“Jennifer, you are ravishing!” He hugged her close to
him again, looking at his sister-in-law over his daughter’s shoulder.
Thank you
, he mouthed.

“Daddy, you are ravishing, too,” Jennifer told him solemnly, taking his face between her chubby hands. “So handsome and formidable. Wickedly dangerous. Absolutely de-
lect
-albe!”

Startled that such words should come out of a mouth so young, he looked at Tara, who was blushing furiously. “Well,” she murmured uncomfortably, “you do create quite a stir. Chloe, the Smithsons’ daughter, was here to tea the other day with her cousin, Jemma Same.”

“And?” he demanded, baffled.

“Well, they’re young. Impressionable. They think of you as a noble …”

“Savage?” he supplied.

“James—”

“It’s all right. So, my daughter is parroting their words.”

She was silent a moment. “You are … an appealing man, James. I’ve told you that often enough.”

“And you are the one and only pale creature I find appealing, Tara. Alas, you’re married to my brother. Spare me from your friends who are entranced with the idea of a wickedly noble savage, will you?”

“That’s not really it at all—”

“Oh, Tara, I have been at enough of your parties. I have had numerous offers from supposedly innocent women, young and old, for comfort in my time of grief. It’s amazing how those offers come when I am decked out in European finery. If these same women were to come across an Indian village and find me fighting in the heat along with others dressed in breech clouts, I doubt they’d be so eager.”

“You might be surprised,” Tara mused softly.

“Ah, yes! Then bring on the fathers of these illustrious maidens. See what they would have to say about their daughters forming liaisons with a half-breed.”

“You are not so prejudiced as you pretend. I have heard rumors regarding a few of your liaisons.”

He shook his head, setting Jennifer down and telling her, “See Othello there?” He indicated his tall bay horse. “Catch his reins and walk him to the greener grass, sweetheart.” Jennifer smiled broadly, thrilled with the adult task. James watched his daughter hurry on, then turned to his sister-in-law. “Tara, I am a bruised and bitter man. There is nothing I have done with anyone since Naomi that might be considered a liaison, and I am very careful where I take solace at all, for I’ve nothing to give of myself. Your giggling young friends both amuse and annoy, for they are so bold to come forward, so eager to whisper and sigh. But watch their fathers come into the room, and see how fast they run. I am too hardened to be entertainment for any woman, white, red, or black—or as you once told me—zebra-striped.”

“Well, I am having a party tomorrow night, good friends, old friends, no army men, not even Tyler Argosy, though I have received a strange letter from him, telling me that he is on his way to fetch a child for some military commander. Jarrett comes home tonight or tomorrow. It’s a simple get-together for his birthday, and those here will all be people you know, friends. You will stay?”

“Tara—”

“It’s your brother’s birthday.”

He sighed. “Ah, yes. Dress me up, put me on display. Let them all see just how civilized a savage can be.”

“James!”

“Tara, I’m sorry. My bitterness is not toward you. Fine, I will stay. I have matters to discuss with my brother anyway, and I am anxious to see him.”

Tara gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I’ll tell Jeeves you’re staying for dinner and the night. Your room is always ready for you, and always awaits you.”

“A soft bed and good meal will sit well with me tonight, I think,” he told her gently.

She smiled and hurried on into the house.

*  *  *

Moments later, Tara McKenzie returned to the rear breezeway doors to the wraparound porch.

James still stood there, looking westward, into the interior of the territory, to the property line where the wild tangle of brush and trees began.

He stood in the sunset, the golds and mauves of the sky casting a true copper glow over his skin. She could see the taut, rippled muscles of his abdomen and chest beneath the open vest, the bronze strength within his shoulders and arms. The life he led had honed him to something as sleek and powerful as a great cat. In his close-fitting breeches and simple doeskin vest, he seemed an extraordinary figure, the noble savage indeed. But she knew him well, knew his anguish, his heartache—and his anger. And even as she watched him she shivered fiercely.

Heaven help the fool who teased the beast! she thought, then turned swiftly again, leaving him to the sunset and his own reflections upon it.

J
arrett McKenzie made record time coming down the river, arriving at his home dock when the sun had scarcely risen in the sky.

His guest, however, had been awake for some time. Even as they neared the shore, she stood at the bow, clearly fascinated by all that she saw.

He smiled, watching her.

Warren’s daughter! Who could have imagined!

Stepdaughter,
he reminded himself, as she had been so determined to point out. But even so, she had grown up with the man as her guardian, and she had somehow escaped the evil that seemed to cling like a miasma about the man. She was eager, bright, and honest.

And stunning.

He was glad his marriage was completely sound, or else it might be difficult explaining such a lush creature on his ship, unchaperoned. Teela Warren was like one of the indescribably beautiful wild birds of the area. Her coloring was vivid, her hair a rich, deep, sun-touched shade of red, her eyes as green as an endless field in the early summer. She was moderately tall for a woman, slim and lithe and yet exotic as well—even her volumes of clothing hinted at a ripe and beguiling figure. Her nose was small and pert, chin just a shade pointed, face a cross between an oval and a heart, brows a shade darker than her hair with a provocative, flyaway arch. There was a restlessness about her that seemed as enticing as her more obvious charms. He was enchanted by her, as he was sure Tara would be.

And he was heartily glad to do anything that might irritate Warren.

Last night, when he hadn’t been involved in sailing the ship, he’d spent some time with her. She’d spoken lovingly of her mother, and admitted that the gossip about her was true. She had walked out of her own wedding, but she’d had no choice. He couldn’t help but be amused. She was a fighter, striking back in the only way she knew how. If she had worried that she might be judged here, then she didn’t really understand this land of runaways yet. She would.

Ah, well, Jarrett would delightedly host her in his household as long as she wished, but there was little he could do when Warren sent for her. Warren hadn’t even asked him for the hospitality—Jarrett’s old friend, the army lieutenant Tyler Argosy, had asked him the favor. Jarrett had found the letter from his friend upon his arrival in Tampa for supplies. Tyler—or a very fine young soldier by the name of John Harrington—would probably be chosen to act as the girl’s escort, since both those men were the most knowledgeable—other than Jarrett himself—regarding the Indians in the area as well as the terrain. He’d heard rumors that Warren was interested now in a match between his daughter—stepdaughter—and Harrington. Young Harrington’s family was quite wealthy, and very influential in political circles.