Frontier Woman (37 page)

“You can put me down now. I can stand on my own two feet.”

To Rip’s surprise, Creed smiled ruefully, then complied. “Sure, Brava . . . your own two feet.”

But Rip noticed Creed slipped an arm around Cricket’s shoulders to support her and she accepted his assistance.

“They’re both still alive!”

Sloan’s exclamation brought them all on the run to see to the two injured visitors. Rip bent down on one knee next to Sloan as she explained what she’d discovered.

“LeFevre is barely alive, but if we could stop the bleeding he might make it,” she said. “Angelique’s injuries are not as serious, but she’s also losing a lot of blood.”

The shadow of a man appeared so suddenly at Rip’s shoulder that Sloan almost shot him. “Luke! What are you doing here?”

“I was out riding and saw the smoke. I came running, but by the time I got back here the Comanches were long gone—and so were you.”

Luke fought to hide his trembling relief at finding them all alive, which would have seemed extraordinary under the circumstances. He’d been worrying for days over whether to tell Rip Stewart who he really was, and during the short ride from the house to this hidden passage he’d had time to work up a pretty good fear that he’d be too late, that Rip would be dead and he’d never have the chance to say
“I’m your son.”

But the old man had survived. He should have known. Now he could sit on his secret until the time was right for his revelation . . . if it ever was.

He turned to Rip and said in a perfectly normal tone of voice, “I’m glad to see you’re all okay. I found one of your Negroes at the house, a man named August, who told me you’d be here if you were alive.”

“Is anyone else hurt?” Rip asked.

“One field hand is dead, and a few are wounded. Your house is burnt to the ground, and so’s the barn, but the bachelors’ quarters are still standing.”

“What about the gin?” Sloan asked.

“It’s still there, as far as I know.”

Sloan breathed a sigh of relief. It was mere weeks before the field slaves would begin picking cotton—not time enough to build a new gin.

“We’ll live in the bachelors’ quarters until I can get another house built,” Rip said. The big man picked up the chargé and cradled him gently in his arms as though he were a child. “We’d better get these two taken care of. I’ll carry Beaufort. You take his daughter, Luke.”

Luke looked down at Angelique’s mangled arm and the bloody grooves that would leave thin scars on her cheeks.
Don’t worry, Angel, honey,
he thought.
I’ll make sure you
know you’re still a beautiful woman, marks or no.

“What about Bay?” Sloan asked, voicing the subject everyone had been so carefully avoiding.

At the sound of Bay’s name Cricket roused and searched the faces around her to find her sister. “Bay? Isn’t she here?”

“Shh. Don’t fret, Brava. We’ll find her,” Creed soothed.

Cricket only got more frantic. “If she’s not here, then Tall Bear has her. We have to rescue her. Creed, you can’t let him do to her what he did to Amy. . . .”

Rip had keyed on one aspect of Cricket’s ranting. “You
know
the Indian who kidnapped Bay?” he asked Creed in a voice that was more dangerous for its calmness.

“I know him. We go back a long way. I’ll find your daughter and settle with Tall Bear as soon as I’m sure Cricket’s okay.” As Creed turned away toward the guest house, Cricket suddenly saw the body of her wolf.

“Rogue!” Cricket knelt by the wolf’s bullet-torn body. His open eyes were glazed, and his pink tongue lay in the dirt. She slowly leaned down to listen to his great heart . . . but it had stopped. She rested her cheek against his shoulder. It was so soft. She thought of all the times she’d fallen asleep with his warm body beneath her head . . . of all the times he’d played with her . . . of all the times they’d howled out their anger against a cruel world together.

Cricket choked back a sob. She should have returned him to the wild a long time ago. Rip had warned her something like this might happen. He’d told her she had no business trying to cage a wolf with love. But she’d ignored him. Now Rogue was dead. She could feel the pain swelling in her chest, and her throat had that awful constricted feeling . . . like being hanged by God’s hand.

Creed knelt beside her. “Come away, Brava. You can’t help him now.”

“It’s my fault,” she whispered. “Rip warned me I couldn’t tame a wild animal. But I wouldn’t listen. I never thought . . . I was sure I . . .”

Creed brushed the tears from Cricket’s cheeks with his thumbs.

“It looks like he attacked Angelique and Bay shot him,” Sloan said. She kept her gun out and ready, despite Luke’s assurances the Indians were long gone.

“But why? Why would he attack Angelique?” Cricket choked out.

Creed put a consoling hand on Cricket’s shoulder. “We’ll have to ask her that.”

As Creed and Cricket stood, she turned her face into his shirt, and his arms enfolded her. She leaned against him and found his strength, and the particular smell she identified with him, comforting. She wanted to hear Angelique’s explanation of Rogue’s attack. Perhaps the wolf’s death had not been in vain. Even so, she vowed to return Rascal and Ruffian to the wilds of
Comanchería
when she and Creed went in search of Bay.

The sight of the charred and blackened ruins of the house sobered them all. It was hard to carve a human niche in the Texas wilderness. Now it looked as though the house had never been there. Only the three giant oaks remained, scarred in places by the fire.

But defeat was not a word in the pioneers’ vocabulary. They would rebuild, reclaiming the land. They had learned enough about the vagaries of frontier life to be grateful none of them would be planted under the rich Texas soil.

The tiny bachelors’ quarters away from the main house had only one bed, and Rip and Luke put both the chargé and his daughter on it. Cricket had revived enough to argue with Creed that she would be fine in the ladder-back chair in the corner of the room. He took the cloth and water offered to him by one of the Negroes who’d come to help and cleaned her wound himself. He felt better when he saw the cut on her temple was small.

“How does it feel?”

“I have a slight headache, but I’m not dizzy at all.”

“That’s good,” Creed said. “Sit and rest for a while.” When she started to object Creed added, “It’ll make
me
feel better.”

Angelique’s moan of pain brought everyone, including Cricket, to her bedside. “Take it easy. You’re okay, Angel, honey,” Luke said, taking her good hand in his. “Angel, can you tell us what happened to Bay?” Luke asked.

Angelique moaned again. “My arm. My arm.”

“Your arm’s going to be fine, Angel, honey.”

“I hate this godforsaken land. I want to go home.”

“Sure, honey, soon as you’re well I’ll take you home. Right now can you tell us about Bay?”

Angelique opened her eyes to an audience that included practically the entire Stewart family—including Cricket. “What are you doing here?” she asked, stunned. “The Comanche had you on his horse . . . you weren’t going to be any more competition for me. . . .” Angelique stopped and glanced guiltily at Creed. “Not that I’d stay in this awful land full of savages for
anyone
now, let—”

Luke interrupted her, bringing her back to the subject at hand. “Angel, honey, tell us what happened.”

“Bay said I should shoot the Indian, or if I couldn’t kill him . . . then I should shoot Cricket. And I would have—in fact, I already had my gun aimed—”

“Except the wolf attacked you,” Sloan finished.

“Yes, so I shot the wolf instead.”

Creed shuddered at how close he’d come to losing his wife.

“But I only wounded it,” she continued. “I guess Bay must have killed it, because there were two shots. I don’t remember anything after that.”

Cricket closed her eyes and swallowed over the huge lump in her throat. Rogue had given his life to save her.

“We have a few more pieces to the puzzle,” Luke said. “I guess it’s pretty clear Tall Bear must have taken Bay with him. Who’s going after him?”

“Tall Bear is my problem,” Creed announced.

“And Bay is mine,” Rip countered.

“You need to be here to mend diplomatic fences when the chargé recovers,” Creed pointed out. “Besides, I know this Indian. I know how he thinks. I’ll have a better chance of catching him than you will.”

“I want Bay back,” Rip said. “I don’t care what she’s been through. I want her back.”

“If she can be found, I’ll find her,” Creed vowed. “And I’ll make sure Tall Bear never troubles you again.” He turned to Cricket. “Are you ready to go?”

“She’s in no shape to travel,” Rip said sternly. “She’ll be here when you get back.”

“Brava?”

Creed had left the choice up to her. She could go with her husband or stay with her father. The choice had already been made. Cricket turned to Rip. “I’m going with him. Don’t try to stop me, because it won’t do any good.”

Rip sighed. He had to get used to the idea of Cricket choosing the Ranger over him. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling, but he figured he’d better start learning to live with it. “What’re you waiting for? Hurry up before you lose the light.”

Cricket threw her arms around Rip’s neck and hugged him tight. “I love you,” she whispered in his ear. “I’ll find Bay. I promise.”

Rip gently pushed her away. “Just take care of yourself.”

Creed grasped the hand Cricket held out to him and tugged her along behind him out the door of the tiny bachelors’ quarters. As soon as they were out of sight of those inside he brought her into his arms and claimed her mouth in a devastating kiss.

“What was that for?” Cricket asked breathlessly when he finally released her.

“For being you. For not being like any other woman I’ve ever known.” He claimed her mouth again before he said, “You know what’s ahead of us?”

“I do.”

“We’d better go, then,” he said. “Before I decide I can’t wait any longer to have what’s finally, truly mine.”

Chapter 26

CRICKET WIPED THE SWEAT FROM HER BROW with her sleeve and felt the fatigue in the muscles of her arm when she did. It was hot and getting hotter. Cricket had always loved the endless, clear blue Texas skies. Now she wished for a cloud or two to block the scorching rays of the sun. She was so tired it took all her effort to stay in the saddle. They’d crossed the borders of Lion’s Dare a day past but hadn’t even considered stopping. The memory of Tall Bear’s cruelty to Amy had brought tears to Cricket’s eyes, but they hadn’t fallen. She didn’t allow herself to waste the energy. She needed all she had to keep the pace Creed had set. She knew as well as he that until the Comanches were certain there was no further pursuit, Bay was safe. It was up to her and Creed to keep the Indians moving until they caught up with them and rescued her sister.

It was different, Cricket had discovered, to be a hunter of men. An animal might use stealth to elude a pursuer, but it paled beside the cunning the Comanches had exhibited, keeping them in constant jeopardy of losing the trail. She and Creed had started out no more than an hour behind the Indians. Yet the Comanches had covered their tracks in ways Cricket hadn’t been aware of when she’d been a captive. Several times they’d had to double back to find them. Even now, the hilly terrain showed no sign of their quarry. But they knew the Indians were headed north toward
Comanchería
, and even if they couldn’t see the hoofprint or crushed grass or overturned rock that told them which direction to go, they doggedly continued riding, knowing that sooner or later they would.

And then there was the worry. Having been Tall Bear’s captive herself, Cricket didn’t need to use her imagination to know what Bay must be suffering. She need only search her memory to discover the terror of helplessness she’d felt when anticipating her fate, and Bay wasn’t used to the hard riding or other tribulations that were sure to be visited upon her. It was ironic that the most gentle of the sisters should be the one the Comanche had kidnapped.

“Aw, hell.”

Cricket yanked her mount to a stop to keep from running into Creed’s horse. “What’s the matter?”

Creed stepped down from the saddle and paced ahead a few steps. He walked in a semicircle ahead of them before returning to his mount. “They’re splitting up.”

Cricket’s heart began to beat faster. “So? We’ll follow . . .” Cricket frowned.

“Ah, you do see the problem. There’s only one shod horse in the bunch, but is Bay riding it? If she were a smaller woman it would be easier to tell. I don’t know, Brava. Tall Bear is clever. He might put a Comanche on that shod horse thinking we’ll be sure to follow it . . . and when we do, we lose Bay.”

“Do you know which of the ponies Tall Bear is riding?”

“Yes, I recognize it from the last time I tracked you. The right front hoof has a crack in it. See?” Creed showed her the tiny triangular mark in the dirt at the corner of one of the hoofprints.

Cricket walked her horse forward to check the prints around it. “The shod horse is going the same direction as Tall Bear.”

“Yes, it is.”

“I think we should keep following Tall Bear.”

Creed walked over to stand at Cricket’s knee. He took her hand in his and looked up into her bleak eyes. “It could be a trick, Brava. He could have sent Bay off on one of the Indian ponies.”

“If she’s not with him, then at least we’ll know he won’t be alive to torment her.” Cricket knew Tall Bear was a dead man if—when—Creed caught up with him. She refused to think of the end of their quest in less than positive terms.

Creed left her side to remount his horse. “Let’s go.”

Cricket didn’t bother to ask if they could rest. The Comanches wouldn’t rest, so neither could they. From what she could see, there were two riders with Tall Bear, one of them on the shod horse and one on an Indian pony. The Indians traveled single file, with Tall Bear in front and the shod horse in the middle, giving further credence to the guess it was Bay who rode the animal.

The grueling march continued through the heat of the day. It wasn’t enough that they simply keep pace with the Comanches; Creed pushed even harder so they could catch up to them. The farther into
Comanchería
they rode, the more dangerous it became. Because they might very well become the hunted themselves.

Creed felt restless. Uneasy. It was dusk—not his favorite time of the day because there were too many shadows. His eyes searched the horizon, then dropped to the ground ahead. The dirt was packed hard, leaving very little trail to follow, but there was no sign at all of the shod horse. Why hadn’t he noticed it sooner? Why was only the shod horse missing? Tall Bear wouldn’t have sent Bay off by herself, and Creed hadn’t seen evidence that anyone had met them and taken her away—which wasn’t to say that it hadn’t happened. He hadn’t been watching for a rendezvous. The signs might still be there if he backtracked to find them, but then they’d be even farther behind Tall Bear—and Creed was sure they were so close. . . .

Creed checked over his shoulder and discovered Cricket asleep in the saddle. Lord knew they both needed the rest. He wasn’t sorry he’d brought her along. She hadn’t held him up and had been a help, in fact, sharing the burden of tracking. And when they found Bay, she was likely to need her sister’s support.

The tingle at the base of his neck warned Creed someone was nearby. His muscles tensed, but he gave no indication he was aware of the intruder. “Wake up, Brava.”

The words were calm and quiet, but they brought Cricket instantly awake. “What’s wrong?” she asked, equally calm, but alert.

“I’m not sure. I think there’s someone following us. The shod horse dropped out of the pack a ways back. Maybe Tall Bear’s planned an ambush. Be ready to run.”

The next few minutes were tense ones. Cricket listened for any sounds that might reveal the presence of another human being, but there were none.

“Hu! Haints.”

Cricket watched Creed stiffen at the first Comanche cry and relax completely at the second. Then she saw why. Long Quiet stepped out from between two hills, onto the trail in front of them, the reins of his pony in his hand.

“Well,
friend
,” Creed said with a chuckle of relief, “you certainly gave me a few bad moments back there. What are you doing here?”

“I met Buffalo Waters, one of the braves who rode in the raid led by Tall Bear. He said Tall Bear had stolen a girl with violet eyes and hair the color of copper from the home of the Woman of the Wolf. I came to see whether he might want to trade for her.”

Creed eyed his friend askance. Long Quiet wasn’t telling him everything. The Indian had long since adopted the Comanche way of life as his own, and his choice was clear in any conflict between the white man and the red. Creed was confused by Long Quiet’s words. What, exactly, did Long Quiet intend to do with the girl if Tall Bear agreed to the trade?

“What’s your interest in Bayleigh Stewart?”

In his mind’s eye, Long Quiet saw the flash of violet eyes, the demure smile, the shy blush of a tall young maiden at her first cotillion, where the gentlemen were all older men from a nearby school in Boston. He answered only, “I thought only to do my brother a kindness. Have you no need of me?”

Cricket slanted Creed an annoyed grimace. Why was he questioning Long Quiet? They could use all the help they could get to find Bay, and Long Quiet didn’t look anywhere near as exhausted as Cricket felt. “Of course we’d welcome your help.”

“I’ll ride ahead and see if Tall Bear is willing to make a trade for Bay. That will be easier than trying to fight him for her,” Long Quiet said.

“I’m not sure she’s still with him,” Creed replied.

Long Quiet waited for Creed to elaborate.

“Tall Bear’s band split up sometime this morning. We’ve been following three horses, or at least we were until about a half hour ago. One of the horses, the one we thought Bay might be riding, isn’t with Tall Bear anymore.”

Creed saw the flare of irritation in Long Quiet’s eyes, quickly hidden, and wondered again about the half-breed’s interest in Bay Stewart.

“There’s only one way to find out the truth. Follow me, but stay back out of sight.” Long Quiet mounted his pony and was gone as suddenly and quietly as he’d appeared.

Cricket pulled her horse abreast of Creed’s and reached out her hand to him. He grasped it, and their fingers intertwined. “Do you think he’ll be able to get Bay away from Tall Bear?”

“If Tall Bear still has her, I’ve no doubt Long Quiet will be as persuasive as necessary to get what he wants.” Creed didn’t voice aloud his uncertainty about Long Quiet’s motives. What did the hard-bitten half-breed want with the gentle white woman?

Creed had only an instant’s warning, but it was enough to avoid the death Tall Bear had planned for him. The Indian’s weight knocked Creed from the saddle, and because she was holding his hand, Cricket came tumbling off her horse, as well. But Tall Bear’s knife landed in the fleshy part of Creed’s upstretched arm, instead of his heart.

The two men rolled on the ground in a tangle of arms and legs, so Cricket couldn’t tell one from the other to get a clear shot at Tall Bear. When Creed at last managed to roll clear, Cricket would have killed the Comanche except Creed said, “No, Brava. Tall Bear and I have a lifetime of differences to settle. This is between the two of us.”

“
Tabeboh!
I will kill you, and then I will take your woman as my slave. I will burn off her nose and her ears so no man will desire her. I will beat her each morning and offer her to any braves who wish a woman for their pleasure.”

“I am not dead yet, Tall Bear,” Creed answered in Comanche. “But come greet the Wolf, and I will introduce you to Our Sure Enough Father.”

Cricket watched Creed shed the thin veneer of civilization and become once more the consummate Comanche warrior. He stripped away the rest of his torn shirt, leaving himself dressed in buckskin trousers and knee-high moccasins. His scarred chest was shiny and slick with sweat. Blood dripped unattended from his slashed arm and was soaked up by the parched ground beneath him. The wind whipped his black hair back from the sharp angles of his proud face.

Across from Creed, Tall Bear crouched in readiness, naked except for a buckskin breechclout and moccasins. His skin was darker than Creed’s, a burnt sienna that blended with the earth. His shiny black hair was braided with fur and decorated with feathers that floated out gently behind him. He wasn’t as tall as Creed, but his body was equally muscled, lean and wiry, while his black eyes were intent, deadly.

Cricket’s nostrils flared when they caught the musky scents of the two men who sought to kill one another. The hills had gone silent to witness yet another combat to determine the bravest and the best. As it had been for centuries for both man and beast, so it was now. She would be the prize of the victor, yet neither man was aware of her any longer. She would let them fight their noble battle without interference. Then, if Tall Bear still lived, she would kill him.

Tall Bear made the first slicing attack, catching Creed off guard and cutting through the skin of the four fingers holding his knife. “Shall I leave you with as many fingers as you left me, Wolf?” Tall Bear fanned a hand missing the third and fourth fingers, which Creed had cut off in their last encounter. “
Hu!
I think I shall take a few more.”

The waning sun cast tall shadows that distracted Cricket’s attention and kept her eyes focused on the eerie black lines rather than the two men who warily circled one another. Yet, as in the past, the fact she didn’t watch the two men didn’t keep her from experiencing the life-and-death conflict being waged before her.

She shivered at the guttural Comanche taunts exchanged between the two men, the swish of air as a knife blade descended, the grunt of pain as the blade found its mark. Her fist clenched around her gun as she remembered more than she cared to of Amy’s horrible rape, knowing Tall Bear surely had an even worse fate planned for her should he win. She felt hate for the Comanche twisting inside her and fought the nausea as her stomach churned with anxiety for Creed.

The blood seeping from his knuckles where Tall Bear had cut him made the knife slippery in Creed’s right hand. He wished he’d practiced more with his left. Not that his left hand was in much better shape, since the slashing wound in his arm troubled him more than he cared to admit. Creed had never felt so little like an invulnerable
Diablo Tejano
as he did right now, when it counted most to be strong. Yet, so long as Tall Bear lived, Cricket was in danger. That knowledge revitalized Creed and gave him the strength to attack.

Creed circled the Comanche brave, waiting for his moment. Suddenly, Tall Bear lunged at him, and the two men grappled and fell to the ground, rolling and twisting through the rocky terrain. Then they were on their feet again, the bear and the wolf, with different strengths and weaknesses, yet evenly matched. They slashed, they cut, they tripped, they recovered, they feinted and parried, until both were bathed in dripping ribbons of red.