Chapter 16
Nate Bone bellied down in the tall grass, steadied his rifle against a rock, and sighted down the barrel at McKenna’s wife. The red-haired woman on the back of that mule made an easy target silhouetted against the blue sky. The half-breed brat, astride a pinto, rode just ahead of her.
Nate paid him no mind. “Bang. Yer dead,” he said, pretending to pull the trigger. And then he laughed.
Beau Thompson wiggled back until he reached the shelter of a tree before climbing to his feet. “Hellfire, Nate, that ain’t funny. Shootin’ McKenna’s one thing. The bastard deserves it for futterin’ my sister. But killin’ a white woman—Big Earl would shoot lightnin’ bolts out his ass over that.”
“Shit on Big Earl.” Nate pushed up on his elbows and spat a wad of tobacco juice at a beetle trudging through the grass. “I didn’t shoot her, did I? Can’t you take a joke?”
“McKenna’s the one what wronged us. I ain’t gonna see you shoot no white woman, Nate. You listenin’? I ain’t part of murderin’ no decent females.”
“Not like McKenna, are ya? He sure sliced that Cerise Larocque. Blood so deep on that whorehouse floor, they said, you had to wade through it.”
Beau stiffened. “Reckon he did carve her up, but a half-breed whore don’t hardly count.”
“Shit, Beau. I didn’t shoot McKenna’s wife, did I? Had her dead in my sights, but did I pull the trigger?”
“No,” Beau admitted, “but—”
“You’re soft as a lil’ girl,” Nate scoffed. “How do you expect to best a hard case like McKenna without having some iron in your bowels? No wonder your old man beats the shit out of you. He ain’t got one girl; he’s got two.”
A purple vein throbbed along Beau’s temple. “I ain’t no girl, Nate. Don’t be callin’ me no girl.”
“If you had balls, you woulda got settled with McKenna by now,” he taunted as he shoved his rifle in the saddle holster. “Rachel’s got bigger stones than you do.”
“Shut up about Rachel,” Beau warned. “I caused McKenna plenty of trouble before you came to work for Big Earl, didn’t I? I been pullin’ down his fences and shooting his calves ever since he murdered his uncle and his cousin.”
“Shit! Pullin’ down a few fences? You think that’s scarin’ him? That’s pissant stuff. Why, your sister Rachel—”
“Why you keep bringin’ up Rachel? You best not be gettin’ ideas about her.”
“You think I got a taste for her? She ain’t what I look fer in a woman.” He coughed and spat again. “Now, McKenna’s woman, that’s something else. I wouldn’t mind havin’ a taste of that.”
Mollified, Beau nodded. “Me, too. She’s a fine handful of woman.”
“You ever had a lady?”
“Reckon I have. Had me a French whore in Saint Louis claimed to be a countess.”
“What did I say before?” Nate exclaimed. “Whores don’t count. Real ladies is bred tight as a rattler’s skin and hot as gunpowder.”
“That Frenchy girl, she was like that.”
“I’d like to give McKenna’s woman a ride she’d remember.”
Beau reached down under his belt and adjusted his genitals. “I saw that, first time I lit eyes on her.”
Nate grinned as he gathered his reins and mounted up. Baiting Beau and then making him forget he’d been insulted was as easy as shooting snapping turtles in a barrel. But anybody as stupid as Beau Thompson deserved what he got.
He glanced over at the younger man. “Remember, your ole man ain’t gonna live forever. I’m your amigo, ain’t I?”
“Yeah.”
“So I’m lookin’ out for what’s best for you. When Big Earl’s dead, who does his spread belong to?”
“Me and Rachel.” Beau reined his bay close to Nate’s horse.
“And if McKenna was dead, who does Kilronan go to?”
“That Injun boy. Him or McKenna’s woman.”
“Not if you deal the cards right,” Nate said. “The boy’s a half-breed. McKenna murdered his uncle to get the place, so why would the law hand all that prime land over to a redskin bastard or a foreign woman?”
“I never thought of that.”
Nate took the lead, urging his mount down the steep hillside away from McKenna’s property line. Keeping Beau Thompson worked up against McKenna was gettin’ to be a full-time job. If his own aim had been a little better when he’d gotten a shot off at him this summer, McKenna would be rotting in his grave, but the darkness had made it a tricky shot.
Nate spat out his wad and stuffed a fresh pinch of tobacco in his cheek. Maybe it was for the best that he hadn’t killed McKenna outright. Nate was a patient man, made more so by two years’ captivity among the Comanche when he was only half grown. Them filthy savages had murdered his father and treated him worse than an animal. Yep, he reasoned, the Injuns had taught him how to hate deep and wide, and how to take his time in getting revenge.
Thoughts of the Comanche made his bowels clench. Nate tried to put those bad years behind him in the daytime. The devil knew he couldn’t at night. He wished he had a silver dollar for every time he woke from a sound sleep with bile rising in his throat, the screams of his own pappy ringing in his ears, and the stench of his father’s burning flesh in his nostrils.
His brother Frank had taken him in once he’d escaped the Comanche. Frank had seen him through the months when he didn’t care if he lived or died. Frank was all he had in the way of kin.
Nate owed Shane McKenna plenty, first for running him off Kilronan, and second for hanging Frank. Some men would have been satisfied to backshoot McKenna and call things even, but not Nate. Once a man tasted the finer points of Comanche revenge, he wouldn’t settle for shortcuts. He’d sworn on Frank’s memory to see McKenna gutshot, castrated, and begging for a bullet through his head before he was done.
Besides, he was getting a little old and stiff in the joints to ride out and start over someplace else. Beau Thompson would be the ticket to a warm bed and a hot meal.
Who knows? he thought. In time, he might even be able to stomach that shrew-tongued sister of his. A desperate man will poke most anything in the dark on a cold Missouri night.
Nate chuckled and sucked a chunk of tobacco out of his hollow tooth. Beau Thompson weren’t none too bright, he mused, and that was God’s truth. Once Big Earl’s son got control of both places and had title to all that land, almost anything could happen to him. He could get throwed off his horse or accidentally shoot himself whilst he was cleanin’ his rifle. And if he did die, sudden-like, Rachel’s man would inherit everything.
Bad luck for Beau, Nate thought, but good luck for whatever smart man was left holding the stakes.
Caitlin drew her mount alongside Justice’s pinto. The two of them were riding Kilronan’s fence line, a task that Shane insisted the boy do several times a week. Checking for downed fences was easy work, and it freed Shane and Gabe to concentrate on haying and other chores that had to be done before the first snowfall.
Caitlin enjoyed being outdoors, and she welcomed the chance to befriend Shane’s adopted son. But when she’d mentioned accompanying Justice, Shane had flatly refused to let her.
“It’s not safe. You don’t know enough about this country yet,” Shane had said.
“But Justice does,” she’d argued.
“I’ll not put the responsibility of protectin’ you on a boy’s shoulders. Stay close to the house, Caity. I’ll try to find more time for you to ride with me.”
Caitlin had been disappointed, and as the days passed, Shane’s decision had seemed more and more unfair. This morning, she’d just asked Justice to saddle the mule for her. Shane’s infuriating habit of controlling her had to stop somewhere, and the sooner he learned to respect her independence, the better.
Since she’d begun to teach Justice to read, he’d stopped bedeviling her with mischievous pranks, but he still remained aloof. He never initiated conversations with her, and he usually responded with terse answers. But if Justice suspected that Shane had forbidden her to ride fenceline with him, he said nothing about it.
She was determined to break down the barriers between them, and being alone with Justice seemed the best way to start. She’d seen how patient he was with Derry, and she knew he had a good heart beneath the tough exterior.
“Justice.” She broke the silence between them and urged her mule closer to his mount.
His black eyes, always alert, widened. He turned his attention to her, but he didn’t speak.
He was a handsome youth, fast losing the gawkishness of childhood. His thick black hair, high cheekbones, and bronzed skin made him a stunner. No doubt Justice would break hearts, Caitlin thought, if he ever learned to smile.
“When is your birthday?” she asked.
“Got none.”
“But you must have—”
He pointed to the outcropping of willow trees ahead. “I saw Goliath in there last week. We’ll ride around. He’s too bad tempered to mess with.”
Caitlin nodded agreement. Shane had told her that the bull was still running loose on the property, but that the animal was no danger to anyone on horseback. She hadn’t seen Goliath since the rampage in the corral, and she didn’t want to.
They reined their animals away from the fence and through a low spot in the meadow. The day was cool; the trees had begun to take on a rainbow of autumn colors, but the grass was still lush.
“Everyone has a birthday,” Caitlin insisted. “When were you born?”
He shrugged. “Don’t know.”
“But surely your mother must have given you birthday gifts.”
Justice stared at her as if she’d suddenly sprouted a second head. “I had food from Cerise when she was sober, an’ the back of her hand when she was drunk. Nothin’ more.”
Caitlin winced. “You have no birth records?”
He made a sound of derision.
“You’re a Catholic. You must have been baptized.”
Justice nodded. “Mary did it.” Then he said a word that Caitlin couldn’t understand.
“What did you just say?”
He shrugged again. “It’s just Indian talk; don’t mean nothin’ much.”
“I’ve heard it before,” she pressed. “You use it when you talk to Mary. Is it a term of respect?”
He clicked to the pinto, and the animal leaped forward into a trot. Caitlin urged Bessie to keep up.
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. I’d be proud to know another language.”
He seemed to ignore her, but a few minutes later, as his pony reached down to snatch a mouthful of grass, Justice glanced back at Caitlin. “It means grandmother. Osage people respect elders. Mary’s not her real name, just her white name.”
“Do you know her real name?”
He nodded and quickly said an impossibly complicated phrase that Caitlin couldn’t begin to repeat. “It means Winter Swan,” he explained.
“Do you have an Indian name?”
Justice shook his head. “Just a baby name. I’ll get a real one sometime. Gabe said he’d tell me when I’m old enough. I have to go off alone without food or water and wait for a spirit to appear to me. The Osage don’t just give you a name; you have to earn it.”
Suddenly he pulled his pony up short and stared at the hillside on the far side of the property line.
“What is it?” Caitlin asked, seeing his unease.
“Somebody’s watchin’ us.”
Caitlin looked, but she didn’t see anything but trees and rocks. The hillside rose sharply beyond the split-rail fence that divided Kilronan from Thompson land.
Two crows rose in the air, cawing loudly. “Come on,” Justice said. “Let’s get out of here.” He slapped his reins across the pinto’s neck.
Caitlin’s mule rocketed forward into a rough canter, and Caitlin held on for dear life as Justice’s pony led them on a zigzag course over a stretch of rugged ground. A tiny creek loomed ahead of them, but Justice did not slow his steed’s pace. The pinto leaped over the water and kept going. Bessie followed.
For an instant, when the mule’s forefeet struck the far bank, Caitlin thought she might lose her balance, but she leaned forward on Bessie’s neck and stayed in the saddle. They galloped through a grove of chestnut trees and then another open field.
As the two approached the outlying barn, Caitlin felt a shiver of relief as she saw Gabe standing in the bed of a wagon, forking hay up into an open loft window. Shane was nowhere in sight.
“Mama! Justice!” Derry called, running from the poultry house. Mary, a clutch of eggs cradled in her apron, followed the child.
Justice reached Gabe first. Caitlin was too far away to hear what the boy was telling the wrangler, but she hoped Gabe wouldn’t think they’d both been foolish. After all, she and Justice had ridden home at breakneck speed without actually seeing or hearing anything amiss.
Justice slid down off his pony and called out to Mary. The Indian woman hurried toward the boy speaking rapidly in her own tongue.
He answered her in the same language, and Caitlin heard the word that Justice had told her meant grandmother. Mary’s reply in Osage was quick and heated.
“He’s not hurt,” Gabe said. “Likely there was nothin’ in the brush but a deer.”
Clearly unsatisfied with Gabe’s remark, Mary scowled and squeezed the boy’s leg.
Why is she so upset? Caitlin wondered. It’s not like Mary to become alarmed without reason. Then an odd notion rose into Caitlin’s mind. Was it possible that Mary was the child’s real grandmother?
If she was, it would explain why Justice allowed Mary so much control over him, and why the two seemed so comfortable together. And if Mary feared Shane’s Irish wife would want to be rid of the half-Indian boy, that would help explain the Osage woman’s antagonism toward her.
Gabe took hold of the mule’s bridle and helped Caitlin to dismount. He didn’t speak to her, but one glance into those accusing dark eyes told Caitlin that Gabe knew Shane had forbidden her to check the fences with Justice.
“I’ll ride out and see if I can find any tracks,” Gabe volunteered.
Justice nodded. “I’ll come with you.”
“No, you stay here. McKenna’s huntin’ for strays. He should be back directly. He’ll want to hear what happened.”
“Nothing happened,” Caitlin said. “Nothing at all.”
Gabe shrugged and handed the mule’s reins to Justice. “Put the animals away. Tell McKenna I’ll be back by midnight. If I go onto Thompson land, I want to do it after dark.”
Mary looked at Caitlin as if expecting an explanation.
“I doubt there’s reason for worry,” Caitlin said.
Mary sniffed. “Missy-Wife have worry,” she said. “When McKenna find out, you have big worry.”
“I told you I didn’t want you ridin’ without me!” Shane said as he stormed into the kitchen where Caitlin was rolling biscuits for supper. “Are you thickheaded or just obstinate that you can’t obey a single order I give? When am I goin’ to be able to trust you?”
Biting back an angry retort, Caitlin glanced at Derry. “Find Mary. Ask her to tell you a story.”
Derry looked from Caitlin to Shane, then beat a fast retreat out the kitchen door.
“Don’t speak to me like that in front of Derry,” Caitlin said when the door closed behind the child. She wanted to scream at him, to tell him how much it hurt her that he didn’t have faith in her, but she didn’t. Instead, she said calmly, “You’re overreacting.”
Shane swore a foul oath, and Caitlin flinched.
“You have no need for such language in this house.”
“You drive me to it, woman.” He stood over her, glowering.
She dusted flour over her dough and kneaded it into a ball. “I was nearly eight years the judge of my own behavior,” she replied tersely. “I may be your wife, Shane McKenna, but I’m not your hired hand. I’ll not be told when and where I may go.”
“Damn it, Caity. You could have been shot.”
“Or fallen off the mule and broken my neck?”
“That, too.”
She slammed the wooden rolling pin on the table and glared at him. “I’m making biscuits, Shane. Maybe my apron will catch fire, or I might quicken with your babe and die in childbirth. There are no guarantees in life.”
“It’s my duty to keep you safe.”
She picked up the wooden rolling pin again and began to flatten the dough. “There was no danger. No one shot at me. Nobody was there. And I’ll not be kept a prisoner in this house.”
“You’ll heed me, Caity, or you’ll not stay at Kilronan.”
“Maybe I won’t, then. Maybe it was a mistake to come here in the first place. Maybe I should get back on a steamboat and take Derry east, where people don’t kill each other over stray cows.”
“Do what you need to do. If you stay here, you’ve got to listen to what I say.” He turned toward the door. “Don’t wait supper. I’m ridin’ out to find Gabe and check for signs myself.”
“Good. If you stayed here, I’d likely put poison in your stew anyway.”
The back door slammed.
She kept rolling the dough until she realized that it was thin enough for flat dumplings. Then, dashing tears from her eyes with the back of her hand, she scraped the dough together and flung it back into the bowl.
Why did they do this to each other? she agonized. Why did they have the same fights over and over?
She wasn’t ready to give up on him yet, though. Surely they’d patch up this argument in bed, as they always did.
Why in God’s name was her husband one man between the sheets and another the rest of the time? There was a dangerous side to Shane. That aspect of his personality frightened her and sometimes made her wonder if there wasn’t some truth to what people said about him.
Maybe Shane was right, she thought with a shiver. Maybe she was thickheaded, too stupid to know whether she shared a roof with a cold-blooded killer or not.
But late that night, when Shane did come home, her fears and anger faded in the face of his apology.
“You were right,” he said as he set the kerosene lamp carefully on the table. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you like that in front of Derry.”
Caitlin sat up in bed. “You said you can’t trust me,” she accused.
“How can I? You get something in your head and go chargin’ off on your own. You don’t listen to me or Mary.” Shane tossed his hat on a peg and began to unbutton his shirt. “Damn it, woman, you’re green. You don’t know what this country can do to innocents.”
“I suppose you mean well,” she conceded, “but—”
“What if you’d been shot?” Shane draped his shirt over the back of a chair.
Caitlin threw her pillow at him. “What about Justice? You send a boy out to—”
Shane caught the pillow and flung it back. “He’s not a boy. Least not what you think of as a boy. He does a man’s part on Kilronan, and he has to take his chances like Gabe and I do.”
“It makes no sense to me,” she admitted.
“I don’t want to argue with you, Caity.” He sat down and began to pull off his boots.
“I don’t want to fight with you either,” she said. “And I was wrong to tell you I was leaving. I don’t want to go, Shane. I want to stay here with you.”
“I want you to.” He shed his pants and slid under the covers beside her. “It’s drives me crazy to think of you being hurt.”
She knew she shouldn’t let him get around her with a few sweet words, but it was hard to resist him when he lay naked beside her. “Did you find anything?”
“Tracks of two horses and two men. It doesn’t prove anything.” He pulled her into his arms. “I care about you, Caity.”
The thrill of his touch made her giddy. “I know you do.”
He kissed her tenderly.
“If you start that, neither of us will get any sleep tonight.”
“I know.”
“You’re bad,” she teased.
“Wicked,” he murmured lazily. “That’s what I want. Can you be wicked for me, darlin’?”
His long, powerful fingers kneaded out the sore spots of her shoulders and upper back. It felt so good that Caitlin sighed with pleasure and curled her legs around his. They’d have to have it out once and for all about his bossy ways, but this wasn’t the time. “Don’t stop,” she whispered. “That blasted mule gets rougher every time I ride her.”
“Be patient, sweetheart. Gabe’s working the mare for you. When she’s ready, her gait will be like sittin’ in a rockin’ chair.” He nuzzled her throat and then kissed her full on the mouth.
Caitlin’s fingers strayed to Shane’s bare chest; he brushed the curve of her breast, and she made a contented sound deep in her throat.
She lifted her face to meet his kiss. Strange how they fitted so perfectly, how it seemed the most natural thing in the world to savor the taste and smell of him, to caress with her tongue and teeth . . . to feel such joy in his embrace.
Shane pulled her on top of him as desire shot through him with the intensity of a lightning bolt. His swollen shaft throbbed with readiness. “Caity, Caity,” he murmured. He couldn’t keep his hands off her. Her skin was soft and sweet; her scent drove him wild.
No woman had ever been so eager, so willing to give of herself. He could hardly get through the days for thinking of her. Each night was a new wonder, and no matter how many times they made love, he only wanted her more.
The thought that she’d once lain in another man’s arms like this taunted him, and he pushed it away. Past was past; she was all his now.
She moved against him, brushing her body against him, letting her unbound hair trail over his face and chest. He buried his face in her warm, silken breasts and drew the hard nipples between his lips, then suckled until she whimpered and rubbed against his rock-hard phallus with her moist cleft.
He could stand it no more. With a cry of eagerness, he seized her hips and lifted her high so that he slid into her depths.
Having Caity on top and in control was a new sensation. And when he finally felt her reach a climax, his excitement was at such a pitch that his own release came hard and fast.
And later he held her in the crook of his arm and kissed her a dozen times and then a second dozen, and whispered sweet words into her ears until she fell asleep.
It was nearly dusk, and a light rain was falling. The sky was an ugly gray, and mist seeped up from the hollows to paint the landscape in ghostly hues.
Shane could hear Caity, Justice, and the baby ahead of him, but he couldn’t see them. Derry’s voice pealed out, a rainbow of tingling laughter amid the somber, muffled thud of his horse’s hooves and the dull creak of saddle leather.
“Wait up!” Shane shouted. “Caity, wait! I’m coming!” He dug his heels into his mount’s sides, but instead of quickening his stride, the animal slowed his pace and flung up his head.
“Cherokee? What’s wrong with you?” he demanded. But when he looked down, it wasn’t Cherokee under him. He was riding Big Earl Thompson’s stallion, Natchez.
And then he remembered. He’d insisted that Caity ride his buckskin.
Caity’s and the children’s voices had nearly faded in the pearly haze. Shane felt a stark uneasiness settle over him. His breathing quickened, and he began to sweat despite the cool, damp air.
“Caity!” he called again.
No answer.
He listened but heard no sound except the steady tread of Natchez’s feet and the drip of water off the overhanging tree branches.
Suddenly, without warning, the air rumbled. Not the far-off crack of thunder, but a grinding din that seemed to rise out of the earth beneath him.
Shane cried out and slashed Natchez with the ends of the leather reins. The stallion bolted forward out of the mist and into a clearing beside a nearly dry gully.
Ahead, halfway across the ancient creek bed, Shane saw Caitlin on Cherokee. Derry rode in front of her, and Justice walked beside them leading his pinto pony. “Hey!” Shane called. “Come back!”
Caity twisted in the saddle and waved. She was smiling, but she made no effort to halt the horse.
Then the ground quivered again. As Shane watched in horror, a flood of water surged down the dry riverbed, churning tree trunks, mud, and the swollen carcasses of cattle into a wall of destruction twenty feet high.
“Caity!” he screamed.
His warning came too late. First they were there, standing in the dust of an old arroyo course, and then there was only a sea of brown, tumbling water.
Shane spurred his horse into the flood, but Natchez’s forelegs folded under him. The animal pitched headlong into the maelstrom, thrashed wildly, and went under. The black’s head thrust up, his eyes rolled white, and he whinnied frantically. Water streamed from the stallion’s nostrils as he tried to reach the safety of the bank. But before he could find his footing, an uprooted tree smashed into his head. He gave up the struggle and was washed away with the others.
Shane ran down the edge of the sluice calling Caitlin’s name. Amid the swirl and crash of the deluge, he spied a flash of color. Caity’s dress? Heedless of his own safety, he plunged into the torrent and tried to swim to the spot where he thought she might be, but the tide of mud and water was too strong. It bore him up, tossing him like a seed pod in the March wind and flinging him up on the far bank.
Wet, exhausted, and cold, he searched the creek bank for them, running, staggering, and finally crawling on numbed hands and knees. And at last he saw a still form sprawled at the water’s edge.
“Caity?” he said. “Darlin’.” But when he turned the lifeless body over, he stared into Cerise’s accusing eyes.
“You killed me!” she rasped. “You killed me, and you’ll be the death of her as well. . . .”
“No,” Shane protested. “Cerise, I—”
“What did you say?” Caitlin murmured.
Shane jerked away, feeling the give of the mattress under him and the warmth of Caity’s breath on his cheek. “Nothin’,” he grated.
“Cerise, you said Cerise.” Caity pushed herself up on one elbow. “I heard you say her name.”
His heart was hammering; his sweat-soaked skin was cold and clammy. “A dream. Just a dream.”
“You’re dreaming about her?” she accused.
“I can’t help what I dream about.”
“No, maybe you can’t.” She stiffened and turned her back on him.
He laid a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t—”
“Leave me alone. Go back to sleep. Maybe you’ll dream about her again.”
Shane flopped down on his back, but he couldn’t shut his eyes without seeing the wall of water crashing down on her and the children, or without picturing Cerise’s dead eyes. For more than an hour he lay awake, then slowly eased from their bed.
Old demons rose to haunt him as he pulled on his trousers and his boots. Grabbing a shirt and his rifle, he slipped from the room and went downstairs and out of the house.
He tried to tell himself that it was just a dream. Only Indians and the superstitious believed in such things.
His uncle and cousin had died in a spring flood, and he had nearly drowned with them. It wasn’t his fault, and the dream didn’t mean that something bad was going to happen to Caity and his family.
Shane didn’t need to think twice to know what Mary would say about it. She would believe it was a sign of coming danger—maybe even death.
Shane had always believed in what he could see and hear and touch, but he wasn’t a fool. He had faith in Justice’s instincts. If the boy said someone had been watching him and Caity, then it was probably true.
He hadn’t told Caity that the horses who’d left the tracks he and Gabe had found were shod. That meant that they weren’t Indian horses. In spite of what Rachel said about Thompson losses, suspicion pointed to someone on their spread. And that meant Beau or Nate, maybe both.
He had to find out who was raiding Kilronan and put an end to it. And if he had to kill Big Earl’s son in the process, it would mean a shooting war with the Thompsons.
He should send Caity and the child away, before it was too late. Shane didn’t mind risking his own life. But in spite of what they’d done to each other, and regardless of whether they could live together as man and wife, he would always love Caity. And her life would be too high a price to pay for Kilronan.