Rain Shadow (Dutch Country Brides)

by Cheryl St. John

  Will Cody shouted into the megaphone, “Ladies and gentlemen, the reigning champion sharpshooter of the world, Miss Annie Oakley!”

  Annie raised her rifle above her head. Frank ran to hug her. From the stands, hats flew into the air. The cowboy band broke into a victory song. The noise was deafening.

  Someone touched Rain Shadow’s elbow, and she turned to look up into Tall Bear’s unsmiling face.

  “Why did you do that?” he shouted. “You had what you wanted.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so, Hank.” She touched his arm and he bent to press his cheek to hers. “Thanks.”

  He handed her the unlit cigar and disappeared into the crowd.

  The arena became a crush of well-wishers. Rain Shadow caught Annie’s attention and saluted her. Absently tucking the cigar into one of her empty ammunition bags, she ran to the back gate and found Two Feathers with Jack.

  His dark eyes assessed her knowingly. “Well done, daughter.”

  She threw her bags over Jack’s back and slid her rifle through a loop. “What are you thinking?”

  “I want only your happiness.”

  She studied his sly expression. “If I could imagine any possible way, I’d think you had something to do with this.”

  He merely returned her gaze. His attention flickered beyond her. She glanced over her shoulder.

  Anton stood watching them, his hat brim shading his features.

  “I must help with the horses.” Two Feathers moved away.

  Jack walked behind Rain Shadow as she started toward the encampment. Anton fell into step beside her.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Perfectly fine.”

  He hooked one arm around her neck and drew her loosely against him. Oh, his smell. A little bay rum, a lot male. She wanted to turn to him and be absorbed by that smell.

  “I’m sorry you lost.”

  “Are you?” She walked without looking at him.

  “Of course I am. Rain Shadow, I didn’t want you to lose,” he said in a husky voice. “I just wanted you to know it didn’t matter to me one way or the other. I still want you to come back with me.”

  She said nothing.

  “Will you?”

  She stopped, turned and met the anguished look in his beloved eyes. He held so much remorse for his first marriage, it was no wonder he’d been terrified to ask her outright. She saw the genuine fear in his eyes. Their relationship had shot holes in his armor, and yet he now placed himself in the position for her to pierce his newly mended heart. What courage he possessed.

  She slipped out of his easy grasp and opened one of the leather bags. “Do something for me, Anton.”

  He watched her. “All right.”

  She slid out her Winchester and reloaded it. From one bag, she withdrew the cigar. “Got a match?”

  He looked at her as if she’d lost her mind. “No.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She thrust the cigar toward him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Humor me. Put the cigar in your mouth and walk to that little stump out there.” She pointed.

  Anton’s eyes followed her hand. He stared at her, and recognition touched the blue depths. “You want me to walk out there and hold this cigar in my teeth so you can shoot at it?”

  “That’s the idea.”

  “Why?”

  “Don’t you trust me?”

  He stared at her, a sandy brow raised.

  “I haven’t killed anyone yet.” She couldn’t suppress a smile.

  He drew himself up and stuck the cigar between his teeth. Without moving his lips, he said around it, “I trust you to take care o’my son if I’m maimed.”

  She wanted to laugh, but watched his tall form as he walked away. He stopped in the spot she’d indicated and turned to face her, removing the cigar. “This is farther than that last shot, isn’t it?”

  “Precisely.” She raised the rifle.

  “Woman, don’t you think—”

  “Turn to the side, Anton. Take off your hat.” She squinted down the barrel. “And stand still!”

  Resigned, he removed his hat and turned. Sticking the cigar in his teeth, he poised, motionlessly.

  Rain Shadow drew a breath and released it. She aimed. Slowly, she squeezed the trigger.

  The shot echoed. Anton took the cigar from his mouth and stared at the frayed end. “You did it,” he said quietly. Then louder, “You did it!”

  Rain Shadow slid the rifle into its loop and met him halfway.

  His gaze probed her face, and she watched him struggle with dismayed recognition. “You lost on purpose?”

  She tilted her head in a half nod.

  “Why?”

  “Why do you think?”

  “I don’t know. You wanted to win so badly. You practiced so long and hard, and you believed winning would bring your family to you. I don’t understand.”

  “Maybe I was looking the wrong way at the right time. I thought you wanted someone like Annette or Lydia or Sissy.”

  He offered her a wry shrug. “So did I.”

  “I knew I wasn’t like them.”

  “None of that matters anymore.”

  “Anton, I never sat at a table with a family until I ate with yours. I never saw a meal served on fancy platters with a lace tablecloth under it. I wanted to die that day Annette asked me to set the table.”

  “I helped you, didn’t I?”

  She looked at him curiously. “You knew?”

  “I suspected.”

  “I’ve never had a bath in a tub. We either bathed in streams or heated water in the lodge.”

  “Want to try it?” He smiled with his eyes.

  “Anton, I’ve never been to church or school. Everything that you take for granted is awkward for me.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  Her heart skipped an uneasy beat. “Doesn’t it?”

  “No.” He set his hat atop the bags on Jack’s back and took her shoulders in his easy grasp. “None of those things make a person who they are. I love you just the way you are. But you want to learn all those things, don’t you? You want Slade to be comfortable with our ways, to go to school and probably even college. I want those things for him, too. But mostly, I want you.”

  He wanted her.

  “Rain Shadow, I’m crazy for sticking my neck out like this again, but I love you.” Quick-shifting apprehension flitted across his expression. “I’m afraid you won’t love me back,” he whispered.

  His honesty reached her heart and twisted it painfully. “Anton, I love you. I told you that.”

  Behind his eyes exultation melted into confusion and then... embarrassment? “You told me?”

  She nodded.

  “When?”

  “After we made love... the second time that night.”

  He skimmed his palms up and down her bare arms. She wanted to close her eyes and revel in his touch. He slid his hands to catch and hold hers. Studying the front of her dress, he asked, “Did you say it softly?”

  “I think so.”

  Color tinged his cheekbones.

  She waited, watching his gaze drift slowly across her breasts, then back to her face.

  “I can’t hear with my left ear. I didn’t hear you.”

  Rain Shadow digested that bit of information. “How come I didn’t know? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t want you to know.”

  She took his face in her hands. “Why not?”

  “I never thought to. Or maybe...I didn’t want you to think less of me.”

  “Nobody’s perfect, Anton.”

  His eyes answered for him.

  Beneath her palms his cheeks were smooth from his morning shave. She ran her fingertips across his face, his sun-kissed brows. “You blame yourself for too much. You feel responsible for Emily’s problems, for her death. Perfect hearing wouldn’t have changed any of that.”

  “I know that.

  “Yo
u’re self-conscious of that scar.” Rain Shadow touched the spot through his shirt.

  He shrugged. “Two scars now.”

  “I like them because they’re part of you. I hope you don’t expect me to be perfect.”

  His eyes darkened. “You are perfect.”

  “I’m not. The toes on my right foot are a little crooked, and I have a scar on my knee from falling off a horse.”

  He grinned. “I’ve seen it.”

  She pressed herself against him and dropped her head back. “I love every stubborn inch of you. Every time you touch me my heart pounds. I could kiss you forever and not tire of it.”

  His golden eyelashes fluttered shut, and he inhaled a deep breath.

  She slid her fingers through the thick hair at his neck and pulled his head down so that her lips touched his good ear. “I love you.”

  His hand trembled on her spine. “I want to trust you.”

  “You already do. You let me shoot at you.”

  He straightened enough to look at her. “That Tall Bear fellow trusts you enough to let you shoot at him, too.”

  “Ah, but he knew I wouldn’t blow his nose off. You weren’t certain.”

  He smiled. A smile as warm as the afternoon sun.

  “Kiss me, Anton.”

  “Does this mean you’ll come home with me?”

  “Yes.”

  He kissed his wife until her toes curled.

  “Ma! Anton!”

  “Rain Shadow! Pa!”

  Childish voices interrupted their embrace. Anton raised his head. Beneath her hand, his heart thundered. “I have a hotel room,” he suggested.

  “I have a very understanding father.”

  They smiled into one another’s eyes.

  Epilogue

  “You know, watching the wedding ceremony in the show made me think,” Anton said from his comfortable position on the bed. “I don’t have a herd of white stallions.”

  Rain Shadow trailed her fingers through the suds. Replete from their lovemaking, she lay soaking in the enormous tub Anton had ordered carried to his room and filled with steaming water. He watched her, his shoulders propped against the pillows, chest and feet still bare. “If you’d stolen a herd of stallions,” she drawled, “you’d be in jail, not making love to me all evening.”

  “I mean I don’t have anything to offer your father except a home.” He stacked his hands behind his head.

  “The show is the way life was years ago, Anton, not the way we live today. A home is exactly what my father needs. Slade and I too. We’ve missed the farm. I can’t wait to go back.”

  “Jakob and Lydia had a girl this time.”

  She smiled and tilted her head in a pretty, feminine gesture. “They must be happy.”

  “Mmm,” he said distractedly. He watched her minutes longer, thinking of all he had to tell her. “Isn’t the water getting cold?”

  “I’m used to cold water.”

  “You’ll shrivel up.”

  “It feels too good to get out.”

  He sat up. “I have something to tell you that will make you feel even better.”

  “Better than this? What is it?”

  “Get out, and I’ll tell you.”

  Reluctantly, she stood.

  Even now, the sight of her body sent a shaft of desire through him. He met her with a towel. With gentle hands, he dried her body, wrapped her in a dry towel and led her to the bed. Tendrils of damp ebony hair spiraled at her neck and temples. He touched his fingertip to a droplet of water he’d missed on her collarbone. She relaxed against the pillows.

  Sitting beside her, he leaned forward and kissed her. He’d almost been foolish enough to lose her. He’d never take that chance again. “I love you, Rain Shadow.”

  She placed her hand on his arm, watched her fingers glide across his skin. “Is that what you wanted to tell me?”

  “No.” His gaze skittered to his satchel beside the bed. Bending, he retrieved a bundle of papers and letters. “I went through Ruiz’ things before I took his body to town. I found a passenger list for a wagon train that set west in 1875 and a few letters from a man named Avarato in Boston.”

  Bolting upright, she sat on her knees and stared at him. “A wagon train?”

  He smiled at her excitement, pleased he could give her this. “Uh-huh. Seems this Avarato fellow had a daughter who married a man the family didn’t approve of and headed west with him.”

  “Who was she, Anton? Why did Miguel have these papers?” She grabbed the stack from his hands and rifled through them, skimming return addresses on the envelopes until she came to the yellowed list. “Why are all these names circled?” She pointed to the names on the parchment. “And these checked off?” She grabbed his arm. “Anton?”

  “Let me tell you. The letter hinted at the fact that Ruiz knew where this man’s daughter might be. It seems Avarato was paying Ruiz to track her down—or her locket, anyway—”

  “Locket!” Her hand flew to her bare chest.

  He’d been surprised that she hadn’t been wearing it that afternoon when he’d removed her clothing, and then he’d recalled she hadn’t had it on earlier in the day when she’d undressed in front of him. The day after Ruiz’ death, Anton had handed the locket to her. She’d stared at it for a moment, and then tucked it into her pants pocket. “Where is it?” he asked.

  She let her hand drop to her bare knee. “In a trunk. Somehow I couldn’t wear it after he had it.” She shook her head. “Anton, is my locket the one this man wanted?” A look of astonishment flattened her features. “Is Avarato my family?”

  “I’m convinced it’s the same locket he gave his daughter years ago, but no, she wasn’t your mother. I have a feeling Ruiz wanted you to pretend she was to bleed Avarato.”

  “How can you be sure?” she asked, disappointment tingeing her voice.

  “Avarato had done most of the work in going over this passenger list. He hired private investigators years ago, and followed up periodically. His daughter had no children.”

  “But it’s the right wagon train?”

  “It is. How else would you have gotten her locket? Two Feathers found you wearing it, right?”

  She nodded fervently.

  “We can only guess that Juanita Avarato, her name was Wilkins by then, gave it to you. Or maybe you just picked it up while you were wandering around after the attack.”

  Rain Shadow’s heart pounded so hard Anton could likely see it. She ran her fingers reverently over the aged paper. “That means my parents are on this list.”

  Anton nodded. He slid a few envelopes from the stack. “Over the years Avarato or his men looked into all of the names. Ruiz checked out the sources and obviously agreed with their findings. Avarato’s daughter died.”

  “But after all these years how would we ever find these people?” The task sounded impossible.

  “Avarato contacted the families years ago. He kept names and letters and telegrams. When I wrote, he was sympathetic to your cause and gladly gave me all the names and addresses of survivors. All I had to do was write each one. Several came back without being delivered. Most came back with replies saying they knew of no dark-haired little girl on that wagon train.”

  Rain Shadow let her eyelids flutter closed. She swallowed and opened them again. So close! How could she have come so close? It had been too many years. They’d never find the families of the passengers now.

  “But this one,” Anton said, drawing a heavy parchment envelope from the pile, “came from a woman whose daughter and son-in-law had a dark-haired, violet-eyed three-and-a-half-year-old girl.”

  Rain Shadow had never fainted in her life, but she feared this might be the first time. Her head grew so light, her vision grayed. Anton’s face blurred, the room faded from view. She dropped the papers, gripped Anton’s forearms and forced herself to focus on his features.

  “Are you sure?” she whispered, excitement sharpened to an unbearable peak.

  He secured her wais
t and smiled into her eyes. “I’m sure. She described your parents. You must have your father’s hair and eyes and your mother’s small size. Your grandmother said you were a beautiful but headstrong child. Can there be any doubt?”

  “Oh, Anton!” she cried, every nerve ending tingling. “Oh, my—” Passionate tears filled her eyes. Releasing one arm, she grabbed the envelope and blinked trying to see the handwriting. “What’s her name?”

  With his thumb, Anton wiped tears from her cheekbone. “Her name’s Melisande Snow. She’s French. Snow’s her married name.”

  With trembling fingers, Rain Shadow slid the heavy sheet of paper from the envelope and unfolded it. Impatiently, she wiped her hand across her eyes and focused on the letter, her eyes devouring the words. “Amorette and Thomas Westcott.”

  “Your parents,” he said, emotion clogging his voice.

  She pored over the remainder of the letter and took great care in folding it and replacing it in the envelope. Her finger touched the postmark. “She lives in London.”

  “And she wants to come to America to visit you just as soon as you say it’s all right.”

  It was all too much! Taking a breath, she unfolded her legs from beneath her, settled back and forced her limbs to relax. “I have a grandmother,” she said staring at the ceiling in awe.

  “Yes. You do, Alexandria.”

  She shot a glance at him. “Alexandria Westcott.” She tried out the name. A long-forgotten memory flitted across her consciousness, an intangible blur of her mother’s face and voice. “Lexie Westcott,” she whispered. “They called me Lexie.”

  Anton leaned over her, his eyes a vivid blue. “Lexie Neubauer, you mean.”

  She smiled and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “Oh, Anton, if I’m dreaming, I don’t want to wake up.”

  He kissed her, running his thumb across her shoulder and under the towel she still wore. “If I’m awake,” he said against her mouth. “I don’t ever want to sleep.”

  A delicious shiver ran down her side. He slid his palm beneath the towel. “Thank you,” she whispered into his good ear.

  “Thank you,” he replied.

  He covered her mouth with his, pressing her into the soft mattress, and she welcomed her husband’s ardent caress, knowing she’d always crave touching him the way she did now. She needed him exactly the way he was, wanted him enough to bridge their cultures and loved him more than enough to last for time and eternity.