Heart of the Hawk

by Justine Davis, Justine Dare

  Luke’s eyes widened. Only then did he seem to take in the rest of the grim tableau, the other dead man and the shotgun Kate still held. He turned to stare at her, awe and admiration clear in his face.

  “You shot him, Miss Kate? Really?”

  “It’s not something I’m happy about, Luke.” Her voice was flat, oddly emotionless.

  “It’s nothing for anyone to be happy about,” Josh said, finally able to speak again. “Killing is ugly, even when . . . they ask for it.”

  “But better them than you,” Luke said, unperturbed.

  “Hard to argue with that, son,” Rankin said with a laugh. “I’ll round up some help and we’ll get this vermin out of the street.”

  Josh blinked. Most towns, he’d be considered the vermin that needed removing. He wasn’t sure how it had happened, but it was different here. He looked back at Kate. She met his gaze for a long, silent moment, then turned and walked back into the store.

  He caught up with her just inside.

  “Kate—”

  “Don’t. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “But what you did—”

  “I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Kate, you saved my life. Again.”

  For some reason this seemed to heighten rather than ease her obvious distress.

  “Please. Just . . . leave me alone. I need to . . . to think.”

  Josh thought he understood. She’d just killed a man for the first time, and she was shaken. Anyone would be. A woman especially. Kate even more so. He wasn’t certain of the wisdom of leaving her alone right now, but he was less certain of the wisdom of pushing her. So, reluctantly, he let her go.

  “Is she all right?” Luke asked anxiously.

  “I think she will be. But she needs to be alone right now. Killing someone isn’t . . . a good thing to do, Luke.”

  “But you do it.”

  “And I hate it,” he said honestly. “And sometimes I hate myself because of it.”

  Luke stared at him. Before the boy could ask the questions Josh saw building, questions he knew he couldn’t answer, Josh hastily changed the subject.

  “Take me to this Mr. Meeker of yours, will you?”

  “But he said—”

  “I know. Take me anyway.”

  They were halfway to the hotel before Luke looked up at Josh and said hesitantly, “Did I do wrong? I was worried, there were so many of them—”

  “It’s all right, Luke.”

  “He was already ready for them anyway. Had that big buffalo gun of his loaded and was sitting in the window. He doesn’t miss much in town.”

  “I’ve noticed.”

  This town, Josh thought, was a most confusing place. They’d let him stay instead of running him out, and now three of them had saved his life, when most would have let him and Carter kill each other and count it a gain all around.

  Henry Meeker was conspicuously absent as they walked into the hotel. Josh supposed after the anxiety of the morning, the aptly named man had retreated to the saloon for fortification. It didn’t matter; it was Henry’s apparently ill-named father he wanted to see. Twice now the unseen man had helped him, and he wanted to know why.

  Luke led the way up the stairs at a run, and turned to head toward the front of the hotel. He knocked, but didn’t wait for an answer to open the door. Josh followed the boy inside. He’d half expected Luke to trumpet his arrival, but the boy remained quiet, as if remembering the man’s request not to see Josh.

  “I didn’t figure you’d stay away this time, Hawk.”

  The man in the wheeled chair still sat by the window, his back to the room. All Josh could see was that he’d been tall, was still lean, and had dark hair flecked with gray.

  “I owe you my thanks.”

  “You owe me nothing.”

  “You saved my life. I’d say that’s a sizable debt.”

  “You want to pay me back? Don’t waste the rest of your life.”

  He knew that voice. Knew that cultured voice with the slight Southern inflection. It was about the only thing Josh was certain of; where or when he’d ever encountered the man escaped him. Along with a lot else; he hadn’t even begun in his own mind to deal with the seeming second miracle of life he’d been handed in Gambler’s Notch.

  “You’ve helped me twice,” he said instead. “I’d like to know why.”

  “Old times’ sake,” the man said, confirming what Josh had already guessed. But Luke was startled, and after a hasty glance at Josh, ran over to Meeker’s chair.

  “You know Josh, Mr. Meeker?”

  “I did. Once.”

  Slowly, with hands that were thin yet obviously still strong enough to wield the big Henry with deadly accuracy, Meeker wheeled his chair around. Josh stared at him, at the eyes he’d never forgotten, the thick brush of a mustache that hadn’t changed at all except for the flecks of gray.

  “Hatch,” he whispered.

  “Robert Hatch . . . Meeker. You can see why I dropped the name.”

  “Hatch,” Josh repeated, a smile curving his mouth.

  “You’ve come a long way since Abilene, boy. Not sure I like the direction, though.”

  “I’m not sure I do, either,” Josh admitted, still stunned to see the man he’d beaten in that first contest so long ago, the man who had been so tall and straight and strong, reduced to the gaunt, crippled figure before him.

  “Your grandfather?” Hatch asked.

  “He’s dead. Nearly ten years now.”

  “I’m sorry. He was a good man.”

  “Yes, he was.” Josh eyed the wheeled chair. “What happened to you?”

  “I started down the same path you did. I wasn’t as lucky. Or as good.”

  “You were always as good.” Josh shifted his gaze back to the thin man’s face. “How long?”

  Hatch shrugged. “Few years back.”

  “Henry really your son?”

  The other man’s mouth quirked. “Much as I dislike admitting it, that he is.” He gave Josh a considering look. “I always had in mind he’d grow up more like you.”

  “I thought you didn’t like the direction I’ve been going.”

  “And neither do you, you said. But you’ve got the brains and the grit to change. Before you end up like me.”

  “Hatch—”

  “That’s a good woman, that Kate Dixon. She deserves better than what she got with that bastard Arly.”

  Josh didn’t question the man’s knowledge; he suspected Luke had something to do with it, but it didn’t really matter how he knew. “She deserves better than what she’d get with me.”

  “Maybe you should let her decide that.”

  “I got lucky this time. Next time . . . well, that’s nothing to ask a woman to live with.”

  “Make sure there is no next time.”

  Josh suppressed a sigh. “It’s not that easy.”

  Hatch lifted one thin shoulder in a half shrug. “You take that girl and get out of here, to somewhere they never heard of you, and men like Robards and Carter aren’t coming after you like the scavengers that they are.”

  Josh let out a compressed breath. “I wish . . .”

  “Don’t wish. Do it. You’ve got another chance, boy. Don’t waste it.”

  HE ALMOST MADE it sound possible, Josh thought later, as he walked back to the mercantile after a long afternoon of talking with Hatch. At Josh’s suggestion, Luke had remained behind; Josh needed to talk to Kate, and didn’t think she’d talk very easily with the boy around.

  By the time they’d finished the meal Kate had silently fixed and placed on the table, he was beginning to wonder if she would even talk to him. She’d changed her clothes at some point during the day, and
her hair was pinned back as tightly and primly as ever. She looked as she always had, but her movements were quick, sharp, and forced, and he sensed a new tension about her, a tension that was building.

  He helped her clean up, trying to think of a way to broach the subject of what had happened this afternoon. When she left the kitchen and walked back into the now closed store, Josh gave up looking for a subtle approach. He followed her into the store, took her by one arm, and turned her around.

  “Talk to me, Kate.”

  Mutely, she shook her head. Josh had the feeling that there was more bothering her besides what had happened this morning. He could only hope it wasn’t what they’d done last night.

  “I know you’re upset about killing that man—”

  “Oh, dear God,” Kate moaned, and Josh felt a shudder go through her. He pulled her close, and after an instant of resistance, she sagged against him. He heard her gulp, and shudder again.

  “It’s all right, Kate. It’s all over now.”

  “No,” she said, in a tight little voice that tore at him. “It’s not over. It will never be over.”

  He couldn’t deny that, not when he was haunted by his own ghosts. So he said nothing, just made soothing noises as he stroked her back. At last she gave in to the sobs that he guessed she’d been fighting all day. He’d never seen her cry, even when her future had been ripped away from her, and her tears seared him like acid. She wept until the shadows faded into darkness, until he knew she had to be exhausted.

  He wasn’t sure what to do next. She needed rest, but he couldn’t bring himself to even suggest that she go to the bed she’d shared with her husband. Yet to suggest she stay with him seemed . . . wrong somehow.

  At last he unrolled his blankets, added the extras they’d used last night, and set her gently down on them. She didn’t protest; in fact, she seemed almost numb when he began to undress her. He left her undergarments, shed only his own shirt, then settled down beside her and pulled her gently into his arms. He held her for a long time, feeling her quiver as if she were still crying, but no tears came. He held her, fighting his own weariness, until she at last drifted to sleep.

  He was startled when he awoke in the darkness to feel Kate clinging to him, an urgency in her grasp that brought him fully alert in a rush.

  “Kate?” he asked softly.

  “Please,” she whispered. “I know I shouldn’t, but I . . . I want . . .”

  Her voice trailed away, but her softly yearning tone left him little doubt as to what it was she wanted. His body hardened with a swiftness that took his breath away at simply the idea of losing himself in her sweetness again, but his mind was crying out that there was something wrong, in her voice, in her clinging, something he should know. But then, hesitantly, she began to touch him, to slide her hands over his chest and her fingers over his nipples, in the way he’d finally convinced her last night was all right, and he couldn’t think of anything except the heaven she was offering him once more.

  The moment he moved to kiss her, Kate seemed to go wild in his arms, kissing him back with an eagerness that stunned him. She followed his lead and probed into his mouth with her tongue, sending darts of heat shooting through him. Swiftly he tugged away her worn chemise and pantaloons, swearing inwardly that someday he’d see that she had the finest of linen and lace. He didn’t linger on what that thought implied. He couldn’t, not when she was touching him like this, with undisguised eagerness.

  He stroked his hands over her with a matching eagerness he couldn’t deny, and she writhed as he touched her, and caressed him in return in all the way he’d shown her. If he realized there was a touch of desperation in her movements, the knowledge was soon lost in the maelstrom of sensation she was causing. He’d never known a lovemaking as fierce, as powerful as he’d experienced with her last night, but now she seemed intent on showing him that that had been merely the beginning.

  He found himself responding to her urgency with a rising need of his own. It was fierce, fiery, and beyond his control. And he found he didn’t care, didn’t care about controlling it, didn’t care about anything except Kate and the passion that exploded between them.

  He tugged at her hair, freeing it, uncoiling the silken length of it. She reached for him, and he shoved away the rest of his clothes heedlessly, and urged her seeking hands down his body. She took his wordless hint and curled her fingers around him, beginning to stroke him in the way he’d taught her last night, but with an eagerness that made his breath catch violently.

  “Kate,” he gasped, “I . . . I don’t want to hurt you . . .”

  “You won’t,” she murmured against his chest. “Not you, Josh. Not you.”

  He felt the hot, wet dart of her tongue as she tentatively tasted his skin. This final sign that she truly wanted him sent him over the edge. But he still knew he was nearly out of control, and not for anything would he frighten her, bring back memories of another man out of control in another way.

  With a throttled growl of need, he reached for her. He pulled her on top of him, settling her hips over his, then urging her to sit up. Kate stared at him, clearly startled.

  “What . . . what are you doing?”

  He groaned as she moved; knowing she hadn’t meant it as a caress didn’t lessen the fierce clenching of his body.

  “You . . . you have to do it. You’re driving me too wild and I don’t want to hurt you,” he repeated, his voice nearly breaking as she moved again, unintentionally stroking his rigid flesh with her body. His hips jerked involuntarily, thrusting himself upward against her.

  Her cheeks flamed, and her eyes widened. Her voice was barely a whisper as she said, “Me?”

  He saw her shock, but saw as well a flicker of shy yearning in her eyes. She might be stunned by the idea, but she wasn’t afraid. He tried to talk but couldn’t, not when he could feel her feminine heat, not when a move of merely inches would put his aching flesh inside her. Instead he guided her, carefully, gently, even though his body was screaming out for him to hurry, to bury himself in her sweet warmth before he died of wanting it.

  When at last she realized exactly what he wanted, her color deepened even more. But she didn’t pull away, didn’t retreat. And when she began to cautiously, hesitantly lower herself onto him, the slowness of her movements nearly undid him. He clenched his jaw as her slick heat gradually enveloped him, so slowly he nearly cried out with his growing urgency. Only the growing look of wonder on her face as she, for the first time in her life, controlled the pace, kept him from rolling her onto her back and driving home in the savage thrust his body was clamoring for. And when she at last settled down atop him, taking all of him in one last easing of flesh into flesh, he did cry out, her name, in a voice he’d never heard from himself before.

  He showed her the movement, urged her with his hands on her hips into the slow rocking that flexed him deep inside her. As much as he loved the feel of this, looking up at her, watching her breasts sway slightly as she moved against him, was making it nearly impossible for him to hold back the tide boiling up inside him. Her hair fell forward, brushing over his skin, feeling as soft as he’d always imagined it would. It screened them both, as if hiding them from the world. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to last much longer, and slipped a hand down between their bodies to find and stroke that tiny knot of flesh that made her quiver.

  Kate cried out his name at the first touch of his fingers, and began to move faster. Josh gritted his teeth and fought to hold on, quickening his circular caresses, reaching up with his other hand to pluck both her nipples into tight peaks, groaning thickly as he felt an answering ripple in the hot female flesh that was clasping him so tightly.

  And then Kate’s head went back sharply, her body curving like a bow. He felt it begin for her, felt the first shuddering convulsion of those deep, powerful muscles. His hands shot back to
her hips, pulling her hard against him. Then he was lost, swept up by the coaxing of her body, and his fingers dug into her soft flesh as he arched beneath her, growling out her name as he poured himself into her in a burst of heat and light and sensation that left him panting and utterly drained.

  She collapsed atop him, trembling. She murmured his name, and he just managed to lift his arms to hold her. He cradled her there for a long, quiet time, drifting in some wondrous place he’d never known existed, where there was more sweetness than he’d ever dreamed of and anything seemed possible. Even a life of peace for The Hawk.

  He slept for a while, then woke when she stirred. It was deep night now, and this time they made love slowly, gently, with less of the urgency but more tender passion. And he thought the sound of his name as it broke from her in the moment her body shuddered to completion the sweetest sound he’d ever heard.

  He didn’t know how much time had passed before he could bring himself to speak. He knew she wasn’t asleep; he could feel the flutter of her lashes against the skin of his chest when she blinked. He wondered if he should just let it go, and hope she was over it now, that somehow the heat of their passion had seared away the ugly memories of having killed a man. But deep down he knew better; it didn’t go away so easily and who knew that better than he did?

  “Kate?”

  “Hmmm?”

  She sounded calm enough. But he didn’t want to bring it up again, if she had somehow come to terms with what she’d done.

  “Why do you suppose Art . . . did that?”

  She went still, and he almost wished he hadn’t said anything at all. But he knew it would haunt her forever if she thought she’d had another choice.

  “It wasn’t a fair fight,” she said after a long moment.

  “Carter believed in sure things, not fair fights,” Josh agreed. “And this would have been a sure thing, if not for Art. And Hatch.” He tightened his arms around her. “And you.”

  This time she seemed to stop breathing.