Before the Dawn

by Denise A. Agnew

  She had no doubt he spoke the truth.

  Time crawled as they rode onward and the sun settled lower in the sky. From what she could tell, they progressed west. How far were they away from Portage or other civilization? Though at first her mind reeled from all that happened, Mary Jane clung to the emotions she recognized. Without fury, grief would have made her pliant. A plan formed in her mind, and nothing would stop her from executing it.

  What happened to her after that, she simply did not care.

  Mary Jane jerked to awareness as her horse whinnied. Fear bit into her with talon-like sharpness. She could not believe she had fallen asleep. Trees threw intimidating shadows over the ground as Amos stopped the horses. Nothing around her looked comforting. Civilization seemed far away, and they had ridden for what seemed hours.

  Amos dismounted. “We camp here.”

  Her body ached as she swung down from her animal and tried not to tangle in her skirts. Her left leg gave way, and she tumbled on her butt to the ground with a surprised cry. Tears filled her eyes. I hate this. I hate him. Struggling for control, she stood. No matter what happened now, she could not falter.

  Amos’s hands came under her armpits and hauled her upward unceremoniously. She forced a laugh to her lips and leaned against him, pressing her breasts against his chest. His arm came around her for a moment, then he shoved her away.

  Disgust filled his face. “Get to work unsaddling that horse.”

  Surprised, she assessed him. Perhaps conversation would change his mood. As she did as she was told, Mary Jane asked, “May I ask a question?”

  He grunted. “You can ask. Don’t mean I’ll answer.”

  “Where are we?”

  “You don’t need to know.”

  She abandoned questions while she worked. It took her considerable time to undo the saddle, and she tore a fingernail in the process.

  “Damn it woman, what’s taking you so long?” He pushed her away. “If you can’t do this right maybe you can cook. That pack has beans and utensils. Get to work making a fire.”

  “I do not… I do not know how to make a fire.”

  Amos swung around and glared. “Figured as much. You a city woman?”

  “I live in Pittsburgh.”

  A slow grin didn’t improve his looks. Though any woman would acknowledge his attractiveness, and his resemblance to Elijah proved disturbing, his soul made him repulsive beyond repair. “Guess I’ll have to do that much for you. You cook?”

  As she’d revealed to Mrs. Connor, she did not, but she could lie. “Yes.”

  “Good. At least you’re of some use. Gather kindling, and don’t think you can run off into the woods. You do and you die.”

  She knew he meant it. After all, what could she do in the forest without supplies or any idea of which direction to run? Dependence on Amos made her angry, but she had no choice.

  He set to making a fire, and as he worked, her mind raced despite exhaustion.

  “Someone will see the fire, will they not?” she asked.

  His head jerked up. “Someone?”

  “Well, yes. I assume someone from the train will look for me. Especially after…” She swallowed hard around the grief threatening to tighten her throat. “…especially after they find Elijah’s body and the old woman.”

  Amos’s laugh held genuine mirth. “Well, if that doesn’t beat all. And why would you care if it were true? Don’t you want someone to find you? Aren’t you planning to escape?”

  His question stalled her for a few seconds, but she recovered quickly. “Why would I try to escape?” She walked closer to the fire. “Elijah told me all about you. I am fascinated.”

  He squatted by the fire pit and watched flames dance. “Girl, I’m sure he hated my innards. Why would anything he told you make you fascinated with me?”

  Though loathing threatened to derail her acting, she pressed onward with her plan. She moved nearer to the fire. Shivers racked her body as night temperatures encroached. “Because I was starting to find your brother…uninteresting. I like a man with an…” she fumbled for words, “…edge of violence.”

  “You’re quite the adventuress?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t believe you.”

  She crossed her arms as fear coiled in her belly for what she might have to say and do in the next few moments. “Do you think I would have acted as Elijah’s wife all this time if I was not the adventurous woman? What proper woman does that?”

  His eyes went as flat as the icy surface of a winter pond. “You said you weren’t married. Did you marry him?”

  “No. Your hired men Claypool and Hoop threatened me. Elijah offered his protection. I could only accept if we pretended to be man and wife.”

  “Then you lost your virtue to him? Or was it already gone when you met him?”

  Her mind reeled with how to answer. She laughed and hoped she sounded convincing. “Would a virtuous woman tell you? I think not. I lost my virginity long ago.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Twenty-two.”

  “And not hitched yet. I’ll be. If Elijah was so Joe fired gentlemanly to you, why did you stay with him? You said you like a man with an edge.”

  His intelligent questions threw her. Though he was Elijah’s brother, she expected a man of low comprehension. Now that she knew otherwise, she must take care.

  She sat close to him, even though the action made every muscle within her stiffen in repulsion. “Elijah was in jail. That gives him all the disreputable quality he needed to attract my notice. Then I realized he was not as unsavory and sinful as I had hoped.”

  Amos gazed into the fire. Wind blew against the flames and caused them to dance and crackle. In the distance an animal howled in horrible pain, adding a surreal ambiance. Her skin prickled as nature around her turned eerie and haunted. What sort of creature inhabited this wood that would make such a sound? What dangers lurked in the dark?

  She scooted closer. “What was that?”

  He glanced down at her, his eyes sparking with a strange fire in the disappearing light. “Don’t get too close to me, girl. Unless you’re offering something you don’t mind giving.”

  She stayed put.

  Amos returned to his work. “Probably a mountain lion attacking a deer or some such.”

  A kind man would have reassured her that fire would keep animals at bay, but Mary Jane knew Amos wouldn’t bother and he certainly wasn’t kind.

  Amos fixed their entire meal of beans, jerky and coffee, even though she had told him she could cook. Odd. They ate in silence, and when her stomach growled and asked for more, she reached into the pot to ladle more beans. For a long time, her mind whirled around morbid possibilities. She could show her real feelings about this man, but then he would remain on guard. So she would stay the course with her plan and hope she did not live to regret it.

  She eventually asked, “What do you plan to do with me, Amos?”

  He took a sip of coffee from a tankard. “What do you think I should do with you, girl?”

  “You could let me go. I will only slow you down.”

  “Too late for that. I let you go and you die in the wilderness. You best resign yourself to staying with me.”

  Despite Amos’s calm, his temper must be avoided at all costs. “Why do you hate Elijah so much?”

  “Because he is who he is.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Amos snorted. “He’s always been the lily white son in the family. Damn boy took care of puppies instead of drowning them when our Da said he should. He always did what Ma told him and worked hard. Never did a thing wrong even when I tried to drag him along for the trouble. A boy like that is way too good.”

  Amos’s odd take on Elijah did not surprise her. “You hate him because he saved dogs from drowning?”

  He sneered. “There was plenty he did that I hated. I’m not going to make a list for you.”

  He lapsed into silence until they finished eating,
then he made her clean the dishes in a creek nearby. Before long he made a bedroll of blankets for them both. He put them close, and she recoiled when contemplating what he might attempt in the night. Though Mary Jane thought she had considered every angle of her plan, when the very last rays of sun disappeared through the trees, dread stalked her. Yet she feared no animal as much as she did Amos.

  Perhaps if she took this slow and acted friendly, perhaps Amos would show some vulnerability. A way she could exploit that weakness. She almost smiled. Here she sat, in many ways defenseless, and plotted this man’s downfall as callously as he once plotted Elijah’s demise.

  Well, well. Mother would have something to say about that. She waited, but the normal mental dialogue with the specter of her aunt did not materialize. Anything that happened from this point forward, she relied on herself. Listening to an angel on her shoulder had no merit in this situation if Mary Jane planned to survive. She could almost hear Elijah’s voice urging her onward. Do whatever you must to survive, darlin’. Whatever you must.

  Inside, Elijah’s death created a hollow within her weary heart. One moment she felt strong, the next weaker than a newborn. How could she do this? How could she find the right way?

  Though she clutched a blanket around her, comfort diminished under the odor. The rough fabric smelled like horse and leather and sweat. She wrinkled her nose. She ached for Elijah’s enveloping and comforting warmth, and the protection she had taken for granted in the short time they knew each other. She swallowed hard and fought the desire to moan with a terrible agony that refused to ebb. She forced it back and drew on reserves of strength. If she wanted to live through this, no matter how horrible things might become, she must move past the grief threatening to rip her into shreds.

  Amos smiled, his mouth crooked and sarcastic. “You’re one of those fine city women.”

  “I am from the city, yes. Like I told you.”

  An epiphany came to her. “Elijah said you and Zeke and your father went into the wilderness in Ireland and learned how to survive.”

  Amos lay on his side and angled away from her so he could lean on one elbow on his blanket. “That’s right. Elijah told you the truth on that one.” Amos slipped a flask from his waistcoat and after opening it, tipped a portion of liquid into steaming coffee. “Whiskey. Give me your coffee.”

  She wanted to refuse, but at the same time, she could not ignore his request and make progress in gaining his trust. Trust. She would never trust him, but he did not have to know that. If she could make him believe she would not run, would attempt no retaliation…

  She handed him her tankard. After he tipped whiskey into her tankard, then a bit more, he returned her cup.

  She took a healthy swallow. The liquid made her gasp and cough as the drink raced hot and fast through her body. So this was the deceitful and sinful drink that drove men mad. If she planned to dance with wild men, she would have to drink their liquor and understand them. With that logic, she felt better.

  One of his dark eyebrows winged upward, the sneer of contempt on his face clear. “Good?”

  She nodded. The watchful look in his eyes made her nerves jumpy. Fear battled with curiosity about this man who came from the same womb as Elijah.

  “You want to know why I killed her, don’t you?” His eyes glinted. “Why I took her from Elijah’s arms?”

  She knew the answer but asked, “Who?”

  “Elijah’s whore.”

  No. No. Do not tell me. “Maureen?”

  “Yeah.”

  Did she want to hear this too? His twisted statements, his meandering desires? “Tell me, then.”

  Amos tilted his head to the side, his gaze filled with curiosity and a mean gleam. “You aren’t anything like Maureen. You’re darker and more exotic looking. Maybe Elijah thought if he was going to bed down with a woman he might as well pick one that looks less the angel and more of the whore.”

  That stung, and she snapped back, “I am not a whore, Amos McKinnon.”

  He chuckled. “You’re a sultry piece. You simmer and burn at just the right temperature. A man knows that underneath there’s substance.” He smiled, but it did not add up to more than a grin of ugly satisfaction. “Maureen had red hair and freckles across her nose. She was small. You’re a hearty sort. Not large, just not as breakable as her. You see, I get that about a woman. I understand women better than Elijah. I know which ones are real and which ones play with men.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “’Cause men are basically stupid, see. Women like Maureen…she was real young and impulsive. As full of heat as her hair. She had a side Elijah didn’t see. She didn’t want him to know.”

  Mary Jane encouraged him, eager to learn more in her search for an angle through this man’s skin. “Tell me more.”

  He smiled. “She liked rough sex.”

  He waited, that smile growing bigger, as if he wanted her to soak in the information.

  “She was a virgin when she met Elijah,” Mary Jane said.

  “That what he told you, girl? He thought she was this sweet thing with no experience under a man’s cock. He was dead wrong.”

  She tried to keep her face even despite his crude expressions, and he continued.

  “I remember the first time I had her. You see, I had her before she even met Elijah. She wasn’t as white and tender as he imagined, what with her needs and wants. She liked when a man beat on her…begged for it as a matter of fact. Sick isn’t it, girl? Anyway, I always thought my Da was a first rate bastard beating on all of us, but when she asked me for it and said she’d tried it once—hell, she said it made sex more exciting. I decided to try it. So I slapped her around. Maureen was right.”

  Mary Jane did not know what to believe, appalled and yet eager to understand the story.

  He laughed softly. “Every time I hit her, no matter where I hit her, it felt…it felt good. Better than anything I did before. She screamed, but it was a good scream. A scream full of pleasure.”

  Horrified, Mary Jane struggled to keep the disgust out of her face. “If she was bruised surely someone would notice.”

  “Nah, I never hit her where anyone would see. We did it in hotels where a woman could scream and no one would ever ask a question.” His eyes danced with memory, filled with a delight both stomach-turning and fascinating. “But you see, it didn’t stop there. Once I found out how good it felt, I knew I wanted it again.” Wicked delight left his eyes, replaced by pure anger. “It didn’t stop with her, though. I had plenty of other women, some that didn’t like getting hit. I didn’t care. You see, I needed it then. And I hated that because Maureen made me like it. It was all her fault.”

  Anger blindsided Mary Jane with its ferociousness before she could temper her response. “Her fault because you hit her? I have never heard anything so absurd.”

  He sat up, and Mary Jane flinched. “Well, believe it. She made me want it. But I know how pristine ol’ Elijah was. He didn’t know any better because he was too innocent himself to know what evil shite that woman had in her heart.”

  Mary Jane licked her dry lips and took another swig of liquor-laced coffee. “Then what happened?”

  “She turned her back on me after I broke her in for my little brother. That’s when I realized no real woman would like the things I did to her. So she must be a whore. A whore who thought she could fool me.” Amos got on his knees and then sat back. He pointed at his chest with his thumb. “Damned bitch thought she could make this Irishman a fool.”

  “Did she fool Elijah?”

  He snorted. “Yep. She made him think she was the sun and moon and the bleedin’ stars at night. Believed every last word. She roped his hide but Elijah isn’t as holy as you think. Hate can fuel a man’s revenge. I’ll bet he wanted to kill me too.”

  She could not argue with that.

  Stunned by the twisted insight coming from Amos, she soaked in the disturbing quiet.

  “That does not explain why you killed her,�
�� she finally said. “If you despised her you could have left her alone.”

  Amos didn’t twitch an eyebrow over her disgust. “I didn’t start off intending to kill her. Maybe hurt her, yeah. When she came to me and asked me to take her away, I thought I might actually do it. She said didn’t want to marry Elijah because living with a man who wouldn’t beat her didn’t appeal.”

  “That is the most awful thing I have heard.”

  “Yeah, you lily white girls always think men are swine with base natures that need taming. But you see, it isn’t always that way. Sometimes women are just as base and evil as any man thought of being. That was Maureen. When she came to me outside the tavern and said she wanted to run away with me, she started to cry and said she didn’t love him. That she was carrying my child and wanted to marry me. That’s when I understood she would probably betray me someday if I married her instead of Elijah. She was no good.” His eyes flashed as the flames from their fire started to sputter and lose height. His hands clenched into fists on his thighs, his mouth a grimace. “I knew the good book was right about this type of woman. She was a whore brought up from the dens of hell, and I couldn’t let her get a hold on me. I pulled out my knife and cleansed her.”

  Fear shot high inside Mary Jane, an insidious monster more terrifying than nighttime tales told by parents to scare children into compliance. She wished right now that their campfire would transform into a bad dream. She would awaken in Elijah’s arms, free from grief. Tears welled. The truth, if Amos told it, was as hideous as any scenario she could have imagined.

  He finished his drink with one gulp. He threw the tankard down by the fire. Leftover droplets went into the flames and hissed.

  Disbelief hovered under the surface. “You certainly twist things to fit your needs, Mr. McKinnon.”

  So much for her attempt to win his favor.

  His eyes hardened even more with a darkness in their depths that made her wonder how he possibly could have been born from the same mother as Elijah.

  “That I do, Miss Lawson. That I do. I’m as evil and dark as Maureen ever thought of being. Unlike some I never claim to be anything else. That’s why I recognized an evil whore when I saw one.” He tapped his temple. “But Elijah got off easy when he went to prison. It kept him safe from the temptations that have wrecked me. If I went to Eastern State it wouldn’t fix me. It would make me more evil than I already am. No good would come of that.”