"If I live in your house," Cassie told him softly, "I think it will end up like that."
"The hell it will!" he thundered.
Yet even while the denial was on his lips, Drew found himself imagining what it would be like to have her warm and willing in his bed. To share deep, sultry kisses and caress her. To thrust himself inside her and feel those long, slim legs around him. To know that every time they did that, he was taking some Indian's leavings.
"I swear to you, Cassie, if you agree to live in my house, I won't so much as touch your hand."
She looked at him, looked into him, looked through him. "After last week, I don't believe that's something either of us can promise. And besides, it's not the only reason I want to marry you."
He eyed her uncertainly, trying to imagine what was going on inside her head. Was she going to tell him she loved him?
"What's the other reason?" he demanded.
"I need somewhere to belong." There was a starkness to the declaration, an obdurate insistence that booked no doubt. "When I realized no one was going to rescue Julia and me from the Kiowa," she tried to explain, "I did my best to make a place for myself. I did the same when I was traded to the Cheyenne. It's how I survived.
"Now that I've been returned to the whites, I have to make a place for myself again. I know that won't be easy because of the way I'm marked." Cassie drew a shaky breath, as if what she intended to say were hard for her. "If I lived with you—even if we never touched, never so much as kissed—everyone would believe I was your whore. They would mark me in a different way, in a way that would be even harder to overcome. I would never be able to make a place for myself when Meggie left and you had no further need of me."
Drew opened his mouth to speak, but Cassie went on. "If you married me, I would be a part of something, part of your and Meggie's lives, part of a family."
What Cassie wanted was really amazingly simple—a home where she could feel safe and people to love her. Wasn't that what everyone wanted?
Everyone but army captains bent on revenge.
Drew dropped into the chair beside her and rubbed at his eyes. What would it be like coming home to her, sitting across the table from her as they ate their meals, watching her holding Meggie? What would it be like to have Cassie in his bed?
Once when they were young, Drew had been able to envision scenes like those, to imagine how sweet marriage between them could be. Now Cassie wanted him to pick up the shards of those broken dreams and make a new reality.
As if he could go back.
As if she could.
There was no question what marrying Cassie would cost him. He would forfeit the respect of other army officers, perhaps even their trust, and advancement through the ranks. But then, he'd never had the hankering for stars on his collar. All he'd ever wanted was blood and glory—and vengeance.
"Please, Drew," Cassie offered softly. "I know it can't be the way it was between us when we were young, but please don't ask me to settle for less than I deserve."
Dear God, what did she deserve?
More than she had. More than she was likely to have if he turned her away.
Sitting there in Sally McGarrity's cozy kitchen, Drew found himself wishing Cassie had never come back. He had convinced himself that she was dead. He had grieved for her. Why wasn't that enough?
She made him remember what it was like to lie helpless when she and Julia needed him, to see that their hands were bound and stained with blood, to know that two shots from his revolver could set them free. If he had been able to reach the pistol, if he had been able to aim the gun and pull the trigger, Cass wouldn't be here now, bringing back memories to torment him.
For a long, desperate moment Drew stared into Cassie's pale, marked face and wondered which was stronger, his guilt or his fear. But then, he had always known the answer.
Drew was trembling inside when he reached across and took her hand. "Would you, Cassandra Morgan, do me the honor of becoming my wife?"
* * *
Hunter stopped just outside the big double doors of the cavalry stable to watch Cass plow toward him through the snow. She was like some bright angel, some fancy he'd dreamed up while riding alone across the vast, wintry prairie. The hood of her faded cloak framed a mass of honey hair he wanted to rub between his fingertips and a face that was all the more arresting for its blatant imperfection.
He grinned in greeting and wondered if she'd missed him.
"Well," Cassandra Morgan said, huffing a little with the exertion of stomping through the drifts of snow, "you took your damned time getting back from Fort Laramie, Alain Jalbert!"
Hunter blinked at her in astonishment. "My God, Cass, you're speaking English! And cussing, too. How did you make so much progress while I was gone?"
"I didn't have much choice," she admonished him.
"No, I suppose you didn't," Hunter murmured, sorry all over again that he'd been ordered away.
"I did fine while you were gone," she said with a touch of pride. "If you'd been here to help, I might not have remembered so many English words so quickly."
That was probably true, and he was unduly pleased she had managed by herself. He was pleased with Cassandra Morgan for a good deal more than that, everything from the way she'd stood up to Ben McGarrity that first day to the deep, sweet curve of her lips. The fatigue of his long, cold ride melted away just seeing her smile.
"So why were you looking for me?" he asked, hitching his saddlebags and his war club over one shoulder and turning toward the friendly camp and the tepee that was his home.
Cass fell into step beside him. "I've come to ask for your help."
"My help?" he asked, teasing her. "It seems you've gotten on extremely well without my help. What do you need?"
"I want you to teach me how to be a soldier's wife."
Hunter stopped dead in his tracks and stared at her. "A soldier's wife?"
"I'm marrying Drew Reynolds at the end of the week."
Hunter's knees wobbled as if someone had landed a sucker punch. "You're marrying Captain Reynolds? Captain Drew Reynolds?" The man who hates Indians? The man who could barely touch you the day you were exchanged?
"Yes, I am," she answered, a hint of defiance in her tone.
He told himself he shouldn't be surprised. He'd watched Cassie and Drew that day at headquarters. He'd seen how they looked at each other. He'd sensed the intensity of the bond between them. This news that they'd picked up where they left off years before shouldn't leave him feeling so hollow inside. It shouldn't make him want to grab Cassie by the shoulders and shake her hard. Make him want to rip off Reynold's head.
He curled his lips in what would have to pass for a smile. "Well then, I suppose congratulations are in order."
If Cass had heard the contradiction in his tone, she ignored it. "Thank you," she said.
"Isn't this marriage a little—sudden?"
"I suppose it is. But Drew and I were promised years ago."
How old could either of them have been back then? Sixteen? Seventeen? Even if they'd loved each other with all their hearts, a world of things had happened. Monumental things. Life-changing things.
"Are you sure this is what you want?" It's none of your goddamned business what she wants. "You aren't just marrying Captain Reynolds because—" Hunter hesitated, "well, because you don't know what else to do?"
He saw a dull red stain creep into Cassie's cheeks. "Drew needs someone to care for his daughter," she told him a little too carefully. "I need to secure my place if I'm to live among the whites."
Hunter stared at her, wondering if it was possible to "secure a place" anywhere. He never had. He'd been an outcast among his half brothers and half sisters in the big house in St. Louis, a stranger among the Arikara when he'd gone back to his tribe, and a misfit in the Confederate Army. Being a respected scout came as close as anything to belonging somewhere. Still, he understood how needing acceptance could push her into this.
"Have you
thought—" he began and stopped himself, wondering what he was about to ask. Had she thought about how driven Reynolds was, how much he hated Indians? How difficult life with him was bound to be?
Had she thought about marrying him instead?
That idea shook Hunter even more than the announcement of Cassie's nuptials. He had never once considered taking a wife.
"Thought what?" She turned those wide, pale eyes on him.
In spite of standing out in the snow, Hunter went hot all over. Flushed and feverish and panicky.
"Have you thought," he fumbled, "that marrying Drew Reynolds might not be everything you expect it to be?"
"Few things are what we expect," she answered coolly. "And a marriage between us serves both our purposes. Still, I want to be a good wife to him, the kind an officer needs."'
The kind of wife Drew Reynolds needed and Cassandra would make were miles apart.
Hunter did his best to squirm out of the obligation. "Why haven't you asked Sally McGarrity to teach you what you need to know?"
Cass ducked her head. "Not everyone on the post approves of Drew marrying me, and because they think Sally brought us together, some of the women—"
"Alma Parker," Hunter guessed.
Cass flushed and nodded. "She's gone out of her way to make things..."
"Difficult?" So Alma Parker opposed the match. It was the first time he and Alma Parker had agreed about anything.
"Will you help me learn what I need to know?" Cass looked up at him, her eyes wide and soft with trust.
Trust he'd wanted so much to win. Trust that damned him as surely as stealing from the poor box.
The anger came again, so strong he couldn't see.
"Let me get this straight," he drawled around the hot, bitter knot twisting in his throat. "You want me to teach you things an officer's wife needs to know—things like how not to get caught stealing from the sutler's store?"
He saw the pain flare up in her eyes and had never felt more like a bastard.
In spite of his gibe, Cassie Morgan held her ground. "You understand the differences between my life with the Cheyenne and the one I'll be living with Drew," she insisted. "You know how these women behave, and the mistakes I might make. You could teach me the things I've forgotten about living among the whites."
Hunter stood, his muscles taut, his fingers clamped tight around the saddlebags. "You can't just slip back into the life you left nine years ago."
"Because I'm marked."
"Damn the mark!" he thundered at her. "You can't go back because you've changed. You've changed not so much in the ways that show, but in the ways that don't. The way you are, the way you think, the things you believe."
"What do you mean?"
Hunter tried to breathe more deeply, to still the tremors racking his insides. He didn't want to be part of this. He didn't want to help Cass Morgan be a better wife to someone else. Still, he didn't seem able to deny her.
He nudged the hem of her skirt with the toe of his boot. "What are you wearing under there, Cass? Are you wearing those bright, shiny lace-up boots Sally gave you, or are you wearing moccasins?"
The color in her cheeks deepened. "The shiny boots hurt."
Hunter gave her a stiff-lipped smile. "I imagine they do. I'll warrant Sally McGarrity's boots hurt, too. And Alma Parker's boots and Sylvie Noonan's boots, but they wear them anyway. It's what ladies do. They suffer to be fashionable, even out here, because they believe that maintaining certain standards of gentility is important. They wear corsets that constrict their breathing and skirts that drag in the fire..."
"I'll get used to the boots," she promised him.
Hunter shook his head. "Will you? Well, perhaps you will. But you miss my point. Because you spent nine years with the Indians, you won't ever again see the world as a white woman sees it. You've learned to deal in practicalities. You'll always see what is, when your white friends will see what ought to be."
"But I'm white," Cass insisted blindly. "I lived among the whites a whole lot longer than I lived among the Indians! I'll learn to think like a white again."
Hunter looked into her pale, determined face. If by sheer resolve a person could make a place for herself, Hunter would have bet money on Cass. But succeeding wasn't up to her.
This was a world where authority ruled and rank had its privileges, where being different was held in the gravest contempt, and sense and sensibility were held in low esteem. It was a world where men with Reynolds's prejudices used Indian women for their pleasure and expected their wives to be inviolate. It was a world where Cassandra didn't stand a chance.
"Oh, Cass," Hunter sighed, unbearably weary all at once. "If you're determined to marry the captain, I can't stop you—"
"But you will not help. You're not going to teach me what I need to know to succeed as an officer's lady."
Hunter knew that if he denied her help, he would be severing the bond between them. It was a connection he was loath to break—a fine, sweet, profoundly uncomfortable connection that meant more to him than almost anything else.
"It's been my observation," he said, measuring out his words, "that success in marriage depends a good deal more on who you are and what you believe than on what you know. But if you're determined to rush headlong into wedded bliss with Captain Reynolds, then I wish you every happiness."
She must have known he lied.
As he turned toward his tepee, his bed, and the solitude that seemed suddenly so appealing, she stood and shouted after him. "I will make Drew a proper wife. I will be an officer's lady. I will make a place for myself here at the fort!"
"Not in a hundred lifetimes, Cassandra," Hunter murmured, and hoped he was wrong.
* * *
Only a fool would be afraid of a four-year-old, Cassie chided herself as she made her way along Officers' Row through the falling snow. After what she'd survived these last nine years, the prospect of spending the afternoon with Meggie Reynolds shouldn't turn her all quivery inside.
Drew had made it clear that they would be married regardless of how his daughter responded to her, but Cassie knew things would be better for everyone if she could win Meggie's trust.
Cassie had come fully armed to do that. A drawstring bag full of surprises dangled from her wrist, and Sally had helped her make a plate of fried cakes dusted with sugar. Cassie figured no child could hold out long against a plate of sweets.
Cassandra knocked for a good long while before the door to Drew's cabin creaked open. Lila Wilcox peered out at her.
"What do you want?" The woman's hostility wafted toward Cassie on the smell of bleach, naphtha, and strong lye soap.
"Drew told you I was coming to pay a call on Meggie this afternoon, didn't he?"
Lila hesitated and scowled. "I suppose he might have mentioned that."
"Then do you think I can come in?"
Lila opened the door in grudging acquiescence, and Cassie stepped inside. Meggie stood peeking at her from behind the blind of Lila's ample hip.
Cassandra hunkered down to greet the little girl. "Hello there, Meggie. It's good to see you again. I hope you like surprises. I have several in my sack, and they're just for you."
Having set the bait, Cassie rose and shifted the plate of fried cakes from hand to hand as she removed her cloak. Lila huffed, hung it on a peg to the right of the door, and led the procession into the kitchen.
In spite of Lila's presence in the cabin, there were no woman's touches here. The table was bare except for a slate and piece of chalk. A pitiful collection of tin plates and mugs, a pitcher and a few chipped crockery bowls sat on open shelves. The rough wood floors were unadorned.
Cassie remembered the thick furs she had spread over the ground cloth in Gray Falcon's tepee. There had been bright blankets on the cots, paint and embroidery decorating the inner lining of the tent, parfleches and other colorful objects stacked here and there. How much cozier that had been than this.
Still, there was an ornate rocker pu
lled up before the fire, with a colorful quilt draped over one arm. Cassie walked to the trestle table and set down the towel-draped plate of fried cakes.
"Whad's in 'ere?" With one fist jammed in her mouth, Meggie's words were all but unintelligible.
"I made some good things for us to eat," Cassie said, hoping to coax Meggie closer. "I thought you and Lila and I could have a party."
The little girl eased out from behind the older woman's skirts and looked up at her for permission. Still radiating disapproval, Lila nodded that having a party would be all right.
"Ca' we hab tea?" Meggie asked around her hand.
"I'll put the kettle on," Lila said, and went to do it.
While Lila puttered at the fire, Drew's daughter looked Cassie up and down. Cass settled on one of the benches beside the table and let her. She'd always thought that making friends with a child was a lot like taming a wild animal. You had to wait for them to make the first move.
Eventually Meggie did, taking the fingers from her mouth and coming closer. "What's that on your face?"
Cassandra might have known it would be the first thing Meggie would ask about. "It's a tattoo."
"Can I touch it?"
Cassie nodded and sat stone still while small, spit-wet fingers traced first the circle and then the star burst that radiated from it.
"How'd you get it?" Meggie asked.
"The Indians put it there."
"Does it rub off?" the little girl asked, stroking experimentally. Meggie's fingers left dampness in their wake.
"No."
"Did it hurt when they put it there?"
"It hurt a lot."
"How did they do it?"
"Meggie!" Lila admonished from where she stood spooning tea into the pot.
As if Meggie suddenly realized how close she'd come, she took two steps back. "You must have been bad for them to do that," she said. "You must have been very bad for them to want to make you so ugly."
Though it was hardly the first time Cassie had heard that sentiment expressed, the words lodged like arrows in her heart. She told herself that they were the defensive words of a frightened child, that Meggie hadn't meant to hurt her, but excuses never helped.
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