There had been other horses since then, all of which he’d loved, but Breeze always watched him. He felt her gaze. He knew she’d forgiven him, which was a stupid thing for a man to think about a horse, but there it was.
Adelaide reminded him of when he’d first bought Breeze. Skittish but needing him. Her eyes, sky blue whereas Breeze’s had been mud brown, wanted to trust him, but terror had formed a protective armour over them. It was less now, that armour. She was coming closer, like when Breeze had first touched his hand. There was no way he’d hurt this filly beside him. And no way anyone else would, either. Not while Jesse Black was around.
“You’ve got nothing to worry about, Adelaide. I’d never hurt you.”
She stared at him with such an intensity, any other man might have looked away. But Jesse had been drawn into the blue, admitted entry into her private thoughts, and he didn’t plan on running away from that. She leaned toward him, bending at the hip, her movement barely perceptible, but he caught it. He covered the distance between them, touched his lips gently against hers, sensed no resistance. Her trembling breath tickled his cheek, the air warm and encouraging. He kissed her a little longer, fighting the devil to keep his urgency in check.
He opened his eyes, but hers were closed, faded lashes touching shadowed cheeks. So defenceless, this girl. A surge of protective instinct flowed through him at the sight, and he closed his eyes again, savouring the exhilarating fact that it was to him she had turned. To him she had finally come. To him she had opened her scarred heart.
Their lips parted, but he pressed his forehead against hers, knowing her eyes were still closed. “I’ll keep you safe, Adelaide.”
He felt her response before he heard it. Her fingers touched his cheek, light as a child’s caress. She was watching him this time, and he kept his eyes closed just a moment longer, let her experience the same feeling of belonging. When he couldn’t bear to be in the dark any longer, he opened his eyes and looked at her, intoxicated by the potency of the space between them, and saw the ice in her eyes had melted.
“I know you will,” she whispered. “I feel safe with you, Jesse.”
Her trust roared over him like a wave, and he could do nothing but ride it. He cradled her face in his hands and brought her against him again, kissing her and feeling the tentative movement of her lips against his. The tips of her fingers pressed on his upper arms, and her pulse galloped against his skin. He moved closer, curling one arm behind her neck, inhaling something herbal in her skin and hair, the remnants of smoke from a hearth fire, and the sharp, unavoidable tang of something he called fear. She made a little sound, almost urgent, and he slid the other hand down to her waist, swathed in soft, strong buckskin. Her arms had gone around him now, her fingers pressed urgently into his shoulder blades, and the taste of her tears touched his tongue.
She relaxed against his arm as he laid her gently back into the cool grass, kissing her the entire time. Then he drew away, leaning on one elbow and gazing down at her, admiring the pink flush that had consumed the white of her skin. Her hair was a pale pillow against the green, white loops and bows he wanted to feel between his fingers. She looked up at him, eyes shining with ready tears, a nervous smile trembling on lips that looked more full than they had a moment before.
“God, you’re beautiful,” he said. She threw one hand over her eyes and giggled. That was an unexpected sound. “What?”
She shrugged, unable to stop laughing, but at least she moved her hand away. He could have laughed himself, seeing the happy twinkle in her eyes. He leaned down and kissed her again and the giggle died away.
“Guess what, Adelaide?” he finally said. She opened her eyes wide, waiting. “You kissed me, and you’re still alive to tell about it.”
A shadow flitted across her eyes, but it passed. As if a bird had flown overhead, cutting them off from the sun for only an instant.
“I am,” she agreed. “Jesse?”
He ran one finger down her tear-dampened cheek, amazed by its smoothness. She was like a china doll, like the one his father had kept in the blanket box after his mother had been murdered. “What is it?”
“That was nice,” she said.
He smiled. “I’ve got more where that comes from,” he assured her.
Her chuckle was slightly lower this time, but her eyes flickered with concern. “Oh, I imagine you do,” she said. “But that’s enough for now.”
He rolled onto his back so they lay side by side, staring up at the underside of the willow. They listened to the water and birds, then he sighed and closed his eyes.
“You okay, Adelaide?”
She hesitated before she spoke, but her voice was confident. “Yes.” He heard the swish of the grass as she turned her head towards him, so he knew she was watching his reaction. He kept his eyes closed.
He smiled. “You’ll be fine.”
Her fingers brushed his, and he took her hand.
“I think maybe you’re right,” she said softly, and he drifted off to sleep, warm with the knowledge that for the first time in his life, he had a reason to stay.
CHAPTER 20
Family Reunion
Jesse and Ahtlee headed out with three other warriors the next morning, riding to the powwow. It was the most unlikely of meetings in so many ways. Cherokee and white politicians, all assembled in the August heat under the pretext of bettering their relations, faced each other across a small piece of grass outside the gates of New Windsor. The day was too hot to do any business inside. Everyone had shown up in their finery, the chiefs in their newest clothes: bright, beaded moccasins, a half dozen or so battle feathers hanging in their hair; the politicians wore coats, hats, and matching moustaches. Jesse wore simple trousers and a buckskin shirt, and he had graciously allowed Adelaide to weave a feather into his hair. Normally the feathers were reserved for warriors who had fought in battle, but Soquili had insisted that applied to Jesse, since he had fought bravely that first day, when Soquili had brought him home.
Something told Jesse that any kind of deal making at this powwow might involve his father showing up, and that little voice had been right. Thomas stood back a ways, leaning casually against an oak, arms crossed. Although his father intended to appear disinterested, Jesse could see Thomas’s hungry eyes taking in every man in the area and measuring him. Didn’t matter that Thomas had nothing to do with the men in charge. He had a way of wheedling his way into things, taking what he needed, and using it however he saw the most benefit to himself. Thomas didn’t spot his son right away, so Jesse got to his feet, dusted off his trousers, and made himself visible. He wasn’t surprised that his stomach rolled a bit, queasy with nerves. Now that it was time to talk, he wasn’t sure what he’d say.
Thomas’s eyes popped open at the sight of him, and Jesse watched a variety of expressions cross the old man’s face: confusion, bemusement, then something more calculating. Not once, Jesse noticed, did the gray eyes register anything resembling relief at the knowledge that his son had survived. Jesse nodded shortly, hiding his grin. Felt good to give the old man a shock. Maybe he’d drop dead of it. Thomas’s stunned expression snapped back in place, leaving a smile that hinted at amusement.
Ahtlee said something quick under his breath and Jesse grunted back. “My father’s over there,” Jesse explained. “I should at least tell him I’m alive.”
Ahtlee shook his head slowly, distrust swimming deep in his eyes. “He sees.”
“Well, he’ll come over here if I don’t go over there.”
“He will not.”
Sure enough, Thomas came loping across the square of flat, dry earth they’d designated for the powwow.
“Jesse, boy!” Thomas called cheerfully, waving as if they were the closest of friends.
“I told you,” Jesse told Ahtlee. This time Ahtlee said nothing, only narrowed his eyes speculatively at Jesse.
Jesse grinned. “I’m c
oming home with you,” he assured the Cherokee. “I just gotta talk to the guy is all.”
Ahtlee nodded, then glanced toward Thomas as he approached. “He call you “boy”? Not “man”? He not know son too good.” Then he turned toward the other Cherokee, leaving Jesse alone. Jesse couldn’t hide the grin that popped out at the unexpected words of praise from his foster father.
“So,” Thomas bellowed as he drew close. “The boy’s alive after all. And would you look at you now? All Injun, you are.” He flicked his fingers at Jesse’s hair. “Even a little feather. Suits you.”
“Yeah, I’m alive, no thanks to you,” Jesse replied, giving nothing away. “And you look the same as ever. Old, dirty, and mean.”
Thomas’s expression resumed his typical sneer. He hooked his thumbs in the waistband of his trousers. “What’s going on, Jesse? Why ain’t you dead?”
Jesse shrugged, looking unconcerned. “Guess I was too pretty to kill. They’d have no trouble with ending you, though.”
His father grunted, then examined Jesse with his piercing gray eyes, hunting for something Jesse had no wish to give. He owed this man nothing, and Jesse held his stare. “And the other fellas they brought in when they caught you?”
“Not pretty enough.”
A couple of seconds passed with nothing said but what passed through their eyes. How many times had Thomas glared at him this way, forced him to look away? Jesse wasn’t budging this time. He wasn’t afraid anymore.
“So what happens next? You gotta stay with ’em?”
Jesse nodded, said nothing. He watched a calculating thought pass through his father’s face, linger in his eyes, then stop on the tight line of his mouth. “You and me stand to do good on this deal, boy, if we play it right.”
Jesse recognized the expression. Thomas had just tossed the dice, and now waited to see which way they rolled. He had no idea what his son was thinking. Jesse loved that. Wanted to keep it that way.
“Yeah? How’s that?”
“I figure you know things we can use, you know? Make the deal even sweeter.”
“Is it a bad deal, then?”
Thomas winked and Jesse’s stomach fell. He knew that wink. The Cherokee were in trouble.
“I tell you what, boy,” Thomas said, coming closer. “I never thought I’d be happy to see you, but I guess I am. Y’all head back and have your little pipe-smoking party, then bring me everything these dogs say. That way I can get it to the men here. Easy pickins. That’s what it’ll be.”
Jesse nodded slowly, remembering so much about his life with Thomas. The beatings he’d been given when he spilled anything, when he left a broom in the wrong place, when he asked a question his father couldn’t answer. The wicked things he’d seen Thomas do that had always haunted his soul, and the way Thomas had told him, over and over, that what he’d seen was how it was supposed to be. All those times when Thomas had bellowed it should have been him that died, not his brother. What a waste of time and food Jesse was.
“Is that right? Easy pickin’s?”
“Sure ’nough. Why, you and me can have just about anything we want after that.”
Jesse sniffed and crossed his arms, staring directly at his father. “Ain’t no ‘you and me,’ Thomas. Never has been.” He got a visceral thrill from calling his father by his first name. It was the first time Jesse had felt strong enough to stand up to him that way, and he figured he had the Cherokee to thank for that. How ironic that the people he’d set out to hate, the people who had captured him and forbidden his escape, had freed him.
Thomas’s eyes hardened to pewter, clashing against the fire in Jesse’s golden eyes. “Is that so? Why the hell did I bother feedin’ you all these years, then?”
“Got me,” Jesse said with a shrug. “Your mistake. You made a lot of mistakes.”
He didn’t give his father a chance to answer.
“I’ll see you in three days, old man. If you want this thing so bad, you’ll have to do it on your own. I ain’t helpin’ you.” He winked, feeling deliciously dangerous. “I gotta go back now, see to my new family. You have yourself a good day, now.”
He turned and headed back to the scrum of Cherokee that no white man would dare enter without an invitation. He ignored the curses his father threw at his back and nodded at Ahtlee when the older man glanced over his shoulder, checking. Jesse couldn’t stop smiling. Never turned to give Thomas any hint of that, though. Didn’t want to give Thomas anything. He owed him nothing.
The speeches began shortly after that, and Jesse sat cross-legged on the mat, glaring across the grass, watching Thomas’s reaction. The old man was listening hard to what everyone was saying, looking for opportunity, and wearing that arrogant grin Jesse knew so well. As if he had the most delicious secret and was just daring someone to ask. Whatever happened to the poker face he always preached about?
Just where Thomas fit into all this, Jesse didn’t know, but wherever it was, it wasn’t good. It made Jesse smile, though, thinking about what Thomas would say if he knew the wickedly narrowed black eyes behind him belonged to a man claiming to be Jesse’s new father. If this meeting wasn’t so damn important, Jesse would have thrown back his head and laughed. After the years of lessons he’d been taught, learning the countless reasons why all Indians were evil savages who deserved nothing better than to die slow deaths, now he regarded his birth father with more suspicion than he did his new family. But Thomas Black didn’t have much of a sense of humour. And Jesse still had to be careful.
Deep inside Jesse there lurked another, deeper concern. Truth was, Jesse was Thomas’s blood son. What was that old saying about the apple falling by the tree? How much truth was in that? Enough that it kept Jesse from entirely trusting himself at times.
Chief Standing Trees, the host, sat tall as his name, towering over the rest of the men despite his advanced years. The day had started out with ceremony, the old chief receiving arrows from the other chiefs, then holding them aloft to signify strength in numbers. Five villages stood before the white men, and pretty soon they’d all be listening to Jesse’s pathetic attempts to interpret. For this meeting, he was mostly supposed to translate English into some sort of Cherokee, which was the biggest challenge. At the next meeting, in a few days time, he would have to pull together the village’s thoughts, put them into English, and declare them to the entire crowd.
Chief Standing Trees’s face, sagging in weary pouches, said nothing. In fact, Jesse wondered if the old man had fallen asleep during one of the drawn-out speeches. He studied the ancient Indian’s eyes, watched them cross momentarily, and figured he was right. Either that or he’d had a long puff on that peace pipe of his.
Beside Standing Trees sat the other four chiefs, all of lesser status and looking exactly that. The smallest, Runs Quickly, didn’t look as if he were going to run anywhere for a long time. His face had been badly scarred by the rampage of smallpox that had decimated the tribes ten years before, and his back seemed to be developing a hunch. His eyes, interestingly enough, reflected the same blurriness as did Trees’s. The other three seemed alert. They also bore ugly smallpox scars, and one had a thick white knife scar running down one cheek. Other than Runs Quickly, the men sat straight, their eyes moving with suspicion over the white men, occasionally glancing off the paper they were expected to sign. Of course, there would be no actual signing, since none of them knew how to write his name. All they were expected to do was make a mark of some kind with the ink they’d be handed. Their names could be nothing but a blotch of ink or an ‘X.’ The white man’s contract didn’t care which, as long as there was a witnessed mark.
Ahtlee stood boulder-like behind Jesse, living up to his name of Does Not Bend, and glaring through ebony eyes at those he trusted least. Jesse figured that of all the powerful men here, Ahtlee was probably the most intelligent. The most . . . vital. He included Ahtlee’s own chief, Standing Trees
, in that. Ahtlee had said little about this powwow ahead of time, keeping his thoughts to himself, but Jesse was aware that his adoptive father was there not only to be Trees’s right-hand man and learn about what the white men offered. He was also there to monitor Jesse’s reaction. Soquili had never doubted who he believed Jesse to be; Ahtlee knew better.
Jesse’s role in all this was to sit among the People and tell them what was being said. It was a difficult assignment, since the white men all postured with magnanimous gestures and generous overtures that weren’t exactly translatable into Cherokee. Jesse assumed most of them were lies, and he had yet to hear a Cherokee tell a lie. The gist of it was that the whites were offering a better trade proposal in exchange for a fair parcel of land they could call their own. The Indians would promise to stay off the land and leave the settlers alone, and the whites would do the same for the Indians. There would also be a neutral portion of land along the Keowee that was open to both for hunting and fishing.
It all sounded reasonable, but Jesse was concerned about this neutral land they kept talking about. The moustaches were going on about how everyone would live together in a harmonious, beneficial partnership, sounding to Jesse like they were just talking garbage. That kind of partnership would never happen. Jesse knew it, Ahtlee knew it, probably they all knew it.
Standing Trees had long been an advocate of better trade with the white men. He wanted his people to have everything the white men had, and if it took giving up a little land, which he didn’t believe anyone but the gods owned anyway, that was fine with him. So the big old man stood firm in his backing of this new initiative. He spoke in his tired, croaky voice, raised his gnarled claws to the sky, and intoned to the gods and the ancestors, chanting about the goodness of this plan and how the Cherokee would only be strengthened by signing. Runs Quickly nodded sagely, then joined in with his own little yips and howls.
When the old men were done agreeing and the ones with the hats had thrown out their last highly questionable promise, there would be three days of deliberation in each Cherokee village. Then everyone was expected to return with answers. With a last glance at Thomas, Jesse rose and followed the others out of the meeting area and toward the corral.
Somewhere to Dream (Berkley Sensation) Page 13