Sarah stood frozen in place. Purnell could see the look of panic in her eyes, lit up by the growing barn fire. He knew she was terrified to leave Caleb.
“We’ve got to get moving, ma’am. That’s why we set fire to the barn—to distract them.”
“I can’t leave yet.”
“You’ve got to, ma’am. Come on now. It’s your husband’s orders. If you want to help him, do like he says. Every minute you wait, the more dangerous it is.”
Sarah turned reluctantly. She couldn’t prolong Tom’s chance for help. She followed Purnell into the darkness, her heart aching for poor Tom who groaned with every step. Suddenly Purnell halted. “Get down,” he told her. Sarah ducked and Jess laid Tom down on the ground again. Sarah could hear voices.
“Who the hell are you?” someone shouted.
“Hafer men,” Jess said quietly to Sarah. “Must have missed them in the dark. They’ve found my partner.”
“I’m just camping here,” she heard a man reply.
“Camping? You a Sax man? What the hell is going on?”
Purnell charged forward and Sarah could hear scuffling and a muffled gunshot, then two more shots. Moments later Jess returned. “Come on.” He picked up Tom and seemed to be grunting as though in pain himself.
“Are you all right?” Sarah asked.
“I’ve been shot. No time to stop and see how bad. Let’s get you and Tom the hell out of here.”
She followed, stumbling over a body when they reached the horses. She fought an urge to cry out. Here she was riding off into the darkness with a wounded Hafer man and her husband was behind them and in great danger. Now she was tripping over dead bodies. She shivered with the cold.
“Come on, Mrs. Sax,” a man told her, lifting her onto a horse. He draped a blanket around her legs. “It’s me—Jake.”
She recognized the voice and felt more relieved. “Jake! Are you all right?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He moved to help Jess lay Tom on the special blanket. Jess mounted up with great effort. Jake mounted his own horse. “We can’t go too fast,” he told Purnell. “But faster than if he was on a travois. Let’s get out of here. Boss’s orders.”
“Right,” Purnell replied.
“You gonna make it?”
“We’ll find out.”
“Hey, thanks, Purnell,” Jake said. “You weren’t lying.”
“Yeah. Tell that to Lynda,” Jess gasped in pain.
They rode off.
Between the main house and the barn, Hafer men were running in every direction, some trying to rescue horses and cattle inside the barn, others trying to form a bucket brigade from the well to the barn to try to put out the fire. But all could see it would be useless. Most suspected a Comanche raid because their men had been killed with arrows.
Charles Hafer ran around cussing, yelling something about “goddamned Comanche” with every other word. He fumed that they had “got the woman,” and how the men had better get that fire out.
“I don’t think it was Comanche, sir,” one man hollered back. “I think it was Caleb Sax.”
Hafer’s eyes widened and he looked around. Sax! It couldn’t be! Where were all the Sax men? He had expected a major fight.
Several yards away two men approached Caleb from behind as he neared Hafer’s house. Caleb turned at the last minute, kicking a rifle from one man’s hands and lashing out at him with his knife.
“Hey!” the other shouted, able then to see Caleb by the light of the roaring barn fire. “He’s here! Caleb Sax is here!”
But there was too much confusion for anyone to notice. Caleb lunged into the second man before he could fire his rifle, knocking him to the ground. He quickly rammed his knife blade into the man’s stomach.
The first man got to his feet then. Unable to get to his rifle in time, he kicked Caleb in the ribs while Caleb was still bent over the second man. Caleb rolled over with a grunt, his knife still stuck in the second man. The first man came at him and Caleb kicked out from a prone position, catching the man hard in the chest and knocking the breath out of him. He fell backward and Caleb stumbled to the second man, yanking out the knife.
The first man found his musket and fumbled with it, turning it on Caleb. But Caleb slashed out with the knife again, cutting deeply into the man’s arms, desperate to keep the gun from being fired. The man cried out and dropped it. Caleb shoved his knife into its sheath and picked up the rifle, slamming its butt across the side of the Hafer man’s face to silence him.
He crept closer then, praying Sarah was well on her way away from Hafer land. He watched Hafer from the shadows. The man was fuming, telling in graphic detail what he intended to do to Caleb Sax when he got his hands on him—and what he should have done to Sarah and Tom.
“We’ll get your daughter, Mister Hafer,” one of the men assured him.
“Over the dead body of every Sax family member,” the man growled. He headed for his house. “I’m going to finish dressing and we’re riding to the Sax ranch.” He stormed inside, wearing only his long underwear and a robe. He kicked over a chair in anger, unaware of the dark shadow that followed him inside.
The door was suddenly kicked shut, and the house was lit only by the glow of the barn fire. Hafer whirled at the sound of the slammed door, his eyes widening at the sight of Caleb Sax, standing there looking like a true savage, half-naked, painted, his eyes cold and wild. His hand rested on his knife.
“Just a neighbor come to visit,” Caleb sneered.
Hafer’s eyes moved to a musket resting nearby in a corner. “What do you want, Sax? My God is this—you planned this!”
“That’s right. Now maybe you understand you can’t get away with hurting my family, and you know how easily I can sneak up on you and kill you. I would dearly love to do that, Hafer. Ordinarily your life would be worth nothing right now. It’s only because of Bess that I’m not going to kill you, but you’ll by God remember never to come near my place again!”
He landed into the man, knocking him back against a chair. The chair flipped out from under Hafer and went flying as the two big men tumbled on the floor. In Caleb’s rage, Hafer didn’t have a chance. Caleb’s fist pummeled into him over and over—into his stomach, his chest, his face, his kidneys. Every blow was stunning, and it was all Caleb could do to keep from taking out his blade and doing what he really wanted to do, which was to let his Indian side loose and cut the man from his belly to his throat. Tom! The memory of how his son looked, how horribly he’d been tortured, it all brought extra force to his fist as again and again he battered Charles Hafer. They crashed about the room, while the men fighting the fire outside had no idea what was happening in the house.
Finally Caleb managed to force himself to stop the beating. He pulled out his blade, holding it against Hafer’s cheek as he shoved the bleeding man up against a wall. “This is the last warning you’ll get, Hafer! There won’t be a second chance. You come near my place or any of my loved ones again, and you’ll die—slowly! It’s as simple as that!”
Caleb let Hafer loose and Hafer slid down the wall to the floor. Caleb stood staring at him, fingering the knife. His hands ached and bled and some of his knuckles were alread swelling. He backed away then, and the house glowed from the fire outside. He turned to leave the back way when he heard a click. He whirled to see Hafer pointing a small pistol at him. A little table lay overturned nearby, its drawer open.
“You’re the one who’s going to die, Sax,” Hafer slurred through bloody, swollen lips.
Caleb quickly ducked aside as the pistol was fired, its orange flame showing bright in the dark room. The ball whizzed past Caleb, and it was all the provocation Caleb needed. His knife was still in his hand. Hafer scrambled to try to get up and run, realizing he’d missed. But a strong hand grabbed his arm, and quickly Hafer felt the knife’s thrust in his chest and knew what a grave mistake he’d made agreeing to work for Byron Clawson. All the money in the world wasn’t worth this.
“It could h
ave been so easy, Hafer,” Caleb sneered as the man’s dying body slipped away from him. “All you had to do was give up, come and see your daughter, and give her your blessing. You sold yourself out, you fool!”
The man fell to the floor. Caleb jerked out his knife and wiped it off on Hafer’s robe, then shoved it back into its sheath and left the back way. No one saw him.
Chapter
Eighteen
* * *
Tom opened his eyes slowly. The first thing he saw was Bess, who was carefully applying more salve to deep lacerations on his stomach. He looked around the room.
Home. He was home. His father must have come for him. He vaguely remembered someone carrying him, but that was all. He didn’t know when that was. He didn’t really remember anything beyond the horror of being dragged until he was unconscious. Surely he had been at the Hafer ranch, but he had no recollection of it, other than Sarah talking to him soothingly—somewhere, as though in a dream. Sarah! They had taken her, too, hadn’t they?
“Bess,” he managed to whisper.
She looked at him in surprise. “Tom! You’re awake!” She bent over him, bringing her face close to his. “Oh, Tom, I was so afraid you’d never come around!”
“Sarah,” he groaned. “What happened? My … father.”
“They’re all right. My father never found me, so they took Sarah with them and said they’d give you and Sarah back when your father brought me to them. But Caleb wouldn’t do it. They never hurt Sarah, Tom. Jess Purnell, one of Father’s men, he came here and helped your father rescue you. He got hurt bad, too—gunshot. But your father is all right.” She kissed his forehead. “Oh, Tom, my father … is dead,” she told him then, her voice breaking. “Caleb had to kill him. He … he tried to shoot Caleb.”
She sat down on the edge of the bed, breaking into tears. “Oh, Tom, tell me you’ll be all right. And tell me … you’ll forgive me.”
He frowned, managing to move an arm to reach out and take one of her hands. “Forgive you? For what?”
She kissed the scabs on his hand. “It was my father who did this to you. You’ve … been in so much pain … and your family has been through so much, all because of my father.”
“Not … to blame,” he muttered. “I love you, Bess. We’ll … be okay now. I’ll be all right.”
She clung tightly to his hands, her tears falling onto the bed covers. “Oh, Tom, I know I should weep for my father … but I only weep over what he became … what he did to you.” Her shoulders shook.
Now he wished he could hold her. “What about me?” he said then. “You should … hate me, too. My being Indian … that’s what started it. My own father … killed your father.”
She met his dark eyes with her own tear-filled eyes. “Oh, Tom, I love you so much. I could never blame you or your father. It wasn’t your fault. I’m just so sorry for what happened to you. I don’t want this to ruin what we had. I don’t want … to lose you.”
He managed a half grin, then winced with the pain of it. “You won’t ever lose me. But you better … be a good nurse. The sooner I get well … the sooner I can hold you … and more.”
She held his hand tightly, crying harder, kissing the hand again. Somehow they would get through this terrible time. Their love would see them through, for she did love him, more than life itself.
In the main house Lynda pulled down the blankets to Jess Purnell’s waist to check the bleeding from the wound in his side. Caleb had repaired the wound himself, giving no guarantees he’d done it right or that Jess would live. That had been two nights and a day ago. It was noon, and soup was cooking on the stove, where Sarah stood stirring it, watched by Caleb, who could still feel the terror of thinking he might have lost her again.
She turned and set a bowl of soup in front of him and he looked up into her beautiful green eyes. “You think Bess will be all right?”
She understood his worry over having killed Charles Hafer. She ran a hand over his shoulders. “She’ll be fine. She has Tom, and this won’t change his love for her.”
He set down a pipe he’d been puffing on. “I have a way of doing things that could make the people I love most hate me.” He glanced over at Lynda, who was gently recovering Jess Purnell.
“I don’t think that’s likely. Bess understands. And I have a feeling Lynda is going to be just fine, too.”
Lynda looked over at them and seemed to be blushing as she moved away from Purnell. “And what is that supposed to mean, dear Mother?” she asked, putting on independent airs. She walked to the kettle that hung over the fire and dipped out some of the soup into a bowl from the table.
“It means that Mister Jess Purnell expressed to your father a very keen interest in you—enough to risk his life to prove he was not your enemy.”
Lynda set the bowl on the table and sat down in front of it. “That was his decision. I never asked him to prove anything to me.” She stirred the soup, feeling both of them eyeing her intently. She looked up, first at her mother, then at her father.
“I’m grateful for what he did, Father, but please stop looking at me that way. I have no room left for men in my life, and if I should decide otherwise, it will be a man of my own choosing.”
“Of course it will. Who ever said it shouldn’t be?”
She blushed slightly. “You know what I mean.”
“The only thing I know is you’ve got to get back to being a woman, and Cale needs a father. I can’t be his father, Lynda. Lord knows I hardly have enough time to be the proper father to my own sons. All I’m saying is don’t be so against Jess Purnell. I know people, and he’s a damned good man.”
Lynda suddenly lost her stubborn look, suddenly looking ready to cry. She looked down at her bowl of soup, stirring it absently. “To think of any other man … it seems so disloyal to Lee,” she said quietly. “I just don’t think I could ever love again, Father.”
“It’s not being disloyal, Lynda,” Caleb returned. “Lee would want you to be happy and fulfilled, loved and cared for the way only a husband can do. He wouldn’t want you being lonely the rest of your life. A lot of people love more than once, especially in places like this. There is danger and death all around, but people keep on going. I lost two wives to death, but I loved again, and you will, too. You’re still healing, that’s all.”
Lynda wiped her eyes, looking down at her lap. “This is a ridiculous conversation—talking about an absolute stranger!”
Caleb grinned. “Go ahead and eat your soup.” He glanced over at Jess then, concern in his eyes. “If he doesn’t make it through this, our discussion won’t mean much anyway.”
Lynda felt her heart tighten. She was not interested in Jess Purnell, yet she felt a strange sorrow at the thought of him dying. She had said some terrible things to him. She hoped she would have a chance to apologize.
Bess watched Tom herd prize horses into Blue Valley. Nearly four months had passed since the terrible raid. It was spring, and water flowed through the Valley again. Everything was green and beautiful and alive, and after weeks of healing for both Tom and Jess, both men were whole again. The joy of spring and temporary peace caused Caleb to make a picnic affair out of the spring herding to that area, and the women sat on a grassy rise above the Valley watching the herd of magnificent horses: spotted Appaloosas, roan-colored mares and geldings, and golden palominos. Caleb’s prize studs were kept in separate pens closer to the house, to be used for breeding only when Caleb knew the time was right, and only with exactly the right mares.
The men returned after an hour of racing through the Valley, showing off their riding skills to the women. Bess never dreamed she could be this happy again after the awful violence involving her father and Tom. But the Saxes had treated her like one of their own, and she felt surrounded by love. Tom Sax had proved to be everything she knew he would be—gentle and loving, a young man of strength, both physical and emotional. Their lovemaking only seemed to get better and better, and she prayed daily that his seed woul
d sprout in her womb, but so far she had been unable to get pregnant. How she longed to give him a child!
He was riding back now, heading up the rise toward her, looking grand and happy, his dark skin healed. The mutilation of his skin from being dragged had left some scars, most of them on his back, belly, and legs. But he had healed much better than any of them believed he could.
Lynda forced herself to look away from Jess as he, too, rode toward them. She had hardly spoken to him since he stayed on and started working for her father. Their words had been confined to those first several days he recovered from his wound. She had apologized for her mean words, but she had remained aloof, struggling to show him she had no interest in him as anyone more important than the other men who worked for her father. He came close then, dismounting. “Caleb invited me to join in on the picnic. You mind?” he asked.
She looked away. “I suppose not. What would you like me to say?”
“Oh, you could say you’re glad to have me, something like that.”
She looked up at him and shrugged. “All right. We’re glad to have you.”
“We. Not you in particular?”
She shook her head, unable to prevent a smile at his persistence. “Not me in particular.” She reached over and rubbed Cale’s belly, feeling a little sorry for her cool attitude toward Purnell, sometimes hating herself for it. He was indeed handsome, a prize catch for any woman. If only she didn’t always feel so guilty thinking of him as anything but a ranch hand. If only she weren’t so desperately afraid to ever love again.
He remounted his horse. “You’re a cruel woman, Lynda Whitestone, and a man’s pride can take only so much.” He turned his horse.
“Jess, wait,” she called out.
He turned back around, and a sudden wave of passion moved through her with surprising force as their eyes met. She actually blushed, turning away to lift Cale and hold him close. “I really am sorry. Don’t ride off. I’d like you to stay. We have apple pie. I made it myself.”
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