White Eagle's Touch: Blackfoot Warriors, Book 2

by Karen Kay

  “This is my dowry?” She chanced a brief glance up at her uncle.

  The man nodded. “Given to you by your mother.”

  “My mother? But my mother was not from this place and she—” Sudden intuition had Katrina pausing, and she could think of no plausible explanation for the tears that were beginning to pool in her eyes. If this were her mother’s gift to her, then… “No, it can’t be. I… My mother came from abroad. It’s what I was told. It’s what—”

  “…Your father wanted you to think.”

  “Wanted me to think? Are you saying that…? But, then, that would mean…” And then it happened. Within the space of a second, the whole scenario of her early life, that of her parents, fell into place, and memory of a woman with long, dark hair surfaced.

  All at once, inconsistencies she had been pondering, things she hadn’t understood, began to make sense: She had felt at peace here in the West, she had known some of the Blackfoot language, she had experienced a sense of familiarity when she’d first seen the Blackfoot doll…

  She was…her mother had been…

  “Indian.” She didn’t realize she had said the word aloud. But she immediately sent an accusatory glance toward White Eagle. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you let me go on thinking my mother was from the East?”

  White Eagle stood motionless under the scrutiny of her glance. “It was not my place to say anything to you,” he said, lifting his shoulders. “Besides, on that first day we met, when you stepped off the white man’s mystery boat, would you have wanted to know this? I think not.”

  “That’s not a good enough reason.”

  “It is a fine reason.”

  “There have been many more opportunities since then when you could have—”

  “I did not wish to force you to have to live here. If you came to love this place, I wanted it to be because of the land, because of the people here, because it…because I became important to you; not because, once you knew you were of mixed blood, you would have to stay here. Besides, you seemed so proud of your mother and her fine heritage. I did not wish to spoil it.”

  A tear fell down Katrina’s cheek, then another and another, but she had ceased to care. “Oh, White Eagle,” she said, “don’t you know? Haven’t you guessed how I feel? I’ve wanted to belong here for so long now, only I didn’t think that I did. I…I believe I am proud of my heritage…I have been wishing for it. I am so proud of you…I am honored to be your—”

  “Your mother’s father was French,” her uncle spoke up from beside her, “and her mother was half-Blackfoot…and…” he seemed to reminisce, “…the most beautiful woman in this part of the country. Your father got her, damn his rotten soul.” The old man’s chuckle took the bite out of his words.

  “And I…”

  “This is your home, child…always has been. Forgive me, it was wrong of me to send you away. I thought I was doing right by your father. I forgot I needed to do right by you too.”

  Katrina drew a tortured, deep breath before she threw herself into her uncle’s arms. “Oh, how I have hated you. But I didn’t know. I didn’t realize.”

  “It’s all right, now. I would have hated me too.”

  “I am…Indian?”

  “Yep, part.”

  “So then it wouldn’t be so wrong if I were to marry…”

  “…This young strapping lad, here?” The old man glanced at White Eagle. “Always hoped you would. The two of you loved each other even as children. Seemed only right to try to get the two of you together.” The old trader suddenly glowered at White Eagle. “Where are those bride presents, young man? Hope you saved many horses in that raid on the Assiniboin. You’re gonna need them.”

  White Eagle grinned at his friend and nodded. “I have many gifts to give you, old man.”

  “Heard you already married her.”

  “It is so.”

  “Better have those gifts ready.”

  White Eagle’s grin widened. “It will be so.”

  “There is one more thing.” It was Katrina speaking, her uncle having settled her back onto her feet. “Am I truly penniless? My inheritance and dowry are only Indian wampum?”

  “Heavens, child. What gave you that idea? Never needed your inheritance, or dowry. Your father and I have as much wealth as anyone could ever want, all in gold and silver and jewels. We’d been here so long, we’d forgotten about it. Came from an old Austrian family, your father and I, one that was sentenced to exile when one of our uncles ended up on the wrong side of a king. But never lost our wealth, never needed it either. And the fur-trade business is mighty profitable. Mighty profitable indeed.”

  “But I did need it.”

  “Nope.”

  “But my lawyer said…”

  “I was trying to get you out here, child. Always did believe you’d be happier here.”

  “What? You mean all the money that I ever needed was in New York City all along? Then my solicitor was…”

  “A friend of mine,” her uncle said shamelessly, though he did give her an anxious glance. “I was right, wasn’t I? Aren’t you happier here?”

  Katrina burst out in a laugh, while tears streamed down her face. But she simply said, “I am happy here.”

  Some of her emotion must have been mirrored on her uncle’s face, for she could see his eyes well up with unshed tears. He said, “The money will always be there in the future for you or for your children.”

  Katrina nodded.

  “Your father and I took the name of Wellington when we came to America, but our real name is Wulver, one of the richest families in Austria—”

  “Wulver…I might have expected as much,” said a cultured, male voice. No one had seen Prince Maximilian come upon them. “Started to suspect something about the girl when I first began to talk to her. She had the features of someone I’d seen before and yet…”

  “Why you old tyrant. What are you doing here?”

  “Heard the botany of this place needed a good study. Had to come here and find out for myself.”

  “That’s right. Just been telling my niece here about her inheritance and about her dowry.”

  Prince Maximilian sent a glance toward Katrina and grinned. “No finer family in all of Austria.”

  Katrina returned that smile.

  “Excuse me,” her uncle said to Katrina and White Eagle, “we’ll talk some more later. I need to catch myself up with this old friend.”

  With that, the two men strode off to the house of the bourgeois, both of them speaking in excited tones, all at the same time.

  Katrina glanced at White Eagle, he back at her. Carefully, almost reverently, Katrina gripped the Indian wampum in her hand and, lifting it up toward the heavens, exclaimed, “This is my husband, White Eagle. I take him now, for always and forever.” She glanced back toward White Eagle and proffered him the gift of the dowry. “Here, my love, this is yours. A dowry is not to keep for oneself, but to give to one’s husband.”

  White Eagle gave her a heartwarming smile, and said to her, “My love, Shines Like Moonlight, has at last come home. Welcome.”

  There against the backdrop of never-ending prairie, majestic mountains and luminous sky, she grinned back at him, her smile gradually turning to a peal of laughter.

  I have for a long time been of opinion, that the wilderness of our country afforded models equal to those from which the Grecian sculptors transferred to the marble such inimitable grace and beauty; and I am now more confirmed in this opinion, since I have immersed myself in the midst of thousands and tens of thousands of these knights of the forest; whose whole lives are lives of chivalry, and whose daily feats, with their naked limbs, might vie with those of the Grecian youths in the beautiful rivalry of the Olympian games.

  No man’s imagination, with all the aids of description that can be given to it, can ever picture the beauty and wildness of scenes that may be daily witnessed in this romantic country; of hundreds of these graceful youths, without a care to w
rinkle, or a fear to disturb the full expression of pleasure and enjoyment that beams upon their faces—their long black hair mingling with their horses’ tails, floating in the wind, while they are flying over the carpeted prairie, and dealing death with their spears and arrows, to a band of infuriated buffaloes; or their splendid procession in a war-parade, arrayed in all their gorgeous colours and trappings, moving with most exquisite grace and manly beauty, added to that bold defiance which man carries on his front, who acknowledges no superior on earth, and who is amenable to no laws except the laws of God and honour.

  —George Catlin

  Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Conditions of the North American Indians, 1832

  About the Author

  Author of seventeen American Indian Historical Romances, Karen Kay aka Gen Bailey, has been praised by reviewers and fans alike for bringing the Wild West alive for her readers.

  Karen Kay, whose great-great grandmother was a Choctaw Indian, is honored to be able to write about something so dear to her heart, the American Indian culture.

  “With the power of romance, I hope to bring about an awareness of the American Indian’s concept of honor, and what it meant to live as free men and free women. There are some things that should never be forgotten.”

  Find Karen Kay online at www.novels-by-karenkay.com.

  Look for these titles by Karen Kay

  Now Available:

  Lakota

  Lakota Surrender

  Lakota Princess

  Proud Wolf’s Woman

  Blackfoot Warriors

  Gray Hawk’s Lady

  Coming Soon:

  Blackfoot Warriors

  Night Thunder’s Pride

  Legendary Warriors

  War Cloud’s Passion

  Lone Arrow’s Pride

  Soaring Eagle’s Embrace

  Different worlds, one heart.

  Gray Hawk’s Lady

  © 2012 Karen Kay

  Blackfoot Warrior, Book 1

  When Lady Genevieve Rohan joins her father in the farthest reaches of the American West, she expects to bring a bit of genteel English charm to his dry, academic existence. Instead, she finds her father desperately ill, and it’s up to her to finish his study of the Indian and publish his work—or face the wrath of his creditors.

  Her troubles mount when the men hired to capture a member of the Blackfoot tribe don’t bring her a docile maid to study. They present her with a magnificent warrior—proud, outrageously handsome and simmering with fury at the loss of his freedom.

  The white woman is beautiful beyond compare, but Gray Hawk can’t think past his plan to exact revenge against this meddling foreigner. It’s ridiculously easy to escape, then turn the tables and take her captive. When anger turns to passion, then to love, he embarks on a new quest. To claim the stubborn, red-headed vixen as his own.

  Yet as their hearts strain toward each other, pride conspires to pull them apart…unless they can each find a way for their hearts to become one.

  Warning: Contains a raging, simmering love, consumed by its fire and destined to explode at any moment.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Gray Hawk’s Lady:

  Genevieve let out her breath and closed her eyes, feeling as though she might swoon at any moment. What was happening to her? Why did she suddenly feel so giddy, so light-headed?

  She would have to relight the candle, for her own sanity as well as for the more practical reasons. She would have to talk with this Indian. And that required light, since she would have to communicate to him via the Indian sign language she had been learning.

  She began to move her hand toward the table when—

  “If white woman had only let me know what she wished, she could have obtained what she required from me without abduction. I might have been willing…then—”

  “You speak English?”

  “Have I not proven just now that I do?”

  “But how is that possible?”

  The Indian didn’t reply, only looked away, and Genevieve was immediately presented with his profile: strong, foreign, handsome. She drew in her breath as a shiver raced over her skin, and she wondered, was she frightened, or…?

  Her breasts swelled against the chiffon material of the gown that she wore beneath her robe, and Genevieve was reminded that she was hardly dressed to receive a man—even if that man was American Indian.

  She gazed up at him, and at once a tremor swept over her, bringing with it with an unusual sensation all over her body, especially there in the junction between her legs.

  Genevieve shifted her weight uncomfortably. What was happening to her? Why did she feel this way? What was it about this man that brought on excitement, this feeling of…craving?

  Briefly she pondered such questions. None of this made any sense.

  This man was hardly what she would call a man, someone she could physically crave. He was an American Indian—a savage, a person reported by the best authorities to be more animal than human. Such “people” were beneath her. Weren’t they?

  Hadn’t the whole of her education so far taught her this? It was true, wasn’t it?

  Or was it?

  Her body didn’t seem to think so. Her body responded to the Indian as any other twenty-year-old woman might when in the presence of a handsome, half-naked and virile man. Genevieve felt her stomach twist. She whispered, “You are not hurt, are you?”

  The Indian swung his gaze back toward her. “Hurt?” he repeated, his stare, or rather his leer, never leaving her. “And where would I feel this hurt? In my heart, which weeps to learn that the white woman has no honor? Or in my spirit, which promises the white woman revenge? Or do you mean my flesh?” He paused. “It is nothing.”

  “You are hurt!” So that was the other scent she had smelled earlier…blood.

  The Indian lifted his chin, and though he stared at her as if she were small quarry he stalked, he said nothing.

  “If you are hurt,” she said, “I will attend to your wounds at once.”

  “You will not.” The Indian raised his chin another notch. “I will not have your touch upon me. The white woman’s medicine is tainted. I will have a medicine man, if I require anyone at all.” He paused; then, barely over a whisper, he ordered, “Now.”

  Lady Genevieve ignored the order. “There is no one else.” Her voice, too, seemed to be strangely quiet, though authoritative.

  He raised his wrists, the rope around them halting the movement halfway up. He stared down into her curious gaze. “Release me and I will find a medicine man.”

  “I can’t do that,” she murmured. “Where are you hurt?”

  The Indian looked away from her as though he could spare no further conversation with her, while she took a dangerous step forward.

  “I could help,” she said, her motion bringing her ever closer. “Please believe me. I intend you no harm. Truly.” She gained yet another step in his direction.

  He didn’t say a word. He didn’t move. He might have been as unmovable as stone.

  She paced forward, each step as treacherous as if she were crossing a swift stream.

  She gazed up at him, studying him while his attention was diverted. So close was she, she could smell the combination of sweat and blood mixed with the musk-sweet scent of sage. She could see the sweat upon his brow. She lowered her inspection of him to his chest, noting the moisture that covered him there, the blood all over his side. Blood?

  She surveyed his chest as best she could while standing here in the dim, silvery light. Vaguely she noted the strong chest and upper-arm muscles, the slim, tapering stomach, the gash to his side…gash? She stared at it. She reached out a hand toward it. “How did you get this?”

  She touched his skin above the wound, her fingertips seeking out the warmth of his skin. All at once he shivered, and she had no more than registered the fact when a heated charge tore up her arm.

  She pulled her hand back as though to escape, but it was too late.
The damage had been done. She was more than aware of him, of his physical, male appeal, and the air fairly crackled with the knowledge.

  He swung his attention back toward her, eyeing her as if she were prey rather than a woman of flesh and blood. And though Genevieve knew she should move away from him as far as she could, she couldn’t make her body respond to the command to do so.

  Slowly, feeling caught in a trap, she positioned her body closer to his.

  “How is it,” he asked, his voice oddly soft, “that the white woman with no honor does not know how I came to be hurt? Was not she the one who commanded this? Was not she the one who wished me into this state? She who wanted to see me again, she who had me practically stripped, she who plans to use me for her own ends?”

  “No.”

  “White man lies easily. So do his women. Look at me when you deny this so that I might see the truth or lies of your words.”

  She sighed, though dutifully she brought her gaze up to meet his. “Truly,” she said after a moment, “I did not know something like this might happen. I only meant to take someone from your tribe for a short while. I would treat them well and return them to the tribe as soon as possible. No injury, no stripping, no degradation. None of that was commanded by me. I’m so very sorry.”

  He stared down at her, and Genevieve wondered how it seemed that his head had come so much closer to her own. She looked away.

  “Then set me free, white woman of no honor—”

  “Do not call me that.” She brought her gaze back to him. “And I cannot let you go. For all that I regret doing this to you, I need you. But I promise you that if you let me attend to you now, there will be no further harm to you.” She was more than aware, as she gazed back up at him, that during her speech his face was no more than a few inches from her.

  She should back away. She tried to make herself do it; she couldn’t. His head gradually descended toward her. And her reaction? She leaned in closer.

  Then it happened. His head came fully down to hers. She didn’t even have a chance to think before all at once his lips crushed down on hers, and in that moment Genevieve thought her world might surely end.