She couldn’t believe he understood her, for he said no word but flung her over his shoulder and lightly ran with his burden as if she weighed nothing. The sounds of voices, the brightened flare of firelight, and the louder drumming told Lacey she was close to where everyone was. Dumped unceremoniously to the hard-packed earth, Lacey sat up and found Luke beside her.
She kept her eyes lowered from the harsh light. Luke didn’t move or turn when he asked if she was hurt. Lacey shook her head, trying to get her bearings.
“Rafe’s here,” he whispered.
Lacey’s eyes followed his gesture. She had the presence of mind to stifle the scream that rose in her throat.
Across the circle from her stood Rafe. But it was a Rafe she had never seen. Stripped to the waist, firelight rippling over his muscles, her gaze was drawn to his face. A rawhide band held his hair back, black stripes covered his cheeks, and his eyes, staring back at her, held no emotion. Her eyes drifted lower, and Lacey almost bolted to her feet. There was a rope around his neck, and as he moved to accept a knife, she saw the rope was attached to a post. Slowly then she looked around the circle, and Lacey realized that no one spoke, not one face revealed any expression.
“Luke what’s happening?”
“They’re goin’ to test him. This is a renegade band of Comanche, Kiowa, and Arapaho. Near as I can tell, Rafe’s got a chance of saving himself.”
Lacey wanted to ask more, but the drums ceased abruptly. One warrior stood and began speaking, calling names, Lacey thought as six men came to stand in the center of the circle. They were young and each held a knife. The motions that were made were toward where Rafe waited, and her heart cried out with the need to touch him, speak to him, but something warned her to keep silent. There were murmurs of dissent from some, but they were silenced quickly.
“He’s goin’ to play coup with them, Lacey,” Luke explained. “I understood some but not all of what they said. I only hope Rafe catches on fast. He’s got to kill one of them to go free. If three of them mark him with their knives, he’s the one that dies.”
Lacey bit down her lip until she tasted blood. Rafe couldn’t die without knowing how much she loved him. She couldn’t stand another moment.
As if he sensed what she was about to do, Luke grabbed her arm. “Don’t move or make a sound. No matter what happens. You try to interfere, and you’ll cost him his life.”
She swallowed and nodded. Rafe ran his finger along the knife blade, then tested its balance in the palm of his hand. His free hand touched the rope, and then she felt the tension that marked his body. At an unseen signal they were ready; all six young Indians spread themselves in a semicircle.
It sounded as if they egged each other to be the first. Lacey didn’t watch their faces. She kept her gaze locked to Rafe’s knife. Two men approached him from each side, and she held her breath. One crouched low, the other leaped high, and Rafe’s leg shot out, kicking the young warrior’s knife hand, spinning quickly to block a thrust. It sounded as if they were all taunting each other, two others moving in, darting and backing away from the swing Rafe made with his weapon. Lacey didn’t wish for anyone’s death, but she prayed that Rafe would not be the one cut. God wasn’t listening. Sweat mixed with blood on his chest. Rafe tripped another man, holding his lithe body down, but two others leaped for his back, and he set him free, jerking aside to avoid another cut.
Lacey covered her mouth with her hand. The rope pulled taut, and Rafe’s head snapped as he almost fell to his knees. She heard others begin to yell, insults, encouragement … she didn’t know. There was a scream of rage, and one Indian backed away, holding his arm.
“Oh, Christ! He’s cut twice.”
“Luke!” She grabbed his arm as Rafe wiped the sweat from his eyes, yanking at the rope. She wanted him to cut it, was going to yell as much, when he suddenly went down on his knee. She saw the glint of knives as an Indian flung himself on top of Rafe. They were holding each other’s wrists away, but after the first roll they made together, Lacey knew the rope held Rafe in place. The firelight played over the strain of his muscles as he held on to the struggling Indian. She did cry out, but the sound was muffled as another Indian swiped at his back. Whatever sense warned Rafe, she was glad, for he stretched out, taking up the slack of the rope and using it to imprison the man he held.
Rafe straddled him for a moment, and it seemed to Lacey that they were locked in a silent combat of wills. She saw the Indian’s mouth move and Rafe’s flashing grin.
What was he waiting for? Dear God, she prayed, let it end.
With a deliberate downward slash of his knife, Rafe opened the flesh on the Indian’s side. With another slashing move he cut the rope that held him and rose. He walked to stand before Walks Like Cat.
Lacey blinked her eyes. The Indian was smiling at Rafe! He was bleeding, and Lacey needed to hold him. She gathered herself to stand when Luke grabbed her and held her tight.
“You stay here until he comes for you. It ain’t over.”
Rafe made no move to staunch his wounds. There was a flurry of movement among those near him and low-voiced orders. Lacey looked around, trying to understand what was happening, and saw Evan removing his buckskin shirt.
“Luke? Luke, what are they telling them?”
“Evan’s goin’ to fight him for you.” He shoved her face against his shoulder, felt the pain from her fingers digging into his arms, and barely nodded when Rafe faced him. He could see the cut on Rafe’s arm bleeding freely and knew he would have to end this fight quickly. Lacey struggled against Luke’s hold, her muffled voice begging him to let her see.
When she looked up, her eyes met Curt’s across from her. His smile was triumphant, and Lacey felt her stomach churn. Evan tied his hair back and walked to stand beside Rafe. An Indian came to them, and they each held out their left wrist. Lacey saw the rawhide the Indian held, and as firelight played over their bodies, she heard Rafe taunt Evan.
“No running this time, Evan. I warned you about Lacey. And I promise you, I’ll make your death slow.”
“Will you?” As Evan dared him, he turned to face Rafe, and the brave tied their left wrists together. “You’re hurt and you’ve lost blood. How long will you last? Odds are mine.” He gestured around the circle. “Think they’ll let you live if you kill me? I’m the one supplyin’ what they need.” “But you want trade for those guns, and I offered them for nothing but Lacey,” came Rafe’s deadly calm answer.
She wanted to scream that she would go with them, do anything to keep him from fighting. Excited grunts made her look around at the hide bags that came forth. Hands were held high, grunted over, and Lacey judged there were agreements made, if nods were any indication.
Luke made her face what was happening. “They’re wagerin’ on the outcome, Lacey. Most of them favor Evan. Expected that. He supplies guns, horses, and whiskey.”
“They’re betting on who wins? This is a show to them?”
“Calm down, you’re yellin’. Understand that their ways ain’t so different from ours. A man’s strength is measured by how well he fights and dies.”
“Stop it, Luke!”
“I can’t. They’d kill me. Rafe wouldn’t let me. He has to do it. And you—you need to let him.”
Lacey couldn’t sit here and watch him again. Galling bile rose in her throat, and nausea rocked her belly. She felt chilled even with the heat of the bonfires. Sweat coated her brow, and she used her sleeve to wipe it.
“Don’t be hidin’ and shame Rafe,” Luke warned. “There’s nothin’ they respect more’n bravery.”
“You think I’m being brave, Luke? I’m not. I’m shaking. I don’t want to see anyone die.”
“Evan deserves it.”
But she saw his eyes drift past her, his lips whistling, and she faced Rafe. Excited voices babbled around her. They wer
e not done with their games. While Rafe and Evan stood, immobile, their hate an almost tangible thing, three Indians scattered brush and firewood in a smaller, tighter circle around them.
The drums began their beat, and the brush was lit in a ring of fire around Rafe and Evan. Through the haze of smoke she heard the chanting begin, and she watched mesmerized as the two men began to move within the circle.
Crouched low, she knew Rafe had the advantage of strength against Evan just by his size. But Evan was not wounded, her mind countered. Evan had not fought one bloody fight already. Evan had been resting for three days; Rafe had ridden hard to catch up with them. She didn’t want to think of all that Rafe had against him. She didn’t want to think at all. She didn’t want to watch them, either, but it seemed she had lost her strength of will to turn away.
Evan was lithe and grace, balancing on the balls of his feet. Time and again Lacey saw how easily he swayed to avoid the thrust of Rafe’s knife. There seemed to be no hurry to them, yet Lacey sensed that each one was aware of how much space they had, of how far they could stretch the rawhide that bound them. The breeze came up, making the flames dance hideously, but now the smoke haze was gone.
Her gaze locked on the whiteness of their knuckles that gripped each other’s weapon hand. Rafe began to push Evan to the edge of the firelit circle. Lacey thought the flame reached out greedily to lick against Evan’s pants. Sweat gleamed on their bare skin. She bit her lip again when Evan viciously kicked Rafe’s leg. Staggering back, Rafe pulled Evan with him.
There were cries as Evan attacked with his knife, and only a quick twist of Rafe’s body saved him from a slicing wound.
Lacey wrapped her arms around her knees, shaking and tense, her fear near to exploding. How much more? She heard their taunting voices rise and fall above those of the Indians. She saw their cold smiles, which promised death, and looked at their eyes, which seemed intent on finding the other’s weakness.
Feeling sickened, she couldn’t deny in the dark recess of her mind that there was a grace to them both. Their balance and strength had a deathly savageness that held a form of beauty, too. Blood mingled with sweat on their skin. Rafe looked like a devil from hell, and Evan seemed as savage as the Indians that watched.
Rafe was weakening. He staggered again, going down on his knees, but managing to pull Evan with him. The swift arc of Evan’s knife descending toward Rafe’s chest brought Lacey’s scream. Luke clamped his hand over her mouth, and she closed her eyes.
“Damn you, Rafe!” Luke yelled. “Get up. Don’t let him win!”
She heard the lust in Luke’s voice. Lacey felt as if she were brittle, about to break, and wondered irrationally about the dark side of men and their need to fulfill their clamoring bloodlust. Why? Why did death alone satisfy them? Rafe! she screamed silently over and over. Don’t die. Live for me! Live for the dreams we shared. Live … oh, please … just live.
Her eyes were squeezed shut, but blinding herself to what was happening made it all a nightmare she couldn’t cope with. She couldn’t stand what her own hellish thoughts were forcing her to imagine.
Chapter 23
Rafe was no longer on his knees. She could feel, just as if she could reach out and actually touch it, the raging hate that flared between him and Evan. They still circled each other. The knives were slashing, coming together and slipping free at the last moment before steel met flesh in a final blow.
Her pulses drummed along with her blood, which was pumping at an alarming rate, knowing they were toying with each other like two vicious animals, so sure of proving their male prowess.
Lacey didn’t feel Luke wiping her tears. She didn’t know she was crying. Rafe held every thought, every nerve of her body. He was down again. Evan jumped on top of him, straddling his body, every muscle standing out like twisted cords. Evan’s hand held the knife in a grip so tight that even she could see it made the veins stand out on the back.
Her gaze locked to the sight of Evan’s hand. She saw it rise, the rawhide tie taut, Evan’s eyes glittering like the flames that were reflecting there. He was poised to kill Rafe with that last thrust. Rafe’s arm and knife were caught beneath Evan’s knee.
It was over. Evan had won and now he would kill Rafe.
Lacey wanted to die. There was no air to drag into her lungs. Her chest was tight, as if someone had bound it. Helpless, she waited for it to happen. There was no one else that she saw, nothing else that she felt.
Luke was yelling, urging Rafe not to give up, and he turned to hear wild laughter from Lacey.
She never counted on Rafe ever having the strength left to resist death. His body, pinned beneath Evan, gave one heave, strong enough to unsettle Evan so that his descending knife plunged into the earth beside Rafe’s neck. There was a wild twist of bodies then, and Lacey strained forward. She heard a grunt of pain and saw Evan fall forward. His body sprawled in a parody of a lover’s embrace across Rafe.
But Rafe didn’t move.
She stood, ready to run to him. Indians blocked her. Their black eyes held no pity, no mercy, but were warning in their cruelty. Just as she was about to strike one of them, Luke grabbed her hand and pulled her down with a sharp jerk.
“You can’t help him! He’s got to do it alone, Lacey. I warned you. If he can’t get up, then no one won.”
“Luke?” she called, not believing him. “Can’t you see? He’s lost so much blood,” she wailed, struggling against his hold. “He can’t get up! Have pity, Luke. Help him!” she screamed. “For God’s sake, help him. Rafe has nothing left. You can’t leave him to die,” she begged, clawing at him.
“Shut up!” he ordered, gripping her arms so tight that flesh melded to bone. “Do you think I don’t want to help him? I can’t. No one can,” he repeated harshly, trying to make her listen. “He’ll lose face if anyone dares to go to him.”
“You cowardly bastard!” Lacey lost control of herself, and she kicked and scratched him wherever she could reach.
Luke held on with one hand and slapped her into stunned silence. Like a bewildered child, Lacey sobbed and looked up at him. Tears streaming down her face, she silently asked why, and all he could do was hold her trembling body close.
“I’m sorry for hittin’ you,” he murmured, stroking her head. “I can’t risk his life and ours. We have to sit and wait.” He lifted her head, pity filling his eyes, and he waited for her to regain some control over her hysterical senses. “Show me some of that Garrett pride that made you the boss lady of the Reina. They may be savages, Lacey, but they have pride, too. Rafe is one of them now. He proved himself. You’re his woman. Don’t shame him.”
Dying inside, she forced herself to obey him. Luke released her, and she shoved her hair back. Her hands clawed her thighs when she looked at Rafe struggling to push Evan’s body away from him. The fire had been smothered. She barely noticed the exchange going on of the wagers won and lost.
Her gaze was targeted on Rafe’s hand as he pushed himself to sit and use a knife to cut the rawhide. His back was toward her, glistening with dirt and sweat, his shoulder muscles bunching and moving. She cried inside, felt his pain with every motion, and let her love silently will him strength.
He rose to his feet, swaying as he turned slowly and met her gaze. If she lived the years with him, Lacey knew she would never bury the look in his eyes deep enough to forget.
His black eyes held a savage possessive pride that seemed to capture her. She couldn’t tear her gaze from his. She didn’t know when he moved, but he came toward her, kicking aside smoldering pieces of wood to cross to her. And all she saw were his eyes, binding her to him like nothing else had. He stood in front of her, legs braced apart, silent, yet demanding that she rise to meet him.
In a trance Lacey rose, her legs trembling, as was the rest of her body. She was suddenly frightened of this man she had given herself to in
love and then married for all the wrong reasons.
“I told you you’re mine, Lacey,” he stated in a raspy voice as he pulled her to him. Her head fell back, her tear-filled eyes searched his face, trying desperately to see what was beyond the savage look in his eyes. With a sob torn from unwilling lips, she came against him, crying his name until his arms encircled her and his lips took her mouth.
She felt the tension of his hard thighs pressed against her own, the fierce possessive moves of his hands running down the length of her back as if he could draw her body into his own. She had no breath but that which he gave her, no strength but that which she took from him.
His fingers tunneled beneath her hair, gripping her neck, slanting her head for his mouth. And sounds receded, faces disappeared, time and place were lost to them. He kissed her as if she were a drink of life to him, and Lacey could withhold nothing from him, desperate with the thought of losing him.
Her hands would not be denied the touch of him. His silky black hair was damp to her fingers as she clutched him to bring his head closer. Their lips tore free of each other at the same moment, slanting to touch and taste, wild with need to reconfirm love and life.
“It’s over,” Rafe whispered, releasing her.
Stunned, Lacey watched him move through the throng of Indians until he stood before Walks Like Cat. When she tried to follow, others blocked her way.
“Luke, make them understand, I have to go with him,” she pleaded, bewildered by Rafe’s leaving.
“He has to talk and—”
“You’re crazy! He’ll bleed to death if those wounds aren’t tended.”
Luke grabbed her chin and forced her to look. “See! He doesn’t need you now.”
Lacey stared at the two young women who came to wash and bind his wounds. Walks Like Cat was speaking in his guttural voice and held sway over the others.
Western Winds Page 29