A Heart so Wild - Straton 1

by Johanna Lindsey

  The tears came in a torrent, and when Maggie offered her shoulder, Courtney took advantage of it. It was so embarrassing. But the hurt was too strong to be pent up.

  Courtney knew she had no claim on Chandos, and knew he wasn’t what she’d thought. There was this terrible vengeful side of him that she couldn’t begin to understand. Yet despite that, and despite knowing she should be glad never to see him again, she felt an agony of abandonment, of betrayal, even, and it hurt. God, how it hurt.

  Maggie sat Courtney down on a sofa, an expensive Chippendale Courtney would later admire, and handed her a lace-edged hanky. She left her young guest only long enough to light a few lamps in the parlor, then returned to wrap Courtney in her arms until the girl began to quiet.

  “There now.” Maggie replaced the wet hanky with another. “I’ve always said a good cry does wonders for the system. But you can’t tell men that, and goodness, men are all we have around here. It’s so nice to be able to mother a female for a change.”

  “I’m sorry I did that,” Courtney said, sniffling.

  “No, lass, don’t be sorry. When a body needs to cry, they ought to. Do you feel better?”

  “Not really.”

  Maggie patted her hand, smiling gently. “Do you love him so much?”

  “No,” Courtney said quickly, adamantly, then groaned, “Oh, I don’t know. I did, but how can I anymore after what I learned tonight? The savagery he’s capable of…”

  “Goodness, what did he do to you, dear?” she whispered.

  “Not to me. He—he mutilated a man in revenge and killed him.”

  “He told you about it?” Maggie was taken aback.

  “I already knew about it. Chandos just confirmed that he was the one who did it. And he’s on his way now to kill another man, probably in the same horrible way. Maybe these men deserved his vengeance, I don’t know. But to kill so—so cruelly!”

  “Men will do terrible things, child. God knows why, but they will. At least most men have a reason for what they do. Does your young man?”

  “I’m not exactly sure,” Courtney said quietly, explaining as much as she knew about that long-ago Indian raid. “I know he had friends among the Comanche,” she finished. “Maybe he even lived with them. But is that enough reason for such hideous violence?”

  “Maybe he had a wife among those people,” Maggie suggested. “Many white men do take Indian wives, you know. And if she was raped before she was killed, that would account for the mutilation.”

  Courtney sighed. She hadn’t wanted to consider a wife, but Maggie was probably right. It would explain why Chandos knew the Indians so well. Of course, Maggie was only guessing.

  “It doesn’t really matter whether I can condone what he did, or understand it,” Courtney murmured. “I’m never going to see Chandos again.”

  “And that makes you very unhappy—no, don’t bother saying no, lass. So now I have to admit to a terrible curiosity about who this young man is. Can you describe him to me? I’m dying to remember him.”

  Courtney looked down at her hands, which were clenched tightly in her lap. “Chandos is a gunfighter. He’s very good at it. That’s one reason I felt safe traveling with him. He’s tall and dark, and really very handsome. His hair is black, but his eyes are blue.” Maggie said nothing, and she went on, “He’s quiet. He doesn’t like to talk much at all. Trying to get any information out of him is like pulling teeth.”

  Maggie sighed. “You’ve just described a dozen men I’ve seen come and go from this ranch, my dear.”

  “I don’t know what else I can tell you… Oh, Sawtooth said Chandos used an Indian name while he was here.”

  “Well, that does narrow it down. There have been two young men here with Indian names. One was a half-breed… and yes, he did have blue eyes.”

  “Chandos could pass for half Indian, though he claims he isn’t.”

  “Well, if he isn’t, then—” Maggie paused, frowning. “Why didn’t he come in with you?”

  “He wouldn’t. He said there were people here he didn’t want to see. I’m afraid he’s done something here. Maybe he’s wanted by the law or something like that.”

  “Did he say anything else, lass?” Maggie asked, her soft voice urgent now.

  Courtney smiled sheepishly. “He did warn me not to call you an old lady. He said when he did, you boxed his ears.”

  “Dear God!” Maggie gasped.

  “You know who I mean?” Courtney asked, joyful now.

  “Yes, yes. It was the day I boxed his ears that we became friends. He wasn’t… easy to know.”

  “Is he wanted by the law?” Courtney asked very softly. She had to know.

  “No, unless you consider Fletcher’s ”law.“ He didn’t leave here under the best of conditions, and Fletcher, well, he said some pretty terrible things in the heat of anger. They both did. But that was four years ago, and Fletcher regrets—”

  “Four years?” Courtney cut in. “But that was when he rode with the Comanche.”

  “Yes, he returned to the Comanche then…” Maggie stopped, her hand going to her chest. “Dear God, that attack, it was, it must have been… His mother lived with the Comanche, lass. And a young half-sister he adored. Then they must be dead, both of them… Oh, that poor boy.”

  Courtney went pale. His mother? A sister? Why didn’t he tell her? He had mentioned a sister once, said she gave him the name Chandos. He said he would use that name until he finished what he had to do… so his sister could stop crying and sleep in peace.

  Courtney gazed, unseeing, out the window. She hadn’t understood. Those men had killed his mother and his sister. She couldn’t begin to imagine what he’d suffered. Why, she had never believed her own father was dead, but look how she had suffered just from their separation. But Chandos had probably seen the bodies…

  “Ma’am, I… can we talk about something else, please?” Courtney pleaded, feeling a new fountain of tears too close to the surface.

  “Of course,” Maggie said soothingly. “Perhaps if you told me why you have come?”

  “Yes.” Courtney latched onto that. “I’m here to find my father. Chandos said you would know if he’s living in Waco. He said you know everyone. Oh, God sakes, I haven’t even introduced myself. I’m Courtney Harte.”

  “Harte? We do have a Dr. Harte in Waco, but—”

  “That’s him! ”Courtney cried, jumping up in her excitement. “I was right. He is alive! He’s here! I knew it!”

  Maggie shook her head, bewildered. “I don’t understand, lass. Ella Harte told Sue Anne Gibbons at the last church picnic that Dr. Harte’s only daughter had died in an Indian attack.”

  Courtney stared wide-eyed at the older woman. “He thought I died?”

  “In a fire that burned the farmhouse down,” she said. “He said you’d taken shelter in the house with your stepmother. That’s what he told Sue Anne.”

  “But we were in the barn, in the feed box!”

  Maggie shook her head, wholly confused. Before she could think what to say, Courtney asked, “Who is Ella?”

  “Why, Dr. Harte’s wife. They were married about two months ago.”

  Courtney sat down again, sobering fast. A wife. No, another wife! It wasn’t fair, it just wasn’t. Would she never have him to herself, even for a little while? And to be only a few months too late!

  Thoughtless in misery, she uttered one of Chandos’s expletives. “Goddamn.”“

  Chapter 40

  THE kitchen was brightly lit, empty except for Sawtooth, who sat at the table with a tall glass of milk and a piece of cherry pie. When the back door opened and Maggie slipped inside, he didn’t move. He knew by the footsteps who it was. Her expression was anxious.

  Sawtooth sat back in his chair and surveyed her.

  “You gonna tell him?”

  Maggie stood looking down at him. “You knew. Weren’t you thinking about telling him?”

  “Nope. I was waitin” to see what you’d do. Besides“—S
awtooth grinned—”the boy made me swear I’d forget I seen him. He was real persuasive about it. You know how he can be.“

  Maggie folded her arms, staring at the door that separated the kitchen from the rest of the house. “Is he still up?”

  “Reckon so.” Sawtooth nodded. “It’s early. How’s the little lady?”

  “I put her to bed. Did you know she’s Dr. Harte’s daughter?”

  “That right? Well, that relieves my mind on one score. Least now I know she’ll be stickin” around a while, if not out here, then in town.“

  “I’m not so sure.” Maggie sighed. “The lass was awfully shook up to hear that her father had married. That is a very unhappy young lady, Sawtooth.”

  “That’ll change, soon as Kane comes back.”

  “You think he will?”

  Sawtooth nodded. “I ain’t never seen him give a damn about anything, Maggie, but I seen it tonight. That gal’s mighty important to him. You must think so too, or you wouldn’t be thinkin” about tellin‘ Fletcher.“

  “That isn’t my reason,” Maggie said softly, sadly. “If that was all there was to it, I wouldn’t take the chance of stirring him up when he might wind up disappointed. But I learned from Miss Harte that four years ago in Kansas a band of Comanches were massacred by white men, and since then, the lad has been seeking the murderers in vengeance.”

  “Goddamn,” Sawtooth whispered. “Then Meara’s dead.”

  “It seems so,” Maggie replied. “Murdered. And Fletcher has a right to know.”

  Loud voices woke Courtney, getting louder as they neared the cottage. Then the cottage door burst open and Courtney sat up in alarm, holding the covers up over her chemise. One hell of a big man was standing in the doorway. Behind him was Maggie, who shoved him aside and came into the room. She eyed Courtney carefully, then turned to the man.

  “See what you have done?” Maggie said loudly, and with a good deal of exasperation. “You’ve frightened the poor lass! This could have waited until morning.”

  The man came farther into the room now and gently but firmly set Maggie out of his way. His eyes were on Courtney, his expression a mask of determination.

  He was tall and brawny, with massive shoulders and chest, and thick arms. He had expressive brown eyes and dark brown hair with a streak of gray smack in the center above his brows. A thick mustache was dotted with gray. He would be a handsome man, thought Courtney, if he didn’t look so forbidding.

  Courtney sat up straighter on the sofa. This was a one-bedroom cottage and she had refused to put Maggie out of her bed.

  “Who are you, mister?” she demanded.

  Her directness threw him. He even glanced at Maggie as if to ask, Is this your poor frightened lass? He seemed the kind of man who had long been used to people jumping to obey him. Was this the owner of the Bar M?

  “I’m Fletcher Straton, Miss Harte,” he confirmed, his voice gruff. “I understand you know nry son, Kane, quite well.”

  “No I do not,” Courtney retorted. “And if that’s the reason you barged in here—”

  “You know him as Chandos.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t believe you. He mentioned you by name. If you were his father, he would have said so, and he didn’t.”

  “Kane hasn’t called me Father since Meara took him away,” Fletcher replied. “That’s his mother—Meara, a stubborn black-haired Irish lass who hasn’t got a forgiving bone in her body. He’s got her eyes. That’s how I knew him when he showed up here ten years after I had given them both up for dead.”

  Stunned, Courtney glanced at Maggie for confirmation.

  “It’s true, lass,” Maggie said softly. “And I wouldn’t have betrayed your confidence except that he has a right to know.” Her gaze went to her hands. “Fletcher, you didn’t give me a chance to finish what I had to tell you, before you rushed over here to see Miss Harte. There is no easy way to tell this. I’m afraid Meara is dead, along with the Comanches she lived with. From what Miss Harte has told me, it appears that when Kane left here, he returned to find them all massacred, and he’s been hunting down the whites who did it ever since.”

  The man’s composure crumbled. The bleakest pain crossed his features, making him suddenly look much older. But control returned in a moment, and his expression hardened.

  “Did Kane tell you his mother was dead?” he asked Courtney.

  She would have liked to give him some hope. She wasn’t sure why, but she wished she could. She wondered why. Her first impression was that he was a hard man. God sakes, even his son apparently didn’t like him. But still…

  “Chandos never once mentioned his mother to me,” she said truthfully. “I knew there was a massacre. I saw Chandos ride with the surviving Comanches after the massacre, when they attacked the farm I was staying at. Chandos spared my life that day, when nearly everyone else was killed. What he did to the farmer who had participated in the Indian slaughter was horrible. But if his mother was ra—killed, I can at least understand what drove him to do it.” She paused, then said carefully, “But if you’re asking me for proof that his mother is dead, I can’t give you any. You’ll have to ask Chandos.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I can’t tell you that.”

  “Can’t—or won’t?” he demanded.

  Courtney’s sympathy was vanishing under his belligerence. “Won’t. I don’t know you, Mr. Straton. But I do know that Chandos didn’t want to see you. Considering that, why should I tell you where you can find him?”

  “Loyal, aren’t you?” he growled, not accustomed to being thwarted. “But let me remind you, young lady, whose roof you’re sleeping under.”

  “In that case, I’ll leave!” Courtney snapped. She rose, dragging the blanket with her, for cover.

  “Sit down, goddammit!”

  “I will not!”

  In the bristling silence, Maggie laughed softly. “I think you had better change your tactics, Fletcher. The lass has been in the company of your son for the past month. His defiance has rubbed off on her—at least where you’re concerned.”

  Fletcher scowled at Maggie. Courtney scowled at Maggie. With a dramatic sigh, Maggie stood up.

  “I would think, Fletcher Straton, that an old codger like you would learn from his mistakes,” Maggie said sternly. “Haven’t you been this route before? Haven’t I heard you say a hundred times that if you had the chance you would do things differently? Well, you might get that chance, but from what I can see, you will make the same mistakes again. You’ve already made a big one. Instead of asking the lass, explaining, telling her how much it would mean to you to hear about Kane, you bully her. Why should she talk to you at all? She is only spending the night here—under my roof, I might add. She’s not dependent on you, Fletcher, so why should she talk to you at all? If it were me, I wouldn’t.”

  Having said her piece, Maggie walked out the cottage door. The ensuing silence in the little parlor was uncomfortable to say the least. Courtney sat down on the sofa again, beginning to feel embarrassed over losing her temper. After all, this was Chandos’s father. And they each had knowledge of Chandos that the other wanted.

  “I’m sorry,” she began, then smiled as Fletcher said the same words at the same time. “Perhaps we can start over, Mr. Straton. Would you tell me why Chandos wouldn’t come near this place?”

  “Chandos.” He grunted the name in distaste. “Goddamn, beg pardon, but that boy will use any name other than the one I gave him. While he was here, he wouldn’t answer to Kane. You could call him anything, even ”hey you,“ and he’d at least look at you. But call him Kane and he ignored it.”

  “Don’t ask me to call him Kane,” Courtney said firmly. “To me he’s Chandos, simply Chandos.”

  “All right, all right,” Fletcher grumbled softly. “But don’t ask me to call him Chandos, either.”

  “I won’t.” Courtney grinned.

  “About what you asked,” he said, pulling up a chair and sitting in it. “It’s
not surprising that Kane didn’t want me to know he was near here. When he took off, four years ago, I sent my men out after him to bring him back. They never caught up with him, of course. He led them a merry chase for nearly three weeks, playing with them, I think, before he got tired of it and lost them.

  “He’s got no reason to think I wouldn’t try to keep him here again. That’s probably why he didn’t want anyone to know he was close by.”

  “Would you try to keep him here?”

  “Goddamn, beg pardon, right I would,” Fletcher said obdurately. “But”—he hesitated, looking down at his large hands—“not in the same way. This time, I’d ask him to stay. I’d do my best to show him it’d be different, not like before.”

  “How was it—before?”

  “I made one mistake after another,” Fletcher admitted ruefully. “I see them all now. I started by treating him like a boy when, to the Comanche, eighteen is a man already. He was eighteen when he returned here. The next dumb thing I did was, I tried to make him forget everything he’d learned from the Comanche, the very things that came natural to him after being with them for so long. I let him rile me, time and again. I couldn’t accept that he didn’t want what I had to give him.”

  “You said you thought he was dead for ten years. Was he living with the Comanche all that time?”

  “Yes, with his mother. She ran off from me, you see. Oh, I can’t blame her for leaving. I wasn’t exactly the most faithful of husbands. But she didn’t have to take the boy with her. She knew how much he meant to me.”

  “You can’t expect a mother to abandon her child.”

  “No, but there are other ways of separating when two people don’t get along. I would have given her anything she wanted. I would have set her up anywhere she wanted. All I would have asked was to have Kane half the time. Instead, she disappeared. I never did understand how she managed it, until Kane showed up. Then I knew where they’d hidden all those years.