Desert Dreams

by Cox, Deborah

  He'd carried the image of the dream with him throughout the day. They were getting closer to Mexico with every step. He'd traveled this route so many times he could almost do it in his sleep. He knew what lay ahead: the Nueces River, a wide stretch of parched land leading to the Rio Grande, and, beyond that, El Alacran.

  What was he going to do about Annie? She was already beginning to toughen a little. A good thing. She'd need every ounce of strength and courage she possessed before this journey was over. He hoped it would be enough.

  Chapter 12

  Anne didn't remember much about last night, but she did have a vague recollection of slipping from the saddle into Rafe's strong arms. She couldn't remember ever being more exhausted.

  Rafe had taken care of her—again. She seemed to remember eating something, which he had undoubtedly provided. And this morning, when she'd awakened, she'd been wrapped in her bedroll.

  As the miles slipped by, she found herself becoming more and more dependent on Rafe, and she wasn't at all sure she liked it. She'd learned a long time ago never to depend on anyone but herself. Now it seemed she didn't have a choice. It was that or perish.

  Her legs were stiff and sore this morning. The pain in her inner thighs made her wonder how she could ever ride when just walking caused such agony. Every muscle in her body ached and cramp as she made her way to Rafe, who was leaning against a scruffy-looking cottonwood tree.

  A dry streambed wound its way through the desolate landscape, barely noticeable, except for the fact that it lay a little lower than the rest of the land. Brush and prickly pears dotted the banks just as they did the rest of the terrain. She couldn't help wondering how long it had been since this stream had contained any water.

  "We may not see water until we get to the Nueces," he said without looking up, as if he'd sensed her presence.

  His words reminded her of her canteen and her saddlebags. Where were they? She scanned the campsite but they were nowhere to be found. Her gaze jerked to the horses. Either he had saddled them or he hadn’t unsaddled them the night before.

  No, he would never leave them saddled overnight. He’d taken her things-her saddlebags-from the saddle. He’d had all night to go through her things? To take her money.

  "How far is that?" She wanted to know, but she also wanted to stop her irrational thoughts.

  "We ought to be there before nightfall, if we don't run into any trouble."

  "Do you expect trouble?" She searched his eyes. He might not tell her the truth, but maybe she could read it in his expression.

  "No, but you never know out here."

  "How do you know the Nueces won't be dry too?"

  He smiled, and she felt a bit foolish, as if she'd asked the question about the Mississippi. "Well, there's no way to be sure, but I've never known the Nueces to dry up. It's a big river, by desert standards anyway, so it would take one hell of a drought."

  She swallowed hard. They would make it. They had to. Rafe knew this country as well as anyone else. He must know what he was talking about. "Do we have enough water?"

  "Yes, if we watch it." He pushed away from the tree and made his way back toward camp. "We'd better get started. It'll be getting hotter as the sun gets higher. We don't want to be caught out in the open at the hottest part of the day."

  He walked toward the horses and Anne followed. She moved slowly, each step an exercise in agony that sent flashes of pain burning through her legs.

  Reaching the horses, Rafe lifted her canteen from around his saddle horn and turned to give it to her, only to find that she hadn't yet reached him.

  Her slow, awkward gate touched his calloused heart. He knew she'd sooner die than admit she was in pain and risk another lecture on her unfitness for this country. Her eyes met his, and her chin lifted slightly at the expression on his face.

  "You all right this morning, Miss Cameron?" he asked.

  She glared at him. "I'll be fine."

  He handed her the canteen, and she took it with a look of surprise.

  "We might get separated,” he said with a lopsided grin.

  He was echoing her concern from the day before. It probably meant nothing, but she couldn’t help asking, "What if we do?"

  The fear in her voice twisted his heart. "Don't worry. But you should have your own water supply, just in case. If we do get separated, just stop wherever you are and stay put. I'll find you."

  Her expression doubtful, Annie gazed at him for a moment. She still didn't trust him, and he couldn't blame her. It showed intelligence on her part.

  She took the canteen and walked around to her horse, winding the leather strap around the saddle horn. Reaching up to mount, she groaned and a grimace of pain wrinkled her forehead.

  "You sure you're all right?"

  She refused to look at him as she murmured, "Will you help me?"

  "What? Annie Cameron admitting she needs help?"

  "If you're going to make fun of me... "

  Rafe had come to stand behind her. A tremor rippled through her body. Her every nerve ending hummed as she waited breathlessly for him to touch her, wanting and fearing at the same time.

  Unable to bear the tension, she twisted around to face him and immediately regretted it. Her body brushed his, the contact flashed through her like a bolt of lightning. He tensed and so did she. Both of them backed away if that bolt of lightning had struck between them.

  "Don't we need to get started?" she asked, her voice thin and unsteady.

  His gaze traveled down from her eyes to her lips. It was all she could do to breathe. Just when she thought he was going to kiss her, he moved past her, closer to the horse.

  "You don't have to jump every time I make a move, Annie. If I meant to harm you, I'd have done it by now."

  Heat rose to her cheeks. If he'd meant his words to be comforting, they had the opposite effect. She was completely at his mercy. It wasn't the first time that thought had occurred to her, but is blunt words brought it home in a way that made her blood turn cold.

  Last night, she had been too exhausted to stay awake long enough to take herself to bed. Not only could he have gone through her belongings, he could have done anything he wanted to her. Truth was, he could do anything he wanted any time he wanted. The absolute silence of the land around them overwhelmed her for the first time. She had no idea where they were, not really. She had no idea how far it was to the next town. If he left her behind, she would die.

  "Don't you think I know what you think of me?" he asked, breaking into her dark thoughts.

  "How could you?" Her voice trembled slightly. "I don't even know—"

  "I am a bounty hunter," he said, anger showing in the depths of his pale eyes. "I kill for money. I live from day to day, never knowing when I'm going to meet a faster gun and end up dead. I have no principles. In any other circumstance, you'd put as much distance between us as you could, and you'd be smart to do it."

  "Well, if all that's true, why should I trust you?"

  "Because I don't have any reason to want to harm you. And you don’t have any choice."

  "And you have a reason to harm the men you kill for the bounty on their heads?"

  "To my way of thinking I do." He shrugged. "Besides, it's what I'm good at. Now, if you don't mind, put your foot in my hands."

  "Why?" She knew why, but she wasn't sure she wanted to comply.

  "Just do as I say. I'm going to give you a leg up so we can get going."

  She stepped toward him, placing her left hand on his shoulders for balance as she lifted her booted foot. He dropped his hands and stood up with a sigh before she could plant her foot.

  "Hold on to the saddle like I taught you. I'm trying to put you on the damned horse, remember?"

  "Well, you don't have to curse at me! I've never done this before."

  He said nothing, just leaned over to assist her. She grabbed the saddle by the back lip and the pommel but found she couldn't lift her foot high enough to place it in his hands without experienc
ing excruciating pain throughout her hips and buttocks. How was she ever going to ride all day?

  His hand closed around her foot, and she began hopping on her other one, trying with all her might to steady herself, to pull herself up. But she lost her balance.

  Before she hit the ground, he grabbed her, swinging her up into his arms as he had that night in San Antonio.

  She struggled in his embrace, but in her efforts to put some distance between them she only succeeded in increasing the contact, sending tremors of excitement through his body.

  "Put me down!" she demanded breathlessly.

  "Just wait."

  "Put me down. Please!"

  But he didn't. Instead, he carried her back to the horse as if she were a child and turned her, shifting her in his arms so he could lift her high enough to put her in the saddle.

  She sat for a moment with both legs dangling over the same side of the horse as she had seen ladies in Natchez and New Orleans ride and glad she didn't have to try to stay in the saddle this way.

  "Throw your right leg over his neck," he instructed gruffly.

  She did as he said, wincing in pain as she settled into the saddle. He stood close by, and she used him to lean on while she found her stirrups. When it was done and she was securely seated, he turned away and walked toward his own horse.

  ***

  At noon, they stopped at a place where two mesquite trees stood close enough together so that Rafe could string a sleeping bag between them for shade. He spread another on the ground, then upended her saddle on the blanket so that it rested on the pommel side. He’d done this before, so Anne knew what to do. She slipped into it and leaned back as if she were sitting in a chair.

  Lunch was dried beef. It was barely palatable, but Anne managed to eat a small amount, knowing it was the last scrap of food she would get until they stopped for the night, and who knew when that would be?

  She glanced over at Rafe where he lay on his side, his torso propped up on an elbow, to find him studying her intently. An instant, uncontrollable tremor rippled through her. It was maddening the way he could set her pulse racing with nothing more than a glance, while he seemed to remain completely unaffected.

  "So," he said in a slow, lazy tone, "why is this gold so important to you?"

  "Why do you want to know?" she asked suspiciously.

  "Just trying to make conversation," he replied, as he rolled onto his back.

  She decided it could do no harm to tell him. "There's a house in Ubiquitous. It belonged to my aunt. I want to buy it."

  He laughed. "That's it? With a million dollars, you could buy the whole town. You could do whatever you want to do, go wherever you want to go."

  "What I want is a home of my own and a simple life," she replied, trying not to be hurt by his attitude. He had no idea who she was, where she'd come from.

  "What about your family?"

  "I don't have any family." She watched him for a reaction, but he just looked at her with those cold, benign eyes.

  "Where are you from?" he asked, but she wasn't sure he really cared.

  "I was born in St. Louis. I've lived in Natchez, New Orleans, Vicksburg, Baton Rouge. My daddy was a riverboat gambler. My mother was a New Orleans Creole. Her family owns one of the biggest sugar plantations in Louisiana, or they did before the war."

  "Well, you should have gone and stayed with them instead of coming here after your father died. It would have been safer."

  She laughed ironically. "They wouldn't have anything to do with me or my father. My father wasn't one of them. He was a Yankee from Pennsylvania. He came down to New Orleans on a riverboat and sneaked into a ball, and that's where he met and fell in love with my mother. Her family disowned her when she married him."

  But when they found out he died in the war-“

  “My father didn't die in the war. He was gunned down on the street in Natchez for cheating at cards.”

  His expression changed slightly. She could swear she saw a flicker of something like compassion. Maybe he wasn't made of stone. She remembered the kiss and the pain and longing she'd sensed.

  "What about you?" she challenged. "Do you have family?"

  "I have a brother."

  "In New Mexico? Do you ever go back there?"

  He hesitated for a moment before replying. "We don't get along."

  "But he's your brother. Surely—"

  "He hates me, Miss Cameron," he said sharply. "And I can't say I blame him."

  "You drive people away."

  He quirked an eyebrow at her, then gave a frown of annoyance.

  She was immediately sorry she had been so blunt. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

  "Go on. You seem to know so much."

  Unwilling to be intimidated by his sarcasm, she straightened her spine and met the challenge in his words. "You wear this mask of violence. You purposely intimidate people because you don't want anyone to get too close and see what's behind the mask."

  "I am what you see before you, Miss Cameron, nothing more, nothing less." He rolled over onto his back, spreading his long, lean body across the blanket, pulling his hat down over his face with a shrug. "While you're working things out, I'm going to take a nap."

  She watched as he settled, unable to keep from asking quietly, "What do you want the gold for, Mr. Montalvo?"

  "I'll think of something," he said, without looking at her. "Get some rest. We'll be starting again in an hour."

  ***

  They'd been watching the smoke all afternoon, a thin gray ribbon that curled its way upward toward the cloudless sky. After days of traveling across the bleak, monotonous terrain, any variation would have drawn their attention, but there was something particularly ominous about this vision.

  A feeling of dread sent gooseflesh over Anne's body, and though she tried with all her might to ignore it, her gaze returned time and again to that silent harbinger.

  They were heading straight for it.

  She might have been able to ignore her own reaction, if not for the fact that Rafe's mood seemed to mirror hers so closely. He had been tense and silent for the last hour.

  "What do you think it is?" she asked.

  "No way of knowing." He kept looking toward the horizon.

  She drew her horse up alongside his and only then noticed the thin sheen of perspiration on his face, the tautness of the muscle in his jaw. His apparent anxiety only served to amplify hers.

  "Maybe it's just smoke from a chimney."

  "Maybe."

  He didn't have to say anything else. The way he spoke the word left little doubt what he thought. Her imagination filled in the rest. She tried to stop her mind from conjuring one grizzly scenario after another, but it was no use.

  They followed the trail of smoke for another hour before the smoldering ruins of a covered wagon came into view. Half a dozen buzzards circled overhead, their cries shrill and eerie in the still desert air.

  Anne swallowed against the bile that rose in her throat. A tremor started in her arms and spread down her torso to her legs as a feeling of unreality, of detachment, overwhelmed her.

  "Stay here with the horses while I look around," Rafe told her in a shaky voice.

  She was glad for once to do as he said. She had no desire to go any closer. She'd seen death before: her father had practically died in her arms, and there had been the Union soldiers in Baton Rouge who died of yellow fever faster than graves could be dug for them. But she'd never witnessed random violence against innocent people.

  As Rafe studied the scene before them, his chest heaving with the force of his ragged breath, Anne noticed that he was trembling, which only heightened her own sense of dread. He seemed to have completely lost the iron control he usually exercised over his body and his emotions. And when he finally turned to her, she had the unnerving feeling that he wasn't seeing her at all.

  As he walked toward the wagon, she had to fight the urge to call him back. He seemed so incredibly fragile suddenly. A
part of her wanted to simply ride away. If there were people here, they were dead. There was nothing they could do for them.

  But if they did that, they would be no better than the butchers who had killed them. Whoever they were, they had to be buried. It would be barbaric to leave them out in the open.

  She started when he took out his pistol and fired a shot into the air. In response, two more buzzards squawked loudly and took flight nearby.

  Anne wiped beads of perspiration from her face with her sleeve. A huge black carrion bird dove toward the earth, swooping down so close over her head that she ducked involuntarily. Her horse snorted and sidestepped and she held on for dear life until he settled.

  It swooped down as if it would land close by, but it rose again toward the sky, then made a wide turn, and dove toward the same spot again, landing this time, drawing her attention to something she hadn't seen before.

  With her heart in her throat, she dismounted quickly and stumbled forward, sobbing, barely able to see through her tears.

  She was looking at a body. Rafe hadn't seen it yet because the ground was slightly lower here and the brush was taller.

  It was a woman. She was naked. There was blood. She'd been scalped.

  She trembled all over, hot and cold at the same time, certain she would either faint or become deathly ill. She did neither. With a deep, ragged breath, she ran headlong back toward her horse.

  At that instant, Rafe reached her. He caught her and eased her down to the ground as she gave in to the nausea that finally overwhelmed her.

  He held her gently, caressing her hair, speaking soothingly with words she didn't understand. The nausea subsided and she began to cry, clinging to him and the comfort he offered. His arms tightened around her, and he rocked her to and fro as if she were a child.

  "They... they raped her," she murmured. "They scalped her."

  "I know," he whispered against her hair. He held her for a moment until the trembling stopped, then asked softly, "Do you think you can stand up?"

  She could only nod.

  Rafe stood, pulling her gently to her feet, then supported her as they walked back toward her horse.