Romancing the Wilderness: American Wilderness Series Boxed Bundle Books 1 - 3

by Dorothy Wiley

  Foley glared at Sam as he spoke. The contemptible man seemed to be gloating.

  He returned Foley’s stare with squinted eyes. He let his mind bore into the man’s heart, trying to find a soul. But Foley’s heart held no honor, no integrity, and no honesty. Nothing but false pride and coldhearted malevolence flowed through this man’s veins. And his soul held only poison. The only antidote for venomous men like Foley was justice. He gripped his knife, wishing the man before him had been Eli Frazier. But he wasn’t.

  “We’ll need another witness,” Sam said finally. “I will not bear false witness.”

  “I understand, and I respect your integrity, Sir,” the Judge said.

  Foley tilted his chin up. “You going to let me loose, Judge?” He gave Sam a look full of loathing.

  “We’ll see what the other witness has to say. Let’s go Captain Wyllie.”

  As they passed in front of him, Foley spat on Sam’s shoulder.

  Like a spark thrown on an explosive, the spittle caused Sam’s already unstable mood to instantaneously blaze. In a split second, he reached in and slammed Foley’s face against the rusty jail bars. The whole room shook with the force of his exploding anger. He whipped his blade instantly to the side of the man’s throat.

  Surprisingly, the Judge made no move to stop him.

  Foley tried to pull away, but Sam’s grip held the man’s face close. So close, they were nearly eyeball to eyeball.

  “I guess you haven’t had enough of the taste of this knife,” Sam taunted, pressing his blade’s keen edge well into the skin on Foley’s neck.

  “You’re lucky I didn’t piss on you,” Foley sneered.

  Drops of red sprang up along the knife’s shiny edge before the Judge grabbed the neck of Foley’s shirt and lugged him back, away from the bars and Sam’s blade.

  But Webb couldn’t pull Sam back from his rage. Until released, Sam could control his anger. But once unleashed, it was near impossible to still. His hands shook with his effort to sheath the knife and bridle his wrath.

  “That’s the second time you’ve spit on a Wyllie. There will be no third time without you dying,” he swore.

  “You going to hang him, Judge?” Constable Mitchell asked on the way out.

  “I can’t without two witnesses. Watch him well while I’m gone, constable. He’d better be here waiting for me when I get back or I’ll sure as hell be looking for someone else to send to a firing squad.”

  The wide-eyed constable nodded his head vigorously to let the Judge know he understood. Sam could tell no idle threats came from this Judge.

  Sam and the Judge left the jail, located in the western corner of the Fort. Alex stood tied just outside. While the Judge retrieved his own mount from the Fort’s stalls, Sam noted with amusement that Alex had left several mounds of droppings below Foley’s jail cell window. He suspected the horse might have deposited the pungent piles intentionally.

  “Let’s go see your witness,” the Judge said, after mounting his horse.

  “First we have to get John. He’s at the doc’s,” Sam said. On the way to the doctor’s office, he explained how John received the scalp wound.

  “Getting that witness was indeed costly,” Webb said, “let’s hope we can make it worth John’s while.”

  Sam and the Judge caught up to John just as he was leaving. “Dr. McDowell said I was already healing well. He wants to meet Jane and compliment her work on my scalp.”

  “I’m not surprised she did so well,” Sam said.

  “Sorry to learn of your injury John. But you’ve just seen one of the best. Doc McDowell is recently returned from Edinburgh. He said it’s a mecca for medical students from all over the world. He practices medicine in Danville, but comes to Boonesborough once a month,” Webb explained as he mounted. “Watch our backs, Sam. Be sure we’re not followed.”

  The Judge couldn’t know that he always watched his back.

  After Sam arrived with the Judge and they dismounted, Stephen strode up and shook Webb’s hand. “Before we get started Judge, we must first thank you for being willing to come out to our camp.” Stephen turned to Jonathan. “I also want you to know Mr. O’Reilly how much Sam and I, all of us, appreciate your willingness to testify.”

  “I do na deserve thanks. I should have told the Judge about Foley before now. I regret that I didn’t. But, I’m here to correct me mistake,” Jonathan said, twisting his hat in his hand.

  “Others are coming forth now too,” Judge Webb responded. “After you men confronted that weasel in court, several citizens have come forward. One man claims that both Frank Foley and his brother Bud raped his wife while Foley’s other men beat him senseless. He wants to keep the rape between us to protect his wife’s reputation, but he swore with tears in his eyes that Frank and Bud did it. Another man strongly believes that this group of men murdered his brother. Foley could probably hang a dozen times and still deserve further punishment.”

  “I know Sam would be happy to oblige,” William said looking in Sam’s direction, “and so would I.”

  It took only a few minutes for O’Reilly to tell the Judge where and how he had remembered Foley. “I know it’s him. Saw him in town with that bunch of vermin. As soon as I caught sight of those deep-set evil eyes and that huge nose, I recognized him. At the Battle of Germantown, the British captured 400 of our men, including that bastard. Within the same hour, he turned turncoat. Many of those captured saw him defect. Two tried to stop him and the Red Coats shot them both right on the spot. They say he laughed, went up to the bodies, and spit on them. It was such a despicable act, tales of his treason spread quickly and far. It wasn’t long before the whole Continental Army and the militias had heard of it and were all looking for him.” Jonathan swallowed hard and took a deep breath before he continued.

  “After Germantown, he worked for the British as a scout. He caused the death of many good men.” Jonathan nearly choked on the words. “The army filed charges of treason against him, but he was never apprehended.”

  “I thank you for your testimony, Mr. O’Reilly,” Judge Webb said. “Now we just have to find a second witness.”

  “What?” William asked. “I thought Sam was the second. Didn’t you recognize him Sam?”

  “It wasn’t him. No one is more disappointed than I am. The man I seek is another son of Satan turncoat.” Sam wavered, trying to decide whether to tell the whole story. Then it all seemed to spill out of him in a foul torrent. “This traitor I’ve searched for all these years led the lobster-backs to our stash of war supplies at Concord. We saw their column coming. They marched five across and their lines went on further than we could see. We were just a small unit, so we hid behind a nearby cottage. The turncoat was at the head of their column, pointing to the storehouse. At that moment, his treacherous face burned into my memory. The British outnumbered us fifty-to-one, so my Captain ordered us to leave. I nearly disobeyed him, and if I’d know what was about to happen, I would have.

  “As we retreated, we started hearing explosions breaking out everywhere. It took us months to stock up those provisions and in one afternoon they destroyed all of it. The grenadiers threw one hundred barrels of flour into a millpond and took five hundred pounds of lead and powder. Gun carriages were set afire. But that wasn’t all they destroyed.”

  A sudden thin chill filled his heart. Sam hesitated, then despite his best efforts not to continue, more came pouring from him, like a swollen river surging out of its banks, rushing where it was forced to go, but didn’t belong. “Weeks later, I learned that during their attack they also burned the general store down, and a beautiful young woman got caught in it. No one could reach her—there were just too many flames and explosions. Her father, the store owner, tried hard but he could not save her. The poor man died trying to get to her as she burned alive right before his eyes.”

  Sam stared down at the ground, shaking his head, trying to regain control of the slight quiver in his voice. “I’ve often imagined her horrible
screams.”

  Opening his eyes, he came back to reality. The group stood in silence, the haunting echoes of a young woman’s terrible death cries nearly audible in the heavy air between them.

  Old pains clawed their way up within Sam. When they reached his heart, it clenched with his effort to keep them at bay. His whole body tightened, like a bow with its string drawn tight, ready to fire a lethal shot, as he remembered kneeling before a grieving mother. He had grasped the woman’s hands, moist with the tears she’d just wiped away as she mourned both her husband and child, and swore an oath to her. “I promised her mother that I would search for the traitor that led the British to their store and that I would never forget her daughter. I’ve kept both promises.”

  Why couldn’t Foley have been Frazier? It would have ended it all. It would have been so simple. But it wasn’t simple anymore. He wanted to scream with the suppressed anger amassing at the back of his throat. His hand squeezed the deer horn handle of his blade.

  He glanced at Bear, who understood the meaningfulness of his death grip on his knife. Bear’s expression twisted in fiery outrage and he started toward him, but Sam shook his head. He didn’t want Bear’s sympathy. He just wanted to kill.

  But the man he needed to kill wasn’t Foley. It was Frazier.

  “As much as I wanted Foley to be Frazier, he wasn’t. And I won’t bear false witness,” Sam hissed. “Foley is a vile human being that doesn’t deserve another breath, but he is not the man I sought all these years.”

  Bear stood there, tall and incensed, and they exchanged a long deep look. Bear understood.

  “Don’t worry Sam. I won’t let the son-of-a-bitch go,” the judge pronounced. “Tomorrow, Constable Mitchell and I will escort Foley to Logan’s Fort. Colonel John Byrd has militia from all over Kentucky, including Fort Boonesborough’s, mustered there right now. A good number of those men served in the Continental Army. Hopefully, there will be someone there who will recognize him and serve as our second witness. With luck, he’ll soon face hanging or a firing squad—both too good for the likes of him for damn sure. I wish I could give him the kind of punishment he deserves—being burned alive like that poor young woman.”

  “I imagine God has in mind that exact type of punishment,” Catherine spat, her eyes blazing and face flushed.

  The Judge and several others shook their heads in agreement.

  Foley wasn’t the one Sam sought, but he was a traitor. A damn traitor, just like Frazier. They were two of a kind.

  Sam couldn’t speak as he struggled for control. His breaths came faster. He turned and slowly stepped away from the others. He needed to be alone with his struggle. With the heartache that had sprung back to life despite his efforts to bury it.

  He checked the sharpness of his knife and replaced the pain with anger.

  It was easier to feel anger.

  Chapter 25

  Sam thrust his knife back into its sheath, picked up his rifle and powder horn, and marched towards his horse. If the law couldn’t do something about traitors, he could. He wouldn’t leave justice to luck as the Judge had suggested. If no one at Logan’s Fort recognized Foley as a traitor, the man would go free. Free to wander Kentucky murdering and raping.

  There was no way was he would let that happen.

  As the other men said their goodbyes, he tightened Alex’s cinch and untied the reins.

  Catherine put a hand on Sam’s back. “Sam, hold up. What’s wrong?” she asked quietly.

  Sam stopped but didn’t turn around.

  “Sam, you knew her, didn’t you? The young woman burned alive. You knew her well.”

  He turned quickly and faced her, fixing his eyes on hers with a hard stare. “I didn’t just know her, I loved her. She was the only woman I ever loved…until,” unsure of his true feelings, he stopped himself. He turned aside. “But she was stolen from me. I never had even one chance to hold her in my arms, but I’ve carried her around inside of me all these many years. I never stopped feeling the anguish of losing her—maybe because of how horrifically she died, or perhaps because I never had a chance to tell her that I wanted to marry her and that I loved her. And I never stopped loving that sweet girl. So instead of using my savings to buy her an engagement ring and to start a home, I used it to buy this knife. I’ve been looking for that traitor ever since, most of my life. Looking for retribution. I made a promise to myself never to forget her and never to love again until that man was dead.”

  “That promise explains a lot,” Catherine said.

  “Now, I’m wondering if I can keep that promise.” Guilt rippled up his spine until it reached the back of his head and surged through his mind. He was not a man to break a promise, especially one he made to himself.

  “If I can’t kill Frazier, then Foley will just have to do. They’re two of a kind anyway.” Even as he said it, Sam doubted that he could kill Foley in cold blood. Foley would have to give him a reason to.

  “Sam, the past is the one thing even you can’t fight. You cannot change the beginning of your life, but you can change the ending. The only way to stop the hurt is to love again. You’ve tortured yourself with that ill-gotten promise long enough. She’s gone. You can’t go on living with only that deep hatred and the past in your heart. As you said, you need to truly live.”

  “If I stop, I’d be turning my back on her and disavowing the promise I made to myself.”

  “If you don’t stop, I promise you something—you’ll never really live again, much less love.”

  Unnerved, Sam crossed his arms and pointedly looked away.

  “You’re afraid to love again, because the last time you did, it brought you only terrible unending pain.”

  Her accusing tone stabbed the air between them. “I’m not afraid of anything.”

  “You thought you had to be the bravest man every place you went because you were protecting your heart. You were terrified that your heart would be wounded again.”

  “I’m not afraid of anything,” he repeated. It was a lie.

  He knew no fear, except the fear of her love.

  “Prove it.”

  Her passionate challenge went too far. He stared at her for a moment. “No. I don’t have to prove anything. What I have to do is end these feelings I have for you. I’m sorry.” He felt himself receding into a past only he understood, unable to part with it. He gripped the saddle horn with his left hand, but then he hesitated for just a moment. He did want his life back—to rid himself of a past that held him hostage. That was why he came to Kentucky to begin with.

  Catherine quickly stepped between the stirrup and Sam. “I won’t let you end those feelings,” she said, forcefully. She looked up at him with love on her face and resolve in her fiery eyes.

  She wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned her head gently against his chest.

  Sam’s heart thundered within his breast, and he felt her heart reach out to calm his.

  She placed a gentle kiss on his chest. The intimate gesture nearly overwhelmed him.

  She gazed up into his eyes and whispered, “I love you.”

  Sam’s hand left the saddle horn. Had he heard her right? Slowly, tentatively, he put his hands on her. Something he had done only once before, and then it had scared him as nothing else had before.

  Now, as he physically touched her, felt the reality of her, it seemed possible that she really could love him. And he could love her back. He ran his hands slowly down her back. He wanted her to fill the terrible emptiness in him, push the pain away, smother the embers of old anger. Next to her, he could almost physically feel the healing beginning.

  But then his stubborn mind threw up a familiar wall of doubt.

  “You can’t possibly love an old warrior like me.” He wanted desperately to confirm this miracle, to let her affection feed his hungry soul.

  But he couldn’t.

  “I do love you, Sam. I promise I will make you happy. And I trust you. Please trust me.”

  Sam jerked hi
s hands away from her body and tightly gripped the reins instead. “I trust you. I just can’t love you. Not yet.”

  “Yes, yes,” she whispered. “Yes, you can. I can show you how to love again.” She ran her fingers over the dark stubble on his cheek.

  As he studied her face, Sam felt near tears for the first time in many years. His eyes begged her for the truth while his mind denied what she just said. He simply could not believe a gentlewoman like Catherine, so refined, could want him. “You don’t know what it’s like on the frontier. It’s a long way from the easy life you knew in Boston, and I don’t mean in miles. You have no business here. A woman as fine as you should go back to that way of life. Marry someone with wealth and prestige.” Even as he said it, he wished he hadn’t.

  “I’ve learned what it’s like on the frontier and I know it won’t be easy. But every day I’m learning more and more about how to cope with it. If I go back, I won’t be allowed to marry for love. My father will force me to marry someone to further his own fortune. And that husband will expect me to be the dutiful wife and the perfect society woman. Do you want that for me, Sam?”

  “No.” Marrying another man was the last thing he wanted her to do.

  “Neither do I. That’s not me and never will be. We both lost our old lives, Sam. But we’re young, on a new frontier. So let’s leave those lives behind us. Put aside old wrongs and your old love. I haven’t fallen for an old warrior. I’m in love with you—a man with a brave strong heart.”

  “But I am a warrior Catherine. That’s me and it always will be.”

  And, he realized, the hardest battle he would ever fight might be this one—the one with his own heart.

  “Sam, it’s time for you to lay your armor down. Let yourself be vulnerable for once in your life. Open yourself up to love.”