Comanche Moon (33 page)

He shifted on his stallion to look back at the band of warriors who rode with him. Their horses were so weary, their heads hung. The men slouched, exhaustion weighing on their shoulders. Hunter had set a grueling pace these last few days, and it was beginning to tell.

‘‘Santos is here somewhere,’’ he told Old Man. ‘‘The horse dung is fresh, and this area of grass is a darker yellow from being trampled. They’ve been grazing their animals here.’’

‘‘So why are you stopping?’’

‘‘We will rest a while.’’

Cha-na, Hog, drew his horse up beside Old Man’s. He scanned the ground quickly, his dark eyes sharp and assessing. ‘‘Why rest now? We’re almost upon them.’’

‘‘One more night will make little difference,’’ Hunter replied. ‘‘If there’s trouble, we should be refreshed.’’

Old Man snorted. ‘‘You have pushed like a crazy man to get here, and now you worry about tiring us? I’m not afraid of a few Comancheros. I could take on ten of them by myself. Let’s get the girl. Then we will rest, eh?’’

Hunter gazed at the horizon for a moment. Loretta’s voice kept whispering to him.
Even in my sleep I dream about what could be happening to her, hear her calling for me. I try to find her, and I can’t.

Hunter wasn’t sure why finding Amy had become so important to him, and he didn’t care to analyze his feelings. Was his aim to cement a bargain with a woman he had already bought? Why must he pay twice to possess her? Was her happiness so important to him that he was willing to risk his life and those of his friends to chase the shadows from her eyes? The questions were unanswerable. And troubling.

It was bad enough that his friends sensed his urgency. They must think him
boisa,
becoming so obsessed over a
tosi
child.

‘‘
Mea-dro,
let’s go,’’ Hog pressed.

Hunter set his jaw. He had made good choices when he had asked these men to ride with him. Not only were they loyal friends, but they asked no questions. ‘‘All right, we’ll keep going,’’ he agreed. ‘‘But on the way home, we’ll take it slower.’’

Hog scowled. ‘‘We may have no choice. The yellow-hair will be in poor shape after being with Santos all this time.’’

Hunter’s guts knotted. He just hoped the child was still alive.

An hour later the group of Comanches crested a swell that looked down on Santos’s camp, situated near an underground spring. The three supply wagons, parked in a half-circle on the west side, blocked the glare of the setting sun.

The Comancheros lay about in the scant patches of shade. Their stench, combined with that of a rotting antelope carcass and fresh horse dung, drifted on the breeze. An unnatural stillness fell over them when they spied the Comanches. One man, who had been scratching his crotch, froze with his hand clamped to his groin. Another had the short butt of a cigarette pressed to his lips. When the ember burned down to his fingers, he yelped and waved his arm. The sudden sound set the others into motion. They sprang to their feet, their voices carrying across the grassland as they yelled for their leader.

The thirty Comanches, shoulders erect, expressions stony, slowed their horses to walks. Hunter riveted his gaze to the third wagon on his right. Something blue and white hung from the rear wheel. As he rode closer he saw it was the girl, her thin arms lashed to the spokes, head hanging to her chest. All that remained of her blue dress was the tattered skirt. The gleam of white was her skin and the remnants of her muslin chemise.

Santos walked out to meet them, his right hand lifted, palm forward in greeting. Hunter advanced on him, his eyes glittering, his mouth set in a grim line.

‘‘Hi, hites,’’
Santos called, linking his forefingers in the sign of friendship. In Comanche he said, ‘‘It is good you come, my friend, El Lobo. I have many rifles and cartridges. And trinkets for your women.’’

Hunter did not make the sign of friendship in return. He saw Santos’s eyes widen on his painted face. ‘‘We do not come to trade. You have my yellow-hair’s sister.’’

The color washed from Santos’s swarthy features. ‘‘Your woman’s sister? No, not me. I am El Lobo’s good friend.’’

Hunter tightened his grip on the reins. As irrational as it was to be so upset over a yellow-hair he didn’t even know, he wanted to kill Santos. He had come to get Amy safely away, though, and he must do that first. ‘‘I have come for her.’’

‘‘I swear on my mother’s grave, El Lobo, I had no idea. This is a terrible thing.’’

Santos was doing an admirable job of acting remorseful. If it hadn’t been for his pallor, Hunter might have believed him. Hunter swung off his black. He glanced at Hog and Old Man. They knew he counted on them to guard his back. The Comancheros, their number about twenty, showed the proper respect and moved aside to let Hunter pass as he strode toward the third wagon. His chest tightened as he drew close enough to see the girl clearly.

Rage. It hit him like a well-placed blow to his diaphragm, cutting off his air. He knotted his hands into fists and missed a step, swallowing the roar of anger that tried to crawl up his throat. This was the spirited child who had confronted him with a rifle? Her thin white arms were peppered with black-and-blue marks where cruel fingers had dug into her flesh. Her chemise had been torn away, baring her chest, and through the curtains of her tangled gold hair, her small breasts protruded, swollen and purple. Her tattered skirt rode high, and he saw that the milky skin of her inner thighs was caked with blood and dried semen.

Hunter knelt on one knee, the toe of his moccasin nearly touching her bare foot. In the dust he could see that other men had knelt there. Many times, judging by the disturbed earth.

‘‘Aye-mee?’’ She didn’t stir. Hunter touched his hand to her hair, so like his woman’s. ‘‘Aye-mee, you will be awake. I have come to take you away.’’

With a suddenness that startled him, she jerked her head up. Her huge eyes filled with stark terror. Hunter stared into their blue depths, searching for sanity. He found none. She took one look at him and began to whimper, fighting against the rope that held her suspended from the wheel. A two-inch swath of bloody-raw flesh banded each of her wrists. This clearly wasn’t the first time she had awakened to find a man in front of her.

‘‘Aye-mee,’’ he whispered, trying to soothe her. ‘‘
Toquet,
it is well.’’

He started to untie one of her arms, but her screams stopped him, shrill and short, interspersed with shallow panting. She shrank against the wagon wheel, digging her heels into the dirt to put distance between them. He realized then that she thought he meant to rape her or kill her, perhaps both.

Hunter backed off and held up his hands so she could see he held no weapons. She glanced around wildly, as if she sought help. Tears welled in her eyes. When she looked at him again, her expression was one of complete despair.

Hunter kept his hands up. ‘‘Loh-rhett-ah sent me. To find you. Loh-rhett-ah, your sister who loves you.’’

For an instant her disoriented eyes seemed to focus on him. ‘‘Loretta?’’

Hunter nodded. ‘‘See into me, eh? You remember this Comanche’s face?’’

She stared at him, and for a moment he hoped she might trust him. Very slowly he reached again to untie her. The instant he moved, she panicked, screaming and throwing her head.

Hunter knew he must hurry. The sooner he got the girl away from here, the safer she would be. His own men wouldn’t make a move, but the uneasy Comancheros were another matter. If they sensed, even for a moment, that Hunter’s men might seek retribution for this foul deed, they would throw caution aside and start shooting.

Pulling his knife, which terrified Amy even more, Hunter swiftly cut the ropes that anchored her wrists. She dropped to the ground and curled into a ball, knees hugged to her chest, head tucked. When he touched her she jerked and whimpered.

Hunter had to pry her knees from her chest to lift her. She offered no resistance, just trembled when he swept her off the ground into his arms. Her head lolled against his shoulder. When he glanced down at her small face, his heart caught. She was sure enough Loretta’s face upon the water. The same small facial bones and sensitive mouth. The same hair. The same eyes, like large patches of summer sky.

Hunter walked toward his horse, looking neither right nor left, acutely aware of the Comancheros all around him. As gently as he could, he set Amy on the stallion’s back, then mounted behind her. She moaned and braced her hands on the horse’s shoulders. As carefully as he could, he helped her sit crosswise, supporting her back with the bend of his arm.

Santos came forward again. ‘‘El Lobo, you have my word, I did not know this woman was close to your heart. I would not have allowed them to touch her.’’

‘‘Woman?’’ Hunter hissed.

Santos shrugged one shoulder, his gaze darting nervously. ‘‘She is not the first young girl to be broken to ride. You have done the same, many times.’’

‘‘I make war on men.’’

Santos scrutinized the entire party of Comanches before he replied. ‘‘That is not true of you all.’’

‘‘This Comanche leaves one set of footprints,’’ Hunter said softly. ‘‘Others walk their own way.’’

Fastening his attention on the girl, Santos slipped into English. ‘‘I meant you no harm, leettle
muchacha.
’’ To Hunter he added, ‘‘I am your good friend, El Lobo. Thees ees the truth I speak.’’

With a snort of disgust, Hunter wheeled his horse and rode off. His men closed ranks behind him to defend his back. Amy huddled in Hunter’s lap, arms crisscrossed over her chest, eyes squeezed closed, teeth chattering. Hunter scanned her body. There were a couple of deep scratches on her legs that needed to be cleaned. He hoped that was the worst of it, that her insides were not torn as Willow’s had been.

He had promised his blue-eyes that he would bring her the child. He didn’t want to deliver a corpse.

An hour later, after the Comanches had stopped and made camp in a ravine, Hunter was no closer to discovering the extent of Amy’s injuries. Each time he tried to touch her, she became frantic. Now, with him sitting close by, she lay huddled on her side, knees drawn to her chest, arms shielding her head.

Memories washed over him, memories of Amy coming out alone to face an army of warriors, a rifle bigger than she was held to her shoulder. Amy, biting and kicking, when Swift Antelope tried to hold her on his horse.
Comanche heart.
Spirit like hers was hard to break. What pain she must have suffered that she had been reduced to this.

Hunter didn’t want to overpower her again. He should tend her injuries, and quickly, but some wounds ran deeper than the flesh. Gentleness was what she needed. From a woman’s hands.

There wasn’t a woman within a hundred miles.

Hunter called to Old Man and asked that he and the others move some distance away, so Amy would suffer less distress. After a few minutes, when all grew quiet around the two of them, Hunter crossed his ankles and sat beside her.

Very lightly he grasped her shoulder. She shrank from him and began to sob. He kept his hand on her, knowing that sooner or later she must accept his touch so he could find out how badly she was hurt. Her weeping reminded him of Willow, made him remember things best forgotten. The one thing he recalled more vividly than anything else about that distant night was his dying wife’s terror. She had clung to him, afraid of the darkness around them, panicking when anyone else got close to her.

Amy had no one to cling to. He could almost taste her fear. She needed to be held. And there was no one. No one but Hunter.

‘‘Aye-mee,’’ he whispered.

She shrank into herself, trying to escape his touch. Hunter ran his hand down her back, then up to her shoulder again. It looked as if there were fresh blood on her tattered skirt. He touched it to be sure. When his fingertips came away wet, fear chilled his skin.

‘‘Aye-mee? You have hurts. This Comanche must care for you. No harm. It is a promise I make for you.’’

He grasped her skirt and tried to lift it. She came up screaming and lashing out with her small fists. Hunter rocked back on his heels and raised his hands. She scrambled in the dirt to put some distance between them, then hunched forward over her knees, palms pressed to her lower belly.

‘‘Don’t touch me! Don’t
touch
me!’’

Hunter kept his hands raised, trying not to frighten her any more than he already had. ‘‘You have many hurts,’’ he said softly. ‘‘This Comanche is your good friend. I will help you.’’

A sob caught in her throat. She lifted her head and fastened swimming blue eyes on him—bruised, aching eyes. He could see she wanted, needed, to believe him. Her small mouth twisted. ‘‘F-friend?’’

Hunter started to lower his arms. She flinched and shielded her face, clearly afraid he meant to strike her. ‘‘Ah, Aye-mee, do not fear. I take you to Loh-rhett-ah, eh? It is good.’’

‘‘You’re lyin’! Loretta’s at home. She couldn’t have sent you. You’re tryin’ to trick me.’’

‘‘This Comanche makes no lies. Loh-rhett-ah waits for you—in my village. She came to me. She knew this Comanche could find you.’’ Hunter searched his memory for something that might convince Amy he spoke only truth. ‘‘She came with a black
sitchel
to carry her White Eyes ruffles.’’

‘‘A satchel?’’ Hope sprang to Amy’s eyes. ‘‘H-her black satchel? The one my ma gave her?’’

Hunter nodded. ‘‘
Huh,
yes, a black satchel. Her dress, it was blue, with small snakes and pink prairie flowers. Much
wannup,
eh? Many white skirts and breeches beneath.’’

‘‘Her blue calico,’’ Amy whispered.

‘‘Ah, yes? Callee-cho. My eyes could not see this if she did not come to me. This is sure enough the way of it.’’

‘‘Th-then why did you stop here? Why aren’t you taking me to her?’’

‘‘You have many hurts.’’

Tense and ready to bolt, she watched him as he slowly lowered his hands to his knees.