The Savage Heart (16 page)

She stood still, waiting.

Mrs. Mulhaney went white and then scarlet. She hesitated, wiped her hands on her apron, muttered some more and then winced. “Miss Meredith, you have placed me in an unenviable position,” she said.

“How?” Tess wanted to know. “Have I done anything immoral?”

“Of course not,” the older woman said at once. “It is simply the notoriety…”

“My cousin is notorious,” Tess pointed out. “He often places himself in danger.”

“He is a man,” the landlady rejoined.

“Is a man more noble than a woman, more courageous, more valuable?”

The older woman was almost stammering by now. She grimaced. “But it is the reputation of my establishment—”

Tess held up a hand. “Say no more. I have friends with whom I can live. I will only ask that you give me until the morning to pack my things and move out.”

Mrs. Mulhaney winced. “Please, Miss Meredith, you must understand my position!”

“Certainly I do,” Tess replied. “And you may explain it
to God when we both pass on to our eternal reward. I'm sure that He will understand your lack of compassion for a sister falsely accused of a crime—just as He understood the crowd for demanding the release of Barabbas and condemning Christ for crimes of which He was innocent!”

On that note, leaving Mrs. Mulhaney openmouthed and Matt envious of her oratory, she stomped off up the staircase to her room and slammed the door behind her. There was hardly any reason for conformity now that she had burned her boats.

She took off her hat and cloak and sat down heavily in an armchair. She felt suddenly deflated—about to lose her home and the man she loved. All that had happened in one night—along with becoming a jailbird. A lesser woman would have bawled. Tess had no such intention. She could bear anything life threw at her.

 

M
RS
. M
ULHANEY
,
CONFRONTING
Matt, her face paper-pale and drawn, said, “I feel quite small.”

“So do I. Eloquent, isn't she?”

“And I am wrong to make her leave? For she is doing what she thinks is right, and I am punishing her for it.” She shook her head. “Oh, Mr. Davis, this modern world is not fit for women of my generation. I fear that I shall never cope with it. So many changes.” She shook her head again and lifted her worried eyes to Matt's. “No one else here knows of her arrest, after all, and she is a good and kind young lady. Will you speak to her for me, and say that
I ask her pardon humbly and hope that she will remain a tenant?”

Matt didn't want to say that. The tension between Tess and himself was reaching the breaking point. If he didn't move her out of his orbit quite soon, he was going to lose his head again. He couldn't reconcile his emotions with his reason, but, still, he wanted only what was best for Tess, regardless of whether it was best for him.

“Sir?” Mrs. Mulhaney persisted.

“I think that it might be a good idea for Tess to leave here,” he said, surprisingly solemn. “She plans to stay with a family of sisters who seem to have good character and at least some influence over her. She might fare better in the company of young women.”

The elderly woman hesitated, but only for a minute. “I would hate to have hard feelings with her.”

“I'll make sure that there are none,” he promised. “Everything will be well.”

She smiled wistfully. “Do you think so? I confess that I have never felt quite so bad over a decision. Thank you for your help, Mr. Davis.” She hesitated. “You will stay?”

“Of course,” he replied.

She smiled again, excused herself and went up to bed. So did Matt, but not to sleep. He sat in a chair by his bed and let his mind go back to the ex-soldier's cutting remarks.

Since he'd come east, he'd been spared most of the racial prejudice that his relatives suffered on reservations all over the Dakotas and Montana. He lived as a white man, was treated as a white man. By denying what he really was,
he'd escaped all the hardships of trying to live as an Indian in a white world. He'd been hiding here in Chicago since 1891. After his schooling he'd begun to play a game of make-believe, pretending to be something he wasn't. And for what? For wealth and prestige and influence, the things that Tess had once said would make it possible for him to stay here even as an Indian. Certainly the Indians who traveled with Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show had managed to live among whites. But, he wondered, did any of them aspire to white society, or were they content to be curiosities?

Tess had such faith in human nature, he thought cynically, and he had so little. He'd seen the worst of people, since his young manhood. Except for Tess and her father, he'd known little kindness from whites while he wore a breechclout and carried a bow and quiver of arrows. Tess knew him as he really was, as he had been. She'd never seemed to mind. In fact, she'd been proud of him. She still was, despite his own misgivings.

He felt uncomfortable, remembering how she liked to revere the past and the life they'd lived. She had no shame that her father worked among Indians. She had no shame that she adored Matt. She spoke Sioux without inhibition, and she had a temper and a wild, independent spirit that he admired.

She made him feel ashamed of the way he'd acted. He was afraid of the truth, but Tess wasn't. She had the courage of her convictions. She was utterly fearless, as she'd been tonight, leading a procession to the jail to protest the
arrest of an innocent woman. She walked the last mile for people she cared about…which encompassed most of the human race. It didn't really surprise him to realize that she'd have done the same thing for him, even if she hadn't loved him.

He got up finally and stripped to his drawers, loosing his black hair from its braid so that it fell down to his waist. He looked in the mirror above the dresser and glared at his reflection. With his hair down and stripped like this, his Indian heritage was so obvious as to be blatant. No one who saw him could ever mistake him for anything except what he was.

He groaned, hating himself. What had Tess said about mirrors? That she hated her face because it wasn't Sioux. He cursed his own doubts. It wasn't that he'd be unwilling to have the truth generally known. But eventually it would kill him to watch Tess react to the insults and the degradation of living with him if people knew what he was. She was strong now and she fought. How long, though, could a woman fight before she fell into despair? She was so bright and beautiful, so courageous. He hated to think of her spirit being crushed by one too many a cruel insult about her Indian husband. And for him to live on the reservation now, after he'd lived so long in Chicago, was unthinkable. He knew in his heart that regardless of the way things worked out, he could never again live as a Sioux.

He turned away from the mirror, thinking about tomorrow when Tess would leave and he wouldn't see her every
day. Dear God, how it would hurt to lose her. And, he admitted, he was going to worry about her, across town with her friends.

What if she made another enemy like Dennis Collier? She wouldn't be totally defenseless because he'd taught her to take care of herself. But he felt more protective of her than ever.

The soft knock on the door surprised him. He went to open it just a crack.

“Matt?”

Tess was standing there, her hair down, her robe pulled and held together at the neck of her silky gown.

He opened the door and glanced both ways, pulling her quickly inside. He shut the door and looked down at her narrowly.

“What do you want?” he asked shortly.

Her eyes caressed him, fascinated with his lean, hard body, with the way he looked with his hair loose and so long.

“You looked like that twelve years ago,” she recalled wistfully. “My eyes fed on you.”

His chin lifted. “What do you want?” he repeated tersely. Her rapt appraisal was making his body react, and he didn't want her to see it.

“I forgot to tell you about what I found out from Nan's sister,” she said.

He glared at her. “It couldn't have waited until tomorrow?”

“I won't be here tomorrow. Not long enough to talk, at least, and you mentioned an early meeting, didn't you?”

He nodded.

“I won't stay long.”

He hoped not. His body was aching. He motioned her into an armchair.

“Aren't you going to sit down?” she asked.

“Is it going to take that long?” he asked mockingly.

She sighed. “All right, I'll be brief.” She related the things Mrs. Greene had said about the prostitutes and her promise to try and find out the identity of those who went to Dennis's apartment.

Matt scowled. “No, that can't be so,” he said after a minute. “I've done some delving into Collier's nocturnal wanderings on my own. They were to opium dens, not brothels. And a man doesn't bring a prostitute to his own home, Tess.”

“Why not?” she demanded. “If he wanted to shame Nan, why not?”

“Because the apartment manager would have known, and he'd have been thrown out into the streets,” he replied. “Besides, a man with senses as dulled by opium as Collier's isn't capable with a woman.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that he can't be aroused in that state.”

“Oh.”

“You should know,” he persisted. “Your friend Bailey was under the influence of laudanum, wasn't he?”

“Yes, but I had no occasion to see the effects on him
in the sense you mean,” she said simply. “The only nude man I've ever seen is you.”

His black eyes slid over her face, her softly waving blond hair, her body in the clinging fabric. “Was there anything else you wanted to tell me?” he asked, his voice beginning to sound strained.

“Only that Edith Greene is very upset about her sister. It's heartwarming to see how much she cares for Nan. I never had siblings.”

“I remember.”

Her pale eyes went over him like hands. The aching hunger in them was as visible as her heartbeat. She got to her feet, trying not to give away her feelings. “I'll go back to my room now,” she said huskily. “I didn't mean to disturb you when you were ready for bed.”

“I'm not,” he said curtly. “I don't wear anything to bed.”

“Oh.”

The silence in the room was thick with tension. She looked at him and couldn't look away.

“Do you have any idea how dangerous this is?” he asked roughly.

She couldn't get words out. She nodded.

“I want your eyes on me. God help me, I want nothing in the world more!” he said tersely.

As he spoke, his hands went to the fastening of his drawers. He slipped it and let them fall to the floor. He was aroused and exquisitely made, so beautiful a physical specimen. Tess audibly caught her breath as she looked at him openly.

He let out the breath he had been holding. He went to the bed and stretched out on the cover, his hair splayed out around him, his body rigid, trembling faintly with desire.

She moved to the side of the bed, her eyes like saucers, hesitant and hungry all at once. “What do you want me to do?” she asked.

His head turned, and his black eyes glittered up into hers. “Anything you want to do.”

Her hands shook. She let her robe fall to the floor, and her hands were on the straps of her gown.

“Anything except that.”

She swallowed, shivering. “Don't you want to see me?”

His jaw tautened. “With all my heart. But it's too dangerous.”

“Please.” She slid the straps down, holding his eyes. “Please. Let me. I want to, so badly!”

He grimaced, but he didn't speak as she let the fabric slither down her slender body, revealing every secret of its contours to him.

He closed his eyes for an instant and shuddered.

“I'll die if this is all I can have,” she managed to say in a tortured voice.

He sighed in sheer, sweet defeat. “So will I.” He held out his arms.

She went to him, trembling as he drew her down with him and turned, pulling her nude body completely against him with her legs tangling in his, the evidence of his desire pressing hot and swollen against her belly.

“Oh, Lord.” She groaned as he rolled over with her
and over again, their bodies touching intimately, sliding together and apart, the glory of skin against skin holding them spellbound. All the lights were on, and she wasn't embarrassed. He was gloriously formed, and she loved the sight of him.

He lifted himself a little away from her and looked for a long time before he bent to her breasts. Even then he was slow and tender, every movement a whisper of pleasure.

Her body moved against him, blindly searching for what he'd given her before, there on the beach. He obliged her in tender, breathlessly invasive ways, his lips traveling from her breasts over her soft belly to sensitive spots inside her thighs. And all the while she whimpered, a fist against her lips to keep from crying out her pleasure in the stillness of the night.

His long hair fell around her like a black cloud as his mouth worked its way back up to her swollen mouth and possessed it. One long, muscular leg slid between both of hers. While he kissed her, he pleasured her with his expert fingers, teasing and probing and exploring until she arched up against them and let him fulfill her in a firestorm of ecstasy.

And even that wasn't enough. Her tormented eyes looked into his as he brought her hand to his body and guided its slow, trembling strokes.

“There must…be a way,” she whimpered. “Oh, God, I want you. I want all of you, inside my body!”

“Tess!”

She was under him, against him. He had no willpower,
no strength to resist her. She moved between his legs while he looked at her in anguish, too enthralled to stop her.

Her body lifted. She tugged at his hard thighs, guiding him, softly pleading with her eyes and her lips.