Comanche Rose (18 page)

A prolonged silence descended as he turned his full attention to the road, leaving her to her own thoughts. The tightness of his grip, the lean hardness of body had startled her. Because of his obviously painful limp, because he'd been so sick earlier, she hadn't thought of him as a strong man. But he was, and if he hadn't caught her, she'd have been thrown from her seat. Sitting back, she rubbed her arm where his fingers had dug in. She was going to have a bruise. She knew, because Two Trees had given her a lot of them.

Forcing her mind away from that, she kept her eyes on the mountains, telling herself they were pretty, wondering what they were called. Just as she was about to ask, he suddenly spoke.

"You know, it'd be a whole lot easier if you'd just call me Hap. Everybody else does, and we're going to be spending a lot of time in this wagon. No sense wasting words, is there?"

"It seems rather personal—rather forward for just an acquaintance, doesn't it?"

"Any more so than if I was to call you Annie?"

"I guess not."

"Besides, I reckon we'll be friends by the time we get there. Otherwise, it'll be a damned long trip."

"I hadn't thought of it like that. Hap," she said, trying it out. "It's rather unusual, isn't it?"

"Yeah. It's not really my name, but I've had it for so long that I don't answer to much else. Comes from being the youngest, I guess. All five of us were boys, and Ma went through the whole roll every time she wanted one of us. When I was little, I wasn't sure if I was Marcus or Julius or Antony or Claudius or Horace."

"Those sound like Roman names."

"Yeah. She was a schoolteacher—came out here from Tennessee. She liked those Romans a whole lot. Anyway, I didn't complain much as a kid, so she was always saying to folks, 'Look at him, he's such a happy little fellow.' It got to where my brothers started calling me Happy, and it stuck. Finally, it just got shorted to Hap."

"So which one were you?" she asked curiously.

"My real name?"

"Yes."

"Like I said, I only answered to Hap," he responded, grinning. "I wasn't nearly as crazy about the Romans as she was."

"Do you keep in touch with the others?"

"Kinda hard." He sobered suddenly. "I'm the only one left."

"They're all dead?" she asked incredulously. "All of them?"

"Yeah. Jeff Davis wrote my ma, thanking her for giving four sons to the cause. I was the only one that came home. I kept the letter after she died. Every once in a while I get it out and read it, but it doesn't help much. I still miss all of them—and her, too. And my pa," he added hastily, "but he was gone a lot when I was growing up."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah. Maybe that's why I never worried much about dying." Embarrassed now, he turned the subject again. "You sure you're riding all right?"

"I'm fine. This is a whole lot better than a Comanche saddle, Captain."

"Hap," he reminded her. "Just Hap, Annie."

"Hadn't you better stop to stretch your leg?"

"No." Then, realizing maybe she had to answer a call of nature but was too embarrassed to mention it, he told her, "Look, any time you need to get down, just speak right up. I, uh, haven't traveled much with a woman, so I might not notice if you were getting uncomfortable—or anything like that. I don't know much about a woman's needs."

"I expect they're about the same as yours."

"But you'll tell me?"

"Yes."

"Good."

He let it go at that. She was a lot easier to talk to than he'd ever expected, and if he didn't watch himself, he'd be bending her ear all the way to the San Saba. And after everything that had happened to her, he didn't really figure she'd want to know all that much about any man.

CHAPTER 12

The afternoon of the second day out of Fort Sill, about ten or fifteen miles after they'd crossed the Red River without incident, the sky clouded over, and the temperature dropped. Still well above freezing, it was nevertheless a cause for concern. If the sky poured, and it looked like it would, the road could become impassable. Hap squinted up at the retreating sun, then at the flattening horizon. Riding behind a plodding team of oxen was too damned slow to suit him. If it was just him and Old Red, the weather wouldn't matter half as much.

He glanced over at Annie Bryce, who rested her head against the canvas support. Her eyes were closed, indicating she was asleep. He thought about waking her up and urging her to get inside, but he didn't. She didn't seem to like it much back there, and he couldn't blame her. It was too dark, too close, and the air smelled of the musty straw in the mattress. With the added redolence of oxen dung wafting backward into the wagon, where it couldn't escape, the atmosphere inside reminded him of a cow barn after a rain.

He had to admire her. As thin as she was, she obviously tired easily, but she never complained. It was he who always stopped for everything—to eat, to walk, to rest, to relieve himself, to sleep. Then she'd busy herself fixing food or whatever he needed before she walked behind the wagon to take care of her own business. Last night she'd helped him unyoke the animals, feed and water them, then tie them out to graze. And when the wolves got too close, spooking the oxen, she'd crawled out of her bed in the back and covered him with the Henry while he brought the team nearer to the wagon. She was pulling her share like a man, something a body wouldn't expect from looking at her.

Only she wasn't a man. She was a damned pretty woman, and it wasn't easy to ignore that, no matter how much he was trying. If he'd met her under different conditions, if he hadn't known her circumstances—and if she hadn't made it real plain that she never wanted to think about a man again—he might have entertained a notion of flirting a little with her. At least that way he could tell himself he was forgetting Amanda.

But right now the last thing Annie Bryce needed was a half-crippled man hanging after her. And the last thing he needed was a woman afraid of being touched again. As open as she was about so many things, she was pretty closed about that. He could still feel her slender body within the circle of his arm, and he remembered how quickly she'd sat up when the danger passed. And the way she'd tensed when his hand brushed hers on the seat. She didn't have to say anything. He knew as long as there was no gender between them, she'd be all right. But if he ever crossed that line and became a man to her, she'd either fight or run.

He could smell the rain in the air now. Yeah, it was about ready to hit, all right. He nudged her with his elbow.

"Better get in back before you get wet," he told her.

"Huh?" She sat up, rubbing her eyes. "I'm sorry, I must've dozed off."

"Yeah. Reckon you needed it what with the wolves and coyotes keeping you awake last night."

"It wasn't that. I was awake anyway."

"Straw's pretty hard when it gets packed down. Guess I should have tried to get a feather mattress, but I didn't think of it."

"The mattress was fine, Hap. It was me—I couldn't sleep."

"Because you were going home?"

"Yes."

The first big drops of rain spattered the canvas. "Go on. Otherwise, you'll get wet," he urged her again. "You can't afford to take sick on the road."

"I won't. I never get sick. I've been tired, hungry, and scared sometimes, but never sick. I never even caught the measles when Susannah had them."

"Yeah, but you didn't weigh eighty pounds then."

"I'm over ninety now. I weighed myself on the grain scales at Fort Sill." Her mouth twisted wryly. "I'm not the one who was at death's door two weeks ago, you know. I just hadn't had much to eat for a while. You were the one with the fever," she reminded him.

"Yeah, well, it looks like it could come a gully washer, so I'd just as soon you got out of it. It'd be real nice if you'd just humor me."

Giving credence to his prediction, a lightning bolt shot through the sky, followed by a sharp crack of thunder. She stiffened, suddenly transfixed, while her stomach knotted, nearly making her sick. To control the wave of fear that coursed through her, she gripped the flat board seat with both hands so tightly that her knuckles went white.

"Go on. I—" He caught her stricken expression and stopped. "You all right?"

"Yes."

Her answer was so low he could scarce hear it. He nodded. "You're afraid of storms, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"I guess I understand that. Claude was like that—three years older 'n me, but whenever there was lightning and thunder, he'd crawl into bed with me and say he was there to keep me from being scared. Hell, as the youngest of five boys, I wasn't afraid of anything. But he was this big, strapping kid, and he didn't want any of us to think he was a coward. I'd try to sleep, but with every new roll of thunder, he'd get this stranglehold on me, making it damned near impossible."

As another bolt shot to earth, she winced, then closed her eyes. "I wasn't always like this," she whispered, swallowing.

He reached over with his free hand and disengaged her fingers from the seat. "Go back there and put the pillow over your head until the storm passes," he told her. "No sense sitting here watching it," he added gently.

"It's silly, isn't it?" she managed. "I'm thirty years old, not a child."

"No. Far as I know, Claude never got over it. I used to be crawling up a hill under fire, thinking about how he hated the thunder, wondering how he stood the cannons."

"I think if I could just get home—"

"Go on. When it's over, you'll be all right."

"All right." As she stood up and turned toward the opening in the canvas, she muttered under her breath, "I despise being weak."

"Here now, none of that, you hear? You're not weak, Annie. Hell, you're the strongest woman I ever met."

"No, I'm not."

A heavy roll of thunder shook the road beneath them, sending her diving into the depths of the dusty wagon. Scrambling onto the hard straw mattress, she pulled her blankets over her head, then turned on her side and rolled into a ball. Shaking all over, she tried to reason with herself. She wasn't lying in the mud, pinned down by Two Trees' body. And every fiber of her being wasn't crying out against what he did to her. She was in a wagon heading home, and Hap Walker was with her.

The worst of the storm had passed, followed by a light, steady rain, the kind that soaked in. Now there was a little respite, one that wasn't going to last. Before long, it'd be dark, but he didn't want to stop and make camp. He didn't want to wake up in the morning and find the road had turned to mire while he'd slept. Yet once night set in, it'd be too risky to travel. And he wasn't alone. He had Annie Bryce to consider. The way his own stomach was growling, she was probably starving.

Reluctantly, he pulled up, then called over his shoulder, "You awake back there?"

"Yes."

"Hungry?"

"Are you?"

"That's no answer. I asked about you, not me! Hell, I know I am!"

"I could eat." Crawling forward, she stuck her head through the opening. "It's too wet to make a fire."

"Yeah. There's beef jerky and salt bread in the sack, along with some dried apples I bought at the post store. That all right with you?"

"Yes," she answered without much enthusiasm.

"Guess you've eaten a lot of jerky, haven't you?"

"Quite a bit." That was perhaps the greatest understatement of her life, but she didn't want to hurt his feelings. "I don't really mind it."

"There's a couple of tins of something called Borden's Meat Biscuits. I picked them up while I was at it. Mind you, I've got no notion what the stuff tastes like, but it's got to be better than what we had in the war, because they're selling it."

"I can't say I've ever had any, but I'd be willing to try some. It'd be a change, anyway."

"You need to stop, don't you?"

"Don't you?" she countered.

"Damn. You can't ask for anything, can you?"

"Yes. I just don't want to cost you any time unless I have to. I figure I can last as long as you can, and then we'll only have to stop once," she explained practically. "You wouldn't like it if I was wanting to get down every mile or so, would you?"

"No. But it seems like I'm making all the choices."

"All right, then. I'm very hungry, I need to take a walk if you see any woods, and I'm cold. There, have I complained enough to suit you?"

"Barely."

"Well, if I said anything else, I'd be lying."

"That cottonwood stand look all right to you?" he asked abruptly.

"It's kind of sparse."

"You could go behind the wagon."

"Not this time."

"All right. Hold the reins."

He waited until she climbed onto the seat beside him before transferring the traces to her hands. Jumping down, he headed toward the group of naked trees, then stood behind one, his back to her. Uncomfortable with this reminder that he was a man, she turned her head and studied the white line of light beneath the low-hanging clouds. The sun was almost gone, so they'd have to make camp. Her gaze took in the flat area, the slope of a hill coming down, and she felt uneasy.

"Your turn," he said, climbing up beside her again. "Better hold up your skirt, because it's muddy as hell over there."

"At least it's too cold for snakes."

"Yeah. While you're gone, I'll get out my knife and open one of those tins. I was told you didn't have to heat the stuff, so that ought to make it easy enough. We ought to be done with supper before the rain starts in again."

"Are we going to camp here for the night?"

He looked around, then shook his head. "Too open— there's no cover. If a Comanche were to come over the hill, it'd be too late by the time I saw him. I reckon we'll eat and then try to find a better place."

Her relief was obvious. "That's what I thought."

"Why didn't you say something?"

"I just did."

"No, you just asked." As she gingerly reached the ground, he looked down at her. "I'm not a man that needs to be cottoned to, Annie. You need to say something, say it. I put on my pants one leg at a time, just like everybody else. You've got nothing to be afraid of with me. I'm no damned Comanche."