Kid Calhoun (40 page)

How long ago had the chain of events been set in motion that had resulted in the loss of her son? Had there ever been a way she could have escaped it? If she hadn’t met Sam? If she hadn’t married him? If she hadn’t moved to New Mexico? If Sam hadn’t taken Jeff with him that long-ago day?

She would never know. It hardly mattered. She had to accept what she couldn’t change, or she would go mad with sorrow. Jeff must have some fond memories
of her, or he wouldn’t have undertaken this journey. She would have to be satisfied with that crumb, because she simply wasn’t going to get the whole loaf.

It was hard to say who was more surprised when the front door of the ranch house at Window Rock opened and Claire found herself staring at a very pregnant woman.

“How did you get here?” Anabeth asked Claire. “Is Wolf with you?”

Claire looked for Jeffrey in the darkness that had fallen, but her son—no, the Apache White Eagle—had already gone. “It’s a long story. May I come inside?”

“Of course. Jake!” she called. “It’s Claire!”

Jake came on the run and scooped his sister up into his arms, exuberantly swinging her around in a circle. “I can’t believe it! How did you get here?”

As soon as Jake set Claire down he knew something awful had happened. Her golden eyes welled with tears that spilled over as she choked out, “Wolf is dead. Killed by soldiers. They attacked at dawn. They shot him … shot him in the head …”

Jake lifted Claire into his arms as she collapsed and carried her to the bedroom she had shared with Sam—the bedroom he had been sharing with Anabeth over the long winter months. Jake sat down beside Claire and saw the ravages of grief on her face in the shadows of light thrown by the lantern beside the bed.

Jake brushed several wayward strands of hair from her face. It was all he could think to do. How could he comfort her? He had hated the Apache for taking Claire away. But he hadn’t wanted Wolf dead this way. Jake wanted to ease Claire’s pain, but he didn’t know what to say, what to do.

He turned to Anabeth and asked, “How did she get here? Did someone bring her?”

“I don’t know,” Anabeth said.

Jake put a hand on Claire’s shoulder. “Claire?”

She had curled up in a fetal ball, shutting him out, shutting out the world.

“Stay with her,” Jake said. “I want to take a look outside.”

Jake found tracks from two unshod ponies. Someone had come with Claire, someone lighter than her from the looks of the hoofprints. Whoever it was had gone away again, taking the second horse with him.

When Jake went looking for Claire again he discovered that she had moved into Jeff’s bedroom. She lay on the bed, her face hidden against a pillow that muffled her sobs. She had curled back into that fetal position again, her knees drawn up to her chest.

Anabeth was sitting beside Claire, her hand on Claire’s shoulder. She looked up at Jake with tears in her eyes. “She’s hurting so badly. Isn’t there something we can do?”

He shook his head helplessly.

Anabeth held out a hand to him, and he took it and sat down beside her on the small bed. When Claire moved toward Jake, he pulled her up onto his lap. He slipped his free arm around Anabeth and pulled her tight against him. He sat there for a long time with an arm around each woman, holding them close.

Jake tried to imagine how he would feel if Anabeth had been killed, and knew he wouldn’t be able to bear it. Death was so final. It took away second chances. He pulled Claire tighter against him, wanting to take her pain and bear it himself.

Anabeth had a lump in her throat so big it was choking her. How awful to have the one you love torn from you by tragedy! How much worse to willingly leave a loved one behind. Anabeth had been waiting for spring to come so she could leave Jake and go back to the valley. She saw now she could never do it. Life would be too empty without him.

She lifted her head from Jake’s shoulder and looked up to find his eyes somber, his features strained. She leaned over and kissed his mouth. Then she took a deep breath, let it out and said, “I love you, Jake.”

He released a shuddering breath. Did he dare believe her? Did he dare speak the words back to her? Would she stay with him if he did? Jake pulled her close. But said nothing.

Eventually Claire’s sobs slowed and finally stopped. She was quiet for a long time on Jake’s lap. At last her hand came up and she played with the flannel at the neck of his shirt. “Jake?”

“Yes, Claire?”

“Jeff brought me home.”

“Why didn’t he stay?”

“He prefers the life of an Apache.”

Jake tightened his hold. “I’m so sorry, Claire.”

Her eyes welled with tears, but she was smiling. “He’s happy, Jake. More than I ever could have imagined.”

“So you’re giving him up?”

“My son died the day he was taken by Apaches. I met an Apache boy named White Eagle who looked a lot like him.”

There was nothing Jake could say to comfort her.

“At least I have something of Wolf left to me,” Claire said.

“What is that?”

“His child.”

“You’re pregnant?” Anabeth blurted.

Claire’s lips tilted upward in a secret smile. “The baby will be born in the fall.” The smile disappeared as she continued, “I never had a chance to tell Wolf he was going to be a father.” Her voice was a mere whisper when she said, “He died without knowing.”

Over the next several days Claire stayed in Jeff’s
room. She didn’t say much, but she didn’t cry much either. Jake and Anabeth clung to each other, sobered by Claire’s tragedy into realizing what they had each been about to lose.

When they came together that first night after Anabeth had told Jake she loved him, Jake felt unaccountably shy about facing her. He tucked her head under his chin to keep from having to look her in the eye. Anabeth was willing enough to hide her face in his broad shoulder.

“I should have said it sooner,” Anabeth said in a rush. “That I love you, I mean. I’ve felt it for a long time.”

“I wish I could believe everything will work out all right,” Jake confessed in a quiet voice.

“But you don’t?”

“I’m starting to. I know I don’t want to lose you, Kid.” He paused and said, “I love you, too.”

“You aren’t just saying that because I did? Or because of the baby, are you, Jake?”

He shook his head. “The baby has nothing to do with how I feel about you.” Jake put his hand on her belly, which was round with their child. “I can’t promise what kind of father I’ll be. I worry sometimes that I won’t know what to do.”

“Me, too,” Anabeth said. “Other people always seem to manage somehow. So can we.”

“Sometimes people don’t do a very good job,” Jake said.

“Like your mother?”

“I’ve tried to understand why she did what she did. I don’t think I ever will.”

“She’s been dead a long time, Jake. Don’t you think it’s time you buried her once and for all? She can’t hurt you any more. And I never will.”

She turned her face up to him and said, “Tell me you love me, Jake. I want to hear it again and again.
And I’ll say the words to you as often as you want, so you’ll know I mean them, that I’ll never stop meaning them. I love you, Jake.”

He kissed her with all the tenderness he was feeling. “I love you, Kid.”

“I’m still wanted by the law, you know.”

“I haven’t forgotten.” But Jake had used the winter to think about that problem. And he had found, in his heart and mind, what he thought was the solution to it. “Actually, Kid Calhoun is the one wanted by the law,” he said. “The only person I see in this room is a beautiful woman named Anabeth.”

“Wat Rankin knows that Anabeth and the Kid are the same person, and Solano is out there somewhere, too.”

“I’ll deal with Wat Rankin and with Solano if it comes to that. Any more problems you need solved, Kid?”

“Just one. I have an ache. Right here.” Anabeth’s hand slid from her breasts, to her burgeoning belly, to the cleft between her thighs, so it wasn’t quite clear exactly where the ache might be.

Jake was happy to ease it no matter where it was.

He started by brushing a tendril of hair from Anabeth’s brow. He treated her as though she were fragile enough to break, removing her clothing one piece at a time, increasing the tension between them as he exposed her no-longer-slender body to his gaze.

“You are so beautiful,” Jake murmured as he caressed her rounded belly.

“You make me feel beautiful, Jake.”

He suckled her as their child would suckle and Anabeth felt her body tighten with pleasure. He kissed his way down across her belly to the nest of curls below. When he kissed her there, Anabeth nearly came off the bed.

“Jake! What are you doing?”

“Loving you. Kissing you.”

His lips and tongue touched her in intimate ways that sent frissons of pleasure through her. A low groan escaped from her throat. He lifted her up to his mouth and loved her until she was shivering with passion, until her body tightened like a bowstring and then erupted in a series of shuddering releases.

“Jake!” she cried. “Jake, I want …”

“What do you want, Kid?” he murmured.

“I want you.”

He kissed his way up her body. When he finally reached her mouth she could taste herself on his lips. “I love you, Jake.”

Jake liked hearing the words. He had been slow and gentle undressing Anabeth, but he was all haste as he practically tore his own clothes off. When he was naked he spooned his body around Anabeth, and angled one of her legs back over his. Then he held her belly with both hands as he entered her from behind.

Anabeth leaned back into Jake’s body, anxious because the only part of him she could reach was his thighs. She found the crease along his inner thigh and had the satisfaction of hearing Jake gasp.

Jake’s hands roamed her body, stroking her breasts, her belly, and finally the tiny nubbin hidden in the crisp hair at the apex of her thighs.

Anabeth felt the tension building as Jake slowly, gently thrust inside her. The breath wedged in her throat as she tried to tell him how much she liked what he was doing.

His mouth found her nape and bit her, then soothed the hurt with his lips and tongue. Her ears also got their share of attention, as he teased the lobe with his teeth. His moist breath in her ear sent shivers down her spine.

Her shuddering release caught her by surprise. Her
whole body tightened and she heard Jake’s cry as he climaxed within her.

Jake stayed inside her. Anabeth relaxed against him, feeling the strength of his sweat-slick body, secure in the knowledge that she loved him and he loved her and that now they would be able to live happily ever after.

Only things have a way of turning out differently from the way people plan. As Claire had learned. As Jake and Anabeth would find out all too soon.

“Claire and I are going on a picnic,” Anabeth announced one morning a few days later.

“Fine. As long as you have it on the front porch,” Jake said.

“I thought we’d go down to the willow by the stream.”

“It’s not safe.”

“Why don’t you come along and keep an eye on us?” Anabeth asked. She gave him a come-hither look from beneath lowered lashes.

“I’ve got too much work to do.”

“Then send someone else to watch over us,” Anabeth insisted.

“Please, Jake,” Claire said.

Jake looked from Anabeth to Claire and back again. “All right. I can’t fight both of you.”

“Thanks, Jake!” Anabeth gave him a quick hug. “Blackie will be along to warn us if Rankin comes around.”

When Anabeth would have let him go, Jake held on and hugged her back. “Take care of yourself,” he murmured in her ear. “Watch out for Rankin.”

Anabeth and Claire walked, carrying the picnic
basket between them. Dog padded along behind Anabeth.

“I can’t believe the difference in that black dog from the first time I saw him,” Claire said. “Or the difference in Jake,” she added.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“They were both … alone. Now they’re not.”

“So was I,” Anabeth said in a quiet voice. “Now I’m not.”

The willow already had spring leaves, and once the two of them ducked inside the canopy of branches they were virtually invisible to the outside world.

“I had forgotten how wonderful this is!” Claire said.

Anabeth settled on the ground, and Dog quickly found a comfortable spot and curled up beside her. “This is my favorite place on Window Rock,” she said.

“Jeff used to come here,” Claire said. “After the Apaches took him, I never came back.”

“How is Jeff, really?”

“He’s fine, really. I just wish …”

Dog stood and stared out beyond the canopy of leaves. His neck fur hackled. A low rumble began in his throat.

Anabeth and Claire exchanged glances. Someone was out there.

“It’s Rankin,” Anabeth mouthed. “I’d bet on it.”

“What do we do?” Claire whispered.

Anabeth put a hand on Dog’s neck. She knew he would attack if she didn’t hold on to him. And this time Rankin would kill him.

Anabeth leaned over to whisper in Claire’s ear. “Here’s what we’re going to do.…”

Jake shielded his eyes and looked down the valley. He could swear he saw a black dot moving down
there. Dog? Why was Dog coming back alone? Where was the woman he normally shadowed.
Where was Anabeth?