Mountain Rose (17 page)

The eastern sky was just flushing pink when Chase came awake. Although his body was still languorously relaxed from the extraordinary love-making a few hours back, his inertia did not extend to his brain. Upon opening his eyes, the niggling question that had kept him awake half the night returned in full force.

What in the hell was he going to do about Raegan?

He had to do something, he knew, and do it fast. Even now, just thinking about her brought a stirring in his loins. He flung an arm across his eyes. Should he take her to some large city and enroll her in one of those fancy boarding schools where she would be taught all the social graces he'd heard of, be prepared to meet an affluent husband? A city-bred man would be more apt to overlook the fact that he wasn't the first with her.

And certainly she'd have no problem attracting a man. She had the beauty, the natural well-bred quality that would draw the gentry to her. Even in her faded old dresses and usually bare feet, she looked like a queen as she moved about the cabin doing the things that occupied a woman's time.

Chase suddenly found himself thinking of reasons why Raegan shouldn't go away. She would be miserably unhappy, taken away from an environment she knew and loved. It would be like caging a wild animal, settling her in a place where the houses were crammed together, where streets teemed with carriages and noises, people coming and going, jostling each other. The sparkling light would leave her beautiful eyes, leaving them dull with unhappiness.

He sat up in bed and swung his feet to the floor, reaching for his clothes. There must be a solution to this dilemma he found himself in and he intended to search it out.

Raegan awakened in the first gray dawn after a restless night filled with unanswered questions. She rose, washed her face, then sponged away Chase's scent from her body. She walked quietly down the hall, grimacing at the tenderness between her legs.

She was still in a grip of sick anger as she entered the kitchen, and her whole body burned with shame. In her surrender to Chase's love-making, she had allowed herself to become like all the other women he had lain with. As she laid a fire in the range and put on a pot of coffee, she was careful not to make any noise. She didn't want to awaken Chase and Jamie. She wasn't ready to face either of them yet.

When the coffee began to simmer and fill the kitchen with its aroma, Raegan pulled it to the back of the stove and walked out onto the back porch. As she gazed down the valley, where stands of tall spruce stood dimly in the night-like shadows, her thoughts were still on Chase. She had been so sure last night that he returned her love. The gentle way he had held her, the whispered endearments. True, he hadn't spoken the word love, but his every action had said it. . . and she had believed it then.

Recalling the pleasure he had given her, the lower half of her body tingled. She blinked back sudden tears. Their love-making hadn't affected Chase as it had her. To him it had been just another release of his loins, all passion for her forgotten once it was over.

The sky continued to lighten as Raegan stood on, only vaguely aware of Lobo bounding through the thick gray fog, coming to throw himself at feet.

She finally became aware of the cool morning air, and shivering, she turned and walked back into the kitchen.

Raegan came to an abrupt stop in the doorway. Chase stood at the stove, pouring himself a cup of coffee. He brought the steaming cup to the table and sat down. When he reached for the sugar bowl sitting in the center of the table, he saw her standing there.

He gazed at her for a long moment, no emotion showing in his eyes. He stood up after a moment as she made no move to enter the kitchen and walked to the stove and picked up the coffee pot. Pouring another cup of coffee, he placed it on the table and sat back down. "Come sit down, Raegan," he said, "we must talk."

Raegan reluctantly took a seat across from him, an angry defiance in her eyes. "I don't know what we could talk about. You made yourself perfectly clear last night. I got your message clear enough, and you can bet I'll never come near your bed again."

"I wish you wouldn't take that attitude about what I said last night," Chase said in a low, regretful voice. "Surely you can see it wasn't right, you bein'—"

With a dark, scathing look Raegan finished his sentence. "Anne's daughter! That's a damn poor excuse and you know it. Why don't you be honest and admit that you found me lacking as your bed partner, that I fell short of what you're used to."

Her voice had risen with her anger, her last charge almost yelled at him. Chase looked nervously toward the hall. Had Jamie heard? He turned back to face the green eyes that shot sparks at him. "Look, Raegan." He lowered his voice to a near whisper, hoping she would do the same, "that's not true. I have never before found such complete satisfaction as I did with you last night. But—"

"But nothing, Chase Donlin," Raegan cried. "Why don't you just take your lying words and get the hell away from me. I'm sick to death of hearing them."

"Fine," Chase snapped, slamming down his cup and surging to his feet. "I wouldn't dream of makin' you sick." As he banged out the door, he didn't see the tears that sprang to Raegan's eyes.

Anger hastened his movements, and it took but a few minutes for Chase to toss the saddle on Sampson, then swing onto his back. He dug in his heels, sending the stallion into a gallop. As he headed in a northerly direction, the sun had burned off the morning mists except for the lingering, loosely twisted ropes of fog that hung over the Platte.

He saw nothing of this, though, as his mount moved farther and farther into the remote, unsettled wilderness. His thoughts were on Raegan and the quarrel they'd had. Which one of them was wrong in their thinking?

Surprisingly, as he spent more time with Raegan, the less she reminded him of Anne. It was still true that every time he looked at Raegan, it was like looking at her mother. But where Anne's demeanor had been gentle arid serene, Raegan was high-spirited, bursting with the lust for life. She had evidently inherited her fiery spirit from her father. He could not visualize his stepsister making the same wild, uninhibited love that her daughter had last night.

And another thing Chase remembered with surprise, although he hadn't noticed it at the time, was that he hadn't felt all that guilty about sleeping with Raegan. Her response to him in bed, the complete giving of herself to him, had

driven everything else from his mind.

He squirmed uncomfortably in the saddle. Just remembering those lusty hours spent with her caused him to get a very painful arousal. He gave a short, harsh laugh. Was he to go around in an erected state from now on?

"You don't have to," his inner conscience nudged him. "You can marry the girl. You've already taken her virginity, spoiled her for a marriage with a good man. Does she deserve to be married to a brute because of you, brutalized by him, given a baby every year?

"No!" Chase exclaimed out loud; the very thought of that happening twisted his gut into knots. Truthfully, he couldn't bear to think of even a good, decent man making love to Raegan.

"So?" He prodded himself, "What are you going to about it?"

Without thinking about it, Chase answered promptly, "I'm going to marry her myself."

"But will she have you? She was awfully riled with you this morning."

"She'll have me. All I have to do is point out to her that I might have planted my seed inside her."

"What if she says that you should wait and see?"

Chase smiled a self-satisfied grin. He knew how to handle that. Raegan was very receptive to his kisses and caresses. She'd come into his arms, surrender her body to him again, and he'd make such lingering love to her that she'd be unable to live without him. She would need his hard

strength the way she needed food and water.

"Don't feel so smug," the little voice jeered. "You can get caught in the same trap. She can become an unbreakable habit with you too."

Chase's face became sober and thoughtful. Was the word
become
the right word? Wasn't she already a very vital necessity to his being? A realization, like a hard fist to the stomach, came to Chase. He loved Reagan O'Keefe, and more then anything else in the world he wanted her for his wife. Suddenly he couldn't wait to get home and make that lovely girl his for all time.

Glancing westward, he noted that the sun would set in less than half an hour. He might as well make camp here and head for home tomorrow morning, he decided, steering Sampson beneath a large hardwood tree. He had dismounted and started to unsaddle, when his fingers froze on the belly cinch. A thin, reedy voice ordered, "Freeze, stranger."

Chase dropped his hands to his side and carefully turned his head. Standing a few feet away was an old man with a rifle pointed at his back. His face was brown and wrinkled like a piece of old leather, and he wore a drooping mustache.

The mustache stirred. "What'er you doin' up here in my neck of the woods?" the old man growled.

Chase started to turn around, then stopped at the sound of a trigger being cocked. "Look," he said impatiently, angered at himself for letting a man old enough to be his grandfather get the drop on him. "I didn't know anybody
owned
this region. I started out this mornin' lookin' for new territory to lay a new trapline and ended up here." It was none of the old man's business that his mind had been so occupied with a young, green-eyed woman he hadn't known where he was going.

"So you're a trapper, huh?" The voice wasn't quite as hostile now. "I kinda thought you was, but I wanted to make sure. Livin' up here alone, a man can't be too careful. You can turn around now."

Chase faced around carefully and stood quietly under the old man's close scrunity. When he seemed satisfied that no harm would be dealt him, he narrowed the space between them and stuck out a knobby hand.

"Will Daniels is my handle."

"Chase Donlin." Their hands met in a firm grip.

"I was gettin' ready to make camp," Chase said, "that is if you don't mind. I'll be leavin' first light in the mornin'."

"No need for you to sleep on the ground. I got a tolerable soft bed you can use."

When Chase looked undecided, the old man added, with an anxious note in his voice, "I'd be right pleased to talk to a white man for a change. I get mighty tired of palaverin' with Indians and listenin' to the youngin' chatterin'."

"You got a youngin'?" Chase couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice.

"Yeah, my grandchild. Orneriest little critter you'd ever come across."

Chase hid his grin. There was pride and love in old Daniels's complaint, despite the words he described the boy with. "I guess most young boys have a wild streak in them."

"Yes, that's true, but in this case we're talkin' bout a girl." His eyes took on a faraway look. "Can't blame her, though. I raised her like she was a boy. Poor youngin', ain't never owned a dress or anything fancy. I don't know anything about wimmen's frippery." After a moment, he added, "I figure it's just as well no one but the Indians knows she's a girl."

"How come they know her sex?"

"She's related to a bunch of them. Her mama was an Indian woman. A good decent woman. My son married her seventeen years ago and we all lived together in a sturdy litde cabin near here." The faded brown eyes clouded over. "Star was three months old when a couple men stopped at the cabin. I know there was two, cause I counted two sets of hoof prints when I returned home. They shot and killed my son, raped his wife, then slit her throat." His voice trembled. "That wasn't enough for the bastards, though. They set fire to the cabin, the baby inside it. I was out huntin' at the time, but thank God I arrived back in time to carry Star out.

"It's been me and her ever since."

Chase didn't know what to say to the sad-eyed man. Consoling words seemed so inadequate. "Were the men ever caught?" he asked instead.

"No, they got clean away, may they burn in hell someday."

Daniels gave his boney shoulders a shake, as though throwing off the sad memories. "It's gonna be dark before long. We'd better get goin', see

what Star has cooked for supper."

Leading Sampson, Chase followed along behind the old hill man who moved as silently as any Indian, and just as warily. He thought of the pain and frustration the old fellow must have suffered at losing his family and his home within a few minutes.

Would Jamie hang around the cabin to watch out for Raegan? he worried for the first time, visualizing the same thing happening to her as had happened to Daniels's daughter-in-law. The pain of such an event formed a knot in his stomach.

Of course Jamie wouldn't go off and leave her. He would enjoy having her to himself too much to do that. Besides, he knew the danger of the Tillamooks skulking around.

Nevertheless, he couldn't wait to get home. He had been a damn fool taking off the way he had without a word to Raegan. He mused on how his action had affected her. At first she had probably been hurt, but by now he knew she would be angry as hell. His lips curved ruefully. He most likely would find the door barred against him when he got back.

The path he and the old man were traveling was suddenly narrow and rock-filled, calling all of Chase's attention to where he stepped and to making sure Sampson didn't step on his heels. It was but a short time later that Daniels halted before the dark opening of a cave. It was so well camouflaged by brush and boulders that a person could walk past it a hundred times and never spot it.

"Wait here a minute," the old man said, then moved into the dark interior. A moment later, there came the scraping sound of something heavy being dragged against stone, then the flare of a struck match. A few seconds later, Daniels's shadow danced before him as he walked toward Chase, a lantern swinging from his hand.