Ride the Fire (3 page)

Criminals flocked to the frontier, eager to escape the gallows.

Deserters, too, hid in the forests, both French and English. Everyone knew of the family near Paxton that had welcomed two travelers to sleep before their hearth one evening, only to be murdered in their beds. Andrew had done his best to protect her from these dangers. But he had died just after Christmas of a lingering fever. Although Bethie had tried everything she knew to save him—every poultice, every herb, every draught—he was not a young man and had died one night in his sleep while she sat beside him and held his hand. Already in her seventh month, she had barely managed to dig a shallow grave for him in the frozen earth.

There was one other possibility, of course, one she almost refused to consider. She could try to find another husband. After the baby was born, she could ride to the nearest settlement, visit the church or meetinghouse and tell the minister that she was widowed and needed to find a husband. But would any man want both her and her child? And if she did find a husband, would she regret it?

Her mother, widowed when Bethie’s father was killed by a falling log, had found Malcolm Sorley in much the same way. A big man with a dour temperament and fists like hams, he’d moved with his bully of a son, Richard, into the cabin that had once been a happy home and had done his best to beat the fear of God into his new wife and stepdaughter. Bethie had tried to avoid the rages of her new father, but Malcolm Sorley had left his share of welts and bruises on her. Then he had turned her mother against her. Richard had done far worse.

And though a husband brought protection, marriage brought duties that pleased her not at all. She had no desire to lie beneath a man, to feel him touch her, to feel him inside her. If she could devise it, she would be content to live as a widow for the rest of her life.

And so Bethie arrived at the same stalemate she always came to whenever she allowed herself to think of the days ahead. There was no place for her to go and no way she could safely stay.

Coming to the frontier had been Andrew’s idea, not hers. And though he had been kind to her and had taken her from a living hell, she found herself feeling angry with him for abandoning her and her baby to this life of fear and doubt.

She rested the ax on the ground, out of breath, her arms and lower back aching, glad to find a good stack of wood piled on the ground beside her. It was enough to last her the rest of the day and the night, but she would need to chop more this afternoon if she didn’t want to be in the same fix tomorrow morning.

She rubbed a soothing hand over her belly, felt her baby kick within her. Then she squatted down and picked up as many pieces as she could carry. She stepped around to the front of the cabin, her arms full, and froze, a scream trapped in her throat.

A man on horseback.

The firewood fell from her arms, forgotten. She glanced wildly about for the rifle, realized that she had left it inside the cabin. A deadly mistake?

She forced herself to meet his gaze, tried to hide her fear; the frantic thrum of her heartbeat was a deafening roar. Where had he come from? Why hadn’t she heard him?

And the geese—why had they made no sound? He was an Indian. He must be, to have crept up on her so quietly. Dressed in animal hides with long black hair and sun-browned skin, he certainly looked like an Indian. But his eyes were icy and blue as a mountain lake, and most of his face was covered with a thick black beard. Heart pounding a sickening rhythm in her chest, she swallowed, pressed her hands protectively to her belly.

“M-my husband will be back soon.”

“Your husband?” His accent was distinctly English and cultured, his voice deep. He smiled, a mocking sort of smile. “Is he the poor fellow buried out back? Aye, I’ve already met him.”

The man started to dismount.

“Nay!” Close to panic, Bethie wasn’t sure where her words came from. “Stay on your horse and ride away from here! I am no’ wantin’ for means to protect myself!” He climbed slowly from the saddle, his gaze dropping from her face to her swollen belly, a look of what could only be amusement in his eyes.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” It was then she saw the blood. His hands were stained with it.

Her heart beat like a hammer against her breast, and for one wrenching moment, she knew he was going to kill her. Or worse.

If only she had the rifle! If only she could get inside the cabin, bar the door. But he stood between her and refuge. She took several steps backwards, was about to run into the darkness of the forest, when he sagged against his horse. Blood. It had soaked through the leather of his leggings on the right side, darkened the back of his right leg all the way to his moccasin. Was it
his
blood? Aye, it must be. He had tied a cloth around his upper thigh to stanch the flow. He was injured, weak, perhaps nigh to collapsing. Some part of her realized this, saw it as the chance she needed. She ran, a desperate dash toward the cabin door, toward safety, toward life. She had only a few steps to go when arms strong as steel shot out, imprisoned her.

“Oh, no, you don’t!”

“Nay!” She screamed, kicked, hit, fought to free herself with a rising sense of terror.

“Ouch! Damn it, woman!”

The click of a pistol cocking. The cold press of its barrel against her temple.

She froze, a terrified whimper in her throat.

“Get inside and boil water.”

She crossed the distance from the barn to the cabin, her stomach knotted with fear, the heat of his gaze boring into her back. Then she saw the firewood scattered on the ground. She stopped, turned to him, half afraid to speak lest she provoke his ire. She had no doubt this man was capable of killing. “I-I’ll need the wood.”

Blue eyes, hard and cold as slate, met hers. He nodded—one stiff jerk of his head.

She stooped down slowly, began to fill her arms. Nicholas watched the woman pick up firewood. She had no idea how close she had come to escaping him moments ago on her doorstep. Dizzy from blood loss, he had found it surprisingly difficult to subdue her, had been forced to wield the threat of his pistol. He could not risk getting close enough for her to knock it from his grasp. He was fast fading, and without the weapon he would not long be able to bend her to his will. He had no doubt that if given the choice she would leave him out here to die, or even kill him herself.

He didn’t blame her. There was only one rule on the frontier—survival. A woman without male protection could not be too careful, particularly a young and pretty one. And even heavy with child, she was a beauty. How old was she? Nicholas guessed eighteen. Her cheeks were pink from exertion, her skin flawless and kissed by the sun. A thick braid of sun-streaked honey-blonde hair hung down her back to her waist. Her curves, enhanced by her pregnancy, were soft, womanly and easily apparent despite the plainness of her gray woolen gown. And although she was great with child, she had felt small in his arms. Her head just touched his shoulder.

He looked on as she struggled to stand. Though she was obviously very near her time, she was surprisingly graceful and was soon back on her feet and walking toward the cabin, arms full, her braid swaying against the gray wool of her cloak with each step.

Nicholas followed, but even this small effort left him breathless. His heart hammered in his chest, fought to pump blood no longer in his body. The Frenchman’s blade had gone deep, and though it had failed to sever his tendons and drop him to the ground as the bastard had no doubt hoped, it had clearly cut into a major blood vessel.

He’d left Fort Detroit early in the morning almost a week ago, having earned more than enough from his pelts to replenish his supplies. He’d traveled south for most of four days before he got the feeling he was being followed. The signs were subtle—the twitching of Zeus’s ears, the cry of a raven startled from its perch somewhere behind him, a prickling on the back of his neck. He’d urged Zeus to a faster pace, kept up his guard, hadn’t stopped to rest or eat until well past nightfall.

They’d attacked just after midnight. The first had sprung at him out of the darkness and might have succeeded in killing him had Nicholas not been awake and waiting. And while he’d grappled with the first, the second had leapt from hiding to deal a surprise blow. Nicholas had quickly dispatched the first attacker, but the second managed to slash his thigh before Nicholas buried his knife in the man’s belly. He’d recognized them both from the fort—French trappers who weren’t ready to relinquish the Ohio Valley to the English. Nicholas had realized immediately he was badly hurt.

He’d have treated the wound himself had he been able to see it and reach it with ease. Instead, he’d tied a tourniquet around his leg and had reluctantly ridden through the night, hoping to cross some farmstead where aid might be available.

As he’d grown weaker, he’d all but resigned himself to death. He was already dead inside. What did it matter if his body died, too? Wasn’t that what he’d secretly been searching for all these years? But just before dawn, he’d heard a gunshot to the east and had followed it until he’d heard the sound of someone chopping wood. He hadn’t expected it to be a woman, much less a woman alone.

He hadn’t asked a soul for help in more than six years. It galled him to have to do so now. He followed the woman inside.

“Build up the fire.”

The cabin was small with a puncheon floor that looked as if it had been newly washed. The only light came from a small window covered with greased parchment. A roughhewn table sat in the center of the room, a hand-carved bedstead against the far right wall. In the far left corner on the other side of the fireplace sat a cupboard and before it a loom, a spinning wheel and a rocking chair. Dried onions, herbs and flowers hung from the rafters, a feminine touch that for one startling moment reminded him of the cookhouse on his plantation. A rifle leaned against the wall beside the door.

Nicholas checked the rifle to make certain it was not primed and loaded. Next he removed his buffalo-hide coat and his jacket, tossed them over one of the wooden chairs. Black spots danced before his eyes. He pulled out another chair, sat, watched as she stirred the fire to life and poured water into the kettle to boil.

“You’ll need thread and a strong needle.”

She started at the sound of his voice. She was terrified of him, he knew. He could taste her fear, smell it, see it in the way she moved.

Smart woman.

Bethie watched as he sliced the leather from his right leg with smooth, strong motions, noticed things she hadn’t noticed before. A thin white scar ran down his left temple to his cheekbone, made him seem even more dangerous. But his face was ashen—what she could see of it above his beard—and his lips were pallid, bloodless. Clearly, he had come close to dying. He might die still. When his leg was cut free, he tossed the blood-soaked leather by the door. Pistol still in hand, he stood, a bit unsteady at first. Then he took up his great shaggy coat, strode to the bed, spread the skin on the homespun coverlet. In one fluid motion, he stretched out over the skin and lay down on his belly. He was trying to keep from getting blood on the coverlet, she realized—an oddly considerate thing to do.

The sight of him lying on her bed was more than a little disturbing. His dark hair spilled over his broad shoulders, fanned across the undyed linen of his shirt to his narrow hips. He was so much bigger than Andrew—leaner, more muscular, taller. His feet hung off the foot of the bed, and he seemed to fill it, just as his presence dominated the tiny cabin.

Then she saw his wound. Gaping and raw, it was at least six inches long, parting the skin of his upper thigh, digging deep into the muscle. If it festered, he would lose his entire leg, perhaps even die.