Sweet Prairie Passion (Savage Destiny) (26 page)

She cried, clinging to his buckskin shirt, drinking in the manly scent of him. “I promise,” she finally whimpered.

They heard the sound of an approaching horse, and he quickly let go of her.

“I’ll not treat you any different once we get back, Abbie girl,” he whispered. “What happened tonight—that’s all of it. God in heaven, tell me you understand! Tell me you forgive me!”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” she sobbed.

“Zeke?” someone hollered. He relaxed slightly, recognizing Olin’s voice.

“Over here!” he shouted in reply. He quickly kissed her cheek. “God be with you, Abigail,” he said softly.

“I’ll always pray for you, Zeke,” she whimpered in reply. Olin approached.

“You found her?” he asked, dismounting.

“The kid can run like a deer,” Zeke answered.

“She all right?”

“She’s scraped up pretty bad, especially her feet, She took off barefoot. You take her back with you on the horse, Olin, and I’ll walk back.”

Olin reached out and touched her hair. “I’m damned sorry about your pa, honey. It’s damned cruel what life’s been handin’ you these last few days. But we’ll all look out for you.”

He put his arm around her and led her to his horse, lifting her up into the saddle.

“Olin,” Zeke spoke up hesitantly. “When you get back, put something around her—a blanket if you’ve got one on your saddle there. There might be something on the back of her gown. I wouldn’t want anyone to see.”

Clinging to the saddle horn, Abbie reddened. Her whole body screamed now with pain and exhaustion. Olin frowned as he looked from Zeke to Abbie and back to Zeke.

“Your own heart is already tore to pieces,” he told Zeke sympathetically. “Did you have to go and add her to the mess it’s
already
in? What about
her?”

“What’s done is done!” Zeke replied almost angrily. “It’s between me and Abbie. And don’t think I’m not considering the fact that I’d be better off to shoot myself right now for what I’ve done!” He turned away. “Just take her back,” he said dejectedly. “Tell the others … tell them you found her … alone. Tell them you didn’t see me anywhere, that I must still be out here searching for her. I don’t want any of them to suspect I was the one who found her first. Do you understand?”

Olin sighed and shook his head. “I understand, Zeke.” He put a hand on Zeke’s shoulder. “You’ll be all right?”

Zeke actually snickered, but it was a bitter laugh. “Sure. Get going. I’ll turn up later.”

Olin turned and mounted up behind Abbie, putting one arm around her for support. “You okay to ride, honey?”

She hung her head. “Yes, sir,” she answered quietly.

He gave her a squeeze. “Things always look better in the daylight, Miss Abbie,” he told her. “Everything is gonna be okay. Ain’t none of us gonna let anything bad happen to you. You’re a good girl.” He kicked his horse into a walk. “No. I guess I should say you’re a good woman—a damned good woman.” They rode back toward camp, leaving Zeke beside the stream where he knelt down and wept in the privacy of the darkness.

Because Jason Trent had shot himself in the head, the other men put a lid on his burial box right away, so that Abbie and LeeAnn would not see the ugly wound. The morning broke bright and sunny, and Abbie walked with Bradley Hanes to pick out a burial spot. She chose a grassy hill that faced the rising sun, and the others quickly dug a hole, Zeke included, while Abbie and LeeAnn waited in their wagon, cleaning up and fixing their hair.

“Thank God for Quentin,” LeeAnn kept whimpering. “Oh, Abbie, what will
you
do now?” She dabbed at her tears, but Abbie knew what her remark meant. Abigail was not to count on joining up with LeeAnn and her lover, nor was LeeAnn about to abandon Quentin to care for her sister.

“I haven’t thought about it much,” Abbie replied quietly. “I expect I’ll stay with the Haneses. They’re nice folks. They’d keep me till I know what I’m going to do.”

“It’s a man you’ll be needing,” LeeAnn replied, tying a bow in the lovely blond hair. “God knows that wild half-breed you have eyes for isn’t about to settle down again. Perhaps you’ll find some nice man in Oregon.
And what about Bobby Jones? He’s got eyes for you, that’s a fact. Of course he isn’t rich and educated like Quentin, but he’s an honest boy and sweet. And you keep saying being rich and educated doesn’t matter to you.”

Abbie’s heart ached so badly that she could almost cry out from the pain. Zeke! He was all she could think about! Zeke! She’d lain beneath him just hours earlier, taken him inside herself, let him make a woman of her while giving him pleasure at the same time! For one short, beautiful moment she’d been Cheyenne Zeke’s woman, and it had been everything she’d expected and more! How gentle and sweet he’d been! Yet how full of sorrow and remorse he’d been afterward. To have to treat him casually now, as though nothing had changed, would be an overwhelming task. But she had promised. She entertained the thought of ending her life the way her father had, but she discarded that idea because of the one thin thread of hope she held. As long as she was alive, and as long as Cheyenne Zeke was alive, there was a chance, especially now that he’d put his brand on her.

She watched LeeAnn primp, finding it hard to believe that the girl had recovered so quickly and seemed so little disturbed by their father’s death. Perhaps LeeAnn was relieved. The one major obstacle to her romance with Quentin Robards was her father’s interference and disapproval. Now LeeAnn’s responsibility to her family was gone. Abbie could fend for herself. How LeeAnn had changed since meeting that smooth-talking gambler from the East!

When they climbed out of the wagon, Quentin was waiting to take LeeAnn’s arm, and he patted her hand
consolingly. Mrs. Hanes waited for Abbie.

“I want you to put your mind completely at ease,” Mrs. Hanes told Abbie right away as they walked to the grave site. “Zeke has spoken with us and asked us to look after you. We will gladly do so, for we had already considered speaking to you about it before Zeke said a word. I just want you to know it’s with open hearts we will take you into our home once we settle in Oregon—that it was really our own idea and not because someone else asked us.”

“Thank you very much, Mrs. Hanes,” Abbie replied. “I’ll help all I can. I can sew and cook. I know how to can food and tend a garden, make butter, milk a cow—everything.”

Mrs. Hanes smiled and put an arm about her waist. “That’s fine, Abbie, but we aren’t taking you because we want a servant! We’ll treat you like our own.” She gave Abbie a light squeeze. “Come now. Remember you have friends in us. And try to keep in mind that your mother and brother and father are all happy now, at peace, and together with God. I prayed so hard for you last night after you ran off, child. I felt so sorry for you. I’m glad Olin found you and that you’re all right.”

Abbie wished she could tell the woman about her love for Zeke. Surely a nice woman like Mrs. Hanes would understand. But what if she didn’t? She might change her mind about giving Abbie a home, and at the moment, the thought frightened her. Besides, she had promised Zeke to keep the secret. It might spoil everything and create a host of trouble if she opened her mouth to Mrs. Hanes, but it was so hard to keep so much love inside.

They walked the rest of the way to the grave site, and Abbie’s chest hurt at the sight of Zeke standing there in his beautiful, white, beaded shirt. Such a handsome specimen of a man he was, standing there in the bright sunlight! Could God mold a more beautifully carved face and body? Surely not. And he’d been her first man—just hours earlier. That was all like a dream now. For she must face the reality that she could never have him for good. She must pretend what had happened earlier had not really happened at all. She tried to catch his eyes, but he would not look at her, and then Preacher Graydon began the services. His words were a blur in her mind. But she dared to glance at Zeke several more times, being careful not to stare for too long. Bradley Hanes brought her some mountain flowers to throw on top of the box before it was buried beneath the earth. When he did, it hit her full force that Jason Trent was dead, and his fiddle was forever silenced. Gone! She could see him playing the fiddle, while her mother laughed and danced and little Jeremy clapped his hands to the music. Now all three were gone! And she could not even have Zeke. She knelt down and threw the flowers onto the box. Was it her voice screaming, “Papa”? Of course it was, and yet it sounded like someone else’s—far away. The wrenching sobs came now, with the awful reality. Zeke’s vision had indeed come true! Now someone was dragging her away from the grave. Zeke stared after her, longing to comfort her himself; but the vision of his raped and bloodied wife flashed into his mind and he turned away to help the others fill in the hole that held Jason Trent.

*      *      *

Zeke waited two hours after the burial before beginning the crossing of the north fork of the Platte. He wanted to give Abbie time to feel “near” her father before leaving the spot she would probably never see again. Abbie sat alone in the wagon, preferring it that way, holding her father’s fiddle in her hands and caressing it lovingly. LeeAnn, in the meantime, was consoled by Quentin Robards in some secluded spot; and when she returned to the wagon, her face was tear-stained, but her eyes were hard and determined. By then Zeke had started the crossing, and he was busy helping the Haneses’ ford the river when LeeAnn climbed into the Trent wagon. The girl immediately began throwing clothes into a carpetbag. Abbie watched her a moment, her heart heavy, for she knew what LeeAnn intended to do.

“You’d really leave me, LeeAnn?” she spoke up quietly, realizing she’d miss her sister more than ever, now that LeeAnn was all the family she really had. “Now? With pa gone, and Jeremy, too?”

LeeAnn stopped packing a moment to face her sister, looking a little bit apologetic, but very sure of herself. “We’re going no farther!” she said decidedly. “Quentin and I are going back. I’m not passing up this chance, Abbie.
I can’t!
If I don’t go with him, he’ll go without me, for he doesn’t intend to go on to Oregon. He wants me to go with him, to be his wife. Somehow I …I’ll get word to you as to where I am. I … we’d … take you with us, but right now it would be too much of a burden for Quentin to be looking after two women and—”

“Don’t lie to me, LeeAnn,” Abbie said disgustedly. “Quentin doesn’t give a
damn
about me! And you’ll
find out soon enough he doesn’t give a damn about you either! He’ll use you till he gets back East, then dump you!”

The girl’s eyes blazed, and she returned to her packing.

“Don’t go, LeeAnn! Please!” Abbie urged. “Come to Oregon with me!”

The girl snickered. “And do what? We’d be dirt poor. Pa didn’t leave us anything but the few belongings in this wagon. I do not intend to be a maid for somebody else when I have a man who can make me rich enough so
I’m
the one with a maid! I’ll not go on to a strange land and clean up
other
people’s messes! I never wanted to make this trip in the first place, but I had no choice. Now I
have
a choice. Quentin said he was going to Oregon just for the adventure, but now that he’s fallen in love with me, he wants nice things for me—and civilization. He loves me enough that he doesn’t want me subjected to any more of this barbaric life! Maybe you can live like the wolves and the bears, but I can’t. I have to have people around me, things to do, nice clothes and all. Quentin can give me those, and he loves me besides. I’m only happy when I’m with him.”

“LeeAnn, it’s
dangerous
to go back all alone! Rube Givens might be out there, for one thing!”

LeeAnn thought for a moment about telling her Rube Givens was the very man who was to meet up with them and guide them back. But if Abbie told Zeke that, Zeke would come after them for certain. That was one thing they wanted to avoid at all costs.

“Quentin has guns and knows how to use them,” she answered coolly, packing more items. “I’m not
afraid. It isn’t that far back to Fort Laramie.”

“Please don’t go, LeeAnn!” Abbie pleaded, now starting to cry. “Don’t you even care that I’ll be alone? How can you
do
this?”

The girl smiled almost wickedly, and Abbie wondered if Quentin was giving her some kind of potion that was changing her personality. “I highly doubt you’ll be alone, Abigail,” she replied. “You have your precious half-breed, and some day you’ll have that tepee and your sixteen kids, remember?”

The words hurt even more because of what had happened between Abbie and Zeke the night before. It was something she could have shared with her sister at one time, and she longed to share it now. A girl’s first intercourse can be a traumatic and painful experience, both physically and emotionally, but Abigail had to keep it all buried inside. LeeAnn was no longer someone with whom she could share secrets.

“You know that can’t ever be,” she replied despondently. “I’ll have nobody, and you don’t even care!”

LeeAnn closed the bag. “Why should I? You’ve insulted Quentin time and time again. You don’t care anything about my feelings for him, nor do you appreciate what a wonderful man he is. I
love
him, and I’m going back with him. That’s that! And I’m taking one of the horses. I have the right.”

Abbie wiped at her tears. “Zeke won’t let you go!” she reminded her. “He’ll come after you!”

The girl turned, her eyes boring into Abbie’s. “I don’t think so,” she replied with a sneer. “You’d best warn him not to make a fuss. Because if he tries to stop us, or if he comes after us and drags us back, I’ll put
on the biggest show you ever saw! I’ll carry on about how he
raped
me farther back there on the trail—that I never said anything because I feared for my life. I’ll tell them I left with Quentin because I was afraid he’d rape me again and hold that big knife against my throat like he did the first time!”

Abbie sat there dumbstruck, her eyes widening in disbelief.

“I’ll do it, Abigail, believe me. I can get Zeke in all kinds of trouble. I’ll tell them the only reason he wouldn’t let us go is because he wants me for
himself,
that he told me he loved white girls with blond hair the best. Rube Givens already planted the idea in their heads back there at Fort Laramie that he likes white girls. He about got in trouble then, Abbie, so don’t stand in my way, because it wouldn’t take much to get him into even more trouble. He’s already a wanted man. If he stops us, I’ll make a scene like you never saw in your life, and you know I can make them all believe me. If you want to keep your half-breed out of trouble, you keep him
away
from us!”