Sweet Prairie Passion (Savage Destiny) (4 page)

The words were spit out hatefully, and Abbie was sure that if it weren’t for her and LeeAnn’s presence, Zeke would have put a hole in the other man’s heart right then and there.

“And you put a hole in me and left me for dead!” Rube replied.

“You deserved it! You’re a thieving, stinking murderer, Rube Givens! I don’t know how you managed to live after I shot you, but I’m kind of glad. Now maybe I’ll have the pleasure of killing you all over again. You slipped past me once. It’s not likely to happen again! Now let loose of those girls!”

“You half-breed skunk! You fixin’ to keep them fresh for yourself, Zeke? Huh? Everybody knows how half-breeds like white girls!”

Zeke’s rifle fired again, and Rube Givens cried out as the bullet ripped across his upper arm.

“You son of a bitch!” Givens screamed. He put his hand to the wound, and blood trickled down over his fingers. By then, having heard the gunshots, most of the people from the train had come, and Jason Trent was leading the pack, knowing Abbie and LeeAnn were not at the wagon. Rube Givens was climbing down from his horse to walk over and cut the ropes from the girls, but when Trent saw his daughters lying there, he quickly surmised the situation, and lit into Givens, calling him names and swinging hard. Jason Trent was a good fighter, but not a cutter, and after he’d gotten in a couple of good blows, the smelly trapper whipped out a huge knife from his belt and waved it at Trent, who backed up slightly in surprise.

Abbie moaned with fear for her father as the two men circled. Abbie knew her father didn’t have a chance against an experienced knife fighter, but he wouldn’t be one to back off from a fight either. She looked pleadingly at Zeke, who was already sliding down from his horse. He stepped up beside Trent and shoved his rifle into Trent’s arms, but his eyes were riveted on Rube Givens.

“This is no fight for you to be in,” he told the man. “He’ll cut you to pieces.”

“They’re my daughters!” Trent replied angrily.

“And they need you,” Zeke replied. “No sense getting yourself sliced up in front of them. Let me take over.”

“But I can’t—”

Zeke whipped out one knife and held it out to Trent.

“Cut your girls loose,” he commanded, as he drew out the other, bigger knife. It was the biggest, ugliest blade Abbie had ever seen, and Givens backed up as Zeke held out his arms for battle.

It was then that the other side of Cheyenne Zeke came alive; his warrior ancestry came to the fore. His eyes flashed with an eagerness to get his blade into Rube Givens, and the fringe of his buckskins danced as the two of them circled and eyed each other. That was the first time Abbie noticed that Cheyenne Zeke had a thin scar on the left side of his face, from the edge of his forehead all the way down to his jawbone, and there was another thin scar across his chin. He looked fierce and mean, and she wondered just how hard life had been for him, being a half-breed.

Trent quickly cut his daughters loose, hustling them to their feet and getting them out of Zeke’s way while they pulled the filthy gags from their mouths. Rube Givens’ two friends backed off, not daring to help him, since Olin Wales sat nearby on his horse holding a rifle on both of them. Givens’ fear was evident and sweat broke out on his forehead. He stood up straighter and put up his hand as though he wanted to call a halt to the fight. He carefully slid his knife back into its sheath, aware that Zeke would not murder a defenseless man in front of the people who stood watching.

“I ain’t knife fightin’ with you, Zeke. I ain’t lettin’ you cut me up like your red brothers would do.”

Zeke kept hold of his knife warily. “Now you’re
showing your true color, Givens!” he snarled. “Yellow!”

“I ain’t yellow!” Givens growled, backing toward his horse. “I just happen to know how a Cheyenne can use a blade! Well, you ain’t usin’ it on me, you half-breed scum! We’ll meet again—on other terms—without all these here witnesses!”

“When you can shoot me in the back?” Zeke sneered. “Why not settle it here and now, Givens! It makes no difference! You’ll be just as dead either way!”

“I’ve put my knife away! You kill me now, it’s murder!” Givens said confidently.

“The man is right!” Preacher Graydon spoke up. Abbie felt like kicking him.

“I don’t care if you
do
kill him!” she spit out in her anger, forcing back tears, as she stood, shaking, next to her father. Givens looked at her and grinned, stepping daringly closer to Zeke as he did so. His eyes moved back to Zeke.

“All these people here heard me say I didn’t want to fight,” he told Zeke. “You’d best remember it don’t take much to get a half-breed hung. And there’s somethin’ else they get hung for.” He eyed the girls again, then looked at Zeke and laughed lightly. “You think I don’t know what you saved them two for? Some night they’re gonna find a half-breed sneakin’ into their wagon and feelin’ their—”

Givens did not finish the sentence. Zeke’s foot came up into the man’s private parts, and Givens gave out a terrible howl. In the next second, Zeke’s knee came up into Givens’ face when the man bent over, and there was a bone-crunching sound. Givens fell backward,
his face covered with blood. Abbie squeezed her eyes shut and looked away; and others gasped and covered their mouths. Zeke picked up Givens’ body and threw it over the man’s horse, at the same time ordering the other two to mount up.

“You get him out of here!” he growled at Givens’ friends. “And when he comes around, you tell him that the next time I see him, I’ll split open his hide, stretch him out to dry in the sun, and feed his innards to the wolves! I’ve had my fill of Rube Givens! He’s just goddamned lucky these people were here watching, or he’d not be alive! Seeing little girls abused is something I don’t take lightly, and I’m not going to forget today!”

He slapped the rump of Givens’ horse and it galloped off, with Givens’ body bouncing up and down on it. The other two went riding after it to catch Givens’ body before it could fall to the ground. Zeke turned to face Abbie and LeeAnn, and Abbie’s heart swelled with pride at how the man could handle himself. Now he’d saved her from being violated, and in her young eyes no greater hero could walk. She wanted to cry, but she held back her tears for fear of looking more like a little girl to him. She wanted to hug him, but she could not. Trent put out his hand to Zeke.

“I want to thank you,” he told the man. “I didn’t even know there was trouble till I heard the gunshots. I guess it’s like you said. They need watching.”

Zeke nodded. “Olin and I saw the girls heading for the hollow, and we was coming here to warn them not to go so far from the wagons when we heard one of them scream. Them being down in the hollow and all,
you probably didn’t even hear. Givens was counting on that.” He looked down at the girls. “You two would do best to stick closer to your pa and the wagon. If you need to tend to personal things, take your pa along.”

“Yes, sir,” LeeAnn replied sheepishly. Abbie blushed at the thought of the man talking about her lifting her skirts to relieve herself, but he treated it as a simple matter and was already talking to her father again, advising him to stay out of fights with men like Givens. Part of Zeke’s job was to protect the people of the train from such things.

Trent shook his head. “I expect I’d have been cut up good if you hadn’t stepped in for me,” he replied. “But you shouldn’t have risked your neck like that.”

Olin Wales laughed. “What’s the risk?” he joshed. “Mister, you’ve never seen Cheyenne Zeke in a knife fight. If you did, you’d understand why Givens backed off. Zeke’s got a reputation from here to west of the Rockies with that big blade. Nobody comes out on the winnin’ end in a knife fight with Cheyenne Zeke.”

Abbie stared at Zeke in admiration as the others thanked him, all but the preacher and John Connely. Mrs. Hanes hung back, wary of this half-breed Indian whom she had not yet even met, but she did not look at him with malice, only curiosity.

“Get on back to camp, and I’ll be along to explain some things you need to know before we head out tomorrow,” Zeke was telling them. The group split up, and Abbie frantically tried to think of a reason to stay behind with Zeke so she could thank him alone. Her mind raced, and finally she asked her father if she could stay and look for a barrette she’d lost in the scuffle.
Zeke nodded to Trent to go ahead, that he’d stay and wait. Abbie’s heart pounded as she and Zeke gradually became the only ones left in the hollow, and she quickly began searching for the barrette, aware that Cheyenne Zeke was silently watching her. She was sure she was red all over and sweating from nervousness, and again she longed to be an experienced woman.

“I was sure I’d be able to find it,” she spoke up, not knowing what else to say. He held his horse’s reins and walked closer, searching himself with the eyes of a hawk.

“Don’t see anything. What color was it?”

“Red,” she replied, bending over and picking up some leaves. “I expect it’s gone for good now.”

She did not see his knowing grin. Cheyenne Zeke knew women, and he suspected the barrette story had been made up.

“Probably so,” he replied. “We’d best go back.”

She stood up and faced him, and he reached out with a big hand and gently pushed some hair behind her ear, his eyes holding her own. Pleasant shivers rushed through her limbs. “You look just fine without the barrette,” he told her. “Did they hurt you bad?”

“Only my pride,” she replied, suddenly at ease, captured by the intensity of his dark eyes. A little smile made one side of his mouth curve up a little.

“You’re a real Tennessee scrapper, I can see that.”

There was admiration in his eyes, and she was proud then of the way she’d fought her attacker, instead of just whimpering like LeeAnn had done. “I guess I couldn’t have done much,” she found herself saying, “but no man’s going to touch me unless I want
him to, not without a fight.” She suddenly reddened at her brazen words, and he brushed her cheek with the back of his hand, then brushed some dirt from her hair.

“Well, he’ll be a lucky man, now, won’t he?” he replied. Abbie could hardly believe the statement, nor the strange, familiar way he looked at her, again as though he knew her. A lucky man, he’d said. Her heart pounded so hard her chest hurt. But then the admiration in his eyes quickly changed to cold aloofness, and he stepped back, as though something had frightened him away from her. “You’d best get on to the wagon now,” he told her matter-of-factly. “I apologize for not getting here quicker, Miss Trent.”

“Please … you may call me Abbie. And you did fine, Mister Zeke.”

“Just Zeke,” he told her.

“All right, Zeke,” she said with a slight smile.
“My God, I think I love you!”
she wanted to shout. But how could a fifteen-year-old girl say such a thing to a grown man she hardly knew—and a half-breed at that!

“I’ll ride you over,” he was telling her. He hoisted her up on the big Appaloosa as though she were a feather, and she thought she’d faint at his big, strong hands on her waist. He led the horse back to the wagons, and she sat there watching his wide shoulders and the dark, thick braid of hair that hung down his back. She suddenly realized she didn’t care if this man
did
make love like a savage, as LeeAnn had put it. She didn’t doubt she’d enjoy lying next to Cheyenne Zeke,
however
he made love.

Jason Trent sat inside the wagon with his daughters, gently sponging their faces and carrying on about
how they’d better never go so far from the wagon again. He stressed how lucky they were that Cheyenne Zeke had come along when he did. He hugged each of them, and Abbie hugged him back extra hard, realizing he could have been killed trying to fight with Rube Givens. But at the time, she knew her father had been desperate and angry; the already lonely man would have been devastated if something had happened to his daughters. There had been one good thing that had come out of the attack. Jason Trent had warmed to Cheyenne Zeke, and that gladdened Abbie’s heart.

“Brush your hair now and change your dresses and come on out to the meeting,” he told them, kissing their foreheads. “You two sure you’re okay?”

“Just … shook up,” LeeAnn whimpered, still dabbing at her tears. Trent looked at Abbie’s bruised face and sighed.

“I’m sorry, girls. But you’ll like Oregon. I’m sure of it. And I’ll make sure you get there safe.” He patted their heads and climbed out of the wagon, hoisting little Jeremy up to his shoulders and walking off to the meeting while the two girls quickly changed.

“Well, I guess your Zeke showed his stuff this evening, didn’t he?” LeeAnn said as she pulled her dress over her head and began buttoning it.

“
My
Zeke?” Abbie replied.

“Well, he will be before this trip is out. You’ve got designs on him, I can see that. And you and I both know you didn’t have any red barrette in your hair today. But I won’t tell pa.”

Abbie reddened and quickly pulled on her own dress. “What does it matter? I’m never going to get a man like that to think fond thoughts of me, especially
considering my age.”

“Fiddle! Older men like younger girls. Why, look at how it is back in Tennessee! Some girls get married at thirteen and fourteen to men forty or better!”

Abbie’s eyes widened at the thought. “They
do,
don’t they?”

“Of course they do.”

Abbie brushed her hair and frowned. “You said yesterday that you didn’t think it was right for me to be interested in a man twice my age. Why are you talking like this now?”

LeeAnn fussed with her golden hair. “Because now that I’ve met Mr. Robards, I know how wonderful an older man can be. The only difference is, there’s no future in Cheyenne Zeke, but with a man like Jason, I could have a fine home and fancy clothes. I just know it. But like I said, if that Cheyenne Zeke is what you want, I hope you get him, Abbie.”

Abbie brushed off the remark about Zeke, attributing it to LeeAnn’s scatterbrained way of looking at things. “There’s an awful lot about him I don’t know,” she replied. “I don’t even know his last name, if he has one. Surely his name isn’t just Cheyenne Zeke. And perhaps he already has a woman he’s interested in. Besides, there’s no sense in even sitting here and talking about him. His being interested in me is about as likely as the sun falling out of the sky.”