Apache Flame (34 page)

Alisha nodded. Her father’s death. A child. A husband. A
mother-in-law. The loss of her teaching position. “You could say that.”

“Wal, change is never easy, but it’s necessary sometimes, ya
know?”

“I know.” She blew out a sigh. “Thanks, Red.”

“Nothin’ to thank me for.” He patted her arm again, then
picked up the reins and clucked to the horse.

“I wish you didn’t have to leave,” Alisha said, meaning it.
He had become a good friend in a short time.

“Wal, I’d like to stay, but…” He shrugged. “You know how it
is?”

“I’m sure they’re anxious to see you, too.”

Red grinned. “Yeah, I reckon. Don’t you worry now.
Everything’s gonna be jest fine.”

* * * * *

Alisha stared up at the ceiling. It seemed strange to be
sleeping under a roof again, in a real bed again. Stranger still to be sleeping
in the bed that Mitch’s parents had shared. Mitch had objected at first, but it
was the only double bed in the house.

She had aired out the room and the mattress and pillows, put
clean sheets and blankets on the bed, rearranged the furniture in an effort to
make it
their
room instead of his father’s.

In spite of Mitch’s misgivings, he had quickly fallen
asleep. Even though he insisted he was all right, she knew his injury still
pained him, that the long journey had tired him more than he would admit. She
snuggled closer, her shoulder pillowed on his arm.

Red had insisted on sleeping outside, saying he’d having
plenty of indoor living when he got to St. Louis.

White Robe and Rides the Buffalo were asleep in their own
rooms. White Robe had gone to bed early, saying she was tired, but Alisha had
the feeling that her mother-in-law was giving her and Mitch an opportunity to
spend some time alone with Rides the Buffalo so they could get to know each
other better.

They had spent a pleasant evening, just the three of them.
They had talked a little about the baby. Mitch had promised to get Rides the
Buffalo a pony, then told him a Coyote story. Later, Alisha had tucked Rides
the Buffalo into bed and, after a brief hesitation, she had kissed him good
night. He hadn’t seemed to mind.

With a sigh, she closed her eyes, completely at peace.

* * * * *

“Alisha! Alisha! Wake up!”

She bolted upright, overcome by a sense of panic. “Mitch?”

“I’m here. Shh, it’s all right. You were having a
nightmare.”

“Oh.” She fell into his arms. “It was awful.”

He drew her up against him. “It was just a dream, darlin’”

“I know, but it was so real.” She took a deep breath. “So
real.”

“What was it about?”

“We were in town. We…we were walking…down the street. It was
night. You were the sheriff again, and…” She shivered. “Someone shot you.”

Mitch lay down again. Tucking Alisha against his side, he
stroked her hair. “Try not to think about it anymore. It was just a bad dream.
Nothing more.”

* * * * *

Red left for St. Louis the next morning. Alisha hated to see
him go. He promised to stop for a visit in the spring on his way to see Owl
Woman.

She thought about what he had said often during the next few
days.
Everything’s gonna be just fine
. She repeated those words in her
mind when she was caring for Mitch, when she was getting acquainted with her
son, when she was learning to adjust to having a husband and a son and a
mother-in-law.

Sylvester Quimby had dropped off her things, and she felt
more like herself in her own clothes. It gave her a sense of being home to see
her few knick knacks scattered around the house, to see her father’s Bible on
the table beside the sofa.

Mitch said he would paint the inside of the house when he
was back on his feet, and she spent a day at the general store picking out
fabric for new curtains, a dark blue for Rides the Buffalo’s bedroom, a yellow
check for the kitchen, a light green for the parlor, white for their bedroom.
White Robe picked a soft blue print for her room.

She rearranged the furniture in the parlor, ordered
wallpaper for their bedroom.

Mitch told her to buy whatever she wanted. It was a strange
feeling, knowing she could spend as much as she pleased. Growing up, Mitch had
always thought of her as being rich because she had nice clothes and lived in a
big house. But the house had belonged to the church. True, they’d had plenty to
eat, and she’d always had nice clothes, but money for extras, for frills and
doodads, had always been scarce.

She bought a crystal swan just because it was pretty. She
bought Mitch a blue shirt because it was the same color as his eyes. She bought
Rides the Buffalo a set of toy soldiers, a new dress for White Robe, and one
for herself.

After her initial shopping spree, she stayed close to home,
busying herself with housework. While Mitch and Rides the Buffalo sat out on
the porch, getting to know each other while their injuries healed, she scrubbed
the floors and shook out the rugs and waxed the furniture. She went through
drawers and cupboards and closets.

At first, Alisha had felt ill at ease. The house had been
White Robe’s home, and Alisha couldn’t help feeling like an intruder at worse,
a visitor at best, but White Robe had quickly assured her that this house had
never been home, and that it held only bad memories for her.

“We’ll have to change that,” Alisha had told her, determined
to make it so.

They worked comfortably together after that. Sometimes,
while they were working together, White Robe reminisced about days gone by,
telling Alisha stories about Mitch, about how he had always loved the water,
about the time he found a wounded fawn and nursed it back to health.

As the days went by, Alisha began to feel that Red had been
right and that everything would, indeed, work out for the best.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

They had been in town almost three weeks when Alisha bumped
into Roger. She was on her way into the general store to buy a spool of white
thread but her mind wasn’t on thread, or the curtains she was making for the
bedroom. She had missed her monthly flow, and she was contemplating the fact
that she might be pregnant when she opened the door to the mercantile and came
face to face with Roger.

“Alisha!” he exclaimed. A smile lit his face, and then his
expression turned sour. “I heard you were back in town.”

“Hello, Roger.”

“Folks tell me you’re staying with him.”

“Yes.” She lifted her chin. She knew what people were
saying, that she was living in sin with a half-breed. But she didn’t care. She
wasn’t living in sin. Mitch was her husband in every way that mattered, and
soon they would be married again. She hadn’t said anything to Mitch about the
whispers and gossip she overheard, nor had she brought Rides the Buffalo into town
with her. The old cats had enough fat to chew. Hopefully, all that would change
once she and Mitch were married.

She was going to make the arrangements with the new preacher
when she finished her shopping.

“Can we go someplace and talk?” Roger asked.

“There’s nothing to say.”

“I think there is.” He looked around. It was Saturday, and
the street was crowded. Women hurried along the boardwalk, or clustered in
small groups, chatting. Men sat in the rockers outside the mercantile, talking
and whittling while their wives shopped. Kids played near the horse trough. A
group of men stood near the blacksmith shop, arguing politics. “We can’t talk
here.”

“Roger…”

“I think you owe me that much, don’t you?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

“Come on,” he said, taking her by the arm.

“Where are we going?”

“To the hotel. We can talk over a cup of coffee.”

Something told her it was a mistake, but it was too late to
back out now. And she did owe it to him. He was right about that.

There were only a few people in the hotel dining room. Roger
held her chair for her, they ordered pie and coffee. Alisha glanced around,
trying to think of something to say.

Roger took a deep breath, and got right to the point. “I was
wrong, to behave the way I did. I should have been more understanding of what
you were going through.” He paused. “Did you find your…your son?”

“Yes.”

“I’m…I’m glad. Is he…where is he?”

“Up at the ranch.”

A shadow passed through Roger’s eyes, and was gone.

“I still love you, Alisha. I want you to marry me, the way
we planned. The house is finished, just the way you wanted it.”

“Roger, please, don’t.”

“We were good together, Alisha. It can be that way again.”

“No, Roger, it can’t. Nothing’s the same as it was.”

“Alisha…”

“Listen to me! I’m in love with Mitch. I always have been, and
I always will be.”

Roger shook his head. “No, that’s not true,” he said, his
voice rising. “You loved me.”

Alisha looked around. “Roger, please, don’t make a scene.”

“You loved me! I know you did.”

“Yes, I did. I…”

The words died in her throat as a sudden stillness fell over
the room. Slowly, she looked up to see Mitch standing beside her chair.

“Go on,” he said. “I want to hear the rest of this.”

“Mitch. What are you doing here?”

“Go on,” he urged coldly. “You were telling Smithfield you
loved him.”

“No, I don’t.”

Roger stood up, his hands balled into tight fists. “Get out
of here, Garret.”

“Roger, don’t!” Rising quickly to her feet, Alisha tugged on
Mitch’s hand. “Let’s go.”

Mitch started to refuse, then, realizing how embarrassed
Alisha would be if he started a brawl in the dining room in the middle of the
day, he let her pull him toward the door.

“This isn’t over,” Roger called. “Not by a damn sight!”

Outside, Alisha took a deep breath. Dropping Mitch’s hand,
she walked swiftly down the boardwalk to where she had left the buggy. She
stood there a moment, eyes closed, fighting the urge to cry.

She didn’t hear Mitch come up behind her, but suddenly his
hands were at her waist and he was lifting her into the buggy. He tied his
horse to the back, then vaulted up on the seat beside her.

“Mitch…”

“I’m listening.” He lifted the reins, and turned the horse
toward home.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“You might start by telling me what you were doing with
Smithfield when you told me you were going to Halstead’s for thread.”

“I was. I did. I bumped into Roger at the store and he said
he wanted to talk. That’s all.”

“Are you in love with him?”

“What do you think?”

“I want you to tell me.”

“Of course I don’t love him. I love you. I always have.
There’s never been anyone else but you.”

“Do you know how it made me feel, walking in there and
seeing the two of you together?”

“How did you know I was there?”

“I saw you go in.”

“Oh. Why did you come to town? Were you following me?”

“My ma was making bread and she ran out of flour.” Muttering
an oath, he turned the horse back toward town.

“Mitch, don’t be angry, please.”

He grunted softly. Anger didn’t begin to describe how he’d
felt when he saw Alisha and Roger together. Hell, it didn’t come close.

He pulled up in front of Halstead’s and wrapped the reins
around the brake. “I won’t be long.”

“Would you pick me up a spool of white thread while you’re
in there?”

He looked at her a moment, then nodded. “Sure.”

She watched him climb the stairs and enter the mercantile.
How could he even think she loved another man? After all they had been through,
didn’t he know by now that she loved him, only him? Always and forever him? He
was her heart, her soul, her reason for being.

He returned shortly. He stowed the flour under the seat,
then swung up beside her and took up the reins.

“Did you remember the thread?”

“It’s in my pocket.”

Roger was standing on the boardwalk in front of the hotel
when they passed by. Alisha didn’t turn, didn’t acknowledge him in any way, but
she was aware of his gaze following them out of town.

“Mitch.”

He grunted softly.

“I love you.”

Three simple words, fervently spoken. She watched the anger,
the tension, drain out of him. His shoulders relaxed, his jaw unclenched, he
loosened his tight grip on the reins.

And then he pulled off the road, following a narrow winding
path that ended at the river.

He climbed out of the buggy, lifted her to the ground.
Taking her by the hand, he led her into a secluded thicket. Wordlessly, he drew
her into his arms and kissed her. She had the feeling it wasn’t so much a kiss
as a brand, a reminder that she belonged to him.

She slid her hands up under his shirt and caressed his back,
reveling in the warm skin beneath her fingertips, the power of the arms wrapped
so tightly around her. She felt his need pressing against her belly, felt an
answering need uncoil in the innermost part of her body, yearning toward him,
aching for the pleasure only he could give, and she leaned into him, her hips
thrusting forward, provocative, inviting.

Still entwined in each other’s arms, they sank down on the
soft grass. He kissed away her clothing, his mouth trailing fire as he rained
butterfly kisses over every inch of exposed flesh. Her hands were equally busy,
divesting him of his shirt, tugging off his trousers, giggling when she
realized she should have removed his boots first.

He laughed with her, a deep sexy sound that made her heart
beat even faster, made her hands clumsy as she pulled off his pants. He wasn’t
wearing anything underneath.

The grass was cool beneath her back, but the heat radiating
from Mitch’s body soon made her forget everything else. She wrapped her arms
around him.

“Tell me,” he said. “Tell me that you love me. Just me.”