Beauty and the Bounty Hunter (17 page)

Alexi knelt next to Cat. “You’re sure I can’t bribe someone else to do this?”

Her lips twitched. “I’m sure.”

“It would seem that one of the women—”

“Everyone out.”

“All right.” Alexi practically leaped to his feet.

“Not you, Romanov. Everyone else.”

“I don’t think—” he began, but Durga must have made some motion to the others, for they all filed through the door.

“If I’m going to snivel,” she murmured, sounding
more tired with every word, “I’m going to do it in front of as few people as possible.”

The idea that he was going to make her cry when she’d never cried before, except on cue, made Alexi’s hand sweat. The knife slid around in his palm like a deer skating across the surface of a frozen pond. He glanced about, hoping for…what? Inspiration? Courage? An excuse?

“I don’t have enough light,” he blurted.

As if he’d been heard on high, two flaps in the hut rolled away and brilliant sunlight poured in. Alexi cursed.

“Quit being a baby,” she said.

“You do realize I’m not a doctor?”

“Haven’t you pretended to be at least once or twice?”

He had, but he’d never actually cut into anyone. He was a confidence man, not an idiot. Taking money was one thing. Murder quite another.

“Alexi,” she said.

Just that. Nothing else. But in that one word he heard so much. She needed him to do this. She trusted no one else.

So he could watch her die, or he could help her to live.

T
o begin, Alexi flicked out whatever the Cherokee had packed in. The wound began to ooze.

He sat back. “It’s deep. I don’t think—”

“Finish,” she managed between clenched teeth.

“Your skin,
ma chère
. I have ruined it.”

“It was ruined before you came along.” She closed her eyes and murmured, “I was ruined before you came along.”

He frowned. She was really starting to frighten him. “Cat—”

Her eyes snapped open, and they glittered like emeralds in the sun. “Dig as far as you have to, but do it fast. I haven’t asked much of you, Alexi, but I’m asking this.”

He sighed like a finicky grandmother and did as she asked. He dug deep; he worked fast. Her fingers clenched on the blanket; her teeth ground together so loudly she might have been chewing rocks. But she did not writhe; she did not cry out.

When the tip of his knife scraped lead, Alexi wanted very badly to do both. Instead, he swallowed back bile and, with a quick twist of his wrist, forced the bullet free of her body. He held it up so she could see. Her lips curved just a little; then her eyes drifted closed.

“Help,” Alexi said, not shouting, not whispering either.
He could no longer work up any emotion. Not worry, not joy, not fear—he’d spent all he had on her.

Durga must have been standing right outside the turtle because he appeared in the doorway immediately. Alexi liked the man more and more with every passing minute. When Durga waved his hand and several women poured in, shooing Alexi away, Alexi nearly reached out and hugged the fellow.

“They will clean and dress her wound,” Durga said. “You and I will smoke.”

Smoking sounded damn good to Alexi. Drinking even better.

They stepped into the bright light of day. Alexi was surprised to discover the sun on its way toward the western horizon. Time had seemed to stop while he was digging a knife into Cat’s flesh, but apparently it had gone on merrily without him.

Durga indicated the stream with the flick of one dark finger. Alexi washed Cat’s blood from his hands. There was little he could do about what had splattered his shirt and pants.

He followed the man to town, then into a house where Mikhail sat at the kitchen table eating a huge bowl of stew. Whoever had made it was nowhere in sight.

Mikhail’s gaze narrowed on Alexi’s stained clothing. “Miss Cathy all right?”

“For now,” Alexi answered. When discussing Cat, it paid to be cautious. “Our horses?” Alexi asked.

Mikhail pointed at the window, open to the late-afternoon breeze. Their mounts were clearly visible, contentedly grazing behind the house, unsaddled and rubbed down. Mikhail would never take his own respite before making sure the horses had theirs.

Three packs sat just inside the door. As Mikhail returned to slurping his stew, Alexi snatched his bag. He
followed Durga’s finger to the man’s room, which contained only a neatly made bed and a small chest at the foot that must have contained his possessions. Alexi drew off his blood-dotted garments and drew on his last unmarred set of clothing before returning to the kitchen.

Durga awaited him on the front porch, sitting in one of two well-made wooden chairs. Alexi took the empty one as Durga opened the pouch at his waist and began to roll cigarettes. He handed the first to Alexi, then started a second. His movements were unhurried, deliberate, soothing.

Alexi considered recovering his saddlebag and the whiskey he kept there, but he’d heard Indians should not be given firewater. Then again, he’d heard a lot of things about Indians—they were lazy; they were dirty; they were vicious—and none of them had proved to be true. Still, he might need the whiskey later for Cat.

Durga removed a box of matches from his pouch, struck one, and held it to the end of Alexi’s cigarette and then his own. They smoked in companionable silence. Once Alexi opened his mouth to ask what, exactly, had happened with Frank, and Durga’s dark eyes flicked to his. “We do not talk while we smoke.”

Alexi lifted his brows, but he remained silent. He owed this man so much, he could at least adhere to his customs.

By the time they were done with their smokes, Alexi was considering adopting the Cherokee way himself. He had enjoyed this cigarette so much more because he didn’t have to inhale jerky puffs between words. A slight headiness spread through him, causing his tense shoulders to loosen; even the knot in his gut eased. He took a deep, easy breath and let it out. One thing at a time; everything at its own pace; listen to your body, your mind, the earth.

Alexi held the stub of cigarette in front of his face. “What is this?”

“Shhh,” Durga murmured, and took a final drag of his own, allowing his eyes to drift closed as the smoke drifted slowly from his lips and trailed upward.

Alexi thought the man might have fallen asleep, and he was considering it himself, when Durga’s eyes popped open and his gaze turned toward the edge of town. “They come.”

“Who?” Alexi glanced that way himself, curious. What he saw made the tension return. He opened his mouth to call for Mikhail, and Durga murmured, “Inside.”

Why Alexi listened, he wasn’t sure. Perhaps because everything Durga had done so far had been the right thing. Perhaps because this was Durga’s town and not his. Or perhaps because the approaching line of riders appeared ready to kill, and he knew even before the first man spoke whom they wanted.

“Lookin’ for Cat O’Banyon.”

Alexi, who was standing to one side of the front window, jerked a thumb for Mikhail to take up a position on the other. Mikhail was a very good shot. Alexi had made sure of it. However, the five men strung out in front of Durga’s house were so close together almost anyone would have been able to plug two, maybe even three, before the others cleared leather.

First, they needed Durga out of the line of fire. Alexi wasn’t quite sure how to accomplish that without revealing his presence, and he wasn’t going to do that unless he had to.

“You will find her there.” Durga lifted his arm.

Alexi’s breath hitched, and he could not catch it again. The betrayal, or perhaps lack of air, caused his chest to ache. Why had Durga saved Cat only to turn her over to these hunters?

Alexi had begun to raise his hand and set Mikhail loose upon them—to hell if Durga was caught in the cross fire—when he saw where the Cherokee’s finger pointed.

The graves on the hill.

Genius!
Had he mentioned how very much he liked this man?

The leader of the bounty hunter posse peered in that direction, his frown causing the numerous creases in his face to deepen. “Mind if we take a peek?”

When Durga did not answer, the others wheeled their horses and galloped up the slope. The leader turned his gaze from the graves to Durga. Alexi had to give the Cherokee credit; he stared resolutely back, saying nothing. Alexi had learned long ago that further explanation in the face of suspicion only created more suspicion. Continued silence worked best in those situations. Apparently, Durga had learned this long ago as well.

At last the bounty hunter lowered his head, flicked his thumb against the brim of his hat, and followed his men. Durga stepped inside.

“What if they dig them up?” Alexi asked.

Durga turned his ever-calm gaze in Alexi’s direction. “Digging up Indian graveyards greatly annoys the Indians.”

Alexi’s lips twitched. “I thought it greatly annoyed the spirits of those who have been dug up.”

Durga shrugged. “Such behavior will bring about immediate bad luck.”

“How can you be so sure?” he asked.

“Because the
Aniyunwiya
”—at Alexi’s lift of the brows, he clarified—“the Principal People. The
Cherokee
who hide in the trees with their guns have been told to shoot anyone who disturbs the sleep of the
duhasata,
the dead.”

“That could cause problems for the
Aniyunwiya,
” Alexi murmured. Due to Alexi’s gift with mimicry and languages, the word came out exactly as Durga had said it. If Alexi stayed here another week, he’d be speaking Cherokee as well as a five-year-old.

“You should have let me”—he glanced at Mikhail and clarified—“let
us
take care of them.”

“Your woman saved me. I will not repay that debt by allowing harm to come to you.”

Alexi didn’t bother to correct the man’s assumption that Cat was his woman. The way Durga spoke of her—with both respect and adoration—if the Cherokee didn’t believe she was already taken, he might decide to take her. Alexi didn’t want to have to strangle his new best friend.

However, he would correct one assumption. “You don’t need to put yourself or your people at risk. No harm will come to me.” Mikhail would not allow it.

“No matter.” Durga moved to the doorway, gaze upon the distant hill. “They are leaving.”

Alexi followed, keeping out of sight in case anyone decided to look back. “They didn’t seem the type to be convinced by a few overturned plots of earth.” Alexi should know. He made his living, and had avoided dying, because of his talent at gauging types.

“What they saw is more than overturned earth.”

Alexi imagined a witch doctor’s spell placed upon the land, one that made everyone who walked there experience an intense need to be far, far away.

“Grave markers,” Durga said, causing Alexi’s fanciful thoughts to disappear. “One with the name of her quarry, the other with the name of her.”

“That wouldn’t convince me.” Alexi knew better than most how simple illusion could be. “If those hunters are any good at their job, it shouldn’t convince them either.”

“What they saw fits with what they know. The bounty hunter followed a bad man. The bad man came here. As both the bad man and the hunter are not known for their patience, or the sparing of bullets, they killed each other and were buried.” At Alexi’s continued expression of skepticism, he continued. “In the end, there is one important question that should convince anyone if they but think to ask.”

“What’s that?”

“Why would we lie?”

Alexi could always think of a reason to lie. Lies were what you made them. They improved stories, improved lives, improved memories and histories. Sometimes he wondered why on earth anyone would ever want to tell the truth.

However, Durga was not Alexi, and there was no reason for the Cherokee to risk the wrath of five well-armed gunmen to protect a strange white woman.

None at all. Except the honor of the man in front of him.

Alexi held out his hand. “Thank you.”

“I did not do it for you,” Durga said, but he shook. “Now you must come with me.” Mikhail, who had gone back to his stew, began to stand. “Not you,” Durga said.

Mikhail sat without argument. Alexi’s eyes widened as he followed Durga from the house and toward the stream. “He doesn’t usually listen to anyone but me.”

“He knows I will not hurt you.”

“How does he know?”

“What possible purpose could it serve?”

As always, Durga made a solid argument. Unfortunately Alexi knew there were many people in the world who needed no reason to cause pain. Mikhail, if he remembered back further than yesterday, would know the same.

Durga went over the ridge, down the hill, past the turtle, which appeared abandoned. Alexi glanced inside to make sure it was, then turned to demand the whereabouts of Cat.

Durga had waded through the shallows, then continued several yards along the opposite shore. Alexi hurried to catch up as the man paused in front of what Alexi first thought to be a natural rock outcropping jutting from the ground. When he neared, he discovered another shelter, this one built partway into the earth, domed like a beehive.

“
Asi.
” Durga indicated that Alexi should enter.

“
Asi,
” Alexi repeated, thinking it was some kind of welcome.

“It is what we call our winter dwellings.” Durga’s face took on a hint of nostalgia. “When we still used them. We have become civilized; we live in the town, but some of us still pine for the old ways. And once in a while we must behave as if we are once again
Aniyunwiya.
”

“You’ll always be
Aniyunwiya,
” Alexi said, and Durga cast him a thoughtful glance.

“You will be comfortable here,” the man continued. “Even if one of my people wished to remember the past, it is summer now and there is a summer lodge for such things.”

“I’m sure the
asi
would be very comfortable, but we have to leave.”

Durga shook his head. “She must rest; so must you. And it would not do for you to be on the trail so near the hunters who believe that she is dead.”