Benjamin (5 page)

After a nearly
sleepless and cold night, Grace ribbed at her gritty eyes and stifled a yawn. Coffee would be nice. Too bad the despot she traveled with refused to allow them a fire. She washed down a breakfast of jerky with water and saddled her horse.

Ben stood by with Paladin’s reins in his hand. His jaw appeared tight enough to crack rocks.

“Which way are we headed?”

“North. Gonna need to cross the Sabine River.” He threw himself up into the saddle with speed and grace. The man seemed to be born to ride a horse. He looked too good sitting on top of that beautiful gelding. She knew it to be his sister’s horse, one she’d sacrificed to Ben to help him escape. The Grahams had some fine horseflesh.

“How long you figure it will take us to get there?” She pulled herself up onto her gelding.

“You ever gonna name that horse?”

She stared at him for a moment, nonplussed by the change in topic. He seemed intent on her naming the damn gelding. This was the second time he’d mentioned it. “What?”

“You’ve been riding that horse for what, a year?” Ben pulled his horse around and leveled a narrow eyed gaze on her. “Name the damn thing.”

He rode into the woods, leaving her to wonder what in the world had just happened. She spurred her mount into motion and followed him. Ben set a moderate pace, which she was able to follow by paying close attention to the forest. She was unfamiliar with the terrain but the horse was surefooted. The sunrise slipped across the sky to their right. The pinks and purples gave way to the bright sun as the morning matured.

Grace’s thoughts turned toward the men they hid from the night before. Although they hadn’t returned, tension had kept her awake with only snatches of sleep. She was exhausted but she wasn’t about to complain.

“Who do you think those men were?” she asked him.

He didn’t answer.

“Is there a reason we should be worried? And why we’re hiding in the woods?”

“I have four sisters.”

She scowled at his back. “Felicitations. What does that have to do with my questions?”

“They have tougher methods than you to try to get me to talk.”

She wanted to punch him. A lot.

“If I’m in danger from them, I need to know.”

He lifted one shoulder in a casual shrug. “Life is dangerous. You forced me to help you, so you’ll have to deal with the consequences.”

“I didn’t—” She stopped herself before she was pulled into an argument she couldn’t win. The harsh truth was, she had forced him. There would be consequences and she would have to accept them. Her annoyance was compounded by lack of sleep but she swallowed the pride that was her nemesis.

An hour passed in painful silence. She wanted to ask him about the compound, about what he’d seen, any details he could remember, but she had a feeling he wouldn’t tell her very much. He’d been a child, a little older than Henry. Alone and scared. Grace wasn’t sure she could hear details if he did care to share them.

The sunlight worked its way through the thick canopy of trees and leaves, leaving a golden pattern on the forest floor. Birds chirped all around them and rustles in the branches told her a few critters were busy hoarding nuts. It was a beautiful place.

Too bad the world around her was a cloud of fear and fury.

“I’m sorry.” She pushed the apology from her throat. “I know this isn’t what you want to do and I’m sorry to get you involved, but I didn’t have a choice.”

Of course, he didn’t reply. She was traveling with someone who chose to be mute.

“Thank you.”

“What?” Surprise laced his voice.

“I said thank you. I’m trying to focus on how to find Henry and keeping him safe. I’ve not spent time thinking about me or anyone else. Nothing is more important than him. So thank you for helping me.” She let out the words in a rush because if she didn’t finish what she had to say, she might not.

He was silent again. “My family never gave up on me, either.”

She smiled sadly at his wide back. “They love you.”

“And you love Henry.” He paused. “I agreed to help you because if someone had helped my family sooner, someone like me, then they might have found me more quickly. It took them five years.”

Her heart ached for the boy he’d been and the man who was still suffering from the wounds of a stolen childhood. She wanted to know more about him, ached to understand the taciturn traveling companion.

“You said you have a big family?”

He took a minute to answer. “Seven brothers and sisters.”

“Your parents loved each other and the eight of you.” She smiled at the thought of a large family. Henry was a blessing she hadn’t been able to repeat with another child. She envied the Grahams and their family love multiplied by eight.

“They did until somebody decided to murder them.”

Grace gasped. “I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.” Cat hadn’t revealed their parents’ murder, not that it was a topic someone would bring up the first time they met. She considered carefully what to say before she spoke. “I’m sure wherever they are, they watch over you and still love each other. I like to believe my husband’s love is still watching over me and Henry.”

A pause before he spoke again. “Maybe. I used to pretend my mother hadn’t died, that she was looking for me. I had her handkerchief for about a month before they took it from me. I would press it against my nose to be able to go to sleep.” He shook his head. “I have no idea how the hell this is coming out of my mouth.”

“Maybe it needs to. Sometimes we’re a bottle with a tight cork that keeps getting shaken up. That cork needs to pop now and then.” She closed her eyes. “And sometimes if we don’t keep that cork in place, there might not be anything left in the bottle.”

“You sound like a philosophy book.” He snorted. “I’m not a cork.”

“No, you’re the fractured bottle sitting next to me, the other fractured bottle on the shelf of hate and fear.” Her voice caught in her throat and she had to force herself to swallow the massive knot that had formed. “I need to get off that shelf, fix the fractures if I can, and live again. Until I find Henry, I won’t be able to. And, I suspect, neither will you.”

He turned around to stare at her with those blue-green eyes. “Are you saying I’ve been waiting more than half my life for you and your son to shed my past and what happened to me?”

“Maybe. I don’t pretend to know why things happen. They just do and we have to figure out how to get past them.” Grace willed herself to be strong, to keep control. “Somehow we both have to.”

He was silent for a few minutes. “I reckon so. I just don’t know how.”

A spark of hope flared through her. It was the first time he’d agreed with her and she wanted to hang onto that flame and nurse it, make it bigger. “Then we figure it out together.”

*

Ben’s anger had
dissipated to be replaced by longing. Spending months without company had made him ache for companionship, no matter if the woman had threatened him at gunpoint. She was doing it for family, for her son, and for that he could forgive her transgressions.

He couldn’t, however, forgive the world for the mess that was his life. Ben had no one person to blame. Instead he simply threw his anger at the rest of the world. Including at Grace.

Her words had impacted him, way down deep in the dark recesses of his soul. He didn’t want to hear her, to feel her pain along with his own, but he did anyway. It stirred his longing for something other than the numb, solitary existence he’d accepted as his future.

Ben didn’t want to admit to her that she might have been right. That perhaps helping her would heal the rancid wounds in his heart. Perhaps finding Henry would be the balm for his long-buried soul.

Or maybe it was another big lie in a long series of lies he’d had to swim in.

He needed to stop living in the past and move into the future. That wouldn’t happen until he burned the hell from his past from his soul. It was time to cauterize the wound. Going back to the compound was his worst nightmare, which was about to be a reality.

His gut did a somersault at the thought. He had no idea what he would do if he got near the place. Burn it down perhaps. To know there was another Cunningham he hadn’t met, who was continuing his family’s heritage of hate, violence, and evil made a red film slide over Ben’s vision. Hatred was an ugly emotion, but it was a partner to rage. Both had been his constant companions for too long.

It was the quiet he’d found while he was alone that kept those dark emotions at bay. No more. His peace, such as it was, was now over. He couldn’t turn around and return to it. Grace made sure of that, intentional or not.

“Tell me what you know of Dominic Cunningham.” He didn’t expect the words but he spoke before he could stop himself. Damn. Did he really want to know about this man? Did he have a choice?

“I know more about the family itself. I spent a lot of time finding out what I could about them. They’re private and don’t let most folks close to them.” Her tone was flat as though she was telling a story for which she had no reaction. He knew it wasn’t true, but there had already been too much emotion from the woman. It was also disconcerting to think of her as female since she appeared, for all intents and purposes, as a man. Yet he knew firsthand she was all woman.

Ben huffed out a breath. “I already knew that. Tell me about Dominic.”

“There were three brothers and they were raised by their mother, Margaret. She was the force behind the ranch’s expansion and her sons’ free rein. She indulged them in their proclivities and even went so far as to buy and sell women and children.” Grace’s voice hitched a little, but she pressed on. The woman had a backbone of steel. “From what I could find out, she still controls the family fortune but no one has seen her in ten years.”

“The grand master behind the entire operation, huh?” He shook his head. “I find it hard to believe Pablo Garza took orders from a female.” The name tasted like ash on his mouth but it was liberating to say it aloud. It was the persona that Ephraim Cunningham had worn like a suit, but it couldn’t disguise the monster that dwelled within him.

“Nobody wanted to speak of her aloud but from what I understand she was a small redhead, but she had a commanding presence. Manfred was afraid of her, judging by the fear in his voice when I asked him about his mother.” Grace snorted. “I had to force myself not to push him about it or risk him banishing me from the races.”

A small redhead.

Memories slammed into him and Ben’s vision blurred. He swayed a bit in the saddle.

Marcello, your Papa won’t like this behavior. You must be a good boy.

He stared at the trees in front of him, desperately looking for something to cling to. To ground him. To save him.

You must not disobey Papa. You must do everything he says.

“Ben?”

Grace’s voice yanked him back from the precipice of the darkness that threatened to consume him. He snapped his head around to find her beside him. And he’d somehow stopped his horse.

“Are you all right?” She watched him with all her all knowing green eyes. Not accusing but concerned.

Ben managed to suck air into his lungs. The black spots in front of his eyes disappeared. “Shit.”

She touched his arm and a shock ran up to his shoulder. “You’re white as a sheet.”

“A redhead?” was what came out of his mouth. “You said their mother was a small redhead?”

Grace blinked. “Yes, that’s what I heard about her.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.” He slid off the horse and walked away, his head pounding, his eyes stinging. He pressed his hands to the sides of his head. “Bernadette. Fucking
Bernadette
.”

Grace appeared beside him. “Who is Bernadette?”

“The housekeeper. She pretended to be the housekeeper. Goddammit!” He kicked at a nearby bush, the past rushing at him in full force. “Tell me what else you know about her.”

“It’s said the boys had three different fathers, but she never married any of them. She runs their businesses in secret, and she’s made a lot of money. Possibly close to a million.” Grace spoke softly, her words firm. “She runs the horse racing and trading, and the slave trade into Mexico. When you killed her second son, she declared war on the Grahams.”

Cold fear curdled in his stomach. “What did you say?”

“I’ve already warned Catherine. They were worried about you but only she knows I’ve come after you.”

He grabbed her upper arms. “Why didn’t you tell me about the threat against my family? You damn sure should have!”

“You didn’t seem to care about anything but your own misery. I got Catherine’s blessing to find you and bring you home, but only after you help me find Henry.” She stuck her chin up in the air, her eyes snapping. “Life is for the living and you’ve done absolutely none of it. Your own self-pity drove you to squirrel yourself away in the woods like a hermit. Don’t you dare be angry with me. I’m the one that came after you.”

Her words slammed into him like hammer blows. Each one rang with the truth, deflating his anger. His actions had caused one man’s death and could possibly cause his family to suffer. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if his crime caused harm to his family. They were the only people in the world who loved him, no matter what he did.