Lily's Secrets [Elk Creek 1] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (32 page)

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you
say
something?”

“It was not my place to make accusations or expose him.”

Wyatt heard the rest, the unsaid words as clear as a bell. It was not Dakota’s place to accuse a white man of a crime. How he must have hated sitting back, holding his tongue, all the while knowing who had attacked Lily and himself.

“I almost killed my best friend,” Wyatt chided.

“I would not have let you.”

Lily knelt down on Dakota’s other side and wrapped an arm around his back. “C’mon, let’s get you into town to see Thayne.”

Wyatt helped his wife get Dakota to his feet and together they half walked, half carried him over to the wagon before helping him up into the buckboard.

A few feet away from them, Brand knelt beside his father’s near- lifeless body.

Wyatt knew his anguish but could not find it in his heart to feel bad for Avery.

Then Brand said the words that shocked them all.

“Lilybelle, he wants you.”

“Lily, no. I don’t want you near him.”

“I know, but I need to do this, Wyatt.” She peered at him long and hard until he grudgingly nodded his agreement.

Lily rushed to Brand and Avery’s side before she lost her nerve. She knew she didn’t have much time because Avery probably didn’t have much time.

Lily didn’t know how she felt about this. She wasn’t exactly sad, but she wasn’t glad, never glad at the thought of a human life coming to an end. She was glad that he would soon no longer be around to hurt her or her family again.

Lily knelt beside Avery’s trampled body at the back of the buckboard. She cringed at the sight of jagged bone protruding from his right leg and left arm. She averted her eyes from his limbs to look at his face only to be met with the sight of blood streaming from his mouth and nose. Lily knew his ribs were probably broken, his lungs punctured, and he was more than likely bleeding inside as well as outside. She derived no pleasure from this knowledge, did not rejoice in his pain.

I am not a savage like him.

No matter how much she told herself this, her heart pounded with the idea that soon her long nightmare would finally be over.

Avery reached for her hand with his good one.

Lily took it, shocked at his strength when he squeezed her hand as he coughed and gurgled blood.

“You know they’re not good enough for you, Lilybelle. No one is good enough for you except me,” he rasped.

She tried to jerk her hand away but he held fast.

“Don’t run away before I can put your mind at ease, filly.”

“Put my mind at ease?” How could he possibly…

“Your husband and the redskin…the only ones to have you.”

“The only ones?” Lily choked on a sob as she realized what he meant. She had hoped, she had prayed in those brief moments when she’d first regained consciousness in the woods that he hadn’t…that Wyatt was still her only.

“Lucky bastards.” Avery wheezed and coughed one more time before he closed his eyes and lay still.

Lily stared at his motionless face, her heart expanding in her chest, not with happiness but with a sense of peace and…freedom.

“Lily?”

Distantly she felt Wyatt’s hand on her shoulder, heard his voice speaking to her, but she couldn’t yet move. She was too spellbound by the thought that the man who had caused her family so much pain and agony was dead. “He can’t hurt me anymore,” she murmured.

“No, he can’t.” Wyatt caught her around the shoulders and guided her to her feet.

Lily turned and threw her arms around him. She held tight as he instantly returned her hug. She buried her face against his chest and inhaled the fresh, comforting scent of him. He smelled like safety and security.

After a long moment, Wyatt pulled away slightly to look at her. “Okay?” he asked.

“I am now.”

Lily watched as Wyatt left her side to go to Brand.

He put a hand on Brand’s back. “Are you going to be okay?”

“I reckon I’ll have to be.” Brand turned anguished eyes on Wyatt and Lily’s heart ached for him. He wasn’t such a bad person. He certainly wasn’t his father. “I’m sorry, Wyatt. I didn’t know.”

Lily watched Wyatt nod, not sure what Brand would have done had he known and glad neither her husband nor Brand ever had to find out.

Lily went to Wyatt’s side and put a hand on his shoulder. “Wyatt, let’s get a wiggle on. Time’s a-wasting,” she said.

“Go,” Brand said. “I can handle…this.”

Wyatt nodded and patted him on the shoulder before he took Lily by the hand and led her to the front of the wagon. He helped her up in the front seat then climbed in beside her.

Lily looked at him then at their son sitting in back of the wagon, snuggled beneath Dakota’s good arm. She had her family all together with her now and after five years, she finally felt like she could breathe easy again. “Don’t be angry with me, Wyatt. I had to do it. I had to come.”

“I know, and I’m glad you did. You saved our lives.”

“No.” She shook her head. “We all saved each other’s lives.”

Baldwin Homestead, Oklahoma Territory, One month later

Little Wyatt ran from the house and jumped off the porch at full speed trying to keep up with his daddy’s and Uncle Dakota’s long-legged gaits as they left the house to welcome Grandpa Dyami to the homestead.

“Not so fast, young man!”

Little Wyatt’s mommy caught him by the back of the shirt and he could not help thinking that if he was still on the reservation with his grandpa and the rest of the tribe, he probably would not have had a shirt on for his mommy to catch him by.

“Mommy, they are going to leave me.”

“They aren’t going far. They’re just going to meet your grandfather and then the three of them are coming back to the house. Let grown-ups do their grown-up things.”

Little Wyatt sighed and turned around to come back into the house.

He followed his mother to the kitchen and sat on his knees in one of the chairs.

“Why don’t you help me make your daddy’s favorite?”

“Apple pie?” Little Wyatt started to drool at the thought. He loved his mommy’s apple pie as much as his daddy did. She only made it on special occasions and she said Dyami’s visit was a very special occasion.

Little Wyatt had never had apple pie on the reservation. There were many things on the reservation that he had not had, but the things he had missed the most before Uncle Dakota visited that last time were his mommy and daddy.

His mommy used to tell him all the time, when he was still a little kid and used to say he missed his daddy, that he could not miss something he never had. Even back then she used to tell him that his daddy was a good and strong man who loved him, but she would never tell him where his daddy was or why they could not all be together.

For a long time after the attack on the village, Little Wyatt thought he would never see his mommy again and never ever meet his daddy. Uncle Dakota was a good and strong man, too, and Little Wyatt knew Uncle Dakota loved him, but Uncle Dakota wasn’t Little Wyatt’s daddy no matter how much he loved Little Wyatt and no matter how much Little Wyatt loved him.

Now Little Wyatt was here on the farm with Mommy, Daddy, and Uncle Dakota together. And soon Grandpa Dyami would be here, too. All the people that Little Wyatt loved in the world would be in one place. Little Wyatt was happier than he could ever remember being.

He watched as his mother mixed peeled, sliced apples with flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and hot cider from the stove until it became a sticky, smooth concoction that she spooned into the pie shell she had prepared earlier.

“Here you go, helper.” She handed him the bowl with leftover filling. “Don’t tell Daddy.”

“No.” Little Wyatt shook his head, but he knew that Daddy would smell the apple filling on his breath like he always did, just like he knew Mommy knew he would.

Little Wyatt scooped out some of the filling with his pointer and closed his eyes as he put his finger in his mouth and the sweet, tangy taste of apple, sugar, and cinnamon burst on his tongue.

He opened his eyes to see his mommy staring at him as if she could not really believe he was there and he smiled at the same time she did. When she leaned her head forward he did, too, and rested his forehead on hers. They used to touch heads like this all the time back in the village before the raid where they lost more than half their tribe. Grandpa Dyami said they had their own little language and lived in their own little world, just the two of them, and Little Wyatt knew it was true.

Now there were four of them to share his and Mommy’s world like it was supposed to be—Mommy, Daddy, Uncle Dakota, and Little Wyatt, together forever just like Little Wyatt used to always dream it would be.

“Mommy?”

“Yes, baby?”

“I love you.”

“Oh, Little Wyatt, I love you, too.” She wrapped her arms around him, hugging him close and tight to her bosom, and Little Wyatt welcomed the old feeling of happiness and warmth he used to feel with his mommy in the village. He had feared that he would never feel this way again.

When Mommy pulled away to look at him, he saw the tears in her eyes. Little Wyatt reached out to catch them with his fingers. “Do not cry, Mommy. All is well.”

“You sound just like your Uncle Dakota.” She laughed. “And you’re right. All is well.”

For the first time in a long time, Little Wyatt really believed it.

For the first time in a long time, Little Wyatt felt like he was finally home.

THE END

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Gracie C. McKeever writes exclusively for Siren as Gigi Moore.

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