Patricia Potter (34 page)

“It shouldn’t be.”

As an answer she merely moved closer to him, soaking up his presence, his scent, his warmth.

They stayed like that for a long while. Lobo knew he would measure the rest of his life by this hour, this afternoon. Of all the minutes of his life, these were the ones that made everything else worthwhile, that justified all the rest.

Willow finally broke the silence. She didn’t want to, but she had to know more about him, know how to surmount all those barriers he erected.

“Do you ever miss the Apaches?”

“No.” As so many of his answers, it was short and did not invite additional questions.

“Tell me about them?”

He looked down at her, at the calm, accepting interest that wasn’t the lurid curiosity he saw in the eyes of others who had asked the same question.

He shrugged. “They’re hard, but their life is hard. It always has been.”

“Did…did you ever have a family among them?”

Lobo knew she meant a wife. “No,” he said.

“Why did you finally leave?”

He thought she wanted to hear something heroic. Everyone did. But she had to know exactly what he was.

“I was captured again,” he said coolly. “Soldiers this time. They surprised the band I was with. An ambush. They went among the Apache, killing those who survived the attack.”

He heard her horrified gasp. “Yes,” he added dryly, “soldiers kill too. Women and children as well as the warriors. I was wounded and they would have killed me, too, but they saw my hair, and there were rewards for white captives. Instead of shooting me in the head, they tied me up and took me to the fort. I was the only one who survived.”

She looked at him with disbelief and horror.

He smiled slightly, but there was no emotion in it. “The Apache would have killed them, probably in more creative ways, if it had been the other way around.”

“Would
you
…” She was immediately sorry she’d asked that question. She knew the answer from his face. You learned what you were taught, what you saw, what you experienced. She knew that. He’d obviously never been exposed to or experienced love or compassion or forgiveness, and yet he had saved Sallie Sue, and Chad and Brady, each time risking his life.

“Yes,” he said again.

Willow was quiet, thinking about his past. She had been so lucky. Even though her mother had died, her father had been a loving though absentminded parent. And at the school she had been surrounded by friends, by safety and a place of belonging, of comfort. She knew he’d never had any of that.

“Was it…hard, when the Apaches first took you?”

He’d never said anything to another person about those years, had never felt the need to justify his time with the Apache. He simply hadn’t cared what anyone thought. Now he did. He cursed himself for feeling that way, but he did. He swallowed and he closed his eyes as he remembered that raid on the wagon train: the fire, the screams, the shots, the curses, and finally the silence, except from the terrified whimpering of the few children who lived. For a short while.

“They took my brother and me…and five others,” he said finally. “I was the only one who survived.”

“Your brother…”

“He couldn’t keep up. They left him in the desert to die.” The words were cold statement of fact, but Willow felt his body tense again, and she knew much more lay behind the words.

“And then?”

“I was given to an old woman as a slave.” This time there
was
emotion. Hard, bitter rage. Her hand curled around his as she felt the confusion and pain of a young boy torn from everything he knew and dragged into a completely hostile and unfamiliar world.

“But you…”

“…became one of them,” he finished for her. “Oh, yes, I became one of them. It was that or a painful death, and I didn’t want to give them any more satisfaction than I already had.” Each word was pronounced distinctly in a harsh voice that almost cracked with strain.

Her fingers tightened around his hand, and she drew it up to her mouth, touching the back of the hand with her mouth and holding it next to her cheek. She had to know the rest, and it was the rest that was so ugly.

“I killed the son of the chief when I was no more than a boy,” he continued. “And I kept on killing, because that’s how Apaches survive. They raid. They steal. From the Mexicans, from the whites. That’s been their way of life since their storytellers can recall.”

She started to say something, but he took his hand from hers and placed it against her mouth, silencing her. “No,” he said. “You have to know everything.”

Willow felt her heart thump wildly. He had tried to tell her bits and pieces before, but now he was forcing her to see everything. He was laying his soul open and she was both fascinated and frightened.

“The Apache didn’t trust me, but they discovered I had a skill they could use. Killing. I’ve killed more than my share of soldiers, Willow. I’ve killed Mexicans on raids. I’ve even killed white settlers once when I was being ‘tested’ by the Apache. Chrissakes, they were fools, taking land in the midst of Apache territory. I couldn’t feel sorry for them.” He looked her straight in the eye as he said the words, expecting disgust and condemnation.

But her eyes remained the same bright blue, a slight mist reflecting in them, like a morning fog over a deep mountain lake. He was lying partly. He had killed soldiers, but as far as he knew, he’d never killed a settler. It didn’t matter; he had been along on such raids and was as responsible as the Apaches who actually did the killing. He knew he was trying to frighten her away, to save her from pain later, and that was very important to him.

“That,” he added slowly, “is how I got my name. Lobo. Predator.”

“You’re much more than that,” Willow said, unable to bear his bitter self-examination anymore.

He shook his head. “Even the army recognized it. They wanted me to scout for them, to turn on my own kind—if anyone is my own kind. I guess the Apache was as much as any.” His laugh was mirthless.

“And then…” she said softly.

He shrugged. “I wouldn’t scout for them, but I quickly learned you needed money in the white man’s world. I wasn’t any damn good at begging for jobs no one would give a man who’d lived with Apaches, and nearly everyplace I went someone knew, or soon heard. Information like that travels. So I started to do what I do most naturally.”

“But you’re so good at a lot of things,” Willow observed. Her hand moved over his arm, feeling the hard muscles, feeling its strength, its comfort and safety.

“You just keep wanting to see the best, don’t you, lady?” he said. “Haven’t you heard anything I’ve said?”

“I’ve heard everything,” she said softly, “and I don’t think I’ve ever respected anyone more. I don’t understand how you even survived, and yet you still care…about people, about Chad, Sallie Sue.”

“They’re children,” he growled dismissively. “Besides, I never meant—”

“To help them? It was just instinctive,” she said with a glow of victory on her face. “What about Brady?”

“What about him?” Lobo growled again.

“You could have left him in the barn.”

“Should have.”

“But you didn’t.”

“Thought some damn fool woman or kid would go after him, then I’d have to go back anyway.”

Willow suddenly grinned at the unexpected explanation, and his harsh face broke for a moment, his expression first sheepish and then, for the first time ever, amused as he realized how lame the excuse sounded.

“I love you,” she whispered again. “And you have the most wonderful smile in the world.”

It instantly disappeared into a scowl.

She leaned up and kissed the scowl away. His face softened again, and she thought how absolutely handsome he was.

“That’s the last thing in the world you should do,” he finally replied.

“Probably,” she admitted.

“I’m fiddle-footed,” he said. “Restless. I’m always moving.”

“I know.”

“And men come after me thinkin’ they might be just a little bit faster.”

“I know.”

“Anyone around me can get in the crossfire.”

“I suppose so,” she said.

“What about the kids? I’m a god-awful example.”

“You’re a wonderful example.”

“Chrissakes!” It was said in a low, almost baffled tone.

“Even when you swear.”

“Hell.”

“And they all adore you.”

“Godammit, they can’t! They need someone like…the doc.” It nearly killed him to say so, but it was the truth.

He looked so frustrated that she had to smile, then grin, and he knew he’d been baited. Teasingly, lovingly, but nonetheless baited. He knew he should be angry, but she looked so fetching that he couldn’t do anything but return her kiss, feeling himself tighten up all over again.

Her hands went up around his neck, and he was wrapped in her magic, in the sweet yet challenging love that did the damnedest things to him. He felt his maleness swell again, the heat pulsing once more through his body as his lips firmed on hers, and the kiss became a contest, a contest over who could seduce the other the quickest. Soft and sweet, then wild and hot, until every one of his objections drowned in the heat of the moment. He didn’t bother to curse this time. He was lost before he knew it. Their hands were now familiar with each other’s clothing, and soon they were naked again and their bodies were melting one into the other, this time with a knowledge that spurred their movements.

He felt like the richest man on earth, and the luckiest His body, worshipping her as his words could not, moved slowly, reverently, within her until they were both spiraling out of control. He heard her small gasp as he reached deeper and deeper into the core of her, matching his movements to her response, and he wondered how he had gone through half his life without knowing that such exquisite pleasure existed. He could feel her body growing more and more fevered until she cried out with need, and he went as deep as he could, moving with ever-quickening rhythm as her body’s pace met his and raced it.

And then there was a shattering climax, one that sent floods, then ripples, of pleasure racing through them, satiating them, exhausting them into a happy, relaxed peace. He lifted his mouth from her neck where he’d been nibbling, and watched her. Her mouth was shaped into a contented smile, her eyes glittered like the brightest stars, and her cheeks flushed like roses.

He didn’t want to leave this time. He felt too good. His body felt too good. He didn’t have the energy to fight off a grasshopper, much less good intentions, so he pushed them away from his mind, absorbing only the immediacy, the smell of her hair, the touch of her body, the tingling of their skin as they savored the exquisite oneness they shared. Her hand went up and down his arm, ruffling the blond hairs she found there, and when she looked up at him he was one of her storybook gods.

The first coupling had been good, but there had been hesitancy on the part of both, fear on the part of both, guilt on the part of both. But now there was none of that, only the knowledge that something quite wonderful had happened, and a humming sound, like the blissful purr of a kitten that knew it had finally found a home, came from her throat. Lobo tried to tell himself this had been a mistake, a terrible blunder, but he couldn’t. If he lived a hundred years, this would be the one moment he’d never regret. He could only hope that neither would she.

The sun sunk lower, spreading a rosy haze across the place where they lay. His hands moved over every part of her body, fondling, loving, remembering. And then he moved slowly away from her, his intent gaze never leaving her face. There was so much he wanted to say, so much he needed to say, but he couldn’t. He wanted to pledge love, but nothing had changed. He was still Lobo, hired killer, wanderer, a man decent folks despised.

He wondered if she understood as she said she did. He wondered if she really knew he would leave. He wondered if she would eventually hate him for this afternoon.

“We’d better go,” he said, but not as roughly as before. There was a tenderness in his voice that made Willow want to sing, a sadness in his eyes that made her want to cry, a determination that made her want to scream.

She did none of them but merely stood and allowed him to refasten her buttons. He helped her up on the horse, and stood there for a moment, looking up at her.

“You go ahead,” he said finally. “I’ll follow in a few moments.”

“You will come back?” Willow couldn’t keep the sudden worry from her voice.

He stood silent, and when he spoke he sounded defeated. “I’ll come back,” he said before turning away from her and staring at the river.

She watched him for several seconds. Despite the obvious despair in his voice a few moments earlier, his back was straight, the head proud as she’d always seen it, and her heart thundered. He looked both very strong yet unguarded, a combination that was irresistible.

Willow turned her horse and went in the direction of the ranch, forcing herself not to look back. Her body felt complete, but her mind worried, wondering what was in his head. Despite his assurance, she suspected that he was thinking of leaving.