Rebel (4 page)

She wished fervently that he had ordered his men to drag her through the swamp on foot. That would have been better than riding with him.
Feeling
his rage, his horror that she was the Moccasin. It seemed to burn
from him, from the arms that held Pye’s reins around her, from the hard-muscled wall of his chest. He was fire tonight, and she would be consumed in it. Cast into Rebel hell.

He seemed to be a mass of heat and muscled tension, and yet the very feel of him when he touched her was somehow colder than a northern ice floe.
As if he could not bear to touch her….

Perhaps that was well. Ian seemed to be a broad-shouldered, yet slender man. His appearance was deceptive, for it was his height, over six feet, that made him seem more lithe and lean when he was actually quite powerfully built. If he were to touch her, he might readily snap her neck, break her right in two.

Yet when they reached the clearing, he jumped swiftly from Pye. Briefly, his cobalt eyes lit upon hers. Blue fire He turned to his men. “See to the prisoner!” he ordered brusquely, then quickly strode to one of the cabins. He couldn’t bear to be near her, she thought. He was afraid that he’d strangle her, tear her limb from limb with his bare hands.

What would that matter, she wondered, feeling a sudden rise of hysteria, if she was to be hanged anyway? A quick death at his hands might be preferable.

Ah, but he was the famed Major Ian McKenzie. He’d never lower himself to the cold-blooded murder of a prisoner. Justice—Union justice—would have its way.

When Ian was gone, she realized that his men had been left as surprised as she. But one of the men quickly sprang to action. “My name’s Sam. Don’t try to escape, now, ma’am. Pye will just throw you, you know.”

Pye would throw her. The horse was as irritatingly loyal to his master as were Ian’s men.

Sam reached up to help her down. She didn’t know just how badly she had been shaken by the night’s events until she realized she could barely stand. Another soldier rushed to her side, supporting her. He looked at her with dazzled, dark brown eyes. Too bad this boy wasn’t her jailer, she thought. She’d be free in no time.

“Thank you,” she told him very softly.

Ah, but that was why they had called her the Moccasin. She’d eluded those sent to trap her time and time again.

Tonight, though, she would not escape. For in Ian’s eyes, she was condemned.

Again she wished she could cry out; she wanted to explain. In a way she wanted to shriek with pain, for all she had seen in his eyes. And in a way, she wanted to rail and beat against him for being all that he was. The Panther.

“Come along, ma’am,” Sam said. “I imagine the far cabin’s yours for the night. Gilbey, see to fresh water for the lady. Brian, post a guard.”

Sam escorted her to the cabin, keeping a hand loosely on her elbow as he helped her up a ladder to the platform flooring. Sam was polite, but firm. He lit a kerosene lantern, illuminating the cabin. “You should be comfortable enough,” Sam said. “Bed and blankets—clean sheets to wear while your clothing dries. Not much else here, I’m afraid. Ah, there’s a sliver of soap and there’s your pitcher and bowl. Gilbey will bring fresh water for washing and drinking. I’m afraid the bunk, the desk, and the chair are all the furnishings we have.”

“Well, Sam, I am quite impressed,” she murmured, attempting to do so with spirit.

There was a light rapping on the door. The young soldier with the deep dark eyes, obviously fairly new in the command, appeared with a big pitcher of fresh water, pouring some directly into the wash bowl for her.

“Sam,” he whispered, “it is a she, all right—is
she
really the Moccasin?”

“She’s the Moccasin,” Sam said wearily. “So it seems. Now get on down, Gilbey. Ma’am,” he said to Alaina, “we’ll leave you now.”

Sam came down the steps. Brian was sitting guard. Sam decided that he’d best take up that position as well. He sat, leaned against one of the thick pine support beams that kept the cabin sitting high off the ground. He pulled out his whittling knife and a piece of old oak he’d been working on a long time. “Go tell the major she’s in the cabin, set for the night,” he told Gilbey.

“But Sam—” Gilbey protested.

“Go,” Sam said.

Gilbey obeyed.

The temptation to wash the salt from her face became
more than Alaina could bear. The fresh water felt delicious. She forgot her peril for a moment, drank deeply, then swore softly and impatiently and shimmied her way out of boots, breeches, and shirt. She doused herself in the fresh water, even pouring it through her hair. Then she stood shivering again; there was no fire in the cabin, and though the late spring night was probably no less than seventy degrees, chills could set in. She found the clean sheet on the bed and wrapped herself in it. She sat cross-legged on the bed. They had left her water and a lamp. Probably far more than the Moccasin deserved. At least she would not die in sea-salted misery.

But that thought brought a sudden sob to her lips. He had been so terrifyingly furious. Ah, but no matter what his fury, he had dismissed her so cleanly! She might never see him again. She might die without ever having a chance to say…

To say what? They had chosen different paths, and nothing could change that. She had hated him often enough. She had to hate him now. She did hate him….

She didn’t hate him.

She hugged the sheet around her. She seemed to be ablaze on the inside, riddled with fear, with fury. She could demand mercy, surely…

Oh, God, not from him. Nor could she cajole, plea, bargain. She’d always told herself that she would die with dignity if she was caught. She’d never beg or plead….

But she’d do so tonight, just to touch him. Except that, oh, God…

She leaped to her feet in a whirl of frustration. She had to set her mind to finding a way to escape. She couldn’t plead or cajole, because he wouldn’t believe a word she said. She couldn’t bargain, because there was no longer anything she had that he might want. Again, a soft sob of rising panic escaped her.

Then she heard footsteps on the ladder, and she swung around quickly. The door to the cabin opened.

And he was there.

He had changed to dry clothing. His skin seemed very bronze in the lantern light; his eyes did not appear blue at all, but rather a deep and penetrating black. He stared at her so long that she thought she would scream and
beg him to shoot her and get it over with. Just when she thought that she would simply save everyone trouble and die on the spot, he spoke at last.

“The Moccasin,” he said softly. Then, “Goddamn you.”

“No!” she heard herself cry in return. “Goddamn
you
, Major McKenzie. You betrayed your state, not I!”

A lock of jet-black hair fallen over his forehead obscured what emotion she might have read in his eyes. Perhaps it was to her benefit; perhaps she didn’t want to know all that lay within their cobalt depths.

“Indeed. My state betrayed my country, madam. But that doesn’t matter now; politics don’t matter now. And whether God Himself is on my side or yours doesn’t matter, either. What matters, my dear Moccasin, is that you have been captured by the enemy, while I have not.”

Involuntarily, she sucked in a quick, fearful breath.

“Yes, I’ve been caught. So … Major McKenzie, just what do you intend to do with me?” she demanded with a false bravado.

He raised an arched, ebony brow. “What do I intend, madam? How does one deal with a deadly snake? Perhaps I should use against you every atrocity blamed upon the Yankees by such delicate hothouse belles as yourself. Plunder, rapine, slaughter!”

“Ian, surely…” she breathed.

But cobalt fires of fury remained in his eyes, in the wired tension of his lithe, powerfully muscled body.

And he had already started toward her.

A shriek seemed to tear apart the satin-rich darkness of the night.

One scream. Cut off.

Gilbey, having relayed his message and returned to the cabin in the major’s wake, leaped up from his position on the ground by the support pole.

“Did you hear that?” he demanded of Sam.

Sam kept whittling. He shrugged.

Gilbey persisted. “I know she’s supposed to be the Moccasin and all—”

“She is the Moccasin.” Sam remained calm. He had
completely ignored the high-pitched, terrified shriek. Gilbey didn’t know how he could do such a thing.

“Sam, this is bad. I’ve never seen the captain so mad, and that’s a fact,” Gilbey said, shaking his head worriedly. “I mean, sure, she’s the enemy and all, but… the major always said before that we weren’t hanging anybody. He’s always said he wasn’t judge and jury, and he wasn’t going to head any lynch mobs. But I’ve
never
seen him so mad. Do we leave such a young—-a young…”

“Lovely?” Sam suggested without looking up.

“Lovely, sweet—why, she’s just a stunning young girl, and that’s that! Do we leave her to the major when he’s in such a temper? He could really hurt her. He looks as if he’s ready to kill her.”

“He’s not going to kill her,” Sam assured Gilbey, his words soft and assured as he sat whittling his wood.

Gilbey walked over to stand in front of him, hands on his hips. “How can you be so damned sure, Sam? How can you be so all-fired certain?”

Sam looked up at him. “Haven’t you guessed yet, Gilbey? He ain’t gonna kill her, Gilbey, ’cause she’s Alaina.”

“Alaina?”

“Alaina
McKenzie
Dammit, Gilbey, she’s his wife.”

Gilbey’s jaw dropped, then worked hard before he could manage to speak again. “Wife? The Panther— married to the Moccasin?”

“Well, now, they do say that all things are fair in love and war,” Sam murmured. “Perhaps passion ought to be added into that saying as well,” he added dryly. He looked up at the moon, then glanced toward the cabin above him.

It was the war. The war had done terrible things to them all. Especially to the McKenzies, all of them, even with their special brand of honor, loyalty, dedication, and love. Brothers who had stuck together through thick and thin, and plenty of bloodshed in the shaping of the state, were suddenly torn assunder in their beliefs. Brother against brother, father against son.

Man against wife.

He felt a great wave of empathy for both Ian and his Southern wife. Alaina McKenzie couldn’t know yet just
what had been driving Ian so hard of late. Or why he’d be so ruthless now. And as to Ian, well…

Sam thought that the two of them might well be wondering just how and when they had started on this road so stained with bitterness and fraught with anger.

Had lover become enemy, or enemy become lover?

It had all begun quite some time ago….

May 1860

Cimarron

“B
y God, what the
hell
…”

Ian first saw the strange party assembled on his lawn when he led Pye off the river barge and looked southward toward his home, Cimarron. A group of young men, several in uniform, faced a young woman. The woman held a sword, as did one of the uniformed men.

What rude and dangerous folly was taking place upon his father’s lawn?

He leapt upon Pye and raced wildly toward the fray, ready to rescue the victim.

Except that there was no victim. He heard her laughter just as he reached the perimeter of the group, and reined in quickly, and thus got his first good look at his unknown guest—and saw her in action.

“Parry, you say?”

“Aye, dear mistress, and still, it’s the strength of the thrust that gives man the greater advantage!”

Laughter rose from the male audience at the play on words.

“The strength, you say—of the thrust? Parry, thrust, parry, thrust, so?” Her voice was soft, sweetly feminine—with just the slightest edge to it. She was deceptively delicate, elegant and angelic-looking. She didn’t bat an eye at the innuendo. She played them right along.

Indeed, Ian thought, there was something about her voice and manner that should have warned the young swains that she knew what she was about. She held a borrowed cavalry sword in good form in her right hand.

The sword seemed quite incongruous, for she appeared to be the epitome of the most perfect, charming Southern belle. Her day dress was a white and teal brocade, suitably chaste for afternoon wear, yet stylishly underscored by corset and petticoats in a manner that evocatively pinched her waist, flared her hips, and enhanced her breasts.

Her hair was a soft tawny gold; her eyes, at this distance, were a color to match its splendor. Gold, as well, cat’s eyes, and right now… they carried the slightest sparkle of the predator.

She knew she could take her man.

She suddenly moved forward; there was a quick clash of steel as she met her opponent and dueled with lightning-swift speed, grace, and cunning ruthlessness.

Her opponent’s sword flew in an arc across the lawn and into the bushes.

Having reached his home just in time to see the strange confrontation, Ian McKenzie found himself quite curious about the petite and tantalizing beauty who had just managed to make a fool of the cocky young man.

The bested fellow wore the uniform of a cavalry lieutenant. His name was Jay Pierpont; Ian had met him briefly at the Tampa base. To his credit, he handled his defeat with grace and a rueful sense of humor. “Brava!” he cried. Laughter welled within the crowd. “Jay! You’ve been taken by a woman!” someone teased.

The woman in question turned to Pierpont’s tormentor. “Well, my good sir, naturally, for I’ve had ever so talented a teacher in Jay.” The lithe beauty applauded in delight. “We’ve proven that a man’s great strength is not his best weapon, but rather the quality of thought within his head.”

“Gentlemen!” Jay cried. “The damsel is an amazingly apt student.”

“Certainly. I learned everything I know from this soldier in the last ten minutes!” she agreed.

Laughter rose again, and the sting of Pierpont’s defeat was soothed. Pierpont bowed to her; she curtsied deeply.

The dozen or so young men who had been on the lawn
then moved in more closely, all vying for her attention, fluttering like a swarm of moths about a flame.