Touch the Wind (30 page)

The part of her mind that could think clearly remembered
the hours she had slept while Ráfaga had remained awake, sitting alone in the main room. He had been plagued by the knowledge of what awaited her this morning. It explained the brooding anger that was never quite directed at her.

Understanding this didn’t make it any easier to accept what was to happen. She strained against his arms, objecting to his attempt to comfort her.

Ráfaga let her wedge a space between them, an arm remaining firmly around her waist to keep her arched toward him. His other hand rested on the curve of her neck and shoulder, his fingers digging into the cord and his thumb pressing against the bone of her jaw and chin. His dark eyes looked deeply into hers, seeing the crackling fires of resentment and fear.

“I hate you for this,” Sheila declared, her voice trembling.

“
Sí
. And you will hate me more before the day is over.” There was a knock at the door. Sheila’s head jerked toward the sound, her heart stopping its beat for a split second. “It is time,” Ráfaga announced coldly.

A stifled cry ripped from her throat. She tried to pull free of his hold, struggling to escape, but he held her easily.

“You are a woman, a
norte americano.”
Ráfaga spoke in a low, slashing voice. “It is expected that you will weep and beg not to be taken, that you will swoon at the sight of the whip, or cower and be dragged to the posts. That is the way they expect you to behave.”

Sheila stiffened, recognizing the challenge he made. She had a vision of herself reacting in the way he had described and knew she could not live with that kind of humiliation. A coldness swept over Sheila to numb her senses and freeze out the horrors of her imagination.

“You may let me go.” The look she gave him was cool. “I will not run.”

“You are going to disappoint them?” There was something of a taunt in his voice.

There was another knock at the door, more demanding
than the first. “You’d better answer that,” she said coldly.

His dark gaze made a considering sweep of her face. Then he released her and walked to the door, opening it wide. Two men stood outside, horses tied to the post. One spoke quietly to Ráfaga while both glanced past him to Sheila, eyeing her with undisguised curiosity. She returned their looks, unflinching and faintly haughty.

Ráfaga turned, announcing impassively to her, “We will go now.”

Her legs were remarkably steady as she walked past him and through the doorway, deliberately ignoring the two men. Outside she paused, surveying the horses, permitting herself a moment of sorrow that the roan mare would never again be waiting for her.

“Which one am I to ride? Or . . .”—her gaze slid idly to Ráfaga—“. . . am I to walk, herded like an animal to the slaughter?”

“You will ride the bay,” Ráfaga answered smoothly.

His horse. As Sheila walked to it, one of the men untied the reins from the post. Sheila mounted and held out a hand to take the reins, but the man kept them as he mounted his own horse. Again she looked at Ráfaga.

“Will you tell your man that I don’t need to be led? I am capable of guiding my horse in the right direction.”

Without a flicker of emotion, Ráfaga said something in Spanish to the man. Evidently he had relayed her statement because the man hesitated, skeptical of the wisdom in giving Sheila the reins. But he didn’t argue.

With shoulders squared and her head erect, Sheila turned the bay toward the houses, waiting for Ráfaga to climb aboard his horse before nudging the bay into a walk. Ráfaga rode at her side, the other two men following behind them.

As before, when Juan Ortega had been brought to the hollow for punishment, everyone in the canyon was gathered there. A tight-lipped Laredo stood waiting,
his hands on his hips. He grabbed hold of Ráfaga’s reins.

“You can’t go through with this, Ráfaga,” Laredo growled.

“I cannot stop it,” was the flat reply.

Sheila let her gaze sweep the hollow before dismounting, deaf to the plea Laredo was making on her behalf. The gentle Juan appeared at her side, his hat in hand, his dark eyes filled with pain.

“
Señora
—” he began.

Sheila looked at him, seeing the self-blame in his expression. She allowed her numbed senses to feel for a moment. “This isn’t your fault,” she assured him quietly. “I am sorry about Arriba. I didn’t take very good care of her.”

“
Señora,
please, I—”

But Sheila turned away, shutting him out. Her voice was again chillingly cold as she addressed Ráfaga. “I believe I’m supposed to go to the center of the hollow, aren’t I, so they can all see me?”

His features were equally cold as he nodded. “Yes.”

She took one step before her path was blocked by Laredo. “I swear I never believed Ráfaga would let this happen, Sheila,” he declared huskily. “If I had, I would have knocked his rifle away before he shot the horse out from under you.”

There was a regal lift of her chin. “It’s too late to think about that now. Please move out of my way.”

The boyish look to Laredo’s features was obliterated by a haunting grimness. After a split second’s hesitation, he stepped to the side. He reached to take her arm, saying tautly, “I’ll walk with you.”

Sheila drew her arm away, scorning his gesture of support with cold pride. “I’ll walk by myself.”

Flanked by Laredo and Ráfaga, she walked to the center of the hollow near the two posts. She saw the curious eyes watching her and felt the silent questioning as they wondered how long her self-control would last.

That knowledge stiffened her spine. They expected
her to cringe in terror, this band of criminals and outcasts. It made Sheila more determined not to be an object of amusement and scorn for them.

As Ráfaga stepped forward to state the reason for her punishment, Sheila turned her attention to him. He spoke in the low tone that carried clearly in the silence, devoid of any emotion. Although she couldn’t understand his words, she sensed an eloquence in his speech.

When he had finished, there was a quiet murmur of voices instead of the agreeing silence that had followed his explanation of the reason for Juan Ortega’s punishment. Sheila permitted a glimmer of hope to shine that perhaps Ráfaga had dissuaded them from seeing her punished for trying to escape.

A voice, a woman’s voice, spoke sharply above the indecisive murmurs. Sheila turned, catching sight of Elena. Malevolent dark eyes glared their dislike at Sheila. The brunette’s spiteful voice was riddled with condemnation as she viciously argued for Sheila’s punishment.

Her malicious words were still ringing in the air when Juan stepped forward to defend Sheila. Laredo stood at his side, signaling by his presence his agreement with all that Juan said. There was a slight constriction of her heart at the sight of her two champions, but Sheila wouldn’t permit her feelings to show.

Juan’s impassioned plea seemed to have swayed the people to Sheila’s side until someone else spoke up. It was a moment before Sheila could locate the jeering Spanish voice. She went cold when she saw Juan Ortega.

His broad face was contorted with the look of vengeance, his lips sneering at her, revealing his yellowed and chipped teeth. His shoulders were stiffly hunched to indicate the pain he still endured from his whipping. There was a sickly pallor about his face, indicating his recovery was not yet complete.

Sheila’s slightly widened gaze shifted to Ráfaga, who was listening impassively to Juan Ortega’s denouncement. Then it slid to Laredo, who had turned away, a
defeated look in his blue eyes. She caught his glance and held it.

“What is he saying?” she whispered, barely moving her lips.

Laredo walked to her side, not looking at her as he answered her question. “He’s telling them that it doesn’t matter what your reason was for leaving here or the circumstances surrounding it. He’s reminding them that he was punished for disobeying an order—an order that he had forgotten in his weakness when you invited him into the house and flaunted your womanhood in front of him. If his reason could not save him from the whip, then neither must yours. And he’s reminding them that, your flight nearly resulted in allowing a government patrol to find this canyon. If for no other reason, you should be punished for that.”

When Juan Ortega stopped talking, there were nods of agreement all around. Some were reluctant, but most heartily endorsed the speech. Sheila didn’t need to be told that her last hope to be spared had died.

For several seconds, no one seemed to move. Finally. Ráfaga turned to face her. A muscle was twitching convulsively in his jaw, but there was no other sign that he disagreed with the sentence. A tremor quivered through Sheila’s knees, but she steeled them to support herself as she returned Ráfaga’s impassive look.

Not waiting for him to issue the command, Sheila turned and walked to the twin posts, standing between them, her head held proudly erect. Ráfaga signaled to one man to tie her up while another brought him the whip. A rope was slipped around her left wrist by the first man and drawn tightly against her flesh.

Laredo was at her side in a flash, his arm barring the man from fastening the hope to the post. He glanced over his shoulder at Ráfaga, his eyes glinting with blue fire.

“Damn it, Ráfaga, you can’t do this to her!” he snapped savagely.

“Step aside,” Ráfaga ordered, showing complete indifference to the protest.

“For God’s sake, man, at least let me take her place!” Laredo hurled desperately, seeking any alternative to spare Sheila.

His demand sliced the thread. Black fury flamed to darken Ráfaga’s expression. “Do you think
I
would not stand in her place if I could?” he hurled with savage anger. “Move away from her!”

Electrical currents charged the air between the two men until Laredo finally backed down, lowering his arm to let Sheila be tied to the post. Tortured blue eyes glanced briefly at Sheila before Laredo stepped away, his head bent in frustration.

While her right arm was being tied to the other post, Sheila stared at Ráfaga, icy fear churning her stomach as she tried not to look at the whip in his hand. She wanted to cry, to beg him not to do this despicable, cruel thing. But gazing into his rugged face, again completely devoid of expression, his emotions totally controlled, gave her the strength to keep her fear silent.

Instead of begging for a mercy she would not be shown, Sheila tipped her head with defiant pride to taunt. “Who is going to use the whip on me? You, Ráfaga?”

“No.” He said it so quietly that she had to strain to hear it. His dark gaze slid to Laredo, his back turned to them as if trying to shut out the sight of Sheila tied between the two poles. “It will be Laredo who will have the whip in his hand.”

Sheila had no difficulty hearing that. Neither did Laredo as he pivoted, a frown of angry disbelief lining his face.

“You can’t ask me to do that!” he declared in a tortured breath.

Ráfaga held out the whip, saying quietly, “I would trust the whip in no one else’s hand,
amigo
.”

There was a moment of indecision as Laredo stared at him. Then he took the whip from Ráfaga’s hand and walked around the posts to a spot somewhere behind Sheila. Ráfaga looked at Sheila, meeting her eyes for a
minute. Then he ducked beneath her arm to stand behind her.

Her muscles tensed as she felt the cold metal of a knife blade slide beneath her blouse, the dull side touching her skin. Then the razor-sharp edge was slashing through material down the center of her back. He walked back to Laredo.

“It is time,” he said, then gave a faint nod to Laredo.

Beads of perspiration broke out on Sheila’s forehead. Behind her the whip cracked three times in rapid succession. Fear knotted her stomach as she heard the whir of rawhide whizzing through the air. Sheila braced herself, curling her fingers around the rope that tied her wrists to the poles. Nothing could prepare her for the biting lash of the whip against the bare skin of her back.

A gasping cry of pain escaped from her throat. Gritting
her teeth, she tried to swallow the scream, partially succeeding. Again she heard the snaking whir before she felt the thousands of needles stab her back in a whipping line. This time Sheila bit into her lip to smother the moan of pain.

Tears raced down her cheeks, although she wasn’t aware of crying. There was only the excruciating pain streaking her back. She knew Ráfaga was standing in front of her, but she couldn’t see him anymore. Her senses were drowning in pain.

Five or six times—Sheila lost count of the lashes—she endured the striking whip. The next time, her knees buckled beneath her and she sagged to the ground, all. of her weight being taken by the ropes. Her arms were nearly pulled from their sockets, but she didn’t feel her limbs.

Her head lolled forward, hair plastered to her forehead and neck by the sweat running from her pores. In a stupor of pain, Sheila waited, half-conscious for the next cutting slash of the whip. Perspiration stung her eyes and she couldn’t see.

There was the salty taste of blood in her mouth, her own blood seeping from the wound in her lip made by her teeth. She waited for the bite of the rawhide lash, and waited. When it didn’t come, Sheila tried to get her legs beneath her and rise.

Ráfaga’s voice came to her. “Stay down,” he ordered hoarsely. “I can stop this if you do not get up,
querida.”

Sheila heard him. She even understood him. Somehow she couldn’t get his message to her legs. A powerful animal instinct was making her rise, as if to stay down would be to die.

Someone swore savagely in Spanish. Erratic moaning sobs were coming from somewhere close by. Sheila wasn’t aware they were being made in her own throat. Then she was standing, swaying unsteadily.

Her heart was pounding like that of a wild rabbit caught in the talons of an eagle. She didn’t hear the snake of the whip and her body jerked convulsively as it cracked against her skin. Sheila was nearly driven to her knees again, but the adrenaline being pumped through her veins gave her the strength to stay upright. Again and again the whip lashed her back. Sheila staggered to one knee, nearly unconscious now. She tried to rise.