White Nights (13 page)

“Yep, you said bossy. Twice. But
nonna
knows how to set a broken arm. She’s had lots of practice, first on my dad, then me. So far, Marco hasn’t broken anything.”

Settled between the covers, Rook closed his eyes, immediately aware that this was Sofia’s bed. Her scent surrounded him, and though he found her personality objectionable—after all, she was bossy, always nosing in his territory, he relaxed. When she returned and started working on his arm, he didn’t protest or make any snide remarks. Not even when she finished and made him sit so she could slide a large nightshirt over his head.

He even accepted a shot of whiskey laced with laudanum. Drifting off to sleep, he didn’t see her release her long dark hair and take a seat beside him. She pulled her brush through the long strands, her gaze never wavering from his sleeping form.

Alone with her sleeping children, Eirica glanced out of the doorway of her tent. The storm had finally passed, leaving behind a cold nip in the air. She rubbed her arms and stared out into the crystal-clear darkness. Though tired, she felt too restless to sleep so she wandered around the camp, picking her way carefully across the wet and muddy ground. Passing Coralie’s tent, she stopped when she heard whispered giggles coming from within.

She recognized Jessie’s laugh. Over the last couple of weeks, she’d noticed how much time the two women spent together when their husbands were on duty. Though happy for her new friends, she couldn’t help the twinge of envy. No matter what happened, they had a large, supportive family.

Maybe she could join them? She bit her lip. No. That would be intruding. She didn’t belong. Feeling a bit depressed and sorry for herself, she returned to her tent, blaming her pregnant state for her sudden weepiness. “You’re tired. That’s all. You just need a good night’s sleep,” she comforted herself.

Climbing between the covers in the midst of her sleeping children, she rolled onto her side and closed her eyes. Somewhere close by, she heard a low howl, followed by a voice ordering Wahoska to shut up. A few seconds later, the sounds of the wolf’s padding footsteps passed her tent, making her feel safe and secure.

Just as she drifted off to sleep, a noise had her bolting upright. She strained to hear. Was it inside, one of her children, or had it come from outside? Had the thief come to their camp?

A whimper broke the stillness and Eirica realized Alison was having a bad dream. She moved Ian to one side and gathered her elder daughter close, whispering until the little girl calmed.

The full extent of what lay ahead kept Eirica from sleeping. So many decisions. So many choices. And the well-being of her babies depended upon her making the right choices. She felt so alone. Then she recalled James’s words that she didn’t have to be alone. He was there for her.

Take him. He wants you, he loves you. He’d be a good father, a good husband.
Eirica reached into her pocket and pulled out the stone. In the dark, she remembered his advice to trust herself.

Trust yourself.

Two simple words but they were oh so complicated and so hard to do.

Thinking about James, about her feelings, she tried to analyze them. What did she feel for him?
Gratitude?
Yes.
Friendship?
Most definitely.
Resentment?
Yes, when he barged in and took over. But there was more. Did she
trust
him? Absolutely. But what about love? Did she love him?

And that was the crux of the matter. She’d thought herself in love with Birk but now knew she’d been in love with the idea of love. But what she felt for James was different, deeper. Harder to put a name to. She only knew she felt
something
for the man set to win her heart. He’d changed her. She no longer felt frozen, and there was an eagerness within her to live, to experience the joys of life that had once been denied her. Was it due to James or her freed state? Though she suspected both were responsible, she had to be sure. This time, she had to be sure of her feelings. Holding the warm rock in her hand, Eirica closed her eyes. Her mind conjured up James’s image and her imagination ran wild as she dreamt of their next kiss. As sleep claimed her, she thought maybe this time, she’d really, truly fallen in love.

Birk Macauley kicked a discarded tin cup that had been smashed flat by a wagon wheel and ground into the trail by countless feet. The sharp toe of his boot loosened it, sending it skittering ahead of him. When he reached it, he gave it another kick, uncaring that it narrowly missed a group of women walking ahead of him. The third time, it struck a gray-haired woman in the back.

The trio turned to glare at him, but when he glared back at them, baring his teeth in a leering smirk at the two younger women, they hooked elbows and moved off the trail, their steps hurried, as if afraid of him. Their fear made him feel good, started an ache deep inside of him, one he was having trouble subduing. There was only one woman he wanted, only one who could slake his lust.

Trudging alone, he scanned the men and women plodding along ahead, heads bent, steps slowing as the long day took its toll. Before him, he noticed a wagon painted completely blue, including the canvas top. He recognized that wagon. Damn. He’d seen it many times and knew it was the same as on both sides of the painted cover. Large black letters proclaimed their family name and city they were from. With hope rising, he carefully studied the faces of his fellow travelers. Yep, by damn, there was another group he recognized—three large families traveling together. He figured there had to be nigh on thirty children between them, ranging from screaming infants to lanky youths.

He quickly passed the noisy group, hating the sound of whining and crying brats. But for the first time in weeks, he was seeing familiar faces and wagons, which meant he was gaining on Wolf’s party. Without a heavy wagon and slow oxen to contend with over crossings and the rough, rocky parts of the trail, he’d put in more miles on foot per day than most of the emigrants were able to average.

Excitement rose within. Soon, he’d catch up with his runaway wife. He curled his fingers into tight fists and sent a cloud of sandy dust into the air with the toes of boots two sizes too large. He ignored the angry shout that came from behind. As he walked, he scanned the distant scenery, searching for large herds of cattle.

“That bitch will be sorry she left me.” The fury in his voice caused several nearby giggling girls to move away. Birk ignored them, heading toward a group of men pushing handcarts. With so many men traveling in small groups during the day, it was fairly easy to blend in, to look as though he belonged.

He spat on the ground, then wiped his cracked and dry lips with the back of his sleeve. As the day wore on, his heart jumped each time he spotted a red-haired woman or small child. Each time it turned out to be a stranger, his fury grew. If Eirica thought she could just up and leave him, hide behind the skirts of her new friends, she had another think coming. He’d teach her who was boss, and this time, he’d make sure they were alone so no one could stop him. When he got through with her, she’d never dare leave him again.

By the time dark swallowed up the last of the light, he knew he had to stop for the night. Aside from the possibility of missing his family in the dark, it was too risky to travel alone at night. He smirked and ran a hand along the barrel of the shotgun he’d taken from that old man. Easing his makeshift pack of supplies from his back, he glanced around for a place to bed down.

“Hey, you, move on,” a threatening voice ordered.

Birk scowled at the man, noted the gun pointed at him and hefted his pack onto his back. Threading his way around wagons, cattle and tents, loud, raucous laughter from a group of men drew his attention. His ears perked. Damn, he knew that barking laugh. He moved closer, heard another voice, rough and gravelly, make some ribald comment. More jeers and laughter followed.

Birk rubbed his hands together. Ah, things were looking up. He’d caught up to his old drinking buddies from before. He smacked his lips, easing into the circle of flickering light from the small fire to eye the three men hunched close to its warmth and light.

“Hey, Zeb. Long time no see.” He’d spent many a night before his near-drowning drinking with this ragtag group of men headed for California’s gold mines.

“Who’s that?” Zeb squinted in the growing dark. When recognition dawned, his eyes widened. “Well, boys, if it ain’t ol’ Birk. Ya ain’t been around for a spell. Figured ya’d gotten way ahead of us when we had to stop on account of Matt gettin’ hisself sick.”

Birk glanced at Pete and Rat. “Where is Matt?”

Zeb shook his head. “Tha’ son of a bitch didn’t make it.”

“That’s too bad.” He didn’t care if Matt died or not, it just meant there was more booze for him. Birk eyed the flask in Zeb’s hands and the pan of beans sitting off to one side of the fire. “Can a man join ya? I ain’t eaten yet.”

“What, wife ain’t fed ya?”

Birk scowled. “We gots separated.”

Zeb lifted a bushy brow, but he didn’t ask any questions. Instead, he motioned for Birk to sit and help himself.

Birk dropped down before the fire, keeping his meager possessions close. He licked his lips and scooped up the cold, crusted-over beans with his fingers. When he’d scraped the last one from the burnt bottom of the pan, he noisily sucked his fingers clean. With the edge of his hunger eased, he turned his attention to the flask of amber liquid sitting between Pete and Zeb. Without a word, Zeb tossed it to him.

He took a long swallow, felt the warmth slide down his throat and warm his belly, then passed it back. Secure among friends, he settled more comfortably on the hard ground, stretching his feet out before him, his boots close to the outer edge of embers. This was more like it. He eyed the three men, his brain working overtime to find a way to turn this bout of good luck to his advantage.

Stroking his chin, he played with the idea of joining them. Not only would he have food, he wouldn’t be as conspicuous as he was traveling alone. “Might like ta consider joining ya.”

Zeb leaned back on one elbow. “What about yer wife and kids?”

Over the fire and between chugs of whiskey, Birk told Zeb how he’d nearly drowned. He blamed it on Eirica, telling the three men that she’d left him, forcing him to come after her to reclaim his children. “The bitch watched me from the other side, her and them friends. Wouldn’t help me git across. Jest watched me fall. It’s their fault I nearly drowned, but I gots news fer them. I’s alive and I’s gonna take back what belongs ta me.” With each long swallow of cheap whiskey, his words slurred even more.

“She left you?” Zeb shook his head. “Had myself a pretty filly once.” His voice trailed off.

Pete spat in the fire. “Yeah, found herself some young, rich, han’some man,” he slurred.

Birk stopped in mid-swallow and lowered the bottle. Eirica wouldn’t do that, would she? The thought of her with another man sent blood pounding in his ears. Not once had he ever really considered that. She was too meek, too afraid of him. He’d trained her right, as his ma had trained him. Memories of his ma flooded his drink-hazed mind. As a child, she’d demanded that he “kiss the rod” before she beat him with it. And he had. He’d always accepted her beatings, her punishments, meekly. And during those times when her anger overrode all else, he’d envision doing the same—not to her, she’d been too strong, too domineering—but to someone else, like Eirica, his nearest neighbor.

The pleasure that came from pretending to do what his ma did to him had made his beatings bearable. Even as a grown man, he’d been able to stop her, could have struck her and ended her dominance over him, but he hadn’t. By then, he’d come to see those beatings as a release. After his ma staggered away, drunk, he’d go off by himself and release the raging fury inside by thinking of his beautiful neighbor and how she might someday meekly accept whatever he doled out to her.

From the time he’d met her, he’d been drawn to her quiet nature. Finally, after his ma died, he’d married her and had taught her to fear him—just as he’d feared his ma. He’d be damned if he’d allow anyone to take her from him. Realizing that he was hardening just thinking of Eirica and the punishments she deserved, he drew up his knees.

But now, he had another worry. Had she found herself another man? In his mind, he thought of the single men in the wagon train. He had no problem dismissing them all—except two. The eldest Jones and that too-pretty Baker boy. His breathing grew fast and shallow. If she dared to look at another man—

Zeb broke into his red-crazed vision by moving closer to take the bottle lying beside him. “That what she done?” His expression held pity and tore Birk from his dark thoughts.

Birk opened his mouth to deny it. She wouldn’t be stupid enough to let another man touch her, would she? Only now did he wonder if she hadn’t left him for another. That Jones family had been against him from the beginning. Though he refused to believe it was the truth, Zeb had handed him an easy way to garner sympathy.

“Don’t matter, I’m gonna get her back. Law says she belongs to me.” Let the other men believe Eirica had left him for another. Though it galled him to let Zeb think he couldn’t hold on to his own wife, he fell silent, watching the man stroke the ugly raised scar covering one cheek from the corner of his mouth to just below his eye. “So, how ’bout it? Will ya let me join ya until I gits what’s mine back?”

“I dunno. Seems there ain’t nothin’ in it for us. Why should we give you food?”

Birk narrowed his eyes. “When I catch up to my wife, I can pay ya then. She gots it all: the food, money, everything in the wagon.” He didn’t know if what he said was true or not. When he’d fallen into the Platte, he’d lost everything. He had no idea if the wagon had survived being stuck in the middle of the river. Was it gone?

“Seems pretty risky to me. What if she don’t come back to ya or let you have any money to pay me? Then me and them boys is out of food.”

“She can’t stop me from claiming my property. Neither can anyone else.”

He watched Zeb absently finger his scar. “Sure is an ugly scar. Someone ought to teach that Jones girl to mind her own business.” Birk knew it had come from Jessie Jones and her damn whip. It hadn’t taken Zeb long to discover that the “boy” who’d stopped Zeb from having fun with some woman out wandering alone—obviously some whore, seeing as no decent woman went wandering in the dark—and sliced his cheek open with a whip had really been Jessie Jones. Whenever Zeb got drunk, he talked on and on about getting his revenge.

Birk’s own resentment against the Jones girl reared its ugly head. Jessie had butted into his own affairs as well, and for that, he owed her.

Zeb shook his head. “Ain’t gonna be me. I ain’t gonna mess with that half-breed husband of hers. Me and the boys keep far away from him and his party. Don’t wanna mess with him.”

Birk paused in taking another drink. “Husband? She ain’t married.”

“Boy, you’s been gone too long. Should’ve been at Fort Laramie when all hell broke loose. That damn woman got herself and some kid kidnapped. Me and the boys was there, you know, enjoyin’ the fort and some of the willin’ women when all these injuns showed up—family of that breed. No sirree, I ain’t messin’ with him.”

Birk digested this news. Besides getting his wife back, he had a score to settle with both Jessie and Wolf. Maybe, just maybe, he and Zeb could team up. “Folk should still mind their own business. After all, a man’s entitled to a bit of fun,” he said, the words calculated to rile the other man into anger.

Zeb took a long drink, then spat on the ground, narrowly missing Rat, who’d bedded down a short distance away. “Yep. A man’s entitled. I’d have had me a beaut that night. Was out all alone, jest sittin’ on the bank, all lonely-like. Now, you and me, we knows no decent woman goes wanderin’ by herself. Nope. She was lookin’ fer action and I’d have shown her a good time. Then that damn boy—Jones woman—ruined it all.” Zeb fell quiet, then closed his eyes. His voice turned wistful.

“Ah, what a woman that li’l angel was. All this long red hair that felt like silk.” He grinned and squinted at Birk. “Had a nice set too, what with that bun warmin’ in her oven. But man, I ain’t never seen a face like hers. Like an angel. An angel, I tells ya, came down from heaven that night jest waitin’ fer me. If that woman belonged to me, I wouldn’t let her out’a my sight for a moment.”

Birk froze with the flask halfway to his lips. Zeb had never described the woman he’d tried to rape that night. Just called her his angel. But now, listening to him talk, it suddenly sounded like his pal was describing Eirica, his own wife.

Suddenly, it all made sense. Eirica and that damn Jones woman were friends. Hadn’t Jessie Jones come to Eirica’s aid with her whip the night Birk had decided to teach his wife a lesson, the night he’d been banished? He also knew that Wolf had warned Zeb away. Birk had just assumed that Wolf was once again butting in where he didn’t belong. But if Eirica and Jessie had been there together, it made perfect sense.

He also recalled the few times he’d woken to find Eirica gone from the tent. When she’d come in, she’d claimed to have gone out to relieve herself. Her being with child, he’d never doubted her. He’d just taken her again to help him get back to sleep. But now, he wondered.

What had she been doing out wandering around so late? Had she gone to meet someone, another man? Had she and that Jones woman been plotting to get rid of him? Red edged his vision and his heart sped up. It was just too much of a coincidence that Jessie had been there for it to be anyone but Eirica.

And what about Wolf? Had he been in on it, too? He’d warned Birk to lay off his wife. The gall of the man to dare tell him what to do still raised his anger. But all this pointed to the fact that it had to have been Eirica Zeb found near the river that night.

Then it hit him that the man sitting across him had lusted after his wife—had tried to
rape
Eirica. No one looked at his woman, let alone touched her. And now, listening to the lecher go on and on about what he wanted to do to his “angel” made Birk want to smash the bottle he held over Zeb’s ugly head.

He lowered the bottle, fighting to keep his rage under tight control. Right now, he needed a clear mind to think. He passed the bottle back to Zeb, then pulled his knife from his boot. Cleaning his nails with the sharp tip, he thought maybe he could use the man’s desire for Eirica to his advantage. His grip on the handle tightened.