Wild Star (2 page)

Brent couldn’t bring himself to move.

“Go, damn you.”

Brent walked slowly past his father and out of the bedroom. He heard Laurel’s sobs, his father’s heavy breathing.

He didn’t feel the pain in his torn cheek. He felt nothing but emptiness.

Lunch started well enough. Alice DeWitt ladled out the stew, passing it to Byrony, who in turn served her brother and father. Plump, good-natured Maria had been gone for three months now. They could no longer afford to pay her miserable wage.

There was silence, for which Byrony was thankful. Anything other than silence was usually unpleasant. She glanced at her father, Madison DeWitt, and thought she saw the signs. He was crumbling a soft tortilla between his fingers, and his fleshy jowls were beginning to quiver.

The attack came swiftly.

“Lazy bitch,” he roared at his wife. “A man needs his food and you serve me up this garbage?”

He threw a thick earthen bowl filled with tasty beef stew across the dining room to smash against the whitewashed wall. Pieces of beef and vegetables fell on top of the mahogany sideboard. It was her mother’s prized piece of furniture.

“Do you think me a pig to give me such swill?”

It wasn’t a question, but Alice DeWitt said in her soft, wounded voice, “It’s filled with fine beef chunks, Madison. I thought you’d like it.”

“Silence. Since when do you pretend to think, you stupid cow?”

Madison DeWitt heaved back his chair and began to pull off his thick leather belt. His heavy face was flushed with rage, the pulse in his throat was pounding above the loosely knotted kerchief. Byrony couldn’t stop herself. She slipped out of her chair and moved to the other side of the table to stand beside her mother.

“Leave her alone, Father,” she said, her voice shaking even though she was fighting with all her might for calm. “Your temper has nothing to do with the stew, and you know it. You’re angry because Don Pedrorena sold his cattle for a better price.”

“Sit down and shut your trap,” Charlie said, eyeing his father’s belt with mild interest. He’d never felt the belt since he was thirteen years old. He leaned back in his chair, folding his arms over his chest. “Don Pedrorena is a damned liar and thief, all the Californios are scum. Someday—”

Byrony turned on her brother. “They are not, and you know it. You’re just jealous, both you and Father. If either of you had an ounce of—”

She never finished. Madison DeWitt slashed the belt downward across his daughter’s back. She lurched back, gasping at the pain. Alice DeWitt made a soft, keening noise, her hands fluttering helplessly. She made no move to interfere; it would do no good. She felt the pain with her daughter, her sweet daughter whom she’d tried all her life to protect.

“You’re as stupid as your mother,” Madison growled, and flayed the belt across her shoulders. “Both of you, worthless sluts. God save me from the stupidity of women.”

“Not God,” Byrony screamed at him, “the Devil.”

Byrony felt the cheap cotton of her gown rip as her father struck another blow. She fell to her knees, her arms going up to protect her head and face.

“Father,” Charlie said, calmly sipping at his wine, “don’t scar her. Didn’t you tell me you might get a good price for her? A husband wouldn’t appreciate welts or scars, you know.”

Madison DeWitt struck another blow before his son’s words penetrated his brain. He drew back, breathing hard. “A damned husband wouldn’t see her back until it was too late,” he said, but he didn’t strike her again. “Get up, you little slut,” he said. He turned his dark eyes to his cowering wife. “Get me something to eat, woman, and no more slop.” He threaded the belt through the loops of his trousers and sat down again, his rage spent, to drink another glass of whiskey with his son.

Byrony slowly inched up and sat back on her heels. She was wounded, in spirit as well as body, and her eyes blurred with hated tears. Why don’t I just keep my mouth shut? But she knew she couldn’t. She had to protect her mother. Her mother, after all, had protected her until just six months ago when Byrony had returned to San Diego at the death of her Aunt Ida in Boston. Aunt Ida, her mother’s older sister, who’d always answered the girl’s questions with “Your father’s a difficult man, my dear. Best you stay here. It’s what your mama wants, you know.”

Difficult? Dear God, the man was mad, his spurts of violence coming more often now that there was so little money. He’d beaten her three times since she’d returned. Byrony bit down on her lower lip to keep from crying out, both from pain and her helpless anger. It would only bring her father’s attention back to her. As silently as she could, she rose and slipped out of the dining room. She heard her father laugh at something Charlie said.

Alice DeWitt entered her daughter’s small bedroom nearly an hour later. Without a word, she dipped a soft cloth into warm water and began to sponge the welts.

“I hate him,” Byrony said between gritted teeth. “And Charlie, he’s become as much of an animal as your husband.”

“Your father has had many disappointments,” Alice said. It was a never-ending litany, as if his own failures excused his savage attacks.

“His disappointments are of his own making. Why don’t you leave him? Mother, we can go together, leave San Diego. We can go back to Boston. Aunt Ida had so many friends—”

“You shouldn’t have interfered,” Alice said. “I’ve told you not to, many times.” She must get married, Alice thought. Soon, so she’ll be safe.

 

The wind blew hot and dry across the top of the rise, making the endless sea of chaparral bend and dip. Several buzzards swooped down from the rise to the flatlands below, seeking prey, their flight slow and steady.

Byrony sat in the shade of a lone pine tree, her long legs spread out in front of her, her felt hat pushed back off her forehead. Her mare, Thorny, was tethered some distance away where she could forage at the scraggly bits of wild grass. It was a desolate place, a private place where no one came, except for Byrony. If the day were clear, like today, she could see the ocean in the distance and some of the buildings in San Diego. She shifted her weight and felt a painful pulling across her back. She found herself wondering yet again if all men were like her father and Charlie. Cruel, vicious, unable to accept their own mistakes, their own failures. Unlike her mother, she couldn’t excuse her father. He’d lost several head of cattle, all through his own carelessness, leaving them to seek out water from a poisoned well. And those that lived, he’d tried to sell, for little money. And Charlie, carousing in the saloons in San Diego, gambling with the same lack of luck that characterized her father.

She’d thought about escape many times in the past few months. She was nineteen, strong and healthy. She could earn her own way; she knew it. She remembered her brother’s words about selling her for a good price. A husband. She shuddered, picturing herself as her mother, bowed in spirit and health, old before her time. The thought froze her with fear. She wouldn’t accept violence from a husband like her mother did. She’d kill him first.

I’m beginning to think of violence as a way of life, she thought, as normal. Aunt Ida knew, but she never told me. She remembered her initial loneliness, her childish questions about her brother. “But, Aunt Ida, if Father is so difficult, why isn’t Charlie here with us?” And Ida had answered slowly, with finality, “Your brother, my dear, is strong and able to take care of himself. He’s safe enough.”

She thought of the scores of letters she’d written to her mother during those long years, and her mother’s letters to her, filled with love and affection and lies.

She told herself yet again that her mother had protected her. What would her girlhood have been like living with Madison DeWitt?

Thorny nickered suddenly, and she shook off her thoughts. She rose to her feet, shading her hand over her eyes, to see the approaching horse. It was Gabriel de Neve, son of Don Joaquín de Neve, a rich landowner and one of the despised Californios. She smiled at him as he reined in his beautiful bay stallion, Espada, and dismounted gracefully. Gabriel was twenty-one, not much taller than Byrony, his hair and eyes as black as a moonless night. His even teeth glistened white against his tanned face.

Like other rich Californios, Gabriel was dressed flamboyantly, his black pants belted at his waist by a colorful red silk sash, his black vest sewn with gold buttons. His black boots were of the finest leather, and his white shirt embroidered with gold threads.

“Como está?”
he asked lazily, grinning at her. He saw a flicker of pain in her fine green eyes, but didn’t understand it. It was gone before he could question it.

“I am fine, Gabriel,” she said. “I haven’t seen you for a week. What have you been doing?”

Gabriel flexed his sore arms. “Working the new horses,” he said. “Tough brutes. And you, Byrony, what have you been doing?”

Gabriel’s father didn’t realize that his son spoke perfect English, a fact that would have enraged him. Nor did his father know that he was seeing a
gringa
, the daughter of a man he considered a fool and a loudmouthed bully. But Gabriel couldn’t stay away from her. She was fresh, sweet, and so lovely it made him ache. He was so busy gazing at her, wondering how her flesh would feel beneath his fingers, that he scarce heard her reply.

Actually, Byrony uttered something inane and shrugged. Gabriel had followed her here to her private refuge some months ago, and now he seemed to know when she would ride out here. She didn’t really mind, for she liked him. He seemed kind and he loved to jest and laugh. He was a relief from the oppressive atmosphere in her home.

“You are quiet today,
niña
,” he said as he looped his stallion’s reins over the saddle pommel. He took a step toward her and was appalled when she shrank back. “What is the matter, Byrony? You act as though I were a bull ready to attack you.”

It was so apt that she nearly laughed. “Forgive me, Gabriel. I guess I’m just a bit nervous today.”

He frowned, wondering as he had many times before what was in her mind. She turned away to gaze out over the desolate landscape, and his eyes were drawn to her breeches. How his mother would screech at the sight of a girl so garbed. Her loose white shirt was momentarily flattened against her breasts by a gust of wind, and he swallowed. After the last time he had seen her, he’d been so filled with a man’s physical ache that he’d gone to a whore in San Diego. But it wasn’t the same thing.

He’ll guess something’s wrong if I don’t say something normal, Byrony thought. “Tell me about the new horses, Gabriel,” she said.

And he did.

The afternoon passed in pleasant conversation. Gabriel spoke of his family, and Byrony found she hungered to hear how pleasant life could be. Had it really been only six months since she’d left Aunt Ida’s house, her dear, fussy aunt who’d given her a home and love? And kept her away from men of all ages. She wondered briefly if Aunt Ida, spinster, had believed all men to be like her sister’s husband. Not that she’d ever said anything against Madison DeWitt, or any other man for that matter. But she’d never said anything positive either. Byrony brought her wandering attention back to Gabriel who was speaking of his own mother. Doña Carlota, Gabriel’s mother, was a laughing, gay woman, plump and loving, who adored playing tricks on Gabriel’s father. His brothers were fun-loving and hard workers at the rancho Los Pinos, and his youngest sister, Blanca, was silly, petted, and beautiful.

Gabriel was telling her about the festivities of the past Christmas when Byrony suddenly jumped to her feet. “Oh, my God. It will be dark very soon. My father—I must go, Gabriel.”

“I will accompany you home, Byrony,” he said as he gave her a foot up.

“No.”

She was clammy with fear, and felt sweat begin to trickle down her sides.

“Of course I will,” he said calmly, and turned his stallion beside her mare.

She would leave him before they reached the house. Her brain teemed with lies she would tell if her father saw her. She saw the lights in the distance and dug her heels into Thorny’s sides. “Good-bye, Gabriel,” she called, turning to wave to him.

“Watch out.”

His warning didn’t penetrate her mind until the tree branch swiped against her shoulder and hurled her from the saddle. She landed on her back, the breath momentarily knocked out of her. Gabriel jumped from his stallion’s back and knelt beside her.

“I’m all right,” she gasped. “So stupid.”

“Are you certain?” he asked. He put his arms around her as she struggled to her feet.

“Yes, yes,” she said, pulling away from him. “I must get home.”

“
Querida
, let me help you.”

She didn’t even hear the endearment. But she saw her brother and father standing in front of the house, smoking cigars. “Please go away,” she said to Gabriel, grasping the saddle pommel.

“All right,” he said. “I will see you again soon, Byrony.”

He wheeled about and galloped away. Byrony drew a deep breath and rode Thorny to the small stable. She dismounted, her body aching and pulling, and began the task of rubbing down her mare. She had nearly finished when she saw her father standing in the narrow doorway of the stable.

“So,” he said very slowly, very precisely, “you finally decided to leave your lover, huh, girl?”

She stared at him, not understanding his words.

“The rich little greaser, Gabriel de Neve,” he said, and spat into a pile of old straw.

“He is just a friend,” she said, her heart speeding up with fear. “Just a friend. I met him three months ago in San Diego.”

“And the friendly little greaser rips your shirt, daughter? You like being on your back?”

She looked down at the jagged tear at her shoulder. “I fell,” she said. “That’s all. A tree branch clipped me and I fell.”