Authors: Norah Hess
Mountain Rose (26 page)
"Should we wait for you?"
"No, you and Star go on. I'll met you at Liza's." Jamie sprang onto the roan, and with a jab of his heel, the horse cantered off. It took but a few minutes for Raegan and Star to get into dry clothes. Raegan locked Lobo in the cabin, then they, too, were racing away.
The fine drizzle stopped as the stallion and mare galloped along. The sun came out and shone hot, sending steam rising from the water-soaked earth, and perspiration popped out on the girls' bodies.
Liza, having passed by the kitchen window, saw Raegan and Star approaching the cabin. She muttered angrily under her breath, "I should have known she'd come hot-footin' over here."
She went to her bedroom door and glanced at the sleeping Chase, a crafty light coming into her eyes. She turned back then to watch the racing mounts come nearer and nearer. When they came to a plunging halt in the yard, she hurried into into her room.
"Let me check your bandages, Chase." She leaned over the bed, speaking fast in a high, unnatural voice.
Before Chase was fully awake, she was sitting on the bed, her body leaning suggestively over him. Chase grabbed her upper arms to push her away, growling that the dressing on his shoulder was fine. But Liza's strength was almost equal to his, and she refused to budge. When boot heels rang across the kitchen floor, she fastened her lips on his, stopping any other words he might have uttered.
When Raegan stood in the doorway, she saw what Liza intended her to see. Her husband holding a woman in his arms, kissing her passionately.
Raegan grasped the door frame, pain filling her green eyes, her vocal chords paralyzed. But there was nothing wrong with Star's voice. It rang out furiously. "What in the hell is goin' on here, Chase Donlin, you sneakin' rattlesnake."
Chase's body went rigid. Liza had deliberately set him up to cause trouble between him and Raegan. He fastened a none-too-gentle hand in Liza's hair and tore her lips off him. And she, a sham look of guilt on her face, sat up, making sure her robe slipped off one shoulder, plainly showing that she wore nothing else.
She gave Star a contemptuous look and sneered, "I heard you'd taken in another breed, Chase."
"You fat buffalo cow!" Star squealed and lunged for Liza.
Raegan shot out a hand and gripped her arm, holding her back. "Don't lower yourself to her level, Star," she said quietly. When Star reluctantly nodded, Raegan walked over to the bed. Chase met her searching gaze without shame or guilt.
"Well, Chase," she said finally, "what I just walked in on—was it what it appeared to be?"
Chase leaned up on his good arm, pain inching across his face as the wounded shoulder was disturbed. "I swear on my dead father's grave that it wasn't, Raegan."
Raegan looked at him another moment, then said, "I didn't think so. She turned cold eyes on Liza. "Where are his clothes? I'm taking him home."
"You can't do that!" Liza screeched. "He's too weak to sit a horse."
"You think she doesn't know that, blubber ass." Star moved to stand protectively beside Raegan, her hand on the hilt of her knife. "Jamie will be here any minute with a wagon."
Pure hatred shone in the glare Liza turned on the young girl. "It's not gonna help him, jolting around in a bouncing wagon."
"He won't bounce. Raegan will hold him in lovin' arms," Star taunted the livid-faced woman.
Her eyes narrow slits, jealous anger spurred Liza on. She took a step toward Star, hissing, "Listen, you dirty half-breed, keep your nose out of somethin' that's none of your business."
Star was ready to fly at Liza with clenched fists when Calvin, who had entered the room unnoticed, spoke sharply. "It's none of your business either, Liza, what Mrs. Donlin does with her husband."
Liza swung furious eyes on Calvin, opened her mouth, then snapped it shut. From outside came the sound of creaking wagon wheels. She did not want to tangle with Jamie Hart.
Raegan was never so glad to see Jamie as when he came walking into the bedroom. She was beginning to think that she would have to physically fight the wild-eyed woman in order to take her husband home.
Jamie sensed immediately the tense atmosphere. One look at Raegan's face, Star's furious one, and Liza's red one told him everything he needed to know. He grinned unpleasantly at his long-time enemy and drawled, "What's wrong, widder woman? Don't you want to give Raegan her man back?"
Liza glared at her tormentor a moment, then wheeled and ran outside. Jamie gave a harsh laugh, then picked up Chase's buckskins that had been thrown over the back of a chair.
"Go get in the wagon, girls. I'll get Chase dressed and we'll be on our way."
As Raegan climbed into the back of the wagon, its floor covered with several inches of hay, and Star clambered onto the high seat, a pair of hate-filled eyes watched them. "You may have him now, missy," Liza muttered to herself, "but not for long, you won't."
Long helped Jamie settle Chase into Raegan's arms, then Jamie muttered, "Thank you, Long," before climbing up beside Star and picking up the reins. As they slowly rolled out of Liza Jenkins's yard, Raegan gently pushed Chase's head down on her shoulder, and just as gently smoothed the hair back from his forehead.
"Ah, my love." Chase sighed, "there were times when I thought I'd never see your lovely face again."
The breath stopped in Raegan's lungs. Had she heard Chase right? Had he called her his love? She had to know. She took his chin and turned his head so that she could look into his face as she asked breathlessly, "Did you just now call me your love, Chase?"
"Of course I did." He looked deep into her eyes. "Surely you know that I'm eaten up with love for you—that you're my whole world."
"Oh, Chase." Glad tears sprang into Raegan's eyes and ran down her cheeks. "I didn't know, not for sure. You never said so."
"I didn't?" Chase looked surprised. "I thought sure you knew. Didn't my actions tell you how much I loved you?"
Raegan laughed softly. "Your actions told me how you enjoyed making love to me. How did know that it wasn't just lust that keeps you at me half the night?"
"I could have the same thought." Chase looked at her soberly. "You've been drivin' me crazy the way you see-saw back and forth. At night a passionate lover, by day a cool, reserved lady with hardly a kind word or smile at me. I was beginning to feel like a whore, like you were using
"Oh, Chase." Raegan's laugh trilled out. "A man can't be a whore."
"The hell he can't," Chase growled. "Maybe not for money, but when he's besotted with a woman, he'd give everything he owned to get her to love him."
"It's a shame you wasted all that love-making," Raegan said in pretended sympthay. "If you'd have asked, I would have told you that I've loved you from the day you rode up to my shack in Idaho." She trailed a finger around his firm lips. "Are you sorry now that you wasted all that energy making love to me?"
"Wait until I get you home, IH show you waste," he said, his voice husky with desire as he pulled her head down and covered her lips in a hungry kiss.
Jamie winked at a red-faced Star and tightened his grip on the reins, making the team go all the more slowly. The longer his friend had to wait to enjoy his wife's charms, the better he'd like them.
July had come and gone, and it was the middle of August. A tense uneasiness hung over the residents of Big Pine. The Tillamooks had stepped up their search for their woman, adding violence to their hunt.
A husband and wife living a few miles on the other side of Calvin Long's run-down shack had been tomahawked to death and fire set to their cabin. Ike Stevens and his family returned home from the village one day to find six of their hogs killed and one of their chicken houses burning.
There had been meetings at the village tavern, the men debating what to do about the threatening presence of the hostile Indians. Older, wiser heads pointed out that if they retaliated, they would be inviting a full-blown war with the tribe from across the Platte. They argued that they were too few to win a battle that would be
fierce and bloody; many lives would be lost.
They went on to suggest that it was time Roscoe was tracked down. He should be brought back and made to confess to the Indians that he alone was responsible for the woman's abduction, that no other white man had touched their woman. A big, bearded man named Rafferty was hired to bring Roscoe in, but as the people of Big Pine waited, the arguments continued.
"It's plain our first plan is not workin'," said Sid Johnson, who had come in from his fur post. "The Tillamook haven't gone away like we thought they would."
"That's true," one of the young trappers agreed, "And even providin' we do run down that worthless piece of buffalo dung, what if the squaw ain't with him? If he's killed her, which in all likelihood he has, who's to tell the Tillamooks he's the guilty one? Certainly Roscoe will deny it."
So it had gone, back and forth, the young men insisting that the only way to handle the heathens was to shoot and kill every Tillamook they saw. They bragged that it would be easy to fight the savages. Didn't they have guns and rifles, while the red man only had tomahawks and bows and arrows?
The family men countered that there were three times as many Indians across the river, and they would win by numbers alone.
The two factions still argued about what to do, with nothing being settled. The elders cautioned the young to be patient a little longer, while Rafferty tried to find Roscoe.
*
Raegan sat on her big front porch, trying to catch a cool breeze off the river. As she slowly rocked, she tried to remember how hot the Idaho summers had been.
Much hotter than here in the Oregon hills, she decided after some thought. The part of the territory she knew best had been dry and dusty, with no greenery to break the ugly monotony of squalid mining camps that had always been home to her.
"I won't think of those times," Raegan said, pushing Minersville out of her mind. She would think only of the present, of how happy she was now. Chase had fully recovered from the Indian attack and was once again a figure of raw physical power. Their nights were filled with sweet, sometimes wild, love-making. But however it was, it was beautiful, a blending of their souls as well as their bodies.
Raegan thought of bedtime, starting a flurry in the pit of her stomach. Before falling asleep, they would exhaust each other, drawing the last drop of desire and passion from each other. Her eyes grew smoky as she remembered how before Chase entered her they always paid homage to each other. That was a part of the magic in their love-making. They had known that magic in the daytime too, she remembered with a dreamy smile. Often a need of each other would arise when they were away from the cabin. Then, chance of being discovered only lent more excitement to the moment.
A horse whinnied down in the pasture, and
Raegan opened her eyes. She straightened up and smiled, seeing Star and Jamie down by the river. Two fishing poles were stuck into the bank, their lines dangling in the water while the two fishermen lay stretched out on the ground.
Were they sleeping? she wondered. The pair were much alike. They could work like the very devil when necessary, then laze away an entire day.
Raegan rose, stretched, then stepped off the porch and walked alongside the cabin to the back yard. She lazily picked a scattered weed from the flower beds, then her aimless steps took her to the corral. Her mare stood beneath a tree in the corner of the pen, listlessly swishing her long tail at the horseflies settling on her rump. Chase's big stallion had gotten to Beauty one night, and she would be dropping her foal any day now.
A wry smile twitched her lips. Strange that Chase's Sampson had sired a baby in one mating, while his master hadn't after countless couplings. She'd have to point that fact out to him when he returned from the village . . . tease him a bit.
At Raegan's call, Beauty approached her slowly, her belly big with her foal. Raegan scratched the smooth spot between her soft eyes, crooning to her in the way the animal liked. Beauty stretched her neck over the pole fence, nudging Raegan's shoulder. But when the caressing fingers reached to scratch the rough, pointed ears, the mare suddenly backed away, her eyes rolling uneasily.
"What's wrong, girl?" Raegan soothed gently. "No one is going to hurt you."
The words had barely left her mouth when Raegan heard the stealthy footsteps behind her. She wheeled around, the blood freezing in her veins. Was she to be attacked by another Tillamook?
But it was no Indian slipping up on her. "Roscoe!" she tried to gasp, but no sound came out of her mouth. Before she could move, dash for the cabin, the fat man was upon her. He grabbed her wrists and, slamming her against the corral, leered down at her stricken face. "I been waitin' a long time to get you alone, little purty, to show you what a real man is like."
"Take your hands off me, you dirty scum!" Raegan panted, kicking out at his shins, connecting with one.
"Ouch!" Anger flared in Roscoe's eyes. "If you want it rough, you'll get it rough, you little hellcat." He fastened a hand around both wrists, then fastened the free one in the neck of her bodice. There came the sound of ripping material, then the feel of hot air hitting the part of her breasts exposed by the low cut of her camisole.
Raegan began to struggle in earnest then, twisting her body, again kicking out at the man who clearly meant to rape her. Her puny strength was as nothing against his. He simply threw his great weight against her slender body, rendering her helpless. "I'm going to faint," she screamed inside herself as Roscoe ripped away the camisole and fastened his thick, wet lips on a shrinking breast.
"You musn't faint!" the inner voice that usually derided her now urged her to be strong. "If you faint, you'll be completely at his mercy. He can do as he likes with you then. Fight!"
Raegan didn't waste her strength on screaming. It was doubtful if Jamie could even hear her. She began to struggle with a strength bolstered by anger and terror. Roscoe's hand on her wrists loosened a bit as an arousal pushed at the front of his trousers. She grabbed the moment, jerking free and giving the obese man a hard push.
Caught by surprise and befuddled by the lust that gripped him, Roscoe sat down hard. Raegan darted away, heading for the barn. If she could get inside and bar the heavy door, she would be safe until Jamie eventually heard her screams.
After what seemed an interminable time, but could have only been seconds, the barn door stood in front of her. Panting her relief, she sprang through it and slammed it closed behind her. Her shaking fingers clutched the wooden bar to slide it home. Then it dropped to the ground, and she went flying backwards, landing on her back with a hard thump.
And while she fought to catch her breath, Roscoe was throwing himself on top of her. In the back of her mind she wondered how he could have gotten to her so quickly, but foremost in her thoughts was the certainty that she had to somehow fight off the animal muttering obscenities at her.
She managed to roll from under him, at the same time trying to scream. She could not utter a sound. The breath had been knocked from her lungs. As her horror-filled eyes watched Roscoe crawl toward her, she saw from the corners of her eyes a pitchfork standing in a pile of hay. Just as he stretched a grimy hand to grasp her ankle, she called on her remaining strength and jumped to her feet. In one leap, she grabbed the three-tined fork.
Roscoe had gotten to his knees when she lunged at him. The sharp prongs caught him on the side of the face, and blood spurted from the three punctures. He screamed with pain as his hands went to his wounds. Raegan stared at him for a split second, then dropped the fork and ran screaming from the barn. She headed for the river, yelling Jamie's name at the top of her voice.
"Raegan! What is it?" Jamie had swept to his feet and was running toward her, pulling off his shirt as he took in her near-naked condition.
She threw herself against him, sobbing hysterically, trying to talk at the same time. All Jamie could make out was "Roscoe."
"You're safe now, Raegan." He stroked her back. "Try to calm yourself and tell me what's happened."
Finally, realizing that she was indeed safe now, Raegan gained control of her emotions, and after a long shuddering breath managed to relate what had happened.
"The lousy bastard," Jamie ground out when she finished. He handed the pale-faced Star his shirt and motioned her to help Raegan into it. "I'm sure he's well away from here by now, but I'm gonna see if I can find him. Star, help Raegan
to the cabin and lock the door behind you."
"Be careful, Jamie." Star looked anxiously at him as she guided Raegan's arms through the garment's sleeves.
"Yes, Jamie," Raegan added her caution. "Roscoe is a sneak. He'll hide behind a tree and shoot you in the back."
Jamie's lips firmed grimly. Patting the gun at his hip, he said, "That one will never get behind this breed." He took off running toward the corral. Before Raegan and Star were halfway to the cabin, he was streaking away, riding the roan bareback.
"Who is this Roscoe?" Star asked, pouring a good amount of whiskey into a glass and handing it to Raegan.
Raegan took a long swallow of the amber-colored liquid. Roscoe had frightened her more than the Tillamook had. Maybe she was strange, but given the choice she would opt for death at the Indian's hand rather than be violated by the loathesome fat man.
After a second, smaller sip of the whiskey, Raegan was able to tell Star everything she knew about the man who had attacked her.
"Oh," Star exclaimed, her small face furious. "I hope Jamie finds him and cuts off his—"
"Exactly," Raegan cut off the rest of her heated exclamation.
Raegan was nearly back to normal when Star answered the door to Chase's knock. Raegan caught the teetering chair as she jumped to her feet and threw herself at him with a little wailing cry.
Chase's arms automatically opened to receive her, his surprised gaze taking in her tear-stained face. Holding her tight, he lifted a questioning look to Star. Where the irate girl related what had happened, an Indian word slipping in here and there, Chase's big body stiffened. "Jamie has gone after him," Star added.
"He'll not find the bastard," Chase grated. "Ill bet he's already beat it from these parts." he tilted Raegan's chin up so he could look into her eyes, "Did he . .. ?"
"No, Chase. I got away from him in time."
"Thank God." Chase hugged Raegan to him. The thought of the fat Roscoe violating his wife's delicate body brought bile rising to his throat.
"He hurt her breasts, though," Star announced tightly. "I saw the scratches on one when I put Jamie's shirt on her."
Chase's jaws clenched and a small tic beat in his cheek. Keeping an arm around Raegan's shoulder, he walked her toward the bedroom hall, saying over his shoulder, "I'm goin' to put Raegan to bed, Star. She needs to relax and sleep." \
"Yes, you do that." A mischievous grin quirked the corners of Star's lips. She didn't know if Raegan would get any sleep, but she knew exactly how the big trapper would relax his wife. She was still much an innocent, but the noises coming from the Donlin bedroom every night gave her a good idea what went on within the four walls.
She thought of Jamie, and blushing a bright red, quickly pushed him out of her mind.
Chase led Raegan to the bed and began disrobing her. When she stood bare before him, he picked her up and laid her on the bed. She watched him move to the washstand and fill the china bowl with water. He picked up a washcloth and her bar of scented soap and carried everything to the bed.
He smiled down at her as he placed the soap and water on her nightstand, then sat down on the edge of the bed. Picking up the piece of soft flannel, he lathered it with the soap; then, squeezing out the excess water, he began to move the cloth over her breasts.
He bit out an oath when he saw the two long scratches on one white mound. He dropped the cloth into the water and took up the soap to roll it back and forth in his palms until they were liberally covered with lather. Raegan watched him as slowly, caressingly, he began to massage her breasts, his soap-slick hands sliding over and under them. When her nipples hardened and jutted out in peaks, he gently squeezed each one, then wrung out the washcloth and wiped away the suds.
"You are so lovely," he murmured, lowering his head to her breasts, hunger for her in his eyes.
With a half sigh, half groan, Raegan stroked his head as his lips drew a pebble-hard nipple into his mouth. She felt clean again as he moved his head to nurse the other breast—not only from the bathing he had given her, but from the cleansing of his mouth. He had taken away the profanity of Roscoe's slobbering lips.
When Chase lifted his head and looked deep into her eyes, she read the question in them. She wound her arms around his shoulders and whispered, "I'm fine . . . now."
He dropped a tender kiss on her lips, then stood up and got out of his own clothes. Raegan hungrily eyed the long, hard arousal standing up against his flat stomach. She gave him a sultry look, and when she opened her arms and legs, he came to her.
Out in the kitchen, Star grinned when there came the familar sound of rhythmic protests coming from the big fourposter. Knowing from experience that she would hear that particular sound off and on for no telling how long, she decided that she might as well get the stew going for supper.
Jamie arrived home a couple of hours later, just as an exhausted, though contented-looking Chase walked down the hall from the bedroom. "How's Raegan?" Jamie drawled with amused eyes as his friend dropped into a chair.
"She's sleepin'," Chase answered shortly, knowing that both young people were aware that he had been making love to his wife the better part of the afternoon. "I don't suppose you caught up with that bastard," he said, cutting short any more teasing.
Jamie shook his head. "I rode all over the hills and several miles down the valley. Didn't see hide nor hell of him."
"I figured as much. Roscoe knows these hills too well. It would be no trick for him to give anybody the slip. It would take an Indian to find his trail." Chase scratched Lobo's ears when the wolf came and sat on his haunches at his feet. "It's too bad I had this fellow with me today. He'd have torn that buzzard's throat out."
"Do you reckon the woman is dead and that's why he ventured back this way?" Jamie asked.
"It's likely," Chase answered. "His ever-ridin' lust would bring him out of hiding, lookin' for another unfortunate woman to abuse."
Star glanced out the window. The sky was dimming rapidly, and evening was almost upon them. She interrupted Chase and Jamie's conversation. "If you two want to wash up, I'll put supper on the table."
"Did you cook it all by yourself?" Jamie asked, a pretended misgiving in his voice.
"Yes I did." Star wheeled on him, her hands on her hips. Staring at him belligerently, she stated sharply, "I've been cookin' since I was ten years old."
"Cookin' what? Mud pies?" Jamie taunted, then adroitly dodged the soup ladle she flung at his head as he went through the door.
"That little girl is gonna really get her Indian up one of these days and scalp you if you keep on raggin' her that way," Chase warned the tickled Jamie as he joined him at the wash bench.
"Ain't she somethin'?" Jamie answered, a proud note in his voice. "Nobody's ever gonna put anything over on her."
"No," Chase agreed gravely, "not unless she loves that somebody. She'd be very vulnerable to the man she gives her heart to."
Jamie wondered if Chase was throwing him a hint, warning him away from Star again. If he was, he was talking for nothing. That little spitfire wasn't about to give her heart to him. Hell, she backed away like a scared rabbit if he so much as touched her hand.