Savage Arrow (19 page)

“He will be a powerful, yet beloved, Historian,” Thunder Horse said.

After everyone was done eating, the dancing and singing resumed until the setting sun splashed orange hues along the horizon.

“I would like to walk,” Thunder Horse said, standing and reaching out a hand for Jessie. “Let us walk, talk, and enjoy the wonders of the sunset.”

Jessie took his hand and went down to the river with him, where they slowly walked along the bank.

“This is such a lovely place,” she murmured. “I imagine you hate having to leave it.”

“A part of it will remain here with me always,”
Thunder Horse said as he patted his chest over his heart. “Inside my heart I will carry many happy memories of the time spent here.”

He smiled at her. “But I can be happy elsewhere,” he added. “You see, Jessie, we Sioux love pure water, pure air, and clean land on which to place our tepees. We will find another place to set up our lodges and be as happy as before, even if that place is one assigned to us by the United States government.”

He sighed, then said, “This was all ours until the white pony soldiers came and took most of the land. But the one man who did the most damage was Reginald Vineyard. He took white gold from the sacred resting place of my Fox band’s past chiefs.”

“I’m so sorry,” Jessie murmured.

“He is the sorry one now,” Thunder Horse said. “My people’s shaman went and asked the spirits of the cave to haunt Reginald forever and ever. That is vengeance enough. Now I wish only to stay here long enough to fulfill my promise to my father—that he will be placed in the sacred cave, after which the cave will be sealed forever.”

Jessie again remembered those ghastly screams and sobs of fear that came from Reginald when he was having his nightmares. She now understood why those nightmares had tormented him so. She could not help feeling a little unnerved over the power the Sioux actually had to put curses on people.

“I’m so glad that the government gave you permission to stay until you were able to fulfill your promise
to your father,” she murmured. “It could have been so different.”

“It has been a struggle to stay, for the white soldier chief, whom you call the president, at first said we could not stay. He said we had sold our land to him and it was not ours anymore,” Thunder Horse said glumly. “But we had not sold it to him. Land is not owned by any one person. It has always been the land of our people. We took money for the use of the land. When the Sioux sold an acre, we thought of it as a temporary arrangement. We believed that when payment ceased, the land was to return to the tribe.”

He paused, then said, “To us, the land, the earth, is revered as our mother. Nothing can ever be done to diminish this land, nor to make it less for all those whose moccasins walked upon it, and for all those whose tracks are still to come. The White Soldier Chief listened, and in the end allowed us to stay, but for only as long as my father lives. We must leave immediately after my father is placed in the cave. In the meantime, we were warned not to cause trouble with whites.”

“Even my cousin,” Jessie said sadly.

“Yes, even your cousin,” Thunder Horse agreed. “But the form of revenge we have chosen is something he cannot prove even if he should try to explain what is causing his nightmares.” He smiled. “Should he tell, people would see him as a man whose mind has become warped, and they would laugh at him.”

He stopped and drew her into his arms. “Enough talk of such things,” he said. “My woman, all day I
have thought of you. Even when I was stalking the deer to bring home to my father, I was thinking of you and wanting you.”

“I have thought of you all day, too,” Jessie murmured, sighing with passion as he swept her closer, his dark eyes searching hers. “I love you so.”

His lips came down upon hers in a heated kiss. His hands between them molded her breasts.

She leaned into his hands, everything within her melting as he now placed a thigh between her legs and pressed it up and against her throbbing center.

“I need you so,” he whispered huskily against her lips.

“As . . . I . . . need you,” she said, almost swooning when he reached a hand up inside her skirt, caressing her where she already felt tender from want of him.

Suddenly he swept her up into his arms and ran with her along the riverbank. He stopped when they were far enough from the village to have intimate moments together beneath the starry heavens.

Thunder Horse laid Jessie where the grass was thick and green. He quickly disrobed her, then stood and let her watch him remove his clothes until he stood nude over her, his eyes branding her as he slowly swept them over her.

Although it was dark, there was enough light from the moon to reveal the need visible on the face of each.

Thunder Horse’s own ferocious hunger for her was like nothing he had ever felt before. He knelt down over her, a knee spreading her legs apart so that he could rest his throbbing manhood against her where she awaited his entry.

She twined her arms around his neck and smiled into his eyes as she felt pleasure beginning to spread through her. His fingers stroked her womanhood, and she was soon aflame with burning need.

This time there was no hesitation, only pure pleasure, especially when he thrust himself deep within her and began his rhythmic strokes.

Her entire being throbbed with quickening desire as she clung to him. His lips were on hers, kissing her wildly as their bodies strained together hungrily.

Feeling her tightening around his manhood as he reached even further within her, Thunder Horse felt electrified by a bolt of pure lightning. Her tightness, her yielding to his needs, made him groan against her lips.

And then he slid his mouth downward until he found one of her rosy nipples.

She sucked in a wild breath of wonder when he licked the nipple, then nipped at it with his teeth.

She clung.

She moaned.

She tossed her head as the pleasure mounted within her.

And then he again gave her a fierce, feverish kiss, as his hands moved between them to curve over her breasts.

Curls of heat tightened inside Jessie’s belly. She was shocked at the intensity of her feelings.

She was overcome by sweet agony, then sucked in a deep breath as she felt the pleasure spreading. It burst inside her like millions of sparks of light as the climax came fiercely, yet wonderfully, throughout her.

Thunder Horse felt his own excitement building
within him just as he knew it had begun within her. He clung to her and thrust over and over again inside her, then groaned and gave himself over to the pure ecstasy of the moment. He felt as if lightning were flashing off and on again within his brain.

And then he felt as if he were floating above himself while he savored these moments of bliss with the woman he would love forever.

They lay there, clinging, kissing, and straining against each other, and once again he felt himself ready to enter her.

He sculpted himself to her moist body. He pressed endlessly deeper within her.

They both drew in deep, ragged breaths, as again, so soon, the wonders of their togetherness brought them total ecstasy and release.

Truly exhausted, and breathing hard, Thunder Horse rolled away from Jessie and stretched out on the grass beside her.

“The long wait today as I hungered for you was worth it,” he said huskily. He reached for one of her hands and held it, smiling at her. “My woman, I want you to be my wife. I want you forever.”

“As I want you,” she murmured, finding it hard to believe that this was actually happening to her. Not so long ago, she had felt totally alone in the world.

She had not looked forward to living with Reginald. She had wanted her own life, her own man. She had wanted a father for her child.

And now she had it all.

Yes, it was like a dream, yet so very beautiful and real.

“We will marry as soon as it is possible,” he said, turning to face her as his hand ran slowly across her body, causing her flesh to quiver when he touched a vulnerable place.

“I will be ready whenever you say the time is right,” Jessie said, gazing in wonder at him when he suddenly stopped his hand over her belly, now slowly and gently stroking her there.

“A child,” he said, smiling at her. “A child grows within.”

“Yes,” she whispered. “I . . . I . . . wish it were yours.”

“It is,” he said, then moved over her again. Their lips come together in a sweet, slow kiss.

Then he laughed throatily as he sat up. “Twice tonight is enough,” he said, reaching for her clothes and pressing them into her arms.

“For me, too,” she giggled, already sliding the dress over her head.

Before he pulled his buckskin breeches on, she reached for that part of him that still was a mystery to her. She wondered how it could be smaller one minute, and so much larger the next, rejoiced at how it could send her to heaven and back.

She slowly moved her hand on him, then gave him a questioning look when he twined his fingers in her hair and slowly guided her face down toward him.

“Just one touch with your tongue is all I ask of you,” he said huskily. “Then we will return to the others.”

“Truly . . . you want me to . . . ?”she said reluctantly.

“It is not wrong when two people love,” he said, his eyes imploring her. “Just one flick . . .”

Stunned that there could be caresses such as this between a man and woman, she hesitated. Yet knowing that it meant so much to him, she cast aside all of her apprehensions and slowly placed her tongue on him. He threw his head back and moaned with guttural pleasure.

Then he straightened himself and took her hand away.

“I never knew. . . .” she said, her eyes wide.

“Lift your skirt,” he said, his eyes gazing intently into hers.

“My . . . skirt . . . ?” she said, swallowing hard.

“Yes. Let me do it for you,” he said, sliding the skirt of her dress up past her thighs.

“Lie down,” he said, his eyes twinkling into hers.

“But I thought you—”

“Just a flick of the tongue, as you did to me,” he said, smiling warmly at her.

“No, not there,” she said, gasping and blushing.

“Yes, but as I said, only a mere touch. Later, when you realize the pleasure to be had from such a caress, we will go further,” he said.

Recalling the intense pleasure that only one touch of her tongue had seemed to cause him, she could not say no to such a temptation.

She nodded, then closed her eyes and waited. She sucked in a breath of pure pleasure when he stroked her womanhood with his tongue, not once, but several times. Her head was swimming with the bliss it created in her.

It was so wondrous, she felt herself quickly go over the edge into a joy that surprised her.

He raised his head and smiled at her.

“I never . . .” she said, again blushing as he drew her skirt down to cover her.

“Yes, you did,” he said, laughing throatily.

They finished dressing, then walked hand in hand toward the village. Jessie was reeling from all she had shared with him tonight. This was something she would have thought so wicked, yet it had been joyful, blissful.

She giggled as she cast him a half glance.

He smiled, for he knew what had caused the giggle.

“We shall do it again,” he assured her.

Again she blushed and looked quickly away from him. She knew now that, when a man truly loved a woman, there were many more adventures than she would have ever dreamed of.

Jade stood wringing her hands as she watched Reginald ride away in his buggy. She had heard him talking to himself only moments ago as he paced back and forth in his study. She had happened along in the corridor just in time to hear him say that he was afraid for night to fall, afraid to go to bed. He said that he would go talk with the Sioux again, to see if they would listen to reason.

Jade had another fresh bruise on her face, for Reginald had slapped her again, much harder than the other times. She couldn’t help thinking of her Lee-Lee being abused by Reginald in the same way, to say nothing of the many men who frequented the crib where her daughter was imprisoned.

“
Tcha!
I have had enough!” she cried, having lost sight of Reginald as he made a turn in the road.

Ai
, she had to be brave enough to leave today. Jessie had left and hadn’t been found. So surely Jade could
be as fortunate. She just couldn’t wait any longer, hoping that Jessie might find a way to help her and Lee-Lee escape the madman’s clutches.

Nay. She would have to help herself, as well as her daughter.

“But will Jessie be discovered today when Reginald arrives at the Sioux village?” she said to herself as she hurried to the kitchen and started packing food in a lunch basket, as she always did when she went to visit Lee-Lee.

Today this basket of food would be an excuse to get Jade inside the crib again. But this time Lee-Lee would be leaving with her, not staying behind at the mercy of Tombstone’s unruly, filthy-minded men.

Jade already knew where she would take her daughter. She smiled as she thought of the safest place of all, a place where Reginald would never dare search for them. Jade and her daughter would be safe there until Jade thought of somewhere they could go to seek a new life away from this town that had meant nothing but heartache for Jade and Lee-Lee.

Breathing hard, her heart pounding with fear, she placed bread, cheese, a jar of jam, and other tasty morsels in the wicker basket, as well as matches and bottles of water, which would be necessary in their new temporary home.

By the time the food was all eaten, surely she would have devised a plan that would keep her and Lee-Lee safe. She must find a way to leave these parts and find a home where people treated Chinese women with a measure of respect.

She knew that she and Lee-Lee would have to work as servants in the homes of wealthy people. That was the only thing either of them could do in America.

If they were back home in China, ah, how different it would be. Her daughter would be chosen as someone’s wife and given a good life, and Lee-Lee would have brought her mother into the household.