“Will he do?” Swift asked Hunter.
Hunter, busily checking his arrows and war ax, looked up. “His forehead and hands need something.”
Swift smeared the places in question. Hilton cocked an eyebrow. “Is this Comanche medicine?”
“You could say that,” Swift replied. “It’ll keep you from glowing in the dark and getting your butt shot off.”
Hilton shrugged and bent his head so Swift could get his brow. “That’s good enough medicine for me.”
“It always was for us, too,” Hunter shot back. He sheathed his ax and went to hug his family good-bye. When he drew Loretta into his arms, he said, “Pray on your beads, little one.” He turned toward Chase and chucked him under the chin. “You pray, too, eh? Say many hell Marys so I come home safely.”
“Hail,” Loretta corrected.
Hunter bent to kiss his daughter, then scrubbed to remove the paint he left on her cheek. Swift, anxious to be gone, waited by the front door. Loretta followed the men out when they exited the house. Standing on the porch, she waved them off.
As Swift started into the barn, she called, “Don’t use those guns unless you have to. Your future may ride on it.”
As far as Swift could see, he wouldn’t have a future to worry about if something happened to Amy.
The first thing Amy became aware of was pain slicing through the back of her head. She frowned and tried to rub the spot, only to find her wrists were bound behind her back. She surfaced to consciousness by measures, first becoming aware that she was lying facedown on a cold wooden floor. Dust and grit filmed her tongue. She no sooner registered that than she heard boots scuffling and spurs jangling. From the corner of her eye, she saw a man sitting down beside her on a wooden crate. She slitted her eyes and turned her head toward him.
A Mexican spur gleamed back at her in the feeble firelight. Her gaze inched up his leather pant leg, taking in the silver conchae along the side seam, coming to rest on the deadly looking six-shooter at his hip. She glanced up at his swarthy face, shadowed by a sweat-rimmed hat. Steve Lowdry.
Memory came rushing back to her—standing outside the community hall, a man looming out of the darkness to grab her arm, a knife pricking her throat. She had struggled, and something had hit her on the head. After that, blackness.
She shot a quick glance around the dimly lit room, taking in the cobwebs and filth. A deserted mine shack? In the shadows across the room, she saw two other men, one standing at a window, another sitting on the floor with his back to the wall. Silver conchae glinted in the firelight. The stench of their unwashed bodies surrounded her. Comancheros.
Such an icy terror clutched Amy that for a moment she felt like a corpse in the first stages of rigor mortis. Her heart stopped. Her lungs quit working. A bone-deep cold seeped through her body.
When at last her heart started up again, it did so with a painful lurch against her rib cage. A breath shivered down her throat and stopped midway, leaving her starved for oxygen and working her lips like a beached fish. A heavy, urgent ache centered low in her belly.
“Well, now. Lookee here who’s awake.”
Lowdry lifted his boot and toed Amy on the hip, rolling her onto her back. Her arms felt as if they might break, twisted as they were under her weight. She closed her eyes. Not seeing was to retain her sanity. If she looked into Steve Lowdry’s face, she might lose her grip.
She heard a rustle of movement. A heavy hand settled on her midriff.
“Say, there, you playin’ possum, honey? That’s a good name for her, ain’t it, Poke?” The hand grabbed her hair. “Curls like honey. What else you got like honey, honey?”
One of the men from across the room laughed. “Lopez won’t get here for a spell. Wha’d’ya say we do a little samplin’ and find out?”
Lowdry chuckled. “Wha’d’ya say to that, pretty thing?”
A third voice, gruff and gravelly, said, “You know what they say about gals named Honey, don’t ya?” He guffawed. “They’re easy to spread.”
The hand released Amy’s hair. The next instant hard fingers gripped her ankle and began dragging her across the room. The planked floor barked her twisted arms, slivering through the sleeves of her dress. She clenched her teeth. Heat from the fire washed over her body. Behind her eyelids she could see golden light. Lowdry released her ankle and let it fall to the floor.
Amy kept her teeth clenched and her eyes closed. She knew what was coming. Fear fragmented her thoughts. Her nostrils narrowed, making it difficult to breathe, but she knew if she opened her mouth, she’d start screaming. And once she started, she might never stop.
Steve Lowdry grasped the front of her bodice. His stench made her want to gag. “What you got under there, honey?”
The cloth of her dress stretched taut against her back. Amy knew it would rip at any second. She gulped down a whimper. His voice oozed over her like slime. She could hear the saliva in his mouth working, the short, excited pace of his breathing. What did she have under there? It was a question calculated to terrify her. And it was working. She imagined those hands on her body.
A hundred unvoiced pleas crowded into her throat. But before she could utter them, pictures from the past splashed across her mind with blinding clarity. She saw herself as a child, struggling helplessly, sobbing and begging for mercy. Above the echo of that little girl’s voice, she heard male laughter. Her terror and frantic pleas had gained her nothing then and would gain her nothing now. Men like these enjoyed hearing a woman scream. They raped and brutalized not for sexual gratification, but for the sheer violence of it.
A sudden calm came over Amy. She was no longer a terrified little girl. And she’d be damned if she’d give these animals the satisfaction they sought. She was no stranger to pain, after all. She knew from experience that no matter how badly something hurt, the agony eventually passed. She couldn’t prevent these men from violating her body, but she could retain her dignity, regardless of what they did to her.
Let me say it my way, just once.
The words slipped into her mind from nowhere, the sound of Swift’s voice, husky soft and silken, echoing and reechoing. She imagined his dark face, the way his eyes clouded with tenderness when he looked at her, the way his hands whispered over her, making her feel cherished. These men couldn’t steal that from her.
Her bodice ripped. Amy felt cool air sifting through her chemise. Fingers dug in around her breast, inflicting pain. She tensed, knowing that this was only the beginning.
Let me say it my way.
The calm remained with her. Swift had given her so many things—love and laughter and hope—but the greatest gift of all had been a renewed sense of self.
Courage is taking three steps when it terrifies you.
Tears gathered behind her eyelids. No matter what these men did to her tonight, she would survive it. And when morning came, she would turn her face toward the horizon and never look back.
The hand tightened cruelly. “Hey, sweet thing? You dead or somethin’? I like my women with a little life in them.”
Amy remained limp and concentrated on separating her mind from reality. She remembered the day she and Swift had chased the chickens until the feathers flew. Once again she floated in his arms to the strains of a waltz, in moonlight touched with magic. With the memories came the certainty that tomorrow would indeed come. Tonight was only an instant out of a lifetime.
The door to the shack crashed open, the sudden sound reeling Amy back to the present. Startled, she opened her eyes to see Hank Lowdry bursting inside. He slammed the door closed behind him and glared down at the man hunkered next to her.
“Damn it to hell, Billy Bo! What do you think yer doin’?”
“Just havin’ a little fun. Doggone it, Sly. You near gave me heart failure.”
“Good. You can fun around later. Lopez ain’t comin’ to have tea.”
Swift was coming? Amy dragged her gaze to the man who had been tormenting her, a man whom she had known as Steve Lowdry. Billy Bo? The name was so ludicrous she nearly laughed, albeit hysterically. He jerked her torn bodice back into place and rose. Amy’s skin crawled where he had touched her.
“I can fun around and be ready,” he complained. “Since when do you git so nervous over taking on one man? There’s five of us.”
Five? Amy slid her gaze around the shadowy room. Including the newly arrived Sly, alias Hank Lowdry, she counted four men, which meant another must be outside. Doing what? Waiting to ambush Swift? Oh, God, Swift was coming here. These horrible men must be using her as bait. Swift wouldn’t realize how many guns he was up against. He was walking right into a trap.
Sly moved to a window and rubbed angrily at a square of grimy glass so he could see out. “Lopez slapped leather against twenty of Chink’s best men. Are you forgettin’ that? And he plugged Chink in the bargain. Get your mind out of your britches and stick to business.”
Billy Bo gave Amy a lingering look. Then, reaching under his hat to scratch, he ambled across the room, his spur rowels dragging on the planks. “What’d’ya want me ta do?”
“Keep watch, you dumb ass. Before you get it shot off.” Sly drew his six-shooter and checked for cartridges. Then he pressed close to the window again. “Douse that damned fire, Poke! Who in hell built it, anyway?”
“I did,” the third man snarled back. “It’s colder’n a witch’s tit in here.”
Amy heard spurs chinking toward the hearth. Water splashed and hissed. Smoke roiled over her. She turned her face into her shoulder, glad for the darkness. Five men? And Swift was expecting only two. She had to do something. The question was, what?
Swift drew Diablo to a halt in the dark shadows beneath a tree. The smell of smoke drifted to him. Hunter was somewhere off to his left. Hilton was on a stand about a hundred yards behind him. Light from the full moon bathed the clearing ahead. Perfect. He and Hunter would be able see one another well enough to communicate by sign language as they advanced on the mine shack.
Forcing thoughts of Amy out of his mind, Swift closed his eyes, trying to absorb the smells and sounds around him, to become a part of them. The words he had said to Hunter that first night in Wolf’s Landing came back to haunt him.
That place within me that was once Comanche is dead.
If that was true, then Amy was as good as dead.
Swift opened his eyes and stared up through the gnarled tree branches at the moon. Mother Moon. His heart twisted. It had been so long since he had begun denying his Indian heritage. Could he still taste a man’s sweat on the air at a hundred yards? Could he still distinguish the sounds of an animal from those of a man, those of friend from foe? Could he still move through the darkness like a shadow? Warble like a night bird? Hoot like an owl? Cry like a coyote? Would he remember the signals he had been trained to use in battle?
Fear crawled up Swift’s spine. A picture of Amy flashed in his head. And now the Gabriel brothers had her in that mine shack. Her worst dread, and it had come to pass. He had to get her out of there.
An owl hooted. The hair on Swift’s nape prickled. Without moving his body, he slid his gaze across the clearing. He saw Hunter crouched behind a bush. His hands flashed. Swift deciphered the signal and stiffened.
There’s a man ahead of you.
Swift lay forward along Diablo’s neck and cupped his hand over the horse’s muzzle. The animal grew motionless. A smile touched Swift’s mouth. Some things were never forgotten. He slid off the horse like a wraith and flattened himself to the ground. Tipping his head back, he worked his throat. “Hoohoo! Hoo-hoo!” Rolling onto his side, he signaled back to Hunter.
I will take him.
Hunter nodded and melted into the black shadows.
“Goddamn it! Rodriguez should be here by now!” Sly turned from the window. The bright moonlight enabled Amy to see him as he pulled his timepiece from his pocket. He tipped it toward the light. “We were supposed to change the watch ten minutes ago. Something’s happened.”
“He’s probably sittin’ out there asleep!” Billy Bo grumbled from somewhere near Amy’s head.
Sly jabbed a thumb at the door. “Poke, go see what the hell’s keepin’ him. One of you report back to me within five minutes. Fernandez,” he snarled at the third man. “I want you on the roof. Move it!”
“Why can’t Billy Bo or Fernandez go check on Rodriguez?” Poke argued. “If something’s happened, why’s it gotta be my neck on the line?”
“Because I said!”
The man named Fernandez leaped to do Sly’s bidding and quietly exited the shack. From the shadows Amy heard Poke shoving up from the floor, still muttering under his breath. “I’ll tell ya why it’s me and Fernandez that’s gotta go. It’s ’cause we don’t hearken to the last name Gabriel, that’s why.”
“Quit yer goddamn bellyaching!” Sly shot back. He glanced up at the roof, cocking an ear at the thumping sound of footsteps above them. “He sounds like a herd of horses up there. Don’t he know to be quiet?”
Poke stepped into a shaft of moonlight and clamped his hat on his head. Amy was glad that his snoring had stopped. It seemed to her that she’d been lying in the same position for hours, listening to him sputter and smack his lips.
Hours. Had it been that long? Or had only minutes passed? Amy had no idea. She only knew that she couldn’t work the ropes on her wrists loose, that there was nothing, absolutely nothing, she would be able to do if Swift needed help. He would come for her. Of that, she had no doubt. And he might die for his efforts.
Poke pulled his gun and made sure it was loaded. With a last curse to show his displeasure, he opened the door and stepped outside. Shortly after the portal closed behind him, the hoot of an owl drifted through the night.
Amy registered the sound and nearly discarded it. Then she froze and stared through the darkness at Sly’s dark silhouette against the window. He was hunched over, doing something with his hands. A moment later a lucifer flared, spraying sparks. The light of the flame bathed his craggy face as he dipped his head to light his cigarette. Amy swallowed and glanced beyond him at the window. If he had heard the owl, he didn’t realize the significance of it. At least he hadn’t yet. But he might at any moment, if she didn’t distract him.