The Darkest Heart Read online

  She had changed. She was no longer in abject terror of him, which was fortunate, because it more than irritated him. Still, the few times he had looked at her (and she had quickly averted her wide eyes) he had seen wariness, mingled with tempered fear. She was ready at the least sign of aggression on his part to take flight. His disgust grew.

  They had had one exchange earlier in the morning. Jack had said, “What happened after your husband’s murder?”

  There was no immediate response, and he had felt her tension, turned to look, saw her pale face under his battered rawhide cowboy hat, which he had given her to wear. There was no mistaking the look on her face. Guilt. And then, abruptly, it was gone. What is she hiding? he wondered.

  “I—I was in shock with grief,” she answered. “I wasn’t thinking right. I hired a horse—and left. I wanted to get home to my family.”

  He was studying her because she wasn’t being honest. “That wasn’t the smartest thing to do.”

  “No.”

  “What happened to the horse?”

  “A rattlesnake.”

  End of conversation, and that had been four hours ago. Still, he was very much aware—too aware—of the woman in man’s clothes on his horse.

  The clothes hadn’t seemed indecent when she was dying. This morning he had looked at her legs, completely revealed—long and beautiful and strong from riding, the kind of legs to wrap around a man’s waist, he thought, while he plunges into her. And it wasn’t his fault for thinking that, he reassured himself—not with the way the trousers were divided, molding the plumpness of her buttocks.

  He had never seen a woman with a figure like this in pants before. It was the most blatant and suggestive sight he had ever seen—and that included when she had been naked under the buckskin hide.

  He almost wanted to ask her if she was tired or needed to stop. He didn’t. He had only to think of how she saw him—as a dangerous half-breed—and he grew angry. She wanted to get home? Well, they would just push on. The sooner he got her there the better, anyway, because from the High C he was heading north, into the mountains. Anticipating that part of the trip filled him with a fierce joy.

  “Mr.… uh, hmmch.” She coughed, as if she couldn’t speak his name.

  He stiffened his back and didn’t stop or look at her.

  “Mr. uh, Mister …” She coughed again. “Savage. Please.”

  He stopped, taking the reins and looking at her unhelpfully. She was red. I, ah, could we stop for a few minutes?”

  He lifted one brow.

  When she saw that he was waiting, she slid off the stallion, and he tried not to look too long and hard and hungrily at her. She kept her shoulders back and straight and her head high, and walked into the shade of some mesquite trees, then beyond. He thought: Be careful. But didn’t say anything. He took a sip of water.

  She reappeared a few minutes later, long-legged and slim-hipped, the shirt tight over full breasts, and he handed her the canteen. She took a few modest sips and handed it back. “Excuse me,” she said, blushing again. “But at this rate it will take us a week to reach Tucson.”

  “So eager to get home? Or just to leave my company?” he mocked.

  “Maybe we could, uh, share the horse?” Her voice tipped precariously upward on the question mark.

  He was stunned. There were several reasons why he wasn’t riding with her. But—he had to face it, the prime one was his untrustworthy male member, which was stirring too easily and too frequently these days. He could easily imagine what would happen with them riding together—his uncontrollable reaction would probably horrify her. He would rather avoid it at all costs. Still, she had actually suggested it.

  “Is this a change of heart?” he asked, eyes smoking. When she didn’t answer, his mouth tightened. He lifted her into the saddle, picked up the reins, and trudged on.

  A few hours later he saw light glinting a short distance away. They had company. The flashing light was caused by the sun’s reflection—either on field glasses or gunmetal. He worried that it might be soldiers from Fort Buchanan. After decoying them the other day and leading them away from the Apache raiding party, he imagined they would be only too glad to nab him, assuming it was the same patrol and they would recognize him. It was an assumption he would go by, because his horse was unforgettable. Not to mention that he was a half-breed. In one lightning movement, he catapulted onto the stallion behind her, catching her when she started in surprise.

  “Someone’s up ahead past those saguaro,” he said quietly. She stiffened in his arms. He knew she was worried about any number of things—more Apache, Pima, Papago, outlaws, banditos from south of the border. He almost reassured her. Instead he urged the stallion into a lope and angled discreetly around toward the spot where he was sure they were.

  “What are we doing?” she whispered.

  “Checking to see who it is.”

  “Why don’t we just circle around them?”

  “Because they may have seen us too.”

  Candice was not reassured. She was worried, yes, but not enough so to take her mind off the more imminent problem—how to ride in front of him without being physically intimate. He had one arm wrapped around her waist, a firm anchor, and it supported the underside of her breasts. That made her very nervous. It was also making her nipples hard and sensitive. Or maybe it was his hard chest against her back, because it was impossible to keep distance between them no matter how rigidly she sat. She shifted her bottom, meaning to get closer to the pommel. The morion only set her higher on rock-hard thighs.

  “Just relax,” he growled.

  She, of course, went stiffer. And her face flamed. She was very aware of his body behind hers, touching hers. She could even smell him—it was a distinctive scent and, if she was honest, not at all unpleasant. In fact, her heart was thudding a bit too quickly and, for some reason, her pants had become tight, making her uncomfortable.

  He pulled the stallion up and slid off, pulling her down abruptly, one arm around her. “Be quiet and just do as I do.”

  She nodded. She knew he didn’t trust her, or else he’d leave her alone with the stallipn while he went to investigate. And he was right. If she had the opportunity, she would be on his horse and galloping across the desert in one split second. In a semicrouch, his arm holding her clamped to his side, he pulled her toward a thick stand of saguaro and boulders. Then he pushed her into a crevice of rock, growling, “Stay there.”

  Candice watched him duck away. She could hear male voices and laughter. She hesitated. It was just possible the men were hands from one of her neighbor’s ranches, or, please God even better, troops. She followed him.

  He was on his stomach, peering down an incline, shielded by thick octillo clusters. Candice got to her hands and knees and scrambled down to join him. She was ten yards away when he whipped onto his back, drawing one Colt so fast she wouldn’t have believed it if she didn’t see the gun pointing right at her chest. She cried out, freezing.

  He lunged up and grabbed her, throwing her down.

  She gasped for breath.

  He reared up and started firing. Three fast, rapid shots in near succession. Then a long pause, and Candice twisted to stare and saw him taking a long, careful bead even as she heard the galloping beat of a departing rider. He fired. The horse’s stride never faltered. Jack straightened to his full height and began scrambling down the slope.

  Candice sat up, wiping sweat out of her eyes. She stood cautiously and looked down the slope, then cried out. Three bodies lay sprawled in blood on the ground. Three riderless horses were cantering away. The dead men—and she did not for a minute doubt they were dead—were cowboys clad in thick chaps and range clothes. She cringed at the sight of the cold-blooded murders. Then she heard another shot.

  He was standing over an Indian who was staked out Apache style and sheathing his gun. Candice saw the red flower blossoming on the Indian’s chest and knew Savage had killed him too, and she felt sick. For a minute she just stood there, fighting nausea, barely aware of how he was standing motionless, his head hanging. Then he straightened, turned slightly, raised his eyes and looked at her. The timing was perfect. Candice was already falling to her knees and retching.

  She stayed on her hands and knees for a long time after the heaves had stopped, trembling and numb. She realized she was clawing the dirt, and she sat back on her heels, taking a few deep breaths. That was when she thought she heard a man’s moan. She looked up.

  Savage was wrapping the Indian in his buckskin bedroll. Candice watched him and was stunned. He folded the blanket over the brave’s face and body as if he were bundling up a fragile infant. Then she heard the moan again, and saw one of the prostrate cowboys move his head. She was standing without realizing it.

  Jack whistled, a sharp sound, and the black came galloping down the slope. He lifted the corpse and settled it on the saddle, speaking softly as the animal shied uneasily. Candice ran down the slope, falling, skinning her palm and running again. She ran past Jack, who was tying the corpse to the saddle. She stopped and knelt. The man’s eyes were open. His face was white and wet with sweat. She saw that he had been gut-shot. She knew enough to know that it was fatal—and that he would take hours and hours to die. She rose. “Mr. Savage! He’s alive!”

  His back was to her, and he continued to tie the Indian corpse to the saddle, as if he hadn’t heard.

  “Mr. Savage! He’s alive! This man is still alive!”

  “Help me,” the man gasped, a barely audible whisper.

  Candice was frantic. Jack hadn’t turned, hadn’t even responded or given any sign that he had heard. She ran to him and grabbed his arm. “He’s alive! Are you deaf? For God’s sake—”

  “I know,” he said tonelessly, not gla
ncing at her.

  She dropped his arm, stunned, and backed away. “He’s gut-shot,” she croaked.

  No response. He patted the stallion.

  “Are you just going to let him die like an animal?”

  Jack turned to face her. “He is an animal.”

  Her eyes widened.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  “What kind of man are you?” She gasped. “You’re the animal, not that poor dying man—you killed his friends in cold blood …”

  “Let’s go,” he said again. Taking the stallion’s reins, he started walking away.

  “You can’t leave him like that!” Candice screamed, running after him and grabbing his arm and hanging on to it, pulling him up short. To her total shock, he threw her off violently, and she fell on her backside onto the ground. He took one stride toward her, and she cringed, half frightened, half furious. He towered over her, his words low and enraged. “The Apache was only a boy,” he rasped. “Fourteen winters, that’s all. A Child of the Water—a novice in training to be a warrior. His status is sacred, special, protected. He was left behind by the raiding party so he wouldn’t be put in danger, because he is unproven and untried. Do you know what they were doing to him?”

  Candice didn’t say a word.

  He knelt. His eyes sparked. “What kind of courage does it take for four grown men to capture an unarmed boy who is all alone, and tie him up and stake him out and carve him up, then watch the ants crawl into his raw flesh?”

  She was gasping, unable to breathe.

  “There was no skin left on his chest,” Jack said. “Even his face was crawling with ants—his eyes, nose, his mouth.”

  She sucked in her breath, and it sounded like half a sob.

  He leaned closer. “That pig will die—slowly. In great pain. Just like the boy was dying.”

  Her voice was very faint. “It’s wrong.”

  “Vengeance is our way.” He stood. His bare chest was rising and falling rapidly.

  Candice pushed herself up into a sitting position. “That doesn’t make it right.”

  He turned his back on her and started toward the black.

  “Oh, God,” she moaned, and got to her feet, her eyes tearing. She brushed the moisture away and stumbled to one of the dead men. More moisture came, blinding her. She was weeping. She took a revolver out of one man’s limp hand. It weighed more than any gun she had ever held, and it was cold, so very cold, in her grip. She stumbled toward the dying man. She had to brush at her eyes so she could see.

  “Please.” The words were so faint, barely audible, with a gurgling quality.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, and raised the gun. Her hands were snaking uncontrollably. He was dying and in great pain—she had to do it. But she couldn’t pull the trigger. Her hand fell against her leg and she fought to control tears and to find the strength to put the man out of his pain.

  Hard hands grabbed her from behind and sent her stumbling out of the way. She looked up just as the shot rang out. Jack turned to her with a black, murderous expression as he slammed his gun back into its holster. He reached out, pushing her toward the black, sending her stumbling forward. His footsteps, usually soundless, were hard on the ground behind her.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  He didn’t look at her—he didn’t trust himself to.

  He was aware of her stumbling behind him, then running doggedly to catch up, but he didn’t slow his long, hard strides. The sun was very high now, and blazing in its intensity. It was late September, probably a hundred degrees, and without a cloud in the sky. There was no shade offered by the saguaro that was giving way slowly to juniper and chaparral as they ascended the foothills. He heard her fall. He didn’t stop.

  He didn’t know what was happening to him. She was revolted by him and all his “kind, yet he had been moved enough to give in to her will and show mercy to the dying pindah. As he well knew, the man did not deserve mercy. Vengeance was preached by Usen, and he had been reared in it. He had never enjoyed torture, few men did—it was left to the women, as was right. He inflicted torture only in vengeance, which was also right. Even then, it was not something he did lightly or enjoyed. It was something that had to be done, like leaving the man in his agony to be broiled by the sun, craving water, eaten by ants, and bleeding to death inch by slow inch.

  But Jack had put him out of his misery.

  He wasn’t sure if he was furious with himself or her, or both of them.

  They covered another mile, the ascent getting rocky, pinyons joining the juniper to offer shade and respite. He heard her fall again and stiffened himself against her. But she didn’t cry out, didn’t ask him to wait. She got to her feet and continued to stumble after him.

  Hours later when the sun was starting to touch the mountain ridges, turning heavy and orange, he stopped. He didn’t look at her, and he didn’t have to, to know what she was doing. She sank gasping onto the ground. He untied the bundled corpse and removed it from the black, very gently.

  The boy had recognized and called him by name, asking Jack to send him into the other world. Jack, of course, could not refuse. For one, it was not the Apache way. And also, the boy had called him Niño Salvaje, and the Apache never called each other by their names unless it was a special or dire occasion. At such a time, the person named could not refuse whatever was asked of him. Jack had been only too glad to obey.

  He hadn’t recognized the boy.

  It was three years since he had last seen his people, but that wasn’t why. It was because the boy was unrecognizable.

  He had left the People—nnee—so he wouldn’t have to take part in the killing or the White Eyes. Now he had only just returned, and it was the same vicious cycle. This time the killing had been just, but the lesson was old, weary, and blatant. He was a fool to have returned.

  As Jack slowly unrolled the blanket, Candice found herself watching. She was badly out of breath, and her feet hurt terribly—her boots were fashioned for riding, not walking. But she watched as his big, callused hands moved over the dead body. His touch was whisper soft and very gentle, as if he were handling china. She didn’t understand now he could handle the dead boy like that after killing so many in cold blood.

  She stood. There was a stream nearby, and she was desperately thirsty. He hadn’t offered her water, and just as she hadn’t asked him to slow his pace, she hadn’t asked him for a drink, either. She stumbled to the bank and sank down, tossing the hat aside. She drank unabashedly with her hands, then rinsed her face the best she could. She dried her skin on the edge of her shirt, then turned slightly, too tired to get up, to see what he was doing now. She stared.

  He had shed his pants and moccasins, his guns and knife belt, and was wearing only a loincloth and the turquoise and silver necklace. For a moment she couldn’t move, or even breathe. He was bending over the corpse, doing something. She watched his body, the powerful thighs, the flat stomach, the bulging biceps in his arms. Then she went very red and looked at her feet. What in God’s name was he doing?

  She consciously averted her gaze, until she saw his bare feet moving past her silently. She looked up and realized he was carrying the corpse, which was now naked, into the stream.

  “What are you doing?” she said.

  “He must be washed.”

  Candice was standing. He was lowering the body, and she saw it and gagged. She averted her head, her heart thumping. How could anybody inflict such torture on another human body? She fought to keep the rising bile down.

  She walked hurriedly away, limping a bit. She busied herself with removing her boots and inspecting her blisters, anything to occupy her attention, but found herself compelled to watch. He was bathing every inch of the boy’s body, even his hair. After Savage carried the brave back out, he redressed him in the pants, leggings, and elaborately feathered war bonnet that he had been wearing. The boy hadn’t been wearing a shirt, and Candice blinked when Jack went to his own saddlebags and pulled a buckskin blouse out and dressed the body in it. She had an inane thought: So he did own a shirt—and then a valid one: Why is he giving it to the boy? She grew even more amazed when he tucked one of his Colts and one of his knives into the boy’s belt.