Chapter 5 #3
“Sloan, these are our friends and relations—your blood brothers!” she said, talking very quickly.
“And everyone here is concerned with the coming Sioux wars. I’m sure that, realizing the danger of your situation, they might persuade you that the Dakota Territory is not a good place for you to be.
Nor is it a good place for you—to bring a wife. ”
Though he struggled fiercely for control, he drew her to her feet far less gently than he had intended.
Control, he reminded himself. His temper was blazing.
“My poor, poor dear!” he murmured and placed his hand against her forehead. He sighed deeply and swept her up, despite the pressure of her hands against him and the cry of alarm that escaped her lips. “She just isn’t feeling well.”
“’Tis a hard thing, losing a wee bairn,” Gawain MacGinnis said with sincere sympathy.
“’Tis sure that it will take healing,” James McGregor added softly.
“I’m well enough—” Sabrina started to say, but he quickly hushed her.
“My love, you shouldn’t fret about the Sioux situation at a time like this!
You need rest,” he said firmly. He forced a smile and looked at the others who sat at the table in tense silence.
“Our pardon; please do go on. Enjoy your dinner,” he said and then led Sabrina up the stairs, holding her so tightly that surely no one could see that she struggled within his arms.
He kicked open the door to her room and put her on the bed. When she would have risen, he straddled her, keeping his weight from her but pinning her to the bed.
“What in God’s name was that all about?” he demanded.
She closed her eyes, ceasing to struggle.
“You persisted, if you’ll recall. I said ‘nothing’ several times, I believe.”
“You said ‘nothing’—but meant to goad me.”
“That’s not true! Sloan, I don’t feel well—”
“How convenient. How damned convenient. But I’m sorry: it won’t work, not after your performance tonight. Open your eyes; talk to me.”
She opened her eyes, staring at him.
She was pale again, amazingly pale, and her eyes were very beautiful. In the firelight, they dazzled, and he found himself staring deeply into them. She seemed very much the delicate Southern belle suddenly, casting herself on the mercy of a man who would behave as a gentleman.
“Now tell me—what the hell was that all about?”
She shook her head. “You explain it to me!” she cried suddenly. “You explain to me why you have to go back to Sioux lands, why you have to fight a war with yourself.”
“Damn it, Sabrina, I’m not fighting a war with myself!”
“You are!”
He leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest. “Sabrina—”
“What if I insisted that I had to be somewhere—”
“Where?”
“I don’t know; anywhere. What—”
“Sabrina, times may change, but wives follow their husbands. Where and when they say. That’s the way it is.”
“Sloan, times may change, but Whites are at war with the Sioux! They kill Sioux, and Sioux slaughter Whites. That is the way that it is!”
If she had struck him, she could not have caught him more thoroughly off guard with her vehement—and not at all foundationless—attack.
He felt his every muscle grow rigid. “Is it? Maybe you just don’t understand all the intricacies of what is going on.
No, Sabrina, Whites don’t automatically shoot down the Sioux, and even among the so-called hostiles, there are many men who refuse to slaughter White women and children, despite the many times Indian women and babes have been slaughtered in army attacks. ”
“Are you all able to stop in the midst of an attack and ask who is noble in their methods of warfare and who is not?”
“You certainly seem to be feeling better!” Sloan informed her. “Well enough to fight me.”
She shook her head, looking down at her hands. “I’m just trying to make you see that…that…”
“That you want an annulment.”
“That you wish to live a very strange life and—and I’m not what you want at all.”
He stood, not trusting himself any longer. “You’re mistaken, my love. You are precisely what I want. You’re my wife.”
“A cavalry wife—to an Indian!” she said, feeling a rise of hysteria.
“A cavalry wife—to a half-breed,” he corrected her matter-of-factly. “A rather good role for you, now that I think about it. I honestly believe that you’ll do amazingly well.”
“But Sloan—” she began, rising as well and coming to him, placing her hand upon his chest as she tried earnestly to press her point. “Sloan, you don’t see—”
“You’d be amazed at what I see. I married you, I want you, and I will have you.”
“You’ll have nothing if you’re dead.”
“Why are you so damned convinced I’m going to be killed?”
“Because someone—white or red—will kill you because you haven’t chosen a side in this conflict.”
He arched a brow suddenly. “Would you care?”
“I—I don’t want to be a party to it—”
“You’d have your freedom.”
“Don’t! Damn you, don’t do that to me. I’ve seen enough bloodshed, and I wouldn’t want freedom at such a price!” she cried. She shook her head. “Sloan! It’s true, and I’m sorry; I don’t want a rugged life. I don’t want to be afraid of the Indians. I don’t know a thing about army life. And—and—”
“And you don’t want a half-breed,” he murmured.
She looked downward quickly. He caught her chin, bringing her eyes to his.
“I can make you want me,” he promised very softly.
She shook her head.
She was so close to him, touching him. And though he knew he had to forcibly dampen all thoughts of making love…
He couldn’t quite keep from touching her.
Not the way she was looking at him now, with the passion and the vehemence that was so much a part of her.
Her eyes were brilliantly ablaze. Blood had rushed to her cheeks; her lips were as tempting as wine.
Drawing her suddenly and forcefully into his arms, he tasted her mouth with all the savage persuasion burning in his blood.
He ravaged the sweetness of her mouth with the thrust of his tongue, caressing and teasing and kissing her until she was pliant in his arms…
No longer fighting.
Indeed…
But it seemed that his blood was rushing through his veins like hot lava, and he was the one falling. He longed to hold her so closely. Longed to…
His arms still around her, he broke the kiss at last and stared down into her shimmering eyes. “Sabrina, if I were a full-blooded Sioux, there would be no question about your coming home to me now. You made me a promise; don’t break it. Don’t make me come back for you, Sabrina, I warn you.”
“Sloan—” she whispered, shaking.
“No, Sabrina, no protests, no arguments. I’m leaving, so we can’t argue, so that I can’t want to either throttle you or—or just want you. But I warn you again: don’t break your promise.”
He swept her up again despite her startled cry of protest, deposited her gently back in bed, and left the room.
He left the castle that night as well, riding across the beautiful, rugged terrain of the Highlands by moonlight.
He spent the next day in Glasgow. Luckily, he managed to book passage out the following day.
As he sailed away from the Scottish shore, he couldn’t help but brood. He wondered if she would follow him home, as she had promised.
He wondered if he would ever see her again.
He would.
Because he would come for her if she didn’t come to him. Hell or high water—or Indian wars—he would come for her.
With that determination in mind, he turned his face toward the wind.
Westward.