Chapter 2 #2
“You think it a game?” he inquired softly.
“I think you need to let me out of here!”
“I think not!” His hand upon her arm drew her back into the room and sent her spinning toward the bed once again.
She caught herself before she could fall against it.
The robe was slipping off her. She drew it back together, drawing the belt tighter.
She placed a hand against the poster at the foot of the bed for support.
“The army is in residence out here!” she cried. “And when they finally come, I swear I’ll see to it that you are hanged!”
“They might just hang you.”
“What?”
“For murder. The murder of Lord Douglas.”
The night was insane. It was all insanity.
Perhaps that’s what caused her to snap and, in a moment of sheer madness, pit herself at him again.
Instead of running, sensibly keeping her distance, she flew across the floor, raising a hand to slap him.
When he caught her right hand, she was ready with her left.
When she was deterred from his face, she did her best to beat against his chest. Sobs shook her body.
She was only barely aware that she was lifted from the floor.
Her head was spinning now. He must have poured half the bottle of whiskey into her cup the second time he filled it.
It had given her courage and strength. Now she was paying for that false bravado.
“Stop it!”
She dimly heard his voice. No matter how rough the command, it didn’t seem to penetrate to her mind. She couldn’t stop fighting or sobbing, hysterically pummeling him with a strength born of raw fear and rage.
“Stop it!”
Her feet were off the ground. She was lifted, flying—and suddenly on the bed again.
He was straddling her hips, pinning her wrists high above her head to keep her from hitting him.
She inhaled raggedly, trying to get a grip on herself.
She could barely breathe. Her robe had fallen open.
So had his. The ridiculous intimacy of their situation fueled her hysteria.
“Please, please…!” she gasped out. She tossed and writhed, twisting against him, trying to throw him off her.
The fur bedcover and the sheets became tangled beneath her. His bare flesh pressed against her, as hers did against his. The pounding of her heart was growing louder and louder, along with the desperate sounds of struggling that escaped from her.
The pounding…it wasn’t her heart. It was knocking at the cabin door.
The door…
It was suddenly thrown open.
“Hawk?” said a worried, masculine voice.
The man atop Skylar twisted at the sound of his name being called. Skylar stared past him to see that there were two men standing in the doorway.
Two men in uniform.
Uniform!
One was young with sandy hair and a clean-shaven face. The other man was older, with a graying set of whiskers, the mustache perfectly waxed and groomed.
Oh, God! The cavalry had come.
She let out a shriek.
“Oh, sweet Jesus, sorry, Hawk!” the older man said. He punched the other, his face turning beet red. “He’s—occupied! With a lady.”
Occupied…with a lady! The words echoed in her mind. Then the realization struck her. They thought that…
“No!” Skylar gasped, inhaling raggedly. He was still on top of her. He leaned down upon her. Close. His breath all but fanning her cheeks.
She couldn’t get enough air to explain. She was mortified. She was more than half naked, his flesh was solidly pressed against hers. It did look like…
She stared with horror into those strange green eyes that now carried a wicked glint of pure amusement. Eyes so close to hers…
“Hush, hush!” he assured her, his voice mockingly tender. “My dear, the soldiers are gallant men, they’ll say nothing.”
“The soldiers will say nothing!” she exclaimed. “Dear God, they will certainly—” she began furiously, but a shift in his weight cut her off as what air she had managed to inhale was exhaled beneath his weight.
“Darling, please. You mustn’t be so upset. It’s really going to be all right. Shh…” came his whisper, his lips atop hers.
Then upon them. Forming perfectly over hers.
His tongue demanding entry. She found her mouth parted with a startling force, the mercurial, hot thrust of his tongue.
The taste of coffee and whiskey. She tried to twist away, but his fingers were threaded through her hair and brought close to her skull, holding her so taut she couldn’t begin to resist. She couldn’t breathe.
The room was spinning…black stars burst before her…
“It’s all right, my dear. Truly. You needn’t be embarrassed.”
He wasn’t kissing her anymore. He was staring down at her, still looking amused while she desperately dragged in breath.
“Dammit!” she cried out.
“Sweet Jesus, I am sorry!” the older man protested. “Oh, ma’am, so sorry. Hawk, we’d no idea you had the company of a woman friend—”
The Indian interrupted, eloquent to a truly staggering degree.
“Captain, all apologies accepted. I should truly be embarrassed that I did not hear your arrival.”
“Damn you all, wait!” Skylar lashed out again furiously.
“My dear! My dear! Don’t you think these poor men are suffering enough as it is? I should have heard them—”
“That’s what worried us,” the older man said. “Why, Hawk, you can usually hear a pony snort a mile away.”
“Ah, but then, I have been quite occupied, I admit,” Hawk said.
The captain laughed. “The Sioux men may be darned right in their attitudes toward women, Hawk. Those boys know that being too close to a lady can cloud the mind and steal the senses!”
“Indeed, I’m humiliated.”
“Hell, it proves you’re human.”
“Human!” Skylar managed to get in.
“Why thank you, Captain,” the Indian stated, another shift of his weight making her gasp for breath again. “Perhaps I do have a respectable excuse. This is Lady Douglas, Captain.”
All the while that he spoke, he stared down at her, still seeming to laugh down at her.
“Lady Douglas!” the captain said, gaping suddenly. “I didn’t know that—”
“Yes!” Skylar managed to assert. They weren’t going to get the better of her this time.
She was going to make them understand. A feeling of triumph rising within her, she stared at the Indian with victorious eyes as she cried out, “Yes! Yes, damn you all, I am Lady Douglas.” It was about time!
She was going to make these men realize that she was desperate to be rescued, make them realize the situation.
“Yes, my name is Skylar Douglas. Please, I—”
“Oh, ma’am, we just didn’t know, hadn’t heard… Please, please forgive us! Hawk, it’s a matter of some importance, but I can find you within the next few days. I am sorry. We’re leaving.”
“Quite all right, my friend. Apology accepted. Of course, we would like to be alone again…”
The older cavalry officer pulled the younger man out, slamming the door hard.
“No!” Skylar shrieked. “No! We wouldn’t like to be alone! No! Wait!” She slammed her fists against the Indian and tried to kick, jab.
Bite.
She got her teeth into his shoulder. He didn’t blink an eye, but again, his fingers came threading into her hair. Pulling.
“Don’t bite!” he warned icily.
“Then let me up!”
To her astonishment, he moved aside. She leaped from the bed, heedless that the robe barely covered her. She raced after the soldiers.
She threw herself against the door, fumbling then to find the latch to draw it open.
“Wait! Wait!” she cried out. “Please, you’re not listening to me.
Won’t anybody help me! My God, I swear to you that I am Lady Douglas.
Please—” She finished the plea with a shriek because she suddenly found herself wrenched back into the room, away from the door, by the English-speaking Sioux they’d called Hawk.
Spun around, she stared into his eyes again. She looked down. His long bronze fingers held her wrist.
No.
The cavalry had come.
Help had been here!
“Help” had watched her on the bed with this man…
She looked wildly back to the door. “You have to let me by! They have to help me. They’re the cavalry.
You’re an Indian. My God, what’s going on with them?
The entire world has gone insane!” She tried to shake free from his hold.
She could not do so. She slammed her fists against his chest, half laughing, half crying.
“Let me go! I’ve got to get to them. I’ve got to make them understand… ”
She broke off, hearing the hoofbeats of the men’s horses fading away.
The cavalry had come.
And gone.
“Let me go. Please, let me go!”
“For what?”
“So I can get them to help me!”
He released her, crossing his arms over his chest as he spoke to her next.
“They’re not going to help you.”
“They will when they know what’s really happening. That you’ve abducted me, half—half—raped me! They’ll save me from you—”
“They’re not going to help you, and they’re not going to save you from me, even if you are Lady Douglas. Especially if you are Lady Douglas.”
She inhaled deeply, her spine suddenly very straight and stiff. “Why not, damn you?” she demanded. “Why won’t they help me?”
He caught her upper arms, pulling her back close to him, and his eyes glittered now with both amusement and fury.
“Because, my lovely little gold digger, Andrew Douglas is not dead. I am Lord Andrew Douglas. Your dearly beloved husband.”
“You’re a liar! Lord Douglas is dead. And you can’t be Lord anyone! You’re an—an—”
“Indian?” he suggested.
“Yes! A savage, painted Indian!”
“That I am. But I do assure you, I am also Lord Douglas.”
She stared into his eyes.
Green eyes.
Oh, God, yes. They were familiar.
“Damn you, know it! I am Lord Douglas!”
Green eyes. Eyes very similar to a pair she had seen before. Set into an older face.
Green eyes.
They faded to black.