Cherish Read online

  Rebecca closed her eyes, wanting to die. Then she felt a tugging on the front of her dress and cool air washed over her upper chest. She looked down and saw that he’d severed the threads of several buttons. Her panicked pulse began to drum in her ears.

  “Uncover that little beauty for me,” he said.

  She made a fist over the gaping front placket of her dress. “No,” she replied stonily. And she meant it. No matter what he did to her, no matter how terrified she became, she would never accommodate him. Let him kill her. Death would be preferable.

  He touched the knife to her chin. “Do it, sweet thing. Right now. I’m gonna have me a taste of that little beauty.”

  “No.” She despised herself for the way her voice sounded, so weak and quavery.

  “You ain’t never done it, have you?” He gave a low chuckle. “I’ll be damned. You mean to say none of those old men ever got you off alone? You ain’t never in all your life been honeysuckled?”

  “Been wh-what?”

  He seemed to find the question hysterically funny and barked with laughter. “Good God, you don’t know nothin’, do you?” His smile faded, and his eyes took on a feverish shine. “I say it’s high time you learn. For a Bible-thumpin’ female, you sure ain’t got a clear notion of what God made you for.” He slipped the blade tip under another button and cut the threads with a flick of his wrist. “It’s like this, see. God made men strong and smart, then gave them leave to rule the earth. You read that in the Bible, didn’t you? Then God, he got to thinkin’, decided men needed mates, and made females, all of them weak and dumb so men wouldn’t have no trouble bossin’ them and teachin’ them manners. Ain’t that the way it is with you church folks, the men bossin’ the women?”

  That had been the way of it, Rebecca thought, only not. The women of her faith were subservient, deferring to the men in all things, but they were also loved, and respected, and cherished. She doubted this creature understood the meaning of love, let alone respect or devotion.

  “Anyhow,” the man went on, “that’s how come, on top of bein’ weak and dumb, that females are mostly pretty and all soft and sweet, so’s men can enjoy them the way God meant, without the females givin’ them a lick of trouble.” He leaned forward to peer at her face. “How come else would you have those pretty little darlin’s, if they wasn’t for men to honeysuckle. They ain’t no use, otherwise. Name me one other thing they’re good for.”

  Rebecca fixed a yearning gaze on the rear opening of the wagon. She wanted out of here. Out. His wickedness was like slime in the air. She was breathing it, tasting it. Almost gagging on it. Recalling her papa’s kindly face, gentle manner, and unfailing love for her ma, she could scarcely believe the filth that came from this man’s mouth. None of the brethren touched a woman in that way. Rebecca was certain of it because her mother had told her as much while defining a woman’s wifely duties.

  “So, sweet thing, now that I got you set straight, you gonna give me some honey?”

  She threw him a horrified glance, saw by the glint in his eyes that he meant to force her, and jerked sideways, escaping the tip of the knife just long enough to throw herself forward and scramble away from him. He was on her in an instant, his weight crashing down on her back and slamming her face to the floor. Stunned, all Rebecca could do was lie there, blinking and rasping for breath.

  He reared back, sitting on her rump to anchor her as he grasped her by one arm, then withdrawing a bit of his weight as he rolled her over. It felt as if he jerked her shoulder out of its socket in the process.

  Tossing aside the knife, he said, “I told you, sweet thing. Easy or hard. Since you’re choosin’ hard, the least I’m gonna get for my trouble is a little honey.”

  She caught him alongside the jaw with her fist, landing the blow with all her might, but he only flinched, then smiled, as if it were little more than a tap. Catching both her wrists in the grip of one hand, he relaxed his legs, dropping hard onto her middle. The breath rushed from Rebecca’s lungs once more. He laughed and bounced again. Then again. Black spots began to dance before her eyes and she feared she might pass out. Knowing she would be defenseless if she did, she struggled to stay conscious, fighting frantically to draw breath. Oh, God. Her ribs. He’d broken her ribs.

  Dimly aware of his hand jerking at the front of her dress, she tried to scream, but all that came out was a squeak. She shrank against the floor planks in an attempt to evade his vile touch, but the hard surface allowed for scant retreat. She heard cloth rip and knew he would touch her bare skin at any moment, that there was little she could do to stop him.

  He wasn’t all that large a man, really. Not much bigger than her papa. But her strength was no match for his, and his insanity gave him the power of the biblical Legion. Horror gripped her. She strained to free her hands, ignored the knifing pain in her midriff, and tried to buck him off. Pictures of what had been done to her mother flashed in her mind. She gulped back a sob.

  “That’s it, darlin’, fight me,” he whispered. “I like it best that way. Scream if you want. I like that, too. Scream real loud.” He gave an insane-sounding laugh. “Ain’t nobody gonna hear you, anyhow! Except for my friends, of course. And all they’ll do is come in to take their turn.”

  Not willing to give him the satisfaction of hearing her scream, she averted her face and tried to stifle the whimpers crawling up her throat. She felt his fingertips gain access to her chemise and begin to fumble with the lacings. She had expected him to simply tear the undergarment off her.

  But, no. That would be too quick. He wanted to prolong this, make it as humiliating and endlessly unbearable as possible in hopes that she would tell him where the money was. She closed her eyes, another sob welling within her, then slicing and tearing its way up from her belly as if she were vomiting glass.

  Clammy knuckles grazed her skin as he loosened her lacings. She couldn’t endure this. Dear God in heaven, she couldn’t. Would no one come to help her? Were she and this man with his weaselly followers the last people on earth? In that instant, even though his weight still crushed the breath from her, she screamed. Not a squeak this time, but an ear-splitting scream. She put all she had into it.

  “Oh, yeah, darlin’. That’s how I like it.”

  In a panicked frenzy, Rebecca saw fleeting pictures of Race Spencer’s dark face, remembering that morning when he had pinned her beneath him and how she had screamed in much the same way. That was the only similarity.

  Though Race Spencer’s hands were much larger and harder than this man’s, he hadn’t bruised her wrists in a punishing grip. Nor had he crushed her with his far greater weight. At the time, as she had struggled with him, she’d believed he was being rough and using all his strength against her. Only now did she understand how much restraint he must have employed, holding most of his weight off her and gentling his grip. Granted, he had pinned her to the pallet like an insect to a board. But for all of that, he hadn’t hurt her. Not even once.

  And his voice. She could almost hear his whispered reassurances, trailing through her mind like wisps of warm smoke. Telling her he wouldn’t harm her. That she was safe. That she had no call to be afraid. That he would protect her with his life. She wished with all her heart that he were here right now to keep that promise.

  Her mind spinning dizzily with pictures of him, Rebecca prayed to him instead of the God she had yesterday forsaken. Please, please, please! Half-formed pleas spiraled through her head, fleetingly there, then gone, to be replaced by another. That Race Spencer would return to camp. That he would suddenly appear and, like an avenging angel, save her.

  By concentrating on that, Rebecca was halfway successful in separating herself from what this animal was doing to her, only vaguely aware of his awkward, feverish fumbling. Race Spencer, her hotshot cowboy. If only he’d come. He would enter the wagon in a killing rage, drag the ruffian off of her, and pound his face until it was a bloody mess.

  Rebecca became so focused on that hope and so s
eparated from reality that when the blond’s weight was suddenly jerked off her, she thought she was imagining it. For a moment, she just lay there, startled and blinking, her vision still impaired by black spots. Only she wasn’t imagining it. Her wrists were no longer manacled by cruel fingers. And she could breathe. It was as if a fierce wind had swept through, knocking the ruffian off of her.

  Her oxygen-starved lungs grabbing desperately for breath, she hugged her battered midsection and twisted to her knees. In a spinning blur, she saw four boots that came slowly into focus, two of ornate, hand-tooled leather with spurs at the heels, two a plain, dull black. Lifting her gaze, she stared, uncomprehending, at a like number of legs, one pair sheathed in black denim, the other in buckskin. Race. He had come back. By some miracle, he’d come back. The thud of a fist impacting with flesh and bone rang in her ears.

  Keeping one arm curled at her waist, Rebecca clawed with her free hand at the rough upper rail of the wagon wall to get out of their way, pulling herself along in a crawl to the front of the enclosure. Once in the corner, she struggled erect, grabbing a hickory support beam to keep her rubbery legs from buckling under her weight. Even empty as this one was, wagons weren’t very roomy inside. With two men fighting, the scant space seemed minuscule. Rebecca pressed her back against the canvas, half-afraid they would stumble and fall on top of her.

  Race pummeled the ruffian with his huge fists, every bit the avenging angel, just as she had envisioned. As lethal and quick as lightning, he struck and withdrew, the jolt of his well-placed blows so forceful that they nearly knocked her attacker off his feet.

  Never had Rebecca been so glad to see anyone.

  He dealt the blond punch after punch to the belly, burying his fist just above the man’s belt and angling upward to lift the man’s feet off the floor. A rush of expelled breath accompanied every blow. “How does it feel, you rotten son of a bitch?” Race buried his fist in the man’s stomach again. “Hurts like hell at the receivin’ end, don’t it?”

  The blond staggered sideways, his knees nearly folding as he fought to keep his balance. Race jerked the other man’s guns from the holsters, then tossed them onto the rumpled pile of quilts along the opposite wall. Then he grabbed the ruffian by his jacket and roughly shoved him toward the opening at the back of the wagon.

  “Outside, you bastard!”

  His back toward Race, the blond tripped and fell to his knees, shaking his head as if he were so dazed he could scarcely see. Looking at him from an angle, however, Rebecca was able to see his washed-out gaze dart to where he’d tossed his knife.

  “Look out!” she cried.

  The ruffian lunged sideways, hitting the floor with a deafening crash and grabbing the knife as he rolled to his feet. Rebecca screamed when she saw the long blade flash through the air, glinting like hammered lightning, Race Spencer’s broad chest its target.

  Chapter 8

  Oh, dear God! Race Spencer was going to die, right before her very eyes!

  Rebecca knew she had to do something. Only what? Legs still so weak she could scarcely stand, she clung with one hand to the hickory support beam above her head. With every shift of the struggling men’s weight, the wagon pitched so violently it threatened to throw her off her feet.

  She glanced frantically around the cramped enclosure, searching for something, anything she might use as a weapon. There was nothing in the wagon but the quilts she’d slept on last night and the lantern that hung from a center beam, which at the moment was working against Race rather than for him. He was so tall that the top of his head skimmed the apex of the canvas roof. With each pitch of the wagon, the lamp swung wildly back and forth, its heavy metal base narrowly missing his shoulder. As she lowered her gaze from the lantern, Rebecca’s attention fell on the piled quilts, and suddenly she remembered Race disarming the other man. The guns. If she could just reach them.

  Hugging an arm to her middle to ease the pain in her ribs, she let go of the hickory beam and scrambled to the pallet. The guns! Where were they? During their struggle, the two men had rolled, kicking the quilts every which way. Oh, God! The guns. She couldn’t find them.

  Race. He was going to be killed. Her breath came in shrill little gasps, pain lancing over her ribs with each inhalation.

  Then something hit her shoulder, knocking her sideways—away from the quilts—away from the guns. She landed on her belly, and a weight crashed down on her back. Stunning her. Slamming what little breath she had from her lungs. Pinpricks of light danced before her eyes. Pushing with her toes and groping blindly at the rough planks beneath her, she tried desperately to move.

  Someone grabbed her by the braid. Fire exploded over her scalp. Her head snapped back. Pain stabbed in at the small of her back and the base of her skull. The vertebrae in her neck popped, hollow little sounds, one so close upon the other that they reverberated through her head like firecrackers going off under a box.

  “I’ll slit her throat!”

  Rebecca flailed with her arms, dimly registering that her body was being lifted and jerked backward. The back of her head slapped against wood. Above her, a blur of images swirled, like reflections on water being stirred with a whisk. Daylight, canvas, hickory beams. And Race Spencer, his dark face there one second, then gone—there, then gone. Something hard dug into her lower belly, feeling as if it smashed her spine against the floor.

  “Back away! I’ll kill the bitch, I swear to God!”

  Kaboom!

  The blast exploded in the small enclosure, bursting against her eardrums, deafening her. Something fell on her. Leather-coated, slimy with grease. Suffocating, desperate for air, she struggled wildly, shoving with her hands, tossing her head from side to side, blinking furiously to clear her vision. She felt something wet on her cheek, trickling into her ear, down her neck. Her vision cleared a bit, only something—hair—greasy, smelly hair—was over her eyes, getting in her mouth. Yellow-brown strings of it, tangling in her eyelashes, slithering between her parted teeth like worms.

  She sputtered and pushed, gagging, trying to squirm free, to shove the weight away, but barely managing to move it. Then a face. Nose to nose with a face. Dirty blond eyebrows, arching like vulture’s wings, one at each side of a blackish-red hole that seeped jagged streams of crimson around staring, pale blue eyes.

  Blood?

  It was blood.

  Blood, everywhere.

  Oh, God—oh, God—oh, God—oh, God—that man—He was dead!—he was bleeding!—On her—all over—blood everywhere!

  “No—oh, no—not—no-oo-o!” She shoved with all her strength again, trying to get him off of her, and this time, he went. Thunk! His head hit the floor like a dropped squash, his body sprawling. “Oh, God! Oh, God!”

  She jackknifed upright, digging at the floor with her heels and pushing with her hands to scoot backward, forgetting her tortured ribs, forgetting the pain that racked her neck and back. Forgetting everything but the need to get away. Away.

  Rebecca! a faint voice called.

  She threw a horrified look at the dead man. Oh, dear, sweet Lord! He was dead! How could he be calling her? Was he alive? He had to be alive! Oh, dear God, he was going to kill her.

  Run. She had to run. Escape. Before he got up. Run now. Far, far away. Fast.

  Her shoulders thudded against the wall. Not far enough. She kept digging in with her heels, slamming her back into the wood.

  Rebecca?

  No farther. Couldn’t go any farther. She stared at that face, at the hole between the staring eyes. At the blood.

  Blood—blood—blood. It was everywhere. She was swimming in it. Blood on her hands. Red polka dots, wide smears, splatters. Blood on her dress, shiny and blackish. Oh, dear God. Off, off, off! Had to get it off. Blood. On her face! Oh, God! Not in her mouth. Please—please—please. It was everywhere, all over her. In her ears, in her hair.

  Rebecca, darlin’.

  Calling her? Him? Still there. Not gone. All over her. On her tongue, the roof
of her mouth, between her teeth.

  Rebecca!

  It was him. Back from the dead. Coming to kill her. She twisted onto her knees. Away. Toward light. Out. Help. Someone. Please.

  “Race! Race!” she screamed. No sound. Voice gone. No God. No Race. No help. Going to kill her. Slit her throat. Hurry. Run—run—run! He would catch her. “Race! Help me-ee-e! Help me-he-ee-ee!”

  She collided with something so solid, it felt like a rock. She reeled back. Strong arms caught her from falling. Race? She threw herself at him, clutching his shoulders, grabbing handfuls of his shirt. He lifted her against him. Wonderful, strong, hard arms. So warm and tight, all around her, holding her close. A wide chest radiant with heat. In. She wanted in. She could hide there. Safe. Race. He felt so wonderful. She was safe now. No one could get her. He was there, and she was safe.

  Uh-thump—uh-thump—uh-thump. His heart. Pounding. Uh-thump. Such a wonderful feeling, the sturdy thuds vibrating out past bone, through a deep wall of flesh and thick pads of steely muscle, to go uh-thump against her cheek.

  And the feel of his body against hers, like a boulder carved to fit her shape and warmed by the sun, only cushioned on the surface. His shirt, the weave slightly coarse against her face. His smell—clean sweat, leather, grass, sunshine, wind, and horses.

  Race. Close, press close. Melt into him. Safe there…safe…No more Rebecca. She’d just melt down into him and disappear. Never come out. He wouldn’t let them hurt her. Nobody. Not ever.

  She felt his large, hard hands moving over her.

  Are you cut?

  His hands on her hair, lifting her chin.