A Wolf In The Desert. Bj James
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especially me.” His expression was impassive. “There is one choice you have. We’re going to your car. If you have luggage—” a shocked and angry look confirmed his instinctive guess that she did “—you will select the clothing and necessities you might need at our camp. You can cooperate and come willingly, or I’ll carry you.”
“Like so much garbage.”
“Like a willful squaw.”
Patience knew the leeway he’d allowed her had ended. Painfully she admitted “allowed” was the proper description. Given his half-foot advantage in height, and the extra sixty pounds on his ruggedly muscular physique, allowed was exactly the right word. Now he was allowing her to make a choice. To do what she must with grace and dignity, or to be done with gracelessly as he wished.
She had few weapons, and dignity could be one of the few. She’d seen it happen. When needed, Mavis, her usually happily undignified mother, could dig deeply for an icy dignity that intimidated the surly as well as the arrogant.
Dignity, a weapon to preserve and protect. Uncommon and effective, perhaps even against Indian. She released her hold on his vest and stepped past his reach. “I’ll walk.”
He wasn’t a man to exult in his mastery, one lone, spare move of his head acknowledged victory. “I thought you might.”
The path he chose to return wandered through shrub and grasses. He didn’t look back or offer an assisting hand. He knew she would follow, that the oblique surrender pledged she would. He knew, as well, she would accept no helping hand.
“Indian.”
He didn’t slow or turn. “Yes?”
“I don’t trust you.”
His step didn’t alter.
“Indian.”
He didn’t answer.
“I never will.” Her defiance evoked no response. She expected none, suspecting taciturnity, rather than heated and lengthy discourse, was his true nature. She watched him, his honed body, his sure and easy step. He moved through the desert as if he were of it, an integral part, and all else was intrusion. And she wondered what manner of man held her life in his hands. Engrossed in thought, she put a foot wrong. The step jolted, but she righted herself with only little effort.
Indian slowed imperceptibly until he heard her steady step again. He smiled, visualizing her frown in her concerted effort to keep him from knowing her passage was not without difficulty.
Their trek continued, Indian leading, Patience following, saguaro lining their path like spine-encrusted sentinels. The scent of beer, peculiar smokes, and drunken mutterings reached out to them before the refracted light of headlights still burning.
“I won’t stop fighting, Indian,” she declared in a hushed tone. “Not ever.”
Indian stopped at the shoulder of the road, keeping his back to her. His shoulders lifted in a long, drawn breath, a breath exhaled in a resigned sigh. “I know.”
As he stepped into the light, a haggard Blue Doggie looked up at him and beyond. Virulent hate burned in rheumy eyes.
Indian reached back, pulling her to him. “Go to the car. Choose what you will need. Sturdy serviceable clothing as you’re wearing now, and no more than a couple of changes. A hat if you have one, but don’t bother with a bag, bundle everything in a shirt. When you’ve finished, tie your hair back and wait until I come for you.”
Patience nodded. When she moved toward Beauty, without looking away from Blue Doggie, Indian stopped her with a hand tangling in her hair, detaining her.
“Stay there, until I come,” he repeated.
“I will.”
“Promise.” There was a new, watchful tension in his voice, arcing through his body.
“I promise.”
“Thank you.”
Patience was surprised by the courtesy but wasted no time thinking on it. Beauty had sustained more damage, clothing and toiletries were scattered inside the car. Even that garnered little of Patience’s attention.
The rifle. She wanted the rifle. Where was it?
To the sound of revving engines, she picked her way gingerly through splintered glass. Her luggage lay in the back as it had. It had been opened and riffled through, the clothing tossed in all directions, but the bag had been moved little. Hoping against hope that the rifle remained undiscovered, she threw the bag aside, scattering clothing and glass more.
“Thank God!” Miraculously the case was still strapped in the special niche created for it by brother Kieran.
The sound of motorcycle engines was fading. She was alone with Indian. This was her one chance to escape. Hurriedly she attacked buckles and straps. Too hurriedly. Haste made her injured hands clumsy. She’d barely managed to yank the case from its place and slide the rifle free when she heard his footsteps circling the car.
There was no time to retrieve bullets and load. When he stopped at the broken window at her side, she faced him, the empty rifle pointed squarely at his chest. “Back off, Indian.”
“Ah.” He acted as if it were common to face a rifle. “The rest of the arsenal?”
“Don’t be cute. Cute doesn’t suit you. Do as I say, back off.”
Crossing his arms over his chest, he looked down at her. He was perfectly calm and at ease. “You’re going to take my bike and ride out of the desert, and you’ll shoot me if I stand in your way.”
Patience shifted the rifle against her shoulder. “Precisely.”
“I don’t think so,” he murmured.
“Are you fool enough to challenge a rifle?”
“Yes.” He reached inside, closed his fingers over the barrel, taking the rifle from her. “When it isn’t loaded.”
She didn’t resist, there was no need. Burying her head in her hands, she faced failure and accepted it. Wearily she dropped her hands to her lap. “How did you know?”
“The derringer. If the rifle had been loaded, you wouldn’t have wasted time with it before.” He laid the weapon aside and extended his hand. “It’s time to go.”
The rifle was her last stand. The adrenaline that bolstered this last hurrah, vanished. She was hardly aware of leaving the car; like a puppet she walked mindlessly through gathering the clothing he felt suitable. All of it no more than vague perception.
When she struggled with her hair with hands grown unbearably stiff, it was Indian who bound it. As he did his own with a bit of fringe ripped from his vest.
She was astride his bike behind him when she realized she would likely never see Beauty again. “What will happen to her?”
“Her?” He glanced over his shoulder. “The Corvette?”
“She was a gift from my family. In a strange way, she had a personality. She was my friend.” Maybe it was crazy to consider a car a friend, but Patience didn’t care. She asked again. “What will become of her?”
“She’ll be stripped. Anything of value will be sold, what’s left will be pushed into a canyon and covered with dirt.”
“Poor Beauty.”
“There’s no hope for the car. There is for you. You don’t have to trust me or like me, but we must do this together. You’ve that choice to make. We have a couple of hours of hard riding tonight. Think on it.”
The engine revved; Indian turned his bike into the desert. To a place Patience knew she might never leave.
Three
Absorbed in her