Through the Fire (The Native American Warrior Series) by Beth Trissel Read Free Book Online Page B

be?” she whispered to him.
    “ For now.” He tore a steaming piece from the speared portion, blew to cool it and offered it to her. “Here.”
    Her stomach rumbled insistently, but she was too intent on his fearsome cousin to take the food.
    “Wabete eats,” Meshewa pointed out.
    Perhaps she was safe for the moment with that demon preoccupied. She accepted the meat Meshewa held out, then another piece. Remorse nagged at her as she chewed. She ’d treated this brave shamefully, yet here he sat feeding her. He hadn’t reproached her. But she sensed a reserve in him not present before. Thanks to her, he’d never again be so naive.
    Her cheeks warmed at the memory of her scandalous behavior. Besides that, she needed an ally. “Meshewa, I’m sorry. Please forgive me for what I did.”
    The stiffness at his mouth eased and he nodded. “I have no anger with you.”
    He cocked his head at her, warning in his dark eyes. His sternness made him look like Shoka, but with far less maturity. “Do not run again. You risk punishment.”
    “ You would never be harsh with me, would you?”
    His eyes softened. “No. Not to strike you, even once. Yet some warriors will do this if you run.”
    She kept her voice low. “But Shoka wants to sell me to a Frenchman. I’m trapped unless,” she gazed at him, “you sneak me away. Guide me closer to my people.”
    He hesitated as though tempted to do as she asked, but only for a moment. “I cannot. Let none hear you speak this.”
    She dropped her eyes to the black enamel ring on her middle finger. That was it, then. She had no one else to turn to and didn ’t dare try to escape again.
    Meshewa touched her shoulder. “Do not be sad. I would buy you if I could.”
    She looked up into his wistfulness. “For a wife?”
    “ If you agree.”
    “ My consent matters? How refreshing. What does Shoka want for me?”
    Meshewa seemed sobered by the steep price. “A rifle.”
    “ A rifle?” she sputtered, finding it a bitter joke when compared to what Lord Carlton had offered her father.
    “ Rifle fires better than musket. Takes many skins to trade for this,” Meshewa explained.
    “ You can’t be serious? Shoka would rather have a rifle than keep me for himself?”
    “ He wants no wife.”
    “ Why?”
    Meshewa shifted his eyes from her gaze. “I cannot say.”
    The cooling breeze lifted lengths of her hair, and she brushed them from her face. “Can’t you tell me anything?”
    “ Little.”
    “ I know Shoka had a wife, Meshewa.”
    “ He told me never speak her name. She is dead to him.”
    It disturbed Rebecca to envision Shoka racked with longing for some other woman. “Is his grief terrible?”
    Meshewa shook his head. “Not grief. Anger. Much.”
    “ What about?”
    “ I say enough.”
    “ You’ve scarcely said a thing. Did Shoka murder her?”
    He darted his eyes at Rebecca. “No. She lives.”
    Leaning in closer to him until the top of her head brushed his earlobe, Rebecca whispered, “Tell me of her. None will hear.”
    He pressed his fingers to her mouth. “Speak to me of you.”
    She smiled at his engaging effort to change the subject.
    “When you smile, more fair you are.” He slid a tentative finger across her lips, and traced the small mole at her cheek. “Like blue smoke this mark is colored.”
    “ It’s a beauty mark. The only mark I have that’s beautiful,” she added.
    He curled his fingers around her cheek. “Why speak so?”
    “ Will you touch all her face?”
    The sudden query uttered in Shoka ’s low hiss made Rebecca jump. Meshewa pulled his hand away as if it had caught fire. She turned to stare up at the tall warrior standing behind them, wondering how much he’d overheard.
    The black hair blowing across his face and bare shoulders didn ’t conceal the resentment in his eyes. Even radiating recrimination, he had an unsettling effect on her heart. The fluttering in her middle swept back. “How long have you been there?”
    “ Long