Heather Graham's Haunted Treasures, Page 3

  And his eyes...

  They were gold, and very strange. They were similar to her own amber eyes, but more gold. She studied them, fascinated. Perhaps some other color vaguely rimmed them. What color? She couldn't tell. But it was there, framing the gold so strangely. They were incredible eyes. Striking. Commanding. Evocative. She couldn't seem to tear her gaze away from his.

  He started walking toward her. In seconds, he was standing before her.

  "Mr. Drago," Lollie began. "This is—"

  "I know," he said, and his voice was deep and rich, sensual and slightly accented, as peculiarly hot and chilling as his eyes. "This is Anne!" He bowed to her. "I am David Drago." He paused. Somewhere in the room, a fiddle was playing. "Shall we dance?"

  "No."

  She was certain that she formed the word. She hadn't come to dance. Not with any man. She was in love with...

  "Come, Anne."

  His fingers were on hers. His gold eyes were commanding her.

  A searing heat seemed to leap from his fingers to spread throughout her body.

  It would not hurt to dance with him.

  "I've been waiting for you," he told her.

  She fought his hypnotic voice and eyes. "Why?" she demanded.

  He arched a deadly dark brow. "They told me you were the most beautiful woman in all of the West. Indeed, in all of the country."

  "I do believe they were mistaken."

  He shook his head. "I know they were not."

  "That is kind, Mr. Drago."

  "If I am kind, then perhaps you will dine with me tomorrow night."

  "I-—I'm afraid I can't."

  "Why not?"

  "There's another man," she murmured.

  "Where is he then?"

  "With the militia. He could not be here."

  "Then you must let me escort you when he cannot," Drago said politely.

  No, never.

  "That would be fine," she heard herself say.

  He leaned close to her. She thought that she heard him whisper. A very fierce swirl of air, so faint she was not certain she heard it, so intense that the feel of his breath seemed to enter into her very soul.

  "There is no other man for you. There can never be. I have waited forever. You are mine. And when you are mine, you will feel my touch and know me—oh, so well, my love!"

  She tried to pull away from him; she could not. She must have imagined the words, the passion. But she wasn't imagining the feel of his arms around her, the strength of them. She wanted to break away.

  But she couldn't seem to tense her muscles; she couldn't break his hold. His eyes were gleaming down into hers again, and she was meeting them. She wasn't sure that she wanted to break away anymore. There was a staggering warmth in those eyes, a fire, drawing her, compelling her.

  He spoke. "Anne..." Just her name. So softly.

  She gave herself a mental shake. She had to stop this! Then she realized that over Drago's shoulder, she could see her uncle. Jem was watching her.

  And there was pure terror in his eyes! Terror that he couldn't seem to hide!

  He rushed forward suddenly and tapped Drago on the shoulder. "May an old man cut in on a far younger fellow to dance with his niece?" he inquired.

  A look of fury swiftly passed over Drago's features. Anne didn't like it. It was frightening.

  But then she thought she must have imagined it because Drago was bowing very politely to her uncle. "By all means, sir! Anne, it is not the end. Only the beginning," he promised.

  She scarcely saw him again that night. That was good! He was so strange. So frightening. She didn't want to be near him.

  Yet she could think of nothing else but Drago.

  And when she returned home that night, she was still thinking about him. Uncle Jem was painfully silent and absorbed, but she barely noticed, her own mind was so fully occupied.

  A breeze seemed to be stirring again. But inside the house, and particularly inside her bedroom, it was hot, very hot. She opened her window and lay down in her bed. It was still so uncomfortably hot.

  She found herself ripping her nightgown off and lying naked on the bed.

  She had never, never done such a thing before...

  And then she was dreaming. He was there. Telling her to bid him enter. He wanted her. He wanted... things... from her. He wanted to make love with her.

  She was dreaming; surely, she was dreaming. But she wanted him, too. She was twisting on her bed, waiting, wanting him. Twisting, parting her thighs, feeling an ache grow between them.

  Drago...

  He was there, a shadow against the moon.

  And all she had to do was bid him enter...

  Chapter 2

  "God in heaven!" Billy Trent exclaimed, not able to look at Michael, his eyes still fixed on the scene before them.

  Michael Johnston couldn't tear his own eyes away.

  And he thought he'd seen everything. Just about everything that one man could do to another. He'd spent five years with the Rebs, butchering the Yanks. He'd seen the Yanks butchering them right back, and he'd seen the landscape in South Carolina—the first state to secede from the Union—once Sherman and his men had marched across it.

  Then he'd come west, to this part of Texas. And he'd met the Apaches.

  And he'd seen what the Apaches did to the white men, and what the white men did to the Apaches.

  This was a Mescalero camp, he tried to tell his numbed mind. They were, to many, the most fiery, proud, and violent of all the Apaches. They were warriors, wild, courageous, and cunning. Few excelled them in the art of warfare.

  But this time, none of their skills had saved them.

  Not a soul seemed to have survived within the camp. And in all his war years, and in all his years on the Texas plains, Michael had never, never seen anything like this.

  Far behind him in their militia ranks, someone was sick. He heard the low, soft moan, and then the choking sound...

  "Colonel, what the hell happened here?" Billy demanded.

  "I don't know," he said. There had to be an explanation for this... this... carnage! Not a single body seemed to have been left in one piece. And the pieces seemed to be scattered so widely that they couldn't be gathered to put one body back together.

  And yet, for all the horror that met their eyes, there seemed to be a singular lack of... blood.

  But that didn't seem to be something that he could just blurt out to Billy. He opened his mouth, trying to say something. Nothing came. "I don't know," he repeated. "I just don't know."

  Robert Morison, a freckle-faced redhead who had been with him in the South Carolina artillery and had traveled with him west to Texas when it was all over, rode up beside him.

  "Colonel, you don't think that the Yanks from the fort did this, do you?"

  Michael shook his head. He knew that everyone in their thirty-man militia unit, most of them Texas boys, was staring at him. "I really don't think that the Yanks are responsible. They were pretty well fired up when they came through South Carolina at the end of the war," he said. "They tore up the countryside pretty bad. It was Sherman's 'scorched earth' policy. So I've seen what Yanks do when they're mad. It doesn't even begin to compare with this!"

  "Then what?" Robert asked. "Wild dogs?"

  "Maybe," Michael said. No, no maybe. Wild dogs couldn't have been so neat.

  There would have been blood.

  "I think we ought to get out of here," Billy said suddenly. "What if more Apaches come upon us here and think that we did it?"

  Their lives wouldn't be worth a wooden nickel, Michael thought. He lifted a hand and called out to all the men. "We'll have to report this to the Yankee fort. We'll ride north-northwest till we reach them."

  But even as he lifted his hand to start the movement, he froze. He had the sense of being watched.

  He looked up. They were in an arroyo, cliffs on all sides. And he saw that they were surrounded by Apaches.

  There was nothing to do but stand his
ground.

  Then one of the Apache horsemen stepped forward, and Michael recognized him. It was the war chief, Walks Tall. The man he'd come to meet. He began to pray that the Indian hadn't just arrived, that he had known what was here...

  "Don't move!" Michael commanded his troops. "For the love of God, hold your ground!"

  His men obeyed. The Apaches, excellent horsemen, began to descend the cliffs. Dust and dirt flew in their wake.

  Then Walks Tall was riding up before him, his feathered lance lifted in a greeting.

  Michael decided not to try his weak Apache with the Indian. Walks Tall had learned English quickly and well because it was the language of the people so determined to encroach upon his land.

  "We did not do this," Michael said. "I swear to you, we did not do this."

  Walks Tall nodded, and made a gesture to some of his men who dismounted and began to gather the victims' remains. They were a burial detail, Michael thought numbly.

  "I've known you since you came to this land, Michael Johnston," Walks Tall told him. "I do not accuse you of this massacre. Women and children, never. Ride back with us. Our camp is not far. We've a fresh buffalo kill. Eat with us before you return home. You must be home before nightfall."

  Michael, startled by the Indian's words, glanced at Robert.

  Robert shrugged. "You think they really mean to have buffalo for dinner and not us, right?" he inquired beneath his breath.

  Michael pondered the question. He had known Walks Tall for a long time, too. They had both tried to negotiate while other white men and Indians had killed one another.

  "We're safe," he told Robert.

  And they were. Just as the war chief had promised, the white men were welcomed into the camp. Several women saw to their comfort. Walks Tall watched the beginning of the activities, then beckoned Michael to follow him.

  There was a certain teepee etiquette, practiced by most of the Plains Indians. Michael knew it well, and entered behind Walks Tall, then sat to the left of his host. He accepted the beautifully carved pipe offered to him. Then he realized that they were not alone in the teepee, that someone was seated in the corner.

  An ancient Apache woman, her face lined and leathery, came forward. She nodded to Michael gravely, threw some dust on the fire which caused it to spark, and began to dance around the fire while chanting.

  Then she knelt before it and lifted her head, staring at Michael.

  "We fight a common enemy, white man."

  Perplexed, Michael stared back at the Apache.

  "Dancing Woman knows," Walks Tall told him gravely.

  Michael shook his head. "Knows what? Does she know who killed those poor people so horribly?"

  The Apache woman and the chief exchanged glances. "It is not a who," Walks Tall said.

  "Animals, then. Coyotes, wildcats—"

  "Evil," Dancing Woman told him.

  "A white man's evil," Walks Tall added softly.

  This was making less and less sense to Michael. If the Indians blamed a white man, they were being extremely kind to him despite it.

  "Walks Tall, I swear that no man I know—"

  "No man," Walks Tall agreed.

  "Evil," Dancing Woman persisted. "An evil whose death lies at the heart."

  Walks Tall sighed deeply and tried to explain. "An evil spirit has come. An evil breeze, an evil wind. It is a white man's evil spirit. Dancing Woman felt it when it came. She cried her warning to the Apaches. Here, among my people, we cried to our gods. We made our land holy and brought our children inside at night. But all of our brothers did not heed our warning. You see what has happened to them."

  Michael opened his mouth to speak, to protest. But what could he say? Something horrible had happened. Something horrible beyond words.

  And even as the chief spoke to him, he remembered the breeze.

  He had awakened in the night, afraid. He had known that it was out there.

  He didn't believe in ghosts and goblins. But there were times when he wasn't certain that God truly resided in His heaven.

  He knew all about hell—he had seen hell, right on earth. He had seen it in the battlefields, in the medical tents.

  But now...

  Now a crazed old Indian woman was talking about spirits, and to his amazement, he believed her.

  Because he had felt the breeze...

  Walks Tall, a man who might have been his enemy, was watching him with pity. He pointed a finger at him. "Dancing Woman says that you must fight the evil."

  A cold chill seized him. He didn't want to fight the evil. He didn't want to believe in it.

  He lifted his hands. "I don't know what I'm fighting."

  The old Indian woman spoke then. "You will see the face of your enemy. He will walk where you walk. He will hunger where you have hungered. He will be more powerful than you could dream."

  This was madness.

  "If he's so damned powerful," Michael said angrily, "how will I fight him?"

  "With the strength of your faith. And your love," the old woman assured him. She was staring at Walks Tall again. The two communicated without words in an eerie silence.

  "Dancing Woman says that you must go home. You must ride hard and try to reach your town before nightfall. The fate of your men rests in your hands."

  It was madness. Truly madness. But Walks Tall was rising and so Michael stood, too.

  He was supposed to go. He saw that. So there was no choice.

  But just as he was ducking to exit through the flap of the teepee, Walks Tall spoke to him one more time. "Look to your woman, Michael Johnston. Look to your woman."

  Fear struck him as it never had before.

  Anne!

  He had felt the need to protect her that night. Felt it so fiercely. And now he was here...

  And she was home. Alone.

  Look to your woman...

  It was madness.

  He didn't care. He shouted the orders to his men, mounted his horse, and started to ride like the wind, leaving the others to scramble onto their mounts and follow behind him.

  He'd never make it. The night wind was coming too quickly.

  And it was chill...

  * * *

  Ah... there she was!

  Drago could see her through the window as he hovered in the darkness.

  As beautiful as he remembered, as lovely as life and as beguiling as death! She was a picture to set an urgent edge to his hunger—naked, sleek as ivory and writhing against the sheets. Her skin was flawless, her face perfection. Her lips as red as blood, her hair an ebony cloud, her throat...

  Ah, her throat!

  He concentrated, seeking to enter her dreams. If only she knew! He had dreamed of her for so very, very long. Dreamed, waited, and come this perilous way...

  He had to possess her mind.

  He had to force her to bid him enter. Yes, come in, my love! Come in...

  He was nearly with her. He had sent the wind to seductively stroke her bare skin. Tendrils of swirling air rose and fell, caressing, insinuating, touching her here and then there... more and more intimately.

  Concentrate, concentrate!

  Yes... yes...

  He smiled.

  He could nearly feel her. The cool silk of her skin. The velvet brush of that glorious dark hair. Oh, he would take care! He would be so very slow, and very careful, nurturing her all the way. He would not lose her again.

  Yes, a stroke here. He closed his eyes, sensing the breeze again. Ah, yes, a long, slow caress with the warmth of the air, along the soft ivory flesh of her inner thigh...

  Call me, my love, call me...

  Yes!

  She was going to invite him in!

  He opened his eyes, gold and all-seeing in the darkness.

  And then...

  Chapter 3

  "Anne!"

  Michael stood at her bedroom door, watching her in amazement. Bathed in an eerie glow of moonlight, she twisted and undulated, her skin sleek and damp.
r />   "Anne!" he cried again, incredulous—and uncaring whether Jem discovered him at that moment or not.

  His sense of fear and unease had increased steadily since he had left the Apache camp. He'd never ridden harder in all of his life. His terror had increased when he had galloped into Anne's backyard and seen the horses careening wildly about the corral, snorting, rearing.

  The horses were afraid...

  He had leaped from his own bay, Sandy, and rushed to the back door, the one that was always kept open. He hadn't cared if Jem had heard the door open and close, or if he'd heard the pounding of Michael's footsteps on the wooden floors.

  All he'd known was that he had to reach her.

  And there she lay...

  He felt it then. Felt the cool and curious breeze. It made the hair prickle at the nape of his neck, just as if he were a hunting pup. The window! Irrationally, unreasonably, he became certain that the evil was entering through the window. He strode across the room and slammed it shut. Then he hurried back to the bed, falling to his knees beside it, desperate to touch her.

  "Anne!" he whispered fervently. She had fallen still now. Her naked flesh was very pale. She opened her eyes slowly, her expression one of confusion and disorientation.

  "Michael!" she murmured. Was there disappointment in her voice? he wondered.

  Who had she been expecting?

  "Yes, it's Michael," he said, somewhat aggravated. He had never expected... this kind of greeting.

  And now that the breeze was gone...

  He wondered if he had imagined it. Could it have been real?

  "Anne—?" he began, but all at once she seemed to realize how she had been sleeping. She was sitting halfway up, still confused. Her fingers fell on her bare abdomen and she gave a sharp gasp of surprise.

  She stared at him hard. "Michael, what—"

  He stood, his hands in the air. "I didn't do a damn thing," he said harshly. "This is how you were sleeping."

  A blush flooded her cheeks. "The night was very hot."

  "The night is quite cool."

  "Well, it was very hot in my dreams."

  "Just what were you dreaming about?" he demanded.