Cheyenne Wife. Judith Stacy

We’d gotten to know them quite well, I’d thought.”

      “Oh, they left already,” Sykes said.

      “Left?” Lily looked back and forth between the two men, an odd feeling tightening her belly. “What do you mean they left?”

      “Gone on to Santa Fe,” Sykes explained. “Them and those other fellas from the wagon train who drove in with you. They all left at dawn.”

      “But…” Stunned, Lily just gazed at the men. They’d gone? Left her behind? Abandoned her in this place? Without so much as a farewell wave?

      “But my father paid the Nelson family to look after us,” Lily said, desperation creeping into her voice. “They’re supposed to do the cooking, drive the wagon, take care of the horses.”

      The two men exchanged a troubled look that squeezed Lily’s stomach into a tight knot.

      “This isn’t hardly the best time, right here at your father’s funeral, but I guess you’ve got to be told.” Sykes pulled at the back of his neck. “I mean, you’ll find out, sooner or later.”

      Lily pressed her lips together, afraid to ask what he was talking about.

      “Last night…” Fredericks cleared his throat. “Well, last night, your horses were stolen.”

      “Stolen?”

      “Yeah, and your wagon was looted.” Sykes shifted uncomfortably. “Pretty much everything you had in there is gone. The wagon was torn up, too.”

      Her horses were stolen? Her belongings stolen? Lily pressed her hand to her forehead as the world suddenly pitched sideways.

      She was penniless—and stranded?

      “Who—who did it? Who’s responsible?” she asked.

      Fredericks shrugged. “Don’t know. Sam Becker—he’s the blacksmith—he saw what had happened to your wagon this morning, then went to check on your horses and realized they were gone.”

      “Shouldn’t we report this to someone?” Lily asked, spreading her hands.

      “Well, Miss St. Claire, it’s not like we got a real lawman here at the fort,” Sykes said.

      “Me and the boys, well, we just take care of things as they come up, best we can,” Fredericks explained. “Becker said he didn’t have any idea who might have taken your belongings.”

      “I—I’d like to go lie down,” Lily gasped, feeling light-headed.

      “That’s a good idea,” Fredericks said.

      “Yeah, good idea,” Sykes agreed, as if he were glad to be rid of her.

      “I’ll walk with you—” Fredericks began.

      “No.” Lily pulled away from him. “No, thank you. I can manage.”

      Though she wasn’t sure that she could, Lily somehow made it to her room and closed the door tight behind her. She fell back against it, her heart thudding in her chest, her mind whirling.

      Her horses and her belongings were gone. Her wagon damaged. And she had no money.

      Without cash how would she buy horses? How would she repair the wagon, let alone reprovision it?

      How would she ever escape this dreadful land?

      Lily pressed her fingers to her lips, holding back a sob. What would become of her?

      Her gaze landed on the cot across the room, the cot on which only yesterday her father had lain, then died. She’d never felt so alone.

      Bile rose in the back of her throat, closing off her breathing in this airless room.

      She had to leave. She had to escape. She couldn’t abide this room—this fort—another moment.

      Lily opened the door and slipped out of the fort into the prairie.

      North paused outside the trade room as he glimpsed a swish of skirt disappear out the gate. Even without seeing her face he knew it was Lily St. Claire, the woman whose father they’d just buried. No other woman wore that sort of dress.

      And no other woman would be foolish enough to leave the safety of the fort.

      North shook his head. Why would she do this? Didn’t she know any better?

      Or did she simply not care that she was a danger not only to herself, but to others who might have to go after her?

      Since arriving at the fort she’d been waited on hand and foot, seemingly unable to accomplish the smallest task, or fend for herself. Was this customary behavior for white women?

      North recalled the stories his father had told about women in the East, his mother, sisters, aunts, left behind like all his other family members. Women so unlike North’s own Cheyenne mother, his sisters and the other women of the tribe.

      North waited and watched the gate. No one else, apparently, had seen Lily leave. The routine of the fort continued on, as usual. Minutes dragged by. The sun drifted toward the Western horizon.

      He watched. Still no sign of her.

      He hoped she’d realize that the prairie was no place for her and come back on her own. He waited longer. She didn’t return.

      North glanced around. No one, still, had noticed that she was gone. That meant he’d have no choice but to go after her himself.

      He hesitated. Something about that woman bothered him. He didn’t know what it was, exactly. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it. But it was there, lurking in the back of his mind, and in the pit of his stomach.

      “Damn…”

      North headed for the stable.

      A dark shadow fell across the ground startling Lily. She gasped and twisted around. A man stood behind her, his approach so silent she hadn’t heard a sound.

      Seated on the ground, Lily brushed the tears from her eyes, then shaded them against the setting sun, squinting to see his face.

      “Who are you?” she asked, unwilling and unable to sound pleasant.

      He didn’t reply, just looked down at her quizzically.

      Lily leaned her head back to see him clearly. He was the Indian she’d seen whispering to the stallion in the corral, she realized.

      She gazed past him and the horse he’d left grazing a few yards away, to Bent’s Fort, now small on the horizon. She hadn’t realized she’d gone so far. She’d walked—then run—through the short, green prairie grass to the river, then followed its banks, finally collapsing here beneath a cottonwood tree, mindless of the distance.

      She didn’t know why this man was here or what he wanted—and she didn’t care, either. All she wanted was to be left alone to cry, to scream, to indulge the ache in her heart and the emptiness in her soul. Was that too much to ask? Surely it couldn’t be, after what she’d been through today.

      “Go away,” she told him, turning away, tears filling her eyes once more. “I want to be by myself. I don’t want any company. Can’t you understand that’s why I came out here in the first place?”

      He walked closer, still staring down at her. Though he’d said nothing, his presence seemed to demand something of her.

      “This has been the worst day of my life. Everything—absolutely everything—has been just awful. Why, I didn’t even have anything decent to wear to my own father’s funeral.” Lily shook the skirt of her green dress, the simple act bringing on another rush of emotion and a fresh wave of tears. “Why, I—I—I don’t even have a handkerchief!”

      The magnitude of her woes descended upon her, crushing her. She sobbed into her hands, not bothering to hide her tears or wipe them away.

      “My horses were