Page 56 of Freedom's Kiss
He hauled her to her feet, and the rope again bit into tender flesh, blood, warm and wet, running a trail from beneath the cords along the underside of her forearm. Jeb glared at her, worked his mouth, and spit a wad of saliva in her face.
Winnie returned his glare, her revulsion matching the sickness that slid down her cheek. “My husband’ll find you. And when he does, he’ll kill you.”
He backhanded her. She would have fallen to the ground again if Martha hadn’t been next in line and caught her.
Jeb turned his hate-filled eyes toward the corporal in the rear. “Lot of good you are.”
The man shrugged. “I’m not risking my life so you can line your pockets. One shot from my musket and we’d have arrows through our hearts in minutes.”
Jeb projected another mouthful of spittle to the ground. “Yellow-bellied coward.” He yanked on the rope. “Let’s go.”
With every step that she was pulled forward and away from her home, Winnie tugged back, resistance in her movements as well as her heart. But her efforts only left her with muscles that screamed, bruises that throbbed along her body, and wrists so raw she feared her skin had been rubbed completely off. At nightfall Jeb stopped, and the women collapsed in exhaustion.
Winnie wiggled until her spine rested against the trunk of a tree. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes, the determination to resist giving way to the emotions she’d fought against as hard as she had Jeb. Tiny pinpricks of discomfort arched over the tops of her breasts, spreading down, filling and weighing her chest with life-sustaining milk. Dampness spread in small circles in the front of her poncho-like shirt. Her body weeping at the distance from her child as much as her heart broke for need of him.
Martha scooted over and laid her head on Winnie’s shoulder, offering comfort. “Don’t lose heart. Remember the words of David, ‘The Lord is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me?”
Winnie wanted to snort, as she could think of many things man had and could do to her and her people.
“Nokosi will come for you. Evil won’t win this day.”
But at what cost? And how long would it take him to track them down? She prayed another woman in one of the villages would have mercy over her precious Otter and nurse him alongside her own child. Otherwise…
She squeezed her eyes shut tight, not able to even entertain a thought along that direction.
Footsteps crunched nearer. She opened her eyes to slits. The soldier stood at the slave catcher’s side, hands fisted at his hips. “Aren’t you going to feed them at least?”
Jeb pushed his hat, discolored along the band from his sweat, back from over his eyes and peered up at the corporal with arms and legs crossed. “What’s it to you?”
“We’ve got days of hard walking ahead of us. They’ll need food and water if they’re going to have the strength to travel the distance.”
Jeb fingered his throat as he scowled in Winnie’s direction. He harrumphed but didn’t bother voicing an argument, just replaced his hat over his eyes and leaned back against a fallen log.
The corporal expelled a breath before reaching into one of his bags and bringing out bits of dried meat and distributing them among the women. Winnie took the food, though it killed her to do so. She wanted nothing from either of these men but to be released.
“No point in trying to escape.” Jeb’s words were muffled through the large brim of his hat. “I’ll only catch you again now, or you’ll be returned to your old masters by your new Injun ones soon enough.”
“He’s right, you know.” The corporal lowered to the ground and rested his forearms on raised knees. “A delegation of Seminoles is meeting now to sign a treaty. The government will pay them five thousand dollars a year for twenty years to move onto a reservation inland, but one of the stipulations is they return all fugitives.” He stared at the tips of his fingers. “It’s a good deal. They’ll get farm equipment, cattle, pigs, compensation. Not to mention a school and a blacksmith.”
How could chasing a people off their land, away from their homes, and caging them in ever be a good deal? How could making an agreement that tore families apart and enslaved them based solely on the color of their skin ever be a good decision?
Cicadas buzzed as the air thinned, night throwing off the blanket of humidity that day draped over them. Winnie’s eyes grew heavy, but she refused to give in to sleep. If an opportunity arose when both the corporal and Jeb succumbed to slumber, she’d quietly rouse the women and flee. But the soldier remained ever alert, and with the arch of the moon overhead, she feared he’d soon awaken Jeb to take second watch.
Thwack!
The corporal’s eyes widened before he slumped foreword, an arrow protruding from his back.
One of the women down the line stifled a scream, but the sudden noise startled Jeb awake. He darted from his reclined position, pistol in hand.
“What the…” He wiped a hand down his beard as he stared at the dead body at his feet. His gaze leaping up, he trained his gun in a wide sweep in front of him. “Come out and fight, savage. Man to man.”
Nokosi stepped out from behind the wide trunk of an oak tree, his visage as ferocious and deadly as Winnie had ever seen it. He looked like a panther who had stalked his prey and was now ready to pounce and devour.
“I see no man. Only a coward who steals women. My woman.”
“These slaves don’t belong to you. I’m returning them to their rightful masters.” Jeb’s finger flexed over the trigger. A shot rang out, smoke curling from the pistol’s barrel.
“Uck.” A gurgling sound, like a man drowning in his own blood, emitted through the aftermath.
“Nokosi!” Winnie shouted as she scrambled to her knees, the rope around her wrists tied to the other women keeping her from dashing forward.
A form split the smoke, broad shoulders slicing through the grayish cloud as Nokosi stalked toward her, his face all hard lines and planes. In her peripheral vision she saw Jeb upon the ground, a tomahawk wedged into his chest, but she only had eyes for the man who gazed upon her with a fierceness that took her breath away.
He removed a knife at his waist and knelt in front of her, slicing through her bonds with one sweep. Arms free, she wrapped them around his neck and pressed against him, never wanting an inch of space between them again.
He cooed into her ear and held her close. “No one will steal my tomorrows from me, Pakse. No one.”
