Page 41 of Texas Destiny
A look of horror crossed her face. “You touched it.”
“It makes the chore go quicker.”
She visibly shuddered. “Should I set it on fire or do you want to?”
“We’re gonna need a few more. Since my hands are dirty, I’ll gather them. You check the cans.”
This time Amelia didn’t protest. She scurried back to the wagon and studied their supplies. Nothing appealed to her.
A shiver raced down her spine, and she shuddered with the realization of how quiet everything had suddenly become. Silent and still, like a funeral. Even the mules and Sorrel seemed to sense it as they lifted their noses and turned their ears back.
She glanced at the sky. It was growing darker, but not from the approaching night. Blocking out the late afternoon sun, black clouds rolled in as though pushed by the mighty hand of a giant.
Without warning, the wind rose, sweeping up the dirt, whipping it around her, and startling her with its ferocity. A fat raindrop splattered on her nose.
She heard a harsh curse and spun around. Houston was fighting the wind to get her tent into place and having very little luck. She wondered if he would stay in the tent with her if it rained.
She heard a crack of thunder. A sheet of lightning flashed, igniting the sky so brightly she would have sworn she was standing in the center of it. Houston flung the tent to the ground and strode toward her, seemingly a man with a purpose.
A wide arrow of white lightning streaked to the ground. Sorrel whinnied and dropped her head between her knees. The sky reverberated with rolling thunder as another streak of lightning burst through the darkening sky. Houston reached her.
“Climb inside the wagon,” he ordered as he began to unbuckle his gunbelt.
Amelia backed up a step. “I don’t mind getting wet.”
“It’s not the rain I’m worried about,” he said as he laid his gun on the floorboards. “It’s the lightning. Now, get inside.” Kneeling, he removed his spurs and tossed them into the wagon.
“Are you going to get in the wagon?”
“No, I need to get all the metal off the animals.” As though tired of waiting on her, he quickly came to his feet, grabbed her waist, and hoisted her into the back as though she was nothing more than a sack of flour.
The wind wailed, thunder roared, and lightning flashed across the sky.
“Get down, damn it! I don’t have much time!”
It was the desperation in his voice that convinced her. She lay on her side and wrapped her arms around her drawn-up knees as he brought the tarpaulin over her. Darkness enclosed her, encircled her, and taunted her with the memories of another time when she’d been huddled in a wooden box.
The rain began to pelt the tarpaulin, a steady staccato beat, like the distant sound of long-ago gunfire, the pounding of a thousand hooves … or so it had seemed at the time.
The terrifying darkness trapped her inside its windowless cocoon, blacker than night with no stars, no moon. She was a little girl again, eight years old. Too small. Too frightened. And the enemy was coming.
Amelia grew hot. Breathing became difficult … just as before. The memories rose up and howled louder than the wind that rushed past the wagon.
She could hear her mother’s frightened voice. “Hurry, Amelia. Hurry!”
“No, Mama! No!”
Her mother’s fingers dug into the delicate flesh of her arm as Amelia tried to dig her heels into the wooden floor. Her mother jerked her so hard that she thought surely her arm would come off her body. “Come on, child. Your papa will protect you. You’ll be safe with him.”
“No, Mama! No!”
The room loomed closer and closer. The shadowed room. The flames from the candles flickered, and the ghosts danced along the wall.
“Hurry, Amelia. Papa will save you.”
“No, Mama! No, please! Papa can’t save me. Papa’s dead!”
Amelia couldn’t breathe. She was suffocating, drowning in the memories. She yanked on the ribbons and jerked the bonnet off her head. Still she couldn’t draw air into her lungs. Desperately she tore at the tarpaulin.
