“That isn’t it. Lance gave me money.”
“Then why can’t we go? You promised!”
Amelia alternately cried and pleaded until Summer finally gave in. Reluctantly she helped pack Amelia’s most prized belongings—the remainder of which Martha agreed to send by stagecoach later—and watched as Amelia said a tearful good-bye to her mother-in-law.
Her last hope that the stage would be filled came to naught when they arrived at the station. They were the o
nly passengers expected. They had no trouble buying tickets from Jeb Burkett, even though he looked at Summer oddly.
“Strange,” Jeb said slowly, as if not wanting to be caught prying. “Lance didn’t mention you’d be wantin’ to take a trip.”
“He doesn’t know about it. My sister doesn’t feel she can stay here any longer. I am taking her home.”
Summer borrowed a sheet of letter paper from Jeb and left a message of explanation for Lance, telling him she was taking Amelia back to Sky Valley. She left the note in Jeb’s care, not trusting the Truesdales to deliver it or in any way help her and her half-breed husband.
The stage arrived only an hour late, with the same two drivers as on the trip north. Shep and Petey both greeted Summer as a bosom friend, and promised to take good care of her and her sister on the long trip home.
Amelia shrank from them both and wouldn’t accept their assistance in boarding, but as the stage pulled away from the station, she looked out the window with more interest than she’d shown in all the time since her rescue.
Summer couldn’t help but feel glad for Melly, but her own heart sank with every mile they traveled. She sat blindly looking out her own window, wondering if she had done the right thing, hoping that Lance wouldn’t consider her leaving him behind a betrayal.
Chapter 16
Home. Sky Valley. From a rise in the road, Summer looked out over the cedar-studded limestone hills with their lush, grassy meadows and bands of grazing horses, and her heart swelled at the sight. They had made it. Amelia was safe.
Her sister sat silently next to her in the buckboard borrowed from Lance’s livery, while his young hired hand drove the team and filled the awkward moments with artless prattle—a prattle Summer encouraged. Amelia felt keenly self-conscious about her return to civilization, and she needed to be treated as if nothing eventful had happened to her. There would be enough people who would condemn her for having been a Comanche captive, but she needed to know there were some who would not.
She took Melly’s hand and pointed in the distance, describing the difficulty they’d had last spring when the creek had overflowed its banks. She hoped to interest her sister in the ranch, in the simple tasks of everyday living, and turn her thoughts from the terrors of the past.
Her own heart lighter than it had been in weeks, Summer drew in a deep breath of fresh air. It was so wonderful to be home! The land looked the same as she’d left it, except for the changing season. It was only the second week in October, but evidence of autumn was beginning to crop up here and there. She could see fields whose hay had been cut, and closer to the ranch, acres of drying cornstalks whose crop had been harvested. There were no immediate signs of the vaqueros who guarded the herds, though, and no one rode out to meet them.
Summer felt uncomfortable at this lack of caution after weeks of living with her nerves on edge. A war party could have raided the ranch and burned it to the ground before any of the occupants could arm themselves. It was not often that Comanches raided this far south, but it still happened. During the war, horses had been stolen and countless head of cattle driven off, for sale to Federal Army contractors in the New Mexico Territory.
The sprawling white clapboard house looked exactly as it had when she’d left five weeks ago—had it only been that long? It seemed like an eternity since she’d first gotten word of Amelia’s capture, since she’d pleaded with Lance to help her, since she’d married him in exchange for attempting her sister’s rescue.
The intrusive memory sobered Summer’s thoughts. She was a married woman now. She was the wife of a Comanche half-breed. Her future was likely to be even more difficult than her sister’s. A captive who survived imprisonment by Indians was considered dirty and disgraced, an object of pity and embarrassment, but a woman who would willingly ally herself with the Comanche would no doubt be subjected to outright contempt and scorn.
When the buckboard clattered to a halt in the sweeping drive, one of the Mexican maidservants noticed them first. With a cry of delight, Estelle ran out on the porch and called excitedly for the patrón to come quickly, that the señora and the señorita had returned.
Hobbling outside, Reed bounded down the steps as fast as his crutches would allow, and dropped them altogether when he reached the buckboard. With a sound that was half shout, half sob, he hauled Amelia down and into his arms.
“Oh, God…Melly…you’re safe.”
Tears of joy streamed down his face as he clutched Amelia in a grip that threatened to crush her. From the look of her shaking shoulders, Amelia was crying also. Summer felt an ache in her own throat, watching her brother’s relief as he rocked their sister in his embrace. She was grateful to Nate Jenkins, the lad who’d driven them, for his sensitivity, when he climbed down from the buckboard and moved away, leaving them in privacy.
It was a full minute before Reed looked up to meet Summer’s eyes. “You really did it. You found her. I feared…”
“I know.” She smiled. “I feared the same thing. But it’s over. Amelia’s safe.”
His gaze narrowing, Reed looked around him. “Where is Calder? Didn’t he return with you?”
At the mention of the man who’d saved her life, Amelia stiffened visibly and pushed out of her brother’s embrace. “I want to go inside now.” She turned to the Mexican women who were waiting on the porch, eager to greet her. “Estelle, Consuala, Maritza, how are you? It is so good to be home!”
Summer’s smile faded as she watched her sister being welcomed by the laughing women.
“What happened?” her brother demanded. “What’s wrong?”
“She wants to pretend Lance doesn’t exist. She blames him for what the Comanches did to her.”