Case repeated to Rayna everything he had told the others and assured her that he had not given up. His next move, he said, would be to investigate the raids east of the reservation. Rayna, in turn, told him what little she knew about Skylar’s early years. The information was important to Case, but he needed no reassurance that Skylar was his sister. The knowledge in his heart was unshakable, and he was much more concerned with knowing about Morning Star’s life with her adopted family.
They sat down to supper, but all of them, including Lucas and Jenny, were too keyed up to pay much attention to the meal. After supper, Case put his children to bed, and it wasn’t until Libby heard a noise on the porch that she finally remembered her strange encounter with Black Rope.
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to the door and wasn’t surprised to find the Apache standing at the top of the porch steps.
“I have come for Longstreet,” he said in his own language.
“I will get him.” Knowing Black Rope wouldn’t come inside even if she invited him, Libby left the door open and she hurried upstairs to tell Case he had a visitor.
As puzzled by Black Rope’s appearance as Libby was, Case made his apologies to Rayna as he slipped out onto the porch.
“You are always welcome,” he told the brave in greeting.
Black Rope’s response was hardly congenial. “I did not want to come.”
“Then why are you here?” Case asked bluntly. He didn’t want to be rude, but Black Rope wasn’t a friend or a relative, and Case was eager to get back to Libby and their very special guest. There was still much he wanted to learn about Morning Star from Rayna Templeton.
What Black Rope had to tell him, though, more than made up for the inconvenience.
“What did he want?” Libby asked a few minutes later when Case returned.
He paused a moment as he captured Rayna’s eyes. “He came to tell me where our sister is,” he replied.
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19
The room erupted into chaos.
“How on earth could Black Rope know about Morning Star?
Where is she? How long has he known? Why didn’t he go to Crook? Why—”
The questions came rapid-fire from everyone in the room, and Case shook his head at the barrage and stood silently until the interrogation stopped. “Everyone on the reservation knows about Sun Hawk and the woman he helped escape,” he told them once he had their undivided attention. “And they also know that Crook sent me to find them.”
“Where is Skylar?” Rayna asked insistently.
“Black Rope told me that two days ago he came across a camp in the Nagona Valley. It had been vacated quickly, as though whoever had been camped there had known someone was coming. The signs he found told him it was a man and woman, but when he tried to follow them, their trail disappeared.”
“Where is this Nagona Valley?” she asked. “Is it far from here?”
“Not too far,” Case replied. “It’s in the White Mountains above the Fort Apache Reservation.”
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Rayna couldn’t sit still any longer. Her mind was racing, and she felt as though she’d had Skylar in her arms for a precious moment and then lost her.
“If Black Rope scared them off, they could be anywhere by now, couldn’t they? For God’s sake, why didn’t Black Rope go to Crook the moment he suspected he’d found them?”
Meade looked up at her. “Rayna, the Nagona Valley is off the reservation. If Black Rope was there, it’s very likely that he was off the reservation without permission.”
“Meade’s right,” Case said. “Black Rope couldn’t go to Crook without risking punishment. We’re lucky that he even came to me.”
“Why did he, do you think?” Libby asked.
“Because he feared that our people would be blamed for harboring renegades if Skylar and Sun Hawk were found anywhere near the White Mountains.”
“Is there a chance they’re still in the area?” Rayna asked hopefully.
“Possibly, but even if they’re not, I should still be able to pick up their trail.”
“Black Rope couldn’t,” Rayna reminded him, then frowned when everyone else began to smile.
“Rayna, Black Rope isn’t Case Longstreet,” Libby told her serenely. “Case will find her.”
Rayna couldn’t argue with her assessment of her husband’s skills because she needed to believe in them as much as Libby and the others obviously did.
“Are you leaving in the morning?” she asked him.
“Yes.”
Rayna squared her shoulders and prepared for a fight. “I’m going with you.”
Case frowned as he thought it over. “That’s not wise, Miss Templeton. I can travel faster alone.”
“I won’t slow you down,” Rayna argued.
“Perhaps not, but if Sun Hawk was astute enough to realize that Black Rope was in the area, he’ll bolt at the first hint that he’s being followed.”
“Then that’s all the more reason for me to come along. Skylar doesn’t know you. She and Sun Hawk will see you as another threat. But if she sees me, she’ll know she’s safe.”
If the situation hadn’t been so serious, Meade might have smiled. Rayna hadn’t uttered a single “hell” or “damn” since she’d started arguing with his brother-in-law. “She’s right, Case. Skylar would never run from Rayna, and you don’t need to worry about her slowing you down. Believe me, I know.” He stood and faced him. “We’re both going with you.”
Rayna turned toward him, wondering what to make of his offer and startling defense of her. “You don’t have to do that, Meade.”
“I want to. I was there in the beginning, and I’m going to be with you till the end. It’s only fitting, don’t you think?”
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He was looking at her so strangely, so . . . tenderly, that she couldn’t hold his gaze. “I suppose so.”
Meade looked at Case again. “Then it’s settled?”
Case knew he could refuse. If nothing else, he could slip off in the night and leave them behind. It would certainly simplify his job of tracking Sun Hawk without running the risk of being discovered.
But then he touched the medallion on his chest, and a strange sense of peace came over him. It was as if his spirit, the eagle, had spoken to him, telling him what he must do.
“It is settled,” Case said with a nod. “We leave together at dawn.”
Skylar was sorry that she and Sun Hawk had been forced to leave the Nagona Valley. The time they’d spent there had been one of the happiest periods of her life. Sun Hawk had felt it safe to stop traveling for a while, and Skylar had built a simple brush wickiup for them. Water had been plentiful, and Sun Hawk had been able to find enough game to feed them and to supply them with several much-needed deer hides. He had patiently taught her how to scrape and tan the hides so that they could make them into moccasins and warm clothing to ward off the autumnal chill of the mountains.
She and Sun Hawk had worked hard, but there had also been time for play, and every night in their tiny home, they had made love with the same sweet passion as the night he had taken her as his bride. He proved his love for her every day in small ways that Skylar had never imagined could be so important.