Capture the Sun (Cheyenne Series) (7 page)

      
“I'm Carrie Sinclair, Noah's wife. Now, would you be so good as to answer my question, since I inquired first?” She was proud of the steadiness of her voice, especially since he now stood a scant three feet from her, towering over her slim frame so that she had to arch her neck back to address him.

      
“I'm Hawk, Hawk Sinclair. It seems we're kin of sorts now.” Again the predatory grin.

      
Suddenly Carrie knew. There had been something familiar in the long, rangy frame and harshly chiseled features. The difference in coloring and costume threw her. He was Noah's son!

      
“You're Noah's son! But you're an Ind—”

      
“Cheyenne,” he cut her off coldly. “Indians live on the Asiatic subcontinent on the other side of the world. Stupid of the white explorers not to know where they landed four hundred years ago.”

      
Carrie felt her face flame as brightly as her hair. She'd never met an actual savage, never even seen one at a distance until they passed through western Minnesota. Now one stood right next to her calmly speaking in an educated voice, giving her a geography lesson!

      
“I didn't mean—”

      
“I know exactly what you meant,
Mrs.
Sinclair.” He stressed the title contemptuously. “My mother was the first Mrs. Sinclair, and she was a full-blooded Cheyenne. I am what is not affectionately known out west as a half-breed.”

      
“Evan, there you are. I see you and Carrie have met.” Noah's voice cut like a knife, slicing through the crackling tension between the man and woman in the center of the room. He quickly walked over to Carrie's side and took her arm as he inspected his only son with flinty blue eyes.“You look well, especially considering I heard at least a dozen rumors to the effect that you'd been shot.”

      
“You should know how hard I am to kill, Noah. You only
hoped
it was true.”

      
Carrie let out a small hiss of breath as the veiled animosity between her and Hawk shifted to open warfare between father and son. What was she caught in the midst of?

      
“Let's adjourn our discussion to a more appropriate time, Evan,” Noah said with a nod to Carrie.

      
“My name is Hawk. I don't use Evan, not since I was fourteen.” He ground out the words with rigid control. “Your missionaries may have turned my mother from Laughing Woman to Marah, but I earned Hunting Hawk, and I'll keep it.”

      
Carrie watched the predatory fierceness in his flashing black eyes and studied the powerful profile. Hawk. Yes, it fit him perfectly, she thought with a shiver as she watched him stare Noah down. It was the first time since she'd met her husband that she had seen him back off.

      
“All right, Hawk. I don't know a good reason to fight it anymore, since no one calls you Evan anyway,” Noah snapped angrily. “Dinner is at seven, as usual. You know where your room is. I'm going to show Carrie to hers.”

      
“Until dinner, Mrs. Sinclair.” That deadly white smile flashed once more. “Oh, never fear, I do know how to use a knife and fork.” With that sally, Hawk went swiftly and silently out the door.

      
Carrie was stunned into silence as she allowed Noah to show her to her room. Pleading a headache, she asked to

be left to nap before dinner. Noah seemed relieved not to have to answer her questions, and quickly left her with a terse nod.

      
Her room was lovely, with a French door to the outside veranda that ran the length of the house. It was light and airy, with soft lavender curtains and bedspread, a thick navy-blue rug, and dainty cherry wood furniture. There was even a rocker in one corner by a window, a perfect spot for curling up to read on cold winter days.

      
Dazed, Carrie sat down in the rocker to contemplate this latest piece in the puzzle of Noah Sinclair's life. A son, an Indian wife. What had Hawk called her—Marah? Then’ a second thought hit her. Good Lord, was his mother still alive, off with those savages? Was her own marriage legitimate? Or was Hawk a bastard and the so-called marriage of his mother to Noah some primitive tribal sham?

      
Her temples pounded as questions whirled about in her aching brain. She must somehow get Noah to tell her the truth. What else lay hidden in his past?

* * * *

      
The first dinner in her new home provided more answers than Carrie wanted to hear. At quarter to seven she walked into the parlor expecting to find Noah waiting to escort her to the table. Instead she found Hawk brooding by the open window. He turned abruptly, sensing her presence with a savage's instinct, no doubt, since she had entered very silently. While he looked her over, he posed indolently, leaning one long arm against the mantel, a drink in his hand.

      
“Very fetching. Redheads always look good in yellow. Soft and warm, like butter 'n' honey.” His words were soft and faintly suggestive, but his black eyes were what really alarmed her. He looked at her like a critical predator, debating whether or not the prey was worth the effort of swooping down to snatch it. Carrie had taken special care with her toilette. She chose a simple but chic dress of deep yellow silk. Tailored in straight lines, it accentuated her coloring and flattered her height.

      
Indeed, she noticed how very tall Hawk was, even more so than Noah, who stood at six feet. Hawk appeared to be several inches taller, making her five-foot-seven-inch frame seem tiny by comparison. She was used to looking men eye to eye and didn't like being at such a disadvantage.

      
Hawk had bathed and shaved, and was dressed differently than before. No guns or knives were visible on his person. However, in spite of his crisp linen shirt opened at the throat, well-tailored gray suit and gleaming boots, he still looked dark and dangerous. Oddly, she felt a thrill of perverse fascination when she looked at him.

      
“Are you always so quiet, or is it just my presence that freezes up that pretty little tongue?” Those relentless eyes continued to skewer her.

      
She blushed. “I—I just don't know how to respond to you, er, Mr. Sinclair. You see, until I arrived here, I never even knew you existed.”

      
He barked a sharp laugh, and then his face lost all traces of humor. “I just bet you didn't! Most western men who go east seem to conveniently forget their half-breed relatives in polite society. I ought to know. I spent a good part of the past decade in eastern schools being a curiosity. Ever seen an ‘Indian’ before, Carrie?” He used her given name like a taunt, as if he was aware of her uncertainty about how to address him and taking advantage of the fact.

      
Carrie was on unsure footing, but highly indignant at his hostility. She couldn't help it if she had never seen a savage before she came west! “I thought you were a Cheyenne, not ‘an Indian,’ Hawk.” Good. She plucked the name of his tribe from the recesses of her memory.

      
“So I am.” He raised his glass in salute, seeming to approve of her spunk and her use of his given name. “Red men are divided into many nations, as are the whites, who my mother's people call
veho
, which means spider in Cheyenne,” he added, baiting her.

      
Trying to change the topic of conversation, she asked, “You've spent a lot of time in eastern schools, you said. Where?”

      
“You mean I speak educated English without accent? I even know the rudiments of political science and geography? Quite a prodigy for a savage, but then consider that I was kicked out of at least three or four of the best schools in Massachusetts, not to mention leaving Yale in my sophomore year. Something about my background seems to upset easterners.” Black humor was reflected in his face as he spoke.

      
“Why are you so bitter? If your father sent you to such good schools, you had advantages most white children never have.” As soon as she spoke, she regretted it.

      
“Yes, white children—like my father expects you to give him, no doubt. For now, he can use me, or my guns at least, but I'm only half white, and that's not good enough to inherit all this.” He let his hand sweep the opulent room in a dismissing, scornful gesture.

      
Carrie was saved from responding to that impossible statement by Noah's entrance.

      
“It's time for dinner, Carrie, Hawk.” His eyes swept from her to his son and back, sensing that some exchange of hostility had just transpired between them. He dismissed it and took her pale hand on his arm, leading her to the dining room. When he felt her trembling, he smiled.

      
Carrie sat across from Hawk, and Noah took his place at the head of the imposing dark oak table, set with delicately patterned china, gleaming silver, and sparkling crystal. The meal was served by a dark-haired young maid. Carrie was amazed at its delicacy, a wine-sauced chicken dish with spicy ham and cheese in the center of the plump breasts. Crusty bread, fresh garden peas, and a delicate white wine accompanied the main course. Despite Carrie's appreciation of the cook's skill, however, she had too much on her mind to do the food justice.

      
Again and again through the course of the meal Carrie's gaze strayed to Hawk. It was as if she couldn't help herself. He was right; his table manners were impeccable. The slim dark fingers held delicate china cups and thin French crystal with careless ease. He had obviously inherited his Indian mother's love of jewelry. The rings on his hands glistened in the candlelight, and he had a silver medallion suspended on a rawhide thong around his neck. Intricately worked, made of many fine strands of silver interwoven into a star design, it nestled in the thick black hair of his chest like a softly winking star. She found herself wondering if he always wore it.

      
Unwillingly, her eyes traveled up to his face, where the strongly chiseled features looked almost satanic in the flickering candlelight.
A splendid barbarian
. Where had she read the phrase that popped suddenly into her mind?

      
He caught her staring, and his amused black eyes scorched her cheeks, turning them aflame with a humiliating girlish blush. Carrie had never felt so young and socially inept in her life.

      
Table conversation did not help ease her case of nerves. Noah opened the offensive, breaking the strained silence under which they'd begun the meal. “Why'd you come back? Things get too hot down in the Nations?”

      
Hawk picked up his knife and meticulously cut a small slice of the chicken breast before replying, “At least I arrived in better condition than last time. Aren't you grateful I'm not bleeding all over your Aubusson rugs?”

      
Carrie gasped in shock. “Bleeding?”

      
Noah cleared his throat in warning to her. Damn her childish curiosity. Grudgingly he said, “Last time my son arrived home more dead than alive. Shot in a gunfight.”

      
Hawk let out a harsh, low chuckle. “Yeah, Lola was furious with Kyle. When he dragged me in I ruined the carpet in the entry hall. Thoughtless of me to hemorrhage in such an inconvenient place.”

      
That was the second time Carrie had heard the name Lola. Who was Lola? Was she the former housekeeper? A sister?

      
Noah glared at his son with such intense hatred that Carrie thought it would shrivel any ordinary mortal. “Leave that tramp out of this conversation!”

      
Hawk looked unconcerned by the menacing posture of his father as he turned to Carrie. “Another skeleton in the closet. Poor girl, you really should check out a man's family connections as well as his bank account before marrying him.”

      
Carrie let out a little gasp of indignation, and Noah's face darkened.

      
Before either of them could say a word, Hawk continued. “Lola Jameson was the second Mrs. Sinclair.”

This time Carrie blanched.

      
“Ah, you didn't know you're number three? Well, maybe three's a charm. Luck!” With that he raised his wine glass to her in a mock toast and then drank deeply.

      
The silence was oppressive for several minutes, then the maid came to clear the plates and bring dessert. By the time the servant finished her duties, Carrie had gathered her scattered wits. “I
assume
,” she stressed the word, “that both my predecessors have passed on?” Damn, she'd get one thing straight!

      
“Marah died sixteen years ago, when Hawk was nine. Lola is still alive.” Noah stopped short, leaving the distinct implication that he wished the latter fact to be otherwise. Rather than elaborate, he bit into a slice of blackberry pie, dismissing Lola from further consideration. He was sure his son would enlighten Carrie.

      
“Lola and Noah are divorced, Carrie. Last year while I was gone, I believe. These things take time and political influence.” He paused here, then added, “And enough money.” With that cryptic comment he, too, lapsed into silence and took a few desultory bites of the pie.

      
The conversation turned to safer ground when Noah inquired, “I suppose Hunnicut's with you?”

      
Hawk shrugged. “Kyle's here. We both seem to have more lives than a cat, I guess. You want to hire his gun?”

      
“Might. Tell him to see Frank in the morning. But, Hawk—this time he'd better not slope off without notice like he did last time. Way that man drifts, I'd swear he's part Cheyenne, too.” He took a slug of the steaming black coffee.