Cherokee Storm. Janelle TaylorЧитать онлайн книгу.
or four girls sharing two lumpy beds in the attic chamber at the tavern. Hot in summer and freezing at winter—she’d never known anything else since her mother had taken her away.
And now, at last, she was home again. It didn’t seem real, after so many years of dreaming about this place. But now that she was here, nothing was as she’d expected. Salty tears scalded the backs of her eyelids but she refused to let them fall. She stood there, stiff and doll-like, bone-tired in a dirt-stained dress and Indian moccasins, while her world slowly cracked and dissolved around her.
Da was growing old, and he had a new wife. Not even a wife, Shannon reminded herself. He was living out of wedlock with Oona. And as shocking as that realization had been, his woman wasn’t Irish as Shannon had assumed by her Irish name. She was Indian, dark-skinned, and foreign. Worse, it was clear to Shannon by the expression in her flashing black eyes that Oona didn’t want her here.
This strange woman had a life with Flynn O’Shea that didn’t include a long-lost daughter by a first wife. Da and Oona were expecting a child. How could her father think they could all live together as though they were a family?
Had she come so far to find she was still an unwanted outsider?
Chapter 5
The sun was well up when Shannon threw open the shutters in her room the following morning. She was shocked at the time. She’d had every intention of rising early the morning after her arrival and helping with the household chores. She was used to working at the tavern from before dawn until bedtime, and she didn’t want her father or Oona to think her lazy. But the long hours of travel had taken their toll, and she’d slept much later than she’d wanted to. She hoped tomorrow she’d wake earlier and make a better impression.
Feather ticks made her bed as soft as a cloud. No wonder she’d slept as soundly as a child. Although the addition Da had built to the cabin wasn’t large, there was space in her room for a cherry poster bed, a brassbound mahogany chest, a butterfly table, and a small mirror. The bed had been fashioned of local wood, but the other pieces had been her mother’s and had originally come from Shannon Hall in Ireland. And although the bed was handmade and not made by a craftsman, someone had taken the trouble to carve a garland of beech leaves twining around each post.
The scenery from her open window was so beautiful that it brought tears to her eyes. Wooded mountains fell away into the distance, and below in the valley a rocky creek wound its way through a flower-strewn meadow, the racing water as white and frothy as meringue on a lemon pie. High above the creek, an eagle soared, wings spread wide, proud white head etched against a cloudless sky as vividly blue as Mary’s cloak.
Reluctant to break the enchantment, but well aware that she couldn’t avoid Oona’s disapproving glare, Shannon hurriedly dressed, twisted her hair into a knot, and splashed cold water on her face. Had she dreamed of Storm Dancer at all last night?
She touched her bottom lip, remembering the taste of Storm Dancer’s mouth. It had been despicable of him to spy on her, and if she should be ashamed of touching herself for pleasure, his behavior was worse. What man worth his salt would take advantage of a woman in her weakest moment? And when she’d confronted him, he’d laughed at her. It was mortifying.
What had happened later—when she’d allowed him to kiss her—was a greater mistake. It could never happen again. If her father guessed that she’d permitted an Indian to kiss her, he’d be furious, perhaps angry enough to send her away.
Storm Dancer was Cherokee; she was a white woman. Their worlds were too far apart to allow such intimacies. What was wrong with her that she could be tempted by the man? She’d never believed herself to be a saint, but she hadn’t thought she suffered from the sin of lust.
She would have to return the pony. Keeping such a valuable gift from Storm Dancer was out of the question. Explaining where it had come from would be impossible. It had been an act of kindness for him to loan her the animal, but Storm Dancer would have to take it back. Surely, her father would see the reason in that. She would talk to Da about it after breakfast.
But when she stepped into the main room of the cabin, the keeping room, containing the kitchen and sitting area, she found it empty. It was obvious that Da and Oona had already eaten without her. Breakfast bowls and cups were drying upside down on the trestle table, and a pan of flatbread hung on a hook at the back of the fireplace. Someone, probably Oona, had set a place for her at the table: a bowl of porridge, a pewter mug of peppermint tea, and a handful of berries waited. The porridge was cold and the tea unsweetened. Shannon nibbled at the berries, grabbed a piece of flatbread, and went outside.
The trading post consisted of the house, a fortlike, log, two-story structure that served as the store, a stable, another smaller cabin that provided shelter for passing customers, and several lean-to storage sheds. Da had cut down all the trees around the buildings except a few large ones, and erected a ten-foot palisade of upright logs sharpened to points on the top around the entire compound. There was a double gate reinforced with iron hinges that Shannon had rarely seen closed when she was a child.
Today was no exception. The doors to the post enclosure stood wide and welcoming, and the narrow Dutch door to the store was open. Three horses stamped impatiently at the hitching post in front of the store. Da’s pack of dogs milled by the step, eyes keen, ears pricked, alert, as if waiting for a command. When they saw Shannon, they trotted over and surrounded her, sniffing curiously and eyeing her flatbread. She’d noticed the hounds last night, but none were those she remembered from childhood. They seemed well behaved, as Da’s dogs always were. Flynn’s dogs, she corrected herself.
“No begging,” she said, lifting her bread out of reach of a lean, black and tan bitch with one ragged ear. Shannon was hungry, and she intended to eat it herself. As she crossed the yard, curious to see who was in the store, she heard the faint tinkling of bells. Oona came around the corner of the house leading the pony that Storm Dancer had given her. “Good morning,” Shannon said.
Oona acknowledged Shannon’s greeting with a quick nod that set the tiny silver bells in her pierced ears jingling and handed her the animal’s rope. Shannon passed her uneaten bread to her other hand and took the pony’s lead.
“Water.” Oona motioned toward the hard-packed path that led away from the cabin. “Spring is—”
“I know where the spring is. I grew up here. Remember?” Shannon had fetched water for her mother as long as she could remember. The source of drinking water and the pretty glade around it had been her favorite spot as a child. Da had nearly convinced her that there were Irish fairies living at the bottom of the pool, and she’d spent long warm afternoons lying in the grass looking for them.
“Good,” Oona said.
“Did someone come to trade this morning?” Shannon asked, although it was obvious they had visitors. She didn’t think the horses in the yard belonged to white men. Only one horse wore a saddle, and that was a crude affair of wood and hide. “Are they Indians?”
Oona stared at her for long seconds, and Shannon wondered if she would answer her question at all. She was a tall woman, almost as tall as Flynn, and slender with delicate hands and a graceful walk. She was younger than Shannon had thought last night, probably no more than twenty-five.
Today, the Indian woman had braided her blue-black hair into a single thick plait, and she was wearing moccasins and a blue cloth dress that fell just below her knees. The garment was loose and shapeless, but the seams were neatly stitched and bright red beads decorated the hem and neckline. In the daylight, Shannon could see the scar on Oona’s cheek better, and it was evident that the disfigurement was the result of an old burn, long since healed.
Oona brushed her cheek with her fingertips. “It frighten you?”
“No, of course not.” Shannon tried again. “Who do the horses belong to? Do we have customers?”
“Cherokee come to buy powder.” She held up three fingers. “Ghost Elk, Runs Alongside Bear, and Gall.” At the last name, Oona grimaced as though she’d bit into a sour plum, then