The Ashtons: Walker, Ford & Mercedes: Betrayed Birthright / Mistaken for a Mistress / Condition of Marriage

He simply looked at her. He hadn’t even realized that she’d hung up the phone. He’d been too busy feeling sorry for his neglected libido. “Ready for what?”

“To go back outside. Or would you rather wait here?”

“For what?”

“The truck.” She made a curious expression. “Are you all right, Walker?”

A bit defensive, he frowned at her. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“How would I know? You’re acting weird.”

Did she have to be so pretty? So smooth and sultry? She wore jeans and an Oyate Project T-shirt, but it could have been a nightgown, a breezy fabric, an erotic temptation. “Maybe I’m just sick of the reservation.”

She crossed her arms. “Then go home.”

He didn’t want to return to California, not without putting his hands all over her first. “I didn’t mean it like that.” Anxious, he leaned against the file cabinet. “And I don’t want to fight with you.”

“Me, neither.”

She sighed, and he almost touched her.

Almost.

He decided it was safer waiting outside, even if Michele would probably be dogging his heels, giving him conspiratorial glances.

But luckily that didn’t happen. The truck arrived, and the pace picked up. So much so, Walker got absorbed in the activity, helping the driver unload the food.

After the cartons were sorted and stacked, Tamra organized the volunteers and individual cars were packed with bags of perishable items and boxes of dry goods. Walker loaded the back of Tamra’s vehicle with groceries from a checklist she’d given him.

Soon they were rolling across the plains again, heading to their first destination. He turned to look at her, knowing she was right. He was getting emotionally involved today. But not only with her charity.

He was getting attached to her, too.

Five

Walker and Tamra had spent the afternoon with families who had no electricity and no running water. People living in abandoned camper shells, in old shacks, in rusted-out trailers. But even so, he’d seen pride in their eyes, determination, kindness, a sense of community.

And now Tamra had taken him to the Wounded Knee Memorial. He wasn’t sure why she’d decided to come here, especially today, after driving all over the reservation. They were both road weary and tired.

Walker studied his surroundings. Aside from a Lakota couple selling dream catchers in a shelter of pine boughs, there was no one around. He suspected a few tourists trickled by now and then, or else the enterprising young couple wouldn’t have any customers.

A green sign, suffering from vandalism, offered a historical account of the Massacre of Wounded Knee. The word massacre had been bolted onto the sign with a sheet of metal, covering something below it.

“What did it say before?” Walker asked Tamra, who stood beside him, her hair glistening in the late-day sun.

“Battle,” she told him.

“The Battle of Wounded Knee?”

“That was what the government originally called it.”

But it wasn’t a battle, Tamra explained, as he gazed at the sign. It was a massacre—a place where more than three hundred Indians, mostly women and children, were killed on December 29, 1890, for supporting the Ghost Dance, a religion that had been outlawed on Lakota reservations.

Fourteen days prior to the massacre, the tribal police murdered Sitting Bull at his home. That prompted Big Foot, another Lakota chief, to lead his band to Pine Ridge, where he hoped to seek shelter with Chief Red Cloud, who was trying to make peace with the army. But Big Foot, an old man ill with pneumonia, and most of his people, were exterminated instead. Those who survived told their story, recounting the chilling details.

“It was the Seventh Cavalry who shot them,” Tamra said. “Custer’s old unit. The government sent them, along with other troops, to arrest the Ghost Dancers. The morning after Big Foot and his band were captured, a gun went off during a scuffle. And that was it. That was how the massacre started.” She paused, her voice impassioned with the past, with a war-torn history. “At first the struggle was fought at close quarters, but most of the Indians had already surrendered their weapons. There were only a hundred warriors. The rest were women, children and old men. When they ran to take cover, the cavalry opened fire with cannons that were positioned above the camp. Later some of the women were found two or three miles away, a sign that they were chased down and killed.”

Walker glanced at the craft booth, where dream catchers fluttered, feathers stirring in the breeze. “The Seventh Cavalry got their revenge.”

“Yes, they did.” Tamra followed his gaze. “The Ghost Dance was supposed to bring back the old way, to encourage spiritual powers to save us. At the time, the government was reducing our land and cutting our promised rations. The Lakota were sick and starving. They needed hope.”

“They needed the Ghost Dance,” he said.

She nodded, and he thought about the documentary on TV, the reenactment of a woman and child bleeding in the snow. Was that a depiction of Wounded Knee? Of the massacre? He’d only caught a glimpse of it while he was switching channels, but it had affected him just the same.

“Someone found a baby still suckling from its dead mother,” she said, her words creating a devastating image in his mind. “And after most of the people had been killed, there were soldiers who called out, claiming that those who weren’t wounded should come forth, that they would be safe. But when some of the little boys crept out of their hiding places, they were butchered.” She paused, took a breath. “We have an annual event called Future Generations Riders, where the organizers take a group of horseback riders, mostly children, on the same trail as the Wounded Knee victims. Sitting Bull’s great-great-great-grandson is one of the leaders. Some of the kids don’t know their culture, so it helps them learn, to look to the future. Hope can come from grief. From accepting who you are.”

“Spencer told me that being Indian didn’t matter,” Walker admitted. “That I needed to forget about it if I wanted to succeed.”

“I was told the same thing. From my mother, from your mother. But Mary and I have changed. We believe differently now.”

“Can we visit the grave site?” he asked, compelled by his heritage, the Lakota blood he’d fought so hard to ignore.

“Yes, of course,” she told him, meeting his gaze.

He wondered if she could see into his heart, if she knew what he was thinking. If she did, she didn’t say anything. Instead she led him to a road that looped around like a teardrop.

On top of a hill, a rustic archway announced the entrance to the cemetery. A mass grave, hedged by a small slab of concrete, was marked with a stone obelisk, listing the names of the Indians buried there. Native gifts, feathers and tobacco offerings adorned their resting place. Surrounding the memorial were other graves, a bit more modern, scattered in the rough grass.

Walker reached for Tamra’s hand and whispered a prayer. She slid her fingers through his, and they stood side by side, a man and a woman who’d forged a bond.

A closeness neither of them could deny.

After they went back to her truck, they sat in silence for a while. Finally he turned to look at her. She moved closer, and they kissed.

Slowly, gently.

And even though the exchange was more emotional than physical, more sweet than sexual, he wished they could make love tonight, hold each other in the same bed. Of course, he knew that wasn’t possible. Especially since he’d agreed to stay at his mother’s house.

Confused, he ended the kiss, still tasting her on his tongue, still wanting what he shouldn’t have.

Tamra lay beside Mary, who snored a bit too loudly. Restless, she glanced at the clock and saw that it was almost one o’clock in the morning. She’d been staring at the ceiling for hours, trying not to toss and turn. But it wasn’t the other woman’s snoring that kept her awake.

It was Walker.

She’d given him her room, offering him a private place to sleep. But picturing him in her bed was making her skin warm. When she touched her lips, intent on reliving his kiss, she knew she was in trouble.

She couldn’t fantasize about Walker, not here, not now, not like this. Guilty, she climbed out of bed, cautious not to wake Mary.