A Drive-By Wedding Page 19

  “Sick?” queried the other, who’d opened the passenger door and stooped beside Jeth. “He looks a damn sight more than sick to me.”

  He reached in as though to unbuckle Jeth and fiddle with the bandages, and Allyn brought the Browning up and leveled it at him.

  “Back off.” A warning, flat and unequivocal.

  Surprised, the man raised his hands wide, jerked his chin toward his badge. “Easy there, sis,” he said. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but you’re holding that thing on a tribal cop, you oughtta know that.”

  “And?” Allyn eyed him, then marked the location of the man who’d proclaimed himself a collection agent. Their features were similar, reminded her of someone. “Doesn’t necessarily make you the good guys. Far as I know you helped set him up to be killed. Uh-uh. Drop your badges in here and back off. Now.”

  “Aw, now, honey,” the one on her side of the jeep objected. “We don’t need to do this, do we? It’s pretty simple far as we’re concerned. If you’re married to Jeth, that makes us your brothers-in-law and you our new sister. I’m Guy Levoie, that’s Russ.” He showed her the wallet ID that named him a member of the Bureau of Indian Affairs law enforcement division. “All right? You got our baby brother in there next to you. Let us help you get him home where we can get your own baby outa that seat and into somethin’ to drink and figure out what kind of help Jeth needs.”

  Things moved quickly after that.

  Almost before Allyn knew what was happening, Guy and Russ had returned to their vehicles and escorted her to an unpainted and weathered wooden structure with an east-facing porch set not far from the river among the cottonwoods and willows, and somewhere behind and out of sight of the village. There, while Allyn fretted about them reopening his wound and played packhorse to Sasha, they gently transferred Jeth inside and into an airy back bedroom. Then, when Russ left—over Allyn’s heated objections—to get his brother medical help, Guy started to strip Jeth’s bandages away. At that point, she dropped Sasha’s bags, hefted her makeshift son securely onto her left hip and grabbed Guy’s arm to haul him bodily away from Jeth.

  “Don’t,” she snapped. “You’ll have him bleeding again.”

  Guy looked at her. She jammed her tongue into her bottom teeth and stiffened her jaw to keep her mouth from trembling. Her lip was sore and tasted crusty, and her knees were starting to feel spongy.

  “What happened?”

  Allyn shook her head. “I—I can’t. Just…get my bags out of the jeep and find me some alcohol, hot water and towels.”

  Guy measured her for a beat, came to a decision. “We double as a lot of things here on the rez. How ’bout I get my equipment from the truck instead?”

  “Thanks,” she said, and he went.

  When he was gone, she breathed deep and folded onto the bed, laid the back of her hand along the side of Jeth’s face, checking his temperature before finding someplace safe to temporarily corral Sasha. Whatever happened, she could not give in to the urge to fall prey to a case of screaming-meemie hysteria. There was too much to do, to take care of.

  She squinched her eyes shut and rocked back and forth, no longer sure whether she was trying to comfort Sasha or herself. God, let him be all right, let him be all right—

  Beside her Jeth’s eyelids wavered with her touch; his free hand made a slow motion effort to snag hers.

  “Lyn…” Dry-throated and barely audible. He moistened his mouth and tried again. “Lynnie.” He attempted to touch her mouth with his fingertips. “You look…bad. You…Sasha?”

  Allyn squeezed his hand, brought it to where he could touch Sasha’s leg. “We’re okay, Jeth, both of us, I promise. We’re here. We’re fine. Guy and Russ found us. It’s you we need to take care of now.”

  “Guy…Russ.” The names came out with an effort that looked almost more emotional than physical. “Judas. Don’t…” Something spasmed through him, and squeezed shut his eyes for a moment, clenched his teeth, tightened his jaw until it clicked. “Don’t…” A breath. “Tell them…” Another breath. “I mucked it up…again. Don’t…let them tell Ma.”

  Heart clutching, Allyn kissed his fingers. “You didn’t muck anything up,” she promised gently. “And they won’t say anything to anyone about anything, trust me.” She glanced at Guy, who’d entered the room, a box of medical supplies dangling from either hand. “Will you.”

  Not a question, a statement. The sort that any man worth his salt knew better than to ignore.

  Guy, who was also, Allyn learned later, known as Guyapi, or Candid, and who stood a good six foot two and was almost frighteningly handsome despite—or perhaps because of—the line of blue war paint painted above and below his right eye and the rattlesnake art that spiraled up his left arm, was often worth the salt of two or three men. Which meant he simply nodded at Allyn, stepped to the bed and set down his boxes, touched his brother’s hand, then relieved Allyn of Sasha and helped her get down to the business of caring for Jeth.

  The wound was bad enough, but it was not worse. The bullet didn’t seem to have struck anything vital. How not was anybody’s guess, although Allyn laid it down with a prayerful thank-you to the divine intervention of heaven’s grace and Sasha’s, Jeth’s and her own guardian angels.

  The doctor Russ brought with him wanted X rays to be certain of the damage, but Jeth, who’d roused sufficiently to be aware of what was going on, put up such violent opposition that the tiny young woman, named Kaze, changed her mind. Any man who could, she said, be so pigheaded in regard to his own health deserved what happened to him. Then she turned her back on her cousin and gave Allyn two handfuls of antibiotics to administer on a regular schedule with instructions for keeping Jeth’s wound clean and admonitions to keep him still. After that she inspected Sasha before Allyn had a chance to ask, suggested a course of vitamins for the toddler and turned her attention to the lip Allyn had forgotten biting. Three tiny stitches closed the wound, then Kaze was gone as briskly as she’d arrived.

  It was only after she’d left that Allyn realized the young doctor hadn’t asked a single question regarding the hows or whys of Jeth’s injury.

  After assuring themselves of Jeth’s well-being, Russ and Guy unloaded the jeep. Along with the family’s luggage, it contained boxes of non-perishable groceries and other household supplies that could last them quite some time. In between checking on Jeth and playing with Sasha, Allyn stocked the cupboards and debated how many of Jeth’s brothers’ questions she could answer, how many to leave blank.

  On the whole she was as inclined to trust them as she had been Jeth; they were solid and apparently imperturbable when it came to filling her in on a few of their younger brother’s exploits. Still…

  She looked at them, and the urge to protect them the way Jeth had chosen to protect her family—by leaving them in the dark—was strong. Of course, Jeth hadn’t been gunshot when they’d been with her family, and both his brothers seemed not only big but good-natured, intelligent and capable—not to mention they both wore badges.

  Blast, what was the rule when you had three big guys hanging around willing to do what had to be done, but one of them was lying hurt and macho trying to protect the other two by leaving them out of what he considered his business? Allyn didn’t have any brothers. She didn’t know what you did with them—although she was seriously inclined to start busting chops the moment Jeth was well enough to take the hit. Because between him and Sasha both requiring her attention she sure as shooting didn’t know if she could handle this entire keeping people safe gig on her own. The one thing of which she was fairly certain, however, was that a huge amount of activity at a dwelling that had apparently been vacant for a while was likely to arouse notice within the immediate community and the sparse summer tourist population.

  “They won’t talk, you know.”

  Allyn started and turned. Russ’s voice was very like Jeth’s and Guy’s in tone and timbre. But where Jeth’s had an undercurrent of intensity and passion towar
d things unresolved and Guy’s was as open and unruffled and filled with laughter as the rest of him, Russ’s voice was like the rest of him, too: quieter, gentler, milder and more circumspect.

  More…forgiving.

  “What?”

  “The village. We pretty much steer clear of outsiders. This is our home. We’re farmers, the people of the river. You can’t keep your values if you let everyone who passes through have a piece of you.”

  “I don’t—how did you—”

  Russ shrugged. “He hasn’t been home for three years. Now he shows up with a wife and a blond baby who looks like he’s been undernourished until recently and who doesn’t look like either of you. Someone basically put a gun to his chest and squeezed the trigger. You’re all in trouble or he wouldn’t have brought you here. Especially not stocked to the gills with groceries for a long stay.”

  “And nothing fresh because we can get that here.”

  “Just so,” Russ agreed.

  Allyn looked away, at Guy who stood in the kitchen doorway, a small box in his hand, at Sasha happily ensconced at the kitchen table with a bowl of dry cereal and a juice box.

  “I can’t tell you what you want to know,” she said softly. “It’s not mine to say. I think he got shot partly because I screwed up taking us to the last place we were. This time I don’t know if it’s better to tell you or leave you in the dark.” She lifted her chin and eyed both men squarely. “I’ll understand if you think we ought to pull out of here as soon as Jeth’s well enough to travel, though. He will, too. That’s all I can say.”

  “Pull out?” Guy looked at Russ, who snorted. “Before Ma has a chance to meet her new daughter-in-law?”

  “I don’t think so,” Russ agreed. “Nah. We just want to know if we need to beef up tribal firepower to keep this blood from getting you all killed.”

  “Yeah.” Guy held out his hand, offered her the box of nonpermanent black hair dye he’d brought with him. “Kaze figures you can use this and maybe a little sunless tanning lotion on the short man there. You…” He reached for her chin, tilted her face to the right, the left and back. “Eh. Braid your hair so it doesn’t look too wildly Irish, and you’ve got enough color you can probably pass from a distance, as long as you don’t go about topless.”

  Outraged, Allyn knocked Guy’s hand away. “As long as I what?”

  “Well, fine, then.” Eyes dancing, Guy backed up. “Maybe I misspoke. Maybe you’ve got an all-over tan and can go about topless, what do I know?”

  “Not a blessed thing, from the sound of it.” Disgusted, Allyn turned her back on Guy. “I mean, really, is this the way you treat all your sisters-in-law?”

  “Sadly?” Russ asked on his brother’s behalf. “Yes, since you’re the only sister-in-law we have. None of the rest of us are married. But if it’s any comfort, he’s always said things like that to Mabel and Kaze and our female cousins, so…welcome to the family, sis.”

  The day eased gently but exhaustingly toward the early canyon sunset.

  Kaze and Jeth’s sister, Mabel—a small, quiet woman who bore more resemblance to her mother than her brothers—turned up shortly after Russ and Guy departed, to help Allyn color Sasha’s hair. It was a process easier talked about than accomplished until Jeth’s mother showed up, too, and, after glancing at her prodigal son, took hold of the situation at the kitchen sink. Sasha responded to yet another new grandmother like a dry house afire. Whatever Sada did, she apparently had the touch in capitals, because he almost instantly settled down to the game of coloring his hair and eyebrows the way he might use crayons in a coloring book.

  Unsure what to do with her make-believe husband’s real-life mother, and feeling awkwardly underfoot, Allyn retreated to the bedroom to check on Jeth, who was propped on his right side with pillows stuffed behind his back, muttering and moaning in restless sleep. A basin of cool water sat on a stand near the bed; she dampened a cloth and squeezed it out, pressed it along the side of his face and neck. Squeezed his hand, stroked his face, side, hip, trying to calm his thrashing.

  “Jeth, lie still. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  His right hand snaked out to grip her shirtfront and jerk her down, eyes opened wide, face turned in her direction, but it wasn’t her he saw. “Tell me where she is, you bastard, or I swear to God I’ll put you down now.” He shook her violently. “Tell me, damn you, tell me—”

  “Jeth.” Sharp and insistent while she grabbed his wrist to hold him still and attempted to gently pry his hand loose. “It’s me, Allyn. Let go.”

  “She’s hurt, I’ll do to you whatever you did to her, you hear me, scumbag? I’ll freaking kill you—”

  “Jeth.” A frightened gasp. He was choking her and didn’t know it. There was nothing else for it. Allyn tucked her middle finger under her thumb, loosed it hard to snap the bridge of his nose to get his attention. “Jeth, stop it!”

  He blinked; his grip on her relaxed, fury subsided. “Lynnie?”

  She ran her palm up the side of his jaw. “I’m here, Jeth.”

  “Good.” He slid his fingers along her arm, searching for her hand. “They didn’t take my ring, did they?”

  “Ring?” Puzzled, she stared at him, then realized he was fumbling with the rings on her left hand. A fist of something achy wedged in her throat. She swallowed it, raised his hand to her mouth and kissed it. “No, they didn’t take it. It’s right here in the drawer.”

  “No.” He licked his lips. “Not…there. I want it…on. Show them you…me…together…rings…on.”

  She couldn’t help it. Tears stung the backs of her eyes, and her throat closed. They weren’t married but even now when he was mostly out of it he remembered the masquerade, the cover, and insisted on using it. “Oh, Jeth.”

  “Please.” A request, a plea.

  “You’re hand’s swollen. And I’m wearing my rings. They see.”

  “But you don’t.” Soft, intense—filled with much the same passion as the night he’d assured her he didn’t plan to fall in love with her over her virginity, shared dangers and a fake marriage. The fingertips she held close to her face brushed weakly at her jaw. “I want…you, need you…to see it on. Please. Do you…understand?”

  She wanted to and was afraid to. “I…I’m not sure. Maybe.”

  He sighed. “Close enough. For now.” He tried wiggling the ring finger on his left hand. “Please.”

  How could she resist when he’d used the magic word more times in the last five minutes than in the entire ten days or whatever that she’d known him? She drew his ring out of the drawer and slid it onto his finger. It was tight, but not too badly so.

  “Okay?” she asked.

  He nodded, smiling slightly, eyes drifting closed. “For now,” he repeated. Then when she made to move away, he squeezed her hand, tried to haul her back. “Stay?” he asked. “I…need you to…”

  What he needed of her was lost in the sough of deep, regular breathing and sleep.

  Looking at him, Allyn understood clearly and irrevocably for the first time that the word she’d been trying to ignore for the last many days when it came to how she felt about Jeth Levoie was love.

  Chapter 15

  The four-letter mental revelation threw her for a loop.

  Feeling suddenly shaky, Allyn hooked a foot around the leg of the rough rocking chair nearby, drew it to the bed where she could sit without letting go of Jeth’s hand and tried hard not to think about anything. His color was better, she decided; she would concentrate on that.

  Yeah, right, her mental demon teased. I’m going to let you study his flush or lack thereof when you left open a word like love. Dream on, sucker! Love, love, love, love, love. See? You can’t stop thinking about it, so dance to the beat. Love, baby, love.

  “Shut up,” she muttered to the demon. “Of course I love him. He’s a human being. I’m supposed to, so go arrest yourself. It doesn’t mean squat.”

  Sure, honey. Anything you say, the demon agreed cheekily and skipped to
the back of her mind.

  Allyn thought she heard it laughing itself silly as it thunked around in there creating havoc until it made its way into her pulse, slam-dunking a basketball all the way to her heart.

  Good grief, she thought. Can one little word really do all that to me?

  Fortunately she didn’t sit alone with her thoughts long enough to find out. In a rush of giggles and short legs outdistancing longer and older ones, Sasha and Jeth’s sister blew into the room, his mother close behind. Shushing him, Mabel whisked the toddler into her arms and departed before Allyn had a chance to get a look at anything beyond the fact that his head appeared to be covered with…something. Then Jeth groaned and struggled to shift in his sleep, and Allyn switched her attention to quieting him again. His mother leaned in to tuck the pillows more securely beneath him, then rounded the bed to look into his face, pursed her lips in sad bemusement and turned to Allyn. Uncomfortable under her scrutiny, Allyn kept her eyes on Jeth and wished for better circumstances and no need to lie.

  Sada Levoie’s lips twitched as she watched Allyn. “He goes from home for three years, no word, and comes back like this.” She spoke with a native cadence, a thick lilt that said though she spoke English well, she didn’t use it often. “I would have him home for Peach Festival, not to hide because he is shot.”

  Allyn nodded, her mouth worked, tasting guilt. “I know.”

  “So.” Sada touched the ring on Jeth’s finger. “You married my son. You know him long?”

  Allyn glanced up, down, at the dark copper hand cupped in hers. “No.” She shook her head. Against her will, her mouth twitched with humor and she shrugged. “Really I’ve just known him long enough.”

  “There was a ceremony? Your family was there?”

  “No. No one. It was very…” She searched for the truth amidst the lie. “Private.”

  “And your son. Where is his father?”

  “His father is scum,” Allyn said flatly. “His father will never lay a hand on him again if I can help it.”