Free Steal Me Away by Cerise DeLand Page B

often through the night and she had returned the
delicious favor. She would ask for a new one.
    “Do we change camp soon?”
    “Why do you wish to know?” His hell-dark eyes turned grim
and she knew at once he feared she would use the knowledge to leave him.
    Rubbing her nipples against his warm, firm chest she purred
like a happy cat and smiled up at her worried husband. “I know of a grove of
trees where we could gather nuts. I would also love a succulent pink-and-yellow
fruit that the German settlers near Fredericksburg grow. We call them peaches.”
    “I know of them,” he said with a sigh of relief. “If you
want them, I will take them for you.”
    She winced.
    He saw her displeasure and asked her to explain.
    “You would take the fruit from their trees. I hoped you
could buy them.” But she knew that was silly because she had not seen anyone
here talk of coins or bills. Money was the Anglos’ invention.
    “My moon, it is the only way I know to get this for you.”
    “Of course.” She hated that Bull Elk and his braves would
steal from the farmers to satisfy her, but she understood that her husband
would do whatever he could to make her more comfortable.
    The next morning before dawn, Fancy stood outside their tent
and waved goodbye to him and his men as they went to find peaches for her. They
returned at dusk, their bags full of ripe ones and green ones. Two of Bull
Elk’s braves looked green themselves. When she saw one of them rush off, a hand
to his mouth, she knew he had eaten the unripe fruit and become ill. That
night, Bull Elk told her that his men tried the fruit themselves and while many
liked the taste, they vowed never to travel so far again for food that made
some of them sick.
    Fancy understood their position and regretted she had ever
asked for the peaches. Still, she ate Bull Elk’s remaining portion with gusto.
For him to see her enjoyment of the sweet fruit was enough. And yet, the
incident tore a hole in their euphoria together.
     
    She began to count her days among the tribe by carving
tallies in a tree trunk. The Comanche had no system of a calendar that she
knew. And she had not yet learned enough of their language to understand their
ways.
    One morning after she had counted forty-two days, Fancy
grinned. She must find her husband and speak with him.
    She tucked the small knife that Bull Elk had given her for
her own use in skinning and dressing fish and deer into the belt around her
buckskin dress. Then she headed through the camp. Squaws sat cooking over their
fires. Unmarried girls talked and played games with dolls made of sticks. Young
men who were not yet braves sat sullen and beady-eyed as they watched her walk
among the tents. Braves were bolder, speaking in gruff tones as she passed. Not
acknowledging their presence, Fancy kept her steps quick and her eyes straight
ahead. At the edge of the camp, she saw Bull Elk and waved to him.
    He spoke with one of the elders and Fancy stood apart,
waiting for them to end their discussion.
    Bull Elk strode to her, his chest bare and glistening in the
brilliant sunshine. He took her by the shoulders. “You seek me, wife? The day
is young. Are you ready to let me lie between your pretty legs again?”
    She jumped up and hugged him fiercely. “I am, my love.” She
stopped, tearing up when she realized the word she had used for him.
    He chuckled and pulled her forcefully into his embrace.
Flush to his marvelous body, she wiggled against him. She was rewarded when his
cock thrust up beneath his breechcloth. “If we return to our tent now, everyone
will know I will fuck you.”
    She took a quick glance around, then jumped up to curl her
legs around his hips. “Take me to the woods and make love to me.”
    Baring his teeth, he growled. “You are hungry, woman.”
    “You make me so.” She slipped her hand under the tie of his
breechcloth at the back of his waist. “Take me quickly or I will have you here
and they must not see. Not even