A Wolf in the Desert by Bj James Page A

once, Patience glared at the perfectly constructed lean-to and back again to Indian, not really sure how she felt or how she should feel. It would be a relief to be shielded from the prying eyes of the camp, but could she deal with the intimacy of the lean-to, where no camp fire would lie between them?
    â€œThis is where we’ll spend our nights for the duration of our stay in the canyon. Where you’ll sleep with me.” There was no smile now to soften the subtle ultimatum. “You have until dark to come to terms with what the night will bring.”
    Sparing her the need to reply, Blue Doggie coughed and stirred and rose naked from his sleeping bag, stretching, yawning, and scratching immodestly like an old bear waking from a long sleep.
    Turning away, her face flaming and confidence flagging, Patience wondered how she would ever survive the days to come.

Four
    I ndian sat by the fire as Custer, Snake, Hogan, and the quieter Hoke played poker again. This fascination for cards escaped him, but he never missed sitting in, occasionally playing a hand. Always watching, always listening.
    He was torn now by the need to be with Patience, to ease her way, to serve as unwelcome protector should it be required. But this was a crucial time when he might discover some bit of valuable information. When all but one would be close enough to sober to speak sense, but drunk enough for loose tongues.
    He’d been with the gang only a short time when he’d learned that not everyone was part of the conspiracy. These four were the inner sanctum, and Hoke, not Custer, was the voice of authority in all things that pertained to the real purpose for the Wolves existence. Hoke, who was quieter and smaller, who held himself aloof from most of the interactions of the gang, speaking little in his ruined voice, was always cold sober, and by far the most dangerous.
    â€œYour woman keeps to herself.” Hoke spoke. The rasping whisper, emitted from a mutilated throat, strained to reach across the fire that was rebuilt in the morning chill, burned in the suffocating heat of the day, and would be their only light come nightfall.
    Indian looked up from his carving. Sliding the trinket in a pocket, but keeping the knife clasped loosely in his hand, he shrugged. “She isn’t accustomed to the desert, nor to our ways, but she will be.”
    Hoke lifted a quizzical brow in a face turned to a rictus by the play of flames. “You plan to keep her long enough for it to matter?”
    â€œShe’s stubborn and trouble,” Indian admitted. “But, yes, I mean to keep her for a while.”
    â€œThe other women are jealous. There isn’t one among them who didn’t hope Indian, with his pretty face and his fastidious ways, would choose her.” With his observation hinting of the culture and education of a past far removed from his current life, Hoke turned from Indian only long enough to toss a card on the blanket that served as gaming table.
    â€œThey were taken,” Indian said succinctly.
    â€œWe share,” Custer put in.
    â€œOr trade.”
    Indian’s dark gaze moved from Custer to Snake, sickened by men who traded the favors of their women with no thought at all. And by the women who allowed it.
    â€œHey,” Hogan added, “you gotta admit, your little redhead is a number to make a man’s blood pump.”
    â€œWhat Hogan is trying to say,” Hoke interpreted in his more classical speech, “is that Miss O’Hara is like wine to men thirsting in a barren land. A tasty morsel for men who hunger.”
    â€œTasty ain’t the half of it,” Snake groused, irritable as he always was when conversation moved past the basics. “I’ve seen her at night, staring at her own special fire, acting like none of the rest of us was good enough for her.” He clinched his cards in an brutal fist, crumpling a winning hand. “I get half a chance, she’ll know