Judith E French by Moonfeather Page B

to be certain the old bear wasn’t lurking in the bushes to charge them again. Then she circled back to the area she felt the arrow must have been launched from. After a few moments’ search, she found the tracks she had been searching for—those of a lone man. She located the spot where he had waited and watched their fight with the bear and the log he had braced his right foot on when he loosed the arrow.
    The forest floor was thick with leaves; there was no bare earth to make her task easier. If she had found a complete footprint, she would have known instantly if the man was wearing a Seneca moccasin or not. The man had not crossed the stream, so there was no chance of finding his tracks in the mud near the water. She did find a freshly broken twig and several crushed ferns—a trail a child could follow—leading off uphill away from the bear’s path.
    Satisfied that the man wasn’t in the immediate area, Leah climbed a tall pine. From the highest branch she could reach, she looked out over the forest. To the north, she saw a red hawk circling; to the south was the deer lick where they had slain the buck. She waited and watched as the early morning mist lifted off the trees. There was nothing to alarm her.
    The sun rose hot and bright; the heat felt good on her throbbing arm. She had told Brandon the truth; the scratch would heal fast enough if she found the right medicine to cleanse the wound. Still, it was nothing to ignore. She had seen men die from smaller injuries.
    Leah laid her cheek against the rough bark of the tree trunk and thought of the kiss she and Brandon had shared. Why had she done it? One minute she was laughing at the running bear, and the next . . . She had thrown herself into his arms. She had kissed him. No, she corrected herself, they had kissed each other. It had been a very satisfactory kiss if she remembered correctly. Brandon’s mouth was clean and tasted of mint.
    She moistened her lips with her tongue and swallowed. Brandon’s manner was arrogant, but his kisses were not so. She had been kissed by enough men to know the difference. Brandon was forceful without being overpowering. He desired her—that was plain—but there had been no insistence in his demands. It was clear that he had been willing to go as far or as short a distance as she wished. That was right and proper for a man.
    She chuckled, wondering how far she would have allowed matters to go. Apparently, she had been so involved with his kiss that she had ignored an arrow flying past their heads. “Aiyee,” she murmured softly. There was more to her Englishman than she had first realized. Perhaps it was not necessary to have such a distance between their sleeping mats. She shut her eyes and let the delightful dream images of Brandon surface again.
    “Leah!”
    She opened her eyes. What was he shouting about now? She wondered why the English were so loud. Quickly, she began to climb down the tree.
    “Leah, where the hell are you?”
    She dropped to the ground, landing lightly on the balls of her feet, and picked up her quiver of arrows. Slinging it across her shoulder, she hurried down to the stream bank where Brandon was washing his hands.
    “Oh, there you are. I thought maybe the bear had eaten you.” He stood up and dried his hands on his breeches. “Did you find out what you wanted to know?”
    She shook her head. “Nothing more. The bear be gone, the man be gone.”
    “Do you think it was a Seneca who shot at us?”
    She spread her hands palm up before her. “The arrow was Seneca.”
    “But you have doubts?”
    “The dead ha’ no doubts.”
    Brandon scowled. “Can you for once say what you think, woman?”
    Her eyes clouded with perplexity. “I do. ’Tis ye who speaks in riddles, Englishman.”
    “And it’s the dead have,” he instructed, “not the dead ha’ . And it’s you , not ye.”
    “You,” she said sharply, “ha’ . . . have made a mess o’ this deer.” She pulled the knife out of the