Chapter 9

 

 

THE morning was sunny and cool, with an easy grade downhill most of the way, and as the day wore on, Gideon’s spirits tried to lift with the temperature. It was more settled here, the land no longer wild but giving way regularly to farms and fenced pastures, mills and old mining operations along the river. They couldn’t go far at all before seeing signs of people, either smoke from a hearth or cultivated fields, cattle herds or orchards. It made him realize just how barren the Midwest still was, outside the mining towns, rail stops, and state capitals, and how heavily peopled California was. No wonder the show had so many stops in this state. Them that had come for the dream of gold had stayed on for rich soil and good weather, finding their fortunes however they could. San Francisco really wasn’t that far away anymore.

This adventure would be over, and soon.

In the past when he’d separated from his family and Bill Tourney’s show, he’d always been happy to get back to it, and them. He’d never felt this disheartened at the idea of meeting up with them, but rejoining them meant losing Jed. He’d carried that knowledge this whole trip, but only now did it feel real to him.

They stopped for lunch at a creek crossing as the sun reached its zenith, and Gideon ate more than his fair share of Mrs. Hennessey’s chicken, mostly at Jed’s urging. His musings had left him without much appetite, even comforted as he was by Jed’s quiet chanting, but he ate what Jed pressed on him, dredging up the will to appreciate her good cooking.

“You ever lived in a city before?” he asked.

“Yes,” Jed said, surprising the hell out of him. “I lived in Laramie, Wyoming, for two years when I first left the reservation.”

Gideon whistled. Laramie was big enough that Bill Tourney ran the show through there when he could. “Huh,” Gideon said. “Somehow, I can’t picture that, with you hatin’ white folks like you do.”

“I do not hate white people,” Jed said, chiding him a little. More quietly he added, “Mostly I just fear them. They are not consistent, not in their beliefs or in their behavior. The Christian Bible says to do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” he mused, “but many white people, even the Christians, do not. They do to others as they wish, as their white laws allow, and at great cost to their spirits and the land.”

“That they do,” Gideon agreed. Hell, he couldn’t argue it. He’d seen all kinds of people in his travels with the show. He’d grown up getting to know folks from all walks of life—farmers and shopkeepers, politicians and immigrants—and liking most of them. The differences were what made folks interesting, what made them unique, and what kept him from getting bored with meeting so many of them. The show moved regular, and the only place he’d ever lived for any length of time had been New Orleans, the big port city in the deep South where the show wintered. Bill had a rambling old farm there that his mother had left him, and those in the show who didn’t have families waiting for them lived on the property, working on new acts. Those that didn’t travel stayed on the farm, caring for what animals weren’t going with the show that season, celebrating Christmas—generally behaving as any big family did.

Until he’d traveled this land with Jed, he’d seen cities and mines, forestry, Franklin stoves, gaslights, railroads, and all the conveniences of civilization as benefits, as folks just making good use of the land. Seeing the country through Jedediah’s eyes, though, and watching him walk through it without leaving much to show for his passing, Gideon could understand better how progress might not be an entirely good thing. Still, from all the stories he’d heard, it wasn’t like the Indians were much better. “Indians ain’t that way, too? Inconsistent?”

Jed frowned as he chewed on a hunk of bread. “They are,” he said slowly, “but not so much. My people—not just the Lakota, those you call Sioux, but most natives of this continent—they seem genuinely more willing to allow others to be who they are, instead of what they think a people should be. Before many tribes were forced onto each other’s hunting grounds, there was very little conflict between them.” He shrugged. “Conflict always comes when resources are scarce.”

“Guess I never thought about it that way,” Gideon admitted. “You hear all kinds of stories, about Indians fighting white folks but fighting amongst themselves, too.”

“Those stories are true. But they are not old stories.”

Gideon nodded as he sucked the last bits of meat off his chicken leg. “We got stories—history, I mean, that go back to before Jesus was born, and it seems like we were always findin’ somebody to war with.”

“I have read many works of white men,” Jed said, “and not all of them are about war. Many of them are about your god, and those works especially I was forced to read at the school.”

The mention of the school reminded Gideon of Jed’s face back in Carson City, when Mrs. Edmundson had told of the school there. “You didn’t have a choice about that school,” he said, tentative. He’d shared such tales from Harold Crowe and the other Indians in Bill’s show, but he’d never had cause to have this conversation with someone he hadn’t been raised up with.

Jed looked up at him as he wiped his fingers on a cloth. “We did not,” he answered quietly.

Gideon tried to imagine what it would have been like for him, if someone had come and taken him from his parents, from the show. There’d been murmurs from time to time, from folks thinking that the road and a traveling show was no place to raise kids, but twenty or more children traveled with the show just about all the time, and Gideon had grown up with it. More stayed with their folks back on Bill’s spread in New Orleans, those whose parents didn’t want to travel while suckling babies—Gideon’s own folks had done that, with him, but not with his younger brother or sisters. Those parents were as important to the show as the people on the road, tending and schooling the foals, pups, and buffalo calves, living a more settled life until they decided their kids were old enough to travel.

His ma taught all of the kids their letters and numbers, and she always found plenty of books or newspapers for them to study, and scoffed at the idea of leaving them with somebody not their own kin. “How will you kids learn a trade if you don’t learn it from your folks?” she’d asked. Besides, most of the people who said that it wasn’t right for children to be traveling with the show were ignorant hicks in his opinion, farmers and churchgoers mostly, and he hadn’t thought their kids were any better off than him. Them that were better educated and held the same opinion, he’d seen his ma talk to, telling them that she was the show’s schoolteacher, and mostly that had settled those kinds of people down.

Gideon couldn’t think of a better or more interesting life than the show, couldn’t imagine a better family—not his own, and not the three hundred or so people who called the show home. But plenty of young folks left it when they reached marrying age. He’d seen them in towns they passed the next year or the year after, usually running stores or working the land with families of their own. Gideon’s younger brother lived in Ascension Parrish, west of New Orleans near Baton Rouge, with his young wife and her folks. He’d met her one winter and stayed for good the next, worried that he’d lose her to a local boy, and Gideon was sure they’d be starting a family of their own soon. He couldn’t see his sisters settling quite so easily, but maybe Grace would be one of them that stayed at Bill’s place and kept the home fires burning, if she and her beau decided to marry. Maybe Gideon would one day himself. Working in Livingston had given him a new perspective on the things he could do other than traveling, if he found a reason to settle down.

“Sometimes, people told my folks—and Bill Tourney gets an earful, too, from what he’s said—that the show wasn’t a proper place to raise children, but my folks never took them seriously. They love to travel, and my brothers and sisters were all born on the road.”

“My parents wanted us to stay with them also, but your government did not ask what they wished,” Jed answered. “We were handed over to the missionaries when the missionaries came for us, and tribes who resisted stopped receiving the supplies from your government that they needed to survive. It is the rule of the day, that we should be educated by white men and women, that we will be better off with white ways.”

Gideon chewed on that for a long moment. “What do you think, Jed? Are you better off?” he asked, wondering how different he’d be if his folks had been forced to give him up.

“I… do not believe so,” Jed said slowly, like he’d given the question a whole lot of thought. “I can read your books, which is probably good. There are some whites who are very wise. And I know your God.” He looked down at his hands, seeming terribly preoccupied with the cloth he’d been using to wipe his greasy fingers on, but his voice was even as he went on. “The missionaries, the representatives for your white god, even they did not embody the ways of nature or of Him.”

Gideon bit his lip to keep from pointing out the obvious, that judging a whole people just because their skin was white wasn’t much different from what Jed accused whites of doing. Besides, while the thought of Jed’s fear made him ache, this piece of Jed, like the other ones he had learned along the way—about Jed’s mother, about his sexual leanings, about his killing—all of these were things that Jed was trusting him with. Despite the fact that Gideon was white, and despite everything Jed had just said, he was giving pieces of himself to Gideon.

That seemed important enough that Gideon decided to honor it by keeping his damned questions to himself. “So tell me,” he said, changing the subject, “the stories of Indians stampeding buffalo herds off cliffs to kill ’em easier, is that true?”

Jedediah snorted. “Yes. Twenty buffalo, or fifty, for food and shelter, teepees and clothing, rope and bow strings.” He looked Gideon squarely in the eye. “We Sioux do not kill for sport.”

Gideon set his food aside and rubbed his hands in the grass to get some of the grease off them. Killing for sport… that was what those bastards had done. It was what plenty of folks did.

“Why so sad, Gideon?” Jed asked him. When Gideon frowned confusion at him, Jed gestured with his bread. “You usually speak of good things, of love and adventure and family, or tell tales that amuse you.”

Gideon shrugged. “Guess I ain’t feeling particularly happy today.”

“Why?”

Because you’re leaving soon. “Hard to, thinkin’ about what them animals did to the Hennessey family and plenty of others, I reckon.”

Jed nodded, taking his words at face value, and Gideon made an effort to cheer himself up. It’d be a damned shame to waste what few days he had left with this man. “What kind of story would you like to hear today, Jed?” he asked.

Jed smiled, and Gideon fancied it was fond. “Any story you would like to tell.”

Gideon told Jed about his twin sisters, little terrors the pair of them, one as tomboy as she could get and one who loved frills and lace, but they were as close as two people could be. They’d turned twelve this summer, and he was lonesome for them, so the stories came easy.

He and Jed had been making good time following a well-traveled road most of the day, and they’d passed plenty of travelers along the way. Every time they met a farm wagon or group on horseback, Gideon would smile and wave, while Jed would tug his hat lower on his head and stare at the ground along the side of the road. Gideon had seen this before, Jed’s natural effort to avoid trouble with white folks who might not take kindly to an Indian off a reservation. But here in California, folks seemed a little more settled about the idea of Jed’s dark skin and long hair. Gideon wondered if it was just because Indians had been converted long enough ago that they were more a novelty now, or if the folks they passed just had more sense than to annoy a stranger on a fit horse with a good rifle tied to his saddle. Either way, Gideon was glad that they didn’t have any trouble.

It occurred to him that with all the people around here, they might have a problem finding someplace private to camp. He made mention on a quiet stretch of road. “I’m lookin’ forward to bedding down tonight,” he said, weighting his words enough that he hoped Jed would get the message.

Jed did. His eyes crinkled at the corners with the tiny smile he offered, and he shook his head. “When are you not looking forward to a bed?” he asked, adding more gently, “And my body?”

Gideon grinned. That was plain enough, and he was glad Jed welcomed his urge. “Think we’ll be able to find someplace private?” he asked.

“Yes,” Jed said. “I will find someplace very private.” Just the way he said the words heated Gideon up, and Gideon bit his lip to keep from suggesting that they stop early. Like, right now.

Late afternoon sun burned hard into his eyeballs when the road widened out into a small collection of buildings that heralded a town in front of them. A wide, well-built bridge over a lazy river carried a sign: Mokelumne River, Lodi, California. “Lodi?” Gideon read aloud. “We’ve made good time today.”

Jed shrugged. “Downhill.” Jed stayed to the road and rode straight into town, a novelty for him, keeping his eyes low while Gideon took in a busy sawmill and clean-looking buildings. He didn’t think much about their route until Jed slowed down near a big livery stable, pulling the bay to a stop before sliding out of the saddle.

“Problem?” Gideon asked, looking around. He nodded hello when a man came out of the stable to greet them.

Jed didn’t answer Gideon but held out his reins to the newcomer. “The horses in the back,” he said, using his chin to point to the corral. “They are not stage horses.”

The man, a big burly guy who didn’t look all that friendly, said shortly, “Not hardly. We keep riding horses here, too—folks like touring out here, and we have couriers coming through every now and again. Why?” he asked, crossing his arms over his burly chest as he held Jed’s bay’s reins tight in one fist.

“I want to trade,” Jed said absently, “my horse for one of those.”

The guy examined Jed’s horse with new interest, stepping up to tug its lip back and check its teeth, then walking backward to the end of the reins to take a good look at its body. “This is a good-looking horse,” he said, “and it ain’t even five years old yet. What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing,” Jed said. “But I see an Indian pony back there.”

The man’s face set into a frown but he said, “Yeah. Couple of your boys came through a few weeks back, traded it for a rifle, shot, and three bottles of rotgut. So?”

“So,” Jed said, “I am an Indian.”

“So were they,” the man replied bluntly. “They didn’t see much reason to keep it….” Gideon grinned when the man realized he might be costing himself money and changed his tune. “Of course, that’s real good horseflesh you spotted, no doubt about that. Could be related to Frank Hopkins’ horse, the one that won that big race overseas. Them Injuns that sold it said they was from Oklahoma or thereabouts.”

Gideon put the brakes on that tall tale as quick as he could. “Ain’t many Indians left in Oklahoma, mister,” he said curtly, “and don’t many folks believe that story, anyway. Jed here won’t fall for it.” He dismounted easily and grabbed up Star’s reins. “Hang on a minute.” He walked over to the fence, nodding to the man as he passed and pulling Star along behind him to examine the pony Jed had eyes for. Its coat, a bright bay dunskin with scattered streaks on its hindquarters, was shiny and well-kept, and he kind of liked the blaze that ran down its face. He knelt down to check its sex and stood back up, eying its form. The gelding had fine conformation, but he could see the mustang blood in its size, the high ridge of its withers and the slope of its croupe. Mustangs didn’t have a lot of room for saddlebags, back there. Mostly though, he could sense the wild in it by the way it stood apart from the other horses. “You mind, mister?” he asked, tilting his head toward the corral.

“Nah, go ahead,” the man said. “Watch out for that white mare over in the back, she likes to bite.”

Gideon nodded, dropped Star’s reins, and slipped through the fence posts. “Easy,” he whispered, edging up to the dun. Its ears swiveled, and it threw its head, but it let Gideon approach it, and held still while he lifted each dark, unshod hoof, then checked its teeth. “It’s somewhere around seven years old, Jed,” he called out. “Older’n the one you got now, and smaller.”

“I am also small,” Jed said with a shrug. He’d walked up to the corral fence and crossed his arms across the top post to watch Gideon check the horse over.

Gideon frowned and walked back to where Jed stood, leaning on the fence from the inside. “You sure about this?” he asked, low, as he came in close to Jed. “You don’t know anything about that mustang—”

“I know enough,” he cut Gideon off. “I know it is of this land—it is not natural for it to stay here, in this corral.” He took his hat off and tossed his head, making his hair fly back over his shoulders. The mustang saw the movement and whuffed, tossing its head, ears and eyes trained on Jed.

“That bay is yours,” Gideon tried again, but he was watching the mustang, too. “You’ve got a title—”

“I have a piece of paper that says this horse is mine, but it is only as good as the name of the man who signed it. Here,” he waved his hand around in a small circle, “the people may know Sheriff Bishop. But as we ride further away, his name will mean less and less. A man like me, an Indian, may not be accepted on a fine horse like that, Gideon. We both know it. Being with you might make it safe for a while, but when we part I will have a big, young, white-man’s horse, with a piece of paper signed by a white man. Even if other white men believe that a sheriff signed over the horse to me, some may not have reason to honor the deal.” He pointed his head when the mustang snorted and stomped a hoof. “No one will look twice at an Indian on an Indian pony.”

Gideon thought Jed must have rocks in his head to think that he could go anywhere and people wouldn’t look. He was fine and strong, and he carried his strength around him like most people wore a warm coat. He was the kind of man people looked at—even people who didn’t have the same kind of interest Gideon did, even when Jed tried to make himself seem like nothing much.

Gideon might have thought that when he’d first met Jed, injured and weak and feverish. He might have made the mistake of thinking it for a time after, even. But even if he hadn’t seen what Jed had done to them marauders back in that shot-up camp, he couldn’t look at Jed and see anything but a strong, independent, and solitary man. A man who knew how to take care of himself even when the odds were against him.

“You don’t leave here with folding money for this trade, I’ll call you a fool to your face,” Gideon warned him.

Jed’s smile showed all his teeth, and Gideon returned it in kind.

After Jed made the deal—and did indeed have more money in his pocket than any time Gideon had ever seen him—Jed asked the man for directions.

“We don’t need directions, Jed,” Gideon scoffed. “Straight west, follow the sun….”

The livery man, Bob Grisham, laughed out loud. “If you want to get stuck in a bog or drown trying to cross all the inland bays up here, sure,” he said. “You got the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers up there, mister, and Suisun Bay, the Carquinez Strait—they all backflow when the Pacific tide comes in, and they’re a pain in the ass on a good day.”

“I’ve been on a train from Sacramento to Oakland a dozen times or more, Mister Grisham,” Gideon said, rankled. “Ain’t never had a problem.”

Grisham shook his head. “On a train you wouldn’t, but I’m betting you don’t know how many coolies died, laying those tracks back in the ’60s and ’70s. If you go south, you’ll hit Stockton. After that you can go straight west just like you want to, and miss all the water.”

Jed raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you wish to swim to San Francisco, Gideon?” he asked.

Gideon felt the flush heat his neck and grumbled, “How far’s Stockton from here, then?”

“Not more than fifteen miles,” Grishom replied. “It’s the route I take when I have to go somewhere.” Under his breath he added, “It’s the route everybody takes.”

Gideon felt the flush heat him further, and Jed’s superior little smile didn’t help matters at all. “He’s the guide,” he finally grumbled and tried hard not to stomp away from the livery.

Jed caught up to him quick enough. “So stubborn,” he teased, and more quietly, “so young.”

“I’m twenty years old, Jed,” he groused. “I been a man for years now.”

“Your parents coddle you,” Jed shot back.

Gideon turned on him and planted his hands on his hips. “You tryin’ to pick a fight?”

“No,” Jed said softly. Softer still he said, “Perhaps I am trying to heat your blood, though.”

This rush of heat, Gideon was powerless to stop, and it went south instead of north, curling in his belly and making his cock twitch. “We ain’t leaving this town without a supper somebody else cooks,” he said, though all of a sudden he was in a hell of a hurry to get back on the road.

Half an hour later they rode right into the huge, low disk of the sun, Gideon on Star and Jed on his new pony, turning south and putting the sun to their shoulders when they picked their way out of Lodi. Gideon had insisted that Jed buy him a hot dinner with some of his extra cash, and Jed, surprisingly, hadn’t argued about it. But Gideon hadn’t asked Jed to stay in town, in a bed, and Jed hadn’t offered that. Tonight, Gideon wanted to be wherever Jed wanted to be, and they both knew it.

The sun had dropped below the horizon before Jed turned off the road and found them a place by following a trickle of a stream. They tramped through tall grasses turned brown by summer sun, and rode right into the edges of a copse of oak trees that grew tall on both sides of the creek banks. A bend in the stream had dug out the bed, and it was deep enough there for them to wash up—cold, mountain cold, that shriveled his little stallion and made his balls try to crawl up inside his body, but clean and clear and waist-deep when he waded in. Jed gathered wood while Gideon cleared dead leaves and twigs until a struck match showed him black, loamy earth, then he dragged handfuls of rocks from the creek’s edge to scatter into the hole. He almost tripped into the little hole in the dark, which earned him a low chuckle from Jed.

He’d have glared at the man, if only there’d been enough light for Jed to see it, but the moon wasn’t up yet and the deepening dusk didn’t penetrate the tree canopy, so Gideon didn’t waste his time on the effort. Jed started the fire while Gideon unsaddled and tethered the horses and dragged their gear near, dropping it on the ground. He hadn’t really expected a fire, since they’d left the cooler night air at higher altitudes and had already eaten dinner, but Jed set out his pan and started coffee. Gideon rubbed his hands together, unaccountably eager, and held them out toward the heat, using that excuse to look at the man who squatted beside him. Jed looked like he usually did, serene and peaceful and self-contained, but there was something else there tonight that got Gideon’s blood stirring: long, silent looks his way, and a set to Jed’s mouth that Gideon wanted to kiss off him. He barely tasted the coffee when he drank it, because his attention was all on Jed.

And Jed knew it. He wasn’t being coy or dragging things out, but he was being purposeful. Every motion seemed steadier and more intent than the one before it, and Gideon felt his cock hardening before either of them said a word about laying out a bed. When Jed finally emptied his coffee cup, he rose tall and straight and grabbed up Gideon’s bedroll, laying it out and folding the top over. Then he untied his own blanket, spread it out over Gideon’s bedroll, and pulled it back. That looked mighty inviting, and with a quick glance Jed’s way, Gideon pushed back to his feet and bent to tug off his boots then shrugged out of his coat.

Jed fell onto his backside, tin cup still in his hand, and looked up to watch him, which did all sorts of things to Gideon’s insides. He was a showman at heart, but this didn’t seem like the time for a performance, so he just watched Jed watching him, and kept stripping down, taking off his pants and, after a brief hesitation, skinning out of his underdrawers, too, to reveal his cock, already hard and seeking. He stood there, warm in California’s autumn air, but a shiver coursed through him anyway, just from the way Jed’s eyes took him in.

“Lie down,” Jed said, and Gideon scrambled to the bedroll fast enough to earn a low chuckle from Jed. “So young,” he thought he heard Jed say, but the words floated between them quieter than most of Jed’s chanting.

“I’m a grown man,” he shot back, more teasing than defensive this time. He reckoned Jedediah Buffalo Bird, of all the people in this world, knew just how much a man he was.

“But you act like a child, in this,” Jed said, plenty loud enough for Gideon to hear this time. Oddly though, his words held no rancor, just more of that gentle teasing Jed seemed to like to do at his expense. Gideon couldn’t complain, not when Jed rose and stripped down, smooth and easy. He was gratified to see that Jed’s cock was hard, too, and his gaze got stuck on the end of that pretty length, where firelight caught a glimmer of fluid at the tip. Without a thought he sat up, reaching out to catch Jed by the back of one wiry, hard-muscled thigh.

“Come here,” he murmured, pulling Jed toward him.

Jed frowned but took two steps forward. It was close enough. Gideon slipped his tongue out to catch the clear bubble of fluid at the tip and sighed around the flesh when Jed’s breath caught. One of Jed’s hands eased through his hair, and for a second, Gideon thought Jed might pull him away. He pulled harder, trying to draw Jed closer, taking the head into his mouth.

“Gideon,” Jed hissed, and his fingers started to tug, “you do not need to do this.”

Gideon backed off long enough to say, “Oh, yes I do,” then dived back down on it.

Jed’s cock fit his body, firm and straight and just big enough to fill Gideon’s mouth well, and Gideon set up a slow sucking, sliding his lips down the shaft and back up, working hard to get a moan from the man. When it came, he lifted a hand and cupped Jed’s balls, rolling them in their sac, and another little groan choked out of Jed, like he was struggling to hold it in. Hell, he probably was. Jed had a whole hell of a lot of self-restraint, more than Gideon would ever try and claim. But his hips started working, and Gideon relaxed, letting the shaft slide toward the back of his throat, resisting a groan or two himself at how good all of this was, how unique to his life so far. He’d had more than his share of men, but to keep one over weeks like this, and such a good man—well, it let him know a little better why his mother and father had stayed together and happy for so long, because the familiarity, the knowing someone else’s body and heart, too, made all of this so much better.

Too soon, Jed tugged at his hair hard enough that Gideon had to let his head be pulled from its task. “What?” he asked, blinking as he savored how the firelight played shadows over Jed’s form.

“Lie down,” Jed said, and Gideon felt a shiver of anticipation slide through him. He didn’t know what Jed was planning, but he’d already learned that when Jed told him to do something in that tone of voice, the result was going to be good for them both.

He stretched back, resisting the urge to take hold of his own aching shaft, and watched as Jed fished through their bags for the leftovers from dinner: sweet butter he’d purchased at the restaurant, paying extra for the little tin, and Gideon sucked in a slow breath. Yeah, that’d be good. That’d be real good, out here in the quiet and peaceful night, with a fire burning bright enough that he could see what they were doing and remember it.

When Jed straddled his thighs, he thought he knew how this was going to go, but instead of buttering him up, Jed curled over him and licked up his shaft, making him buck against Jed’s weight across his legs. Jed, hands on their bedrolls to either side of Gideon’s waist, looked up his body, all mysterious and foreign and intent. “I will take you,” he said, more order than offer, and all the muscles in Gideon’s body tightened at the words.

“Yeah….” He swallowed, licked his lips. “Yeah, do that.”

He followed where Jed’s hand guided, rolling to his belly and watching the fire dance while Jed’s strong hands worked at the dense muscles of his ass, kneading at the cheeks. Gideon thought he could come just from that touch, from anticipation, and from the way his cock rubbed against the rough fabric of his bedroll. But it felt like Jed was inside his head, because the kneading stopped, and Jed gripped his hips hard, lifting them a few inches off the ground.

“Stop that,” Jed ordered, “or it will be over before it begins.”

Gideon hissed a breath when he heard the tin lid scrape against the container, and he hissed again when one slender finger found and pressed into his hole. Jed had done that before, dry, but not with this plan in mind, and Gideon felt his cock pulse in time to his racing heart. “You don’t hurry up, it’ll be over before it starts, anyway,” he huffed out on a laugh. Everything he knew about the world told him this shouldn’t be so good, but everything he knew about Jed rejected what he’d learned before. His body felt hotter than that fire burning near, so that when one finger turned into two, and then Jed’s weight settled along his back, Gideon felt like they’d throw sparks between them.

“Be ready,” Jed whispered, breath and long hair tickling his shoulder just before Gideon felt the snub, smooth head press against his hole.

He was ready, more ready than he’d ever been. But Jed didn’t move, his body so still that Gideon couldn’t even feel him breathing. “C’mon in, Jed,” he whispered urgently. He wanted it, wanted the pressure and the burn and all the good that would follow.

Jed tensed briefly, then a slow push came, pressing against his body, trying to open him up. He tightened instinctively, but before he could do anything about it, Jed murmured, “No, Gideon, let it happen.”

It wasn’t the words, but the layer of desperation in the other man’s voice that got to Gideon. He turned his head, trying to see over his shoulder, wanting to see what that sort of need looked like on Jed’s face, but Jed’s hair hung down, hiding him.

Jed made a low noise as he pushed forward again, and the pressure on parts that hadn’t felt it in too long made Gideon offer up some sounds of his own. The burn grew as the head of Jed’s cock breached him, but Jed stopped before it overpowered Gideon’s senses. “Good,” he gasped out, “feels good, keep going.”

“Soon,” Jed said, the word more breath than sound against his skin. “Wait.”

He didn’t want to wait, he wanted to feel Jed all the way up inside him, wanted Jed to own him. It wasn’t a startling realization. He knew already how deeply he cared for Jed, but he’d never had this physical want as intensely as he did now, the want to be possessed by a man, just this way, belly-down in the dark, giving it all up and over. “You move or I will,” he warned, earning a huff of hot breath on his shoulder blade.

“So young,” Jed breathed again, and pushed home, right on through.

Gideon’s body was all mixed up, and he had to work to keep it open, to push his ass back until he felt the full weight of Jed’s hipbones against the cushion of his butt. It hurt, but it hurt good, better than anything he’d felt in—maybe ever. He’d had men inside him before, but it’d never felt this good. It was like him and Jed were made for this, like Jed was supposed to be doing this, just this way.

“Gideon,” Jed whispered, his body trembling like a leaf. Gideon could feel the tremors where their skin touched, from the backs of his thighs all the way to his shoulder where Jed’s lips moved soundlessly against the flesh. “I—”

“Don’t,” Gideon said, gasping. “Move, Jed. Move.”

Jed did. It was slow at first, as if he were scared but couldn’t stop himself—which Gideon could understand. He forced himself to move, too, forward, away from Jed, until he felt the tug that warned of separation. Then he pushed back and was rewarded with a groan as Jed reseated himself deep, so deep, like he was in Gideon’s heart and not just his ass. Gideon pulled forward again, and Jed groaned again, and the movement was smooth and sharp and energetic. Jed pushed forward, faster this time, and pulled back instead of stopping. Gideon moved, too, but he was slower now, waiting to see what Jed would do—and Jed took control.

It was deep and thorough, as if Jed were laying claim, taking possession of him in a way that no one else ever had—in a way Gideon had never invited anyone else to do. Every movement zinged through him, sparking heat and friction and a pulsing electricity that pushed him close to the edge, driving him up toward release. His cock felt too heavy, as if the weight of release was too much—but he knew that feeling wouldn’t last long. His body was poised, ready to spring the release as soon as he dropped his guard.

Jed didn’t give him much chance to, though. A strong hand bruised at his hip as it worked underneath him, and Jed’s sure touch to his cock shocked him, coursing through his whole body. One firm tug, two, and Gideon hoped to hell Jed had picked them a good spot and there wasn’t a home over the next rise, because the yell he let out would have brought folks running. He couldn’t help it, though, couldn’t stop it—not the noise, not the gush of pleasure that geysered down and out of him, not the sudden furious pounding Jed gave him from behind, inside, all the way through him. His muscles went lax, trapping Jed’s hand between him and his bedroll, and it was all he could do to breathe and come, breathe and come together, like every breath in made room for more pleasure to pour out. When Jed’s hips stuttered and pushed home one last, harsh time, Gideon whimpered for it, for how well Jed fit him and how good it was.

And because things this good weren’t meant to last.

He was mourning his losses before his cock stopped spitting, and surely before Jed’s did, slicking him up inside and making him squeeze his muscles to hold everything right where it was, right in this surfeit of sensation and feeling.

Jed couldn’t convince him this was just how men were. Gideon knew how men were, because he was one, hornier and more determined to get his satisfaction than most. This was more than that, and Jed could talk himself hoarse denying it, and Gideon wouldn’t believe a word. He lay there, limp as a dishrag, while echoes of pleasure arced through him, and he felt held together by nothing more than the steady weight of Jed’s body on his.

“Gideon,” Jed whispered after a time. He sounded weak as a kitten, but from somewhere he found the strength to pull up and out. Their parting made a wet sound, and it hurt, but not in his ass, not to speak of. Separating from Jed took more out of him, like breath but deeper in his chest.

Jed pushed himself up and away and made as if to rise, but Gideon rolled awkwardly onto his side and reached out, catching one of Jed’s wrists. “You got no reason to move,” he mumbled, working hard to make his mouth move right.

“I want to look around,” Jed said, sounding nervous. “You were loud.”

Gideon huffed a breath of tired laughter. “That, I was,” he agreed. “Your fault,” he added smugly, grinning when Jed shook his head in annoyance. He almost expected some kind of comment about his age again. But he thought the same thing Jed did about how loud he’d been, so he gathered up the strength to push up on one elbow while Jed pulled on his clothes.

“Wait here,” Jed said, which was all Gideon needed to move.

“I’ll go with you.”

“You will slow me down.”

Gideon refused to take offense. He’d taken offense in Carson City, and wasted time they didn’t have. Maybe he would slow Jed down, but he’d be lonely if Jed wandered away right now, and as long as they were both presentable, it didn’t matter how slow the going was anyway. “Best to work out some of the stiffness before it sets in,” he said, offering a reason to walk with him, and Jed tossed him a worried frown. “I’m fine—better than fine. Still,” he added, bending carefully, “you could’ve told me you were this good at that.”

Jed’s frown melted into confusion. “I am… I….”

Gideon chuckled, pleased to see the man so discombobulated. “We’d have been doing it a lot sooner if I’d known.”

Jed shook his head and looked down as he tied up his pants. “I thought you liked the other way better.”

Gideon pulled on his own pants, thinking long before he answered truthfully, “I like it almost any way you want to do it, Jed. Don’t know that I’d ever have thought that about another guy, but I guess you taught me something new.”

Jed stared at him for a few seconds before nodding. He didn’t say anything else, just slipped on his boots instead and walked away. Gideon hurried to catch up before he lost him in the dark.

They didn’t take long, stumbling around a circuit of the camp—well, Gideon supposed he did most of the stumbling, because Jed was better at dealing with the dark than he was, but at least Gideon didn’t run into any trees. As sated and dozy as he was feeling, he could have. Jed led the way while they both listened for anything that shouldn’t be there—voices, footsteps not their own, rustling in the dry grass. After a time, when Gideon was good and cold, Jed turned and headed back toward the fire. Gideon walked along behind him, enjoying the ache in his ass. He’d be sore tomorrow, but it was a good sore, one he could live with. One he didn’t like the idea of living without, in fact. Riding wouldn’t be particularly pleasant, but then, maybe that’d slow them down a little. He liked the idea of that.

They got back to camp, and Jed went straight to their bedrolls, pulling his blankets off the top of Gideon’s and moving to put them on the other side of the fire.

“Hold up, now,” Gideon protested. “You put them blankets right back where they were.”

“It is not cold enough to warrant sharing blankets,” Jed said, and he had a stubborn look on his face that told Gideon he wasn’t the only one affected by what they’d done tonight.

He slid around behind Jed and put his hands to the narrow hips, just holding them. “Let’s say it is.”

Jed stiffened, ready to resist him, but Gideon plowed on before Jed could get all reasonable. “What are we, two days out of San Francisco? Three, if we dally? And I intend to, now,” he added honestly. “The road’s only gonna get more crowded from here, Jed, and I want to lie with you.”

“You always get what you want?” Jed asked, and Gideon heard the frown in his voice.

“Nope,” he said easily, “but when I can? I try.” He stepped up close, pressing his body against Jed’s warmth and setting his chin atop Jed’s shoulder. He had to tilt his head up to do it—Jed wasn’t that small—but it was worth it, to smell his hair and feel him through the layers of their clothes. “No good reason not to, and this could be the last night we’ve got that’s this private.”

Jed’s shoulder slumped, in acknowledgment or surrender, and he tugged gently away. Gideon let him, watching to see what he’d do and gratified when he tromped, sullenly enough that Gideon thought he could do some teasing of his own, back around the fire and laid his blanket back down beside Gideon’s.

Gideon hopped to, getting his boots off and shrugging back out of his coat, and when he lay down, Jed joined him without a word. Both of them faced the fire, and Gideon wasn’t ashamed of his urge to prop up and look down at Jed’s profile in the flickering light, to card his fingers through Jed’s hair and pull it back, revealing more of him. He wanted to say some words, but after what they’d done tonight, words seemed mighty inadequate to the task of description. So he bent and planted a kiss in Jed’s hair, and finally settled back behind him.

He slept well and hard.

 

 

GIDEON woke to the feel of Jed trying to ease out from under his arm. “Mmnn,” he mumbled, and cleared his throat. “You tryin’ to slip off?” he asked, sated and warm and teasing, mostly.

“No,” Jed said, frowning at him, and Gideon drew up short, propping on an elbow to blink around their little camp. He’d remember this place for a long time, he knew, but it wouldn’t be a story he ever told, not even to another man, when there was one.

“I reckon I could find my way on into San Francisco from here, couldn’t I?” he asked.

Jed huffed. “A child could.”

“Well, you accuse me of being one often enough,” he said, smiling to take any sting out of the words. “But that don’t mean I don’t expect you to get me all the way there. Jed….” He sighed, thinking again about how words didn’t seem up to the task before him. “I know we’re close to the end of the road, all right? And I know you’ll be turning around and going home, after. But don’t slip off, okay? Don’t slip off when I’m expecting to see you in the morning. I think it’d break my heart.”

Jed rolled under his arm, stretching out flat on his back, and frowned up at him. “Gideon,” he started, and sighed. “I will not leave before we reach your destination,” he said, and Gideon wondered what he’d started to say. There was no sense asking him. Jed would just shut up tighter than a clam, and that would be that. 

“Time to go?” he asked instead.

“It is early yet,” Jed said, calmer now. “I thought I would fish.”

“No need,” Gideon reminded him. “We’ll find plenty of wide spots in the road between here and Stockton. We can eat food somebody else cooks.”

Jed frowned at him, looking honestly curious. “You truly prefer food other people have cooked.”

“Well,” Gideon said, thinking about it, “I guess I just like variety. Meals that ain’t always one dish with too little salt and seasonings. Most times, that means somebody else’s cooking. The show’s head cook, she’s real good. Kind of like a restaurant cook I guess, ’cause she and her team are cooking for three hundred hungry people. You ought to try her food before you head home,” he said.

“If we have not missed them,” Jed said, but Gideon heard the doubt in his voice and didn’t push. He wasn’t so sure he wanted to share Jed anyway, not even with his folks. His ma would ask questions, and he’d want to answer them, and he thought the telling of this tale, so close to Jed’s leaving, would just make their parting feel worse than he already knew it would.

“If it’s early yet, and we ain’t in much of a hurry,” he tried, and slid his hand over Jed’s flat belly, “I sure would be happy to suck you off right this very minute.”

Jed blanched. “I have not washed.”

Gideon grimaced, remembering, and chuckled a little. “Okay, you’ve got a little bit of a point there. So, what then?” He was rubbing circles over the hollow of Jed’s belly, from the end of his ribs to the pointed hip bones, firmly enough that the fabric of Jed’s shirt traveled with his hand.

“So, we walk,” Jed answered, and with a brief squeeze to Gideon’s hand, he slithered out from under it and rolled to his feet.

Gideon couldn’t complain. He could honestly say that he was still all soft and sated from last night, even though he already missed the feel of Jed’s body against him. He lay there and watched Jed walk to the far side of the camp and away, into the trees. First piss of the day, he thought, which finally motivated him enough to stand.

Ouch. As he sat up, he felt sharp twinges, not just inside but all through his lower back, reminding him of how eager he’d been, how much he’d bucked underneath Jed last night. It wasn’t painful, but it was distracting, and he groaned a little as he got to his feet, then he groaned a little more as he followed Jed’s path into the trees.

He’d ridden horses since he was big enough to climb up on one from a step or a fence, and he was in fine form, but however he’d moved last night had stretched him different, and he was more sore than he’d expected. Walking helped, and he bent to stretch the backs of his legs as he tucked himself back into his pants. The movement brought another sharp pain through his lower back, and he hissed, turning this way and that to try and loosen the pull. He was still stiff when he came back to the camp, enough that Jed stood up from where he was putting his pack in order.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, and Gideon was pleased to note the worry in his voice.

“Nothing I can’t handle,” he said, but he hissed as he started to bend over to gather up his own bedroll.

“Gideon….” Jed sighed just like he had earlier, and stepped up as Gideon turned to look at him. “Lie down.”

“What?”

Jed smiled a little. “It is not often that I have to ask you that twice. Lie down. On your stomach.”

Much as it would cost him in comfort, Gideon perked up at the idea. “Yeah, that’s—”

Jed shook his head and shot Gideon an annoyed look. “Just lie down.”

“All right, all right!” He stretched out carefully, propping his chin on his fist. “But if you think you’re gonna—”

“Be quiet.”

He huffed a breath but closed his mouth. When strong hands started kneading at the muscles in his lower back, he opened it again. “Oh, that’s good,” he groaned, “that’s—yeah, right there.”

“Are you able to do anything without narrating it?” Jed asked, and Gideon thought it was a joke until the annoyance in Jed’s voice registered. He started to answer before he realized that shutting up was maybe the goal Jed had in mind, and went back to clamping his jaw tight. Still, the little groans of pleasure worked their way out, and if Jed didn’t like it, he could lump it. This felt too good, and the ache in his muscles drained off him like water. Jed’s hands moved down, kneading his ass cheeks like a good baker kneaded bread dough, so that the hurt and the relief combined to confuse his body to no end. His balls itched like they did when something was starting to work him up, and he humped up against Jed’s hands then settled more deeply against the bedroll. Decades of leaves made this ground almost as soft as a mattress, and he fisted his hands and just wallowed in the comfort, ignoring the itch as Jed moved to one side and worked his way down the back of one leg, then up the other. Finally, with a light swat to his backside, Jed said, “That should help.”

“Mmm hmm,” he mumbled, thinking he could go right back to sleep for another hour, if only Jed would stretch out beside him.

It occurred to him that he hadn’t seen Jed nap during the day since he’d recovered from the fever and infection back in Livingston. And while he was in no hurry to start moving again, he reckoned that his chances of a lie-in were low.

“All right,” he muttered, and pushed up to his hands and knees. “Quick wash in a cold creek, then we head out.”

“All right,” Jed replied.

Gideon barely splashed his hands and face, thinking he could maybe get a hot bath in a town somewhere along the road today, but he did squat by the creek to watch when Jed stripped off all his clothes and washed thoroughly. I could suck him now, and he’d just taste like Jed. So he set to doing it, putting himself between Jed and the clothes he’d spread out on a branch. “Hey,” he said, looking up from where he knelt.

Jed frowned at him.

“Come here.”

“We should get moving.”

“And we will, just as soon as I do this.” He scooted forward on his knees when Jed made no move to close the distance between them, and reached to put his hands on Jed’s hips, taking a moment just to look at his manhood. It was already starting to thicken, even after that cold water. “He wants it,” Gideon said, grinning up at Jed. Jed frowned all the harder, but he didn’t try to pull away, so Gideon used his tongue to tease at the loose skin covering the crown, then sucked the cold shaft in. It didn’t take but a minute for Jed to get all the way hard in his mouth, and Gideon used his hands to guide Jed’s hips, starting an easy thrusting motion. Jed’s hands touched his shoulders briefly before they curled up, one around the back of his neck and one sliding into his hair.

“Gideon,” Jed said on a sigh. He was sighing a lot more since the Hennessey homestead, but this time the sound was filled with need. Gideon smiled around the cock in his mouth, lingering at the crown when Jed pulled away a few inches. The tip delivered a drop of bitter fluid, and he licked it like a lollipop before going back down, all the way.

The hands at his neck and in his hair tightened, reflex motions that warmed Gideon right down to his own cock, which he manfully ignored. A piece of him wanted to pull it out, jerk himself off while he did this, but the greater part wanted to remember this, wanted every detail for cold and lonely nights to come. Hot and smooth, all man, tasting woodsy and natural and clean, topped with that bitter taste at the tip that he kept pausing to lick off. Jed was getting close, he could tell just from how tightly the man held himself, so he pulled back and off Jed’s manhood to look up at his face. “Let go, Jed. You ain’t gonna hurt me.”

“I don’t—I do not….”

“I do,” Gideon said firmly, and sucked the shaft back in. It seemed like Jed wound himself even tighter, so Gideon slid one hand over a narrow ass cheek, seeking with a fingertip until he found the pucker. His other hand, he slid in between Jed’s legs from the front, rolling the tight balls in their sac, and it seemed like he’d found the combination that would make Jed cut loose. Both hands went to the sides of his head, giving him what he’d been wanting for minutes now, and Gideon tightened his lips around the shaft and let go himself, tonguing the underside as it slid into and out of his mouth, urging Jed on with grunts and the finger pressed into him from behind. That’s it, he thought, as hungry for this as Jed was. That’s it…. Jed actually let loose a garbled shout when he came, startling Gideon so bad he almost fell backward onto his ass. He caught his balance by grabbing Jed’s hips again and held on through the shuddering, swallowing around the head of Jed’s cock and moaning his satisfaction at a job well done.

When Jed’s hands tugged at his ears to pull him off, he knelt back and grinned. “Ain’t such a bad way to start the day now, is it?”

Jed just looked at him for a long moment, naked and glowing in the dappled morning light, and reached a fingertip to trace Gideon’s lips. He knelt in front of Gideon and kissed him, and Gideon felt like whatever inhibitions Sioux had against the act of kissing, Jed had clearly overcome them. His tongue went everywhere, seeking out the taste of himself or of Gideon or both, and Gideon relaxed into it, struggling not to just surrender to this assault and fall back into the leaves.

“I can do for you now,” Jed said when he pulled back, and Gideon sat there and watched Jed’s eyes search him as thoroughly as his tongue just had.

“You could,” he said, “but I c’n wait ’til we bed down tonight.”

Jed looked around their little campsite, and a tiny frown marred the sated, tender look on his face. “I do not know that we will find a camp away from other white men,” he said slowly.

“Well,” Gideon said, pushing to his feet and adjusting his hard cock in his pants, “I guess you’ve got good cause to, now.”

Jed’s frown deepened. “You are trying to manipulate me.”

“I think I just did manipulate you,” he teased, touching a finger to Jed’s softening cock.

“Very funny,” Jed said dryly, like he was trying to criticize. But he couldn’t pull it off, naked and flushed, and the idea that he was trying so hard made Gideon loose a full-throated laugh.

“You don’t gotta be so buttoned up all the time, Jed,” he said. “If you can’t find us a good place to repeat that performance, well, it’s your loss. Or I ain’t as good at what I just did as I thought I was.”

Jed’s chuckle was low and throaty, but he didn’t say a word as he edged around Gideon to gather up his clothes. Neither one of them spoke as they packed up their gear, readied their horses, and picked their way back to the road. Gideon did say a choice word or two when he mounted and a sharp twinge of pain shot through his ass, and he grumbled for a while afterward, but Jed, after offering a concerned look or two that Gideon waved away, mostly grinned at him.

They rode for a while, but the slow pace that they started with didn’t waver much. Gideon didn’t complain, not just because of his own discomfort but because he was glad of the extra time with Jed. They stopped for breakfast and coffee at the first wide spot in the road they came across, and Jed encouraged him to walk a little after. It amused him that Jed walked with him, leading his horse along like Gideon did. “You gonna sell that horse when we part?” he asked.

“Why would I?”

“Well,” Gideon shrugged, “all the noise you made about horses slowing a man down….”

Jed shrugged. “He is an Indian pony. I will return him to Montana and then decide.”

“You gonna keep him on your reservation?”

“No.”

The one word, harder than Gideon had expected, got Gideon thinking. “Do you live on a reservation?”

“No. But I do not believe a man or beast should be confined to a place not its own.”

“I like the sound of that,” he said, meaning it. Star’s place was with him. She’d been birthed into his hands and raised up from a wobbling colt with him teaching her right from wrong. Maybe this pony’s place would be with Jed, by the time Jed got it back to Montana. “You ought to give it a name.”

“I have,” Jed said, surprising him. “Sunkdudan.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Short-legged pony.”

Gideon snorted. “What you suffer from, Jed, is a lack of imagination.”

Jed shrugged. “That is what he is. Just like your horse. She is the star of your show.”

Gideon blinked. Those were pretty much his daddy’s words, that she’d be a star if he took proper care of her. He couldn’t recall having told Jed that story, which made the man’s assumption all the sweeter. “Sort of,” he said, without offering any more explanation. Jed didn’t ask for one.

The trees had thinned out a little as they came out of the mountains, but plenty of the north-facing hillsides in this rolling country were dotted with stands of oaks, the short and stubby kind that grew hardy and slow in this dryer climate, and whole crowds of them dotted rivers and streams. They stopped for lunch by a stand of willows, letting the horses feed on grass and drink water from the stream they’d been following. Gideon sat back in the sun, letting his mind drift as his body relaxed. The ache inside wasn’t so bad now, but it was nice to be still and to be warm. Nice to feel those aches that reminded him of Jed.

Movement beside him drew him out of a drowse and he looked up to see Jed openly watching him. The frown on Jed’s features made him think it was time to start moving again, but as he gathered himself to rise, Jed turned and dropped into a sit beside him, his legs bent at the knee and his ankles crossed almost under his butt.

“Time to move on?” he asked anyway.

Jed reached out a hand, patting his knee. “Not yet.”

Gideon tilted his head, listening for any sounds that shouldn’t be here, or the noise of horses or people, but all he could hear was the birds in the trees and the breeze in the grasses. “Time for something else?” he asked hopefully, and it looked like Jed was trying to frown at him for the suggestion, but couldn’t quite make his mouth do it.

“My father was a good storyteller, like you,” Jed said out of the blue. “He would tell us stories, when we were small, of the way the land was before the white men came. His father and his grandfather could walk the land for three days in almost any direction, if they wished, and never see sign of another Indian, much less a white man.”

“Feel like we did that, too,” Gideon said, “when we were east of the Sierra Nevada.”

Jed chuckled. “We walked white men’s trails, Gideon. We followed white men’s train tracks and crossed white men’s bridges. And we were rarely three days from some white settlement, even though they might have been difficult for you to find.”

Gideon shrugged, accepting. He was thirsty for details, for knowledge he could hold on to about this man who’d come to mean so much. “What else did your daddy do?”

“He was born on the reservation, but his father was not. My father learned the old ways, and he and my grandfather taught them to us. He taught us to hunt and fish, to be as one with the land, to honor all the creatures that Earth Mother created. Grandfather said that even white men had a place here, a reason for being.” Jed pulled his knees up and wrapped his arms around them, staring so thoughtfully at Gideon that Gideon felt mesmerized by those night-blue eyes. “But my father told us never to trust them, that even with the best of intentions, white men cannot honor the ways of our people.”

“Reckon plenty of us are pretty ignorant,” Gideon said slowly. He didn’t like talking white folks down, but he wasn’t going to ignore the evidence of his own eyes, neither. Besides, his friends in the show like Harold Crowe had called folks like Bill and the troupe exceptions to the rule.

Jed nodded. “Even your teachers—at least the missionaries who taught us—are ignorant. They believed they were teaching us better ways, but really they only taught us white ways: whites believe the Earth has no soul, that she exists to be conquered and used and that she will always provide plenty. Yet through my father’s eyes I have seen the buffalo disappear, and the wolf, and the way your mining for metal can poison the rivers and kill the fish.”

Jed turned his face away, gaze rising toward the afternoon sky, but his hand returned to Gideon’s knee and rested there. “You asked me about my school.” He hugged his legs closer but his voice was even as he went on. “We learned many things from the white teachers, Gideon, but the thing I learned best is that my father was right. The white man is uncompromising and unforgiving. You may not intend to be, but it is in your nature. For my people, to trust in your kind is to die a little. Or a lot.”

The words were hard—not the tone, because Jed’s voice stayed as even and gentle as it had been through the entire telling. But Gideon knew that the story was more than a piece of Jed’s history. It was Jed’s explanation for why nothing could be between them.

He took a breath, wanting to say something, but he knew that telling the man he was flat-out wrong wouldn’t get him very far. Nobody liked hearing that, and it didn’t matter one whit what color their skin was.

Jed rose and turned to look down at him. “We should go. We are not far now, and you may find that your companions have waited for you.”

Gideon chuckled at that; Bill Tourney didn’t wait for anybody, not when money was on the line, and he sent advance teams up the road, men and women to put up posters and spread the word. Jed reached out a hand, offering to help Gideon up, and Gideon let him. But as he came to his feet, ignoring the protest of his muscles, he stepped in close to Jed, letting their bodies touch.

“I’m real sorry for the way things are between our peoples,” he said, slipping an arm around Jed’s waist. “But I’m not sorry for the way things are between you and me. I’m not looking forward to leaving you.”

Jed sighed again, but he squeezed Gideon’s hand before pulling away.

Gideon held the silence for a mile or more, chewing over what Jed had said. It wasn’t all wrong, but it wasn’t all right either. “Jed,” he started a ways down the road, “you’re making a mistake there.”

Jed looked around himself. “Where?”

Gideon waved an annoyed hand. It wasn’t like he’d ever been accused of waiting too long to talk. “That story you told me. You think that white folks are like the white God, that there’s only one of ’em and only one way they can be. But that’s like saying all Indians are the same, and I’ve already met enough of ’em, from enough different tribes, to know that ain’t true.”

“You are more the same than you are different.”

“Then how does that explain you and me?” he asked, dogged on that point. “You ain’t seen me disrespect you or your ways, have you?”

Jed frowned at him. “Every day, Gideon,” he said. “You are like a child, you do not even know what you do.”

“Then you’d best teach me fast,” Gideon said heartily, “if we ain’t got much time left together.”

Jed blinked surprise, like he’d never thought of that before, and Gideon smiled, reining Star close enough to Jed’s pony that he could lean over and pat Jed’s thigh. “See? Some of us are plenty teachable and happy to learn new ways.”

“Many of you seem to think so,” Jed said.

Gideon snorted, shaking his head. And Jed called him stubborn.