"I am Comanche, yes? A , cruel one. This is what you run from? A heathen. A man who will beat you? Or maybe throw you to his friends? That would be good, eh? I could find a man so stupid he would take you!" Releasing her hair to cinch a bruising arm around her waist, Hunter fell silent, nudging his horse forward into a jarring trot. His hand on her hip was heavy, the bite of his fingers uncomfortable but not cruel. Loretta leaned against him and closed her eyes. "Why can't you understand that its over between us--that I can't stay in that village with you?" she said. "Even if you had nothing to do with my parents' deaths, people in your village did! I can't forget that! And I can't forgive it!" "This Comanche cares nothing for the song in your heart," he retorted, his voice still venomous. "You belong to me. Forever, for always! Within you is my seed. A Comanche man does not give up his woman." Those were the last words to pass between them."