Chapter 2
Two
Mission of mercy. Mr. Bertrand’s choice of words served as a reminder of her duties. An injured man needed help. She would go. It was as simple as that. Let Nash Burns look as surprised as he chose. Let him protest all he wanted. This task called her to action.
“Be careful.” Mother patted Addie’s arm.
“Of course.” She slung her wet coat tighter around her.
She was wet clear through, as were all of them.
The heat from the stove had just begun to make its way to her skin.
As soon as she got back, she meant to get warm and dry, though it might take the rest of the day and all night to accomplish it.
Squaring her shoulders, she dismissed her discomfort. She’d dealt with worse in the past and survived.
“You’ll do.” Hawk’s words might have been resigned.
She followed him out the door, Nash at her heels.
In the pounding rain, her determination faltered.
A purely miserable day loomed. Water sloshed at her feet.
Wind erased every memory of heat. Visibility shrank to a few feet, urging her to hurry after Hawk lest she lose sight of him.
Behind her, the slosh of Nash’s steps provided more impetus to stick close to Hawk.
They navigated through trees that dripped miserably.
Hawk stopped. She and Nash drew to his side. He pointed at a fallen tree, its shattered branches strewn at their feet, the trunk wheezing on the ground. She squinted and gasped.
“Is that Shorty?” A face almost hidden by a branch peeked out. Nothing more of him showed.
“It’s him.”
Nash swept aside a leafy branch. “Shorty?”
No response.
“He’s still alive,” Hawk said. “Barely. No tellin’ how long the man’s been here.”
Ignoring Nash’s presence, Addie edged in closer to Shorty, leaned over, gripping a branch to steady herself, and touched Shorty’s face. “He’s cold as ice.”
“Guessing we all are,” Hawk said.
She pressed her fingers to Shorty’s neck, seeking a pulse. Air rushed across her teeth when she detected one.
The tree shifted, putting her off-balance. She would have fallen except Nash caught her arm and pulled her back. “Whoa. We don’t need a second person to carry out.”
An alarming jolt of warmth rushed up her arm.
She hadn’t come here to think of Nash as a man.
He remained just a person. As she shrugged to escape his hold, she still teetered off-balance.
Only his grip on her arm kept her upright.
He eased her back until she steadied. He still didn’t release her arm, forcing her to shrug him off.
But twisted branches had tangled around her feet, and she grabbed his arm to keep from falling.
He chuckled, and she bristled. How dare he mock her efforts to avoid him?
She might have voiced her protests, but Hawk spoke.
“Nash and me will lift the main trunk. Miss, you make sure nothin’ falls on Shorty.”
Nash and Hawk picked their way to the thick trunk and leaned into the task.
Branches creaked and snapped. One released and sprang toward Addie, sharp twigs gouging her cheek.
She staggered back and fell on leafy debris.
Hoping no one—namely Nash—noticed, she righted herself and knelt beside Shorty, pushing aside branches snapping toward him.
Her acute awareness of Nash made her grit her teeth.
No room in her life existed for such feelings.
Besides, what did she know about him apart from the fact that he owned beautiful eyes and he’d been kind to Mother?
The tree lifted. The men heaved it farther away. Shorty lay exposed. A dark area on the leg of his trousers suggested blood.
Nash hunkered beside her. He ran his hands along the man’s limbs. “Hard to say how injured he is.”
“He certainly isn’t going to improve out here in the cold.” She hadn’t meant to sound so sharp. But he seemed not to notice.
Hawk spoke from beside her. “Nash, help me get ’im on this stretcher.”
Stretcher? Where had that come from? Hawk must have brought it out before he came asking for help.
“Miss Addie, steady his legs. ’Pears one is injured.”
Nash and Hawk rolled the man to the canvas stretched between two long poles while Addie held Shorty’s legs together.
The man groaned but didn’t wake.
The men picked their way past the debris left by the fallen tree, through the woods, and across the muddy clearing. Addie hurried ahead to open the door and stepped to one side as they carried the man indoors and deposited him on the bed.
Together, they rolled Shorty, with Addie holding his legs steady, and eased the stretcher from under him.
The stain on the leg of his trousers widened.
“His wet clothes need to come off.” Nash’s silvery eyes impaled Addie, making it impossible to think. “Maybe you’d like to wait by your mother.”
His words jarred her into action. With burning cheeks, she hurried to Mother’s side, where she kept her back turned as Hawk and Nash undressed the man.
Mother’s color had not improved. If anything, a faint greenish hue had appeared around her mouth.
“Are you feeling poorly?”
“I’m tired.”
At the weary words, Addie studied the woman more closely. They’d been traveling for days, enough to suck the energy from even a younger woman. And they’d been almost drowned in the downpour. Of course, her skin felt cold. Did that explain the way she looked and sounded?
Cries and protests from the cot proved Shorty’s pain increased at the movement.
“He’s decent,” Nash called.
Addie hung her wet coat on the back of the chair, turned it toward the stove to hurry it in drying, and then returned to the narrow cot. A gray woolen blanket covered Shorty.
Nash peeled it back to expose Shorty’s leg. “It’s gouged pretty deep.”
An unnecessary observation. Addie could see it for herself.
Mr. Zacharius had fallen asleep with his head resting against his arms on the tabletop. His breathing sounded like he needed new bellows.
Mr. Bertrand shifted his back to the injured man. “I will certainly be letting the owners of this stage line know their service is not up to standards.”
No one paid him any mind. Did he think Shorty had injured himself just to inconvenience Mr. Bertrand? Or that God had ordered it to rain on the day the man would be traveling? Mr. Bertrand surely had to be aware of the dangers he’d encounter traveling across the mountains.
She found the washbasin hanging behind the stove and filled it with the warm water left in the kettle. “Do you suppose he has any clean rags?”
Nash opened cupboard doors and drawers. “This do?”
The gray rag he held up seemed clean. She took it and began washing out the wound.
“Perhaps it’s a good thing he’s passed out.”
She nodded at Nash’s words.
Hawk looked through the contents of an upper cupboard. “I recall he had whiskey here. For medicinal purposes, mind.” Bottles rattled. “Yup.” He held up a dark bottle and carried it back to the cot.
Satisfied she had the wound as clean as she could get it, Addie stepped back.
Shorty mumbled something.
“I hope he isn’t coming around. At least not now.” Hawk spared the man a glance before he poured whiskey into the wound.
Shorty roared and reared upward.
Nash caught his shoulders and pressed him back to the bed.
The man kicked and shot out his fists. Hawk held his legs, and Addie reached under Nash’s chest to pin the man’s arms down.
Nash had removed his wet coat, and welcome body warmth wafted from him.
When Shorty calmed and Nash stood back, coldness crept over Addie.
She had good reason for being cold. Her clothes were damp, and slashing rain had washed every exposed inch of skin.
Her skirts dripped, and her shoes were soaked.
But the chill didn’t come from wet clothes or water from the sky.
It originated from a place deep inside, a place permanently cold since she turned eleven years old, and her life had been shattered.
She clenched her teeth and forced a deep breath into her lungs.
She’d improved at erasing the horrible pictures from her mind, but they occasionally flared like an out-of-control fire as they did now.
One way to end those memories involved turning her mind to other things.
“Does he have any other injuries?”
“’Spect his ribs are sore.” Hawk studied the man who had passed out again. “No tellin’ if he’s hurt inside.”
The three of them watched Shorty’s chest rise and fall.
“I need ta tend the stock.” Hawk shrugged into his slicker and strode from the room. The thud of the door closing accompanied the snap of wood burning.
“I’ll put a dressing on his leg.” Addie chose the cleanest rags from the drawer and applied them to the wound, which still oozed. Finished, she stood back at Nash’s side. “About all we can do is watch and wait.”
“And pray.”
“Yes, of course.” Why had he been the one to remind her? She should have done so. Father would be disappointed in her. Not that she hadn’t prayed since they stepped out into the rain. For her, praying formed a constant murmur in the back of her head. Please, God, be with us all and keep us safe.
“Addie.” Her name carried on a faint whisper. Its urgency jerked Addie’s attention to her mother as her head dipped forward and her body angled toward the floor.
At Miss Stone’s sharp intake of breath, Nash turned to see what alarmed her.
Mrs. Stone tipped forward, about to fall face-first to the floor.
He jumped forward and caught her before flesh met wood.
He shifted her into his arms. He felt her thinness through her damp clothes.
This woman needed rest and food. A warm cot would do her a world of good.
But Shorty lay injured and semiconscious on the only bed available.