Outlaw Hearts(55)

“I’ve got to reopen the wound, Randy,” the man told her. “It’s going to hurt worse than anything you’ve ever known, but I’ve got to drain the infection and get something on it to help it heal, or you’re going to lose your foot. I’ll try to find some of your pa’s laudanum to help kill the pain.” He was leaning close now. “I’m sorry, Randy. It’s all I can do. I hate like hell to bring you even more pain.”

She opened her eyes, finally able to focus them a little. Jake? It looked like his face, but it seemed too impossible. He had ridden off over a week before she had even left Kansas City. How could he be here? “Jake?” she whispered. “Is it really you?”

“It’s me. You’re going to be all right, Randy. I won’t leave you for a minute now until I get you to Nevada.”

She stared at him, trying to believe he was real.

“I’d like to find that sonofabitch Preacher Jennings and blow him away for what he did, leaving you alone with those bastards at that trading post!”

Jake! Such language! She almost felt like laughing. Who else would talk like that? And it was his face she saw hovering over her, his dark, handsome, familiar face. Fever and tears mixed with joy overwhelmed her. She said his name over and over, trying to convince herself she was not dreaming. He drew her into his arms and she sat up slightly and wrapped her own around his neck. Somehow he had found her, but how? And why? It didn’t matter for now. It only mattered that he was here. Jake Harkner had found her and he said he’d take her to Nevada.

“Don’t let them touch me again,” she sobbed. “Those men…”

“Hush, Randy. They won’t touch you again. You have my word.”

His cheek was resting against her own, and it was comforting. “It hurts so bad, Jake. I’ve never known…such pain.”

“I know. Once I drain it, it’s going to feel a lot better.”

She wished she could stop crying, but everything seemed to hit her at once, her desperate fear of being left alone with the strange, rude men; the false accusations; the abandonment; her horror of being snakebit and the unbearable pain that followed; the thought that she would surely die alone on the prairie with no one who cared to pray over her grave. Most of all, the thought that she would never see Jake Harkner again. “I love you, Jake,” she sobbed, unable to control her emotions in her weakness. “Don’t let go. Don’t ever let go!”

He held her a moment longer, saying nothing at first. He pulled her arms away then and made her lie back down. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” he told her. “You’re just sick and all mixed up right now, but that’s okay. In a few days you’ll be back to your old self.”

Jake rose, turning away and breathing deeply, removing his hat and running a hand through his hair. “Jesus,” he muttered. Would she misinterpret the reason he had come to find her? All he wanted to do was repay her kindness by helping her get to Nevada. There was nothing more to it than that…or was there?

She couldn’t have meant what she just said. She was just delirious, that’s all. She would probably forget all about it when she was better, probably be horribly embarrassed, if she did remember. Women like Randy didn’t love men like him. It was then he remembered what he had shouted to Jack Nemus. She’s my woman, he had told the man. The words had come out so easily and felt so right.

He shook away the unfamiliar emotions this woman stirred in him. First things first. She could die on him and there would be no more need to think about these feelings. There would only be a strange, unbearable emptiness in his life. He climbed into the wagon and searched through her trunk to find her father’s medical bag. Inside were three small bottles of laudanum. He also found a small surgical knife that he knew would cut better than his own pocketknife.

He closed his eyes, breathing deeply. “God, let me do this right,” he said quietly. “And don’t let her die.” He climbed down, bag in hand, not even thinking about the fact that he had said a prayer for the first time since he was a little boy and used to pray with his mother.





Nine


Jake sat back and watched Miranda sleep, hoping she really was finally experiencing a peaceful sleep and not passed out again. He would not soon forget her screams of agony when he recut her wound and forced out the infection, and he had no idea if he had done any of it right. That had been yesterday afternoon, and she had tossed in fever and delirium since. The laudanum had done little to help deaden her pain, and he figured it was because the wound was just too badly infected. Early this afternoon her fever had finally broken, and she seemed to be resting at last.