by Jodi Thomas
When Rainey ran to the well for water, she saw the horses pull up a few feet from the back door. Teagen and Tobin, covered in a layer of dust, swung down. Tobin grabbed Sage and held her tightly as she cried while Teagen removed the blankets from the body lying on the litter.
Rainey dropped an empty bucket as she recognized the Ranger's black hair.
Travis lay beneath dusty wool, his clothes looking as though they'd been soaked in blood.
She moved a step closer, unable to resist. Travis was so still, she didn't know if he was alive or dead. The smell of sweat and blood blended in the air, thick with death's promise.
Teagen's big hand moved the hair back from his brother's forehead. "We got him here as fast as we could, but I'm afraid a fever's already set in. He's burning up one minute and shaking with chills the next."
Sage shoved tears from her cheek and knelt in the dirt beside her brother. She took his hand in hers. "You're home now, Travis. Everything is going to be all right."
No one looked like they believed her words.
The brothers lifted Travis and carried him into the house.
Rainey followed.
"Put him in the library. I've already spread a blanket on the desk," Martha ordered. "The afternoon light is best there for doing what I have to do. We'll get him patched up and then decide if we take him upstairs, or bring down a bed."
No one argued.
As they moved into the study, Rainey ran to get more water. She could do nothing for Travis, not with everyone around, but that didn't mean she couldn't help. With her hat pulled low, she stayed in the kitchen and kept busy. Each time Martha returned for water, or more bandages, Rainey had them ready. She even made coffee and set out mugs before Martha thought to ask. When Sage appeared with clothes soaked in blood, Rainey silently took them from her and put them in cold water to soak on the porch. The day wore on as dread seeped through the work like a heavy cloud settling to earth.
"How is he?" Rainey whispered to Sage, who stood in the middle of the room staring at her bloody hands.
"He's bad," she finally managed to answer as tears streaked her face. "He's real bad."
Rainey took a clean towel and soaked it in warm water, then wiped the blood off of Sage's hands. "He's alive," she whispered. "That's something."
Sage looked at her as if she didn't understand Rainey's words. "He's a Ranger with a busted leg right at his hip. Even if he lives, Martha says he'll limp. He may never ride. What kind of Ranger can he be?" She looked at Rainey as if daring her to find the lie in her words. "What can he do?" Sage swallowed hard. "He'll wish he was dead when he finds out how bad it is."
Rainey stared at the floor. Part of her wanted to tell the girl that there was more to life than being a Ranger, but she wasn't sure, for Travis, there could be. "I'm sorry," she finally whispered.
Sage patted Rainey's arm as she wiped her eyes. "You're a good boy. Thanks for your help."
Rainey watched as the youngest McMurray straightened. She'd aged in the past few hours. Sage was less a girl and more a woman now. She would do what had to be done.
Long after dark, Rainey sat alone at the opening to the kitchen. Down the hall, she could hear the family talking about how long it had been since Travis moved. Martha turned in, saying she'd take the first shift of watching him in the morning. Teagen and Tobin looked dead on their feet, but still they waited. Sage, after pacing for hours, dozed in a chair by the door to the study.
Rainey knew she should go. The bunkhouse cook would be yelling at her to help before dawn. But she decided to stay. Just a few more minutes. Just until there was some change in the Ranger.
Travis's brothers finally said good night to Sage and climbed the stairs. They'd slept in the saddle for two nights and were ready to find a bed.
"Call us, Sage, if he wakes," they both said several times.
Sage nodded as she stretched and moved to the ladder-back chair in the small library. "I will," she mumbled. "I'll be fine here. You both get some rest."
An hour later Rainey handed Sage a cup of tea. "If you want"-Rainey forced her voice low-"I could sit with him a spell, and you could rest in that chair." She pointed to where Sage had been sleeping earlier. "I'll let you know if he so much as moves a finger."
Sage hesitated, then nodded and stood, too exhausted to argue. "Promise you'll wake me if he seems in pain?"
"Promise," Rainey answered as she took the girl's place beside the makeshift bed they'd made for Travis on the library desk.
Before Rainey finished her own cup of tea, Sage was asleep just beyond the study door. The girl had spent her day crying until all her energy had flowed away. Rainey had held her own tears back. For her the work kept her going and her thoughts away from how near death Travis must be.
Without taking her attention from Travis, Rainey removed her hat and scratched her scalp. She didn't have to worry about falling asleep; she felt like she had fleas dancing in her hair to keep her fully awake. The damp curls tangled around her fingers as she wished for the hundredth time since she'd arrived that there was somewhere on this ranch where she could take a bath in peace. By pretending to be a boy, she couldn't make use of the main house's back porch every morning like the women did, and she wasn't about to join the men in the bunkhouse kitchen on Saturday night.
Rainey swore at herself for thinking about her own little problems while a man lay near death a foot away. Carefully she reached over and brushed his hair from his forehead. His hair was as straight as hers was curly. His forehead warm, too warm. She wet a rag and pressed it against his skin.
Travis McMurray was one good-looking man. Dark tanned skin, high cheekbones, delicious mouth. He looked nothing like the few pale, thin men she'd known who taught at the school or the weathered and tattooed men onboard the ship between New Orleans and Galveston. Travis was handsome, strong… born of the wind and open sky, she thought.
Rainey rolled her eyes. Maybe she should go back to thinking about fleas and bathing. What kind of woman was she to size up a dying man as if he were a hero in one of the novels she loved?
Only months ago she'd been a very proper lady. A teacher at a fine girls' school in Washington, D.C. She'd worn her hair in a tight bun, made sure her English was impeccable, always kept her gloves white. She'd once been afraid of what would happen if she made her father frown.
She smiled, betting he hadn't stopped frowning since he'd yelled for her to come down to work on Monday morning. Knowing him, he had yelled several times before he stormed up the stairs to her room and found her gone.
He'd almost broken her spirit when he decided there was only one thing to do with an old maid daughter who thought she should be paid. Marry her off so she could work the rest of her life for no pay. He was so sure she would follow his order, as she had all her life, that he hadn't even mentioned the match to her before putting the engagement announcement in the paper.
But I surprised him, Rainey thought. I ran from the hell of marrying an older man to the hell of trying to keep from starving in Texas. She looked down at her nails, broken and dirty. "I showed Papa," she mumbled, thinking of how her father had never even noticed how she hated fish-she fought back tears-or how heartbroken she'd been seeing her value in his eyes.
He'd called her plain all her life. Once, she'd heard him tell a neighbor that she would have been the runt of the litter if his wife had seen fit to give him more children. As it was, he was stuck with a mouse. Oh, he'd tried to make her brave. He'd made her live a life to the ticking of a clock. He'd forced her to be alone for hours when he thought her not listening. He'd taken the candle from her room when she'd been three so she'd learn to be brave in the dark. All she'd ever learned was to curl into a ball and wait for dawn.
In the end, after she'd been a good daughter for over twenty years, all he'd seen her as was a liability to be taken care of… a problem to be passed along to someone else. A tear drifted down her cheek, but Rainey refused to wipe it away.
A tanned
hand crossed into her blurred vision and touched the tear. Rainey looked up into brown eyes. Travis!
"You're awake," she whispered. He looked weak and in pain, but very much alive.
"I knew your hair wasn't red," he answered. "It didn't fit, somehow."
Rainey reached for her hat, realizing she'd given herself away to the one person on the ranch who knew her to be a horse borrower. And he was a Ranger! He'd probably have her hanged at sunrise.
His strong fingers closed around her wrist. Even in his weakened condition, they might as well have been shackles. She'd never be able to break the hold.
Slowly, almost gently, he tugged her down beside him. She curled against his side, careful not to touch his bandaged leg. He released one of her wrists and circled his arm around her, pulling her close. She spread her fingers over his bare chest and felt as she had before for his heart. Somehow the feel of it pounding warmed her as if it were the only music her soul longed to hear.
He covered her hand with his own and took a deep breath. "I knew you were near, even before I opened my eyes."
She knew little of this man so close to her now, yet more surprising than the way she felt about him was how he seemed to feel about her.
"Your name's not Molly, is it?" The corner of his mouth twitched in a smile for only a moment.
She thought of lying, but her tired brain couldn't think fast enough. Panic made her jerk slightly. What good would it serve to tell him her name, he'd never see her again.
His hand moved along her side as though calming her fear. "Don't run," he said as he closed his eyes. "I need to talk to you. I need you close."
"But running is what I do best," she answered, trying to figure out how she could get away from him. Touching him might feel wonderful, but she had to be reasonable. She had to protect herself and follow Mrs. Haller's advice to disappear, to change, to stay away from the law. One mistake might mean her father would find her, and if he did she knew he'd make her wish for death if he didn't kill her outright. "I have to run," she whispered to herself more than Travis.
"I'll find you, I swear. If you disappear again, I'll find you," he mumbled as his fingers loosened and he slipped back into a place where the pain wasn't so overwhelming.
Rainey leaned closer, listening to his breathing. She trailed her fingers along his jaw line and touched her lips one last time to his mouth. As she leaned back, she whispered, "I wish I could stay. I have a feeling you'd be a man worth the knowing, Travis McMurray."
He would live, she decided, but he'd never find her. No matter how strong an attraction she felt toward this man, she couldn't stay and help him. She had to save herself. He had his family. He didn't need her. But she had no one and nothing but a will to survive. He might think of holding her now, but when he healed, he'd remember he was a Ranger and then he'd arrest her.
Brushing her fingers over Travis's hand, she almost wished he'd wake and hold her again. But he needed rest. And she needed to run.
Rainey woke Sage as she passed to the kitchen and collected a few supplies. From there she moved like a midnight breeze into the corral. By the time she saw a light come on upstairs, she was riding for the bridge and out of Travis McMurray's life.
As she rode, the tiny bag holding her grandmother's ring thumped against her throat, reminding her of the one thing she must never lose again. Freedom.
CHAPTER 8
As the days passed, Travis lost tram of time. He drifted with the fever, eating and sleeping in no order. His family talked around him, and about him, as if he were a piece of furniture and couldn't understand. They took care of all his needs even before he thought to ask and whispered encouragement in short prayers near his ear.
From his bed in the study he paid little notice as summer dried the earth with endless days without rain. During the brief spells he thought of something besides the pain, he searched for her, the woman who'd told him that what she did best was run. Her lips had been cool when they'd touched his, but he'd felt her kiss through the pain that first night in the study.
He was a man who never let anyone close, and she'd managed to kiss him twice without ever giving him a chance to kiss her back.
Sometimes he lay with his eyes closed, listening to the conversations around him, listening for her voice… a voice he'd recognize whether it was flavored with an accent or not. But it never came. Once, in the middle of the night, he thought he felt her touch him, but when he'd opened his eyes, no one was there.
He tried to put a name with her face, but none fit. He never wanted to forget how her lips had felt on his, but with each day the memory faded. Only at night, when he drifted in and out of sleep, did he remember exactly how she felt against him. In the silence of midnight, when the entire house was still, he almost believed they were dancing again. Her hand in his. Her body brushing against him. Her foot beneath his boot. Her laughter close to his ear.
There was a kind of magic in her laughter, almost as if they shared a secret. Travis had a feeling she'd laughed very little in her life… but she'd laughed at his dancing.
He smiled, remembering, he almost whispered that he was sorry for trampling on her toes before realizing he only danced with a dream.
"I'll find you," he'd mumbled, loving the challenge. "I swear, be you fairy or real, I'll find you again."
It took almost two weeks before he felt his mind fully return, another week before he was able to sit up. The bullet had struck at the point between his hip and leg making almost any position uncomfortable. Sage treated him like a child, praising his slight progress from day to day. Teagen and Tobin were back at work, but usually one stopped by at noon for a meal with him. They must have known that between Martha's bullying and Sage's smothering he would have gone mad without them.
Teagen, as always, talked of the ranch, filling Travis in on details that he really didn't care to know. Tobin talked of horses, when he talked. At night they'd all eat in the study around Travis as if all the McMurrays had to be together to overcome his injury.
Travis asked only once about how the bay had gotten back to the ranch. When he realized everyone thought the fairy/woman was a boy, he saw no need for other questions.
It didn't surprise him one afternoon when Tobin mentioned that one of the corral horses used by the cowhands was missing. Travis guessed who rode the animal over the bridge.
He slept the days away and spent hours plotting what he'd say to the girl when he found her. Maybe he'd just walk up like they were old friends and question her as if they'd only been apart for a few days. Or maybe he'd demand to know why she'd walked out on him… not once, but twice.
He even played with the idea of returning her kiss without saying a word to her. When his mind drifted in that direction, he reminded himself that he was still a Ranger and by right should arrest the woman for a horse thief.
In a strange way the little thief gave him a reason to push himself each day. She'd gotten to him as no other woman ever had.
Three weeks after the shooting, Travis tried to stand. His right leg was weak from lack of exercise, but the left wouldn't hold any weight. Martha tried to tell him the bone might still heal, but he saw the doubt in her old gray eyes. Without asking Travis, she told one of the men to make him a crutch.
Travis hated even looking at the thing, but finally used it simply because he hated not being mobile more than he despised the crutch.
Once he could move about, he managed to make it to the kitchen for meals and to the porch to watch the weather. But no farther. He'd not step foot away from the house as a cripple. When he left home, it would be as a full man, or not at all.
When he advanced to a cane, he saw it as little progress even though the rest of his family celebrated. With each step he had to pause and regain his balance. Travis was a man who'd never known fear, but now, suddenly, he was afraid of falling. Or worse, not being able to get up once he fell. The few times he had tumbled, the pain had almost knocked him out.
Days shortened
and fall settled in with cloudy mornings and evening breezes. The house grew more confining. On cool days Travis paced the porch without a coat, welcoming the discomfort like an old friend. His mood grew darker than any storm that might cross their land and the family left him to his brooding.
One question kept shifting through his mind, polluting any other thought or plan he might have. How does a Ranger do what has to be done if he can't ride? How can he stand and aim a rifle when he has to use one hand to hold a cane?
Finally, when Travis had yelled at everyone in the house, his siblings ganged up on him. When he refused to join them for Sunday lunch, they filled their plates and moved to the study.
Travis frowned as they filed in. He wasn't in the mood for company, and from their expressions his family looked more like a war party than dinner guests. He'd never been a man to drink, but if he could have, he would be passed out on the floor. It might not make anything better to drown his troubles, but at least he could forget them for a few hours.
Martha set a plate in front of him, but Travis wasn't hungry. He didn't want to eat, or read, or talk, or even look out the window. It had taken him some time, but he'd finally reached the bottom of the well. He felt he could sink no lower and still be breathing. All he'd ever loved to do in this life had been taken away from him. Since he'd been eighteen his career had defined him. He'd not only lost being a Ranger, he'd lost himself.
"Something wrong with the pot roast?" Martha asked with a poke to his shoulder.
Travis looked up from his plate. "It's fine," he growled. If she had her way, he'd not only be crippled, but fat. "I thought I'd wait for the jury's verdict before I eat." His brothers and Sage did look like they were about to pronounce sentence on him.
Martha huffed and left the room. She never wanted any part of what she called their "family business."
Travis waited for the door to close. He knew the others had been talking about him behind his back. Hell, he'd been so short-tempered, he wouldn't be surprised if they'd voted to send him to the bunkhouse. Leaning back in the chair, he crossed his arms and waited to hear what they had to say.
