The Bounty Hunter's Heart

by Jillian Hart

  "He has to, or if I hear about it, he will be in trouble with me." She heard the warm twist of her voice and winced, her tender heart too easily revealed. She turned her attention to sort through the drawer in search of measuring spoons. "The storm sounds like it's getting its second wind, so no chance of fetching the doctor. Neither of us could reach town before we froze."

  "That has occurred to me." His step padded on the floor, this time as silent and stealthy as a hungry wolf. "I'm hoping that you can live up to your word, that you are good at home remedies. I'm afraid they might not be strong enough to help my boy. What do you think?"

  Saydee felt aware of his presence along every single inch of her. Tiny flares of attraction kicked to life along every nerve ending, and her captivated brain was overwhelmed, unable to think about anything but him. She set down the pestle and brushed the crushed leaves from the clean counter and into the sink. "Yarrow, along with birch bark is enough to make your son better."

  "You have birch bark on hand? That's important to know. That can make a real difference."

  "I know, it's why I've been busy." She brushed the bits of remaining leaves off her fingers and lowered the tea basket into the pot. "I can see you're worried and so am I. This fever can get out of control fast. But don't worry, we won't need the doctor."

  "I believe you, Saydee." He paced to a stop in front of her. Lamplight danced across his face, across the furrow of emotion marring his high, intelligent forehead, and revealed the unmistakable gleam of real heart and integrity in his eyes. "Maybe there's more to you than meets the eye. I had high expectations when I first saw you again, but now they are greater."

  "Greater? As in great expectations? That's a book by Charles Dickens, and I've read it."

  "So have I, and I have loved the tale of Pip's adventures but mostly, I'm inept and awkward when it comes to praising a pretty lady. I use to be a man of few words before I married Jack's mother." His face pinched briefly with an old sorrow long buried but never released. "Yes, I'm a widower. But that also means I'm trained up in the kitchen as a good back-up worker. What help do you need making up medicine for my boy?"

  "It will be easy, don't you worry, and I can handle it. Just a few simple poultices, a different tea and a steam vapor mixture that has worked very good at breaking up congestion. When I taught public school, oh, the home remedies I heard of from my students' mothers. And the wonders they worked, and the illness they defeated!"

  His face softened with laughter, and he shook his head, making the muscled cords rope up in his neck. He looked like a man of strength in his physical prime and it surprised her that she could see his warm soft heart in his eyes, when they could also be hard and glittering; that she could see tender loving goodness in a man as hard as an icy, unrelenting winter.

  Desire of her long lonely stretch as a widow flashed like moonlight on snow, silvered and darkly glittering. She lifted the tea kettle off the trivet, working away with her back to him so it was easier to keep her heart hidden and her feelings locked away. She poured the steaming water with care and kept her voice steady. "I also lived in an orphanage for a while, and as an older child, I got to help take care of the younger ones, including when they were sick. I learned a lot about taking care of others, including when they had the croup."

  "I know about the orphanage." His baritone rang quietly, a steady and understanding tone. "Your brother, Edwin, told me all about that hardship that happened to your family that led you two there."

  "Tough times happen to families now and then, and Ma was unable to take care of her children." Her voice cracked as distant memories tugged at the scarred-over edges of her soul. She set the kettle on its trivet with a thunk, her hand trembling. "It's a hard time that changed my family forever. It's painful to remember it. I like to forget about it completely, if I can."

  "Of course you do." His voice rolled downward a few notes, fluid like molten steel and mixed with warm sympathy that made her chest ache.

  This was a man who was just passing through, a traveler stopped for a rest, that was all. She should not involve her heart. But the tone in his voice was caring and told her that he was much more than a stranger. When she lifted her gaze to study him, she saw real sincerity in a man who had been through too much.

  Look at the pain lining his granite features and the exhaustion pale on his hard-edged face. Desire thudded in her veins, pushing the painful memories right out of her mind, while thoughts of him rushed right in. As if he knew his power over her, he reached out and caught her hand with his. His gentle touch was callused and warm, almost hot. He wasn't getting sick too, was he?

  "It's hard for me to admit, but it isn't easy trusting you with my son's care. I'm putting my faith in you and it's been a long time since I've been able to trust like that." His throat worked. "But I'm trusting you."

  He was vulnerable and genuine, and she could feel the heart in his words, this man of might and steel, and his fear. He was afraid of trusting her. His fingers gripped hers more tightly, and his hand felt so large engulfing hers and in that touch she felt his need to be able to trust her. Well, until the storm stopped, she would have to trust him, too. Her heart tugged, feeling deeply of that knowledge.

  Reluctantly, Saydee withdrew her hand and stepped away, but the feel and impact of his touch remained.

  * * *

  "I don't want to drink any more." Jack shook his head, turning away from the cup. "My throat hurts real bad, Pa. A whole lot worse."

  "You need to swallow this down anyway, and I'm sorry about that." His baritone dipped tenderly, chasing every shadow from the room and driving the chill from the storm away. The bounty hunter set down the cup on the coffee table. "You can't get well if you don't drink this. Saydee went to some trouble to brew this up, and I promise you that it'll help you feel better."

  "I don't want to feel better, Pa." Tears brimmed his eyes. His voice went up higher, two full notes. "Please, Pa, don't leave me. If I get well, you're gonna have to."

  "I wish I can change that, son, but I can't. Not right now." His jaw tensed, determined to stay strong, but he couldn't as he gathered the boy into his big arms. "Do your best. Drink it up."

  A cough racked Jack's little body, mixing with a sob that left a single held-back tear rolling down his face. His dark eyes pinched in pain and heartbreak.

  "I have more honey if that will help." Saydee padded in from her work in the kitchen with a jar of honey and a spoon resting in it clutched in one slender hand. "Honey is good for what ails you."

  "He's fond of honey, so that will help." Winn spoke up, his smile relaxed and grateful. "He has quite a sweet tooth."

  9

  "The best kids always do." She set the jar next to the steaming mug, holding back her vulnerable and too-easily-involved heart.

  The poor boy, sick and hurting. He sure loved his pa. Jack clung to his father with both hands fisted in his shirt, as if he were afraid of letting go. What hardships had the two of them been through running from those bad men?

  Fear kicked through her, icy and shivery, but it could not begin to dim the sympathy and caring she felt for the boy. Jack had been forced to leave everything that he'd known, and now he had no home or no bed to call his own, and not a drop of comfort.

  Did they have family somewhere who could help? Or did Jack and his father have no one else to turn to? She didn't know how to ask, but the child's face was dear, reminiscent in some way. The boy snuggled more deeply against his father's chest, where he was lovingly held. The big, grim-faced man leaned forward, reaching to snare the cup by the handle.

  "Drink up, kid." His voice could have been an archangel's, full of gentleness and strength and whiskey-rough. He lifted the steaming cup for the boy.

  Another reluctant tear trailed down Jack's cheek and he sniffled, trying not to cry. He muttered something too quiet for Saydee to hear. The bounty hunter dipped his head closer, his dark locks cascading down over his forehead to hide his eyes, and the warmth of his voice
rumbled with tenderness so quietly that the rise and fall of the notes of his baritone rang as rich as a Brahms lullaby. She'd never seen a man so tender with a child.

  "That's my good boy." The grave lines etched into his face began to fade away and for a moment there appeared to be no more worry or hardship there, just the at ease face of a man holding his look-alike son with love, a sight rare and illuminating.

  Her throat ached, unable to look away, but it hurt to feel so much. She blinked and forced her gaze away, hovering at the reaches of the lamplight's glow, and just as surely outside of the tender intimacy between father and son. The lamp's flame danced on its wick as she hesitated, unwilling to force her feet to move away from him, preferring to turn toward the night table, sending the golden light dancing across father and child.

  "That was a pretty big sip, good job. That's a good start."

  "It tastes as bad as the doctor's back home almost." Jack's mouth puckered and he gave a mighty shiver, unable to hold back a natural revulsion to the bitter tea. "That must mean it's real good medicine, Pa."

  "That's always the way it goes, isn't it?" He was both warm humored and kind, and the little boy nodded.

  "Yep." He scrunched up his mouth, firmed his chin and squared his shoulders. Then he wrapped both small hands around the mug and took another long sip. He screwed up his face, fighting to keep the tea in and swallowed with great effort. When he was finished, he slumped back against his father's hard, comforting chest and rested, his breath rasping, his face flushed. The handsome man set aside the empty mug and wrapped both arms around his beautiful son.

  Saydee couldn't move. She didn't dare make a movement and risk interrupting the precious moment between a father and his boy. The kettle gave a rasp of a whistle, breaking the stillness anyway, and she launched through the room and into the kitchen, feeling her heart cinch up ever harder. She was glad the boy had a loving father, but her eyes stung. She ignored the pull of pain in her empty heart, padded through her empty-feeling kitchen and where a child should have been, there was only stillness. Emptiness. Shadow.

  Attempting to dodge the sorrow, she snatched the tea kettle off the stove. Emotion hurt like a wound in the depth of her heart. She tried to still it and make the pain ease as the fire crackled in the stove's belly and the lamp's flame flickered in the lonely feeling room as she kept walking. The house felt even lonelier with them here, lonelier than before. This house full of her loved and lovely things was not a home, regardless of how she tried to make it so. It echoed with what-might-have-been and with what-could-be but wasn't.

  And maybe never would. Sorrow from that emptiness wrapped around her like a shadow and felt as insurmountable as the snowstorm outside. The memory of how big and dangerous the bounty hunter had looked holding his sweet little boy safe in his iron-strong arms stuck with her and would not let go of her. A smile touched her lips. She wouldn't have expected that brand of tenderness in a man so steely and rugged, a man with a bounty hunter's heart.

  Well, she may have uncovered a hidden clue to the truth of tenderness inside the man who remained a stranger to her, but she didn't have time to solve the mystery of him now. She reached for the tea kettle sitting on its trivet. She had medicinal compresses to make, not to mention more herbs to crush and mix to soothe and cure Jack's sore throat.

  This feels good, to make a difference for a child again. It had been a long while since she'd had the chance. Determined to get the boy feeling better, she tugged open the pantry door, unable to stop the rush of emotion that rolled over her. She blinked the tears away threatening to blur her vision and focused on the labels on the bottles on the shelf in front of her.

  The last thing she expected to remember was that rough year and a half in the orphanage, and the rows of beds in the girl's dormitory. Always too hungry, too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter and overworked the year round, and the sorrow within her deepened. It was best not to remember. This, remembering, is because of Mother's letter and not little Jack, she thought.

  Her mother's scolding letter brought up more pain than fury and settled hard like a fist over her heart. She set the little bottle onto the counter and tried to breathe out the pain in one long full whoosh. She wished this was an issue she could resolve, but it wasn't up to her. She'd done all she could for her mother and stepfather, and she was now the sole commander of her own life, no longer subject to their control and criticism.

  Of course, she'd made the mistake of marrying the wrong man, who was not their choice or preference, and her stepfather had cut her out of her paternal grandfather's will then. After her husband's death and her sorrowful miscarriage right before that, her stepfather had insisted she move home and take over control of her finances and more.

  She'd been too overwhelmed by grief at the time, and had wished she'd severed all ties with her parents when she'd first gotten married. It was her grief that they never understood or had sympathy for others or her. They saw it as her fault that she had no husband or children to fill the emptiness of her life. If only she'd followed their advice instead of marrying for love.

  She uncapped the little bottle, and the aroma of mint wafted into the warm air. She tapped out several drops of the sweet-smelling oil into the small basin and measured the menthol. She blinked, fluttering her eyelids until her vision cleared, wishing the image of the bounty hunter and his child would not stay lodged in her heart.

  When she carried the basin into the lamplit parlor, she noticed that the boy had climbed off his father's lap and retreated onto his sheets, blankets and pillow. The child was silent, head drooped in his misery, and swallowed once with visible pain and difficulty, the poor boy. He gave a small, harsh, croup-laden cough, and as soon as the child spied her, he reached out with one small hand and wrapped his fingers around his pa's with white-knuckled need.

  Well she could remember the feeling of being a child, ill, in need and afraid. The lamplight tossed golden luminance across Jack's angel face. The little one was losing his battle against the illness. His forehead and cheeks were darkly flushed, his face damp with faint beads of sweat and his long eyelashes, dark like his father's, were spiky with tears. Every rasp of a breath seemed to grate the inside of his throat.

  "Is that gonna taste awful too?" Jack's button face twisted to look up her, pinched with real worry. "I don't want any more bad-tasting medicine, please? I can't take anymore. It's so awful, oh, please."

  The child's words wrung out her heart, and Saydee knew exactly how that felt. Again, memories from her time spent at the orphanage flashed back, and she remembered how it felt to be that ill with children crying out for the mother who'd simply abandoned them or died. Her hand trembled as she set the little basin on the coffee table, her eyes stinging both from the boy's suffering and from her own, not to mention the stinging steam from the hot water.

  "You are a gem, Saydee." The bounty hunter rubbed his hand over his son's brow. "This is just what Jack needs."

  "I know what I'm doing." Her smile came sweet and sad, dear and full of yearning.

  He had wishes too, Winn acknowledged, wishing, just wishing. And one of those wishes was that he could change the fact that he was too old to believe in wishes being granted or coming true. Or maybe he was just too world-weary.

  "Papa, I can't breathe much!" He wheezed in air and coughed, sputtering.

  Winn whipped his attention back to his son, adrenaline jolting through him, and he gathered the suffering boy into his arms. Jack's illness was progressing fast, and he couldn't halt the fear taking root as Jack, just a little guy, spindly and vulnerable, coughed, unable to draw in air.

  "Good thing I expected this, don't you worry, Jack." Calm as a summer's dawn, Saydee swished up alongside him with a rustle of her skirts and gave the small basin a shove. "This is easy, little boy. Just slide down onto the floor and sit there and breathe in the steam. You will feel better in no time."

  "Thank you, Miss Saydee." Jack eyed the dishtowel she shook out with a grate
ful sigh. Tears welled in his eyes, and he climbed down onto the carpet, coughing painfully. Winn's chest felt ready to break open, he hurt so hard for his son.

  He took the towel from Saydee's soft, feminine hands with a silent nod of thanks. How did he voice his fears in front of his son? Or put the depth of his gratitude into words? All he could do was to press a kiss to the boy's head and hold back his sweetness.

  "Jack." He kept his voice gentle, trying to lull away his panic and his fears. He knew exactly what he was trying to do. He pressed a kiss to his head, tamping down that swell of fatherly adoration. He really loved his son. "That's right, breathe in the steam. That will do it, just fine."

  He watched his boy lean toward the basin, a single tear on his cheek, and draw in the fragrant mint and eye-stinging menthol. That rasping wheeze troubled him, but he dropped the towel over Jack's head to trap in the steam. "You keep on going. That will clear your chest up in no time. That's my good boy."

  It was a relief that they had Saydee. Her home remedies were a boon and exactly what Jack needed. What he didn't like was the way his son's fever had worsened so rapidly. The increased heat radiated off Jack, leaving him sweating. "I'm grateful to you, Saydee."

  "We'll see, hopefully the vapor will work." Saydee's hand reached out with gentle intent but then paused, hesitating. Perhaps she'd realized the boy was not hers to touch. Not that they didn't appreciate her. She gave a little shrug. "I'll go see if the plaster has cooled enough for his chest."

  "You would make a good ma."

  "That is something I might never know for sure." Golden curls tumbled across her forehead, hiding her big blue eyes but not the concern she had for him shining there. A drop of grief shadowed the blue, and her brightness dimmed just enough to let him know the sadness she carried was real. She surprised him by taking a step back when she should have stepped closer and turned around to leave the room.