Apache-Colton Series

by Janis Reams Hudson

  He was a warrior. He fought every day of his life against the greatest enemy of all—death. And last night, he had come to her triumphant from battle, stained with the blood of victory.

  And she hadn’t recognized him. Hadn’t known, even then, that he was the warrior of her dreams. He was her destiny. And she loved him. God above, she had fought her own feelings so hard, she hadn’t even acknowledged to herself what they were. She was in love with Spencer Colton. All her talk of being free, of wanting to make her own choices—that was her fear speaking. If she were given all the choices in the world right then, she would have chosen a life at Spence’s side.

  Spence. “Spence.” She dropped her head back against the embankment and imagined she heard his voice calling her over the roar of the water. The rain had let up a small degree. She opened her eyes and imagined she saw her golden warrior above her.

  “LaRisa!”

  She blinked and smiled. It was him. He had come for her. Too late. He couldn’t save her. No one could. But he had come. Tears filled her eyes. “Spence,” she whispered.

  One look at LaRisa sent panic slicing though Spence’s nerves. He had to get her out of there before the water rose any more.

  Beside him, Harriett cried in ragged sobs. “She says her foot’s caught. She saved Janey’s life, and now her foot’s caught and she’s trapped. You’ve got to do something!”

  He intended to. “Hang on, honey! I’m coming!”

  “No!” LaRisa cried. “Don’t come down here, it’s too dangerous!”

  Spence slid feet-first down the muddy wall of the ravine. The icy force of the water shocked him. Good God, it was a wonder she hadn’t been swept all the way to the river. He worked his way carefully to her side.

  “Spence, no, get out of here! There’s nothing you can do!”

  He read it in her eyes then, her acceptance of what was happening. She had given up. She was standing there in the water, waiting for it to finally pull her under for the last time. Terror shook him. Rage, white-hot and consuming, filled him. “No, goddammit! I’m not leaving without you!”

  He gripped her by the shoulders.

  She cried out in pain.

  “What is it?”

  “Nothing.” She swallowed. “Spence, go.” The water was up to her armpits and still rising, swirling, rushing. Threatening.

  “Your foot’s caught?”

  “Yes.”

  Spence took a deep breath and held on to her as he dropped beneath the roiling surface of what had become a rampaging river. He worked his hands down her right leg until he hit rock. Solid rock. A huge rounded boulder on one side that appeared to be embedded in the ravine wall, and another rock, jagged, that must have shifted at just the right moment to catch her foot. He pulled gently on her foot, but it didn’t move. Damn, he wished he could see, but the water was thick with sand and mud.

  His burning lungs forced him to the surface. Gasping for breath, he had to brace himself against the boulder to keep from tumbling downstream. “I’m going to try to dig under your foot. Maybe I can make enough room for you to pull free.”

  He saw the hope flash in her eyes, and knew he would sell his soul to get her out of there.

  Another deep breath, and he went down again, following her leg with his hands to keep from getting disoriented.

  He couldn’t squeeze his hand beneath her foot, so he got as close as he could and dug his fingers in—and hit rock. Goddammit! Frantic, he tried again on the other side of her foot, but it was the same. He pushed to the surface again and filled his lungs with precious air.

  She must have read the truth in his eyes, for the hope in hers died.

  From behind her came a loud, thunderous roar. Spence knew what it was without looking. He’d seen flash floods before. But he looked anyway, and so did LaRisa. A wave of brown water, its crest rising above the banks, roared toward them at a terrifying speed.

  “Go!” LaRisa screamed. “Get out now!”

  “I won’t leave you, goddammit!”

  “There’s nothing you can do,” she cried.

  Spence held her gaze firmly and felt his insides turn to ice. “I will not let you drown, not if I have to cut off your foot to save you. Do you hear me? I will not let you die!”

  But they both knew he was lying. Even if he could bring himself to amputate her foot in the desperate hope of saving her from drowning, there wasn’t time. Nor did he have a blade with which to cut.

  “Spence,” she cried. “I lo—”

  The wall of water slammed into them. The force of it tossed LaRisa against the boulder that was partly responsible for her entrapment. Her forehead connected with the rock with a sickening whack.

  Spence was pushed under, then tossed up, as though he were no more substantial than an old shoe. Coughing and choking, he frantically wiped water from his eyes. He’d been thrown downstream, and was still headed that way. Madly, he scrambled for the side of the ravine. He had to get back to LaRisa!

  Something rammed into him and cost him his precarious footing. He came up sputtering and cursing to find LaRisa in his arms. The force of the water had shifted one of the rocks enough to free her!

  Clutching her to his chest fiercely with one arm, he used his other to battle his way toward the high bank. God would have to literally rip off both his arms before Spence would let go of her.

  This section of the bank was embedded with numerous rocks. Spence used them as steps to climb out, slipping twice on their muddy, slimy surfaces before he made it to the top.

  Icy wind rattled through him, but he was too terrified by the lifeless way LaRisa hung against him to pay much attention. Was she breathing? There was a gash at her temple, and a raw scrape on one cheek and jaw. He was afraid to carry her back to the office without checking for further injuries. Jostling her the half-mile home could aggravate her condition.

  He laid her gently on the ground and ran frantic hands over her. He searched for a pulse and didn’t find one. Wondering how much water she’d ingested, he realized her injuries would have to wait. He rolled her onto her stomach and turned her head to one side, then started pumping her lungs. Beneath his hands he felt at least three cracked ribs on one side. To keep from causing further damage, he had to move his hand to a less effective position.

  “Come on, Risa, come on,” he whispered fervently. “Breathe for me, honey. You can do it.”

  The rain had stopped sometime while he’d been in the ravine. Harriett and her mother and daughter rushed to his side.

  “Is she…”

  He didn’t bother answering the unfinished question. He pumped. “Breathe, dammit! Don’t you dare quit on me now!” Desperate, he pumped harder.

  Finally, water trickled from LaRisa’s mouth. Then a low groan. He pumped again, and she coughed and choked and cleared her lungs. Her pulse was too weak and too damn fast for his liking, but it was there. Thank God it was there.

  As gently as he could, he turned her back over and checked for further injuries, not wanting to cause more damage or pain than he had to. The shoulder he’d carelessly grabbed was dislocated. Her arms and legs seemed fine, except for scrapes and small cuts. Her right foot was already swollen and possibly broken. He found nothing life-threatening, but she was still unconscious from the blow to her head, where a knot had risen.

  “Risa? Come on, honey, wake up.”

  She didn’t answer, didn’t open her eyes. Her head lolled to one side. Her face was ashen, nearly gray. Her lips held a blue tinge. He scooped her up in his trembling arms and raced for home.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Spence was nearly at the end of his endurance, and his hope. For four days he hadn’t left LaRisa’s side. He had taken care of her shoulder, and had her arm strapped to her side to keep the shoulder immobile so the ligaments could heal. He had wrapped her cracked ribs tightly. Her foot, miraculously enough, was not broken, but was badly bruised and sprained. It, too, was wrapped.

  He’d cleaned and medicated every c
ut, scrape, and scratch on her body, no matter how small, including the gash on her temple that turned out not to need stitches.

  He’d bathed her and dried her and dressed her in a warm gown. He’d tucked her into bed and elevated her swollen foot on a small pillow from the sofa.

  And he’d waited. He’d done everything he could, but still she remained unconscious. With each passing day, his nerves stretched more taut. The coma had lasted four days now. All his training and talent couldn’t do a damn thing to help her. He held her limp hand in his and prayed like he’d never prayed in his life.

  “Spence?”

  Serena’s voice from the bedroom door barely fazed him. He’d sent word to the ranch that first day, and she had come. Joanna had come the day after, but had gone back home to care for Will and Russ.

  Harriett and Janey had been here every day. Even Mrs. Masters had come by. It seemed he was never alone.

  “I made some stew. Come to the table and eat.”

  “I’m not hungry,” he answered absently without taking his eyes off LaRisa’s motionless form.

  God, she was so still. The only movement was the rise and fall of her chest. He was afraid if he looked away, it would stop. She had not made one voluntary move since he’d pulled her from the water. The only sound she’d made since he’d staggered home with her had been a whimper of pain when he’d rotated her shoulder back into position.

  “You have to eat, Spence.”

  Go away, he thought tiredly. Why didn’t they all just go away and leave him alone? “I’ll eat when she wakes up.”

  “You’ll scare her to death when she wakes up, if you don’t eat and get some sleep and shave. You’re not doing her any good like this.”

  He rubbed his burning eyes with one hand. “I can’t leave her.”

  Serena crossed the room and placed a hand on his shoulder. “There’s still no change?”

  He shook his head. “Christ, I’ve never felt so helpless in my life. I should be able to do something. I can’t find any reason for her to still be unconscious. Not this long. Not a coma this deep. It’s almost as if she doesn’t want…”

  Spence straightened slowly in the wingback chair he’d dragged into the room days ago. It was almost as if she didn’t want to wake up. As if she had no reason to come back to him. He couldn’t believe he’d been so stupid as not to have thought of it before. He—who had delivered the paper on the subject of a patient’s state of mind affecting recovery!

  He had to think. “Okay,” he told Serena. “I’ll eat. You sit in here and talk to her.”

  “Talk to her? What…what do I say?”

  “Anything. Talk about the boys. Tell her what they’ve been up to. Tell her about that surprise birthday party you’re planning for Will next month. Anything. Just talk.”

  While he ate, he tried to formulate a plan. He had to give her a reason to wake up. He had always believed that a patient could hear and understand at least some things while unconscious. It had never been proven, and he knew his belief was scoffed at by others, but he didn’t give a damn.

  When Harriett and Janey came by that afternoon, Spence took them directly to LaRisa’s bedside and encouraged them to talk to her. Janey reached out a tentative hand toward LaRisa, then jerked it back.

  “Go ahead,” Spence told the girl. “You can touch her. I think she’d like that.”

  Janey stroked LaRisa’s cheek. “I hope you get better, Missus Spence. I think…I think maybe it’s my fault you’re hurt. I shouldn’a gone to the rocks. I knew I wasn’t ‘posed to.” Janey hiccupped and her eyes teared. “I’m sorry, Missus Spence, I’m sorry.”

  Spence knelt beside the child. “Janey, it’s not your fault. It was a flash flood. LaRisa wouldn’t want you to blame yourself.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked, sniffing back tears and rubbing a fist in her eye.

  “Of course he’s sure,” Harriett said quietly. “But we do need to thank LaRisa.” She placed a hand on LaRisa’s arm. When she spoke again, her voice shook. “Oh, LaRisa, you can’t know how much I thank you for what you did. You saved my baby’s life. Mine, too, probably. You have to wake up so we can thank you properly. We would have drowned if you hadn’t been there to help us, and then you almost drowned, and we feel so awful that you were hurt because of us. Please, please get well, LaRisa.”

  Word spread throughout town of LaRisa’s injuries and heroism. Urged by Maryanne, although it didn’t take much urging, Lawrence Hoddinger came. He thanked LaRisa for giving Maryanne the strength to endure her labor and for helping bring his son into the world.

  Jake Haskell, the merchant next door, came and thanked LaRisa for removing the splinter from his baby daughter’s finger. Edwin Goetche stopped by when no one else was there and thanked her for keeping the secret about just where those cactus spines had been embedded in his flesh.

  For two days they came, from all over town and beyond. Everyone she had helped in the office, and others. People whom Spence wasn’t aware she knew. Even Mrs. Conner from the Ladies Fine Emporium came and thanked LaRisa for spending so much of Spence’s money in her store. A little girl from two blocks over, whom Spence had never met, made her mother bring her to LaRisa’s bedside so she could thank her for getting the sticker out of her dog’s paw, and to offer her a puppy when the litter was weaned next month.

  Joanna brought the boys in. They sat with LaRisa for a time, telling her what they’d been doing, urging her to get well. As they rose to leave, Will stopped and turned back.

  “You have to get better, Aunt LaRisa, so you can come to my surprise birthday party next month. I’ll be eleven, you know.”

  And finally, Lettie Masters came again late one evening. After the parade of people in and out of the bedroom during the past days, Spence wasn’t even particularly surprised to see her.

  “I’ve come to speak with your wife, Doctor Colton.”

  Serena hovered anxiously in the background, plainly not sure the woman should be allowed anywhere near LaRisa.

  Spence nodded permission, and Mrs. Masters, with shoulders back, chin out, marched to the bedside and looked down. “Mrs. Colton, I have come…” The woman’s words trailed off and her shoulders slumped.

  “Would you care to have a seat?” Spence asked, indicating the wingback he’d vacated when she’d entered.

  Her eyes were downcast in her sagging face. “Yes, thank you,” she said quietly. Then she cleared her throat. “Mrs. Colton…thank you.” Her voice shook. “Thank you for my granddaughter’s safety, and my daughter’s. If I hadn’t been so blind stubborn about Janey coming to visit you, this would never have happened. I was wrong about you, I know that now. There’s nothing savage or heathen in you. What you did for my family was probably the most courageous, most selfless act I’ve ever witnessed. I’ll never be able to repay you for what you’ve done, but I hope you make a speedy recover so that I may try. And, my dear,” she added, leaning forward. “There’s a very anxious man behind me who would dearly love to see you open your eyes. He looks rather lost without you, if you don’t mind my saying. You’ve rested long enough, now. It’s time to come back to the living, to all the people who value you in their lives. And there are many of us, I assure you.”

  She took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders again. “There. I’ve had my say. The rest is up to you, young lady. If you’re brave enough to save my daughter and granddaughter the way you did, then you’re surely brave enough to wake up. Good-bye for now. The next time I see you, I expect you to be up and around.”

  Spence sat at LaRisa’s bedside that night with a lamp burning low and thought about all the people who had cared enough to come lately. LaRisa had touched the lives of more people than he’d known, more than he’d thought possible during the short time she’d been in Tucson.

  He checked her pulse and found it strong and steady, as it should be. Her lungs sounded clear. Her injuries were healing. All but whatever it was that kept her so pale and still on the bed.
>
  He leaned toward her and braced his elbows on his knees, with his fingers threaded together. “I think pretty near half the town has been by to see you lately. You’ve heard from everybody but me, it seems. I guess it’s time. I need to tell you that—God, LaRisa.” His voice broke with emotion.

  He slid to his knees and clasped her cool hand in both of his. “I love you so damn much. You have to know that…but then, I’ve never told you, so maybe you don’t. I was afraid to tell you. Every time we got close, you seemed to panic. I thought…I thought by keeping you beside me, you would learn to love me back.”

  Spence raised his burning eyes to the ceiling and tried to swallow around the lump in his throat.

  “I know this isn’t the life you wanted. I’m not the man you wanted. All you ever wanted was the freedom to make your own choices, and I rarely gave you that. Oh, I know what you’re thinking. It shouldn’t be mine to give. Freedom should be yours by right, not because someone else decides to give it to you. And you’re right. I just…I couldn’t let you go. I never thought I’d find a woman like you, someone strong enough to stand on her own, who would stand beside me. Someone I could love, someone I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.

  “I think I fell in love with you a long time ago, and was just afraid to admit it to myself. I think it happened on the train to Alabama, when you beat me at poker. Remember that?

  “I…dammit, LaRisa, I need you. Come back to me. You have to…no. I vowed I wasn’t going to do that anymore—tell you what to do. And I won’t, I swear it. Whatever you want to do, I promise I won’t stand in your way. We got a telegram this morning from Mother and Dad in Washington. Congress signed the bill yesterday authorizing the funds to move the Chiricahua to Fort Sill in Indian Territory. If you want to go there, I’ll help. I’ll take you, or send you, or just step aside and watch you leave. Whatever you want.

  “Hell, I never told you, but that day I brought you and Jo to town to go shopping, I opened a bank account for you. There’s five hundred dollars sitting across town with your name on it. I meant it to help you get started on a new life after we got our annulment. It’s yours for whatever you want. I can’t touch it now that it’s in your name.”