Holt's Gamble (8 page)

All of that didn't matter now, Kierin sighed, pulling the quilts up under Holt's chin. All that mattered was that he survive. She eased herself up off the mattress, careful not to disturb him. Wrapping a blanket around her shoulders, she stepped out of the wagon into the dazzlingly bright morning sun.

"Mornin', ma'am," Jacob called to her from the campfire as casually as if he said those words to her every day. With a hand rolled cigarette dangling from his mouth, he was lifting a coffeepot from the fire. He pointed a cup in her direction. "Coffee?"

"Jacob," she cried, "I was so worried about you. Where did you go? I thought you'd be back hours ago. I was afraid they had—"

"I'm fine," he told her, pouring her a cup anyway. "It just took me a might longer than I expected to do what needed doin', is all."

"Thank God, you're all right. Did anyone see you?"

"I don't reckon I was see'd or we'd have heard from them by now," he drawled. He handed her the coffee. "I been back since nigh on sunup".

"Sunup—" Kierin's faced flushed with the knowledge that Jacob must have seen her sleeping with Holt. "Oh, I... I'm sorry I fell asleep. Holt was so cold. It was the only thing I could think of to warm him... and I-"

Jacob waved his hand as if to dismiss her apology. "Probably the best medicine you could 'a give him. Sometimes a man..." He hesitated and looked back at the fire before continuing. "Sometimes a man got's to have a reason to fight his way back from somethin' like that. Someone to hold him gentle—like a woman can. I 'spect that done as much for him as that powder I give ya." Jacob looked at Kierin sideways and smiled.

There was no malice in it. No judgment. Kierin met his smile and returned it. She found that she liked Jacob. But she couldn't let him think there was more between her and Holt than there really was. She wrapped her hands around the cup and took a sip. A small sip.
Strong
hardly described the taste. "Jacob," she began uneasily, "it's not what you think between Holt and me."

Jacob nodded his head, seemingly not surprised by that bit of information. "Brown told me what happened. I seen the papers in Holt's pouch. And a good size stake to boot."

"If Holt had only known what kind of a man John Talbot was, he wouldn't have stayed in that game to bid on my papers and none of this would have happened."

"Don't you go blamin' yourself for that," Jacob told her sternly. "Clay's the kinda man likes a challenge. Fact is, sometime he ain't as careful as he oughta be. That boy got's a wild streak in him." Jacob took a drag on his cigarette, then looked up at the wagon. "A good challenge draws him like a honeybee to a flower. Got hisself stung this time though. Stung good."

Kierin watched the pain flit across the black man's features before he reined in his emotions. It was obvious that he cared deeply about the man in the wagon. She wondered what type of man earned that kind of loyalty from his friends.

Jacob's voice broke into her thoughts.

"This yours?" He handed her the tapestry bag she had dropped behind Brown's shop.

"Yes. Oh, Jacob. You took a big risk going back there. Did you find out anything?"

"Only that there's a posse formin' ta look for the two of you."

"A posse," Kierin breathed.

"Me an' Clay planned to pull out with the wagons this mornin'. I reckon as how we ain't got no choice but to stick with that."

"This morning?" A new kind of fear sliced through her. "I'm not sure Holt can take the jolting of a ride like that. It could kill him."

Jacob stirred the fire with a stick. "It be risky. But Clay's a strong man. I don't see how we can wait."

"His fever
is
down a bit this morning," she said, hoping to convince herself that Jacob's words were true.

"I know, I checked him when I got back from town."

"Oh, yes... of course," she murmured dumbly. "I guess I'd better go back and look in on him." Kierin rose, picked up her bag, and started to walk toward the wagon. Jacob's worried voice stopped her.

"Uh-oh."

"What is it?" she asked, turning back to him.

"Pull that blanket around you an' let me do the talkin'." He discarded his cigarette and crunched it beneath his boot. Jacob turned to the small weasel-faced man who had stepped up to their campfire.

"Reverend Beaker." Jacob's greeting was cool and blunt.

The man nodded curtly, but refused to actually acknowledge the black man with words.

Kierin could almost feel the thickness in the air between the two men. Jacob's face was a study in control. The weasel—dressed entirely in black, save his white clerical collar—peered at Kierin through narrowed eyes, his mouth set in a sour expression. She flushed deeply under his scrutiny and she looked back at Jacob.

"Somethin' I can do for you this mornin', Reverend?" Jacob asked in a tight voice.

Beaker gestured at Kierin several times with his bony finger as if he were pointing at a piece of dust that had been missed in a cleaning.

"You and Holt know the rules on my train about... camp followers." The words slid out of his mouth with distaste. "This is a family train, boy. We don't tolerate... single women."

A muscle twitched in Jacob's jaw, though he managed to keep an even expression on his face.

"I don't reckon Mr. Holt would take too kindly to you callin' his new bride a camp-follower, Reverend Beaker," Jacob said with quiet control.

Kierin's eyes flew to Jacob in disbelief. Did he say
bride?
She tried to breathe normally, knowing Beaker was watching her reaction.

Beaker pursed his thin lips. "Are you telling me that Holt has taken a wife since I saw him yesterday?"

A smile curved Jacob's lips. "Love works in strange ways, Reverend. You ought'a know that. Besides, I reckon he couldn't face my cookin' all the way to Oregon. Mrs. Clay Holt, meet the Reverend Josiah Beaker, the spiritual leader of this here wagon train."

Kierin clutched the blankets more tightly around her and nodded to Beaker, who stood looking down his thin nose at her. Lifting her chin, she tried her best to look self-assured.

"Mrs. Holt," he said finally, touching the brim of his fat-crowned black hat. "I beg your pardon for the misunderstanding, ma'am." The apology came grudgingly. "Where is your husband this morning, by the way? I have yet to see him. I should offer him my congratulations."

"He's sleepin', Reverend," Jacob said. "You know how it is with newlyweds. A little too much celebratin' last night." Jacob winked at Kierin.

"I see.... Well, I'll be on my way then," Beaker said. "We'll be pulling out within the hour. Perhaps Mr. Holt will see his way clear to join us by then. Good day, ma'am." Beaker turned and strode out of the campsite.

* * *

The sound of voices penetrated Holt's senses slowly, as if the darkness that surrounded him was wrapped in thick cotton, unwinding layer by layer until the muffled sound became the familiar deep voice he recognized as Jacob's. The other voice had a higher pitch to it and he knew it was a woman's, but for the life of him he couldn't remember where he'd heard it before. She sounded downright irritated though.

His eyes ground open as if they'd had a fistful of sand thrown into them. He blinked at the sunlight streaming through the canvas cover and wondered briefly what he was doing lying in the wagon in the middle of the day.

His first movement answered all of his questions and then some. A blinding pain shot up his arm and through his chest and he squeezed his eyes shut tightly. When the throbbing subsided, the memory of last night came flooding back to him.

He fixed his stare on the dust motes churning through the morning sunlight filtering into the wagon and tried to remember how it had all turned out—how he had gotten here. But that part of it flitted teasingly on the edge of his memory, out of reach. The image of the woman—her delicately drawn face and her green eyes, the color of a stormy sea and the way they had flashed at him, first in anger, then in fear—leapt to his mind.

In truth, he hadn't expected either one of them to get out of that situation alive. But somehow they had. The pain in his shoulder confirmed that for him. He lay quietly, recovering his senses one by one.

There was the smell of Jacob's coffee brewing on the fire. It was always strong enough to knock a man on his ass, he mused, but it was infinitely better than his own, so he never complained. Mingled with the coffee smell was the scent of something else that touched off a growling deep in the pit of his stomach. It was broth, whose beefy aroma drifted up tantalizingly into his senses—as readily as did the memories of the woman who had once cooked it for him.

That thought caused him nearly as much pain as his shoulder did and he struggled to put it out of his mind.

But the memory of holding Amanda last night came unbidden. He could still almost feel her warmth against him. He knew he must have dreamed it, but it had seemed oddly real. Holt clenched the fingers on his good hand into a fist in frustration. His brain must be as muddled as the rest of him, he reasoned. Either that or he had finally gone over the edge. Amanda was dead. Dead along with their unborn child. Dead for years.

His grief over their deaths had consumed much of the past three years, but he thought he had gotten beyond that; left it behind him. Why then did he still imagine her touch or her voice encouraging him to fight against the death he would have once welcomed?

A new, hot wave of pain stabbed at his shoulder and he sighed deeply, allowing the pain to take him back to the dark, comfortable place where he had been. To the place without memories.

He woke again as the wagon tilted with the weight of someone's step, though he had no way of knowing if his eyes had been closed moments or hours. The girl moved into his line of vision, and Holt watched her through half-closed eyes, taking in the tiredness of her movements; the worn expression on her face when she leaned over him. Her eyes opened wide as she realized he was conscious.

"Mr. Holt. You're awake. I—I'm so glad."

She seemed truly pleased. He opened his mouth to try to respond, but it was as if someone had stuffed it full of feather ticking and he could not manage more than a muffled grunt.

"Don't try to talk," she admonished. "I've brought you some water. Do you think you can manage some?"

His eyes followed her as she reached over to feel his forehead. The smooth leather of his familiar buckskin shirt molded to the soft curves of her breasts as she pressed her hand to him. Her touch—gentle and blessedly cool—left him wishing she would not move her hand. But in the end she did, seemingly satisfied.

Holt nodded toward the water and tried to ease himself up on his good elbow, but a crashing pain set him flat again.

"Here, let me help you." She lifted his head ever so carefully and he fought down the wave of nausea that swept over him as he gulped down the water greedily.

Finally, she pulled the cup from his lips. "Not too much. You have to take it slowly at first."

Cautiously, he licked his parched lips with a wet tongue and found that he had gained use of it again.

"What... happened back there?"

Kierin lowered her eyes and picked at some invisible thread on his quilt. "I killed John Talbot."

"Y-you what!" he rasped, astonished. But somewhere in the back of his mind, the dim memory of what she was telling him rang true.

"At least I think I did," she added. "He would have killed you."

Clay rolled his eyes.
Sweet Jesus. What had he dragged this girl into?
He cursed his impulsiveness once again, sure now that she would have been better off working for Talbot than wanted for murder.

"He... Talbot didn't... hurt you, did he?" he asked finally.

"No," she answered simply, understanding his unspoken question.

"How did you get me back here? I don't remember any of it. Did anyone see us?"

"Only Scudder Brown. He came back to help us. He was the one who brought you here. I'm sure I'd never have gotten you back by myself."

I'll be damned, Holt thought. He never expected that of Brown, considering his family and all.

"Jacob says there's a posse forming in town. Well have to pull out with the train this morning. Do you think you're up to it?"

"I'm up to it," he answered, though he didn't feel up to it at all. "Where's Jacob?"

"He's hitching up the team."

"Get me my gun," he told her.

"Y-your gun? But why?"

Clay let out a long sigh, too tired to make long explanations.

"Just
do
it," he told her irritably. At the surprised flush that leapt to her cheeks, he added more gently, "I feel naked without it."

Kierin slid the heavy revolver from its place atop a box at the foot of the wagon.

"Here—if it makes you feel better," she said, holding the weighty gun out to him with a steady, even hand.

"Thanks." He slid the gun under the quilts next to him then sank back, tilting his head toward his injured shoulder in a vain effort to ease the burning ache there.

"You should eat something," she told him. "I made some broth."