Kate Wingo - Western Fire 01 (13 page)

Once Dewey and Pru
had left the room, Mercy, taking care not to wake Spencer, leaned over and kissed him on the forehead.

“I’m truly sorry t
hat I caused you so much pain.”

To her surprise, Spencer grabbed her by the wrist, his eye
lids flickering open. “Good night, pretty lady,” he husked before his eyes shuttered closed.

Mercy extricated her wrist from his sleepy grasp. Exhausted from the night’s ordeal, she trudged up the stairs, wanting nothing more than to lose herself in the arms of forgetful sleep.

Mercy
woke earlier than usual, suffering from a painful throb in her head. As her eyes slowly fluttered opened, she wondered why she was lying on top of the bed covers instead of under them. And why her nightdress was covered in dark stains that looked like—

Blood!

With a gasp, she hurriedly sat up, the sudden effort causing the pain in her head to acutely intensify. Woozy, she placed a hand over her mouth, hoping to quell the nausea in her stomach. Given the fact that it was not yet dawn, Mercy calculated that she’d had only a few hours sleep. Which undoubtedly accounted for all the sundry aches and pains. That, and the fact that she’d spent most of the previous night extracting a bullet from of Spencer McCabe’s leg.

Truth be told
, the past week had been a test of her Christian faith. But now, with the very man who she feared above all others, seriously wounded and lying in her downstairs parlor, she wondered if God had put too difficult a test before her.

Easing herself off
of the mattress, Mercy pulled the blood-stained nightdress over her head, tossing it onto the floor. She should have removed the gown last night and put it in a bucket of water to soak, but she’d been too exhausted to do anything other than fall across her mattress in a dazed stupor. Now she doubted that she would ever be able to scrub it clean.

Reaching for a match, she lit the candle on the
bureau . . . and nearly shrieked in horror.

Her breasts and abdomen were covered in dried blood where it’d soaked through the cotton of her nightdress. There were even dried streaks of
blood smeared across her face.

Trembling,
Mercy filled the wash basin, her hands shaking as she splashed water over her face and torso. Then, opening the top drawer, she snatched a clean towel, briskly rubbing it over her body, determined to remove all traces of Spencer McCabe’s blood. Twisting and turning, she carefully examined herself to verify that she hadn’t missed a spot. Satisfied, she stepped over to the wardrobe and removed a shift, a well-mended petticoat, and clean drawers and stockings.

Once her undergarments were buttoned and tied into placed, she dressed in her oldest, least favorite gown, not wanting to give Spencer the wrong impression. Last night had been an extremely tense and harrowing situation. And the two of them had, quite naturally, put their differences aside in order to focus on the serious matter at hand. One might even go so far as to say that
they’d forged a bond of sorts. But it was an impermanent bond, fragile and weak, a bond that could not surmount the death and destruction which took place a week ago.

Opening her bedroom door, Mercy stepped into the hall, careful to tread lightly. Since dawn had not yet arrived, she car
ried a candle to light the way.

With slow, measured steps, she descended the staircase, lightheaded from an insufficient night’s sleep. At the bottom of the stairs, she debated whether to first check on Spencer or to start the morning fire. After a moment’s deliberation, she stepped toward the parlor, her compassionate inclinations over
ruling more practical concerns.

Setting the candleholder on the small table adjacent to the settee, she bent over Spencer, concern
immediately welling within her. Even in the dim, flickering candlelight, she could see that he was burning up with fever, the wool blanket twisted around his lower body, his face flushed with heightened color. Although she had only a modicum of medical knowledge, Mercy knew that if Spencer’s body temperature wasn’t soon reduced, he could very well succumb to fatal infection.

Worried, she rushed out of the room and hurried down the hall to the kitchen. Grabbing a large clay mixing bowl off the shelf, she filled it with water from the storage crock. She then plunged a towel into it before hefting the bowl into the crook of her arm.
Espying the basket of clean bandages that had been left on the table the previous night, she grabbed it with her free hand. Thus armed, she returned to the parlor.

Setting the bowl of water on the table next to the settee, she proceeded to change the bandage on Spencer’s leg. Contorted in
to an uncomfortable-looking position, he didn’t so much as twitch a muscle when she removed the old bandage. His lack of movement made Mercy think that far from being asleep, he was, instead, in the throes of a fevered infection. Much to her relief, though his wound appeared red and puffy, she could detect no sign of gangrene. As a precaution, she would later concoct a curative ointment out of plantain leaves.

Finished applying the new bandage,
Mercy perched herself on the edge of the settee. Long seconds passed as she stared at the blanket tangled under Spencer’s lower body. Then, with a resigned sigh, she slipped her hands between his legs and gently tugged the blanket out from under him. When she felt a rock-hard muscle beneath her hand, Mercy belatedly realized that she’d inadvertently pressed her palm against his upper thigh. Unduly flustered, she straightened the blanket around hips.

As she watched
her patient’s chest expand and contract with each fevered breath, Mercy gnawed on her lower lip, dreading what next had to be done. Inwardly steeling herself, she yanked Spencer’s shirttail free of his trousers, grateful that he remained unconscious while she went about the nerve-wracking yet necessary task of unbuttoning his shirt.

A few moments later, Mercy
peeled the shirt away from Spencer’s chest, unable to stop herself from staring in mute wonder at the curly brown hair that covered his upper torso, thinning as it neared the ridge of muscles that spanned his abdomen. Over the course of the last week, she’d forced herself to forget that she’d spent a night in the same bed with this man, that she knew what it felt like to have his muscular, broad chest intimately pressed against her body.

Shifting her gaze,
Mercy wrung the wet towel, water noisily splashing into the clay bowl. Repeatedly, she told herself that she was merely performing her Christian duty; and if it wasn’t for Spencer’s dangerously high fever, she wouldn’t be here in the same room with a near-naked man.

Neatly folding the cloth,
Mercy placed it in the middle of Spencer’s chest, trying to keep her gaze averted as best she could. And trying not to dwell on the fact that the only thing separating her hand from Spencer McCabe’s naked chest was a folded piece of cloth.

With a long dragging motion, she pulled the wet towel down the length of his
torso. After several swipes, she re-dipped the towel into the water bowl, wringing it out before continuing the procedure. Very soon, she fell into a rhythm, her hands acclimating to their task, adjusting to the steady rise and fall of Spencer’s chest.

When
a quarter of an hour had passed, Mercy placed her hand against his chest, trying to gauge whether her ministrations were actually doing any good. Although she had no means to accurately measure his temperature, Spencer’s skin did feel cooler to the touch.

Knowing
that she should remove her hand from his chest, Mercy could not bring herself to do so. Spellbound, she gently slid her palm over Spencer’s pectoral muscles, unwillingly fascinated by the sight of her pale, slender fingers moving across his furred chest. Having never touched a man’s bare chest, she was taken aback to discover that the hair on his torso was surprisingly soft and springy to the touch.

To her consternation, Spencer
suddenly moaned in his sleep, his head moving back and forth against the arm of the settee. Fearful that he might awaken, Mercy hastily removed her hand and pulled the two halves of his shirt together, clumsily buttoning it. Too late, she realized that she’d put more than one wooden button into the wrong hole. Muttering under her breath, she corrected the error. Finally finished, she retrieved the bowl from the table and hurried out of the parlor.

Entering the kitchen, Mercy stopped in her tracks, barely able to stifle a terrified gasp
– Gabriel stood beside the kitchen table, one of Spencer’s loaded pistols grasped in his small nine-year-old hand.

“Gabriel! For God’s sake
! Put that gun down.
This instant!
”

Startled, he jumped slightly, unaccustomed to being admonished in so stern a manner. “I wasn’t going to shoot it
. Honest I wasn’t.” He slid the gun into the leather holster that hung on the back of the kitchen chair. “I’m . . . I’m sorry.”

“I know that
you are.” Mercy spoke slowly and evenly, not wishing to further alarm him. Children were curious by nature. A fact that did little to mitigate her terror at seeing a loaded firearm in his hands. “Why don’t you go out to the woodshed and gather a load of kindling so that I can start the morning fire? Will you do that for me?”

Always eager to help, Gabriel ran to the back door. As Mercy watched him head outside to the woodshed, she
released a tightly held breath. Later, she would caution him as to the dangers of firearms. For now, she was simply relieved that his boyish curiosity had ended without incident.

Of course this was all Spencer’s fault
– Gabriel playing with a loaded pistol, the blood stains on the floor and kitchen table, the strange emotional affliction that seized hold of her whenever she came into close contact with the man. He was a renegade, a southern bushwhacker. And she didn’t intend to have him quartered in her house one minute longer than was necessary.

As soon as
Spencer McCabe’s fever broke, she would send him packing.

A
n entire week had passed. Surely enough time in Mercy’s estimation for Spencer’s leg to have sufficiently healed.

Already he was up and about with the aid of a hand-hewn cane. Not to mention that he seemed to have regained his former strength, the fever having left his body nearly four days ago. A blessing in Mercy’s opinion for she didn’t know how many more curative sponge baths she could administer and still maintain any s
emblance of ladylike composure.

All of which meant that it was time for Spencer to
pack his saddlebags and leave.

Unfortunately, he seemed in no hurry to depart
, placing her in a very awkward position. One that Mercy intended to rectify that very evening. In fact, as soon as she finished with her evening chores, she would politely inform Spencer that he’d overstayed his welcome.

Lifting the lid on the barrel of Indian meal, Mercy turned the meal with a large wooden paddle, airing it in order to prevent fermentation. Having the kitchen all to herself, she again rehearsed what she would say to Spencer. Since no mention had been made in the last week of the threat
that he’d issued the night of the ambush, she didn’t want to say anything that might unintentionally incite Spencer’s ire. The unpleasant task must therefore be handled in a calm, cordial manner.

With that thought in mind,
Mercy replaced the lid on the meal. She then smoothed back several loose strands of hair before she purposely made her way down the hall.

A few moments later
, she came to a sudden halt outside the open parlor door, stunned to find her entire family avidly listening to Spencer read aloud from their family Bible. As Mercy stared at the well-worn, well-loved volume, she recalled how her father used to read to them each evening. And though Spencer’s deep, southern drawl added an almost musical quality to the words, somehow it seemed blasphemous to see that same Bible in the hands of a renegade bushwhacker.

Aghast
, Mercy rushed headlong into the room.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” she exclaimed, making no attempt to
mask her anger.

Spencer, seated on the settee, didn’t
seem the least bit taken aback. “What does it look I’m doing? I’m reading from the Good Book,” he replied with an unconcerned shrug. “Why don’t you have a seat? I was just getting to the good part where Nebuchadnezzar—”

“
You’re actually familiar with biblical text?” Mercy interjected, finding it difficult to believe that the scoundrel had ever opened a Bible.

“When we were growing up, Pa used to read aloud from the
Bible most every night.” Spencer nodded at his brother who was seated next to Pru on the other side of the room. “Of course, Dewey probably doesn’t remember, him being so young when . . . when Pa died.”