touched his lips. It tasted bitter. Adam screwed up his face. If Bedell wanted to poison him, he’d have to do it without his cooperation. Swearing, he smacked away the liquid.
Something clattered to the ground. It rolled and smashed.
“He’s still fitful,” the woman said. “All night he’s been—”
He didn’t catch whatever else she said. Her voice, low and cautious, wavered in and out of his hearing. Several of her words made no sense. Adam thought he heard his gelding nearby. The horse shook its traces with equine impatience—or maybe with prescient concern. Once he’d been rifle-shot in an ambush, and his horse had carried his limp body all the way to Mariana.
Mariana. He had to rescue her. He was running out of time.
He tried to call her name again. All that emerged was another groan. Soft hands touched his face, then moved lower.
The hands patted his chest. With effort, Adam opened his eyes. The world wavered, showing him a lopsided view of a blond-haired woman. He knew her. But he didn’t. He couldn’t remember.
Weakly he grabbed her wrist. “Mariana?” he mumbled.
“Yes, it’s me. Savannah.” She slipped from his hold, then set aside his hand with a soothing pat. “Just rest now.”
Adam frowned. She was treating him like a child. Annoyed and still hurting, he clenched his fingers. They encountered soft quilted fabric, a cushy mattress. Where the hell was he?
“You gave me quite a scare,” she said. “But you made it here, and you’re going to be fine. That’s all that matters.”
Savannah. Savannah. Drowsily Adam pondered the name.
His eyes drifted shut. Damnation. He forced them open.
Savannah’s concerned face swam above him. She smiled as she tucked a blanket snugly around him. “I’m so happy you’re here.”
He couldn’t be happy. There was something wrong with Mariana. Something awful … But he couldn’t remember what.
A heartbeat later, Adam crashed into the blackness again.
The next time Adam awakened, he opened his eyes on a cozy, dimly lit room. Frowning with concentration, he took stock of his surroundings. They were small and modest, framed by split-log walls and crammed with furnishings. A medicinal tang hung in the air, along with a flowery fragrance he couldn’t place.
Beneath him was an unfamiliar bed. Nearby, an old bureau hunkered with a lighted oil lamp atop it. To his left sat an empty ladder-back chair. Rhythmic tapping came from the next room. Adam recognized the sound as a telegraph machine in use.
He was inside the telegraph station. Hazily he remembered confronting Bedell. He remembered going down, remembered hitting the man, remembered his last words: You do have a weakness.
They made less sense to him now than they had then, but Adam didn’t have time to consider the matter further. He had to get to Mariana. He threw off the coverlet, then wrenched upward.
The motion sent searing pain through him. Gasping with it, he clutched his middle. Gingerly he spread his fingers apart.
Two bandages met his unsteady gaze. He blinked at them, then sucked in another breath. Next, he twisted to touch his back. More bandages had been wrapped near his shoulder blade. Tentatively he patted them. He was hurt. That didn’t mean he could stop moving. He had to find Mariana and save her.
Another agonizing movement brought him to his feet. Adam teetered, clenching his jaw. Pain throbbed through his head, making him dizzy. His ribs hurt; so did his shoulder. His legs threatened to buckle beneath him. He grabbed the chair. A few more raspy, painful breaths fortified him enough to go on.
The tapping of the telegraphy equipment ceased. He sent a cautious glance toward the other end of the station, straining to hear. All he sensed was the occasional rustle of papers. A distant chair scraped across the floor; a shadow moved across the wall. He wasn’t alone here. Propelled into motion by the realization, Adam sighted the latched door. He surged toward it.
An involuntary moan escaped him. Tightening his jaw, he made himself keep moving. His fingers scrabbled clumsily on the latch. Frustrated, he tried again. The door finally swung free, revealing the darkened woods surrounding the telegraph station.
Adam staggered outside, leaving his shirt and suit coat behind him. Warm nighttime air swirled over his exposed skin. Sweating and breathing heavily, he lurched across the station’s yard, looking for his horse. He hardly felt the stones and grass beneath his bare feet. All that mattered was finding Mariana.
“Whoa there, stranger!” someone called. “Hold up.”
At the sound of that deep male voice, Adam whipped his hand to his belt. His empty belt. His usual firepower wasn’t there.
Hell. In his muzzy-headed haste to leave, he’d forgotten to arm himself, he realized. Too late. Instinctively Adam flexed his knee, but his backup knife was gone, too. He was forced to stand on weakened legs, defenseless and light-headed, as a big, dark-skinned man tromped toward him with a handheld lantern.
“Let me help you.” The man put his free arm around Adam’s shoulders. He looked older than he’d first appeared, but genial—and clearly determined. “I guess you’re looking for the privy.”
Warily Adam nodded. Deprived of his weapons, there wasn’t much else he could do. Besides, he recognized Mose Hawthorne. He doubted the station’s part-time helper posed a threat to him.
Together they crossed the yard, moving slowly toward the outhouse. Adam scanned the tree line as they went. If Bedell or his brothers were still out there, he needed to be aware of it.
He cleared his throat. “I’m looking for a woman. She ought to be around here someplace. Have you seen her? She’s—”
“Right in there, friend.” Mose nodded toward the station, interrupting before Adam could describe Mariana. He opened the outhouse door. “Savannah’s been waiting on you awhile now. You have no idea what kind of hopes that woman’s got pinned on you.”
Having read her letters to Bedell, Adam had a fairly thorough notion of what the confidence man’s mark might expect of her new beau. But that wasn’t what concerned him now.
“I meant another woman. Dark hair, about this high—” Adam held his hand to chest height “—foul mouth, dirty skirts most likely, probably packing a pistol or two? She might be hurt.”
“That don’t sound like any woman I ever heard of.” Mose frowned. “You hurt your head, though. I’m guessing you’re still a little confused.” He gestured. “You need help in there?”
Adam gave the outhouse a dismissive glance. “No. If you haven’t seen her, then I’ll have to go looking.” He wavered on his unsteady legs. Mose held him up. “Did you find my horse?”
“Your horse?” This time, the station’s helper cast him an even more fretful look. “You didn’t have a horse. I found your rucksack over there in the bushes, but that’s all. If you had yourself a horse back in Baltimore, it’ll be no help to you here in the Territory. Although Savannah
