herself. She’d always been independent. And strong. She’d helped her mother run a boardinghouse until her death when Sam was eleven. Her father had died several years earlier, and there had been no living relatives. Mac, Reese and Archie—all of whom had loved her mother—promised to care for Sam. One of them was usually gone, one was always in town, and each had taught her his special skills, and most of all, how to take care of herself.
She’d never questioned why they’d stayed here when everyone else left. To her, it made sense. Gideon’s Hope was a safe place for Mac. Few people even realized it still existed after the gold ran out. They’d had some visitors. The hopeful who thought they might still strike it rich. Sometimes friends of Mac or Reese or Archie. But visitors were increasingly rare these past few years. The town had made a convenient base for Reese, who gambled up and down the gold camps and now the silver mines, and Mac and Archie both loved the mountains. They had a comfortable home in the saloon Reese owned. There were plenty of trout in the stream, game in the forest and enough remaining nuggets carried down by mountain rain to pay for any additional supplies they needed.
As for her schooling, she had three teachers. Reese had attended Cambridge University in England, and Mac the University of Virginia until the war started. Between the two, she’d learned to love knowledge. Reese had collected books from all over Colorado, and she’d read every one. He’d introduced her to Shakespeare and poets along with penny novels and romances. Mac was more interested in sums and astronomy because that was something he could use.
From Archie, she learned the greatest gift of all: healing.
She’d begged Archie when she was no more than thirteen to take her along with him on one of his calls, and over the years he’d taught her more and more. Even when the last of the residents left, she continued to help him with mountain folks—and even some Indians—who’d heard of Archie and made their way to Gideon’s Hope. And she’d helped him mend creatures who needed it.
At her request, Reese had brought her books on medicine and she’d built a small library. She sometimes dreamed about being a doctor, but she never told her godfathers. She knew it would mean leaving them and she was too indebted to them for that. Archie was slowly going blind, and Mac, well, what would Mac do without having to fret about her? The valley was the only safe place in Colorado for him.
The one thing they didn’t teach her was how to be a woman, and for a long time she hadn’t cared. After most of the miners and merchants left, she had a freedom she relished. She loved running barefoot in the summer and swimming nude in the mountain spring. She could ride like the wind and play a fine game of poker.
They had been talking, though, about going north to Montana, where Mac wouldn’t be known. Starting a ranch with the money they’d saved from years of on-and-off panning for gold and Reese’s winnings.
Her godfathers didn’t have medicine in mind with the move. They wanted her to “have a more normal life.” She knew exactly what they meant by that. The male species. She’d heard them talk about her future, how she “needed” to meet some men—prospective husbands. And, truth be told, she’d been feeling stirrings inside, a longing for something she couldn’t quite define.
And there was no one to explain it to her.
But apparently Mac had sensed it. And for that reason, he’d left the safety of Gideon’s Hope. He’d planned on trading in the nuggets they’d collected over past years for cash for the trip north. For her. Only for her.
If not for her, he wouldn’t be lying upstairs as much dead as alive.
She decided to check on him. She wanted to reassure herself she’d done the right thing by shooting the marshal. She needed that mental weapon before she saw the wounded man again.
She went past the five empty rooms that had once been occupied by the women who worked below, and sometimes above. She’d known many of them, and they hadn’t seemed soiled doves to her. After her mother died, they’d been kind to her, even taught her to play the guitar and to sing songs, both pretty and naughty.
Archie was hunched over Mac when she opened the door. “How is he?” she asked.
“Still slipping in and out,” Archie said.
“He didn’t hear anything?”
Archie simply shook his head.
She went over to the bed and looked down at the man who was the closest thing to a father she had. Father. Friend. Teacher. Confidante. Her heart lurched as she gazed at his wounded body. He’d arrived barely alive four days earlier, and must have used every remnant of strength he had to reach them. He’d been ambushed by bounty hunters. He thought he’d killed two and wounded a third, but the cost was high. He had two bullets in him and a third had smashed his right hand.
It had taken him nearly two days to reach Gideon’s Hope, and by that time one of the wounds had festered. She and Archie had packed it with poultices made of moss, using old Indian remedies Archie had picked up over the years. They’d also gone through most of what little laudanum Archie had hoarded. The fever had lessened, but Mac still alternated between being unconscious and delirious. His breathing was labored and she knew he couldn’t be moved again.
He had always been so strong and sure, so capable in every way. And now his right hand—his gun hand—was buried in a swath of bandages. His unruly sandy hair was touched with gray and his normally sun-bronzed face looked years older than forty-five. A sandy beard covered his cheeks and chin.
Still buffeted by emotions, she drew a deep breath. She had done the right thing, she told herself. The only thing. But what now? Two wounded men. What if the marshal recovered quickly and discovered Mac above him? What then? Her chest tightened.
She wished Reese was here with his cocky grin and quick hands and seemingly endless knowledge. He was close to Mac’s age, but they couldn’t be less alike. The third son of an English lord, Reese was destined to go into the church. Instead, he escaped to the West to make his own fortune, and he’d never been particular as to how he did it. Reese considered life one big joke while Mac was intense and quiet. They had been competitors while her mother lived, and friends after.
“I’ll go look after the marshal,” she said. She had to keep busy. Then maybe she wouldn’t think.
With Dawg at her side, she picked up several more sheets from the room and went back downstairs. The lawman was still unconscious. The sheet Archie had placed under him was bloody, along with what was left of the long johns he wore. They no longer covered much of anything and she couldn’t take her eyes from him. Her body suddenly reacted to his, and she took a deep breath. This had never happened before, but then Archie had always tried to block her from seeing that particular piece of anatomy.
Dawg inched in and bristled as if he detected danger.
“Friend,” she told him softly. Dawg immediately backed off and sat several feet away.
The marshal was no friend, but she didn’t want Dawg to inflict more damage on the man. She reminded herself he was the enemy. He hadn’t had to come here. But he didn’t look like an enemy now. He looked like someone who was suffering.
She angrily brushed away a tear at the edge of her eye. She’d done what she had to do. She kept telling herself that.
First things first. She took a bottle of salve from Archie’s bag and liberally spread it over the wound. It would ease the pain and hopefully speed the recovery.
She
