belly was huge. Her eyes widened with fright and, choking back a sob, she said the one thing Alexandra Merritt was afraid to hear.
“My water just broke.”
The last thing Jackson Jacob Malone wanted to hear was singing, especially a woman singing in a high, sweet voice that reminded him of angels he didn’t believe in. The words drifted to him from the bottom of a rocky gorge, and he wondered if he was still drunk. The singing was bad enough, but as the trail dipped and curled, he recognized the words. She was singing a hymn, and for a moment he thought he’d died and gone to hell.
Two seconds later a scream burst out of the ravine, and Jake heard the devil himself in that cry. It tore through his head like a bullet burning flesh. A bead of sweat broke across his brow and he wiped it away.
“Hang on, Charlotte! Hang on for the baby!”
The angel’s voice reminded him of sleigh bells on a winter morning. Hopeful and bright, they defied the cold even as it settled into a man’s bones, and he wondered if the angel had ever shivered in the dark. Somehow he doubted it, and he was sure when she started singing again, even louder than before.
“Oh, come, let us worship and bow down,
Let us kneel before the Lord, our God, our maker…”
The noonday sun stung his skin and cast shadows through the sage. His jaw throbbed just below his ear, as if the pain in his bruised eyes had leaked down the side of his face. He clenched his teeth against the misery of it. He didn’t want reminders of his brother’s fist slamming into him, the mess he’d left in Flat Rock, and especially not the melancholy hope of a woman singing in the desert.
“Oh, no! It’s starting again!”
“Breathe easy, Charlotte. Easy…”
“I can’t!”
A moan rose from the gorge and snaked around him.
“Try to pant,” the angel crooned. “Like this…hhhhh…hhhhh…hhhhh…”
It was the sound of sex, of life being formed, of need and desperation, and he recalled the pleasured cry of the last woman he’d bedded. He didn’t know her name, but he remembered her breasts, the taste of her, and he felt himself going soft inside. He had to get away from Charlotte and the angel before he did something stupid. Grimacing, he nudged his horse into a faster walk.
The trail twisted around a boulder rimmed with goldenrod, then cut straight across a hard slope. A dry mud slide blocked the way, as if a huge hand had pushed the trail into the mountainside. Tugging his hat low, he nudged the bay with his knees. The horse shimmied nervously, sending ripples of apprehension through Jake’s thighs and up his spine.
The heat of the day pressed against him, and the stench of bad meat was unmistakable. His stomach nearly heaved, and he squinted into the gorge where pale green sage made a fence along the streambed. His gaze followed the trickle of water down the ravine to the graceful curve of a red stagecoach. The front wheel spun as if set in motion by an invisible hand, and someone had draped women’s clothing over the rocks and bushes.
The bay splayed his forelegs and balked.
“Whoa, boy,” Jake said softly.
He’d just won the horse in a card game, and the animal’s distrust was mutual. The bay was likely to buck, but Jake took a chance and nudged him forward until he had a wider view of the gorge. The women were nowhere in sight, but he saw three dead mules tangled in the harness. The fourth was lying on its side, braying like a forgotten pet. Sensing the presence of the bay, it raised its head and snorted before falling back against the sand.
“For He is our God,
And we are the people of his pasture,
And the shee-eeee-eeep of his hand…”
The singing was closer now, as resonant as a howling wind, and his stomach clenched. He wanted a drink. He wanted to block out the rotting mules, the women, the god-awful singing. Suffocated by dust and sweet sage, he dug his heels into the bay, bracing himself as the animal coiled and lurched over the slick of dry mud.
The crust collapsed beneath its hooves, and Jake fought for balance as the horse jerked its head and pedaled backward.
“Breathe, Charlotte! Don’t squish up your face. Breathe like me…hhhh…hhhh…hhhh…”
The voice was clearer now, and as the sagebrush thinned to a veil of green lace, Jake saw the angel. She was less than ten yards from him, on her knees in front of the other woman’s sprawled legs, splattered with blood and birth water. Her hair was the color of Arbuckle’s coffee, and it fell over her shoulders in a tangle. Her blouse was torn at the shoulder, and he could see a hot pink crescent where the sun had burned her skin.
Trails of sweat streaked her dusty face. The high collar of her blouse was loose and gaping, and he saw the curve of her breasts as she laid her hand on the birthing woman’s belly, leaned down and peered between her legs.
Pushing back the woman’s dark blue skirt, she said, “Don’t push, Charlotte.”
“I’ve got to!”
“It’s too soon. You’ll tear.”
Jake cringed. The woman moaned, and the mix of grunting and agony turned into a wail. Her pain was terrible to hear. The bearing down of her hips and the writhing of her belly was the most horrible thing he had ever seen.
“Breathe, Charlotte!”
But the birthing woman was beyond understanding. Instead of listening to the angel, she curled her spine, grabbed her knees and screamed. A bullet to the head would have been an act of kindness, and yet he couldn’t look away.
There was no singing now, only the blue skirt and streaks of bright red blood on the petticoat spread beneath her hips. His gaze traveled from her thighs to her belly, and then to her ashen face. He had never seen a baby being born but he’d seen a few men die, and Charlotte plainly needed more help than any man or woman could give.
Her face registered shock and stark fear. “My baby! Oh God, my baby!”
For a man who didn’t give a damn about anyone or anything, he was dangerously close to tears. He prodded the bay with his heels, but the animal refused to budge, giving an angry chuff that carried through the gorge.
The angel raised her face toward the blistering blue sky. Her eyes locked on him, and for one painful second she stared at him with fierce brown eyes.
“Go away! Go away, you son of a—” Her lips locked together, as if she had never spoken a curse word in her life. He nearly laughed at the stupidity of it. She needed help. If not now, then later when she had to get to a town.
Jake wasn’t enough of a gentleman to feel honor-bound to stay, but he was enough of a rebel to pick a fight. He held the bay at the top of the trail. At this point he wasn’t going anywhere.
“Alex! Help me—” Charlotte grabbed her bare knees and grunted like a crazed animal.
“It’s coming! The baby’s coming!” The angel touched
