Holt's Gamble

by Barbara Ankrum

  The train had traveled some fifteen miles before Jim Kelly had called for the wagons to circle up for the night. Except when she had been in the wagon checking on Holt's condition, she had covered most of that distance on foot. In fact, only the small children were allowed to ride in the wagons for any amount of time. To save the ox teams the added strain of unnecessary weight, the rest of the people walked. And walked.

  Kierin sat back on her bare heels and winced. Her feet were blistered and sore. She had slipped her shoes off at the river and soaked her feet in the cool water for a few minutes, which had helped some. But now, they were too tender to even consider putting her shoes back on. She tucked her toes under the hem of her dress and decided to ask Jacob for some salve to put on them when he got back from unharnessing the team.

  Kierin gathered up a handful of tinder and fed it—one stick at a time—to the growing fire. The breeze worked for her now that the flame had caught. She turned in time to see Jacob and Jim Kelly walk into the campsite together. In Jacob's hands were two buckets of fresh water from the river.

  An appreciative smile tipped the corners of Jacob's mouth as he set the buckets down. "Ain't as easy as it looks, is it?" He gestured at the fire.

  Kierin laughed softly. "I don't think I've ever tackled anything more frustrating in my life."

  "Clay awake?" Jim asked.

  "He was asleep last time I checked. I don't know how, but he managed to sleep most of the day."

  "Best thing for him," Jacob said, setting the black iron tripod over the fire for her. "I got's to go settle the stock in for the night. Be back directly."

  "Jim, won't you stay for supper?" Kierin asked before he turned to go. "I can't guarantee how it will turn out, but you're welcome to share it with us."

  A smile crossed the wagonmaster's face. "I doubt you could do to a stew what I do to a stew, Mrs. Holt. It's not pretty. I'd be obliged to share supper with you. I've got to see to the wagons before it gets dark, but I'll be back by the time it's ready, ma'am."

  Kierin smiled. "See you then."

  Jacob and Jim headed out toward the center of the circled wagons while Kierin fixed the supper. She hummed as she set to work hanging the pot over the fire and plopped chunks of carrots and potatoes from their store of fresh vegetables into the soup. She added a hunk of salted beef and some leftover navy beans from their noon dinner and stirred it up with seasonings she had found packed in among the dry goods. After she had mixed the biscuits and settled them in the Dutch oven over the glowing coals, Kierin sat back and savored the bubbling aroma of the meal, her mouth watering in anticipation. The day's walk not only had given her blisters, she thought, touching her tender heels, but had stirred up a growling appetite.

  Kierin stoked the fire with more kindling and was lifting the pot lid to stir the stew when she heard the creak of the wagon springs. With her back to the wagon, she assumed that Jacob had returned from tending the animals.

  "Dinner will be ready soon, Jacob," she told him without turning.

  "Am I invited?" asked a voice that was definitely not Jacob's.

  Kierin spun around to see Holt standing—or rather, swaying—beside the wagon, looking very pale and weak, but wearing the lopsided grin she remembered from the night before. He had pulled on a clean pair of Levi's and a light blue denim shirt. Unbuttoned, it only partially concealed his bandaged shoulder and did little to hide the muscular physique she had been trying to put out of her mind all day.

  "Mr. Holt. What are you doing up? You should be in—" The scolding died on her lips when she saw him trying to blink back the dizziness that threatened to topple him. He listed perilously to one side, clutching the wagon for support. She jumped to her feet and caught him around the waist before he could fall. Her face pressed unavoidably against his broad chest and she felt the ragged pounding of his heartbeat against her ear. The flush of fever was still on him, but he was considerably cooler than he'd been earlier.

  Holt leaned on her, silently cursing his weakness. The fever had claimed more from him than he had imagined. He dragged a hand across his face to clear the black spots from his vision. He felt Kierin push him back against the wagon, and hold him there, bracing both palms firmly against his chest.

  "Are you all right?" she asked, searching his eyes.

  All right? Hell no, Holt thought, looking into the depths of her sea green eyes as he tried to sweep the dizziness from his brain. He swallowed hard. Eyes like that could make a man forget himself. He was reminded of all the times in the past twenty-four hours she'd saved his neck—all the times he'd wondered if he had merely conjured up what he had glimpsed again in her eyes just now.

  "Mr. Holt?"

  Holt blinked and released his hold on her shoulder.

  "I'm okay, now," he answered, rubbing a hand across his stubbled face. "I... just need to get my legs under me again is all. It's a wonder what a day in bed can do to your stamina."

  "Stamina? Well, for heaven's sake, you nearly died last night!"

  "Well, thanks to you, I didn't."

  "And if you have anything to say about it, you'll try your best to undo everything I did. Is that it?" Kierin glared stubbornly at him, hands on her hips.

  "If you really must know," he answered, not sure quite how to put the issue to her delicately, "with all the liquids you've been pumping into me for the past twenty-four hours, I felt the sudden urge to pay a visit to the bushes down by the river."

  Abashed, Kierin's face suffused with color and she mouthed the word "oh," but no sound accompanied it. She cleared her throat and tried again.

  "I'm—I'm sorry I didn't think of that. But still, you shouldn't go alone. I'll go get Jacob to help y—"

  "Don't bother him," Holt told her, pushing off from the wagon. "I can manage. I'd be obliged, though, if you'd fix me a plate of whatever you're cooking there, when I get back. It smells good."

  Kierin softened at the compliment and suppressed the urge to warn him about the possibility of scorched stew and biscuits with soggy centers. She nodded with a tentative smile and turned to the fire to give the pot a stir.

  "And by the way," he added, turning once more before he headed to the river, "you have lovely toes."

  Kierin shot a mortified glance at her bare feet and then toward his retreating back. She curled her toes into the soft dirt.

  She narrowed her eyes and let out an indignant huff. "He might have had the decency to pretend not to notice," she said under her breath. Turning back to the bubbling kettle, she stirred the stew with more vigor than was wise. The fire hissed and spat as the hot liquid slopped over the sides of the blackened pot.

  She replaced the lid and sat down on a nearby rock to tug on her shoes. And oh, how it hurt. Her heels were twice as sore now that they'd had a few minutes of freedom. She was limping back to the fire when Jacob sauntered back to the campsite, depositing his hat and damp leather gloves on the rim of a wheel.

  "Somethin' smells good."

  He rolled up his sleeves, poured bucketful of water into a basin, and splashed his face with the cool liquid. "Ah-h," he sighed, swiping the water from his face with one hand. "Been wantin' to do that all day. Supper almost ready, ma'am?"

  Ma'am. Now there's a word I'll never hear leaving Clay Holt's lips. She gave Jacob a grateful smile. "It's ready, I think. Just sit down, Jacob. I'll serve some up for you."

  Kierin wrapped a towel around her hand and lifted the three-legged Dutch oven from the coals. The biscuits, much to her consternation, were indeed scorched on the bottom and, in weight, more closely resembled the stones she'd been kicking all day than the biscuits she used to cook for her family. Kierin sighed and dropped one onto Jacob's plate with a clunk. Luckily for them all, the stew had fared better.

  Jacob sank down near the fire with the plate Kierin had fixed for him. The firelight gleamed off his face, highlighting his strong features: a broad, handsome face; skin the color of rich coffee; black hair, already peppered with gray, though she guessed he was n
ot much over thirty.

  It was his arms that drew her gaze away from his face. Long, sweeping scars, which she judged could only have come from a lash, snaked around his forearms and beyond. She stared at them, horrified, unable to pull her gaze away.

  Jacob looked up from his food and followed her gaze. He sighed and set his plate on the rock in front of him, then rolled his shirtsleeves down to his wrists.

  Heat stole to her cheeks. "Forgive me, Jacob. I didn't mean to stare."

  "It's natural," he told her kindly. "Most folks do. That's why I keep 'em covered most times so's nobody gots to look at 'em. They ain't a pretty sight and that's a plain fact. Ain't for no lady like you to be seein'."

  Kierin released a breath. "It's been a while since someone has called me that."

  "What?"

  "A lady."

  Jacob shook his head and retrieved his plate. "You's as much a lady as I come across in quite a while, ma'am. Quite a while indeed." He smiled at her across the firelight and the tension between them melted.

  "Jacob," Kierin began, not sure how to continue, "can I ask you something?"

  Jacob nodded, waiting.

  "Do you know who Amanda is?"

  A deep furrow appeared between Jacob's eyes as he considered her question. "Yes'm. What about her?"

  She had a thousand questions she wanted to ask. Why isn't she here with Clay? Does he love her and why does she haunt his dreams? But Kierin couldn't bring herself to ask him any of those questions. Instead she asked, "Is she Clay's wife?"

  Jacob rubbed at his nose evasively. "Clay talk to you about her?"

  "Not exactly," she admitted. "When he was delirious with fever, he called out her name. He thought I was her."

  "I think it be best if Clay be the one who tells you about her."

  "Jacob," Kierin sighed, "please."

  Jacob lowered his head and stared into the flickering amber fire. "Clay don't talk about it to nobody. Hardly even me. It happened a long time ago."

  "I see." She had no choice but to respect the loyalty Jacob felt toward Clay. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry."

  "How is he, anyway?" Jacob asked, deftly changing the subject. "Still asleep?"

  "No, you old rooster," Holt answered as he appeared out of the darkness, startling them both. "I'm up. I think I've seen my fair share of that canvas roof, don't you?"

  Jacob rose and clasped Holt's hand. "Clay." The emotion behind the word spoke volumes. "For a while there, I—I was worried you was fixin' to weasel your way out'a this trip."

  Holt eased himself down to the fire next to Kierin, cradling his left arm with his good one. "You ought to know I'm too ornery to let a man like John Talbot be the end of me."

  Jacob chuckled and shook his head. "Yeah, I 'spect I should'a know'd that. From what I hear, Talbot got the short end of the stick in that fight anyway."

  "I guess I had some help there," he admitted, glancing up at Kierin as she handed him a plate of food.

  "How's the shoulder?" Jacob asked.

  "It's felt better, but it'll heal." Holt took a mouthful of food just as the Reverend Beaker and his wife and daughter strolled into the campsite. Clay paused in mid-chew and gave Jacob a heavenward roll of his eyes.

  "Oh, now you see, Josiah," the plump woman on Beaker's euro exclaimed as they neared the fire, "we're interrupting their supper. Mr. Holt, I told Josiah we should wait 'til later to come over to meet your new wife."

  Holt nearly choked on his food and shot a disbelieving look at Kierin. "My... my—"

  "My, my," Kierin finished, standing and offering the woman her hand. "How good it is to meet you, Mrs. Beaker. Of course, it's no inconvenience at all. I'm sure that's what my husband was trying to say." Kierin aimed a warning look at Holt. He glared back at her.

  "Well, mercy. It's so good to have another young woman on the train my daughters age..." The Reverend's wife spoke rapidly, waving a delicate, lace-edged hanky to emphasize her words. Her voice burbled on, but Holt didn't catch the words. He was too busy trying to grasp the bombshell she had just dropped in his lap.

  He narrowed his eyes and cast a suspicious frown at Jacob, who merely shrugged and tossed him back a halfhearted yet hopeful smile. Holt rose, set his plate down deliberately on the rock beside him, and crossed to stand next to Kierin.

  Clara Beaker was too involved with introductions to notice the dark clouds that had gathered behind Clay Holt's sky blue eyes, but Kierin could scarcely have missed them. She knew she should have told him about this sooner, but he had been too ill to broach the subject. Now, any opportunity she might have had to break it to him gently had just vanished. She cast a fearful, sideways glance at him and was not surprised to see that he was furious.

  "...and this is my daughter, Rachael," Clara said, introducing the beautiful, willowy blonde standing beside her. "Rachael, I'd like you to meet Mrs. Holt."

  "Please, call me Kierin," Kierin told the younger woman.

  Rachael Beaker smiled back at Kierin with an all-too-practiced smile—one that sent a cold shiver up Kierin's spine.

  "Kierin," Rachael repeated, fluttering her eyelashes becomingly in Holt's direction. "What a quaint little name. Really, Clay, you should have given us all some warning. My father could have done a proper ceremony for you and your wife here, instead of some secret affair back in Independence."

  Clara Beaker fluttered her hanky around her face and flushed a bright pink at her daughter's bold words. "Rachael dear," she said, taking a conciliatory tone, "I'm sure Mr. and Mrs. Holt had a perfectly lovely ceremony in—"

  "Now wait just a minute," Holt blurted hotly, "she's not—" he began, but the words died on his lips. Kierin's desperate, imploring look stopped him just short of saying that she wasn't his wife, that he hadn't the foggiest idea what was going on here. It took only that fraction of a second for his denial to flounder and become lost in the green depths of her eyes.

  At his outburst, all heads turned in Clay's direction.

  "She's not... what, Mr. Holt?" Josiah Beaker asked, puzzled.

  Clay hesitated, feeling slightly sick. God Almighty. Nothing in his life had gone smoothly since he'd met this blasted woman. Now she had him hog-tied and married, for Christ's sake. And as he opened his mouth to speak, he had the sinking feeling that it was about to get worse. "Well... I just meant to say—she's... uh... not upset that she missed a big wedding. Are you, darlin'?" Holt slipped his good arm around Kierin's shoulder and pulled her close to him.

  Two can play this game, he thought as he splayed his fingers beneath her arm and brushed her firm breast with his thumb. It gave him a measure of satisfaction to feel her sharp intake of breath at his touch and see the confused expression in her eyes.

  "N-no," Kierin answered finally, forcing her gaze back to the Beakers. "No, not at all." She patted Holt's arm with mock affection, shrugging his arm discreetly off her shoulder. "Of course, he did promise me a proper ceremony once we reach the West... i-in a church..." she added for good measure.

  Holt had to restrain the urge to roll his eyes.

  "Oh," Clara cried happily, pressing the hanky to her cheek, "Two weddings. Isn't that just the most romantic thing you've ever heard?"

  "Well, I think so..." Jacob mumbled at Holt's shoulder, smiling broadly, then shrinking back at Holt's withering stare.

  "Yes, Clay," Rachael crooned, "who knew you were such a romantic?"

  Kierin felt a curious rush of jealousy at the look that Holt exchanged with Rachael and her familiar use of his given name. Unconsciously, she moved closer to Holt.

  "Indeed," Holt muttered, "who knew?"

  "Well, dear," Clara Beaker said to Kierin, "it's a lucky woman who marries a man with a little romance in him." She smiled up wistfully at her husband and patted the coarse black sleeve of his clerical jacket. "Come along, Josiah. Let's leave these two lovebirds to their supper. We've kept them from it long enough."

  "You're right, Mother," Josiah Beaker said. He held his hand out to Holt and shoo
k it with bone-jarring vigor. "Mind you, be true to your word, boy, and find a House of God in the West. The Lord blesses those who seek him. Congratulations, Holt," Beaker told him briskly, then clapped Holt hard on his injured shoulder.

  Beaker failed to see Holt's reaction as he turned back to his wife, but Kierin didn't. She watched the color drain from his face as he struggled to maintain control over the pain from the unexpected blow. She moved close to him and allowed him to lean on her. Oh, if only he'd stayed in bed where he belonged. If Beaker discovered that Holt was injured...

  "It was so nice to meet you, Mrs. Beaker, Rachael," Kierin said, hurrying them on their way. "We'll see you again soon, I'm sure."

  "What else have we in this desolate country but each other for solace and company?" Clara Beaker called over her shoulder. "Good night, my dear."

  "Good night," Kierin answered halfheartedly, her attention already focused on Holt. She steered him toward the wagonbed.

  "Are you all right?" she asked when the Beakers were out of hearing.

  Holt reached out and braced a hand against the smooth, planked wood and leaned into it, closing his eyes. "Yeah," he said curtly, swallowing hard.

  "I told you, you should have stayed in bed," Kierin scolded gently while she inspected the fresh blood on the bandages. "You're—you're bleeding again."

  Holt brushed her hand away angrily. "Leave it. It'll be all right."

  "But-"

  "I said leave it." His voice was brittle, angry.

  Jim Kelly strode into the encampment just then, doffing his hat and shaking off the trail dust. "Holt. You're up. Hey, I was just asking your wife about you and she—"

  "Dammit. You, too?" Holt snarled, turning on his old friend, whose mouth dropped open in surprise.

  A knot formed in Kierin's throat as she watched him push away from the wagon and disappear into the darkness outside the circled camp. She couldn't leave it like this. She had to explain....