Depending on the Doctor (Nevada Bounty Book 2)

by Margaret Madigan

“Neither of us is Catholic.”

  “Don’t much matter.”

  “I guess it doesn’t.”

  What were the chances I got tangled up with the one outlaw gang with a disgraced priest among their number? My luck couldn’t get much worse.

  “All right then, it’s settled. We’ll have a wedding tomorrow, you’ll stay on as part of the gang, and your wife’ll be our cook and help Billy take care of the place.”

  “I’m not signing on for the long term, Clyde. This isn’t a life for a baby.”

  “This is a perfect place for a family. It’s safe and there’s always plenty to go around. You go to Omaha, you’ll be beholden to her family, you’ll have to work hard to earn a living and it’ll never be enough. Besides which, none of this changes the original deal—Ernie’s dead. At the very least, you have to work that off.”

  “I didn’t kill him,” I said, trying to follow his crooked reasoning.

  “You didn’t keep him alive.”

  “Nobody could have.”

  “Nobody else was there. You were.”

  I could think of no response to that, so I didn’t answer. I just stared out at the moonlit valley, wondering whether we’d be able to escape alive.

  Clyde stepped for the door.

  “Clyde,” I said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Not tomorrow. Give me a couple of days to break it to her. I think, even given her condition, she hoped for a nice church wedding.”

  He narrowed his eyes a bit, probably wondering what I was up to, but he finally shrugged. “Fine, two days.”

  “And don’t say anything to her about the baby. She’s already embarrassed to find herself in this position. She doesn’t need everyone here bringing it up.”

  “She’ll find out we know soon enough.”

  “True. Just let me figure out how to ease her into the idea.”

  I followed him inside where Billy had banked the fire and blown out the lamps before crawling into the other bottom bunk. Clyde headed for the ladder to the loft, and I went for the ladder of the bunk above Lydia. With one foot on the bottom rung, I glanced down at her. She still had her back turned to me. Her hair fell from the pins, and even fully clothed that curve from her ribs dipping to her waist then back up to her hips called to me, begging my fingers to trace it.

  I scrubbed my hand over my face. I was too tired to resist her and the comfort of her warm body against mine, so I toed off my boots and lifted the blanket to crawl in next to her. I fit perfectly against the curve of her back, and when I snuggled behind her, she shifted and murmured in her sleep.

  I brushed a loose curl from her neck and leaned in to whisper in her ear. “Shhh, sweetness. Go back to sleep.”

  I dropped a kiss on her neck just below her ear, and felt her little shiver right before she sighed and wriggled her bottom further back into me. I had to stifle a groan.

  She settled and her breathing became the even motion of sleep, but despite the comfort of her body next to mine, sleep wouldn’t come for me. How would I explain to her that in two days we’d be married? I couldn’t see her agreeing to it, even if it meant saving our skin. Given her recent fearlessness, she’d probably rather brave Clyde’s wrath than marry me.

  Still, I’d made the choice to play the ruse with Clyde, and if he found out I’d lied to him, there’d be hell to pay. I had to find a way to convince her, and then, before we met up with Randall I’d have to figure out a way to tell Lydia my darkest secrets and hope against all hope she could accept me anyway. If she knew the truth, Randall would have no hold over me. But sharing that truth meant taking a giant leap of faith I didn’t know if I could manage.

  On top of that tall order, informing Lydia she was supposed to be pregnant, too, well, I didn’t think that would go over well.

  It occurred to me that after we were married if we were stuck here through the winter we’d either have to make sure she became pregnant quickly—an idea which made certain parts of my anatomy twitch in anticipation—or we’d have to convince Clyde that she’d miscarried. He was smart enough that he’d notice if her belly didn’t start to swell soon.

  I settled further into the blankets, nestling my own swelling into the cleft of Lydia’s bottom, and relaxed the most I had in months, despite all my troubles. There was something about her that drew me like a moth to the flame. She was a study in contrasts—sweet, shy, proper, and yet resolute, saucy, tempting. The combination was arousing, even if that wasn’t her intention. I sighed. Everything else could wait until tomorrow. These few moments of comfort were worth relishing. If Lydia could face everything we’d faced head on, so could I. We’d make it work, together, no matter what happened.

  I woke early the next morning to Billy shaking my shoulder.

  “Miss Lydia, it’s time to wake up.”

  I scrubbed my eyes and tried to roll onto my back, but a huge obstacle blocked my way. I shifted around in the tiny cave-like space between the wall and the warm barrier enough to see Emmett’s sleepy face smiling at me.

  “Mornin’” he said.

  I gasped and pushed myself against the cold exterior wall. “What are you doing in my bed?”

  “Until Billy here insisted on waking you up, I was sleeping.”

  I gave his shoulder a shove. “I figured that much, but why? There are plenty of beds.”

  “This one looked the most comfortable.”

  He yawned and stretched like a cat—a big, sleek, well-muscled cat. I wiggled farther away from him, before I was tempted to reach out and touch him. My fingers didn’t seem to want to obey the commands of my brain; they wanted to stroke the stubble on Emmett’s cheeks, they wanted to trace his lips and ears, they wanted to know how soft his hair was and if he had any on his chest.

  I bit my bottom lip, hard, hoping the pain would clear my head and bring me to my senses. “Well get out of my bed. I have to get up and feed everyone.”

  He reached up and tucked some hair behind my ear, taking my breath away. “If you say so,” he said, his voice vibrating low, and his breath hot, in the small space between us.

  He shifted so he sat on the edge of the bed. I snatched my glasses from the spot where I’d left them for the night, and twisted myself until I sat next to him. I hadn’t moved all night and my body was stiff.

  I rolled my neck and put my glasses on. I almost chastised Emmett for climbing into my bunk, but the look on his face made me stop cold. I had no experience with it, but I’d swear I saw wonder in his eyes, and the same look I always saw on Isaac’s face when he looked at Beth—like he wanted to take a bite out of her. I couldn’t imagine any man ever looking at me like that, much less a man like Emmett.

  “You might want to fix your hair,” he said, lifting a loose curl to prove his point.

  I had to swallow before I could speak. “I was too tired to take it down and braid it last night.”

  I reached up and took the pins out. Half of my hair had already come loose from them anyway. The rest of it tumbled down my back in a tangled mess.

  Emmett made a choking sound and stood, heading for the door. “Going to go see to the horses…” he said, and left.

  Billy laughed out loud and headed for the hearth to start making coffee. I followed him.

  “What’s his problem?” I mumbled more to myself than to Billy, but he heard me anyway.

  He lifted an eyebrow at me. “You really don’t know?”

  “No. Do you have a brush?”

  He chuckled. “If you don’t know, you’ll find out soon enough. He’s a stick of dynamite with a lit fuse.”

  I had no idea what he meant. Was Emmett angry at me? Was that why Billy compared him to dynamite, because he was about to blow up at me? I couldn’t imagine why he’d be angry. We were alive, after all. We could still escape. I’d have to find some time today to talk to him, to set him straight.

  Billy had fetched a brush from the dresser, and handed it to me.

  “I assume we need to start some breakfast?�
� I asked as I brushed the tangles from my hair.

  “Yes, ma’am. And if you don’t mind my saying, Emmett’s a lucky man.”

  My confusion must have shown on my face. “What do you mean?”

  I twisted my hair into a bun at the back of my neck.

  “To have you as his woman. He’s a lucky man.”

  I sighed. “We told you last night, I’m not his. He’s not mine. We’re not a couple.”

  He shrugged. “If you say so, but you say one thing and act completely different. Just so you know.”

  “Let’s just focus on breakfast, shall we?” I asked, using my best teacher voice. I didn’t want to think about Emmett right now. What if Billy was right? What if somewhere deep down on an instinctive level we were drawn together? Did I want to be Emmett’s woman? Did I want him to be my man? I’d pretty much accepted the fact that I’d always be alone, and some part of me liked being independent. I was proud of being self-sufficient, of not depending on a man to provide for me and protect me. On the other hand, ever since Emmett had come into my life, everything had turned upside down. I’d changed just in those few days, been forced to tap into parts of me I didn’t know even existed—and I liked how liberating it felt.

  I thought about waking up with him in my bed this morning and I liked the possibility.

  I realized Billy was talking to me. “I’ll show you where the henhouse is, and we can draw some water from the well. We have some bread left from yesterday, and there’s some ham here in the cabin, but once the sun’s up, I’ll give you a tour of the camp and where we store all the food.”

  Of course, we’d been talking about breakfast.

  “Fine. Good. And later today, I’ll need to bathe and wash some clothes.”

  “Oh, that’s a good idea. I can’t wash clothes with only one hand, but I’m sure the men will be happy to have you around to do their washing.”

  I groaned to myself. Just what I wanted…to be washerwoman to seven men. A mental image of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs struck me then, though I had no illusions of any prince coming to my rescue. My possible prince was in as much danger as I was. I’d have to engineer my own rescue, and take Emmett along with me.

  Outside on the porch, I took a deep breath of cool, refreshing air as I buttoned my coat. The sky at the east side of the valley had turned a lovely shade of lavender as the sun approached the horizon and lit the clouds from behind.

  As Billy and I descended the porch steps he said, “Looks like clouds came in overnight. Hope we don’t get more snow.”

  He’d given me a basket for eggs, and he carried a bucket. The well was in the middle of the yard central to all the cabins. I helped Billy hook up the bucket and lower it into the well, but as it splashed, I also heard a thud. Billy began the process of cranking the bucket back up. I heard another thud.

  “What’s that sound?” I asked.

  Billy looked over his shoulder. “Looks like Mr. Emmett’s letting off some steam,” he said, his voice colored by humor.

  “Letting off steam?”

  “He’s chopping wood.”

  “How’s that letting off steam?”

  Billy retrieved the bucket. “Ma’am, if you don’t know, it’s not my place to explain it.”

  He left the water near the well and told me we’d collect it again on the way back from collecting eggs.

  We passed near Emmett on our way to the henhouse. He didn’t so much as acknowledge us, so complete was his concentration. He’d discarded his coat and rolled up his sleeves.

  He placed another chunk of wood on the block and stepped back to swing the axe. It whistled through the air and sliced through the wood with such ease, it may as well have been a saber slicing butter. His face belied the depth of his emotion. I understood then what Billy meant by letting off steam. Something clearly troubled Emmett. The planes of his face looked sharp and cruel in the deep shadows before dawn. He appeared angry, and I worried because of it. Of course, I was concerned about him, but what could lead him to those kinds of emotions? Did he know something about Clyde that I didn’t? Did he think we wouldn’t be able to escape? The questions swirled in my head until my heart became a toxic soup of emotion, too. Just how deep was the mess we’d got ourselves into?

  Emmett just kept chopping one piece of wood after another, like a huge, lean, angry machine.

  “This here’s the henhouse,” Billy said.

  “What?”

  I had to pull my attention away from Emmett to focus on Billy’s words. Something about the way the muscles of his forearms stood out as he gripped and swung the axe had left me breathless.

  We had to find our way by touch in the darkness of the henhouse, but we collected a couple dozen eggs, fed the hens grain from a nearby barrel, as well as some scraps I’d hauled in the basket from the house.

  When we stepped back outside the sky had turned lighter gray and it appeared that clouds had definitely come in during the night, and they looked as angry as Emmett—heavy, low-hanging, and foreboding.

  “Hard to tell until the sun’s all the way up, but it looks like snow today,” Billy said. “If the wind picks up, may even be a blizzard coming.”

  By now Emmett was stacking wood. When we walked by he looked up. He seemed surprised to see us. “Lydia.”

  “Yes?”

  “I need to talk to you sometime today.”

  I nodded. “Find me when you have a minute.”

  Billy and I managed to get breakfast on the table for everyone. As we sat and ate, I noticed furtive glances, downcast eyes, and some grins directed at Emmett. He kept his attention doggedly on his plate, and when he finished eating, he headed back out the door without so much as a word. Snickers followed in his wake.

  After they’d left, and while I cleaned plates, I chalked their behavior up to being unused to having a woman around. It was the only explanation I could fathom.

  “You said you wanted a bath, Miss Lydia?” Billy asked.

  “Yes, but I think I should get the rest of the cleaning done first, and bathe last. Can you show me where you usually wash clothes?”

  “We actually have a bathhouse,” he said it with such pride, it made me smile.

  “Well, show me the way. We’ll collect all the dirty clothes at the bunkhouse on the way.”

  Outside again, snowflakes tumbled from the sky, and the wind had picked up some.

  “Looks like we’ll have that blizzard after all,” Billy said. “When we finish here we’ll need to stock up the cabin. Make sure we have enough food for a few days.”

  “Okay,” I said. I’d never lived somewhere that had blizzards, so I was unaware of how people survived them, and how long it would delay our ability to escape.

  Bathhouse was a generous description of the building. It had a fireplace for heating water, shelves on one wall—there was even a small stack of clean towels, though there was also a pile of wadded towels on the floor nearby—clotheslines strung all across the room, a rough bench along another wall that I’d hesitate to expose naked flesh to, and two large tubs in the middle of the room.

  We’d collected a huge pile of laundry that I dumped into one of the tubs. Billy began the process of hauling water, and I started a fire in the fireplace.

  By the time we had all the laundry scrubbed and hanging from the lines, I was ready for a relaxing bath. I didn’t care if there were any more chores left to do, or if the blizzard had decided to rage outside. I needed a few minutes to rest my sore muscles and joints, and inside the bathhouse was cozy.

  When the second tub was partially full of warm water, Billy left me blissfully alone.

  I stripped off my dirty clothes and took a few minutes to scrub them in the washing tub and hang them with the rest of the clothes, then I poured the last kettle of hot water into the bathing tub and stepped in. Just hot enough to sting, I hissed as I sat, then moaned out loud at how wonderful the hot water felt on my achy body and filthy skin.

  I had to admit, despite being he
ld captive against my will, I’d enjoyed the manual labor of washing, and I always enjoyed feeding people. I felt like I’d accomplished something today. I knew it was only one day, and after many days of the same monotony, I’d certainly loathe it, but even though they were a gang of criminals, I thought these men needed me, almost like taking care of a family, albeit a lawless, dangerous one.

  Just as the heat of the water and fireplace had me feeling drowsy, the door opened and shut, letting in a sharp blast of cold. The rows of hanging clothes hid whoever had come in.

  “Who’s there?” I asked.

  “Lydia? Where are you?”

  It was Emmett. His voice sounded urgent and concerned. The rows of clothing bobbed and jerked as he tried to find his way through.

  “I’m in the bath.”

  The movement stopped. “Are you decent?”

  “I’m naked, so no.”

  “We need to talk.”

  “So talk. I can hear you.”

  “I can’t talk to you while hiding in the laundry.”

  “All right. Hand me one of the towels from the shelf.”

  He was quiet for a moment. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Whyever not?”

  “You should get your own towel.”

  “But it’s cold, and I’ll drip all over.”

  I thought I heard him growl. “Lydia, why can you never make things easy?”

  He wrestled his way through the laundry and finally burst free in a swirl of shirts and trousers. His back was to me, his coat stretched taut across his shoulders, his pants tight across his behind and thighs.

  He grabbed a towel from the shelf.

  I swallowed hard. I’d made a mistake. How would he hand me a towel without seeing me naked? The same thought must have occurred to him, because he hesitated. But not for long.

  He turned and opened the towel, ready to wrap it around me. His eyes met mine and held my gaze while he took the two steps to the tub. I crossed my arms over my chest, and pulled my legs up to cover myself as best I could. My heart hammered in my chest. Sweat dripped down my neck. There wasn’t a hint of cold in the room. It was hot as a Roman steam bath.