Karen Witemeyer

by Stealing the Preacher

  But it wasn’t the buck that fell.

  A slender figure had emerged from the brush fifty yards downwind at the same moment Silas’s rifle cracked its shot. The buck bounded away. The figure crumpled.

  No! Silas’s mind screamed the word his constricted throat couldn’t voice. How . . . ? Where had he . . . ? It wasn’t possible. All of the men were farther north.

  But it wasn’t a man.

  Acid churned in his stomach as the truth dawned in horrifying clarity. “No. Please, God. No!” Leaping forward, Silas sprinted down the hill, stumbling over tree roots, slipping on sandy soil. Thick shrub branches tore at his face and hands. He shoved them aside.

  He forced his way through the last bramble and fell to his knees beside Jackson Spivey’s writhing form. The boy was belly down, moaning, trying to reach behind his shoulder to the place where blood oozed from a bullet-sized hole. A bullet Silas had put there.

  “Easy, Jackson.” Silas snatched the bandana from his neck, wadded it, and pressed it hard against the boy’s wound.

  Jackson cried out, the sound lacerating Silas’s soul.

  “Don’t worry, son. I’m gonna get you out of here. You’re gonna be fine.” He had to be fine. Silas couldn’t be responsible for another boy’s death.

  Holding the dressing in place, Silas rolled him over. A whimper echoed in the air between them, but Silas wasn’t sure if it emanated from Jackson or himself.

  Muddy streaks marred the kid’s face, where tears had coursed over his cheeks. His breaths came in shallow little pants as he struggled to keep a brave front. “It hurts, Mr. Robbins.”

  “I know, boy. But you’re tough. You’ll pull through.” Maybe if he said it enough times, one of them would start to believe it.

  Silas searched Jackson’s chest for an exit wound. He found none. Biting back an oath, he scanned the hillside for any sign of his men. Where are they? They should have headed his way after hearing his gunshot—if for no other reason than to see what type of game he’d bagged.

  His grip tightened on Jackson, remorse hitting him so hard, his head spun. He squeezed his eyes shut and gathered his wits. Regret wasn’t going to get the boy home. A strong back was. Silas slid his hunting knife from the sheath at his waist and yanked the tail of his shirt free from his trousers. Slicing the flannel with the blade, he tugged and tore until he had a strip long enough to wrap around Jackson’s chest. Trying not to jostle the boy too much, he wrestled the bandage until it securely bound the dressing to the wound.

  When he finished, Jackson’s eyes had closed. The fight seemed to be draining from him along with his blood. Silas swallowed the growing lump in his throat. He couldn’t let another minute pass without saying what needed to be said.

  “I’m sorry, Jackson.” He hugged the boy gently to his chest and squinted away the moisture pooling near his lashes. “So sorry.”

  “It ain’t your fault.” Jackson’s eyes cracked open a slit. “Jo fussed at me ’bout not hunting without permission. I was . . . too stubborn to listen. Guess . . . she was right, huh?” He tried to chuckle, but the weak sound turned into a cough.

  Silas winced.

  He’d been too stubborn to listen, too. What if she was right again? What if God really did care?

  Jackson’s head lolled to the side as the boy lost consciousness. His face ashen, his body limp, he was knockin’ on death’s door.

  Silas lifted his face to heaven. “I know you and I ain’t seen eye to eye for quite some time, and I know I’m to blame for this predicament. But if you could see your way to intervening on the boy’s behalf, I’d take it as a personal favor.”

  The sky didn’t open. No angelic chorus started singing. No beam of heavenly light fell across Jackson’s face. The kid just lay there as broken as before.

  Fine. He’d handle it by himself. It’d been crazy to think God would listen to him anyway. Maybe he listened to people like Jo and Martha, but to bitter old outlaws with blood on their hands? Not likely.

  “All right, kid,” he grunted as he shifted to take Jackson’s weight. “Let’s get you out of here.” He collected the fallen rifles and hoisted the boy over his right shoulder like a gangly sack of potatoes. Using the rifles as if they were a cane, Silas levered himself up to a standing position and quickly braced his legs. Once he had Jackson’s weight distributed evenly, he set off for the trail using the arm with the rifles to shield the boy from the worst of the brush as he pushed them through.

  A pair of shots echoed some distance to the north, drawing a scowl from Silas. If the men were off chasing their own game, there’d be no one to help him with Jackson. The kid would never make it.

  “Why won’t you do something?” Silas groaned beneath his labored breath. He would have shouted his frustration to the sky, but he had no energy to spare. The vegetation thinned as he neared the edge of the gulley. He struggled to put one foot in front of the other, the ground beneath him growing increasingly steep.

  His boot slipped. He tightened his one-arm hold on Jackson and leaned into the hill, digging his toes into the sandy soil. Silas rammed the rifle butts into the ground to help him stabilize. His gaze lifted to where the hill leveled out above him. Still twenty yards to go.

  Sweat beaded his forehead despite the cool morning breeze. Silas set his jaw and took another step. He’d get the boy home or die trying.

  Ten yards. Five. Something caught the toe of his boot. A root, maybe? He staggered to the right, Jackson’s weight nearly toppling him sideways. Not now. He was so close. Just a few more steps.

  He thrust the rifle butts into the earth as he corrected his balance. Once steady he started onward, but the sandy slope shifted beneath his boots. As his feet struggled to find purchase again and again, his defenses weakened. Determination alone wasn’t going to save Jackson. Nor would stubbornness or strength of will.

  The next slip took Silas to his knees. As his legs absorbed the impact of his collision, his soul absorbed the realization that relying on himself was hopeless. A forty-year-old grudge against God had no place on this hillside nor in his heart. Not when a boy’s life hung in the balance.

  Arms shaking, he clung to Jackson while his pride and bitterness crumbled to dust. “I need your help.” Though God knew he didn’t deserve it. “Please. No favors. No bargains. I’m just a sinner on his knees beggin’ for mercy. Beggin’ you to spare the life of this boy. Please. I ain’t demandin’ a miracle or a flock of angels to swoop down and flutter their wings around him. I ain’t got no right to ask for such things. All I ask is that you give us a fighting chance.”

  His breath shuddered as he inhaled. “I’m done running. If you want me . . . I’m yours.”

  Silas made no effort to get up. He did make an effort to trust—to trust in a God he didn’t understand. Leaning on the faith of his daughter and his wife . . . he waited.

  Barely a moment passed before the sound of his name being called met his ears.

  “Here!” Silas yelled in response. “Hurry!”

  Footsteps pounded faster, louder.

  Silas struggled to stand, bracing himself against the slope and clasping Jackson’s legs tight to his chest.

  “Give me your hand,” a voice called from above.

  Silas lifted his head as he swung the rifles up over the ridge. “Archer. Thank God.” Never had he meant two words more.

  The parson’s solid grasp encircled his wrist, and with his strength counterbalancing the downward slope of the hill, it only took two long strides for Silas to regain the trail.

  “Is that Jackson?” Archer paled, taking in the kid’s limp form.

  Silas swallowed hard, guilt tearing at his throat. “He jumped in front of my bullet when I tried to take down a buck. I never knew he was there.” Moisture pooled in his eyes, but for once he didn’t care. His pride no longer mattered. All that mattered was Jackson.

  He braced himself for Archer’s disdain. It was what he deserved. But the man met his gaze head on, nothing more than con
cern etched on his face. “Come on,” he said, slinging his rifle strap over his shoulder and gathering up the other two. “I’ll help you get him to the house.”

  Each man took one of Jackson’s arms and wound it about his neck. Their greater height kept all but the toes of the boy’s boots from scraping the ground as they stretched their stride in the rush to get home.

  “How’d you know to come?” Silas huffed out between steps. “I heard the others hunting farther on.”

  “It’s hard to explain,” Archer replied, his own breath heaving between the words. “As soon as I heard your shot, my gut reacted. The guys assured me you were fine, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was supposed to check on you.”

  God brought him back. Archer didn’t make the claim, but Silas knew it was true. God had intervened. Even before Silas had been aware of the need.

  Silence fell between them again as they concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other as quickly as possible. Finally, the barn came into view. And with it another slew of problems. They might have gotten the boy home, but the doctor was miles away. Fetching one from Deanville would take at least a couple hours—if they could even find the man.

  Silas regarded the preacher from the corner of his eye. “You prayin’, Archer?” Heaven knew the boy needed someone with more pull than he had with the big man upstairs if the kid was gonna have a shot at surviving this mess.

  “With every step, Si,” he grunted out, twisting his neck to meet his gaze. “With every step.”

  Silas nodded, the vise around his heart loosening just a touch. “Me too.”

  30

  Joanna plucked another weed free from around the new carrot tops that had recently pushed through the soil, her mind far from her task. Crockett had invited her to go riding with him when he returned from hunting. Just the two of them. A flutter of anticipation danced in her belly. She planned to show him some of her mother’s favorite painting spots, and if she could muster the nerve, she might even ask permission to sketch his likeness. Not that she hadn’t sketched him already. She’d completed at least a dozen drawings, but they’d all captured Crockett from a distance.

  What would it be like to study him up close? To take her time with each feature of his face in order to replicate it on paper? The strong line of his jaw. The sparkle in his eyes when he teased her. The curve of his mouth when he smiled.

  The way his lips softened right before they met hers.

  Joanna’s hands stilled. Would Crockett kiss her again? Mercy, but she hoped so. Her breath caught in her throat as her eyes slid closed to savor the memory of the kiss they’d shared down by the river. Would their second kiss be as heavenly as the first?

  She blinked against the sunlight, and a smile bloomed across her face—until she noticed three men limping toward her from the edge of the woods.

  Instantly alert, she shot to her feet and lifted a hand to block the sun’s glare.

  Someone was hurt. She couldn’t tell who from this distance, but she knew what her father expected of her in such a situation.

  Dashing through the open gate, Joanna abandoned the garden and ran for the house. She bounded up the back porch steps and grabbed the metal rod that hung from the large metal triangle she used for calling the men to supper. She circled the inside of it again and again, striking metal against metal with a strength borne of fear. The clamor nearly deafened her, but she kept it up until the ache in her arm forced her to stop. She prayed the others were within earshot. If so, the alarm would have them running for the house.

  The entire time she rang the dinner bell, her focus remained locked on the trio of men approaching from the north. The one on the right had the build of her father, but he was so hunched over from the weight of the injured man, she couldn’t be sure. The one on the left was slightly taller, and her heart wanted so badly to believe it was Crockett—that both he and her father were unharmed.

  She longed to sprint out to meet them and see for herself who’d been hurt and how bad the injuries were, but practicality drove her into the house instead. Rushing out to them would only assuage her curiosity, but it wouldn’t actually help anyone. She’d be of better service gathering medical supplies and preparing a sickroom.

  Working the pump at the sink, Joanna quickly scrubbed away the garden dirt from her hands and under her nails, then ransacked the linen closet for the rolls of bandages and wads of cotton wool she always kept on hand. By the time she’d gathered the medicine box and the shears from her sewing basket, and stripped the quilt from her bed, heavy footfalls from the porch announced the arrival of the men.

  She’d purposely left the back door ajar, and as she rounded the corner into the kitchen, a male boot kicked it wide.

  “Bring him around to my room,” Joanna instructed before she’d even gotten a look at the men. “I’ve got things set up for him in there.”

  She held the door open as the threesome finagled their way through. A breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding whooshed from her lungs when she recognized her father and Crockett.

  Thank you, Lord, for keeping them safe.

  Crockett dropped the rifles he’d been toting to the floor. The injured man didn’t even flinch at the racket. That’s when she noticed the sandy hair and the slender build.

  “Jackson?” The name escaped her in a strangled cry.

  How had this happened? He was just a boy. A boy who should be pestering her with inappropriate marriage proposals, not drooping lifelessly across her daddy’s shoulders. She moaned, pressing her hand over her mouth to mute the sound. Was he dead already?

  “Is he . . .” She couldn’t quite voice the question as the men shuffled past her into the hall.

  “He’s still breathing, but there’s a bullet in him,” Crockett answered, his grim expression offering her little comfort.

  She followed the men into her room, and when she realized they meant to lay Jackson facedown, she darted to the head of the bed to remove the pillow. Better not take any chances. If he survived the bullet, she didn’t want a pillow suffocating him.

  The men grunted as they slowly lowered Jackson to the bed, taking care not to jostle him too much.

  “Hand me those shears,” Crockett said from the far side of the bed and immediately set to work extricating Jackson’s shirttails from his trousers.

  Joanna grabbed the scissors from the bedside table and held them out handle first.

  “Thanks.” He barely spared her a glance, so focused was he on Jackson. He snipped through the makeshift bandage that held the blood-soaked dressing in place and then started in on the shirt, cutting it from tail to neck.

  She retrieved the discarded bandage from where he’d tossed it on the sheet. Only then did she recognize the fabric as being from her father’s shirt.

  “Daddy . . . ?” Joanna turned, intending to ask what had happened, but the haunted look etched into his features dissolved her words.

  He stared at Jackson as if he didn’t really see him, as if his mind recalled another horror. She held her hand out to him, but he backed away until his bootheels hit the wall on the opposite side of the room. Then he slowly lowered himself to the floor. His hat knocked against the wall and tumbled to the rug. He never even blinked. He just covered his face with his hands and bowed his head over his knees.

  She’d never seen him like this—defeated. It frightened her.

  “I’m going to need water, Jo,” Crockett said, bringing her attention back to the boy on the bed. “Warm if you have it. And sponges or rags to clean the injured area.”

  She met Crockett’s gaze over the top of Jackson’s prone form. Compassion glowed there, along with a rigid determination that helped her own spine stiffen. They would fight this. Together.

  “You can start with the water in the pitcher.” She hurried to the washstand and filled the porcelain basin with water, then carried it to Crockett’s side of the bed, setting it on the edge of the dresser at his elbow. “The stove reservoir should h
ave warm water, and I’ll put on a couple of kettles, too.”

  He caught her hand before she could dash off to the kitchen. “Heat some of the reservoir water nearly to a boil and bring me the strongest lye soap you’ve got. Oh, and a knife. A thin, sharp one. And tweezers if you have ’em.” He spoke softly, as if he didn’t want the unconscious boy to overhear and start fretting.

  His gentleness nearly brought the tears she’d been battling to the surface, but she blinked them back and nodded her understanding before slipping out to the kitchen.

  She had just set the second kettle on to boil when the rest of the hands burst into the house.

  Frank and Carl bent double as soon as they saw she was unharmed and started wheezing as they gulped air into their lungs.

  “What happened?” Jasper demanded, apparently the only one who had enough breath to talk.

  “Jackson’s been shot. We’ll need to fetch a doctor.” She glanced back at the hall, expecting to see her father emerge. There was no way he couldn’t have heard the thundering herd arrive. He’d snap back to his usual self, start barking orders, and set everything to right. But he never came.

  “The boss?” Jasper asked, obviously at as much of a loss as Joanna.

  “He and Crockett are in with Jackson.” They didn’t need to know what state he was in at the moment. It would only rattle them, and right now Jackson needed them at their sharpest.

  “What do ya want us to do?” Frank wheezed.

  Joanna straightened her shoulders and spoke with authority. “Jasper, you and Frank ride to Deanville. One of you fetch the doctor. The other better track down Sam Spivey.” After years of watching her father lead his men, she easily mimicked his manner and tone. “Search the saloons first. Sober him up before you bring him back here, though. The last thing we need is someone yelling and knocking things around when we’re trying to save his boy’s life.”