My Heart Burns (Bandit Creek Book 24)

by Marlene Renee

  Sheriff Dan’s eyes narrowed at me and his voice was as dry as dirt. “No idea how much to charge a patient. Just how new of a doctor are you?”

  “Very.” I’d always been honest to the bone. Couldn’t help it - that was me. But I did wonder if coloring the truth might have been wiser.

  “Define very.”

  Oops. But good lord, could his tone get any drier?

  In for a penny in for a pound, Daddy always said. So I answered, “You were my first patient.”

  A nerve jumped along the side of his jaw. I braced myself for an explosion and got a surprise instead.

  He laughed. Guffawed actually. It made me cross my arms and put my nose in the air.

  “My God, woman, you’ve got nerve. Either that or you’re crazy. Can’t say that I enjoy knowing I was your practice patient. But you got the job done, I’ll give you that.” Then he paused, gave me look that made me want to fan myself. “Who are you? The lady in green, the salon girl in red, or the pretty doc in gingham blue who told me to drop my pants?”

  None of those yet all of those. In less than a day this man had seen more facets of myself than even I knew I had. Made my emotions jump all over the scale too. For some reason I felt compelled to remind him of another side of me. “I’m Rob Delaney’s niece, recently graduated from medical school.”

  “Rob’s mentioned his nieces, said they’re spoiled rich Chicago girls. Hard to believe Rob’s niece would wear a red prostitute’s dress and point a derringer at a train robber.”

  He had no idea how hard it was for me to believe that too. “I am his niece. Besides, rich or not, a Chicago lady just might do that if a baby puked all over her clothes, someone had stolen her satchel, she had nothing else to wear, and a deranged bandit took her grandmother’s reticule.”

  Sheriff Dan slapped his Stetson against the side of his leg.

  “Uh-huh, I’m still not convinced. I think fainting as opposed to shooting someone would be more a spoiled Eastern lady’s style.” His teasing tone took the sting from his words. “But whoever you are, you are proving to be one interesting lady. Let’s go for that walk and that breakfast.”

  Interesting? Not exactly a word that makes a woman glow with feminine pride but - I decided I’d take it. I swayed to the front door, pointedly waited for the Sheriff to open it for me.

  As I passed through the doorway, he caught my elbow, leaned his head close to mine. Whispered words brushed soft and warm over my ear. “By the way, I don’t faint.” His eyes crinkled at the corners before he added with a wicked grin, “And maybe I’ll figure out which of the four women I’m with today.”

  I wanted to protest the burn and suggestion in his smile but my red woman side quirked an eyebrow back at the sexy man and purred in a husky tone, “Maybe I’ll keep you guessing.”

  The flash of surprise on the Sheriff’s face tugged the corners of my lips higher. Maybe being interesting was a good thing after all.

  Of one thing I was certain, I’d left the Chicago Mackenzie back in my parents’ home.

  Chapter Seven

  Carly had been right. By the time I’d walked Sheriff Dan and his horse to the stables at the other end of town and then back to the B and C, tongues were wagging. Their comments easily reached my ears. Who was I? Wasn’t I Rob Delaney’s niece? Why was I with the Sheriff? Also, I received a fair share of venomous looks - from unattached ladies I assumed. It seemed surprising considering Bandit Creek’s population weighed heavily on the male side. My assumption was single females would have their pick of suitors, rather than many vying for one man. But maybe my theory was lacking information. From the corner of my eye, I did a subtle survey of the rangy lawman beside me. Even dusty and with a hitch in his step, he’d draw Chicago debutantes like bees to honey. Feminine pride thrust my head a little higher, swayed my skirts a little wider. All those women looking at the Sheriff - not so surprising after all.

  Our polite conversation rested on the town, its people and the bandits. By the time we were outside the B and C we’d both found the rhythm and dance of drawing each other out and our words flowed with ease.

  Sheriff Dan stopped me under the covered porch with a touch to my arm, turned so we were face to face.

  “Do you have what it takes to be a female doctor in the west?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Grit. You’ll need it in spades.”

  Did I? “After what you’ve seen me handle since I’ve arrived, what do you think?” I was dead serious. He knew what made this town tick, what it took to survive out here.

  “The West tests a person time and time again. If you can’t get back up after a blow, stand strong no matter what it throws at you, you’ll wither away. So I ask you again, do you have grit?”

  Did I? I asked myself that question again, turned it over with careful hands, studied it. “Yes, I think I do.”

  “Think isn’t good enough, Mackenzie.”

  His hand on my lower back guided me to a deep corner table. The Sheriff sat against the wall with an unobstructed view of the customers. I sat to his left, our bodies making a right angle at the small table. Our proximity - we were knee to knee when we pulled up our chairs – silenced me. Odd, I know, considering I’d just operated on him. But he’d called me Mackenzie in a gentle voice, touched me with a soft hand. Both confused yet warmed me.

  Carly greeted us, obliged Sheriff Dan’s needs by folding and refolding a soft blanket for his chair and then filled a pair of heavy mugs with fragrant coffee. We simply ordered breakfast - the only meal on the menu this time of day - eggs, slabs of fried meat, and slices of the heavenly bread the B and C was known for.

  Carly winked at me from beside the Sheriff’s full head of chestnut hair.

  She didn’t actually think - the sheriff and I? I shook my head no – ever so slightly – hoping the man in question didn’t notice our silent exchange.

  Nor the color that bloomed on my cheeks.

  Where had all these blushes come from? Where was the Mackenzie who handled men with distance, composed coolness – sometimes ice? Here in the West I zeroed in on broad shoulders, muscular arms and discovered I had a fetish for buttocks. Well, at least for Sheriff Dan’s. Heat flooded me from tip to toe. I ducked my head, pretended to take a sip of the steaming coffee, inwardly groaned at my wayward thoughts. What other latent actions, emotions, had the mountains awakened within me?

  We sat in silence for a few minutes – me pondering my grit factor, the Sheriff watching the comings and goings in the B and C. As I pondered and he watched, I snuck peaks at the slight crook in his nose, noted his long fingers wrapped almost entirely around the width of the coffee cup.

  I was aware of him as I’d never been aware of any man in my life.

  When our meals arrived, our silence continued. I put it down to hunger.

  I lied.

  Sheriff Dan spoke first, lay his utensils on the table, took a long drink of the coffee that was so black I had to pour a substantial amount of cream in it just to tolerate a small mouthful.

  “Mackenzie, I apologize for my behaviour yesterday on the train. Lorelei’s girls have been stirring up hornet’s nests with the minors. I didn’t need another girl – especially one so pretty – arriving in town to stir up more.”

  When I started to answer, he lifted a hand, stopped me.

  “There’s more. I apologize for my - indiscretion when I stopped you from shooting Boyd.”

  He looked at me straight, held my gaze without blinking.

  I studied his eyes that had gone evening blue, noted the slight flush of his neck along his collar, heard the steadiness in his deep tones. I believed him. He struck me as a proud man, one who didn’t often misjudge or behave inappropriately. Yet he’d stopped just short of touching my breast when he thought me a prostitute.

  That action still bothered.

  With a quick look at the full tables surrounding us, I leaned forward, lowered my voice to a whisper. “You touched me . . .” I couldn�
�t finish the sentence. Discussing my breasts with anyone let alone a man I barely knew was unthinkable.

  The flush crawled higher on his neck. “I did. I thought you were . . .”

  Anger fire-balled through me. “What? A whore?”

  His nod was short, sharp.

  “Even a . . . lady of the evening deserves to be treated with respect,” I hissed.

  “I have no excuse. It was wrong.” His voice was flat, devoid of mockery or denial. It rang clear and true.

  It doused my anger better than a bucket of water.

  And left me defenseless against the velvet smooth words that followed, that brushed my skin, left bumps and shivers in their wake.

  “Would you consider leaving my misjudgement and indiscretion in the past? Consider restarting our acquaintance as friends? Perhaps share a few meals with me, walk with me in the evening?” His eyes were rock steady on mine.

  Why then were mine flicking every which way but straight ahead? Why was my breath caught high in my throat? Why was pleasure smiling a big sappy grin in my stomach?

  I snapped back in my chair. Wished I had a fan to cool my face, hide my traitorous emotions. It was all Tepid Tom’s fault I decided. Never had he looked at me with any intensity. Never had he made me feel these feelings.

  “I’m engaged.” I pushed the words out there. They were the only defense I could muster. I felt like I was floundering in quicksand and grabbed whatever I could to steady myself. But I knew my words were too shallow, too falsely bright, for a woman who was getting married within a month.

  The warmth in his eyes dimmed, died.

  My stomach’s sappy grin shrivelled into dust.

  “I’m here for the doctor!”

  The sharp yell ricocheted around the room, silenced the B and C crowd.

  A quick shot wrenched a man’s hat from his head, drove him – hands wrapped around his skull – under his table.

  “Next shot someone dies!” screeched Hettie Larange. “Now where’s the doctor?”

  Chapter Eight

  I slipped my right hand beneath the table.

  “Don’t! Hettie chose to miss that shot.” Sheriff Dan growled. He caught my hand, held it tourniquet tight as he reached for his hip with his right. “Damn it to hell! I left my gun at Rob’s place!”

  “But.”

  “No! Let me handle this. She’s volatile. Any provocation could set her off.”

  I eased my gun hand back to the tabletop.

  “Doc, stand up or this man dies.” Hettie grabbed the collar of the man sitting closest to her, yanked him towards her, held her gun to his temple.

  “Mackenzie, stand up nice and slow, hands visible,” Sheriff Dan whispered to me. To Hettie he called out, “The doctor’s here with me.”

  I pushed my chair back, rose and turned to face my nemesis. Sheriff Dan moved to stand ahead of me and slightly to the side. I breathed in his solidity.

  “A woman doctor.” The sneer in Hettie’s voice cut through the air and slapped me on the cheek. “Sheriff, where’s the real doctor?”

  I reacted in a way I never would have in Chicago. If Hettie shot a hole in me as a result, I’d blame my actions on the effects of that mountain magic.

  I lunged forward - that is lunged until Sheriff Dan’s iron grip on my arm held me back. But he couldn’t control my mouth.

  “A woman bandit.” My sneer was an exact replica of hers. “Sheriff, where’s the real bandit?”

  He muttered a curse under his breath.

  “You’re the whore from the train!” Hettie swung the handgun’s sights directly between my eyes. “Step away, Sheriff. That one needed killing on the train.”

  “Hettie, she’s the only doctor in town.” His words were as dry as sunbaked dirt.

  Hettie’s eyes narrowed on me but she flicked a glance to the Sheriff before she spat, “Hell you say. The whore’s a doctor?”

  “Doctor, not a whore.”

  The click of the gun’s hammer echoed like a death knell through the room; the second time I’d experienced that sound around Hettie. The association was not a positive one.

  “You better not be messing with me Sheriff. She looked, moved, and acted like a whore.”

  “She’s a doctor. She removed your buckshot from me this morning.”

  The tension in the room quivered like a tightly strung bow. When Hettie first pointed her gun my way, those customers closest to me had crept, some outright bolted as far away from me as possible. They huddled now in tight little knots around the room, their eyes swinging from Hettie to me and back again. Their escape was cut off; Hettie controlled the room from the doorway.

  Hettie vibrated with anger. The Sheriff was right about that. If I had reined in my emotions just moments before, I would have recognized that fact and not added to the powder keg of danger. It wasn’t how she white-knuckled her gun, nor the fact that she danced from the ball of one foot to the other that clued me in. No, it was Hettie’s eyes. They were glazed, unfocused like an animal trapped with no obvious escape except through those around her.

  I gritted my teeth, pushed rock hard bravado into my look as I stared back at her.

  “Bloody hell,” Hettie bit out. “Whore, you better be good. My Boyd is gut shot. Needs help now. If he dies, so do you.”

  My stomach knotted so tight I feared every scrap of food in it would vomit back onto my plate. But I’d learned since my rash clash with Hettie on the train. This was a woman without qualms or conscience. What little compassion she had in her was for Boyd period. No one else. I suspected not even for herself.

  I no longer had any doubt she would stick to her word.

  I clamped my trembling jaw still, pushed my chin higher, and stepped around the tables towards the doorway of the B and C. Mentally I scoured the pages of my knowledge, preparing myself for my second operation of my day, of my career and possibly of my life.

  Chapter Nine

  I could feel Sheriff Dan’s warm breath on my neck as he followed on my heels. Instead of adding comfort, it rattled my thin hold on my composure.

  “What are you doing?” I hissed under my breath.

  “My job. Without my gun, the only protection I can give you is to stick close to Hettie, closer to you.” As we stepped past Hettie, he ground out, “Kill the doc and I’ll kill you, Hettie.”

  I didn’t care if it was his job or not. I sucked in the raw determination from his words and drew comfort from the light pressure of his hand on my lower back as I stepped through the doorway.

  Hettie’s shrill laugh followed us outside. “My men will kill you first, Sheriff.”

  Sure enough, the rest of Boyd’s gang sat on horseback outside the B and C, guns pulled, eyes scouring the buildings on either side and across the dirt-packed street from the B and C. A wagon sat in their midst. I guessed that Boyd was laid out in the back.

  Hettie waved her gun towards the wagon bed, barked, “Get in with Boyd.”

  The Sheriff hoisted me onto the lowered back end of the wagon, gave my trembling hand a squeeze before he climbed on himself. I bunched my skirts up with one hand, crawled my way to Boyd’s side, peered down into his face.

  “That’s no doc. That’s the whore.”

  I was sincerely tired of that word. But I clenched my hand tighter in my skirts so I didn’t strike Boyd with a sharp right to the nose just like Daddy had taught me. However, chasing my flash of anger was fear for my well-being. For the first time since I’d arrived in Montana I seriously questioned my decision to travel west. A sick baby, stolen baggage, a saloon girl’s dress, my grandmother’s reticule – all faded into insignificance alongside my life. If I had stayed in Chicago, I wouldn’t be sitting in a wagon surrounded by gunmen with a seriously injured man’s life on my hands. Instead I would be making a mess of needlepoint and painting stick figures on a canvas waiting for the days to crawl by until I became a reluctant wife.

  Would I make the same decision over again?

  Did I have the grit to sur
vive in this land?

  I glanced past Sheriff Dan, past the gang surrounding the wagon to the mountains holding dominion over the town. I don’t know if I expected those ancient wrinkles of rock to speak to me or to rock my core like they did the first time I laid eyes on them.

  They did neither.

  Instead, those massive juts of granite were what they were best.

  Strength. Power.

  They didn’t rock my core, they made my core a rock.

  With a sigh, I admitted what my gut had known all along. Even with my current danger, leaving Chicago had been the best choice of my life.

  JD’s words drifted through my mind: mountains will forge your pieces into purpose.

  He’d been right. This raw land created strong people - if you accepted the challenge.

  My anger for Boyd’s comment and for myself melted away. With steady, sure hands I felt his hot, dry forehead, checked under the wad of cloth tied to his blood-soaked shirt on his lower left side.

  I didn’t want to risk moving him any more than necessary before we reached the office so I asked Hettie, who was sitting beside the driver, “Did the bullet exit or is it still in his back?”

  “All I know is there’s a damn big hole in his back.”

  Thank God. A damn big hole meant the bullet had likely gone through. The wound appeared to be an inch or two above Boyd’s waistband and an inch or less in from his side. I hoped the bullet had gone through muscle and missed internal organs. If that were the case, my task might be as simple as cleaning, suturing, and prescribing rest.

  Except for Boyd’s slight fever.

  My brow furrowed as I looked at his overbright eyes and dry lips.

  On the down side, a fever could kill. The odds increased if infection had set in. On the positive side, it was the body’s defense to heat up, fight off any infection from setting in.

  I hoped Boyd’s defenses were on the offensive.

  At Uncle Rob’s I ordered three men – one at his head and chest, one by his abdomen, and one at his legs - to pick Boyd up, keep his body as straight as possible, slide him onto the stretcher I’d grabbed from the office and pass him to a couple of men standing at the end of the wagon. I raced ahead into the office and pulled out the surgical tools I would need. I sent another gang member off with a bucket to the water pump. I would need plenty of fresh water.