Miranda Jarrett - Gift Of The Heart

Sighing, she leaned his rifle against the wall, opened the barn door and bent to slide her arm around his waist. Gratefully he put his arm across her shoulder and with a grunt managed to stand upright. Together they swayed unsteadily, the man’s weight almost too much for Rachel to manage. Having Billy clinging jealously to one of her knees didn’t help her balance one bit, either.

“Where’s your man?” the stranger asked when they’d managed to hobble to the wall for him to rest.

Rachel chewed on her lower lip, considering how best to answer. Most likely the man wanted to know if there was someone larger and more able to help him, but even weak as he was, she didn’t want him knowing exactly how alone she and Billy were.

“My husband’s not here at present,” she answered stiffly. With her arm around his waist, she was acutely aware of the man’s size, how he seemed all lean muscle and bone and sinew. Seventeen months had passed since William had left, seventeen months without feeling a man’s body pressed this closely to hers. “But I expect him back directly.”

The man glanced down at her beneath his long lashes. “Which army is he with?”

“American, of course, though—” She broke off, shamed by how easily he’d discovered the truth. “You’re a soldier, too, aren’t you? Is that how you were wounded, in a battle?”

“Aye, in a battle.” His voice was flat, so unemotional that Rachel guessed he had secrets of his own to hide. So be it; she’d respect that. But she couldn’t deny that she was curious about who he was and where he’d come from, why he hadn’t told her his name or asked hers either, and if the battle he’d fought would draw the war closer to her home. She’d simply have to wait until he told her himself, that was all. If he was like William, the next words from his mouth would be bragging and boasting about himself.

But somehow already she knew this man wasn’t at all like her husband.

“You go.” Billy looked suspiciously up the man’s long legs to his face. “You leave Mama alone an’ go. ”

The man smiled again. “I’m trying my best, lad.” He pushed away from the wall with a grunt, leaning heavily on Rachel. “If you can spare something warm—broth or cider—I’d be obliged, and then I won’t trouble you further. I’ve tarried here long enough.”

“All the hot cider in this county couldn’t make you fit to travel,” scoffed Rachel. “You’ll stay here until you’re able to move on.”

He looked at her warily, in a way that reminded Rachel of how he’d evaded her question about the army. “Nay, you are kind, but I can’t ask you to shelter me.”

“You didn’t ask. I offered.” And only common hospitality made her offer, she reassured herself. Blue eyes and the neat way her body fit next to his had nothing to do with it. “There’s precious few white folks in these lands, and we all do for each other. I wouldn’t want to think of you perishing by yourself in the woods.”

“So I won’t be alone after all, will I?” He might have laughed; the sound was so hollow that Rachel couldn’t tell. “How far to your house?”

“Not far.” Not far to her, thought Rachel grimly, but for him the short path would seem like forty miles instead of forty feet. She could feel the heat of the fever burning through his heavy clothing, and she suspected he was a great deal sicker than he wanted her to know. “Not far at all.”

The man nodded. “What’s the horse’s name?”

“Horse?” repeated Rachel, mystified. When William had left, he’d taken the one horse they’d owned.

“Aye, the lad’s.”

“Oh, Blackie.” Realizing belatedly that the man meant the stuffed horse that Billy was swinging purposefully in his hand only made her wonder more. Why under the circumstances should any man ask about a child’s toy?

“Blackie’s my horse an’ she’s my Mama.” His jaw set stubbornly and his small fist balled possessively in Rachel’s skirts, Billy glared up at the man who was claiming far too much of Rachel’s attention. “Now you go! ”

“Your Blackie’s a fine horse, lad,” answered the man with a seriousness neither Billy nor Rachel expected. “’Tis shameful to see him bound up in here with the cows. You’d best take him outside. Go on, lad. Show me how fast you and your horse can run!”

For a moment Billy looked at Rachel, clearly amazed by the freedom he’d just been given, and then he was gone, off through the open door as fast as his short legs, and Blackie, would carry him.

Trapped beneath the stranger’s arm, Rachel was powerless to stop him. “You’ve no right to do that! He’s scarce more than a babe!”

“He’ll be well enough, and you know it.” Resolutely the man took a tentative step, swayed unsteadily and grimaced with the pain. “Better than I will, anyways.”

He was right. By the time he and Rachel finally reached the little log house, the man’s face was white as the snow, his shirts soaked through with sweat, and he’d long ago stopped trying to talk. Rachel steered him toward the bed she’d shared with William in the house’s single room, and the man collapsed on it without a word, already past consciousness.

Quickly Rachel stripped away his damp clothing, striving to be briskly efficient and feel nothing else. Until she knew for certain that William was dead, she was still his wife, and she’d no business beyond compassion touching another man’s body.

And he would need all the compassion she could give, for the man had already slipped beyond the limits of her healing skills. As soon as she cut away his shirt she saw that the wound in his shoulder was worse than she’d feared, the skin around it purple and angry with infection. While Billy watched, she tended the man as best she could and covered him with three coverlets to keep him warm and help break the fever.

“He’s hurt,” said Billy sadly, his small face serious with concern and his jealousy forgotten after the euphoria of running free through the snow to the house.

“I’m afraid he is, Billy,” said Rachel softly. She lifted the boy into her arms and hugged him, the feel of his warm little body in her arms comforting to her as she held him close. “He’s hurt and very, very sick, and your mama can’t do anything more but hope and pray that he’ll get better.”

Through the rest of the day she stayed close to the man’s bedside, hoping he’d wake and speak to her again, or at least take some of the soup she made to help him build back his strength. Past sundown, after she’d put Billy to bed, the man stirred restlessly, and she flew to kneel on the floor beside the bed. He muttered odd fragments that made no sense to her, speaking of his mother and someone named Sam and then, though Rachel wasn’t sure, asking for a piece of pie. Yet too soon he stilled again, moving deeper into unconsciousness, and as she listened to his labored breathing through the long night, Rachel knew to her sorrow he’d likely be dead before morning.

She didn’t know when she fell asleep in the spindleback chair by the fire. She dreamed that winter was over and spring had come, the apple trees in the orchard a mass of pink and white flowers and the warm air fragrant with their scent. She was sitting on a coverlet with the stranger on the grass, laughing merrily.

Because it was a dream, she didn’t wonder that the man was strong and healthy again, his blue eyes bright and teasing, or that she was wearing her favorite gown from when she’d been Miss Rachel Sparhawk of Providence Plantations, the rose-colored silk lutestring that had no place on a farm. Still laughing, the man reached out to smooth back her black hair and tuck a sprig of apple blossoms behind her ear. With his hand still gently beneath her chin, he drew her face close to his and kissed her.