wish you luck. You’ve a good head on your shoulders and an obvious sense of right and wrong. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be trying to get away.” He studied her face in the shadows. “You aren’t having a baby, are you?”
The thought revolted her. “No, Doc.”
“Just needed to make sure.”
She understood. If she carried the outlaw’s baby, Jenkins wouldn’t kill her. If a baby wasn’t his, he’d peel the flesh from her body.
Casey watched Doc open the cookstove, stir the embers, and add firewood. With his massive shoulders and arms, his efforts looked like child’s play.
“I’ll make it through this.” She leaned against the doorway. “I don’t have much choice. Jenkins will kill me, given the first opportunity.”
“I thought he only wanted you back.”
“Maybe at first. I imagine the thought of me getting away has him powerful mad.”
He slammed the top of the stove, and the sound startled her, reminding her of gunfire.
“Too bad Morgan didn’t finish him off for you,” Doc said as he headed into Morgan’s room.
Her gaze flew to his back. “I didn’t tell you his name. In fact, I wondered if he’d given me his real one. Guess you know more about him than I do.”
He turned and eyed her curiously. “Maybe so. I haven’t seen him in quite a spell. Knew his folks well. That man lying in there is a whole sight better than the likes of Jenkins and his bunch. He comes from a good family—educated, churchgoin’ folk.” He shook his head. “Right now, I wish I could do more for him. I tell you this. He’s one of the finest men I’ve ever known.”
Exhaustion tore through her, but she craved to hear more. “What else can you tell me?”
He scratched his bearded cheek. “Ah, I’ll let him tell you when he’s feeling better.” His words rang with finality. “Right now, you come with me.” He headed into the room where Morgan lay, and she followed like a child who knew better than to disobey. He pulled out two neatly folded quilts from a leather-strapped trunk.
Most likely somebody’s payment for his doctoring. Unfortunately, she didn’t have any money and nothing to give in trade. Both thoughts worried her.
Doc fashioned a pallet on the floor beside the bed. She couldn’t remember feeling so tired, but she ought to be sitting by Morgan’s side and tending him. She glanced up at Doc as he examined the bandages, clean and unstained with blood.
“If you don’t lie down and get some rest, I’m going to have two patients.” Doc’s tone would have caused the worst of men to take notice. “The circles under your eyes could bury a man.”
She merely nodded, too weary to respond. Suddenly the room began to spin, and the horrible pounding in her head nearly blinded her. In one stride, Doc caught her before she tumbled to the floor.
Through the haziness clouding her mind, she sensed Doc tugging at her boots. She wanted to focus on his previous words about Morgan. What did he say? Morgan is one of the finest men he’s ever known?
*****
Casey woke with stinging, sleep-robbed eyes. Groggy and disoriented, she stretched sore muscles and pieced together the events of her last waking hours. Light filtered in through the closed window blinds. Panic raced through her. What time was it?
She rose slowly from the floor, dizzy with the telltale signs of extreme hunger and the weakness accompanying it. She grabbed the iron bedpost and battled a surge of blackness. Morgan, what had happened to him? She had to make sure he was still alive.
She blinked away her mind’s confusion and focused on the man’s face. He seemed to be asleep, and his coloring looked better. His forehead felt cool. Morgan had survived the night.
She searched the room for her boots. Usually she slept fully clothed, a habit formed years ago to protect herself from Jenkins and the other outlaws who craved women like babies craved milk. Casey spied her boots at the foot of the bed. Doc.
The tantalizing smell of food tugged at her stomach. She listened at the door, and when silence greeted her, she slowly opened it. The aroma of eggs, biscuits, potatoes, fried ham, and real coffee nearly made her crazy. Her attention focused on a plate on the cookstove, heaped high with the food. Beside it sat a coffeepot and a full mug of steaming coffee, certainly not the dirt-tasting brew she often made by the fire.
Doc paused from reading a newspaper at the table.