despite their shortsightedness, that both men had believed every word they said.
The lieutenant invited her to dine with him and Anna declined. She didn’t even give a reason. She just said, “No, thank you.”
The moment he’d gone, Cunningham closed the door. “Anna,” he began in his slow, polite way that hinted they’d been friends for years and not days. “You need to get some sleep. I’ll stay awake tonight and if McCord so much as twitches, I’ll yell out for you. With the tent so close you’ll probably hear him anyway.”
Anna shook her head. “I’d like to have a proper bath and a clean change of clothes, but after that, I’ll be back.”
Cunningham looked like he thought it would be a waste of time to argue.
Chapter 10
McCord felt his body moving through layers of muddy water, floating slowly to the surface. He forced himself to take a deep breath and swore he smelled buffalo. He hated buffalo. Orneriest creatures God ever made. The only thing worse than having them roam over the plains, eating every blade of grass for miles, was seeing the thousands of carcasses rotting after the hunters shot them.
He tried to swallow, but couldn’t. His mouth felt like it was packed with sand.
Opening one eye, he noticed he was lying on what looked like a buffalo hide, and just beyond that was a mass of midnight hair. “Anna,” he whispered.
She raised her head and looked at him with eyes heavy with sleep. Her mouth opened slightly in surprise. “Wynn,” she whispered, as if she’d just been dreaming of him.
She looked delicious. He moved to kiss her and felt the stab of a dozen knives in his back.
“Don’t move,” she ordered, her hand on his shoulder.
Memories came back with the pain. The feel of her beneath him a moment before fire crossed his back. Floating in darkness, unable to open his eyes. The sound of her voice constantly talking to him, pulling him closer to shore, not letting him sink away from the pain . . . away from life.
He closed his eyes and tried to think. Maybe he had died. It would be just his luck that hell would be full of Yankees and they’d all be talking.
He opened one eye again. No. He was alive and Anna was sitting beside him. He caught her fingers when she touched his hand, gripping tight, needing to know that she was real. Almost losing her had tortured his mind for days, and when he’d watched her fall off the horse he swore his heart stopped until he saw her rolling on the ground.
The fingers of her free hand brushed through his hair. “You’re going to be all right, Wynn. Just rest. You’ve lost a lot of blood. Sleep now.”
He smiled and closed his eyes, thinking of how he liked the way she said his first name. He hadn’t heard a woman say his name in years.
When he woke again, morning shone through the windows, but the face in front of him was Dirk Cunningham’s. The sergeant looked tired, but a smile spread from ear to ear.
“’Morning,” the sergeant said. “You look terrible.”
McCord groaned. “Where’s Anna?”
Cunningham laughed. “She’ll be back. I’m not surprised that my face wasn’t the one you wanted to wake up to, but you could at least act like you’re glad to see me. Anna said if you wake I’m to roll you over like you was a newborn and prop you up.”
McCord swore as Dirk lifted his shoulders off the buffalo hide.
“Stop your complaining. I ain’t never said I was a nurse.”
“That’s an understatement,” McCord managed as soon as the pain subsided enough for him to breathe. “Where is Anna?” Somewhere in his dreams he’d thought he heard someone ask her to dinner.
“She went to tell the cook how to make broth for you. He sent some over that Clark and me thought was fine, but she said it wasn’t near thick enough.” Cunningham shook his head. “That woman’s been giving more orders than the captain and, unlike the orders we usually get from him, every man on the place does what she asks.”
McCord wasn’t surprised. She’d ordered him to come back from the dead, and he’d done so for fear she’d follow him down and spend eternity complaining that he didn’t listen.
“I swear,” Cunningham mumbled. “I have a hard time believing that woman don’t fight for slavery. She’s a natural master.”
They both laughed. They’d never had slaves or believed in owning slaves. Like most Texans,