Crossings (9 page)

But Helena had saved his life.

Why she'd done so was perplexing. She didn't owe him and might have been able to run the station on a widow status alone. But maybe not. Hell, he guessed he was worth more to her alive than dead, and that was incentive enough. Not since Jenny had someone
done for him. A woman taking care of him felt strange and burdened him with a debt to return the favor.

Female voices sounded outside the door, which had been left ajar. While he distinguished Helena's, the other's was unrecognizable, but her identity became apparent as their conversation progressed.

“I don't see why you had to put him in Father's bed. Why couldn't you have put him in your room?”

“Because he'll be using Father's room for the duration of his stay here,” Helena replied.

“But he's your husband. You mean you're not going to really be his wife. I thought that since you went through with it, you'd at least make the best of things.”

“The particulars of my marriage aren't important right now, Emilie. Getting him well is what matters.”

“So you can parade him around town and have everyone see that we're not alone.”

“I doubt he would let me parade him anywhere.”

“Then you got a loveless marriage for nothing,” Emilie stated flatly. “The sacrifice wasn't worth it. I wish you could see that.”

“And I wish you could see that it is.”

The hallway grew silent for a long moment, then the door creaked inward and Helena entered the room. Her head was down. His gaze fell on her, and he wondered why she was denying herself happiness. He didn't find martyrdom noble, nor indispensable to a strong character. Suffering never gained him a damn thing but misery.

The heavy lashes that shadowed Helena's cheeks flew up as she raised her eyes to find him watching her. “You're awake.”

“Were you expecting a corpse?” he asked with disaffection for his weak tone, which bore the parched dryness of fall leaves.

“What a thing to say,” she chided. “Of course not.”

The dark and drab poplin of her bereavement skirt modestly swayed as she walked toward him. He allowed
himself to picture what she would look like in a blue the color of violets that grew on the mountain. Her eyes would mirror the hue and bring a spark of eroticism to her face that was suppressed by the somberness of her weeds. At least she'd twisted her golden hair into a loose knot on the top of her head instead of trapping the curls in a net. Unbound tendrils softened her face, but didn't lessen the strength of her demeanor.

She stood over him and put her hand on his forehead. His stomach muscles tightened from the unexpected contact. A woman's touch wasn't something he'd experienced in quite some time. The fragrance of wild roses filled his nostrils and wrapped around his sex. He was practically eye level with the side of her breast, its high lift formed by her corset. For years he'd annihilated his desires for women, and in doing so, he'd annihilated his manhood. His gratification had languished under the drowning stimulants of whiskey—a poor substitute for sipping love from a breast.

“You don't feel too warm,” she claimed optimistically, then withdrew her hand.

He could have taken issue with her, for the heat within him equaled the bake of summer. The excessive bedclothes suddenly grew sweltering and oppressive. Longing for a smoke, he asked, “How did I get here?”

“Eliazer and I moved you.” Helena backed from the headboard and stared at his bare chest where a crimson-stained bandage was wrapped around his torso. Her intense, exploring gaze on him was not purely curative, and he took satisfaction surmising she found his body attractive.

“I vaguely remember being lifted. My side hurt like hell.”

Her eyes shifted to his face. “Did you see who shot you?”

“No.” He was having trouble picturing a set of facts
that would screw on straight. Recalling the details of the shooting while the residue of laudanum polluted his brain only frustrated him. “No,” he repeated, his annoyance spilling into his tone.

“I don't want you to think about it if it's going to upset you.” She turned to the bureau and collected some strips of white cloth. “I have to give you a fresh dressing. I'm going to get Eliazer to help me sit you up.”

“I can sit up myself.”

“I don't think you're well enough—”

“I'll sit up on my own,” he growled, unaccustomed to someone dictating to him.

A pregnant pause stretched between them. He brooded over his state of incapacity, while she frowned at his adamant refusal. At length, Helena was the one to relent. “It won't do you any good to get upset. If you think you can sit up yourself, then try. In case you do need assistance, I think I should have Eliazer here—”

“No.”

Putting her hands on her hips, she glared at him. “You're not a very cooperative patient.”

“It's a damn inconvenience being laid up.”

“Being sick is never convenient,” she said without sympathy. “You'd better accept you're going to be in this bed for at least a week.”

His lack of sleep, the fiery stab of pain shooting through his upper body, and the ring of truth to her statement pulled a presumptuous remark out of him. “I'd consider staying in it if you joined me.”

“Don't be absurd.”

He gave her a slow, lazy smile even though he didn't feel like smiling. “I wasn't.”

Riveting his gaze on her face, he got her to blush. “I don't see the necessity for this conversation, as the subject was already discussed in our agreement. You knew perfectly well what the sleeping arrangements would be before you married me.”

“That doesn't mean I have to be satisfied with them.”

“If you're implying you'll be after me to change my mind,” she said as she laid the bandages, salve, and a pair of scissors next to him, “I can assure you, I won't.”

“We'll just have to see.”

An arched eyebrow indicated her ill humor, but she said nothing to the contrary. She sat next to him, the edge of the mattress dipping slightly under her weight. Taking the scissors in her fingers, she shifted her energies to his wound. “Rather than unwrap the binding, I'm going to cut the fabric away layer by layer. It will be far less painful for you that way.”

Without asking him his opinion, she leaned forward and snipped the knot free, then lightly pulled one of the strips until she was able to get a scissor blade beneath it. As she began to cut, there was no place for him to put his gaze except on her. Her movements made him notice a tiny gold cross undulating from a thin gold chain around her neck. If she'd worn the crucifix before, he couldn't recall. He wondered if she was a devout listener and follower of Psalms and exhortations.

“Do you drop down on your knees on Sundays?” he asked in a voice fringed with a rasp as her fingertips touched him.

“No,” she replied without pause from severing a soiled band.

Complete surprise hit him. “You're wearing a cross.”

“I didn't say I was a disbeliever in God. My sister attends the church. I don't. Our systems of faith may be different, but we both pray.”

Her ministrations were slow and drawn out like foreplay. He felt the blood pumping through his veins and heard his heart beating in his ears. “Did you pray for me when I was shot?”

“Yes.”

“You think that's why I didn't die?”

Keeping her chin down, she stole a glance at him. Her blue eyes shimmered with the light streaming from the window. “Do you believe it's a possibility?”

“I was raised on Proverbs, if that's what you're getting at.” He made no attempt to hide the fact he was watching her. “I guess I'm like you. I don't need to stand on any prayer carpet to say what I've got to say to the man upstairs.”

“Then we have two things in common. Our views on religion and the deaths of our fathers.”

She left the observance open-ended, as if she were waiting for him to elaborate on how his father had died. The day it happened seemed far off, and as recent as yesterday. Hundreds of years could pass, and he would still think of the times that could have come.

Closing his eyes, he transported himself into the spirit of the past so he could see the man he used to be: infinite in his desires, in union with the soul of another, and laughing at the riddles of humanity. But Jenny's death didn't leave him the same. The world spun a groove of change into his life. Each revolution seemed to decay his old character until he became unrecognizable even to himself. No change in his surroundings could repair the defect, for living alone hadn't blotted out his past. Solitude had only given him more time to let the horrific scene embed itself into him deeper than roots.

Ensconced on his windy mountain, he soon realized that no possession, no sunset or sunrise, no hill or valley, no constellation, no river or body of water, and no choir of birds was gratifying without a companion. But he accepted this as his forfeit and was reconciled to living alone until his hair grew as silver as a birch, and he became as petrified as a stone.

Then Helena came to him, her offer of matrimony ruining his plans. He became starved for human
contact. Not only in a physical manner, but the exchange of thought and the contagious need to trade gestures and voices. Though he clung to the security of his freedom, each subsequent day in her company, he'd soak up every drop of her to hold him through the years to come.

“Are you in any pain?” Helena's subtle voice broke into his guarded thoughts.

“No,” he murmured, his eyes still closed. Breathing in until his lungs were filled, he let the scent of a woman flow into him like a river through the woods. Helena's fragrance was exceptionally delicate and fine, akin to the bouquet of roses. She seemed unaware of the poignant affect she had on him.

He slipped his eyes open, needing to utilize his other senses or else he would throw his arm around her neck and bring her down to his mouth.

Lines of concentration deepened along her brows. “I'm almost finished.”

She was nearing the end where the cloth wasn't as thick. The natural heat from her hands diffused across his chest, and the snip of the scissors sliced at the tension in his ribs. Like a summer storm, the touch of her hands on him was all too brief. She stood and visually examined his injury. He followed her gaze to the ugly pucker of flesh around a hole the size of his smallest fingernail. Having never been gunshot before, he muttered his disgust under his breath. The scar would be nasty, but he figured the ones on his body were nothing compared to the hidden ones of his heart.

“It actually looks better today.”

“Then I'm glad I didn't see it yesterday.”

“You'll have to sit up a little now so I can get the bandages out from behind your back.” Her hand supported his shoulder to help guide him.

Seeing as he'd been lying in bed so long, he called to mind the strength that should have been revitalized
by now. Only it didn't answer. He found this out as he inched his way off the pillows and immediately flopped backward. In a fit of swearing, he condemned the beads of sweat that had popped out on his brow.

Helena's mouth thinned with displeasure. “Blasphemous use of the Lord's name isn't going to do you any good.”

“Saying it makes me feel better,” he grumbled, refusing to acknowledge his weakened condition. Willing his muscles to work right, he tried again. Once more, failure seemed intent on breaking him. But he gritted his teeth long enough for her to remove the dirty bandages and tell him he could lie back down.

Girding himself against the stroke of her fingers across his skin as she gently applied salve to his wound, he kept his focus straight ahead on the high collar of her bodice. The vertical row of jet buttons that safeguarded exposure of her pale throat marched downward between the pinnacles of her breasts. He'd forgotten just how tiny a woman's fasteners were. A man had to have a fair amount of patience and dexterity to master them with one hand.

“You'll have to lie on your left side now,” Helena said.

Carrigan complied, suffering the irritation of his pain and aspiring for an intermission from it—no matter how short.

“You can rest for a moment, but then you're going to have to sit up so I can get fresh bandages around you.”

He wouldn't anticipate the torment while she arranged the strips of cloth. Though the notion of sitting up for such a length left him cold. His weakness indicated dependence. And dependence went against the grain of his mind.

Helena studied him with hesitation. “Are you sure you don't want me to get Eliazer? He could—”

“I'm sure.” Using the muscles stretched along his belly, he rose to half sitting and slightly lifted his arms. Through a grunt, he said, “Do it fast.”

Nodding, she nimbly set out to work.

“It's not snowing outside today,” Helena commented as if to sidetrack him. “Maybe spring will come after all. The sun is shining and melting the snow.”

“I want to go outside.”

“You can't.”

“That doesn't make me stop wanting to.”

“You'll adapt to the bed. You'll see.” The faint smile on her lips was shot with bygone thoughts. “When I first arrived in Genoa, my petticoats were like my mother's. A mass of lace—frills upon frills. I found out pressing ruffles was too much ironing with so much else to do. So now I make my petticoats with just a single deep ruffle to hold the starch.”

Carrigan tilted his brow in amused wonder and momentarily captured her eyes with his.

She laughed, the sound singularly affecting. Its depth was throaty, and as sweet as music. “I hope I don't shock you talking about my petticoats.”

“No.”

“Good. Because I'm just trying to tell you how one makes adjustments when they have to. On our journey through the states and then the territories, I also learned how to make rice pudding without eggs. That may not be thought-provoking for you, but it was a learned accomplishment.” Her sleeve brushed his sore ribs as she made another pass around his rigid torso. “Rice pudding without using my eastern recipe calling for eggs, plus a vague understanding that petticoats ought to be plain, was all I knew about conquering the West.”