“How long has this been bleeding?”
“Not sure.”
Her gaze cut sharply to him as she carefully peeled the blood-soaked sheet from his drawers.
She looked so alarmed that he felt a jolt of concern himself. “It probably just needs a new bandage. I’m not too good at that kind of stuff.”
“It’s been bleeding all night, hasn’t it?” She didn’t wait for an answer, just breezed out of the room and returned in a few minutes with a bowl of water, a rag and a tin of soap.
“I knew these stitches were torn. I should’ve tended to you last night,” she muttered under her breath.
Jericho didn’t like to see her blaming herself. They both knew why she hadn’t gotten close enough to him to see the damage. “It’s not your fault. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have made it this far.”
“You’re not going to die now, either.” Determination firmed her lips. “I was afraid of this. I had Andrew go to the fort early this morning, but Dr. Butler was off tending a man who was crushed by a horse on his ranch. I’ll have to restitch you, but it should be bearable, since I have laudanum for the pain.”
“No laudanum.” Jericho didn’t fancy being knocked out when he had so many suspicions about her and her brother.
“I don’t have anything else. I’m so sorry.”
“You do what you have to and I’ll be grateful. Got any whiskey?” he asked hopefully.
“No, but I can get some in town.”
“I’ve got some in my saddlebag.”
By pressing a warm cloth to his leg she eventually loosened his stiff, bloodied drawers. She stared uncertainly down at his leg, her neck growing pink.
“What?” Jericho’s gaze shifted there, too, as he tried to figure out why she was blushing. His manhood was behaving, so he wasn’t sure why Catherine seemed so embarrassed all of a sudden.
“I’ll get that whiskey.” She wiped her hands down the front of her clean white apron. “Do you think you can get out of your drawers by yourself?”
So that was it. She didn’t want to undress him. Why did he find that amusing? “Yeah.”
His blood started humming and he could feel himself grow hard. Thanks to the pain that would come when she started to restitch his wound, that wouldn’t last long. Still, he didn’t want to scare the lady off again.
She walked to the corner and bent to rummage through his saddlebags, looking for the whiskey. Using his left hand, he pushed his drawers to his knees, then managed to tug them off with his foot. He was naked by the time she returned to the bed.
She passed the bottle to him without meeting his eyes.
“If you want to wait for the doctor, you can,” he offered.
Distress drew her features tight. “No, I don’t think we should wait. I’ll do this as quickly as I can.”
He nodded, uncorking the whiskey and swallowing a hefty amount. Maybe if he got drunk he wouldn’t rise to the occasion the way he seemed to every time she got within a foot of him.
She crossed herself, then pulled a chair up to the bed. Gingerly she folded the sheet away from his injury, careful to keep his manhood and vital parts covered.
The first cool touch of her scissors between his skin and the bandage caused him to twitch.
Her gaze flew to his and she grimaced. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay. I’m okay. Just do it.” He took another gulp of whiskey.
She quickly cut the bandage; it took her a few minutes to pry it away from his skin. Her touch was firm and capable as her fingers moved over his flesh.
His arousal grew, mounding the sheet. And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.
A flush rose on her neck, up her cheeks, and still she worked. That same flush heated his body. His jaw working, he closed his eyes until she removed the bandage.
He noticed her hands were shaking, and he set the whiskey bottle inside the vee of his thighs so she couldn’t go poking that needle into any vital areas if she slipped.
She cleaned the wound carefully, frowning as she leaned over him.
“What do you think?”
She looked up, her gaze sober and earnest. “I’ll do the best I can, Lieutenant.”
He wanted to relax her a tad. It wouldn’t help either of them if she stabbed too deep with that needle. Or too far to the north. “Maybe now would be a good time for you to call me Jericho, seeing as how we’re getting pretty familiar here.”
“All right.” Her hands trembled.
“You’re steady, aren’t you?” he asked. “I won’t have to worry about you sewing that sheet to my leg?”
“I—I’m fine.”
He was nearing the end of the whiskey and still feeling more than he liked, pain and otherwise.
She picked up a bottle marked Carbolic Acid and poured a small amount of the liquid on the needle. “Ready?”
“Ready.” He gritted his teeth, hoping he would pass out once she got started.
It didn’t reassure him that she flinched before she even began.
He looked away, guzzled down another burning swallow of liquor. He felt a sharp prick, then a red-hot sting slicing through his flesh. “Damn!” he roared.
She bit her lip as she pressed his flesh together to take her first stitch.
Sweat trickled down his temple and his vision hazed. With a shaking hand, he lifted the bottle and downed the rest of the liquor. Pain throbbed through his body, razor sharp.
“Try to breathe. It will help.” Catherine didn’t look up from her task. Even though her voice shook, she was reassuring.
She took another stitch and another. The hurt layered upon itself until Jericho grabbed the edge of the bed with his good hand. His knuckles burned. His arm quivered.
Her skirts brushed his hand, her warmth reaching out to him. He tried to focus on the fresh clean scent of her, and wished again he could pass out.
“Last night, I noticed you walked without your hip dipping. That’s a good sign there’s no nerve damage.”
He grunted.
“Where are you from, Jericho?”
Her voice seemed thick and heavy, as if coming through a wall. “Southeast Texas. Outside of Houston.”
“How far is it from here?”
“Far.” A lifetime away.
“How long have you been a Ranger?”
How the hell was he supposed to remember? “Since I was nineteen. Thirteen years now.”
“And before that?”
“I apprenticed with a gunsmith in Uvalde. Took me two years to get a commission.”
“What made you want to be a Ranger?”
He appreciated that she was trying to distract him, and he struggled to force his mind on to something other than the pain. “My pa was one.”
“Is he tracking the McDougals, too?”
Jericho watched her through slitted eyes. “He’s dead.”
“I’m sorry.”
She kept stitching with a single-mindedness he envied. “He died when I was twelve. My ma raised me and my sisters.”
“You