Free Dorothy Garlock by Restless Wind

head was on a pillow. The light came closer until it was so bright he had to shut his eyes against it, but not before he saw that it was a lamp and a woman carried it.
    “So you’re awake.”
    Logan opened his eyes and tried to focus them on her face. “Did they . . . did they . . . cut me?”
    “No. You’ve still got all your parts.”
    For a space of a dozen heartbeats he stared at her soft, pretty face, not knowing that tears gushed from his eyes and ran down over his torn cheeks.
    “What’s wrong with me?” he whispered. “My jaw feels like it’s broken.”
    “I don’t think it is. I felt it before it had time to swell. You’ve got some bruised or broken ribs and your back is torn up pretty good. It would have been a lot worse if you hadn’t had on that buckskin shirt.”
    “I thought the bastards were going to kick me to death.”
    “I was on my way to town when I saw your team and wagon. One of the men was going through it and the other three was standing over you. They left in a hurry. I didn’t get to see them, but I recognized a horse or two.”
    “I know who they were,” he said wearily. “Did they take my money belt?”
    “You didn’t have a money belt on you when we found you, but we found money in your wagon when we unrolled the canvas to cover your supplies. It’s in your saddlebags.”
    “Thank you, ma’am.”
    “My name is Mary Gregg.”
    “I passed here on the way to town. The flowers . . . and things . . .” He closed his eyes for an instant, then opened them wide. “My horse?”
    “He’s all right,” Mary said quickly. “He was a handful to deal with, but we got him into the corral. Josh, the man who works for me, has an eye for a good horse. He said he’s one of the finest he’s seen, even if he is as ornery as a polecat.”
    “He doesn’t like anyone near him but me and Brutus. Oh, God! The sonofabitches killed Brutus!”
    “Brutus?”
    “My dog. I remember now. They . . . shot him.”
    “We didn’t see him, but we wash’t looking for him, either.”
    She dipped a towel in the washpan beside the bed, wrung it out, and laid it over his discolored face. The cool dampness laid its soothing touch over his burning skin. His voice came to her muffled by the cloth. “Thank you, ma’am.”
    Mary looked down at the man’s battered, swollen face and anger welled up in her. She gently smoothed the tangled hair off his forehead.
    “Do you want something to drink? I’ve got whiskey.”
    He rolled his head on the pillow. “No, but . . . thanks.”
    She drew a chair close, sat down, and continued to lay the cool cloth on his face. Here was a man, a real man. He had as fine a body as she had ever seen; rangy, muscular, hard. Beneath the smooth skin of his chest and arms were ridges of muscle, put there by hard work. His stomach was a flat, hard plain, and his manly privates, which had been exposed to the sun when they came upon him lying in the trail, were huge, as was fitting a man his size.
    Mary removed the cloth and dipped it in the water. She looked closely at the still face with the thick brush of black eyelashes lying on his cheeks. He had Indian blood; the high cheekbones and sculpted nose told her that. His midnight black hair was soft, wavy and clean. He was a man anyone would turn to look at a second time.
    The minutes passed; Mary changed the damp cloth. She thought he was sleeping. Suddenly his eyes sprang open.
    “My papers!”
    “They’re safe, Logan Horn. The deed to your land is in your saddlebags under the bed.”
    “Thank God! And . . . thank . . . you!”
    “Go to sleep. You’ve nothing to worry about.” She gave his big, hard hand lying on the bed a squeeze with her soft one. “Try not to move around. I’ve got a coat of salve on your back.”
    “Ma’am, I couldn’t move if the house was on fire,” he mumbled, and was almost instantly asleep.
    Mary turned the oil lamp down low and continued to sit beside him until Minnie, a thin,