Joshua poked his head into the back of the wagon, and after conferring with her patient, helped him up and out of the wagon. Sweat beaded Davis’s forehead as he climbed out, his face riddled with pain. Emma placed her palms on her heated cheeks when she realized they were going off into the bushes. How was she ever going to continue this trip with a total stranger doing personal things practically in front of her eyes?
The sound of female voices caught her attention. Sarah, with Stephen settled securely on her hip, walked alongside Elizabeth as they moved down the line, heading in Emma’s direction. The little boy rested his head on his mother’s shoulder, and slipped a small thumb into his rosebud mouth. Sarah slid the baby down and handed him a biscuit. They all settled on the soft grass alongside Emma’s wagon, the women tucking their skirts under them.
“How are things going?” Sarah pulled Stephen toward her, and sat him on her lap. “Is Mr. Davis behaving himself?”
“Mr. Cooper hasn’t done much of anything except sleep. It turns out his name is Davis Cooper, not Mr. Davis.” Pulling her knees up, she wrapped her arms around her legs, and leaning her chin on her knees, studied the women. “I don’t know if I can do this. After all, Mr. Cooper will be sleeping right above me, and he’s a stranger! I think Ezra needs to find somewhere else to put him.”
“That’s probably not going to work.” Elizabeth shook her head. “Every other wagon is carrying more than one person, and loaded to the limit. I know because Jeb has been asking around. As much as I hate to say it, yours is the only wagon he can travel in.”
Emma banged her fist on her upraised knee. “It’s not my fault my husband was killed! Why should I be made to take care of the man who wasn’t?”
Sarah and Elizabeth quickly glanced down, suddenly interested in what little Stephen was doing.
Noting their discomfort, she glanced over her shoulder to see Davis hanging onto Joshua, walking slowly as they returned from their visit to the bushes. Emma felt the heat rise once again to her face as she looked at Davis. But instead of appearing angry, he looked at Emma with sympathy.
To cover her embarrassment, Emma stood and left the group for her own visit to the bushes. She grumbled all the way. She didn’t want that man’s sympathy. Truth be known, she wanted to hate him. Hate the fact that he was alive and Peter wasn’t.
When Emma returned, Elizabeth and Sarah had left, and Joshua waited for her.
“Ma’am, Ezra asked me to walk with y’all this afternoon to take some of the burden off you.” Joshua took hold of the oxen and added, “Why don’t y’all climb up into the wagon and ride for a bit this afternoon?”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They had barely begun to move when Davis felt the wagon dip with Emma’s entrance. He kept his eyes closed, trying to identify the sounds as she moved around, and eventually settled across from him.
He opened his eyes and studied her as she waved her bonnet slowly in front of her face.
Emma Thorpe would be a pretty woman if she didn’t always look annoyed, scared or embarrassed. She had beautiful light brown curly hair that refused to stay tucked into her bonnet. Her changeable eyes appeared hazel right now, but earlier they had more of a green hue to them. She had a full lower lip, high cheekbones and a smattering of freckles across her nose.
Although of a slim frame, her breasts were full enough to please any man. The apron tied around her small waist gave way to full hips and what he would bet were long, slender legs. In all she made a lovely looking companion for him while he recovered. Too bad she most likely wished he’d been killed instead of her husband.
He cleared his throat. “Can I trouble you for another drink of water? If you’ll fetch the canteen from my saddlebags, there’s some left in there. I know you can’t get to your water barrel with the wagon moving.”
“Certainly.” She flushed as she fumbled with the saddlebag, yanking things out and stuffing them back until she found the canteen.
She unscrewed the top, and handed it to him. When he continued to stare at her, a slight smile on his lips, she sighed and placed her cool hands behind his neck to lift his head so he could drink.
“Thank you, ma’am, I appreciate it.”
“Well, Mr. Cooper, I’ll leave you to get your rest.” She climbed over boxes and barrels and left through the front opening, the wooden seat creaking as she settled there.
Davis swayed with the movement of the wagon. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be troubling this woman for long. Never one to be comfortable lying around, he already felt restless in his first day of recovering from his injuries. He hadn’t been badly hurt, certainly, not as badly as Peter Thorpe had been, but riding a horse was out of the question for a couple more days with his damaged ribs.
He shook his head when he thought about Emma being on her own now. A wagon train was no place for a widowed woman. And this woman’s slight build could never handle the rigors of the trail.
The rumbling of the wagons together with the clanking of pots and pans lulled him. His thoughts turned to his jumpy nurse. He grinned as he realized he obviously was the one who made her anxious. He had seen her talk with Ezra, Joshua and Jeb in a sane, rational manner, but every time she had to look at him she flushed red, stuttered, and began that nervous habit of picking at her clothes.
Davis struggled to get more comfortable. Unfortunately there wasn’t any easier position for him. The doctor with the wagon train who had tended his injuries said his ribs were bruised, along with cuts, scrapes and other slashes all over his body. Peter Thorpe had taken the worst of it when that horse went wild. Davis was damn lucky to be alive, and he knew it.
Thinking about how close he came to dying, he considered Peter and the cute little wife he’d left behind. Although everyone was aware there were plenty of dangers on these trips, it rattled the group to lose someone so soon into the journey.
He smiled to himself when he thought of Emma going through his saddlebags looking for “spirits.” He had been awake and listening to her conversation with Ezra. She may have been embarrassed when he called her on it, but she certainly didn’t back down. The woman had a bit of spirit herself.
Now that he knew her identity, he recalled a rumor that Thorpe’s wife was a bit of a princess. She apparently didn’t want to leave her home in Indiana, and her husband had pretty much dragged her along. Talk was she’d been too attached to her parents.
Thinking of Emma’s parents had his mind drifting back to the last time he saw his own mother. She and his little sister, Jenny, dressed in a yellow flowered calico dress with two long braids hanging down her back, had been swinging hands, climbing the stairs to their small farmhouse. Davis had waved as he’d headed to town to take care of bank business.
Stuart Granger had not been just the banker in the small town; he and Davis had been best friends. They had grown up together, wandering the woods near their homes, chasing small animals and each other. They’d swum in the lake, fished in the summer, and skated on the frozen pond in the winter. As the years went by their focus had shifted from chasing small animals to pursuing the pretty young girls in town.