Blackwolf's Redemption

There was a stack of newspapers on the long white sofa. He swept them to the floor and put her down on the sofa, grabbed the old patchwork quilt that hung over the sofa’s back and covered her with it.

“Hey,” he said. “Cummings. Open your eyes.”

She gave a low moan. Well, that was a start.

“Come on,” he said sharply. “Look at me.”

A faint flutter of her lashes. That was all. Damn it, he thought furiously. Why couldn’t she have climbed somebody else’s pile of rocks? Gone after some other supposedly sacred ledge? The pictographs, the legend of the Blackwolf stones, were hardly the only ones out there.

She moaned again. Turned her head from side to side. Whispered something. He bent closer, tried to make it out. No, maybe?

“No, what?” he said.

She didn’t answer. She was still out. And, hell, she looked as fragile as his mother’s bone china dinnerware.

A muscle knotted in his jaw.

Where was the tough, don’t-screw-with-me babe who’d faced him on the ledge? He didn’t want her fragile, didn’t want her helpless. He didn’t want to be responsible for her.

He didn’t want to be responsible for anyone, ever again.

If only he hadn’t given in to that stupid desire to ride to the canyon and see the solstice one final time. If only he’d stayed here, right here, because what in hell did the canyon or the solstice or any of it matter? If only. If only…

“Stop it,” he said out loud.

A man did what he had to do. Life’s great lesson, he thought bitterly, even if you were dealing with a trespasser, a thief…

Or a woman.

This one, at least, would be gone by tomorrow.

Jesse stood straight, headed quickly for the kitchen, grabbed a towel from the rack next to the sink and dried his naked arms and chest. He was chilled, too, his jeans soggy with rainwater, but first things first. Deal with the woman. Get her out of those wet clothes, dry her, get her conscious enough to drink something hot and sweet. The idea was to elevate her core temp, keep it from sliding to the danger point.

And call the doctor.

By the time he arrived, the woman would be okay, but the doc could check her over, just to play it safe. And he could take her back to town with him. To a motel. To the hospital. Who cared where he took her?

He grabbed the phone, started to dial the number—and realized the thing was dead.

“Damn it!”

Of course the miserable hunk of plastic was dead. Heavy rain, lightning, high winds, for all he knew a grizzly rubbing its ass against one of the telephone poles was more than enough to take down the phone lines. It happened with regularity.

Besides, what good would a call have done? The doc couldn’t make it out this far any more than he could do the trip in reverse. Trees would be down, roads buried under sheets of water. The creek that ran between the ranch and the highway would make the stream they’d crossed heading out of the canyon look like a puddle.

There was an emergency chopper in Bozeman but it couldn’t fly in this stuff.

“Okay,” he muttered.

Forget the medical help. A man did what he had to do, he thought again, and he got started. It was a short list, but a vital one.

He turned up the thermostat as high as it would go. The burner kicked in with a throaty roar. Start a fire in the fireplace. Fire sucked warm air out of a room, but with the Cummings woman lying where she was, she’d get the best of the heat coming up through the registers and from the hearth.

Now he needed towels. And blankets. Tea. Honey. A kettle of boiling water.

Keeping busy was good. He felt purposeful, less aware of the woman as an unwanted intrusion and more as a problem to deal with. He’d always been good at handling problems.

Handling people was different.

Linda had thrown that at him, toward the end, and he hadn’t even tried to refute it.

He checked the woman again, then went swiftly through the house, collecting a bunch of oversized bath sheets, an armload of blankets. A fast stop in the kitchen to put the water on to boil.

Back to Sienna Cummings.

Already, simply from being indoors, wrapped in the quilt, heat coming up and the fire going, she looked a little better. More color in her face. Less labored breathing. She was still shivering, though. Not a good sign. He knew it could indicate that her temperature was not just low but still dropping.

He had to warm her, and fast.

“Miss Cummings. Can you hear me?” He squatted beside the couch, took her wrist, checked her pulse. A little thready but nothing too bad. “Come on,” he said briskly. “Open your eyes.” He leaned closer, spoke louder. “Look at me,” he ordered.

And she did.

Her eyes opened. Her gaze met his…and slid right on by.