Mackinnons #02 For All the Right Reasons (48 page)

She didn’t remember biting the back of her hand until it bled, and then, when the pain of it registered, the long, agonized scream that tore from her throat. There was no recollection of wadding the letter and throwing it, of her arm sweeping out to clear the desktop with one sweep, sending everything smashing and floating to the floor, or the lamp that shattered the window.

“Katherine, my God!” Adrian shouted as he tore into the room. “What’s happened?” He saw the blood on her hand and her dress, saw too, the room in shambles, the broken window, the ravaged look on her face. She was wild and uncontrollable, and the only thing he could do was wrap his arms around her and throw her to the floor, screaming for Wong.

It took both of them to hold her down until the thrashing subsided.

Uncertain, they forced a few sips of whiskey down her throat, hoping that would relax her. Wong bathed her hand and wrapped it in clean linen before Adrian sent him to find Alex. After Wong left, Adrian sat beside her on the sofa, stroking her forehead, trying to soothe her with words. When she had calmed and the frenzy had passed, he asked her again. “What happened?”

“The letter,” she whispered. “I found it.”

Adrian saw her eyes move to the desk. Leaving her for a minute, he easily located the crumpled letter in the papers that littered the floor. He read the letter.

His heart pounded and he felt sick. He didn’t know what to say. “It isn’t as bad as it sounds. Alex loves…”

“Don’t add lying to the list of violations,” she said. “Please save me the indignity of that.”

“Katherine, at least give Alex a chance to explain…”

“And what about you, Adrian? What was your part in all of this? Were you part of the choice Alex didn’t have?”

“I only did what I thought best. We thought the best thing to do was for Alex to go on with the marriage.”

“We,” she said hatefully. “How nice. Just the two of you, planning my life with deceit and lies. I guess it never occurred to either of you to ask me what I thought?” She struggled to sit up, slapping his hands away when he tried to help her. “I don’t want your help. You’ve
helped
enough.”

A flash of guilt came and went across his face and Katherine felt no sympathy. She came to her feet. “Katherine, wait a minute. You’re in no condition to walk. Stay here until Alex comes.”

“No, I can’t. I don’t want to see Alex…or you. I just want to be alone for a while.” She made her way to the door and paused. “I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to forgive either of you for this,” she said. She turned away and picked up her skirts, walking out the door.

Adrian picked up the tiny kitten and held it toward her. “Don’t you want the kitten?”

“No,” she said coldly. “Alex never wanted it. Put it outside. Put us
both
outside.”

“Katherine, listen to me. I know how you must feel about what’s happened…about Alex, about me.”

“No, you don’t. You can’t possibly know how I feel. Not even your worst imaginings would come close.”

“Katherine, at least…”

She slammed the door before he could finish.

She went outside without bothering to collect her cape. It was cold outside, but she didn’t care. She wanted to be cold. She wanted to feel something. She wanted to feel anything besides this deathlike numbness. She walked away from the house, away from camp, going up the hill in the opposite direction, knowing she couldn’t get her thoughts clear until she was as far away as possible. She had no idea how far she walked, or how long she had been gone. But the sun was dropping low in the sky and the shadows stretched long and thin down the hill behind her.

When she began to think more clearly, she realized she was a long way from the house, and it would soon be dark. She turned around, looked back down the trail and with a sigh decided she couldn’t do anything about it now. She only knew she couldn’t stay here in this camp any longer, couldn’t carry on this charade of a marriage to a man who did not want her, had never wanted her. Whatever happened would have to wait until tomorrow.

Alex was running up the steps when he met Adrian coming out of the house. Adrian explained what happened, explained too, that he couldn’t find Katherine anywhere. “You stay here, in case she comes back,” Alex said. “I’ll go after her.” He grabbed his rifle and left the house in a lope. If this had to happen, why couldn’t it have happened a little later in the year, after the bears had gone into hibernation?
Dear God, there were so many dangers out there. Katherine. Katherine.
He knew she hadn’t taken the road toward camp, or he would have met her. He started off in the opposite direction, praying as he went.

Not long after she turned back, she paused, hearing the snapping of dried brush and sticks coming from her left. She thought il was probably the camp dog following her, when a massive, battle-scarred bear burst into view, crashing through the brush. The moment it saw her, it stopped. It was too close for her to stand any chance if she ran, close enough that she could see the dished face, the turned up nose, the humped shoulder, and she knew instinctively it was a male grizzly.

The grizzly was close enough that she could smell its strange, musky scent, a smell that swept over her in dizzying waves. Strange, how the mind works. Here she was, frozen in place, looking at the fiercest animal to be found in the whole of North America and the only thing that flashed into her mind was the scientific name for the grizzly Alex had told her:
Ursus horri-hilix
. The next moment it reared up on its hind legs and she saw I he powerful long claws, heard the savage growls that made her blood run cold.

The last thing she remembered was someone shouting her name and being told not to run, but when the bear charged, it was instinct, not common sense that sent her running down the trail.

Running for her life now, she knew the bear was too close, that she would never make it. A deadening growl, a stabbing pain to her shoulder. Then she was falling, hitting the ground and rolling, the pain in her shoulder excruciating, the sound of someone calling her name the last thing she remembered before rolling over and over and over, plunging into a black void.

Adrian was sitting in the great room staring at the fire, stroking Banjo’s fur and drinking a brandy when he heard the shots. He sprang to his feet and ran for his rifle. As he headed for the front door, he heard the dogs barking outside. Something about their bark was urgent and he was already expecting the worst when he heard Alex shout, “For the love of God, someone open the door.”

Adrian opened the door, seeing Alex stagger toward him, Katherine’s bloody, inert body draped in his arms. “Grizzly,” he said. “Get Molly.”

Adrian took off like a pistol shot, his shouts clearing the cookhouse long before he reached it. By the time he brought Molly to the house, Alex had Katherine stretched out, face down, on the kitchen table. He was holding a towel pressed to her shoulder. Blood was everywhere.

Alex looked up the minute they walked in and a bolt of terror shot straight to Adrian’s gut. He had never seen Alex with such a look of fear stretched painfully across his pale face. He had never seen so much blood, soaking into her clothes, the towel, and dripping onto the floor. For over two hours they did what they could do to clean the wounds and staunch the bleeding. Molly was the first to realize their methods were far too primitive to save Katherine. “We’ve got to get her to San Francisco. She’ll never make it. If she survives the wound, the infection and fever that follows will kill her.”

“We’ll take one of the ships waiting for lumber, one that hasn’t been loaded. With the winds behind us and no load, we should be able to cut our time in half,” Alex said.

As the men fashioned a bed between two poles to carry her on, Molly went upstairs to pack some of Katherine’s things. Half an hour later she carried them on board ship. She stood beside Katherine’s pale stillness and used her palm to smooth the frown from the brow of one so lovely and so young. She remained there, looking at Katherine’s face until Adrian and Alex said it was time to get under way. She turned and walked to the door, pausing to take one last look. She wasn’t sure why she stopped to look. Perhaps it was because she had the feeling she would never see Katherine again.

Chapter Twenty-One

“Damn! That’s what I was afraid of,” Alex said.

Adrian had been resting his head on the table in the small ship’s cabin. Hearing Alex’s words he looked up to see Alex leaning over Katherine, his hand on her head.

“She’s burning up with fever,” Alex said.

Adrian stood, coming over to stand beside Alex. “That’s what we were hoping against. Thank God we’ll be in San Francisco in a few hours.”

“With a fever like this, every minute is precious.”

“I know,” Adrian said. “We’ll take turns with her, keeping her covered with wet cloths.”

“I think wet blankets would be better. We can use two, exchanging them as soon as the one in use becomes warm,” Alex said.

Adrian put his hand to her head. “As hot as she is, it won’t take long.”

“Then we’ll both stay with her and we’ll use more blankets if necessary. She isn’t going to die if I have to harness her and dip her in the ocean.”

Adrian nodded and thrust his hands deep into his pockets. The two of them stood side by side, staring down at Katherine, feeling useless against the fever that heated her without mercy.

“Hurts,” she whispered weakly. “Head hurts.” She fought for consciousness, but the disabling chills and throbbing head that accompanied the fever had too great a hold. Soon the effort became too much for her and she drifted off to sleep.

But before long she was robbed of even her sleep, when visions of the bear left her paralyzed and crying. The bear was behind her now, close enough that she could feel the heat of his breath. She writhed in the bunk, trying to free herself as she felt the sharp claws dig into her upper arm and shoulder.

Alex covered her with another cool, wet blanket, tucking the sides around her, then picking her up and sitting on the bunk, holding her in his arms. He felt the shock that ran through her, heard the sharp, indrawn breath that preceded the struggle. He held her for a long time, long after she had worn herself out and ceased to struggle. When he finally did stand up and lower her back to the bunk, it was to remove the warm blanket and replace it with another, cooler one Adrian handed him.

Alex watched her flinch, her lids fluttering when the cold blanket touched her fiery skin. He never took his eyes from her as its coolness began to absorb the heat and she began to drift away.

She didn’t regain consciousness, even when she was carried from the ship and loaded into the back of a wagon for the short trip to the doctor.

Alex didn’t want to leave her, but the doctor refused to treat her unless he and Adrian both got some sleep and a decent meal before they returned. Adrian was grateful the clever brown eyes of the doctor had correctly taken in the signs of their devotion as well as their exhaustion. He knew as well as the doctor that neither of them would be of any help to her until they rested. But for Alex, it was a cruel command, one he heeded reluctantly. “Leave? Why? So he can stuff her wound with wood ashes and cobwebs?”

“Get him out of here,” the doctor said.

Adrian gave him a pleading look. Alex looked at Katherine, hot and dry, her face flushed with fever. “Send word if she gets any worse,” he said.

The doctor nodded. “Tell my wife where you’ll be. I’ll send word. In the meantime, get some rest. She may need you when she wakes.”

If she wakes
, Alex thought, feeling as if his life was flowing backward.

Once they had eaten and slept, Alex was tense with the need to get to the doctor’s office. “We can’t go like this, Alex. We both need a bath and a shave, and clean clothes. It wouldn’t help Katherine to wake up and see us looking like this.”

Once again, Alex gave in. Grudgingly.

Hearing returned to her first.

She tried to listen to the voices, but each word slipped away from her as soon as she heard it. All around her she was conscious of softly muted sound. When she tried to open her eyes, all she could see was a background of great darkness splashed with mosaics of abstract shapes and vivid colors. The red came, like a wave sluicing across the beach, washing away all of the color. Then she slept.

The voices were gone when consciousness returned to her, but as it had the time before, the chore of waking to full awareness proved too much for her and she slept once more. The third time, she heard a voice she did not recognize. “Feel how cool she is. The fever is down.”

“Thank God.”

Alex
.

The next voice she recognized was Adrian’s. “Will it go back up?”

“No,” the doctor said. “The worst is over. Her fever has broken. She’s out of the woods.”

The weights on her eyes were so heavy and she felt so very weak. The voices began to fade and she felt herself drifting.

The early morning light touched her closed lids and she frowned, mumbling for someone to “take the light away”.

Her eyes were still heavy, but the weights were gone. The first thing she saw was Alex sitting beside her bed, badly needing a shave and his eyes red-rimmed. Gradually, as the room came into focus, she saw Adrian standing behind Alex, and a strange man with a kind face standing to Adrian’s side.

“Welcome back,” the strange man said. “I’m Dr. Glover. I imagine you’re feeling like you’ve been hit by a locomotive.”

“I feel like the back end of hard times,” she said crossly, slapping at the doctor’s hand when it came out to touch her forehead. “I’m thirsty. Why are you staring at me like you’ve never seen me before? How did I get here? And where is here?”

Dr. Glover laughed. “Crotchety as they come,” he said. “A good sign.”

Alex never knew he could float while his feet were planted firmly on the floor. He could never remember feeling so happy or so relieved. He could never remember crying since his parents died, but he knew the wetness on his face could only be called tears. Taking one look at him, Katherine said, “Was I dying?”