THIRTY-ONE

When Caitlyn limped back to Billy and Theo, she was carrying an armful of long, cone-headed purple flowers. They’d found the canoe, as instructed, waiting under the bridge, then traveled a mile downstream and pulled ashore to hide the canoe.

“I wanted to do this sooner for Theo, but there was never time for me to collect the flowers. I’d hoped things wouldn’t get this bad so quickly.”

Theo lay on the grass unconscious, his head propped by a pillow made from his coat, his face flushed with fever. His arm and shoulder were exposed, and the purple swelling was ominous, with pus oozing from where he’d cut himself open to remove the chip. Caitlyn set the flowers down beside Theo, whose eyes were closed, fluttering behind the eyelids.

Billy sat cross-legged beside the flowers, and with quick, dexterous movements—unnaturally so, considering his massive hands—he began to strip the flowers and stems.

“You’ve done this before.” Caitlyn kept her hands hidden. If he was going to do this, she wouldn’t have to let him see her fingers.

“My grandmother showed me, before she passed on and I was adopted. I didn’t know what you meant when you said needed to find etcha…echo…echy—”

“Echinacea,” she said. Her cloak was hot and she knew it was growing damp with sweat, but she needed to keep it loosely around her to hide her deformed back from Billy.

“Grams called it purple coneflower.” He kept his head down, focused on stripping the flowers.

“I hope it works. He needs a doctor.”

“You don’t need to look farther than his arm to know a doctor’s not an option. He cut the chip out himself—that tells you how bad he hates the factory. He was starving to death in the woods, and yet he still wouldn’t turn back. If you brought him to a doctor, you wouldn’t be saving him at all. I think he would rather be dead.”

“Thanks.” Caitlyn’s voice was hardly a whisper. It surprised her how much she wanted Theo to survive and how much of a comfort the big, quiet man in front of her was turning out to be during each new hour of stress.

Billy focused on the f lowers. “We need to cut farther into Theo’s arm to clean it. I can do that if you don’t want to. I helped the vet with horses. I’ve seen this before. On horses, I mean.”

Again she found comfort in his steadiness. “Do you need me to hold him for you?”

Billy shook his head. “He’s tiny.”

She watched as he gently doctored the wound. Theo turned and groaned but did not come to full consciousness. Billy took the poultice and pressed it against Theo’s arm. Then he removed his outer shirt, cut strips for bandages, and tied the poultice in place.

“We’re ready,” he said. “I’ll lift him back into the canoe.”

His trust at her leadership amazed her. He hadn’t asked what was ahead. Theo would have rattled through a hundred rapid-fire questions already.

They’d known each other only a few hours, but she felt comfortable around him. She had never experienced that comfort with anyone before, except Papa. Yet whenever Billy gave her a shy, sideways glance, something in her heart surged.

“Billy…”

There it was again. The shy look. It eased her loneliness.

“I’m afraid,” she said. “Not too afraid to do what needs to be done, but still afraid. It’s good to have you here.”

“You make me feel strong. I don’t know why they are chasing you, but I don’t care.”

“Do you know that Mason Lee had been hunting me with the hounds?”

He nodded, but as he spoke, he looked at the ground. “You disappeared from a mountaintop, is what I heard.”

“Yes, I scaled down the rock face.” She had escaped the hounds and the hunters, but she knew her father paid the price. The question was, how much of a price? No matter how numb she’d tried to make herself, that question haunted her still.

“I’m afraid for my father too.” She half hoped Billy would put his arms around her and let her lean her head against his chest. Just a couple of moments of comfort.

Billy didn’t look up. Something about his shoulders changed, and it wasn’t shyness that kept him from looking at her. Before he answered, she knew—but his words broke her anyway.

“I’m sorry.” Billy lifted his head and looked at her without flinching. “He’s dead.”