She moved, thinking to ease the ache in her leg.

Immediately he turned, this man--this stranger--who was her husband.

Hattie froze, feeling his eyes staring through the dim light. Staring at her.

"Awake?" His voice was deep and gentle. It made her think of distant thunder, too far away to threaten, close enough to suggest its power.

Snapping her eyes shut, she peered through the barest slit between her lashes.

He was standing still by the crude table in the middle of the room, his hands holding a long knife. Watching her.

She kept her breathing as soft as she could. An itch began in the bottom of her left foot, spread across the sole until she wanted to scream with the need to scratch.

Forcing herself to lie still, Hattie hoped he'd believe she was still asleep. Or unconscious. She wasn't yet ready to speak to him, for she'd only just remembered who he was.

For an indeterminate time she simply drifted. Smells assailed her nose, meaty smells, piquant smells. When they grew stronger, she heard her stomach growl.

The next thing she knew, her shoulders were being supported and a cup full of the most delicious smell of all was suspended just under her nose.

The cup touched her lips and warm, rich broth seeped between her half-open lips.

She swallowed, sipped, swallowed again. When the cup was removed, she cried out in protest.

"Hush." You need water too." And another cup replaced the first, full of cool, sweet water.

It seemed like a long time to Hattie that he held her and fed her, in tiny sips that seemed all she could manage at one time. The light dimmed even more. She grew exhausted, until the effort of swallowing was more than she could make.

"Enough?"

She tried to nod, but her head was so heavy. Her eyelids refused to obey her and her eyes seemed to want to roll back in her head. "Nuff," she breathed, even as she felt reality slipping away again.

"You don't need to tell Craigie where you're goin'. Just get enough cash money and supplies to get you to Grande Ronde and have him put the balance on the books." But for Hattie, he'd be doing the trading himself. He wasn't sure Silas had it in him to hold out for a good deal.

"I wish we didn't have to sell them," Silas said, checking the jerry-rigged panniers on the big black ox. "Hat, she's gonna be awful mad when she finds out."

"What are we going to do with eleven of the damn beasts?" Emmet said, impatient with the boy's reluctance. "I don't know about you, but I'm not feedin' any more stock through winter than I have to." If he had his druthers, he'd not be feeding any oxen, just his gelding and mule, maybe the milch cow. He'd already felt the weight of responsibility, just with Hattie and Silas. How was he going to deal with chickens and cows and.... He knew now how beaver felt in his traps.

He ought to be on his way to China by now, not planning for winter here on the Boise.

For a moment, he wondered what would happen if he loaded Hattie back in the wagon and took her on to Waiilatpu. Surely the kindly, Christian Whitmans would care for her until she was healed, then send her on to her destination. If she survived the trip over the mountains.

No, he couldn't do that. He'd given his word. For better or for worse.

Emmet lifted the last log into place, hoping he'd found all the weak spots in the fence. His gelding didn't like to be penned and would do his best to escape.

Silas scuffed his toe in the dust. "Yeah, I guess so. It's just that I hate to see old Ajax, or even that cranky Janus go to somebody who won't treat 'em right." He looked Emmet in the eye. "They've been raised like pets."

Emmet grunted. Damn, but it was muggy, here by the stream of hot water. "You'd better get started. Tell Craigie I'll be along in a few weeks, to get the supplies."

Silas tossed a canvas bag full of dried venison onto the broad back of the black ox--Thor, for God's sake! For a moment, Emmet felt guilty, sending the boy off across unfamiliar country. Then he reminded himself that the lad was older than he himself had been when he first signed on as an able seaman.

Of course, Emmet had been man high and strong. Silas was scarcely taller than Hattie, and skinny as a rail, for all he ate like a bear in the spring.

"Guess I'll be goin'," Silas said, laying the goad gently across Ajax's shoulder. His voice trembled, but his chin was set.

"Take care of yourself." Emmet heard a certain gruffness in his own voice. "I'll be lookin' for you before snow flies."

For a long time he stood watching the oxen plod away from him. He surely hoped he wasn't making a mistake, trading Hattie's five spare oxen for flour and coffee, gunpowder and lead.

He had a feelin' he'd be grateful he had, come winter.

Silas was gone. He'd said he was going after someone to care for her. She'd be safe with Emmet.

So now she was alone with a stranger and she knew absolutely nothing about him.

Except that he was her husband.

The sunlight lying across the sandy floor was blocked by a tall figure. Hattie turned her head.

She gasped and he turned to look straight at her. With eyes adjusted to the interior dimness, she could see very well indeed, and what she saw made her forget the pain in her leg, the ache in her head. Made her forget the embarrassment she felt when he tended to her as carefully as any sickroom nurse.

He was naked, his clothing bundled in one hand, the other holding his long rifle. Hattie tried to look only into his face, but her eyes betrayed her. She could not keep them from seeing the width of his shoulders, the dark patch of hair on his chest that narrowed, then spread, to provide a soft nest for the jutting vitality of his sex, now rising to a bold height. She could not help but appreciate the narrowness of his hips, the supple strength of lean arms and legs, where long muscles rippled and shifted with his every movement.

Heat kindled in her belly as she stared at him, the first man she had ever seen entirely unclothed. Try as she might, she could not help but wonder how his skin would feel against hers. Would it be cool and dry? Or hot and damp with sweat?

Would their bodies slide against each other, like soap against a wet hand?

And what would he taste like, were she to touch her tongue to the hollow at his throat where she could see the beat of his heart?

Waves of heat swept over Hattie until she all but groaned. She clenched her hands against the comfort, closed her eyes against temptation.

And in the darkness, she once again became aware of the pain that seemed her constant companion.

Emmet moved when she finally closed her eyes, as if freed from unbreakable bonds. He could have sworn she was touching him, the way his skin burned everywhere she looked.

He pulled on his buckskin pants, ignoring the discomfort when he forced his sex into their tight confines. Too bad there was no cold water for Buff's bathtub.

He had a feeling he'd be needing it right regular for a while.

Thoughts of wading in icy streams did little to alleviate his body's reaction to her gaze, but shaving without soap or a mirror held his attention for long enough. By the time he could find no more whiskers with his searching fingers, he figured he could do what he had to do.

He sat on the edge of her cot, careful to keep to the frame and not jostle her.

"Wake up, Hattie." He reached to touch her, but stopped the motion, incomplete, and let his hand hover an inch above her face. It was still near enough that he could feel her heat.

"I'm awake," she said, though her eyes remained shut. "Are you dressed?"

He almost laughed. So she'd been layin' here afraid to look for all this time.

"Sure am," he told her. "And now it's your turn."

Her eyes flew open. Her eyes were enormous in the dim light. He could have swore he saw fear lurking in their dark depths. "My turn?" she whispered.

"For a bath." Without further explanation, he swept her covers aside and slipped his arms under her shoulders and knees, carefully so as not to twist her still splinted leg. "Good for what ails you," he said, carrying her outside, trying not to notice the warmth of her against his bare chest, the soft weight of her in his arms.

She struggled, but with no more than a sparrow's strength. "Put me down!" she demanded, then cried out as he was forced to tighten his grip on her legs.

"Damn it, stop wigglin'! Do you want me to drop you?" He carried her, quiet now, across the way to the cluster of willows screening the hot spring and Buff's bathtub. It was a rock-lined pool, filled with steaming, strong-smelling water.

Earlier he'd hitched up Odin and Baldur to drag a fat log up beside the tub, and he'd wedged it so it wouldn't roll when she sat against it. He let her down into the nest of blankets, silently cursing himself when a cry of pain burst from her lips.

"I wish you didn't have to do this for me," she said as he moved her nightgown above her knee and unwrapped the ties around her bandaged leg.

"So do I," he admitted, knowing his reasons were not hers. The linen towel was stuck fast to her leg, stained with blood and pus. Lifting it, he checked the gaping wound, noting that he could no longer see the whiteness of bone in its depths. There was no smell, thank the Lord. No gangrene, but it was too soon to count his blessings. She was not yet out of danger.

He retied the splints, lifting her gown even higher to do so, hating the wounds and bruises that marred her white skin. Her thigh, slim and tempting, was impossible to ignore, even though he filled his mind with images of looming icebergs and towering, icy waves. While he unbuttoned her gown, he did his best not to notice the fullness of breast under his hand. He reached for the bottom of the gown.

"Stop!" she cried. She clutched his hands, held them in place against her thighs. "What are you doing?"

"I'm taking your clothes off," he snarled, driven beyond his limits. "What the hell does it look like?"

He ignored her one-armed struggles and her protests. The tub was about six feet across and three feet deep, with a big, squared-off rock at the near end, serving as a step. He eased into the steaming water, wishing he could have left his pants off. Buckskin took forever to dry.

Slowly, still ignoring her weakening struggles, he lowered himself. The hot compresses he'd been putting on her leg for the past week had worked pretty well. On the assumption that if some is good, more is better, he figured soaking would drain off the infection in her leg twice as fast.

Hattie stopped struggling as soon as he had her in the water up to her neck.

"Oh, my," she said, her voice just above a whisper. "Oh, my, that feels good."

She closed her eyes and her lips spread in the first smile he'd seen from her since she was hurt.

He'd been able to contain his desire as long as he had to pay attention to her struggles and the need to avoid hurting her. Now she was soft and pliant in his arms and the raging need returned, swelling his sex, drying his mouth, making his heart pound against his ribs. Quickly he turned and slid her from his lap onto the step-rock. "Can you hold yourself there?" he said, aware that his voice had a weakness about it.

Her good foot went to the bottom. "I think so," she said, in tones as wobbly as his, "as long as I've got something to hold onto." She scrabbled with her free hand at the stone wall behind her but her fingers slid across its wet surface.

"Just a minute," Emmet said, rearing out of the water. He went to the corral, knowing she watched every move he made. There were still some peeled poles he hadn't used when he was repairing the fence.

After a couple of tries, he had the pole laid across the tub, close enough for her to drape her arm over. Between it and her foot on the bottom of the tub, she should be able to sit there for quite a while.

He did his best not to look below the surface of the water while he was fixing the pole. Seeing her like this, her breasts floating high, their dark pink nipples pouting and seductive, was a far cry from taking care of an unconscious, limp, feverish woman. Especially one whom he resented for keeping him where he didn't want to be.

"There." He tested it with a push. The rocks he'd set at either end held it in place. "Lean on that. And call me when you get tired." He headed back to the cabin, removing himself from temptation.

"You're a good man." Hattie had managed not to flinch when he dressed her after her soak. As long as she kept telling herself that he was her husband, with the legal right to touch her body intimately, she could keep herself from burning up with embarrassment. Now she lay quietly in the wide bunk, watching him, thinking on her good fortune.

He raised his head at her words. Now he stared at her across the room, his face in stark half shadow from the light of the fire. "You think so?"

"You're decent. Honest. Caring." Most men didn't like soft words like those applied to themselves and Emmet was no exception, she saw. His mouth tightened, became a thin, hard line. He had a temper, although she'd only seen it once, that night she'd gone to him with an outrageous request.

"I'm none of those things," he said, looking back at the chunk of wood. He'd begun carving at it at their nightly camps, his hands competent and strong in the flickering light of the fire. Hattie had never gotten a good look at it, because he always returned it to his saddlebags. It looked like an animal of some sort. A dog?

"You don't know me. I could be a thief. A murderer." Another slim curl of wood fell from his hands onto the pile below.

"No." She yawned, feeling entirely safe with him. "No, you couldn't." When, she wondered, would this terrible lethargy leave her? "You're a good man. But mysterious."

His grin flashed in the firelight. "Mysterious?" He gave the word a sinister sound.

"I don't know anything about you." She paused. Yes, she knew one thing about him. "Except that you're a man of your word." He had stripped her of her clothing, handled her naked body, and he'd done it all with impersonal gentleness, although more than once she'd felt the unmistakable swell of his desire against her hip or leg.

"I'll tell you my life story," he said, putting down his carving and coming to the side of the bunk, "another time. You sleep now." He laid his hand on her forehead, slid it lightly down to cover her eyes.

Surprisingly, she felt herself slipping into a doze. "'Nother time," she agreed.

They spoke little of an evening. Hattie wanted to ask him the thousand questions that bubbled in her mind, but had already learned that he was a private man who would reveal himself only in his own good time.

The irresistible need to sleep lessened over time. She hadn't counted the days, but she thought it had been somewhere around three weeks since he'd brought her to this dark little cabin with the musty smell of mice and moldy fur when he stopped tying her arm to her body.

"Don't try anything fancy," he warned. "Your collarbone's probably not knit solid yet."

She was so relieved to have the use of two hands that she almost wept.

Emmet left the door open if he was working just outside, but too often he closed it behind him, leaving Hattie in semi-darkness for hours at a time. She understood he could not leave her undefended, yet she hungered for sunlight like a starving man might crave food. She treasured the brief times when he carried her to the bathtub and left her to soak.

She considered the day she was allowed to stand on her good leg while she dressed a major event. Another was when he allowed her to occupy the great chair with its woven rawhide seat for meals. Last night he'd let her sit there after supper until she nodded and nearly fell off.

Emmet returned to the cabin that morning, shortly after he left it, carrying a long stick with a fork at one end. "Here, he said, handing it to her. "Try it for size."

Hattie tested the crutch. She was sure that, with a little practice, she could get around nicely on it. "Thank you," she said. "I was so tired of being carried everywhere. Then she bit her lip. Would he take her words as a criticism? He'd been so touchy lately, snarling at her if she said boo, spending most of his time cutting firewood or fishing.

"You'll probably want to wrap some cloth around the top, so it won't bruise you." He took the crutch back, ran his fingers along the smooth wood shaped so carefully to just fit under her arm. Apparently satisfied to its smoothness, he handed it back to her. "Don't go outside until you've practiced. Ground's pretty rough."

With those words, he simply turned around and walked out. Hattie stared after him. Did he really expect her to stay in the cabin now that she had the means to get around on her own? As soon as she had the hang of walking with it, she intended to do some exploring. Surely there were places to go other than the bathtub and the outhouse.

She managed to take care of herself all morning long without mishap. It felt so good to be doing for herself that she didn't notice how tired she was getting.

When a check outdoors showed her the sun close to the zenith, she decided to make biscuits for dinner. They would go with the stew Emmet had set to cook this morning, the stew that even now was filling the room with its mouthwatering aroma.

She worked harder making those biscuits than she'd done for many a full dinner back in Pennsylvania. Filled with satisfaction, she set the Dutch oven in the coals, stirred the stew.

The door opened. "What the bloody hell!" She'd scarcely opened her mouth to speak when he was scooping her off her feet. Two quick strides took him to the side of the bunks where he deposited her unceremoniously in the bottom one. "I told you to practice, not try to commit suicide." He laid a cool, callused hand on her forehead.