Holt's Gamble by Barbara Ankrum

was startled when his long, slender fingers closed around her wrist, stopping her. She found him staring at her. His sky blue eyes were glazed and overly bright with fever and he frowned as if trying to focus on her face.
    "Amanda?" The word was little more than a whisper.
    "What?" Kierin leaned closer to his face.
    Holt's fingers tightened around her wrist. "Sorry... so sorry... forgive me."
    "Shh-h," she soothed, "don't try to talk."
    "No... I didn't know, Amanda... God, if I'd known..."
    "No, it's all right... Mr. Holt." Kierin tried to make her voice calm, but his growing restlessness alarmed her. Clearly, he had mistaken her for someone named Amanda in his delirium. For the first time, it occurred to her that he might be married. Could Amanda be his wife? Lover? Whoever she was, it was plain Holt cared very deeply for her.
    He struggled to sit up, but she held him down firmly.
    "I'll kill them..." he said suddenly, his voice a harsh, rasping whisper. "Bastards... my gun."
    His cold, hollow tone sent a chill through her.
    "Mr. Holt—Clay, please," Kierin begged, "stay... still." She struggled to keep him flat, but his wound began to bleed again.
    "Oh, no, " she sighed, and wrung out another cloth in the marigold solution. She pressed it against him and Holt began to shiver again.
    "C-cold... I'm... so cold. Hold me, Mandy... the snow is so c-cold."
    "Shh-hh." Kierin brushed his dark brown hair back from his forehead. She could see no other remedy. There were no more blankets to pile on him and still he trembled. Quickly, she lifted the covers and slid in beside him, nestling against the damp heat of his body. She kept one hand on the poultice, draping her arm awkwardly across his bare muscled chest, and leaned her head tentatively against his other shoulder.
    With his good arm, Holt drew her closer still, tightening his grip on her almost fiercely. Minutes passed—her body entwined intimately with his—and his shivering began to subside. Slowly, gratefully, she felt his breathing become deep and regular with sleep.
    How long she lay like that, listening to the lulling sound of his breathing—afraid to move for fear of waking him—she didn't know. Her sense of time was framed solely by the rhythmic rise and fall of Holt's chest beneath her arm. Her body molded to the lean, male contours of his, fitting together like two pieces of a puzzle. She watched his face in the lamp glow. The fine even features were shadowed by a dark growth of stubble and his long, dark lashes lay still in dreamless sleep. Her breathing became attuned to his and soon, despite her best efforts to stay awake, her eyes drifted shut. She had never felt so exhausted as she did now. Sleep took her gently, but insistently, as the morning sun lit the eastern horizon.
    * * *
    The rich deep scent of coffee found its way beyond the haze of sleep that had encompassed Kierin and brought her slowly to an unwilling consciousness. Her uncooperative eyes refused to open as if she were lost somewhere, deep in a dream from which she had no desire to escape. She curled toward the warmth beside her, her arm still draped across Holt's chest. Her fingers tightened around the almost dry poultice lying against his wounded shoulder.
    Kierin's eyes flew open. She sat bolt upright on the straw mattress, letting the bloodstained cloth slip from her fingers. The oil lamp had somehow gone out and she blinked in the half-light, trying to focus on the man beside her. A wave of panic swept her as she realized she had fallen asleep, leaving him completely unattended. Silently, she cursed her carelessness and leaned close to the still man to check his breathing. Relief flooded through her when she found that he was breathing with the slow, easy rhythm of sleep.
    She touched his brow lightly and found that the searing fever had subsided somewhat. Kierin sank back on her heels with a sigh of relief. She dipped the cloth in the now cooled marigold concoction and wrung it out