Only 06 - Winter Fire

sleep, clean and gentle.”
    She waited, but all he said was, “Anything else?”
    â€œWhen I tried to ease out of your bed, your arm tightened and you started to wake up. I waited, and tried again. Same thing.”
    Case looked away from Sarah, but she sensed that she still had his full attention.
    â€œI fell asleep,” she said simply. “It was so warm and peaceful to be held like that. No wonder Emily came to you when her dreams troubled her.”
    A flash of stark pain went over his face like black lightning.
    Sarah’s breath caught. Despite everything, she wanted to go to him, to hold him and be held in turn.
    There were times when life simply hurt too much to bear alone.
    â€œEmily is dead, isn’t she?” Sarah whispered.
    Only silence answered the question.
    â€œIs that why you’re hunting Culpeppers?” she asked.
    â€œI will see every last one of them in hell.”
    His voice was like winter itself—quiet, cold, unstoppable.
    She shivered and rubbed her hands over her arms.
    â€œI don’t doubt it,” she said. “Unless you get yourself killed first.”
    â€œNo one will hang crêpe if I die.”
    â€œI would.”
    Slowly Case looked back to her.
    â€œDon’t,” he said simply.
    â€œDon’t what?”
    â€œCare about me. It will only hurt you.”
    Sarah’s smile was bittersweet.
    â€œThat’s how you know you’re alive, Case. You hurt.”
    After that, nothing disturbed the morning silence but the sound of her footsteps moving away.
    Â 
    Case dumped an armload of wood in the cabin. Sitting on his heels, he sorted and stacked the wood neatly near the fire.
    Sarah looked up from her spinning. Though she was tired enough to fall on her face after a day of grinding corn with Lola, boiling laundry, and making soap, the spinning still had to be done. The cloth not only made their own clothes, it was one of the few sources of cash she had.
    Unfortunately she wasn’t too tired to blush every time she thought of what had happened that morning, with the sun barely up, her pants down around her knees, and a wild singing in her body.
    Hastily she looked away from Case. The firewood he had brought in was obviously from the higher country beyond Lost River Canyon. There was even some pine wood among the piñon and juniper.
    â€œThank you,” she said. “You’re very handy with that ax Ute, uh, found.”
    She suspected Ute had “found” the ax—and more besides—at the raiders’ camp in Spring Canyon.
    â€œNo thanks necessary,” Case said. “I eat food cooked over that fire just like Conner does.”
    The cabin door opened. Conner stuck his head in.
    â€œIf you’re finished with that wood,” he said to Case, “I could use a hand.”
    Sarah looked up quickly from her spinning.
    â€œWhat is it?” she asked.
    â€œNothing you need to worry about,” her brother said.
    â€œThen Case doesn’t need to worry about it, either,” she said. “He worked like a donkey getting firewood today.”
    â€œIt won’t take long,” Conner said.
    Case glanced at the rawboned boy and stood up smoothly. He had been expecting something like this ever since Conner had reluctantly walked off this morning, leaving his sister in Case’s bed.
    â€œBe right with you,” he said.
    Conner withdrew. Rather pointedly he left the door open behind him.
    â€œThat boy,” Sarah muttered, setting aside her spinning. “You would think he was born in a barn.”
    â€œI’ll get the door on my way out.”
    When Case closed the door behind him, Conner was standing off toward one of the clumps of big sage. In the waning light, the boy cast a long, thin shadow. The six-gun he wore was a blunt black bulge on his hip.
    He put the sun behind him , Case realized. Right in my eyes. The boy has promise .
    Hope he lives long enough to grow into it .
    â€œWhat happened this morning?” Conner demanded as soon as the other man was within speaking range.
    â€œYou heard your sister.”
    â€œHow did you nick your eye?”
    â€œWhat’s on your mind? Something special eating on you?”
    â€œSarah. Leave her alone.”
    Deliberately Case hooked his thumbs through his belt and took a relaxed stance.
    â€œYou do recall whose bed is out in the brush and whose is in the cabin?” he asked quietly. “Have you