Wayward Wind by Dorothy Garlock

protested weakly as Cooper carried him into the cabin.
    Bonnie was half-sitting, half-leaning against the wall. Weak tears streaked her face. “Is he dead?”
    “Hell, no, I ain’t dead!” Griffin tried to cover his embarrassment with bluster. “I’m just arestin’ while I bleed to death.”
    Cooper eased him down on the pallet and Lorna knelt beside him, cutting away his shirt with her knife. With a competence born
     of long practice, she dabbed at the bloody wound with a cloth, studied it, then laid several thicknesses of the cloth over
     it.
    “The bullet went through, but there’s a bit of your shirt in there, Griff. I’ll have to get it out.”
    “Yes, ma’am. I’m obliged for what yo’re adoin’ ’n to ya for what ya done. I sure do hate it that I brought my trouble down
     on ya. They was dead set to hang me—”
    “It was my fault, Griff. I went to sleep and let them sneak up on us.”
    “You sure as shootin’ bluffed ole Dunbar.”
    “It was no bluff,” Lorna said quietly. “I was set to kill him if he raised the gun.”
    “Ya’d… a done it?” Griffin asked in a breathy whisper.
    “Yes. I would’ve killed him before I let him shoot you down.” She said it with no inflection at all. “We’re beholden to Mr.
     Parnell. I was sure of Dunbar, but I didn’t know about the other two.” She stood and looked up at him. “How did you know I
     was calling you?”
    “I knew.”
    Their eyes met and held. She nodded, gripped by a sudden shyness. The eyes looking so intently into hers were the bright blue
     of summer skies. For a moment they were enclosed in a timeless world, seeming to come close to each other, spirit moving effortlessly
     toward spirit.
    “I’m beholden to you, too, for keeping Dunbar from shooting me,” Cooper said.
    A smile crinkled the corners of his eyes and brightened a face that needed a shave and was streaked with dirt and sweat. Suddenly,
     to Lorna, it was a dear, familiar face, and she longed to place her palms on his cheeks and lean against his strength. Her
     answering smile lighted her brilliant, violet-blue eyes until they shone like stars.
    “It was what I was supposed to do,” she murmured for his ears alone.
    He nodded, and she thought how strange it was that they understood each other. It was as if they spoke a language other people
     didn’t know.
    “You’re the spunkiest woman I ever met. You’ll have to teach me how to throw a knife.”
    “I will, if you’ll lend me yours. I’ll need it to get the cloth out of Griffin’s wounds.”
    Cooper handed her the knife, then watched as she carefully wiped it on a clean cloth and placed it, alongside hers, on a stone
     beside the fire so that the tip was in the flame. She allowed the blades to heat for several minutes and then removed them
     and waved them in the air so that they cooled quickly. She fascinated Cooper as no human being had ever done before. He saw
     her tighten her lips grimly; she didn’t relish her task, but went at it, confidently picking the fragments of cloth from the
     wound by pinching them between the tips of the two blades.
    From her bent position beside Griffin, Lorna asked, “Cooper, will you bring the pan of hot water?”
    Cooper.
It was the first time she had spoken his name. A strong, unidentifiable emotion set his hands trembling as he poured water
     from the teakettle into the pan. He set it on the floor beside her. He felt so right being with her, working with her.
    Then a thought struck him like a blow between the eyes.
He was acting like a lovesick fool!
He didn’t know anything about this woman, and even if he did, there was no room for a woman in his life right now. Hell,
     he was almost a hundred miles from home. Home was a horse ranch where he had all he could do to scratch out a living for himself
     and his mother. This woman who so completely dominated his thoughts had a family somewhere in these mountains. She might even
     have a husband, he reasoned, but he