"Cole?" Kristin murmured.
"It's a surprise," he said, squeezing her shoulder. She followed him down the steps and out to the yard. There was something lumpy in the back of the wagon, something that cried out plaintively, "Kristin, Shannon?"
"Matthew!" She screamed her brother's name and flew to the wagon. She kissed him, and she held him so tightly that he muttered, "Kristin, I survived being shot, you're going to kill me here in my home at last with kindness!"
"Oh, Matthew!"
Then Shannon was flying down the steps. The three McCahys greeted one another, and the men looked on, and then the harmonica player started up again, with "Lorena", this time bringing tears to eyes that had nearly run dry in all the years of bloodshed.
Matthew was brought in and put to bed in his own room. Once he was tucked in, he caught his sister's hand, and Kristin smiled and kissed him on the forehead again and told him to rest.
"Kristin!" He pulled her back. "Kristin, there'll be a bunch of Yankees here soon. They'll find out that Major Emery and his men were slaughtered, and they'll know that Cole and his men came in for the cleanup, and they'll be damned glad. But there's still a war on. They'll have to take them prisoner, or else they'll have to fight, and a lot of men will die needlessly. They're true heroes — to both sides, probably — but that won't make any difference. Kristin, are you understanding me?"
No, she wasn't. Or perhaps she was and she wanted to deny it. She couldn't have her husband taken away from her so soon.
"Kristin, Cole is considered an outlaw. Worse than ever before."
"Why? What do you mean?"
"He'll have to explain that to you himself. But be prepared. They need to sneak away now, tonight."
She felt weak, as if she had been drowning and she had reached and reached for a rope and it had been viciously wrenched away.
"Thank you, Matthew," she told her brother.
She blew out the lamp and left him. She hesitated, leaning against the door.
When she came back downstairs, she quickly discovered that everything that Matthew had said was true. The Confederate surgeon who had so carefully tended to her brother was checking the men she had sutured and bandaged — and preparing them for travel. He smiled at her when he saw her.
"Your brother is going to be just fine. Keep the wound clean. Never use the same sponge twice when you're cleaning out a wound. I'm becoming more and more convinced that rot travels that way. Seems we have been doing better with sanitation than the blue bellies." He paused, and she thought that he, too, looked weary. "He's a fine young man, your brother. You take care of him."
"Thank you, Captain Turnbill," said Kristin. He was about to turn away, but she stopped him with a hand set lightly upon his arm. "Captain, are you sure these men are fit to travel?"
"The worst wounded are the Yankees we found in the bunkhouse and the barn, and they don't have to travel anywhere. My men have one broken arm, a broken leg, some shot in the shoulder and two concussions. They'll be all right." He paused, looking at her unhappily. "Mrs. Slater, they'll be a lot better off traveling now than they would be in a Yankee prison camp. I'm not a man to say that all Yanks are butchers, but there's not much good to be said about prison camps, whether they're Yankee camps or Confederate camps."
The able-bodied men were walking past her, making ready to leave. Kristin couldn't see her husband anywhere.
Malachi came around behind her and squeezed her shoulders. He turned her around. "Hope Cole won't mind," he said, and he hugged her and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Hell, I don't care if Cole does mind!" he said, and he kissed her again. She didn't know there was a tear on her cheek until he wiped it away.
"Oh, Malachi…"
"It's all right. We won't be far away."
"Not far away at all."
It was Jamie who spoke. He was right behind Malachi, and he took her from his brother and kissed her cheek, too. "You take care of yourself, little sister, you hear? Take good care of that nephew of mine, too."
She nodded, unable to speak for a few seconds.
"Cole —"
"Cole is right here," her husband said. Tears blurred her vision. He took her in his arms. "Hey!" he whispered, his lips nuzzling her throat. "Stop that! You can't send my brothers away with tears in your eyes."
"Your brothers…"
She whirled around in his arms. Cole looked over her head. Malachi tipped his hat and grinned, and Cole grinned back. The two of them went out, and the house slowly fell silent. "I'm not leaving tonight, Kristin."
"What?" she whispered.
There was a bit of a commotion outside. Shannon was saying goodbye nicely to Jamie, and not so nicely to Malachi. Cole grinned, and Kristin grinned back, her eyes searching his. Then the door slammed, and Shannon whispered, "Oh, excuse me!"
Neither of them turned around. They heard Shannon tiptoe into the parlor to stay with the Union injured.
He was beautiful, Kristin thought. He was the most beautiful man she had ever seen. He was leaner than he had been that first day she had seen him. Strands of gray were creeping into his hair and into his beard, but somehow they were beautiful, too. They went well with the silver light in his eyes, with the handsome, dignified planes of his face.
"Oh!" she whispered heatedly. "You have to leave! Matthew says they consider you an outlaw —"
"They won't know I'm here, Kristin. My men are gone. They've taken my horse. They've learned how to disappear with the night. And for now I'm staying with my wife."
"Oh!"
"If she'll have me."
"Oh!" She touched his cheek, tenderly moving her fingertips over the coarse beard there. "Oh, she will have you!" she breathed.
He caught her hand and kissed her fingertips. Silently he led her up the stairs and through the doorway to their bedroom. Then he leaned against the door, and she smiled as she watched him.
"I never thought I would be here with you now!" he whispered.
"But you are," she said.
"Yes, I am."
Kristin walked over to him. She lifted off his hat and tossed it on the floor, and she unbuckled his scabbard and his gun belt and cast his weapons aside. Studiously, she unbuttoned his frock coat and his uniform shirt, and when his shoulders and chest were bare she felt the sweet thrill of anticipation invade her. Her fingers grew awkward, and she found that she was trembling. She whispered his name, and she pressed her lips to his chest and to the pulse at the base of his throat. He caught her lips and kissed her hungrily, tasting and tasting her mouth, trembling with ever-greater ardor. She was breathless when he released her and turned her around to work at the tiny buttons of her dress. He was shaking as badly as she, but was more practiced, and more determined, and she was startled when the dress fell quickly away from her, and then her chemise, and then her petticoats. He lifted her up with her stockings and shoes still on and carried her quickly to the bed, pausing with a rueful laugh to check on Gabriel, who was sleeping sweetly in the little bed in the corner.
Then he tossed her on the bed and fell upon her, and she threaded her fingers joyously through his hair. He groaned and kissed her again, and then he kissed her breasts, staring at them, savoring them, easing his tongue over each nipple, then his teeth, then the fullness of his mouth.
"Oh, Cole!" Her head tossed from side to side, and lightning swept through her, embedding a
sweet, swirling heat at the apex of her thighs, a dizzying need for him. He filled it, touching her with a light and tender stroke and then with a demanding one, watching her eyes, watching her body, feeling the thunder of the desire that grew and grew within him.
He kissed her belly, and he stroked her thighs, and he played his touch over the golden triangle at their juncture, and then he delved within it. He made an incredibly sensual act of taking off her shoes, peeling away her garters and hose. Then he rose boldly above her. He drew a steady pattern with the searing tip of his tongue from her throat down the valley between her breasts to her navel and into the very heart of her fire. And she cried out for him, and he came to her.