“Get out of my way!” the man shouted as he headed straight to Nichole. “Both these girls have been nothing but trouble since the day I took them in. First Dancing tried to drink all my whiskey. Now she’s got the others thinking they need to leave work and come visit. Well, they can visit her at the funeral. It’s no crime to stomp out trash, and I aim to finish the job this time.”
Nichole glanced around for a weapon. This madman wasn’t going to touch Dancing without a fight. She grabbed a pitcher and hurled it at him. As he dodged, her hand slid down her leg and pulled the knife from her boot. Seven inches of thin, shiny steel reflected the lamplight.
He growled like an animal and jerked a thick-bladed hunting knife from a sheath at his side. “I’ll cut you deep for interfering with my business.”
She knew she could take him in a fair fight, but he didn’t look like the kind of man who fought fair. She took a step backward.
His growl fouled the air as he moved toward her. His free hand caught Dancing’s arm as he passed her. He jerked her from the bed, sending her tumbling to the floor between Nichole and him. Dancing screamed with pain and fright.
In the second Nichole glanced down at her, the madman slashed forward.
The first swing missed by an inch, the second lunge brushed across her shirt.
“Run!” Nichole yelled to the others. “Get out!”
Sister Cel lifted the screaming redhead and moved toward the door as Mole kicked Dancing out of his way and closed in on Nichole.
She swung once, twice, missing him by a hair.
He was huffing now, snorting like a bull. “I’m going to slice you up good,” he growled. “No one interferes with me.”
Nichole dodged another lunge and countered with a cut across Mole’s forearm. He swore and swung wildly, slinging blood through the air. Nichole ducked and darted a few steps away, but the windows pinned her.
He took a great breath and began closing in, leaning his entire body from side to side as he walked. Teasing her to try and get past him.
Suddenly a shot blasted through the room, shattering a window above Mole’s head. “Hold it right there!” Adam’s clear voice shouted.
Mole and Nichole both turned toward the door as Adam took a step closer. “What’s going on?” he demanded without lowering the rifle from his shoulder. “Nick, are you all right?”
“This ain’t none of your business, Doc. Stay out of it.” Mole lowered his knife an inch. “I got a right to deal with my girls the way I see fit, and I don’t like the idea of Dancing coming over here whining to you about her sorry life.”
“She’s very ill. You almost beat her to death.” Adam moved closer, the rifle still pointed at Mole’s chest.
“I didn’t give her any more than she deserved,” Mole reasoned. “And I don’t take kindly to your butting in where you ain’t wanted. You don’t know how these women are in my place. I got to keep them in line or they’d steal me blind. They’re all lazy, or they wouldn’t be making a living on their backs.”
Adam didn’t lower his gun. “Get out,” he said. “Get out and don’t come back.”
Mole glanced around the room. “I ain’t no fool,” he said as he took a step toward the side door. “But no man treats me wrong and gets away with it, not even a doc. You’ll get yours sometime when you ain’t got a gun pointed at me. And you can tell Dancing, she’s as good as dead. I’m through with her and that mouthy friend of hers. They can starve, for all I care. When I toss them out there ain’t a person in town who’ll give them a bread crumb.” He turned and was gone as quickly as he’d appeared.
“He means it.” Nichole moved to Adam’s side.
“So did I.” Adam put the rifle down. “Are you all right?” He glanced first at Nichole, then at Sister Cel.
“We’re fine, but Dancing-”
Before she could finish, Adam knelt beside Dancing. The patient looked like a rag doll someone had kicked into a corner and forgotten. She wasn’t even crying anymore.
Adam’s hands moved carefully down her body, feeling for more breaks in her bones. After a moment, he ordered, “I’ll need more bandages, hot water, and all the light we can set up about the table.”
Nichole hurried to the cabinet just as she heard footsteps rushing down the stairs. In a blink, she had vanished into the corner by the cabinet.
“What is going on, Adam?” Bergette screamed as she rounded the corner and rushed past the nun and into the office. “Did I hear a shot?”
Adam carefully lifted Dancing to the table. Blood was spilling onto her bandages in several places and his shirt-front was stained with crimson rain. “We have an injured woman,” he said calmly. “Would you like to help?”
Bergette looked first at Dancing, then at the redhead standing next to the nun. “Does Mrs. Jamison know about the kind of people you see?” Her voice held a hint of a threat.
“She knows I’m a doctor.” Adam was far more interested in Dancing than in Bergette. “I see people who need help. I suggest you either help or get out.”
“You can’t talk to me like that!”
“I don’t have time to talk to you any other way.”
Bergette opened her mouth then snapped it closed. She ran from the room yelling for Charles to bring her pills. Everyone knew the argument wasn’t over, she’d just run out of ammunition. She was the kind of woman who would make him pay dearly for his harshness.
“Sister, lock the door,” he ordered. “And you,” he looked at the redhead.
“Ro-Rose,” the frightened woman hiccuped her name. “Just Rose.”
“Do you think you can hold your friend? Cradle her in your arms and try to keep her still. We’ve got to reset her leg, and she’s got a bad gash on her head from the fall. We’ll have to work fast, she’s losing a great deal of blood.”
The prostitute joined him. “I can do whatever I have to do. My ma was a midwife back in the hills. Blood don’t frighten me none.” She seemed happy to be asked to help and she hugged Dancing. “And Doc, no matter what happens, thank you.”
When Nichole heard Sister Cel lock the door, she joined Adam. They worked for hours trying to repair the leg and cool Dancing’s raging fever. While Nichole and Sister Cel followed Adam’s orders, Rose seemed to know what to do. She’d been honest about having no fear of blood for by the time Dancing’s head was stitched Rose’s top was wet with her friend’s blood.
She pushed away the nun’s efforts to clean her up and continued to cradle Dancing.
Finally, long after midnight, Dancing slipped away. They’d all tried but couldn’t hold her to this earth. She died without a whimper, without a fight.
Adam pulled away in defeat, Rose cried softly as she held her friend’s cooling hand to her cheek. Sister Cel prayed in a soft voice that was almost a song. The smell of blood and death hung in the air, weighing on everyone.
Adam heard Nichole follow him as he walked into the darkness of the porch. Without a word, he opened his arms and they held one another tightly. He could feel his heart pounding against hers, her breath brushing the side of his throat, the warmth of her body pressing against him.
This was part of it, he wanted to scream. Part of the magic she thought he had. Part of being the doctor she wanted him to be. Not the wonder of saving a life, anyone could handle that, but the ability to keep going when death wins.
He didn’t kiss her. He only held her. There were no words for him to tell her why, or how dearly, he needed her close. There were no words needed for her to understand.
When the nun called him, Adam slowly pulled away. He touched her hair, silently saying thank you as he returned to the house.
Without a word, Nichole slipped into the foyer. Moving up the stairs, she climbed into the attic. She retrieved a box of clothes that would make her invisible and maybe even bulletproof. She now had a mission.