The Devil's Own Desperado Read Online Free

rapid succession. “Lady, please, give me my gun. You don’t understand.”
    “You don’t need it. No one is going to shoot you here.” Amelia picked up the revolver again and dropped it into the pocket of her apron. No, it didn’t need to be put somewhere, as Dr. Archer had suggested. It needed to be well hidden. Somewhere Saul’s inquisitiveness wouldn’t find it.
    She paused in the doorway. “And my name is Amelia, not lady.”

Chapter Three
    He was delirious, that had to be it. He drifted in and out of consciousness, trying desperately to hold onto a single thought…any thought other than the memory of that kid’s face the moment the bullet entered his chest and ended his life.
    He knew if he slipped under again, everything of that night would flow across his memory again. He wanted to forget it, forget all of it, because then it might not have happened. And he also knew that was a vain hope. It had happened.
    An angel hovered over him, and pressed a cool cloth to his burning skin. He shivered, despite the heat roiling through him. He knew beyond a shadow of a doubt he wasn’t dead, because there weren’t angels where he would be spending eternity, and definitely not angels who ministered cool water and bathed his fevered flesh. He’d been told too many times where he would end up to think there were angels with cool water in that place.
    He couldn’t figure out where he was. His brain was too muddled to reason it through. His shoulder throbbed like a son of a bitch. There was a vicious demon in his head, beating his skull with a hammer. He shuddered with the fever racking him. His throat was dry, and when he ran his tongue over his lips, they were peeling, and rougher than a corncob. He tried to ask for a drink of that heavenly cool water, but couldn’t form a word.
    As if she’d read his mind, the angel gently lifted his head with her oh-so-cool-and-soft hand pressed into the nape of his neck. She held his head up and lifted a glass of water to his parched lips. He gulped the sweet-tasting liquid, only to have her pull it away.
    His stomach lurched as the water hit it. He gagged on something vile lurking in the liquid.
    This was hell, after all.
    “…said the medicine he left for your pain has a very bad taste.”
    His eyes slid shut. He was too exhausted and too weak to hold them open anymore. He was too sick to care about any medicine. He’d figure out who said that later, when his brain wasn’t fuzzy and his whole body didn’t ache. Later he would figure out what that vile brew was, as well. At the moment, it just didn’t seem important.
    What seemed to be most important was surrendering to the darkness once more, where a soft voice whispered that he was safe, that no one was going to come gunning for him, that he was protected and would be cared for.
    “…Mathews that live around here.”
    Who were the Mathews? He knew he should know and that it should matter.
    The angel smoothed another cool rag over his burning face and neck, pressed a wet cloth to his cracked, dry lips, and murmured that he was safe. The water, this time, was sweet as it trickled down his throat and he swallowed instinctively. It tasted just like heaven would taste to a man burning.
    For the moment, he was willing to believe that the words were true and that the Mathews, whoever they were, were not a threat to him.
    ****
    Amelia dozed in a chair at the wounded man’s bedside. He had been in and out of consciousness for three days. At times, his fever raged so high the heat radiating from him was like the warmth rolling off a red-hot stove. Other times, he was nearly cool to the touch. The wound in his shoulder had stopped draining.
    Dr. Archer had been out daily to check on him, and seemed pleased with the way the wound was healing. He was lucky, Dr. Archer had said. He was young, despite the gray in his hair, and in good physical condition. The past day he had been sleeping deeply, an exhausted, but healthy sleep