A strength she didn’t know she possessed rose up inside of her, and she came to her feet with a roar. And then she ran face-first into a hard chest.
“My goodness, Elizabeth,” Cole said, wrapping his arms around her. “You scared me to death.”
“I can’t believe you shot at me,” she said. And then she broke down sobbing in his arms.
“I shot around you, darling. That’s entirely different.”
“That’s all of them, boss,” one of the men called out. “The Silver Creek Bandits are dead.”
“Everyone head to the house and get warm. Nothing we can do about the barn. We can get the animals settled in a bit.”
“Lester’s already taking care of it,” Calhoun said. “Better get your woman inside before she gets frostbite from all those tears. I got to hand it to you, son. That takes courage to shoot at a man who’s holding your wife. One wrong move…”
Elizabeth pulled back from Cole’s arms, but he scooped her up and started walking toward the house. The barn was still in full flame, but it was far enough away from their other buildings as to not be a danger. Cole was right. There was nothing they could do about the barn but watch it burn.
She looked up at her husband and her breath caught in her chest. He was so big and strong. And so hers. And most importantly, he loved her.
They had tough days ahead. They had friends to bury and rebuilding to do. But as long as they had each other, they could get through anything.
“Cole,” she said, touching a hand to his face. He stopped and looked down at her. His eyes were tired and his face drawn. Killing his brother had more of an impact than he was letting on, and there would be grief and healing to tend to in the coming days and weeks.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked.
“Because I love you. Because you make me proud. Because this is a moment that will be passed down in story to our children and grandchildren, and I want to remember exactly how I felt as you held me in your arms.”
“There is no greater love,” he said, his voice husky with emotion.
Epilogue
One Year Later…
“I can’t do this,” Elizabeth said.
Cole watched her battle for every breath, each inhale a struggle, each exhale a prayer, as the life within her fought to come into the world with what seemed like deliberate, punishing slowness. She was soaked with sweat despite the December cold that tried to seep through every crack in their bedroom walls, her nightgown plastered to her body, her dark hair stuck to her forehead and neck in wet strands. Exhaustion showed in the darkness beneath her eyes—bruise-dark circles that spoke of hours of relentless pain—and in the way her body seemed to have given up on trying to find a comfortable position. There was no comfort to be found.
The pain had started yesterday afternoon, just small twinges that she’d waved off as false labor—she’d had them before over the past few weeks. But by dinnertime, the twinges had become contractions that took her breath away, and by midnight she’d been gripping the bedpost and breathing through each wave like her life depended on it. And now it was nearly midnight again, a full day of labor that seemed to have no end in sight.
And he could see the worry on Doctor Jones’s face, could read it in the tight line of the man’s mouth and the way he kept checking his pocket watch and shaking his head. The doctor was younger than Cole had hoped when he’d hired him to replace old Doc Morrison who’d retired—barely thirty, fresh from medical school back east, full of book learning but light on practical experience. Especially with difficult births. And this was clearly a difficult birth.
Cole laced his fingers through Elizabeth’s and grimaced as she squeezed hard enough for the bones to crack, hard enough that he could feel his wedding ring cutting into his flesh, as another contraction wracked her body. Her back arched off the bed and a low moan escaped through gritted teeth—she’d stopped screaming hours ago, too exhausted even for that, and somehow the quiet moans were worse than the screams had been.
The fire burned hot in the hearth—too hot, making the room stifling—and the doctor tried to keep thick blankets over her, muttering something about maintaining body heat and preventing shock. But she kept kicking them off with what little strength she had left, sending the heavy quilts sliding to the floor where they lay in defeated heaps.
He’d never felt so helpless in his life, not in battle, not facing down Riley, not in any of the dangerous situations his work had put him in. He’d already bucked the doctor’s orders by staying in the room with his wife—apparently it wasn’t done, husbands witnessing birth, but Elizabeth had threatened to shoot anyone who tried to remove him. But after the first several hours, after watching her suffer with nothing he could do to help, he’d begun to question his sanity. The need to go out and get drunk with Lester and the rest of the hands—to pace the yard and smoke cigars and pretend this wasn’t happening until someone came out to tell him it was over—was starting to sound like a very good idea indeed.
“Elizabeth, really,” Doctor Jones said. “You must keep covered. You don’t want the baby to catch a chill when he’s born.”
“Get out,” she said, pushing the covers off again. She tried to sit up, but her weight was too bulky and she was too uncoordinated, so Cole put an arm behind her back and helped her sit up some.
“Get out!” she said again when Doctor Jones just stood staring at her as if she’d lost her mind. Then she turned to Cole. “Please.”
“Give us a few minutes,” Cole told him.
“That’s unwise, Sheriff. Things can sometimes happen rather quickly. This is typical of a woman giving birth. I’ve plenty of experience with this. They don’t know what they want when the pain overtakes them. They don’t have the same constitution that we men have.”
At that moment, he questioned the sanity of Laurel Valley’s new doctor. He’d never seen a warrior, not in battle or anywhere else, who was fighting like his wife was.
“It’ll be fine,” Cole said as diplomatically as he could. “I’ll call you back when we need you. Bessy has some fresh coffee. Help yourself.”
