Page 49 of Wellspring
A shout tore from Cade’s throat as he dropped to the ground at Erick’s side.Blood pulsed from the hole in his back, staining his chambray shirt bright red.The memory of Pahayoko falling from his horse with a similar wound flashed through Cade’s mind, stealing what little breath he still had.He couldn’t let history repeat itself.Erick groaned, struggling to push himself up, his arm trembling with effort.“Warn them,” he rasped, his voice breaking as his elbow buckled and he collapsed, unconscious.
Cade leaned his full weight onto the wound, trying to slow the bleeding.He hadn’t been able to save his brother when the cavalry gunned him down, but he would be damned if he let Erick die.The cries of fear and distress from the other patrons echoed around him without registering as more than sound.He had eyes only for the labored rise and fall of Erick’s back.As long as he could see that, Erick was still alive.
“Here.”Javier pressed a folded kerchief into Cade’s hands.“Use this.”
Cade pressed the pad against the wound and turned to meet Sanders’s gaze.“You’re a dead man.”
“Watch yourself, Webster,” Lutz blustered, but Cade ignored him as he pushed to his feet.
“Cade!”Javier’s voice cut through the rising anger that colored his vision.“Erick needs a doctornowif he’s going to survive, and I can’t get him there by myself.”
Cade shook himself free of the rage threatening to consume him.Killing Sanders could wait.Erick had to come first.He bent again to find Javier holding the pad he’d just pressed against Erick’s back.When Javier rose, he saw the cloth was already soaked with blood.“Keep pressure on the wound,” Javier said as he lifted Erick over his shoulder.
Even pressing as hard as he could, blood seeped through the pad and trailed in rivulets down Cade’s arm.How could Erick possibly survive this?His vision darkened around him, the red haze of blood all he could see, until Javier staggered up the steps to Dr.Lillard’s surgery and kicked open the door.
“We have an emergency here!”Javier shouted.Lillard hurried out from a back room, grimacing as Javier laid Erick on the examination table.“He’s been shot.”
“In the back?”Lillard looked horrified as he peeled the blood-soaked pad away, though Cade couldn’t tell if it was by the wound or the cowardice behind it.
“Sanders,” Javier spat out, just as disgusted.
“Can you save him?”Cade would deal with Sanders later—there was nowhere on earth he’d be safe from Cade’s vengeance—but Erick had to survive first.
Lillard cut away Erick’s shirt, shaking his head.“I’d have to operate to get the bullet out, and if it’s pierced a lung or nicked his heart, there’s not much I can do.”
Before Cade could insist that he couldn’t let Erick die, a young woman and man hurried into the surgery.“We saw someone carried in from the street,” the woman said in a lilting accent.“What can I do to help?No, Tim, you know blood makes you queasy,” she added, trying to push her companion back from the table.
“Lucy and Tim O’Neill are new in town.They’ve opened an apothecary next door,” the doctor explained.“Lucy, get my surgical tools ready, please.O’Neill, I’ll need ether to keep him anesthetized.Triple the usual amount—this will be a lengthy surgery, if he doesn’t die on us first.”He rolled up his sleeves and began to pump water at the sink to wash his hands.
O’Neill nodded, seeming relieved to have something to do that would take him out of the surgery.“Yes, sir.”
Javier tried to herd Cade toward the door after O’Neill, but Cade stood his ground.“Webster, let the doc do his job.”
“No,” Cade protested.“I have to stay.I have to be here if….”He couldn’t get the words out.He’d lost so much in his life.He couldn’t bear to lose Erick too.
“Come on, Cade.”Javier guided him out of the surgery, shutting out the sight of Lucy O’Neill laying down a variety of gruesome-looking tools for Lillard to use to cut into Erick’s back.“You have to warn Wellspring.”
“No, I can’t leave Erick!I—”
“Cade,” Javier said sharply.“Pull it together.You’re a better rider than I’ll ever be, and they have to be warned.I’ll stay right here and I won’t let anyone get to Erick, but you being here won’t change whether he lives or dies right now, and you warning Wellspring could make that difference for all our friends.For Michele.”
And she was the one person Cade loved enough to leave Erick’s side for.“Fuck,” he muttered.“You won’t let Sanders get a second chance at him?”
“I swear,” Javier said.“I’ll get my gun from the wagon, and I won’t let anyone other than you come through that door.Now, go!”
Cade cast one more glance toward the surgery where Lillard was preparing to fight for Erick’s life.He ached for a moment of privacy to give Erick one last kiss, but asking for it would give away their secret and take the doctor away from Erick’s side when time was critical—for both of them.He turned and bolted for Nahnia, driving his heels into the horse’s sides as soon as his ass hit the saddle.They raced down the dusty streets and out of town.He blamed the wind in his face for the tears that blurred his vision and wet his cheeks.Cade briefly considered crossing through JR land, since Sanders’s threats made it sound like everyone would be focused on attacking Wellspring, but if he had the timing wrong, he’d end up wounded or dead with no backup, and that wouldn’t help anyone.He’d have to take the southern road and hope he could get there in time.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
CADE COULDN’Thave described the race back to Wellspring if his life depended on it, his focus on pushing Nahnia and himself to their limits in his haste to get back before it was too late—for Wellspring, for Chel, for Kit and Mac and the rest of his friends.For the life he’d almost started to believe he and Erick could build together.He crossed out of the foothills and onto Wellspring property as the sun started to set.Sanders had implied the attack would come as night fell, probably hoping they’d be less alert or at least less able to see anyone coming under the cover of darkness, which gave him a matter of minutes.He drew his pistol from his belt and fired into the air, hoping someone would hear and the sound would put them on alert enough that they’d be ready if he couldn’t get there in time, especially the riders out on the range.
A horse approached, and Cade had his pistol drawn before he recognized the rider as Jesse Beaufort.He couldn’t waste time explaining the threat more than once, so he waved Beaufort back.“Get everyone together,” he gasped, pulling air into his lungs.Beaufort took one look at his and Nahnia’s state and didn’t ask any questions, just wheeled around and raced back in the direction he’d come from.
Payne was on the porch of the main house, rifle in hand, when Cade pulled up and slid from Nahnia’s saddle.At least half the hands clustered around the steps, with more running up every second.“JR,” Cade ground out.“They’re planning to attack tonight.We have to be ready for them.”
Chel pushed through the men to his side.“Javier and Erick?”
“Sanders shot Erick.”The words cut like knives, all the more since Cade knew Erick might already be dead.“We brought him to Dr.Lillard, and Javier stayed with him, but….”
