Page 77 of The Outlaw and the Heir

"Nicely done. It gave me the...the chance to take the man with the...the gun down," I said as the faint dizziness I'd felt before grew.

"Is there something wrong?" she asked, her eyes widening.

"Just a little winded from the excitement," I told her as my vision began to wobble. The pain in my muscles was growing,and I was beginning to wonder if I had pulled something badly. "I just need to take a little...a little?—"

"Samuel?"

"Okay...something might be?—"

That was all I managed as my strength gave out, and I no longer knew where up or down was. A new wave of pain slammed through me, and I felt something gritty between my teeth. Somehow, I’d ended up off my horse and on the ground, which made no sense. Not much was making sense at the moment because the edges of my thoughts were getting increasingly fuzzy.

"What in the…" I managed and realized Elizabeth was above me, her voice was raised, but her words were not making sense, and I tried to focus on her. Even stranger, I watched as she gripped her skirt and began sawing at it with the bloody blade from earlier, which I’d dropped at some point. I chuckled a little when I realized she’d been wearing pants under her dress the entire time. Honestly, her father was wasting potential by leaving her to sit in that house all day playing mother and pretty figurehead when she was clearly made for a lot more than that.

"Samuel!" she barked, and I wondered how she'd managed to get into my face without my noticing. "Hold on! I'm going to figure out how to get your big ass out of here, you hear me? Don't you dare bleed out on me. Don't you dare, you bastard!"

"That's not...ladylike language," I muttered, wondering how I could be bleeding out.

Not that it mattered because the fuzziness was growing, and it brought a chilliness with it that should have been concerning, but instead, I just let it wash through me. After being in this damned desert heat for so many weeks, feeling cold was welcome. Of course, the pain shot through me as Elizabeth grabbed hold of me and tried to do...something wasn't all that great, but even that was losing importance as I began to drift.

She kept shouting, but honestly, I was more tired than I could ever remember. It didn't matter that I was being bumped and knocked around, it was still comfortable enough for me to feel my eyes slide closed. Ambrose was definitely going to give me shit for the trouble I'd let his sister get into, and probably for falling asleep while I was supposed to be bringing her back, but I would...I would deal with that.

Then nothing.

AMBROSE

"Arthur," I chided the boy as he began scaling the inside beams of the barn. "If you fall an' break somethin', you're gonna have to explain it to your daddy, you hear?"

"I'm okay," he proclaimed, far too young to understand that shouting aloud was a real quick way to make God take a peek and go, "Are you now?" and show you otherwise. The thought made me smile as I began to move the soiled bedding before I heard the scrape of his boots against the wood. A horrible feeling shot through me. I spun around to see first one foot and then one hand slide, and I shot forward.

To his credit, Arthur fought like hell to keep himself on that beam, but it was as determined as a bucking horse to throw him off. He slipped, and only then did he give a panicked shout as he realized his attempts had been in vain. I was under him in a flash, catching him before he hit the ground. I stumbled forward, tucking him against my body until I caught my footing so I could finally set him down.

"Alright?" I asked him, taking in his wide eyes and pale skin.

"Think so," he said, peering up at the beams. "They...that looks higher from down here."

"Probably because ya almost cracked that thick skull open down here," I said, rapping my knuckles on the top of his head and making him wince. "And now you get to tell your daddy how you almost hurt yourself and scared me half to death."

"Aww," he complained, scuffing his boot against the ground.

"No, no complainin', and no tryin' to get out of it either," I told him firmly. "You've done gave me enough scares for one day, and you're gonna go fess up to it, or I'll be the one doin' it. And I best hear that you told your daddy the full truth, you hear me?"

"Yes, sir," he said with a heavy sigh.

"Good, and if your daddy ain't too hard on ya, maybe I'll see if I can't snag you a piece of pie for later," I said, smirking when his downcast expression immediately brightened at the prospect of a sweet he wasn't normally allowed to get his grubby little hands on. Well, he wasn'tsupposedto, but just about everyone knew that Hipolita was as much a soft touch with him as she’d been with me when I was his age. Not that anyone was going to say anything because Hipolita would chase them out of the house and scold them for not minding their own business and sticking their busybody nose into hers.

I did love that woman.

"Now go on," I told him, giving his back a push. "I need to get my heart calmin' down before I keel over tryin' to shovel this mess up...unless you wanna do it, and I can go take a break."

His eyes widened. “No, sir!"

I chuckled as he sped off without so much as a glance back. He couldn't be too scared of his gentle and usually permissive father. More like he was scared of the guilt he’d feel when he had to tell his dad he'd nearly hurt himself badly or worse. Perhaps he just wanted to follow through on his promise to me because he wanted that piece of pie desperately.

Come to think of it, it was definitely the pie.

Still shaking my head in amusement, I bent over to grab the pitchfork and resume cleaning. I jerked at the sound of a distant bell, my brow furrowing as I knew instinctively it wasn't good, but the beat wasn't one I recognized. My father had set up a bell system throughout the ranch during the grim days of Le Garou, and most of it went unused. Nowadays, the beats were the daily call for meals, to wake the place up, and on occasion, to signal that someone had been hurt and needed attention.

It was similar to that beat, but it was only reserved for terrible injuries, possibly fatal ones. My heart sank as I wondered who could have been hurt so badly on the west side of the ranch, where I’d heard the beat start before others swiftly began ringing to the same beat. It was followed by someone shouting Rapture, and I knew then that it was that bell because someone was running to the nearby town to find the doc.

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