The Drifter. Сьюзен Виггс

verge of sinking.” She glanced pointedly at the aft hatch. The rudder seemed to be hanging by a thread—or by a waterlogged rope, to be more precise. Worm-eaten wooden bolts lolled uselessly along the deck. Big gaps separated the caulking of the hull. The line holding the post in place strained with a whining sound.

      “This is no place for a patient in her condition. We’ve got to move her.” Leah coiled the stethoscope and tucked it back into her bag. “As soon as it stops raining, bring her to the house, and we’ll put her to bed—”

      “I guess you didn’t understand,” the man said in an infuriating drawl.

      She scowled at him. “Understand what?”

      He stuck his thumb in his gun belt and drummed his fingers on the row of cartridges stuck in the leather loops. “You’re coming with us.”

      A chill seized her, though she took care to hide her alarm. So that was why he’d abducted her at gunpoint. This outlaw meant to pluck her right out of her own life and thrust her into his. “Just like that,” she said coldly, “without even a by-your-leave?”

      “I never ask leave to do anything. Remember that.”

      By the time Leah had finished neatening her bag, she had worked herself into a fine fury.

      With a quick movement that had him going for his gun, she shot to her feet. The old boat creaked ominously.

      “No, you don’t understand, sir,” Leah said. “I have no intention of going anywhere with you, especially in this leaky hulk. I’ll treat your wife after you bring her to the boardinghouse where she can enjoy a proper recovery.”

      Leah tried not to flinch as he trained the gun on her.

      “She’ll recover just fine right here with you tending her,” he said.

      Leah glared at the too-familiar blued barrel, the callused finger curling intimately around the trigger. “Don’t think for a minute that you can intimidate me. I won’t allow it. I absolutely won’t. Is that clear?”

      His lazy gaze strayed over her and focused on her hands, clutching the bag in white-knuckled terror. “Clear as a day in Denver, ma’am.”

      She hated the mocking edge to his voice. “Sir, if you hope to give your wife a decent chance to recover, you’ll let me go, and after the rain you’ll bring her to the house where I can treat her.”

      “You call yourself a doctor. So how come you can only doctor people in your fancy house?”

      Fancy? She almost laughed bitterly at that. Where had he been living that he’d consider the boardinghouse fancy?

      “I refuse to debate this with you,” she informed him.

      “Fine. I’m not fond of debating, either.”

      “Good. Then—”

      “Just get busy with Carrie, and I’ll be in the cockpit, making ready to weigh anchor.”

      Red fury swam before her eyes, obliterating everything, even the hated gun barrel. “You will not,” she said. Her voice was low, controlled, yet he seemed to respond to her quiet rage. He frowned slightly, his hand relaxed on the gun, and he regarded her with mild surprise.

      “Lady, for someone at the wrong end of a gun, you sure have a mouth on you.”

      “Sir,” she went on, “you cannot simply pluck me from my home and sweep me away with you.”

      She gestured again to indicate all the damage. Her gaze followed the fraying rope across the heading of the room; the line exited through a scuttle and was tied somewhere above.

      “Sugar, it’s not that I want to sweep you away,” he said insolently. “It’s just that I need a doctor for Carrie.”

      He stepped forward, and for the first time, she got a good look at his eyes. They were a cold blue-gray, the color of his gun barrel, and his gaze was piercing, as if he saw more of her than she cared for him to see. Leah experienced an odd sensation—as if the tide were tugging her along, drawing her toward a place she didn’t want to go and couldn’t avoid.

      No. She would not surrender to this man.

      “You cannot force me to come with you.” She looked pointedly at the flapping hatch. The wind made a sullen roar, twanging the shrouds against the mast abovedecks. “This ship is unseaworthy. Honestly, what sort of sailor are you, to be out in this tub of—”

      “Shut up.” In one long-legged stride, he came to her and pressed the chilly round eye of the gun to her temple. “Just…shut up. Look, after Carrie’s better, we’ll put you on a ship back to the island.” He added under his breath, “And good riddance.”

      The touch of the gun horrified her, but she refused to show it. “I will not go with you,” she stated. Clearly, this man had no appreciation for how determined she could be. He’d never outlast her. “I have too many responsibilities in Coupeville. Two of my patients are expecting babies any day. I’m treating a boy who was kicked in the head by a horse. I can’t possibly come along on a whim as your wife’s private physician.”

      “Right.” He removed the barrel from her temple.

      Relieved, she brightened and took a step toward the door. “I’m glad you decided to see reas—”

      “Yeah. Reason. I know.” He gave her shoulder a shove, thrusting her back into the room. “Now get busy, woman, or I’ll make sure you don’t ever see your patients again.”

      He stepped out into the companionway. Leah heard a bolt being thrust home as he locked her in the stateroom with his wife.

      Standing in the bow of the creaking schooner, Jackson T. Underhill looked up at the sky. A white gash of lightning cleaved the darkness into eerie shards. The thunder roaring in its wake shouted a warning from the very throat of heaven. The storm came from the sea, blowing toward the shore. It was crazy to be out in this weather, crazy to sail in night so deep he could barely get a heading.

      But Jackson had never been much for heeding warnings, heavenly or otherwise. He jammed his gun back into its felted holster, fastened the clips of his duster, and scowled when the wind tore at the backside of the coat, separating the flaps. The garment was made for riding astride a horse, not sailing a ship. But everything had happened in such a hurry, everything had changed so quickly, that the last thing on his mind had been fashion.

      Bracing himself against the wind, he hoisted the sails. They went up squealing in protest, the mildewed canvas luffing. He hoped like hell the ship would hold together just long enough to make it to Canada. He’d been working on the rudder when Carrie had gotten sick, and had only managed to keep it from falling off with a hasty rig of lines connecting it to the helm. A sailor’s worst nightmare was being swept onto a lee shore in a storm with no steering. The vessel would round up into the wind and start going backward, then go to the opposite tack as the sails backwinded. It would seesaw its way toward shore with sails flapping and no control.

      Jackson set his jaw and told himself the steering would hold. Once they were out of the country, there would be time to fix the schooner up right.

      Over the quickening breeze, he heard indignant thumps and muffled shouts from the stateroom below. Add kidnapping to his list of crimes. That, at least, was a first for him.

      Yet when a healthy puff of wind filled the sails, he felt a measure of relief. The unplanned stop at Whidbey Island hadn’t been so costly after all. He had a doctor for Carrie, and no one was the wiser. The doctor wasn’t at all what he’d expected, but he’d have to put up with her.

      A lady doctor. Who would have thought it? He’d never even known such a thing could be possible.

      Leah Mundy was a prickly female, all pinch-faced and lemon-lipped with disapproval, and there wasn’t a thing to like about her.

      But Jackson did like her. He’d never admit it, of course, and would never