Chapter 19

Brook woke slowly, one eye wide and frightened, the other swollen to a slit. She saw the shaggy man at the same time she felt his hands on her breasts. Her body went stiff for a moment, and then she panicked. Screeching like a deranged banshee, she slapped ineffectually at his arms.

“Noooo!” Scrambling backwards, Brook fell from the bed, and scuttled crab-like to a corner. “No!”

Lance was momentarily shocked motionless. After a slight hesitation, he tried to approach the woman. She swung her arms in an attempt to keep him away. One of her flailing hands popped him in the eye and he stepped back, exasperated. He put his fingers to his stinging eye, rubbing it gently. Lance stared at her. What was he going to do with this crazy woman? She now had her arms protectively over her head, huddled in the corner, trembling like a wounded animal.

Lance considered the situation. She needed help. How am I going to give it to her if she won’t let me touch her? He ducked into the bathroom and returned in a moment later with a pill and a cup of water. He knelt by the woman. “Take this pill.”

Brook glanced sidelong at him and then turned her face away. She shook her head. Covering her face with her arms, she scrunched back further into the corner. Lance sighed. This wasn’t going to be easy on either of them. He set the cup and the pill on the floor beside him, dropped to his knees, and moved closer to the woman. Reaching out slowly, he captured both her hands in one of his. “Lady, hold still! Just do what I say and everything will go smoother. Now, take this pill. It’ll make you feel better.”

The woman blanched, and began fighting. She kicked her legs and tried to bite. He wrestled with her, struggling to subdue her. She wore herself down and then paused to catch her breath, panting from her exertions. Lance's greater strength prevailed, and he pinched her nose shut. When she opened her mouth to gasp for air, Lance slipped the pill past her lips, grabbed the glass, and tilted the water in. He reached a massive hand under her jaw and held her mouth shut. The woman choked but Lance wouldn’t let her spit the pill back out. Reluctantly, she swallowed and began to fight once more.

Lance easily blocked each of her blows and finally maneuvered behind the woman. He wrapped himself around her torso, trapping her arms. Next, he pinned her legs under his. Holding her firmly but gently, he was careful not to hurt her worse than she already was. At last, he felt her begin to relax, and eventually her body went slack.

Whew! What a fighter. I hope the tranquilizer isn’t too strong. She probably weighs a hundred pounds less than I do. Well, too late to worry about that now. Right now I need to get her on the bed and check her out.

Moving the daybed from its usual corner, Lance placed it closer to the fireplace where it would be warmer and the light better, and then moved the woman to the mattress. She was a pathetic sight. He resumed his examination, once again feeling for broken ribs. There was a wound below her left breast, seeping fresh blood. It looked like a knife slice, a clean-edged wound, not too deep. He wondered again what had happened to this battered lady.

He ran his hands over her abdomen and she shifted in her sleep, and then lay still again. Until now, he had avoided looking at her naked crotch. But, as he moved lower in his examination, he observed that her thighs were caked with dried blood. He parted her legs and realization dawned on him. His throat tightened, and he swore softly. It took only a short leap of the imagination to picture his precious Ellen in this woman’s place. How could any man treat a woman this way? It made him sick.

He felt along her legs again, trying to be as thorough yet gentle as possible. A large gash on the back of her thigh drew his attention and he scrutinized the wound. Jagged edges and raw flesh met his eye. This, he determined, should really be stitched. He shook his head. He would try butterfly bandages first, reluctant to actually take needle and thread to the woman’s skin.

Taking note of her feet, he winced. They were swollen and felt hot to the touch. The soles were red and raw like ground meat, her open wounds packed with dirt and pine needles, evidence that she had traveled a long way with no shoes. No doubt she had been running from whoever had done this to her when she had stumbled across him.

He knew he had presented a wild sight at first glance with his straggly hair and bushy beard. She must have thought him a maniac when she saw him screaming over Belinda’s bloody carcass in the clearing! No wonder she was terrified. Later, he would do some work on his own appearance, but for now he needed to address her physical needs.

Moving to the kitchen area, Lance started water warming on the stove and dug out his first aid supplies. After gathering washcloths and towels and placing the items on a small table next to the bed, he poured hot water into a couple of basins. Before cleaning the woman, Lance needed to perform one more task. At its completion, he turned his total attention to finding out just how injured this woman was.

Lance started at her face and worked his way down, carefully washing her, cleaning her wounds, and treating them with peroxide and ointment. After clearing the gunk from her injured eye, he gathered a little snow from outside into a washcloth and laid it over the swelling.

He continued down her body, wiping and drying and medicating. He dumped and refilled his basin many times during the process. He was particularly attentive to the large injury on the back of her leg, closing it up as best he could and holding the ruptured skin together with butterfly strips before bandaging it with clean gauze.

It was lucky he had saved those tranquilizers from his old days of grief over Ellen’s death. This cleaning process would have been painful for the woman, and almost impossible to accomplish considering her panicked mental state. He only had two more of the pills left. He hoped he would not have to force any more on her. He felt a deep stab of guilt over the heavy-handed way he’d had to subdue her, this woman who had already been hurt by a man or men. They’d probably used her until they could get no more use from her and then dumped her down the side of the mountain, the bastards. He clenched his fists and thought briefly of what he would do if he ever met the monsters responsible for this.

Finally, Lance gently spread her legs and wiped the dried blood and fluids from her thighs and private parts. Her anus was swollen and ripped, scabbed over in places, oozing a clear liquid in others. He felt tears well up in his eyes as he imagined the pain and horror she had suffered.

This woman needed a doctor. Even as the thought entered his mind, he felt another part of him rebel. He didn’t want to get involved. There would be questions. He might even end up as a suspect! His whole way of life could be threatened. He hadn’t gone to all this trouble to withdraw from civilization only to have this woman dropped in his lap with the potential to take away everything he had worked for.

Not only that, the snow outside was piling up and it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to transport her. He knew it was wrong, felt it in his soul, but he was not going to take this lady into town. Not now, anyway. He hoped she wouldn’t die on him. Inside, he railed against the circumstances that had made this person his responsibility. He felt bad for her, really bad. But, she wasn’t his problem! Son of a bitch! he grumbled. Son of a fucking bitch!

He took a deep breath and returned to his ministrations. Her hair needed washing, but there was nothing he could do about that now. It would have to wait. After cleaning her as well as possible, with the exception of her feet, Lance once again performed his earlier task.

He then went to his closet and removed one of his shirts and a pair of sweat pants. With some difficulty, he managed to get the clothes on her but it was like working with a huge lifeless doll. As he buttoned the shirt, she opened her good eye again. She was very drowsy, but he could tell she was fighting the tranquilizer. Ignoring her, he moved down to her feet.

She tried to cower away, but her movements were uncoordinated. “Are you going to hurt me?” she whispered, her voice hoarse and gravelly.

“Probably,” he said, his expression unreadable.