The Gentrys: Abby

Drums? “Tell me about the drums,” he demanded in a hoarse whisper. “Did they seem to come from everywhere at once? Did you feel them seeping inside you like they belonged to the air and the wind?”

She nodded sharply, then stared at him. “Do you know what they were? Did you hear them, too?”

He sat forward and leaned his forehead into his palms. Man, his head hurt.

“I thought I must’ve been dreaming,” he groaned.

“Tell me about it.”

“I have to think.” He rubbed his temples. “I can’t think.”

She placed a hand on his shoulder. “It’s all right, Gray. We can talk about it later. You’ve been through a lot.”

His chin jerked up. “You know my name? But I don’t know who you are. I remember your help in the dry wash, but I can’t remember ever meeting you before.” The frustration was evident in his dark-rimmed eyes.

Abby swallowed the small ego buster. She clearly remembered the time he’d knocked Bigelow Yates off his horse when that bully had decided to use her as a lassoing post. A few of the dumber adolescent boys had oftentimes made her the brunt of their jokes back then. Probably because she’d fought back and refused to flutter her eyelashes and cry like the other girls.

But although Gray had been her hero that day and had always treated her with respect, there was no reason on earth why he should remember. It was a long time ago, and they’d both changed over the years.

“I’m Abby Gentry. We’re neighbors. And…we went to high school together for a year.”

“Abby Gentry?” He shook his head and wiped a palm over his mouth. “As in the Gentrys? I can’t…” He rubbed at his temples again.

“Don’t…don’t try. I doubt if I was very memorable.” She sympathetically placed her hand on his shoulder but quickly withdrew it when the feel of his bare skin sent a shock down her arm. “Let’s, uh, try something easier. What were you doing in that dry wash without a horse? And how on earth did you let that rattler get the best of you? Don’t you know better than to turn your back on a snake?”

He grimaced and rubbed his hand across his mouth again. “Can I have a little water?”

Abby was startled. How cruel could she be? Here the poor man had been near death and fighting for his life until just a little while ago, and instead of treating him like a patient she was interrogating him.

When she looked a little closer, she saw the dark, purplish circles under his eyes. “Sure. I’m sorry. Don’t talk. Rest. The paramedic helicopter should be here soon.” She quickly got him a cup of the bottled water.

He took a sip, cleared his throat and handed the cup back to her. “I owe you an explanation.” His gaze landed on her eyes, and his scrutiny made her nervous again. “In fact, I owe you much more…. I owe you my life.”

Abby shook her head sharply. “Really, I was just glad I was trained to help. Don’t give it a second thought.”

His lips crooked in a semblance of a smile. “I will do more than give it a second thought, Abby Gentry. Ask anything of me. My life is yours. Forever.”

Abby backed up a step, trying to put distance between them. She didn’t quite know how to take his fierce and serious manner. Shaking her head over and over, she began to deny his words, but he silenced her with a raised hand.

“We will not speak of it now. But I’ll honor the debt with every breath.” He eased back on the cot, staring up at the ceiling with unfocused eyes. “I do remember that I was checking on the herd. My mustangs have been having some trouble with your fence lines for the past few weeks.

“Then, when I discovered that a section of the Gentry Ranch fence was down near the dry wash, I began to worry that the ponies might’ve wandered through. I was riding Thunder Cloud…” He let his words trail off for a second. “We ride together in the old way. No saddle. No bridle or bit. No horseshoes. Anyway, I thought I heard a horse’s whinny coming from the wash. I didn’t want to force Thunder Cloud into the rocks, so I dismounted and left him on the rim.”

“You left your horse? I should go back and get him. I’ll see to it that he gets fed and watered then returned to your ranch.”

He shot a surprised glance in her direction. “You’re worried about my pony?”

“Of course.” She said it so directly, so simply, that Gray was amazed.

A Gentry would be concerned over one horse? And another man’s horse at that?

“Do not trouble yourself over Thunder Cloud,” he told her. “He goes where he wishes, and he’s more at home on the range than in a corral.”

Gray still needed to finish the story, his pride be damned. “As for the snake, I never saw him, never even heard him. I don’t understand how I might have disturbed his nap.

“I track with the Comanche wisdom,” he continued. “My grandfather taught me. The nemene belong to the earth, they do not trample upon it.”

She tilted her head, lowered her chin. “Do you remember how you got that wound on your head?”

Gray touched the spot on his temple that now was swollen and bruised. “No. I must have hit my head on a rock after the snake startled me.”

Abby nodded. “That would explain why you didn’t just walk away from the rattler bite and ride for help.”

He couldn’t remember. The sounds of the beating drums had been so strong in his head that they obliterated everything else.

Was he going crazy? He needed to call his grandfather to ask about the dream—and why this Gentry girl had heard the drums, too.

At his first thought of the eerie drumbeats, Gray could swear he heard them again. But of course, that was nuts. A minute later he recognized the sounds. A helicopter was landing outside.

“Ah. The paramedics are here,” Abby said as she headed to take the barricades from the door. “It must be dawn.”

“I’m okay now,” Gray muttered. “I remember you administered antivenom. I was very lucky you carry such things on the range.”

He didn’t need the embarrassment of having to be airlifted off the ranch for a simple snakebite. “I’m well enough to find my own way back to the Skaggs Ranch. Thunder Cloud won’t have gone too far.”

Abby started toward him and smiled—the first real smile he could remember having graced her face. With the early-morning light seeping through the open door and under the cracks in the window coverings, Gray finally saw what he’d hoped was true. Her eyes were a gray-green.

The swift arrow of lust he felt as he watched her walking to his side left him shaken. There was nothing overtly sexy about this woman, yet…

That must’ve been it, he mused. For the first time, he’d actually recognized the woman inside the tomboy’s form.

It had been so long since the spark of desire had shot through him, he barely recognized the feeling. Returning to Texas after his mother’s death had only brought him anguish, pain and hard work. Not women.

He didn’t have time for that nonsense now, either. Especially since it involved the one who’d saved his life, and most especially because she was one of the rich Gentrys. Besides, as a white woman she did not have the blood of the nemene running through her veins.

“You look like you’re going to survive, but you haven’t even gotten to your feet yet,” she said. “Why don’t you try standing first? Then you can decide about the paramedics.”

Abby took his arm, assisting him to get up. His head swam and his stomach rolled. Apparently seeing his weakness, she gently pushed him back down on the cot.

“Well, that answers the question. If you can’t stand, you can’t walk back home.”

Gray groaned with misery and embarrassment as two men in jumpsuits, carrying large plastic cases, piled into the little room. “Sorry it took so long, Miss Gentry. We’ve been filled in on the patient’s condition, so we should have him stabilized and delivered to the regional hospital within a few minutes. Don’t worry.”

The paramedics had been true to their words. Over Gray’s protests, they’d taken his vital signs, administered oxygen from a portable bottle and started an IV containing fluids to rehydrate him. Within minutes they had him loaded into the chopper and on his way.

Afterward, as Abby rode alone to the main house, she’d had a long discussion with herself about letting imagination overtake reality. Now, a few hours later, after a bath and nap, Abby began to feel human again.

She must’ve been exhausted and in a state of shock herself to imagine smoke and drums last night. And to believe that somehow Gray’s body had been spirited away…. Well, it was all just a crazy dream.