Pieces of Sky by Kaki Warner Read Free Book Online Page A

pushed her back down.
    “Hold still. You’re safe. You’re all right.”
    Squinting against the sun, she saw a dark, blurry shape looming over her. Wilkins. What was he doing? Why was he touching her? She felt his fingers move through her hair and flinched when they touched a tender spot beside her left ear.
    “Just a bump. Move your arms and legs.”
    She did, but it hurt. Bruised and battered but nothing broken. She struggled up on one elbow, then hung there as tiny suns collided behind her eyes.
    “Do you remember what happened?” he asked.
    Pain knifed through her shoulder as she lifted her head. Fifty feet away was a dark mound. Beyond it, the coach lay on its side like a giant wounded beast, spilling clothing and luggage across the ground like entrails. She remembered the coach falling. Someone grabbing her. She looked down, saw blood on her dress, and air rushed from her lungs. “No . . . oh no . . .”
    “It’s mine. You’re all right.”
    Befuddled, she looked over, saw a bloodstained rag tied around his forearm, and sagged in relief. Not the baby. Not Victoria.
    Wilkins rose. “Can you stand?”
    “I—I’ll try.”
    He bent toward her, his broad hand reaching out to offer help.
    She shrankback. “No. I can do it.” She knew it was rude, but at the moment she couldn’t bear to be touched. “Just—just give me a moment.”
    He straightened. “Don’t take too long. I need help.”
    As she watched him limp toward the coach, she realized the dark mound beside it was a dead horse. Behind it lay another. What of the passengers? With painful slowness, she turned to study the long slope behind her. Halfway down were two more horses, one motionless, the other frantically fighting the traces. A man—Phelps?—worked at the leathers to cut it free. Below them, luggage and clothing littered the slope in bright splashes of color, and near the bottom, thrown across the rocks like a discarded rag doll, lay the single twisted form of a man.
    Swallowing hard, she looked away.
    “Over here,” Wilkins called, bent over another still form beside the coach.
    Untangling her legs from her tattered skirts, she struggled to her feet. Dizziness swept over her. Without warning, bile surged up her throat. She bent, heaves wracking her body.
    When the nausea passed, she straightened, spots dancing behind her eyes. She took a shaky step and almost tripped on the tattered hem of her cape. Loosening the ties, she let it fall. Her hat was gone. Her gloves were shredded, but habit and principle wouldn’t allow her to discard them, so she tucked them into her skirt pocket. On legs as weak as warm pudding, she worked her way toward Wilkins.
    As she passed the first horse, it stared blindly up at her, flat-edged teeth bared in a frozen grimace. A fly darted in and out of its nostril. The second horse was also dead, its forehead caved in, brains matting the dark fur like clabbered milk. The stench of blood made her stomach reel. Pressing a hand to her mouth, she forced herself to keep moving. When she finally slumped to the ground beside Wilkins, she was so dizzy she could scarce hold up her head.
    “I need cloth,” he said.
    She looked over and gasped when she saw the two-inch-wide sliver of wood stuck in Mr. Ashford’s side and the huge bruise darkening the left side of his face. Dear God, was he dead? Wilkins said something, but she could make no sense of it. Everything was suddenly off-kilter as if the world were slowly tilting.
    “Hell.” Wilkins’s hand closed over the back of her neck and shoved her head down until her forehead almost touched her knees. “Breathe.”
    She sucked in air. After a moment, the spinning slowed. As her mind steadied, she realized his hand was still there, a hot, heavy weight against her skin, his fingers so long they almost encircled her neck. She shrugged him away and slowly straightened.
    “No more fainting,” he said gruffly.
    “I do n-not faint.” Her tongue tripped over the words.