The intruder was moving toward the warmth of his bed. Caleb swung his legs over the side of the cot ready to fire, but then he heard the sound of violent, uncontrollable shivering. It wasn't the menacing approach of a killer. It was the broken rhythm of someone dying.
Before Caleb could stand, a small, snow-caked figure collapsed against the edge of his cot. Icy fingers fumbled blindly in the dark, pulling at the edges of Caleb's buffalo robes. A body, impossibly cold and soaked to the bone, crawled over the mattress and pressed desperately against Caleb's side, seeking the residual heat of his body. Caleb froze.
The sheer, terrifying cold radiating from the intruder was shocking. It was a woman. He could feel the length of her freezing hair against his arm and hear her ragged, shallow breaths. She was shaking so violently that the entire cot rattled.
Instinct overrode his caution. He couldn't shoot a freezing woman. Caleb holstered his weapon, scrambled out from under the furs, and rushed to the wooden table in the center of the room. His hand shook slightly as he fumbled for a sulfur match.
He struck it against the table's edge. The match flared, casting a dancing yellow light over the bed. Caleb stepped closer, raising the flame. Beneath the heavy brown fur of his blankets lay a woman.
Her skin, normally a rich, warm copper, was pale and tinged with the blue hue of severe hypothermia. She was Apache. Caleb recognized the cut of her buckskin clothing, though it was torn to shreds and stiff with frozen blood and snow. Her dark hair was matted to her face, and her lips were cracked and trembling.
"Lord almighty," Caleb whispered, rushing to the stove to throw in a handful of kindling and a heavy oak log. He needed to get her core temperature up, or she would be dead in 10 minutes. He moved back to the bed with a lit kerosene lantern. As the bright light washed over her, Caleb reached out to pull the heavy blankets tighter around her shoulders.
But as he did, his eyes fell upon her hands. Her right hand was clenched tight against her chest, her knuckles white with a death grip. And hanging from her trembling fingers, swinging slightly in the lantern light, was a heavy silver pocket watch on a broken chain. Caleb stopped breathing.
The blood roared in his ears, drowning out the howling blizzard outside. He knew that watch. He would know it in the dark. It was a custom timepiece, forged in St. Louis.
He reached out, his large calloused fingers trembling as he gently pried her cold hand open. The silver casing was scratched and dented, but there, glinting in the lamplight, were the deeply engraved initials E. H. Elias Hayes. Caleb's heart stopped. The air vanished from his lungs.
This wild, freezing woman who had just collapsed into his bed was clutching the only piece of his brother left in this world. "Where?" Caleb choked out, his voice cracking. He grabbed her shoulders, perhaps a bit too roughly.