A/N: It's getting really embarrassing for me to apologize for the delay each time I post a new chapter. But here I am again, hoping you'll forgive me.

This story will probably have 15 or 16 chapters, and I'll make sure to finish it, even if it takes me much more time than my previous fics. So stay with me, and please review!

Oh, does anyone still remember the ring?

Chapter 11 – Collateral Damage.

Sixteen days had passed since James and Peter had departed to search for Kurt. It was almost the end of October by now, and still we hadn't heard a word from them. Katherine had become a nervous wreck while I was doing everything I could to remain confident for both of our sakes even when my heart was telling me that something bad had happened.

Kitty had dismissed Remy LeBeau from his security duties after she had learnt that Victor Creed had left town about a week ago. No one had attempted against us or the ranch again, but Samuel still slept in the house with us, and Katherine and I kept our guns under our mattresses at night just in case.

It was a Saturday morning, meaning that with or without Logan, bourbon deliveries were expected across Fredericksburg. Therefore, we borrowed the Guthries' wagon for the day and left to town with a big batch of liquor.

After running some errands, Kitty, Sam, and I stopped by The White Queen for one last delivery. The saloon was nearly empty, with only a few worn out patrons drinking coffee after an exhausting night, and Mr. Cassidy drying glasses behind the counter.

"Howdy, my fair damsels! Can I get ye lovely lasses anything on this chilly morning?"

"Morning, Mr. Cassidy. Some coffee would be nice, thank you," I replied. Katherine and I sat by the counter to enjoy our hot beverages while Samuel brought the casks inside.

"Where's that grumpy father of yers, Kitty? Been a while since he last paid this ole Irish a visit."

"He's away on a selling trip with Pete. He…"

I could no longer pay attention to their conversation. One of the patrons had moved to the piano and was now playing Strauss' Serail-Tänze, which happened to be one of Jason's favorite compositions. He had explained to me once that it meant 'The Dance of the Harem' -an appropriate theme for a brothel-, and I caught myself wondering how many times my husband had played it in whorehouses across de country. Plenty, probably.

Inadvertently, my eyes welled up. It didn't matter that I didn't love Jason and hadn't seen him for almost four months, the weight of his betrayal still hung heavily in my heart. I quickly wiped away my tears to conceal them from Kitty, but the red tinge in my eyes must have given my sadness away.

"Are you alright, Laura?" she asked when Mr. Cassidy turned away to get our payment.

"I'm fine," I lied. Then we heard the squeaking sound of steps as someone began to descend the old wooden stairs to our right. Glancing up, I felt my heart skipping a beat as no other than Sheriff Summers appeared on the staircase. Our eyes met, prompting him to halt on the spot.

New tears that I couldn't explain gathered between my eyelashes. I shouldn't care where or with whom my boss spent his nights, and yet there I was, feeling betrayed again. Katherine looked between me and the sheriff; all of a sudden, she retrieved the money from Mr. Cassidy's hands, thanked him, and urged me and Samuel to leave the saloon.

I felt Kitty watching me during the whole trip back to the ranch. I knew that she wanted to ask me what my tears had been about; but how could I explain them to her when I couldn't understand them myself? I didn't love nor missed my husband, and I felt nothing for Scott Summers. Nothing.

My 'niece' and I didn't have a chance to talk, because minutes after we had made it home, Logan's horses trotted onto the dirty driveway pulling a familiar wagon behind them.

"Go fetch McCoy!" James shouted to me from the coach box.

As soon as the car halted, Kurt and Peter emerged from the schooner carrying the limp body of a woman – a woman whose platinum hair I recognized immediately.

"Ororo!" I ran to meet them. I saw a big blood stain on the Wind Rider's tunic, and I could tell that she was barely conscious. Wagner had a black eye. "Wh-What happened?"

"She was shot. We need Hank, Jean, now!" Logan demanded.

I unlatched one of the horses from the wagon and galloped back to Fredericksburg as fast as I could, all the way praying to the Lord to keep my savior alive. Somehow, I made it to Dr. McCoy's pharmacy and back to the ranch in less than forty minutes.

Samuel tended to our horses while the surgeon and I stormed with all his medical equipment into the house. We found Ororo lying on James's bed; someone had stripped her torso but had been careful enough to cover her chest with a towel. Logan was kneeling on the floor to the left side of the bed, his hands putting pressure on her wound, while Kurt held her right hand and prayed in German.

McCoy positioned himself beside Logan to inspect the patient. First, he felt the Wind Rider's pulse for a few seconds, then his hand moved from her neck to her forehead. "Tachycardia, hypothermia and clammy skin – worrisome signs, to say the least," he murmured, turning to James and Kurt next, "Gentlemen, I need to know what happened to this lady."

"She was shot in the belly… th-three days ago," James explained. I didn't know what surprised me the most, the fact that Ororo remained alive after three days of bleeding, or that Logan's voice was faltering with emotion.

Only then I noticed that his eyes were moist.

"Three days? Oh my stars and garters! How's that even possible?" the surgeon inquired.

"We bandaged her abdomen real tightly, and it seemed to stanch the bleeding for a while. But since this morning, it started bleeding again… and Ororo stopped talking to us," Kurt clarified.

"I see," McCoy voiced. He pushed James's hand away to examine the wound, his thick eyebrows raising up in surprise "You did a splendorous job stanching the blood flow, my friends, but I'm afraid this lady's injury won't heal unless the bullet is properly removed." From his bag, the doctor removed an iron clamp, a tweezer, a scalpel, a small cylinder containing thin iron seams, and a big glass recipient filled with some liquid. He placed all the items on the bed.

On that moment, Kitty entered the room carrying a bucket with steaming water. "I've boiled some water, Dr. McCoy," she announced.

"Ahh. Excellent, Katherine! We'll use it to bathe the wound cavity. As for my hands and equipment, I rather apply Professor Lister's techniques. That's why I always carry carbolic acid lotion with me."

The doctor opened the bottle and splashed his hands with the liquid, then did the same to his tools. I left for a minute to fetch clean towels, and when I returned to the bedroom Dr. McCoy had the bullet out and secured in his tweezer.

"You devious, ugly projectile," he mumbled, staring at the small bullet for a moment before returning his attention to the patient. He cleaned the wound with water several times, then used one of the clean towels to put pressure on it; after the bleeding had reduced to a minimum, he sewed the inner tissue with a thin iron seam -catgut suture, it was called- then sterilized the wound with carbolic acid, and finally sutured the skin back together. Ororo didn't flinch once during the whole procedure.

I never thought that I could witness surgery without passing out, but I guess that my concern for the Wind Rider's life was bigger than any weak stomach I might have. James watched it all as well, alternating between cleaning the sweat off of Ororo's forehead and holding her hand.

Dr. McCoy put all his tools away and stated, "My work here is finished, ladies and gentlemen. Now, we need to wait and see if and when the patient will awaken." He handed the bottle with what was left of the carbolic acid to Logan. "You should apply this lotion to her injury twice a day and pray that it doesn't get infected. Oh, and make sure this lovely lady drinks lots of water in the next days. I'll stop by tomorrow to see how well she is recovering."

James exhaled. "Thanks, doc. I owe ya one." Then he asked Kurt to give Hank his 'special order', which I knew now it was opium. Wagner retrieved one small recipient from each one of his boots and handed them to Dr. McCoy.

Kitty and I carefully wiped Ororo's body with a moist cloth, then we changed the blood-stained sheets for clean ones and dressed her in one of my nightgowns. After that, I made her tea; Logan was able to give her some as she alternated between periods of consciousness and unconsciousness.

James sent Samuel home that afternoon, slipping a one-dollar bill into his hand and trusting him not to tell a soul about the Wind Rider's whereabouts. The rest of us took shifts watching her. I prepared a late lunch consisting of roast pork with apple sauce and vegetables – Logan's favorite. Around 7 p.m., I went outside to sit on the porch to watch the sunset. As expected, my 'brother' was there with a cigarette in one hand and a flask of bourbon in the other.

"Hey," I said, sitting beside him on the top stair.

"Hey," he responded after briefly glancing in my direction.

I took the cigarette from his fingers and had one long drag. "How are you holding up?"

James snorted, then swallowed a good amount of bourbon. After a moment, he responded, "Fantastically."

I smiled. "You love her."

That made him turn my way, his expression serious. "No shit."

My smile widened. "Logan, you tricky bastard! All these months living with you, and not once you told me you were in love! I thought you were just a heartless, bitter old man!"

He chuckled at that. "Sorry to disappoint ya, Red."

The humor soon faded from both of our faces. I took another drag, and with my other hand reached for his and squeezed it. "Ororo is going to make it, you know? She has to."

"She's a tough lady," he commented.

"She is."

I let go of his hand and put off the cigarette after one last drag. We stared ahead at the sunset for a while, until James broke the silence by saying, "They found your ring, Jean."

I turned to him, confused. "What?"

"Your weddin' ring, with your husband's name on it. Someone was sellin' it on a fair in Fort Worth; one of the Marshall's men got it, and they started askin' questions."

I felt all color leaving my face. I had totally forgotten about the ring. "Are you… are you sure, Logan?"

He nodded. "Positive, darlin'. Some doctor ratted you and Wagner out."

"Essex," I concluded, gritting my teeth in rage. That damn butcher!

James went on. "Lehnsherr's goons captured Kurt in a place called Round Rock. They were going to hang him as an accomplice, but Ororo showed up and set him free in the middle of the night. They ran away on her mare, and that's when that son of a bitch Creed shot her," he paused for a moment to have another gulp of the bourbon, then continued, "They managed to flee to Bee Cave. Pete and I found them by evening and brought them here as fast as we could."

For the third time that day, I cried. Except this time, the reason beyond my tears was crystal-clear to me. Two of the people who had helped me escape from my husband and my sins had been persecuted and hurt -one still was- because of me. That was something I couldn't accept.

"It's all my fault, Logan! Ororo may die because of me!" I sobbed as pain and regret crushed my heart. James didn't reply. I took that as a hint that he was agreeing with me… I mean, who wouldn't? I decided that I wouldn't let anyone else get hurt because of me, so I looked at his face and stated decisively, "I'm putting an end to this. I'm turning myself in to the sheriff tomorrow morning."

I thought Logan would agree with me, but instead he grasped both of my shoulders roughly and glared at me with mean, dark eyes. "Ya ain't goin' nowhere, ya hear me? Ya keep your mouth shut and your head low, or I swear to God, I'm gonna end ya myself, ya ungrateful brat!"

I hadn't expected such a brute reaction from him; I realized that, for the first time since we'd met, I was afraid of James. But he had misunderstood me, and I needed to explain myself – I wasn't ungrateful, it was quite the opposite, actually. All I wanted was for my friends to stop suffering because of me. I would explain to Sheriff Summers that it had all been my fault, and then the Howletts and their associates would be rid of my menace for good.

"But Logan, I-I…"

"Ya turn yourself in, and Kitty, Pete, and I are dead… probably Sam, too," he was still gripping my arms, his voice low and dangerous. "If Ororo dies or Kurt's captured again, it'll have been for nothin'. Is that how ya wanna repay us, Red? By betrayin' us?"

"Of course not, Logan! I just want you to be safe! I can't stand seeing any of you getting-"

We heard the galloping of a horse approaching us. James abruptly let go of me to retrieve the revolver from his holster, redirecting his furious gaze to the man on the horse's back instead. Sheriff Summers descended his mount and calmly walked to us under the darkened sky. He wasn't wearing his badge.

"Evening," the lawman greeted us, removing his hat. I was unable to tell by his impassive look how much of our fight he had seen. Still, I tried to discretely clean the tears from my face.

Logan eyed me sharply before putting the gun back in the holster and standing up. "What d'ya want now, Summers?"

"Didn't know you were back from your sales trip, Logan. You had your sister worried for the last couple of weeks."

"Humph. I'm sure ya were there to comfort her," James replied, taking both me and the sheriff aback. "It's late. What d'ya want?"

The sheriff cleaned his throat and looked away from us for a moment, embarrassed. "I uh… I wanted to talk to Miss Howlett, actually… explain something… I mean, if it's okay with you, Logan."

James looked between Summers and me, considering his response for a second. Then he declared, "you have five minutes," turned around, and entered the ranch house, but not before sending me a menacing glare that meant 'don't do anything stupid.'

I stood up and smoothed down my skirt the best I could before climbing down the few steps that separated me from the sheriff. The day had been full of unpleasant surprises, and I wasn't sure if seeing Summers again would end up being another one.

"I-I wasn't at The White Queen this morning to be with a lady," he told me out of the blue. "I went there to talk to Miss Frost -talk only- because I found out that Lorna has been hanging around there lately, and I wanted to make sure Emma won't take advantage of her," he revealed in one breath, staring at my face expectantly.

I didn't know what to respond to that, or even if I should respond. My boss's romantic life wasn't of my concern. So why was he telling me that? I felt confused but somehow relieved at the same time.

Since I said nothing, he went on. "Anyhow, Miss Howlett, I uh… I just thought you should know… I-I didn't want you to get the wrong impression about me… because of Nate, of course. I'm trying to be a good father to him, to give him good examples."

I finally felt the day's tension leaving my body and was able to smile a little at that. "You're a great father, Sheriff. Nathan is lucky to have you. And you didn't need to explain anything to me. I wouldn't have told a soul about you being at The White Queen."

"That's… not what I was worried about," he sighed and gave a step forward. He must have noticed my puffy eyes because he gently lifted my chin with his thumb and index finger to inspect my face under the yellow, new moon. For some reason, I let him. After a moment, he let go of my face and asked, "Is everything alright between you and your brother?"

"Y-Yes," I replied, taking a step back. "Logan just… has a lot on his mind lately… with the ranch and the distillery, I mean."

Summers nodded. "Of course."

At that moment, James appeared on the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest.

"I uh… need to go back inside," I told the sheriff.

He put the hat back on his head and tipped it in my direction. "Have a lovely evening, Laura."

I felt my heart fluttering at hearing him saying my first name, even if it wasn't my real name. "You too, Sheriff."

Later, on my bed, I could still feel the soft touch of Summers's fingers on my chin. I dreamt of him and me surrounded by voluptuous flames, and for the first time in years I woke up yearning for a man's touch.