okay, forgive me for the fictionally diarrhitic episodes to follow. I'm playing a bit of catch-up here. *bg*

The days of their ride towards Ft. Leavenworth passed easily. Spring is always kind to the prairies, and as Bill watched the pair sitting in the wagon, he felt a twinge of envy. Katherine was obviously enjoying being out on the trail, and Bill smiled to himself every time she would gasp and point out some rabbit or prairie dog that was sunning itself outside a burrow. He wanted desperately to be in that wagon, and when his chance came, he took it.

Bill sat loosely in the saddle, and when his horse stumbled in a gopher hole, Bill took the opportunity to 'fall'. He'd had hundreds of worse tumbles, both he and Jack could be witness to that, but Katherine was certain that he had broken something and she insisted that it wasn't that far now to Leavenworth, he could just lay in the back of the wagon and rest until they could get him to a doctor. Bill relished the opportunity to play injured to Katherine's nurse, and he was also beginning to like it more than a little bit when he saw Jack fuming.

Katherine had thrown their blankets out in the back of the wagon, and sat beside him when he dragged himself into the bed. She positioned his hat to block the sun from his face, and gently took his hand in hers and rested them on her lap. Bill could hear Jack muttering to himself, but he couldn't have been happier than when he looked up into Katherine's face and saw that particular mix of concern and kindness that women get when they are tending to their own. It was the same face she'd had when she sat outside the General's office with him, and he wanted it for himself forever.   

After a while, the warmth of the sun and the jostling of the wagon lulled Bill into a half-sleep and he felt Katherine move. She slipped his hand across his chest and as the wagon came to a stop, he heard Jack helping her back to the front of the wagon. He couldn't quite hear the words they were speaking over the creaking of the boards, but he knew from their tone that there was trouble brewing. Jack certainly distrusted him at this point, but Bill only assumed that it was because of Katherine's attentions. He changed his mind rather quickly, however, because the 'pillow' that Katherine had been leaning against in the back of the wagon was her own pack. Bill remembered her guarding his line of sight in her hotel room and took this opportunity to slowly untie the laces and peek inside. He kept both ears and one eye tuned to the bickering pair in the front while he quietly looked for the papers that Katherine had in her room in St. Louis.   He didn't have much time to look before he heard Jack tell Katherine that 'that must be the great Ft. Leavenworth', but what he saw in those papers made him realize that he was in trouble, more so if Jack has seen the papers and recognized the same names that he had. He leaned back, closed his eyes and took a deep breath as he made the decision that would seal his fate forever.