Up Close and Dangerous by Linda Howard

rock enough to melt the snow, and they would have water. Not much of it, true, but every little bit counted.
    With everything she needed laid out on one of the trash bags, she was about to wake Justice when she realized that he probably had mouthwash, too. Going to his bag, she unzipped it and found his shaving kit stuffed on top of, as she had expected, a single change of clothing and underwear. The kit had two zippers; the one on the left opened to reveal a hairbrush, a travel-size bottle of shampoo, and about a dozen condoms. Men. The right side held a toothbrush, a tiny tube of toothpaste, a disposable razor, and a travel-size bottle of mouthwash.
    “Damn it,” she said, sighing. He’d already used the mouthwash at least once; about half of it was gone, and there hadn’t been much to start with. Half an ounce wasn’t going to make any real difference, so she left the little bottle in place, zipped up the shaving kit, and replaced it in his bag.
    She’d have to do the job with what she had. She just hoped what she had was sufficient to keep him from developing a raging infection.
    First, though, she needed to get some sugar into his system, and then, well, a couple of preemptive painkillers were probably called for.
    Carefully she removed the shirt that covered his face; even though she knew what he looked like, she almost flinched when confronted by the reality. His entire face was covered with dried blood, caked in his eyes, his ears, his nostrils, the corners of his mouth. Even worse, his forehead was swelling, pulling the edges of the cut wide. She hadn’t anticipated the swelling, and winced at the idea of stitching him now. The swelling would probably get worse, though, so waiting wasn’t an option either.
    “Justice,” she said, reaching under the layers of clothes to touch him. “Wake up. It’s showtime.”
    He inhaled, a quick, deep breath. “I’m awake.”
    His voice was stronger, so maybe she’d made the right choice to get him warm before she tried to do something about that cut.
    “I have a candy bar here. I want you to eat a couple of bites, okay? In a little while, if we’re lucky, we’ll each be able to have a swallow or two of water. Then I want you to take two ibuprofen. Can you swallow them without water? If you can’t, I’ll put some snow in your mouth, but we can’t eat much snow because it’ll lower our body temps. Uh, on second thought, maybe you should take the ibuprofen first, let it get started working.”
    “I’ll try.”
    She opened the sealed square containing two generic ibuprofen tablets, and slipped one between his lips. She saw his jaw working a little as he maneuvered the pill around, worked up some saliva, and swallowed. She gave him the other pill; he repeated the process, then said, “Mission accomplished.”
    “Good. Now for the food.” Tearing open the candy bar wrapper, she pinched off a small piece of the Snickers bar and held it to his lips. Obediently he took it in his mouth and began to chew.
    “Snickers,” he said, identifying the taste.
    “You got it. Normally I take my chocolate straight, but I thought the peanuts were a good idea, for the protein, so I brought Snickers. Smart, don’t you think?”
    “Works for me.”
    She waited a minute, to see if the chocolate made him sick. She was on unfamiliar ground here, so she didn’t know if he was likely to start vomiting or not. She did know that, after donating blood at the Red Cross, the donors were given something to drink to help replace their lost liquid, and some crackers or cookies to stave off shock. With the Snickers, she figured she had half of the bases covered.
    After a few minutes she gave him another bite of candy. “I wish I had something to numb your scalp and forehead,” she murmured. “Even teething gel for babies would be better than nothing, but the first-aid kit doesn’t seem to be geared toward babies.”
    He chewed, swallowed, and said, “Ice.”
    The first-aid kit did