The Path To Tame a Wild Heart: A Historical Western Romance Novel

by Melynda Carlyle

  She knew she was still angry with him, of that much she was certain. When Billy had mentioned his name last night, it was enough to bring all of that rage flooding back to her. But what would she do if she was face to face with him? Would she scream at him? Would she try to attack him? What would he do to her? That was a whole other matter entirely.

  She knew how dangerous he was at the best of times. If he was jealous, it just got worse. She couldn’t imagine how he would react if he knew that Lonnie was interested in her. He’d be in danger, that much was certain, and she didn’t want to put him in harm's way if she could help it.

  These thoughts occupied her all the way home, where she found Lonnie waiting on her porch, sitting on the swing. Her heart skipped as she saw him, something she silently scolded herself for. It was unexpected and she couldn’t stop the smile from bursting across her face. Before she managed to stop herself, she was hurrying over to him.

  Calm down, Evelyn, she thought to herself. Don’t get carried away.

  She pushed the thoughts away as she stopped. He even seemed a little bit pleased to see her, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth that he was definitely trying to hide.

  Caught you, she thought.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said. “It’s just nice to see you.”

  He sighed. “I spoke to Billy Rivera today,” he said.

  She blinked. “You did?”

  He nodded. “I found out it was him who climbed in your window last night,” he said. “If that’s what’s got you all worried, then don’t. He seemed pretty harmless to me.”

  “He did?”

  Lonnie nodded again. “Has he ever told you that he loves you?”

  She laughed, thinking back to what he said the other night. “Yes, he has,” she said. “I didn’t know how serious he was but, if he’s mentioned it to you…”

  “Why would he not be serious?”

  “People say crazy things all the time.”

  Lonnie sighed. “You just don’t seem to know the effect you have on people Evelyn,” he said.

  “What?”

  “You can’t be surprised that people fall for you,” he said.

  She wanted to press him for more, she wanted to know if that was the way that he felt too, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask. She could feel that the heat had risen in her cheeks, she was running hot now. But she let herself look at him, watching that easy smile of his, as he looked at her. He was too smooth, sweet-talking his way into her heart like this, and way too good-looking.

  Evelyn! she scolded herself. She tried to push the feelings away, bury them deep within herself, but it was hard. Maybe she’d managed to do that with Willard because she didn’t like him as much as she thought she did. Maybe everything that was happening with Lonnie was a little bit more real, maybe there were more feelings involved.

  But she couldn’t.

  All men are the same, she told herself. But even she didn’t seem too sure about it this time around. What if he is different…? she thought.

  Evelyn pulled herself away from Lonnie to make them something to drink, just a little sweet tea to drink as they watched the sun fade from the sky, as the day turned to dusk.

  Rose joined them for a little while, coming over from her father’s house to check that Evelyn was okay. Evelyn was sure that she was there to do a little bit of spying on her and Lonnie, but she didn’t mind all that much.

  This whole situation was surreal to Evelyn. In the space of a single day, Evelyn had gone from having nobody in town like her at all to having two people love her. Billy, she supposed, and Lonnie. And she quite enjoyed one of them loving her, at least.

  “How about a little target practice?” Lonnie said, standing up and rubbing his hands together.

  “Shooting?” Rose said. “I don’t know, my pop—”

  “He probably won’t mind if you learn to defend yourself,” Evelyn said. “It never caused me any trouble.”

  Rose scoffed. “Evelyn Pierce, you knowing how to shoot a gun has caused you nothing but trouble,” Rose teased.

  “Rose, you take that back!” Evelyn gasped.

  “I won’t!”

  “You know how to shoot, Evelyn?” Lonnie asked, sounding more than a little impressed.

  Evelyn laughed. “Oh, I know more than how to shoot, Officer Steele, I never miss.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to see about that!”

  Lonnie and Rose headed inside to grab some tin cans, setting them up along the perimeter fence. Evelyn grabbed the gun she used to shoot with, surprising Lonnie that she even had a gun in the house in the first place.

  “You see,” she said. “If I was really worried about Billy Rivera, I would have pulled this on him and he woulda left even quicker.” She grinned and Lonnie couldn’t help but grin back.

  Lonnie stood back. “Show me what you got, then.”

  Rose lined up the tin cans and, without missing a beat, Evelyn shot every single one off the fence, all of them clattering to the ground in a heap.

  “You’re good,” Lonnie said. “Better than good, I didn’t know you could shoot like that!”

  “There’s an awful lot you don’t know about me, Lonnie Steele,” Evelyn teased.

  “Well, I quite enjoy learning,” he said. “Set ‘em up again, Rose,” Lonnie called.

  Rose did as she was asked, and Evelyn watched as Lonnie headed over to where his light brown horse was tied up. He untied it and clambered astride, holding his pistol and pointing at the tin cans.

  “Now, I bet you can’t shoot while riding!” Lonnie teased, readying himself to take a shot at one of the tin cans.

  “You might have me there, Lon,” Evelyn replied, lining up one of the shots and sending a tin can flying.

  Before she had time to turn to Lonnie and celebrate, she could see what was going on. The horse was spooked, rearing up into the air. Lonnie wasn’t paying attention, too busy looking at her, too busy trying to show off to be holding onto the reins.

  “Lonnie!” she cried out, as she watched him tumble from the horse, falling hard onto the dirt.

  Rose hurried over to the horse, grabbing hold of its reins to calm it down while Evelyn quickly found herself at Lonnie’s side. He sat up pretty quickly, gripping his leg.

  “What on Earth were you doing, huh?” she said, examining his leg. She slapped his hands away. “Leave it to me.” She ran her hands across his right leg until he winced. “There?”

  “Uh-huh,” he said.

  “Okay,” she replied. “Can you move it?” He moved it. “Can you move it well, Lon, I don’t want you actin’ like a big man and then me havin’ to hear from Sheriff Hawker that you can’t even walk right.”

  “I can move it fine,” he said. “Thank you.”

  She turned to face him to see that he was smiling. “What are you smiling at?”

  “I knew there was more to you.”

  She blinked. “More to me?”

  “More than just anger and hatred toward men,” he replied. “Certainly more than that hard exterior you put up.”

  Evelyn could feel her cheeks going red again. She turned away from him, pulling herself to her feet, dusting herself off. She helped Lonnie up, throwing his arm over her shoulder and helping him back up onto the porch. She sat him on the swing and found herself looking at his shoes.

  “You know, it doesn’t do well for a ranger to be wandering around town with dirty shoes,” she said. “Didn’t your daddy ever teach you how to clean your shoes?”

  “He did,” he said. “I just forget.”

  “Rose, would you mind getting me a cloth from inside?”

  “Evelyn, what are you—”

  “Stop your complaining,” she said. “I can’t have you wander around town with dirty shoes.”

  Rose hurried back with a cloth, glancing at her with a look of surprise. Evelyn willed her to stop, she didn’t want to draw any more attention to it if she could.

&n
bsp; “You really don’t have to do that,” he said.

  “I only do things I want, not because I have to,” she replied, dead serious.

  He took his boots off and she started to clean them while sitting next to him.

  He reached out and stroked her arm, his fingers rough against her bare skin. She couldn’t suppress a shiver. “Thank you anyway,” he said.

  Their eyes locked and she smiled at him. She couldn’t help herself. She didn’t know who this person that he brought out of her was, but she liked it. He was making her soft, and she wasn’t even sure she minded.

  “Do you want to stay for dinner?” Evelyn asked when she was done.

  “You really don’t have to—”

  “What did I already say to you?” Evelyn said, raising an eyebrow at him. “If you’ve got somewhere else you want to go, that’s fine. But I promise you what you have here will be better.”

  “Thank you, that would be wonderful,” he said.

  “Rose?” Evelyn said. “You’d be more than welcome too.”

  “I should probably head off,” Rose said. “My parents will be wondering where I am. You two have a lovely evening though.” She widened her eyes at Evelyn, and Evelyn immediately felt her cheeks glow red. She hoped Lonnie hadn’t noticed.

  When she was done with his boots, she brought him inside, seating him at the dining table next to her father. Immediately the two of them jumped into conversation, like they were a pair of old friends, not someone her father had only met once.

  From the kitchen, she watched the two of them talking, Lonnie asking questions about Pops’ life, Pops responding where he could, and admitting he’d forgotten the answer in others. It was strange how easily he fit into her life.

  “Here we are,” Evelyn announced as she brought a pie to the table, following it up with some vegetables. She served a plate for Pops and a plate of equal size for Lonnie before serving her own, taking a seat across from both of them to eat. “Enjoy,” she added.

  “This is wonderful, Evie,” Pops said, through a mouthful of pie.

  “Pops, not while your mouth is full,” Evelyn said. “We have company.”

  “Don’t mind me!”

  “Oh, Lonnie doesn’t mind,” Pops said with a grin. Evelyn raised a careful eyebrow at him. She didn’t want him to embarrass her in front of Lonnie, though she certainly couldn’t place why. “Sorry, sweetheart.”

  “It really is delicious, Evelyn,” Lonnie said. “Thank you so much for having me.”

  She smiled. “It’s my pleasure,” she said. “You’re new in town, I can imagine you’re inundated with offers to—”

  “No, I’m not,” Lonnie interrupted. “But I’m glad that you did. Thank you. It’s very kind.”

  Evelyn shrugged. “My pleasure.” She had to tear her gaze away from him and return to her food, trying to silence the hammering in her chest.

  Chapter 15

  Lonnie left Evelyn’s home an hour or so later. Having dinner with her was truly wonderful. He’d gotten a chance to speak to her father a little, and he realized that spending time with her when it didn’t feel like she was trying to best him in some way, was really nice. It was almost like they were friends. He could feel the beginning of something more there. He didn’t want to leave. He’d wanted to stay with her for as long as possible, but she had to take care of her father, get him ready for bed, and he didn’t want to intrude any further on her evening.

  He got on his horse, treating it extra kindly after Evelyn spooked it earlier on, and took the road home, unable to get her out of his head. The night had been wonderful. He could barely keep the smile off his face as he rode home.

  He had started to see who she really was, not the girl who was determined to shut him out, but someone who might actually be perfect for him. He could hardly believe his luck.

  When he got home, he noticed something stuck to his door. It was flapping a little in the breeze, but in the limited light of the evening he couldn’t make it out. What he could see, even from this distance, was that it was stuck to his door with a knife. That was a threat if he ever saw one.

  He tied his horse to the fence post and walked toward it, suddenly painfully aware of his surroundings, of how open and exposed he was as he was walking to his own front door.

  He reached for what he now could see was a note and took it off.

  ‘Leave Evelyn alone, or else’, it read.

  The scrawl was untidy, like it had been scratched into the paper in a rage. He knew it was from Willard, and the thought of him being anywhere nearby made his blood run cold. He put the note in his pocket and climbed back onto his horse, heading off in the opposite direction he’d come. How could he not have seen him? How was he moving around without anybody spotting him?

  Lonnie rode through the streets in the quiet, only the sound of his horse’s hooves and his breathing filling the space around him. He kept his eyes peeled, carefully looking down every side street, toward every corner, ready to grab his lasso if he needed to, even his gun if it came to it.

  But as time wore on, it became clear that wherever Willard was, he wasn’t in town. That didn’t change the fact that he’d gotten away again, and Lonnie was going to have to keep an even closer watch on Evelyn if he was going to keep her safe. And he needed to do that.

  At least it gave him an excuse to go and see her again tomorrow evening. She didn’t need to know that Willard had threatened him, it would only worry her, maybe even make her push him away. But he would keep a closer watch on her.

  * * *

  The following evening, Lonnie finished his day's work for the sheriff and headed in the direction of the hardware store. Without making too much of a fuss, he waited outside as Evelyn finished her work, cleaning up around the store before locking up and heading outside. Her eyes widened when she saw him.

  “Well, well, well,” she said. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your company this evening, Lonnie Steele?” Evelyn asked, unable to keep the smile off her face. “I thought you would have had enough of me by now.”

  Lonnie grinned. “Hardly.”

  “You here to walk me home?”

  “If you don’t mind,” he said.

  “Well, I’m not about to say no to someone escorting me home,” she said. “And I could always do with the company.”

  As they walked, they talked about their respective days and Lonnie found himself hanging on her every word. Everything she said seemed to leave an imprint on him, wrapping him further into her life. He wanted this all the time. He wanted to be the person she walked home with or, better yet, the person she came home to. He hadn’t felt that before about anyone else. There had been girls in the past, but nothing like this, nothing that haunted his mind with such intensity, with such fire.

  What was it about Evelyn Pierce that made him feel that way? Sure, she was beautiful, no one could deny that. But there was so much more to her than what she showed to people in Kecheetah. They saw a feisty girl with a damaged past, someone to be avoided, someone who was dangerous, but he saw someone strong. He saw someone who had already lived an incredibly hard life, even though she was barely older than twenty, someone driven, someone passionate, someone who was determined to show love and do the right thing. That was the Evelyn he was getting to know. It was an Evelyn that the rest of the town didn’t even know existed.

  “What are you thinking about, Lon?” she said, as they reached her house. “I’ve lost you.”

  “I’m just enjoying myself,” he said, smiling. “I like these walks, Evelyn. Actually, I like spending time with you, it doesn’t really matter what we’re doing.”

  Evelyn shrugged. “Well, the evening isn’t over yet,” she said. “And you were meant to be teaching me to take care of myself, remember? But our lesson got cut short.” She stopped suddenly. “I forgot all about your knee,” she said. “How is it? I wasn’t walking too fast or—”

  “It’s fine, it’s fine,” Lonnie said. “I just fell at a weird angle
. But I’m more than alright. I managed to get through the day just fine.”

  “Clearly.”

  “So, you want me to keep teaching you how to fire a gun?” he asked. “I can set up the cans, seeing as Rose isn’t here to assist.”

  “Well how about we try something else then,” she said. “If your knee is okay, we could always race.”

  “Race?” Lonnie hadn’t been in a footrace since he was a young boy. When he needed to catch somebody, he was normally on a horse.