by Lisa Plumley
And whatever his business, it was probably best handled in private—without station hands nearby.
Megan nodded toward Mose. “It’s all right, Mose. Thank you for your help.”
He grinned and tugged the horse’s reins he was holding closer to his chest, staring down at his big clodhopper boots. “Ain’t nothin’, Miss Megan.”
“It was a great deal,” she insisted with a smile. “But why don’t you take Mollie to the stable now, and get on with your work. I’ll be fine here.”
Mose cast a suspicious glance at Gabriel Winter. Reluctantly, he tugged the horse nearer. “Yes’m,” he muttered, taking his leave—but not before slamming his shoulder into Mr. Winter’s chest as he passed.
Men. Always having to prove something.
To her amazement, the stranger didn’t even sway. And, to her greater surprise, he didn’t seem to feel the need to shove Mose back, either.
“Shall we talk inside?” he asked instead. He removed his hat, revealing a headful of hair thick and black as a moonless night, then gestured toward the opened stage station doorway. “You may prefer hearing what I have to say in private.”
His solicitousness surprised her. But the appreciative glance he aimed at her bustle when she moved toward the door did not. Megan stepped sideways, putting a little extra wiggle into her walk as she preceded him into the station. As near as she could tell, she might need whatever weaponry she could muster.
In her experience, a well-padded bustle counted among the most effective.
Smiling, she pulled off her hat and gloves with motions leisurely enough to let her observe Gabriel Winter—hopefully, without him noticing. His tall, broad-shouldered body blocked much of the light from the doorway, then he followed her inside. His boots beat solidly on the hard-packed dirt floor as he made his way around the room, somehow managing to fill the space in a way the station hands never had. He carried a sense of authority with him as easily as he wore those citified clothes.
Her curiosity piqued, Megan finished removing her gloves, and lay them daintily across her palm the way she’d read the Godey’s ladies did.
“Did you say my father expected you?” she asked, taking a seat behind the desk. At least there she felt more in control, however little she knew about her visitor.
Gabriel Winter nodded, still examining the room. He traced his fingers over the books shelved near the door, touched the lantern on its hook, rubbed his palm over the pair of old ladder-back chairs Jedediah and Prudie Webster had occupied earlier. At her desk, he closed his eyes and fairly caressed the quartz paperweight Megan kept atop the bills of lading. It was as though the man felt as strongly as he saw.
His eyes opened, then focused on her face with unnerving intensity. “Yes, he expected me.”
Enough of this mysteriousness. “Why?” she snapped, throwing down her gloves to open the journal of express shipment records. “Do you have something to ship on the express?”
“No, not that.”
He dropped his hat atop her journal. He walked around the side of her desk, near enough that his pant legs almost brushed her skirts. Then, to her astonishment, Gabriel Winter kept right on going toward the living area at the rear of the station.
“I’m here to arrest him,” he said, tossing something over his shoulder.
She scrambled to her feet just as it landed on the desktop with a scrape of metal on wood.
A Pinkerton agent’s badge.
Things had gone from bad to worse.
Chapter Three
“Come back here this instant!”
Megan Kearney’s voice preceded her to the rear of the stage station by no more than a hair’s breadth. Clear, precise, and achingly female, the sound would’ve been sweeter than molasses—if the lady behind it hadn’t been mad enough to wake snakes. Her tone made it clear she wasn’t used to being ignored.
Gabriel could see why, after noticing the way her bustle trailed her earlier. A man could follow that sweet side-to-side swoosh clear to heaven and back. For a spinster, Joseph Kearney’s daughter knew how to use every feminine asset the Lord had granted.
And some He hadn’t.
She barreled into the plain-furnished bedroom he’d found himself in, affording him no more than a glimpse of the room before she blocked the view with those assets of hers. The rounded flare of her hips beneath her skirt was a sight finer to look at than the old military cot, chest, and bare adobe walls behind her, and so was the rest of her.
A man couldn’t help but take a second look.
“This is my father’s bedroom!” she said. “Get out of here at once.”
“Or what?” Gabriel asked lazily. She really was a pretty thing—if a little on the oddly dressed side. Those geegaws on her hat had been enough to send the cactus wrens toward her with thoughts of nesting on their minds. “You’ll call that oversized kid you call a station hand in here to roust me out?”
“Yes!”
He shrugged. “I’ve put bigger men in the ground. Maybe not dumber ones, but—”
She started to tremble—with anger, he guessed, not fear.
“If you so much as lay a hand on Mose,” she said, “I’ll—I’ll—”
Just as he’d thought—she was softhearted. Soft all over, by the looks of her. If he’d had more time, more leads on the case….
The case.
For all he knew, she’d helped her father pull off that damned stagecoach robbery. Reminding himself of the duty that had brought him here, Gabriel pressed his fingertips to the pale canvas tacked over the low viga ceiling and leaned over her.
“You’ll what?”
She glared upward, taking in the way his fingertips reached the ceiling. Then she glared upward at him.
He grinned. Lord, but he did like a feisty woman.
“Hmmm?” he prompted.
Her big brown eyes lost some of their warmth. Her gaze narrowed, then centered on him.
Low-down on him.
“I’ll do this,” she said—and kicked him in the shin.
Damnation. Pain exploded along his leg bone. Ducking, he rubbed it out, still keeping an eye on her. He wanted to know it if she took it into her head to kick him a little higher up.
“Desert women are a little different than you’re used to, I guess,” she said, returning his look with vinegar to spare.
Gabriel grunted. “Yeah. A city woman would’ve jabbed me with her parasol instead.” He winced as he straightened again—this time, out of kicking range. “What the hell’s in those shoes?”
“Feet. Please get out.”
He looked her over, gauging his chances of sweet-talking her into letting him search the place without getting crippled for his efforts.
They didn’t look good.
But he had to try.
He reached inside his coat pocket and tugged out the wanted poster he’d drawn up on the train from California. Based on the case file, it contained details about the stagecoach robbery, the man he sought, and the reward offered. If things went according to his plan, he wouldn’t need to have it printed up and posted.
But Miss Kearney didn’t know that.
“Not until you read this.” Gently, he pushed the rolled paper into her hands.
She looked like she expected it to sit up and bite her. “Look, agent Winter,” she said, thrusting the paper toward him as though to give it back, “I was on my way to conduct some very important business in town, and I don’t have time for some sharper’s shenanigans. Someone has obviously misled you, if you think my father is involved in some sort of—”
“Just read it.”
She strangled it in her fist instead, giving him a defiant glare. “No Pinkerton man has any reason to go after my father. You people hunted down the James and Younger gangs, for heaven’s sake!”
Megan slapped the rolled wanted poster onto his chest. He clapped his hand over hers, holding it atop the paper hard enough to keep the poster from falling—hard enough to keep her from getting away.
“I suggest you devote yourself to chasing the real criminals in this Territory,” she said, trying to wriggle her hand away. “Everyone knows they’re common as cactus.”
“And twice as prickly.”
She sighed and quit struggling. “This may be funny to you, but I don’t think—”
“Neither do I.”
Her small hand stilled beneath his, warm enough that he could feel her heat clear through to his chest, even past the layers of paper and clothes separating them. He sensed the rounded bulk of a ring on one of her fingers, and wondered if the spinster Kearney was really as lacking in beaus as his research into her family implied.
“Then let me go and we’ll both be on our way,” she said, her voice crisp.
For a small woman standing up to a much larger man, Megan Kearney somehow managed to look fierce. Determined. She kept her shoulders straight, kept her gaze level on his face…and kept the wanted poster she refused to believe plastered against his chest while she waited for him to take the document back.
At that moment, her loyalty to her father, however mislaid, struck him as endearing as hell. Suddenly Gabriel wished he’d let McMarlin question her instead.
“This is no sharper’s trick,” he said. “I’ve got good reasons to be here. Otherwise, I’d let you head out to town and get on with your business. I’m not in the habit of making hasty judgments.”
He stroked his thumb over hers, then released her hand and pressed the poster into it. “I’m sorry.”
The disbelieving look she gave him did nothing to salve his conscience. As far as some folks were concerned, the Pinkertons were no better than high-paid bounty hunters. From the looks of things, Megan agreed with them.
With the air of a stable hand wanting to get the damned stalls mucked out, she dipped her head and rapidly scanned the page.
“This can’t be,” she muttered. With a sound of confusion, she wrinkled her forehead and read it again. Then, looking wounded, she raised her head and stared toward the window. Gabriel waited. Her gaze turned distant, distracted.
Trying to think of an explanation that would prove her father’s innocence somehow, he figured. It was the reaction most folks had when faced with the kind of news he brought. Witnessing their despair and disbelief turn to acceptance was one of things he hated most about being an agent. It was also one of the things he’d been forced to accept early on.
“Happens all the time,” he replied, hoping to take some of the sting from the news. “You couldn’t have known.”
She said nothing, only lowered her head and touched her fingertips to the poster. Her motions stirred the air in the room, sweetened it with the feminine scents surrounding her. Apparently, painted flowers weren’t the only kind she came in contact with. She smelled like she’d rolled in a whole meadow.
Just as the contrast of blossoms drawn on dirt-streaked adobe had, the combination of sweet and tough in Megan Kearney intrigued him like nothing he’d known. He watched the play of late-morning sunlight over her features, and liked what he saw. Any honey-coated words he gave her would have truth to spare.
“In my line of work, I’ve seen things you would not believe, Miss Kearney,” Gabriel said when she looked up from the wanted poster. “But I’ve never seen a woman with hair exactly the color of sugared coffee, like yours.” He paused to push back a strand that had come undone from the knot at the back of her head. “And eyes like the heart of a flame.”
Her jaw dropped. So did the wanted poster, to the rug at their feet. Apparently, he’d shocked her into stillness. Taking advantage, Gabriel let his gaze linger on her hair, her neck, then followed the trail of black buttons toward the ample curves of her breasts, hidden beneath her stiff-starched clothes.
“You’re a right fine looker,” he said softly, giving her hair one last, smooth stroke before lowering his hand. “Too bad you’re a wanted man’s daughter.”
Too bad he wanted her himself.
He couldn’t think about that. Not with a case at hand. But it had silenced her well enough, and that would have to do. He couldn’t afford to turn mush-hearted now.
Putting behind thoughts of wanting for wanted, Gabriel surveyed the room and decided the chest was the most likely hiding place for the stolen money he sought. With an ache of regret he didn’t care to consider, he went first to the scratched wooden trunk at the foot of the cot.
He didn’t expect to find the loot stored in such an accessible place, but the criminals he’d tracked had done stupider things in the past. It wasn’t his practice to overlook any potential lead. Bending to one knee on the soft rag rug, he peered closely at the latch.
“Too bad you’re insane!” she cried.
Ahhh. She’d recovered.
With a rush of displaced air that smelled of soap and sage, Megan Kearney came toward him. Before she could reach him, he grabbed for the cold iron latch, wrenched it upward…and felt the whole chest shudder as she heaved herself on top of it, rear-end first.
It slammed shut.
“And you’re the one calling me insane?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Looking indisputably unconvinced of her father’s guilt—and extremely satisfied with the loud thunk the lid had made when it came crashing down—she glared at him from her perch on top of it. “You can’t look in here, you—you—madman!”
“Madman?” Gabriel watched her blow a wisp of hair from her eyes, and fought the urge to grin. “I’ve been called worse.”
“I’ll just bet you have.”
He shrugged.
She narrowed her eyes, transforming them from the warm, caramel brown he’d admired earlier into something a shade darker—and miles more dangerous. Nothing appealed to him more than a woman with grit, a woman with the courage of her convictions and the gumption to back them up.
“Unfortunately,” she said with a toss of her head, “whatever it was, it wasn’t nearly bad enough to describe a man like you.”
“Probably not.” He shrugged and flipped her scratchy brown skirt hem out of the way, then wedged his fingers along the lid’s seam and tried to lift it. It rose an inch…a little more…then the little hellion bounced harder.
“Youch!” He snatched his fingers back, narrowly missing having seven or eight of them crushed flatter than her station hand Mose’s head. “Careful. This is official business.”
“It’s official bunk! My father hasn’t done anything.”
“Ma’am, as you read on that poster, somebody stole ten thousand dollars from a Kearney express shipment last week. If that’s what you call bunk, you’ve got a mighty sobering idea of what’s a crime and what’s not.”
Her expression turned serious. Then defiant.
“Well, since we haven’t had any thefts reported, and you’re chasing the wrong man, it’s still bunk,” she said. “But I guess a common trespasser like yourself wouldn’t care about things like what’s right and wrong.”
Ahh, yet another tactic. An accusation, followed by a change of subject. If you don’t have the answers, change the questions. His estimation of Megan Kearney went up a notch.
“Trespasser, hmmm? I’ve heard that around here, a man could get strung up for such a thing,” Gabriel said, echoing her earlier remark. “Even one who has a pretty daughter to hide behind.”
With a murderous look, she flung something small and shiny at his head. He ducked just in time to hear it ping against the wall and drop to the floor.
His Pinkerton badge. He left it where it lay and caught hold of her wrists instead, meaning to haul her off the trunk lid by force. Instead, the incredible sensation of having so much softness in his grasp stopped him before he could move. Warm and pliant, her skin felt like silk beneath his callused fingertips.
Like warm outlaw’s silk, Gabriel reminded himself. He couldn’t afford to be swayed by distractions, even ones packaged as prettily as Megan Kearney.
“You’re wrong. I care a lot about what’s right and wrong,” he said. �
�Most agents do.”
“Hmmph. How do I know that thing’s even real?” she asked, jerking her chin toward his badge.
He tightened his hold on her wrists. “It’s real.”
Her chin didn’t lower, and her behind didn’t budge, but her gaze lowered to the sight of his big, tanned hands wrapped around her slender wrists. He saw her eyelashes flutter, like she was surprised at the sight, and then her gaze met his again.
“Let go of me,” she said.
He murmured a refusal, mentally bracing himself for the screaming and struggling—and inevitable victory—that would come next. A hundred-odd pounds worth of woman wasn’t keeping him from searching that chest, and it was high time he made that much clear.
Her cool, measuring glance told him she understood. Just to be sure, Gabriel stroked his thumbs over the delicate insides of her forearms and warned, “If I have to move you forcibly off there myself, I will.”
Megan gave him an odd half-smile, then opened her mouth to suck in a gulp of air. Resigned to the need to haul her off the chest and get to work searching, Gabriel braced himself to release her wrists in time to muffle her scream.
Instead, something seemed to occur to her. Megan stopped in mid-breath and cocked her head at him, eyebrows arched. “You really don’t care if I scream, do you?”
“Nope.”
Her forehead wrinkled in apparent puzzlement. She looked at him a moment longer.
Her breath came out in a whoosh. “Isn’t that against the rules?”
“There’s only one rule to tracking outlaws.”
Her eyebrows lifted in question.
“Find them before they find you, and get out alive.”
“Oh.” Her gaze softened.
His shifted to her lips…and they’d softened, too. They looked full, slightly downturned at the corners. Kissable. I’ll be damned…
“That’s the saddest thing I’ve heard all year,” she murmured.
Something feathery touched his palm. Her fingers, caressing the pad of his thumb. Gabriel arched his hand without thinking, allowing her greater access to stroke him. Maybe he’d judged her unfairly. The sins of the father weren’t necessarily those of the daughter…
