by Jenna Kernan
“You satisfied?” asked the captain.
Boon drew a heavy breath and then gave a single nod of his head.
“Then you’re free to go, unless you changed your mind about that reward money.”
“Nope.”
Bender cast him a long speculative look. Boon wondered what he was thinking.
“Too bad I didn’t get to hang Hammer. That’s what all outlaws deserve.” Bender’s voice was congenial, as if they were now old friends. It put Boon further on edge.
“Outlaws like me?” asked Boon.
“Son, when we took you, you didn’t even have a gun. You were their prisoner, same as Laurie. That’s why I didn’t hang you. You were an innocent man.”
“I’m a killer.”
Bender held his gaze. “We’re all killers, son. Me, Coats, the rest of my Rangers. Some men just need killing. You were fighting for your life and for Laurie’s. I can square with that. You done real good, son.” Bender squeezed his uninjured shoulder. Boon had once lived for such a show of affection and approval. Now it felt hollow and not nearly as important. Laurie had changed him right down to the core and he feared he’d never be able to be that man he’d once longed to become. Was there any way to have them both, the respect of this man and the love of his daughter? No, he decided. He’d burned that bridge good and proper.
“So all that’s left is for us to settle up,” said Bender.
Boon braced for another blow but Bender only reached in his pocket, drawing something out which he held in his fist. He extended his hand, uncoiling his fingers. There in his palm lay the only thing Boon had ever really coveted—a shiny Mexican peso cut into a Ranger’s badge. Across the middle the letters had been stamped and then blackened so they could be easily read: Texas Ranger.
Boon’s heart started pumping like a piston as he looked to the captain for confirmation.
“It’s yours, son. You earned it.”
Boon reached. The captain closed his fist, removing the prize. Boon’s arm dropped back to his side as elation ebbed against the incoming wave of suspicion. No one had ever given him something for nothing, so what was the catch?
“But just one thing,” said the captain. “I won’t be your commander. You’ll be working under Robert Hart down in McAllen. Mostly trouble with bandits and rustlers.”
McAllen. If it were any farther south he’d be in Mexico. In fact, you could see Mexico from the banks of the Rio Grande.
“I think you’ll understand when I tell you that you are exactly the sort of man I’d like as one of my men. But not the kind I’d choose for my Laurie. She needs someone steady, someone who’s gonna stay put and not get himself shot chasing rustlers. You’re too damned much like me.”
Boon agreed with him there. But if the captain was forcing a choice, Boon was sure he wouldn’t like the outcome. He wasn’t keen on being offered the badge as a bribe to keep clear of his daughter. Still he didn’t see that he had any choice in the matter.
“I understand, sir.”
Bender’s mustache twitched in what might have passed for a smile and then he slapped the badge down into Boon’s palm, following the exchange with a handshake that kept the warm metal star suspended between them.
Boon slowly shook his head. He met the captain’s puzzled expression and held his gaze.
“Coats was right. I ain’t Ranger material.” Boon set the badge on the top of the porch rail, tapping it once in farewell. “And as for Laurie…”
Bender’s expression turned from cordial to deadly but Boon forged on.
“As for Laurie, she’s too much of a lady to fall for the likes of me. So I’ll be heading out.”
The captain’s exhalation seemed to hold a good deal of relief. That surprised Boon. Did her father really think his daughter was a fool? Laurie might have had a fancy for him, but she’d come to her senses with time.
“Where you headed, son?”
“Don’t know, exactly. I’m free as the summer wind. Might see which way it blows me. I hear there’s gold in the Black Hills.”
“Raiding Sioux up there, too.”
“No one lives forever.”
Bender’s mustache twitched in what might have been a smile.
Boon headed for the livery where he’d boarded the ponies he’d stolen from Hammer for the cost of one of their saddles.
He needed to get clear of San Antonio, this man, this whole damn city. He wondered how far would be far enough to put Laurie behind him.
Chapter Twenty
Laurie dressed and then announced that she would see Boon. Her mother ordered her to stay in the hotel, but not even her mother’s ire would sway her. She wanted to see him and this time she would tell him that she loved him. She pushed past her mother and left the hotel.
Since she did not know where to find Boon, she retraced their steps, deciding that Dr. Langor would likely know where Boon could be found. She had reached the doctor’s office and was just lifting her hand to knock when her father caught up with her.
“Laurie!”
She turned and saw the captain, approaching at a fast walk.
“Laurie, why you out here alone?” Her father glanced at her raised hand, poised to knock on the doctor’s door. Then he stared at her midsection. “Something wrong with you?”
She blinked, unsure how to answer. There was so very much wrong with her at the moment.
“Did you see Boon?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Her father reached for her now, taking firm hold of her elbow and turning them about.
“Come on,” he ordered.
If he wanted a fight, she would give it to him. Laurie lifted her chin in defiance. “I am not your hound.”
“You’re my girl.”
He hadn’t called her that in years.
“I used to be. But I am not yours any more than I am a girl.”
“I don’t know why you had to go and grow up anyways,” he grumbled, rubbing the back of his neck with his opposite hand, which sent his hat tipping forward.
She almost felt sorry for him. John Bender was competent in many areas, but raising a daughter was clearly not one of them. Did he feel uncertain as to his decisions regarding her?
“Well, I have grown up, very recently in fact. Father, do you know why I came to be on that train?”
His eyes grew cautious, but he did not answer.
“I was trying to find you. I hoped that telling you about mother would bring you home. I truly believed that if I went to you and explained what was happening that you would swoop in, like you used to, and make everything all right.”
Bender released Laurie and his mustache drooped with his mouth.
“A week ago, I believed that your divorce had ruined my life. That I couldn’t find a suitor because of it. But the truth is that I cast off every man that got near me. I’d think of Anton Fischer and freeze up inside like the Great Plains in February.”
Her father’s eyes narrowed and he cast a glance about. For a moment he looked as if he needed rescuing.
“I’ve been afraid of every single man that’s come near me, except Boon, but he won’t have me without your approval because he thinks I’m too much of a lady. Well, we both know that’s not so.”
Her father tried unsuccessfully to set them in motion. Laurie dug in her heels.
“Do you recall the day you told me that it was unladylike to ride a horse?”
He stopped at her side, glaring fiercely.
Laurie continued. “When you said a lady might carry a derringer in her bag, but not a holster strapped to her hip? We stopped riding together that day.”
He lowered his head as if ashamed, but that was wrong. Her father had never felt shame, never apologized for anything. And up until today, she had never suspected that he was uncertain about his decision to leave them.
Her father’s voice held a note of strain when he spoke. “Your mother said that you were a distraction to my men, flying across the territory with your sk
irts up and your hair trailing behind you. You needed some education.”
“You taught me.”
“That was when you were a girl. When you grew up, it was no longer proper.”
“So you sent us away.”
“Your mother thought it best. She said she needed to get hold of you before you turned out just like Calamity Jane. That woman could drive an eight-mule team even after she drank a full bottle of grain alcohol. But I can see your mother’s point.”
Laurie had never known that, but she knew they argued over her upbringing.
“Hell, I don’t know what’s best for a young lady. That is your mother’s area of expertise. So I gave you up.”
“So I could put on corsets, put up my hair, start wearing gloves and bonnets? Lavender powder, satin ribbons? Do you know why I did all that?”
“Because it is the proper thing.”
Laurie shook her head. “Because you told me that you wanted me to grow into a proper lady. That you expected me to do just as Mother said and put away my rifle and the rubber waders I used for fishing and so I did. Just like that, because you asked it. I did everything you wanted and all to please you. But you never came back. I believed you were checking on me. Wondered who among the town folks was your agent. It took me a long time to realize that no one was.”
“I was working to provide for you and your mother.”
“I gave up everything I loved for you.” She tore off her bonnet with such force it toppled her carefully styled hair. A shower of hairpins bounced off the planking like hail. “And I won’t do it again.” She pulled off her gloves and threw them down to the porch boards between them.
“Laurie! What the Sam Hill are you doing?”
She’d never seen her father look uncertain before, but she saw it now, that shifting of his eyes, the search for rescue and then the bewilderment when he realized that he’d have to face her alone.
“I won’t be a proper lady any longer.” She reached back and removed the combs, untying the ribbons, letting her dark hair fall down her back. “I am more like you than I am like Mother. I do not want to sit with embroidery. I want to ride and shoot and live. Why do the men get to have all the adventures while the women have to perch, like birds, in stifling hot parlors in corsets that hold us so tight we cannot draw a full breath?”
Her father released her and backed away. Laurie advanced.
“Do you remember the snake skin we found? I kept it. It’s tucked away in a cigar box at home with all the other improper things I’ve hidden.” Laurie lifted her hand and ticked off the list. “My throwing knife, the deck of cards you used to teach me poker, the horse pick, jaw harp and the last pack of Black Jack chewing gum you bought me because ladies must not chew gum.”
“Laurie, you stop it now. You hear?” Her father’s voice did not hold its usual authority. Instead it held a certain note of panic.
“No.” She stepped forward. “No more. I have had my fill of bustles and corsets and ridiculous hats that do not even keep the sun from my face. I have had enough of tiny uncomfortable shoes and reading poetry. I am my father’s daughter and I will not allow you or anyone else to dictate to me.”
His face turned red as he aimed a finger at her. “You’ll do as we say.”
Laurie pulled back. “No, sir. You lost that right when you sent me away and made me ashamed of what I was. From now on, I make my own decisions and I will ride astride and shoot and I’ll drink whiskey if I like. I will be a proper lady no more!”
Her father’s eyes narrowed.
“Now tell me where he is,” she ordered.
“He’s leaving. Might be gone already.”
The fight left Laurie so fast it turned her knees to jelly. Laurie swayed, her mission suddenly becoming imperative. If she didn’t find him, didn’t catch him, she might never see him again.
Her father grasped her wrist but she wrenched away.
“Laurie?” Her father’s eyes were wide with concern.
“Where?” she whispered.
He didn’t answer.
“Where!” This time her words were a shout.
“Sheffield’s boardinghouse. Happy? Now let’s go.”
Her father made a grab for her but she upended a chair on Dr. Langor’s porch and then threw herself over the railing while he tangled on it, giving her time to run. She lifted her skirts and bolted down the street as fast as her legs would carry her.
Laurie stopped only for directions to Sheffield’s but upon reaching the house she discovered that Boon had departed after speaking with her father.
Desperate, she hurried to the livery as directed by Mrs. Sheffield and found Boon headed for the office with one of the three saddles they used slung over his shoulder.
He spotted her a moment later and paused. He dropped the saddle, raising a cloud of dust.
“Come to shout good riddance?” He tried to joke but his heart hurt and his throat felt tight.
He took a good look at her, seeing she was panting, pale, with perspiration beading on her brow. Her hair was flying about her face and she had no gloves. Where was her bonnet?
“Laurie, what in tarnation?”
He untied his neckerchief and used it to wipe her brow. He couldn’t resist letting his index finger stroke her soft cheek in the process. Laurie gasped and sputtered a moment and he drew her to the shade of the eaves.
She leaned in and lifted both hands, reaching for his face, but he stepped back. Was she crazy, trying to caress him right out here on the street? If Laurie wouldn’t see to her reputation, he’d have to.
“Your folks know you’re out here alone?”
She didn’t answer.
“Go on back to them, Laurie-gal.”
“I had to see you.”
So she had been on her way to find him, seeking him out. Lord Almighty, the woman lacked all sense.
“Well, you seen me. I’m right as rain.” Except he was still seeing double and he couldn’t lift one arm.
She glanced about again as if expecting pursuit, then met his gaze with those big dark eyes that caused him to melt inside.
“I am sorry about before, with my mother. I didn’t know what to say or do.” She peeked up at him from beneath dark, thick lashes and he knew for certain his heart was gone. Lord, he’d never get over her.
He checked himself. This gal stirred him up like dust before a thunderstorm, his rainmaker, but he’d already caused her enough anguish. He’d not make it worse. Her parents were right to tuck her away like the prize that she was and keep her safe until they could find someone who deserved her. If not for that one night together, he’d already be gone.
Lord, what was she doing talking to the likes of him?
“I was so worried when you had that fever. I feared losing you.”
“Well, I thought that was the idea. You never planned on keeping me, Laurie. I ain’t the keeping kind.”
“You could be.”
She looked up at him with wide expectant eyes. He needed to put an end to this, for his good as well as hers.
His heart squeezed with a pain that took him totally unawares. He ached to have her and to have a child by her.
“Hell.”
Laurie blinked in surprise and he recalled belatedly that men didn’t say damn or hell to ladies.
“Do you remember what you told me? Do I look like a banker or a preacher to you?”
“If you were, I’d be dead right now,” she said. “You saved me.”
He threaded his hands through the hair at his temples, trying again to do what was right.
“Your pa told me,” he said. “You come through all right?”
She flushed and nodded her head. “This morning,” she confirmed. Her eyes welled with tears. “Don’t leave me.”
“Laurie,” he said, his voice chiding. “How did you think this would end? Did you think your ma and pa would be happy to have their daughter fall for a no-account drifter who’s ridden with the worst outlaw in the entire sta
te of Texas?”
“They don’t know you.”
He locked his jaw, not wanting to do what he must. Wishing to savor the moment when Laurie Bender wanted him as much as he yearned for her.
“Oh, Laurie,” he choked, longing to give in to the fantasy.
“Stay with me, Boon.”
He almost said yes. But he loved her too much to stay. Too much to watch her lose everything. Too much to saddle her with the likes of him.
“You’re not hitching your wagon to mine. I’ve got no land, no livelihood. Hell, I don’t even have a last name to give you. So here’s how it is—I’m going. You’re staying.”
“But I love you,” she whispered.
He closed his eyes against the joy and agony. How could he ever have hoped to win the love of such a woman?
She tried to kiss him but he held her off with one hand.
“No, you don’t. You can’t. I won’t let you. Your ma and pa are right. You listen to them and marry a man who can give you all the things you deserve.”
“But I want you.”
“No.”
She looped her arms about his neck, looking at him with welling eyes, and he felt his heart turn to dust. She’d never forgive him for what he was about to do and that was best for all concerned.
He dragged her arms from his neck and pushed her roughly aside. “Laurie, you aren’t my type. I’m used to good-time girls, not some prim, priggish woman who’s as starched as her corset stays.”
Laurie staggered as if he had punched her. But still she didn’t go. He reached down deep, lifting one last stone, the one he knew would drive her off and still he hesitated, hating to throw it.
“Boon,” she whispered. “Stay.”
He shook his head and threw the rock. “I never stay anywhere. You come with me and I’ll leave you upstairs in some saloon, which is probably where you belong.”
She stared in horror. “But you said…you said it didn’t matter. That any man worth his salt would choose a woman for what is on the inside.”
He scooped up the saddle. “Oh, hell, Laurie. I’d have said anything to get you on that horse and moving.”
