Once an Outlaw

by Raine Cantrell

  Despite the cool night air, his body was warm. She hadn’t thought much about touching his bare skin before, but noticed the play of muscles beneath her palms. He was lean and hard. She felt the dampness of her palms slide over his waist and belly as he moved to lower himself to the bed. Her heart was pounding and she knew better than to fool herself that it was helping him that caused it. Harry had always been covered up, either with a shirt or his nightshirt. She couldn’t remember him ever encouraging her to touch his body.

  Instinct warned that Logan would not only encourage a woman to touch him, he’d like and expect it.

  Jessie, don’t go off on a tangent and start getting ideas about him. He’s a moving-on kind of man. He’ll be ready to go in a few days. Keep that in mind.

  She backed away from the bed and barred the door before finding her way to her own bed.

  Logan heard the rustling of the quilts as she settled down to sleep. “You’re a brave woman, Mrs. Winslow. Guess I got lucky after all.”

  The last made no sense to her, so she ignored it. “Good night, Logan. And it’s Jessie. Somehow Mrs. Winslow sounds too formal now.”

  “Jessie, then.” Logan found himself smiling. Jessie. The name suited her. A foolish notion to have when he had to grit his teeth as the throbbing in his arm renewed itself.

  He had to keep in mind that his job wasn’t finished.

  She had trembled as she held him.

  The thought surfaced and stayed.

  This is crazy, he told himself. He felt the subtle changes in his body, the sexual tightening that a desirable, available woman often brought him. He had no right to feel like this. As if to reinforce his conclusion, he broke out in a stomach-churning cold sweat. The moment of sexual awareness that Jessie had caused disappeared.

  Wouldn’t have done him a lick of good to let things progress on their natural course. He was weak as a newly hatched chick, helpless as a freshly dropped calf, and she’d helped him to bed. If he’d started anything, Jessie would have had to help him all the way.

  Tantalizing as the thought was, Logan couldn’t avoid figuring what he was going to do once he’d recovered and could travel.

  He had an added score to settle with Monte and the others for stealing his horse, his gun and rifle, and his belt buckle. He was right partial to his horse and weapons. A man broke those to the feel of his own hand.

  A stay-around kind of man had the pleasure of knowing his woman was partial to the touch of his hand.

  Logan frowned in the dark. Where had that stray thought come from? Surely he wasn’t still thinking about Jessie?

  He couldn’t be. He wouldn’t allow thoughts of her to interfere.

  An attempt to shift position ended in frustration. He hated sleeping on his back. His brothers teased him that his belly-down position, arms and legs flung to the four corners, made him look like a splayed frog that hogged the bed. But that teasing had happened in the days before little brother Ty had had a bellyful of Conner’s orders and had lit out for parts unknown.

  It was a major source of friction between him and Conner. His older brother had never indulged in the horseplay with him and Ty, never got rip-roaring drunk on Saturday night. But Conner was steady as a rock. And Conner held people to their promises.

  He would be going crazy if Logan didn’t get in touch with him soon. Conner wasn’t going to be happy to learn that he’d got himself shot and lost his gear.

  He could still hear Conner’s warning the day he had left the ranch. Get what you’re going after, but don’t get killed.

  Well, he hadn’t gotten himself killed, thanks to Jessie Winslow. But he sure as hell hadn’t got what he’d been after.

  One more mess-up for Conner to shake his head over. But only if he went home with his tail between his legs.

  He’d find a way. Somehow, he would.

  “What happened, Kenny? You said she’d be so happy having a man. Didn’t you? How come she shot at you? How come, huh?”

  “Jeez, you an’ your questions. Don’t you ever stop with ’em?” Kenny, more frightened than he cared to admit to Marty, nursed his swollen thumb. He’d figured that widow woman would be so busy taking care of the wounded man that he could steal some eggs or a hen. She’d scared the dickens out of him when she’d come out and let that big shotgun of hers go off. He’d slammed the henhouse door on his thumb, dropped the two eggs he had managed to find and got pecked on the cheek by the rooster.

  It appeared that she got madder than one of her hens when it got wet.

  Climbing into the wagon that was their home, Kenny knew he wasn’t going to tell Marty about the man he’d seen nosing around the widow’s shed. No sense in both of them worrying. And he didn’t want more questions that he couldn’t answer.

  Could be, he thought as he blew out the lantern and stretched out on his bed, that they had brought the widow woman more than a man. They might have given her a passel of trouble.

  Chapter Four

  Logan, Jessie decided two days later, led a charmed life. And a dangerous one, she reminded herself as she recalled the smaller, old scars on his body. He hadn’t regained anywhere near the full use of his arm, but his wound was healing at a rapid pace. After she had cleaned and bandaged it this morning, she had told him she wouldn’t use any more of the pine tar salve.

  Thankful that there had been no more attempts to steal her hens or their eggs, Jessie scattered feed to them. She couldn’t stop thinking how little she had learned about Logan beyond a few personal likes and dislikes.

  He wasn’t a fussy eater. He was polite, always offering some compliment about a meal, or her gentle touch. Sincere compliments, too. Someone had taken time to teach him manners. He took his coffee black with lots of sugar, and when she informed him there wasn’t any, he apologized for asking.

  He was a man used to doing things for himself. Accepting her help for the simplest tasks bothered him. His total lack of expecting her to wait on him forced her to see Logan in another light. Her brother was the only other man like this that she knew.

  Jessie threw another handful of seed to the hens, checked to make sure the gate was securely latched and headed back to the shed.

  Admonishing herself not to be so curious about Logan didn’t do a bit of good.

  Setting the feed bucket down, she eyed the few bales of hay left for Adorabelle. She couldn’t put off going to town to sell her ring. Just as she couldn’t put off riding out to see her small herd of cattle. Taking the halter down from its peg, Jessie went back outside to the corral.

  A quick look showed that the cabin door was open, but there was no sign of Logan. She had made a spur-of-the-moment decision last night and hauled out the trunk of Harry’s possessions she had stored away. Logan now had a few shirts and pants to wear, ill fitting unfortunately, since Harry was shorter and heavier. But Logan had a pair of boots to wear. Harry was buried in all new clothing. Upon reflection she wondered if it had been a foolish, empty gesture to use all his gold on a burial.

  The one item in the trunk that she hadn’t been able to bring herself to give Logan was Harry’s gun. Something held her back.

  Adorabelle, bless her, stood placidly awaiting Jessie’s attention.

  Logan called her.

  “Water’s boiling.”

  “Be right there,” she answered. How could she forget that she had promised to shave him? Once she had hidden the gun in the shed and dragged the trunk outside, Logan had pounced on the strop and razor lying on top of the folded clothes.

  Walking back to the cabin, Jessie added cleanliness to the list she mentally kept about him.

  She spared him a glance where he sat at the table, the basin, strop, towel and razor laid out neatly in front of him.

  “It’s real kind of you to take the time to do this for me, Jessie. I tried to strop the razor but that’s a two-handed job.”

  “I don’t mind. If I did, I wouldn’t have offered.” Please, Lord, guide my hand. Don’t let him know I’ve never sha
ved a man before now.

  The whistling kettle warned that she had no time left to dither about it. Logan didn’t hide his anticipation as she poured the boiling water into the basin.

  One look at Jessie’s trembling mouth as she began to strop the razor, and Logan promptly forgot about his shave.

  The more time he spent with Jessie, the less control he had over his response to her. Even something as simple as watching her graceful moves around the table was enough to distract him from whatever he was thinking or doing.

  The reaction was unaccountable. She didn’t flirt with him. Logan wondered if she even knew how to. But he’d caught her sneaking looks at him, and more than once he was surprised to see a sensual curiosity in her gaze.

  When she gave him the trunk belonging to her deceased husband he no longer questioned that she’d been married. But the longer he was around her, the more it bewildered him that she revealed a certain discomfort with their enforced intimacy. It didn’t make sense. Just some tantalizing, vague feeling that he had about her.

  He thought of his parents, and of Santo and Sofia, who had come with his mother when she married. There were always whispers and looks shared between husband and wife, hinting of secrets shared. Not that he expected Jessie to share secrets or special looks with him. But she didn’t seem to know how to respond to simple compliments about her cooking or the little things that she did to make him comfortable.

  Since he’d never courted a woman, and wasn’t about to begin, Logan knew he should keep his own curiosity under wraps. A week or so and he’d be ready to leave.

  Jessie, he had learned, wasn’t a woman to bed and then walk away from.

  Besides, she’d let drop enough hints that she wasn’t in the market for another husband or a man in her life.

  If the need to get on with what he’d set out to do hadn’t been pressing, Logan would have taken up that challenge and seen where it led.

  He looked up to find her staring down at him, the towel held in her hands.

  “Are you ready, or have you changed your mind?”

  “Ready.” Surely he was mistaken that he heard a wishful note in her voice that he had indeed changed his mind. “You’re sure you know how to shave a man, Jessie?”

  “Sure. You just lather up some soap and cut real carefully.”

  As she wet his heavy beard stubble and began to work the soap into it, Logan closed his eyes. He didn’t like thinking about how many times Jessie must have done this for her husband. The thought was so strange. Why the hell should he care? It would be different if she was his woman…

  Jessie gazed down at Logan’s closed eyes and knew her touch pleased him. There was a hint of a frown that disappeared as she worked the soap into the beard. Standing behind him, she tried to avoid pressing her breasts against the back of his head, but she quickly saw the position as awkward.

  “You won’t move or anything, will you?” she asked, reaching for the razor. Please, Lord, keep my hand nice and steady.

  Squinting up at her, Logan shook his head.

  “That’s good. Real good. Just close your eyes and leave it all to me.”

  Mentally, Jessie reviewed the moves she had seen her brother and Harry make when shaving. Scrape up the throat and down the cheek was all she could remember. Releasing a deep breath, she set to work.

  Using a light touch, she began on his left side, her motions neat, only a slight betraying tremble giving away how nervous she was. She had never thought of all the small intimacies that a woman shared with a man who lived with her. Not that she thought of Logan as exactly living with her, but it seemed that way.

  She lifted his chin and began on his throat with light, even strokes. Rinsing the blade and wiping it on the towel as she went along, Jessie became more confident. True to his word, Logan hadn’t moved. All she had to ignore was the warmth of his breath on her hands, and the brush of his head against her breasts.

  “I need you to turn a little so I can shave your upper lip. That is, if you don’t want that mustache.”

  “No, it goes, too.” But Logan opened his eyes to see her frowning. “What’s wrong?”

  “You’re not sitting right. Maybe if you faced me.”

  Jessie backed up as he swung his legs over the bench and faced her. “Better?”

  She nodded, but it was anything but better. She would have to stand between his legs to shave that small spot. Well, if he didn’t see anything wrong with it, she wouldn’t, either.

  The moment she stepped up close, Logan raised his hands to her hips.

  “Whatever are you doing?”

  “Just keeping you steady, Jessie. That razor’s so sharp I wouldn’t know that you cut my throat until I saw the blood drop.”

  “I didn’t cut you!”

  “No. But I aim to keep it that way.”

  “If you were so worried, Logan, that I would slice your throat,” she said testily, “then why did you agree to have me shave you in the first place?”

  “’Cause my beard itched and I couldn’t do it for myself.”

  “Then let me finish.” Jessie took hold of his chin with one hand to steady herself. Without asking, Logan rolled his upper lip over his teeth to make it easier for her. Her breaths reflected the tension that built inside her as she scraped away at the small area. When done, she wiped it clean with the towel.

  His mouth was firm and sensual. The thought startled Jessie. She wasn’t a woman given to inspecting men’s mouths. There were tiny lines fanning from the corners of his as if Logan smiled and laughed a great deal.

  “Miss a spot?”

  “What?” Her gaze clashed with his. She would have jumped back, but he held her firmly in place.

  “You’re staring so hard at my mouth I thought you’d missed a spot.”

  “No. No, I wasn’t.” But she didn’t attempt to move.

  And Logan found himself drawn to her eyes, as if he could probe their depths to find all her secrets.

  Jessie closed them. “I think you’d better let me go.”

  “And if I didn’t want to?”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “We’ve been living together for almost a week—”

  “Four days. It’s just four days, Logan.”

  “Right. Close enough. Aren’t you the least bit curious about kissing me?”

  Jessie went still. How could he know the curiosity kept her awake at night? Lie, Jessie. Lie like crazy.

  She was so quiet that Logan thought about letting her go. If she had asked, he was ready to tell her that the curiosity drove him crazy. But Jessie wasn’t asking. Jessie was tense and, he thought, a little afraid of him.

  “I wouldn’t hurt you, Jessie. I’ve never hurt a woman.”

  His deep, slightly rough voice ruffled her nerve ends. Her hands slid down, one touching his unbandaged shoulder, the other falling to her side. Why didn’t he just take a kiss if that’s what he wanted? Why did he have to ask? Because asking makes you a willing party, a little imp’s voice whispered.

  And you are willing, aren’t you, Jessie? Almost eager?

  Yes. Oh, Lord, yes.

  But it wasn’t right.

  “Jessie?”

  She didn’t answer him. Didn’t want to. Keeping her eyes closed was a coward’s way of dealing with him. An unsettling warmth unfurled inside her. The same warmth she’d begun feeling since he’d come into her life. His skin felt warm beneath her hand and she just knew that his lips would be warm and maybe gentle if she let him kiss her.

  “Jessie, listen to me.” Logan wished she would open her eyes. His mother always said they were the windows to a person’s soul. But he didn’t push her. “Tell me if I’m wrong. I didn’t get the feeling that you’re still in mourning for your husband. I’m not asking you to tell me about him and your marriage. But I think I’ve got the right to know if you still care deeply for him.”

  Jessie couldn’t hide any longer. Gazing down into his dark blue eyes that held untold secrets, she s
ummoned her courage.

  “Why do you want to know? You’re not courting me. You’re not asking me to marry you. All you wanted was a kiss. That doesn’t give you any rights at all.” This time when she moved, he let her go. “I have cattle to check.”

  Grabbing the floppy felt hat from the peg near the door, Jessie paused. Without looking back at him, she said, “I’m not mourning Harry.”

  Wrapped in a silent blistering for his clumsy handling of her, Logan took a few moments before he understood. When he did, Jessie was gone.

  He could have gone after her. But his instincts warned that Jessie needed time alone. It was little enough to give her after the way she had taken care of him.

  Logan didn’t want to start questioning himself about why he’d been tempted to kiss her. Trouble was, he was bored with having nothing to do. Glancing around the cabin, he knew that wasn’t true. There was enough work to keep a man busy through to winter around the whole place.

  Taking stock of her poorly supplied pantry confirmed what he suspected. Jessie was in dire straits. And he was helpless as teats on a boar to aid her. Having him to feed had depleted what little food she had. It added to the score he had to settle with the men who had left him to die.

  From the high branches of an aged cottonwood tree, Kenny and Marty watched Jessie ride out at a walk on her old mare.

  When she was far enough away that she couldn’t hear them, Kenny signaled Marty to climb down.

  “Now, you stay here and keep watch.”

  “But the man is still at her place, Kenny. He could shoot at you, the same as she did.”

  “You saw same as me. He ain’t walkin’ around. I know I’ll get us a hen this time. Hang on to PeeWee and wait for me.” Kenny started to walk off, then turned. “If she comes back, you whistle like I taught you, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  For all the brave words, Kenny still approached the henhouse with caution. There hadn’t been any rain in weeks and his boots kicked up tiny puffs of dust as he darted from tree to tree, and when they disappeared, he crawled from bush to rock. His gaze split between the henhouse and the cabin. But he didn’t see anyone moving around.