Guilt was a bitch to live with.
“Perhaps I’ll have the luck of the Irish after all.”
“More likely you’ll have the devil’s time of it,” Mallory said as he splashed whiskey into a shot glass, “when your past charges into your life with guns blazing.”
A possibility Reid hoped to avoid. He stepped out and let the wind blow the rest of Mallory’s dire predictions back inside.
No matter how much he groused about his fate, he’d made the right choice. Never mind it’d been the only one at the time. If his skin felt a mite tight for him at times, so be it.
He was ready to live up to his end of the bargain now. Or had been until he’d hired a fetching house cook that had him thinking of dishes best served warm in bed.
Reid squinted against a punishing sun, searching for Miss Cade. He spotted her easily down the street, thanks to a royal blue cloak snapping in the wind like a bullfighter’s cape. He hadn’t known her hair was the color of whiskey until now.
The back of it was caught up in an intricate weave of sorts and that touch of red glowed in the sun.
Reid headed toward Miss Cade, his blood running thick and hot with need. He had a fondness for fair-haired women.
She tugged the full hood up and ended his ruminations of taking the pins from her hair and running his hands through it. By damn, but the lady was a sparkling gem amid a blanket of white. She’d be living in his house, a constant temptation for him to take what he wanted and damn the consequences.
He paused to let a buckboard churn by, the bed laden with goods and squealing children huddled down in a bed of straw. He knew the whole family worked their behinds off on their ranch due north of his, yet he’d never seen a happier brood.
Simple pleasures.
He’d never known what it was like to have the love of family until he’d lost it. Now there was no getting it back.
Reid caught a glimpse of Adam Tavish plowing through the muck in the street. He, too, seemed arrested by the sight of Miss Cade.
Though the U.S. Marshal swore he was on the trail of the Kincaid gang, Mallory told him that Tavish had been asking an awful lot of questions about Reid. It wasn’t the first time a lawman had inquired about his past.
The fact remained that Reid had left word everywhere, all but begging his brothers to come back to Wyoming. He’d also baited a trap for the man accused of killing Lisa True, letting it be known that Slim was at the Crown Seven as well. But so far the only one sniffing around was the lawman.
As for Ezra Kincaid? He’d likely be watching.
If the old outlaw was out there, he was holed up planning his move. That worried Reid the most.
Truth be, he was relieved Tavish was dead set on stopping the old rustler who surely must be drooling over Reid’s thoroughbreds. But that didn’t mean he wanted to be on close speaking terms with Tavish.
Considering his past, Reid was careful to keep his distance from the local sheriff and the marshal. But with Tavish reaching Miss Cade first and guiding her into the livery, he couldn’t very well do that today.
Ice crunched underfoot as he made his way to the livery. He wrenched open the door, finding Miss Cade and Tavish squared off inside.
He knew the feeling.
Reid gave the livery boy a nod to ready his sleigh.
“I see you’ve met the marshal.” Reid stopped beside Miss Cade, sparing Tavish a dismissing glance but feeling the man’s curious gaze skewer him all the same. Was that annoyance he saw in her eyes?
“Yes, he was just assuring me that this is a quiet, lawful community,” she said.
Tavish favored Miss Cade with his good-ol’-boy smile that didn’t fool Reid one bit. “You never did tell me what brought you to Maverick, Miss Cade.”
She flinched this time, a slight tremor Reid attributed to a case of nerves. Until he got a closer look.
The lady was clearly angry and her ire was directed at the U.S. Marshal. Damn, what had Tavish said to her earlier?
“I’m taking over Mrs. Leach’s role of cook at the Crown Seven Ranch while she’s away,” she said.
Tavish thumbed back his hat, revealing a pair of observant green eyes that no doubt had saved the lawman’s ass on more than one occasion. “Pardon me for saying, ma’am. But most cooks I’ve met tended to sample their fare a bit more than necessary.”
It was the truth, but Reid took umbrage with the way Tavish looked at the lady, like she was a tasty morsel and he was starving. Never mind Reid had done the same earlier. She was his employee, and judging by her tight-lipped expression, she didn’t wish to tarry in Tavish’s company.
“So, where have you worked before, Miss Cade?” Tavish asked, his conversational tone at odds with his shrewd perusal.
A dull flush blossomed on the lady’s cheeks, and the rigid set to her shoulders seemed an odd reaction, in Reid’s estimation. “The Denver Academy for Young Ladies.”
“Do tell?” Tavish’s eyes took on a calculating glint.
“I fear I’d bore you with stories of teaching young ladies to acquire discriminating tastes,” she said over the tinkling of harness bells. “Besides I am sure Mr. Barclay is anxious to be on his way.”
“Another time then. Afternoon, ma’am.” Tavish slid two fingers over his hat brim but stayed rooted to the spot. “Barclay.”
Reid dipped his chin in farewell, then guided Miss Cade to the red sleigh. “You leave your baggage at the depot?”
“Yes. I have a small trunk and a carpetbag.”
A rarity for sure. He’d warrant Cheryl would drag all manner of trunks and valises with her from England.
“After we retrieve your things, we’ll stop at the mercantile. I suggest you select anything you need for yourself or the ranch now.”
“I have everything I require with me.”
“Fair warning, Miss Cade. We won’t be coming into town for a week or more.”
“I’m sure everything I’ll need is at the ranch.”
Reid expected she’d say that. So why did he have the sudden feeling he’d be going hungry this night—and in more ways than one?
And the passion continued with a warm embrace In a Cowboy’s Arms ...
Colorado sheriff Dade Logan has waited twenty years to reunite with his long lost sister, Daisy. But when she finally turns up, they barely recognize each other. That’s because the beautiful stranger isn’t Daisy, but her childhood friend Maggie, on the run from an impending marriage. Moved by this last link to Daisy, Dade determines to bend any law that stands between him, his sister—and the intriguing Maggie ...
Maggie Sutten will risk anything to escape her fate, though accompanying the broad-shouldered sheriff in his pursuit of Daisy rattles her to the core. But as their search—and desire for one another—escalates, the two provoke a vicious bounty hunter, one who threatens their hopes for a future together ...
Colorado, 1895
It wasn’t yet ten in the morning, and Dade Logan was already bored clean out of his mind. Other than locking the town drunk up every Friday night when he got a snootful, there wasn’t much in the way of law to enforce in Placid, Colorado.
Not that he was anxious for trouble to come to this sleepy town that rested in the valley east of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Nope, he’d been waiting all winter for one person to return, and if she didn’t show up soon he didn’t know what the hell he would do.
The hiss of the locomotive and clang of the rail cars pulling out echoed up the main street of Placid. Two folks had boarded the Denver & Rio Grande, heading east to Pueblo. He hadn’t seen anyone get off.
Maybe she’d arrive on the afternoon train. As the racket from steel wheels on rails grew faint, he heard his name being called out.
“Sheriff Logan! Sheriff Logan!”
Dade smiled. Raymond Tenfeather was pounding down the boardwalk somewhere between the stable and the jail, hollering out his name like he did every day about this time.
When the liveryman’s younger son was
n’t trailing his elder brother Duane around town, he had taken to following Dade on the pretext of helping him look for lawbreakers. Dade had gently explained that wasn’t necessary, but the boy took it on himself to be the town spy. God only knew what Raymond had seen this time.
Dade rocked back in his chair and stacked his crossed boots on the edge of his desk, awaiting the boy’s imminent arrival. As always, his gaze narrowed on the wanted posters tacked on the wall.
Dammit all if the three outlaws staring back at him weren’t smirking. His pa and uncles would find it amusing that Dade had taken an oath to uphold the laws that Clete, Brice, and Seth Logan had been hell-bent on breaking all their lives.
It’d been twenty years since he’d seen any of them, though their wanted posters had haunted him most of his life. There sure as hell wasn’t any love lost between him and his kin.
Yet one question nagged at him right after they pinned a tin star on his chest. If his pa and uncles came to town, could he draw on them?
Part of him said yes. His pa had had no qualms about deserting him and his little sister. Yet when all was said and done, he wasn’t sure he could turn on his blood. Hell, unlike Reid Barclay, he couldn’t have turned on either of his foster brothers either.
“Sheriff Logan!” Raymond burst into the jail, his dark skin glistening with sweat and his scrawny chest heaving from his run. “I saw her.”
“Just who’d you see?” Dade asked.
“The lady you been waiting for,” Raymond said.
“Daisy?” he asked.
The boy nodded. “She got off the train, just like you was hoping she’d do.”
Now how the hell had he missed seeing her?
Dade’s heart took off galloping at the thought that sticking around here had paid off. His missing sister had finally come back like everyone in town said she would.
For the first time in months he visited that dream of buying a nice little farm for them to call home. He could run a few head of cattle. Do a bit of farming. Hell, he could find his brother Trey and bring him into the deal.
It was a damn sight better thing to dwell on than the idea of going back to the Crown Seven and having it out with Reid, the foster brother who’d sold them out when they needed him the most.
First things first. He’d waited twenty years to find his sister. He wasn’t about to waste a second forestalling their reunion.
“Where is she?” he asked, heading for the door as he spoke.
“Mrs. Gant’s boardinghouse,” Raymond said, hot on his heels.
The place where Daisy and her crippled traveling companion had stayed before. Mrs. Gant had told him about their visit to Placid. How Daisy had caught the young sheriff ’s eye. How she’d promised to come back last fall and marry Lester.
But the sheriff was dead, spring was in full bloom, and nobody in town had any idea where Daisy Logan and her lady friend hailed from.
Dade figured she’d heard about Lester’s murder and wasn’t coming back to Placid. He feared he’d lost her again.
“Thanks, Raymond.” Dade flipped the boy a silver dollar and headed out the door.
Long determined strides carried him across the dusty street. He wondered how much Daisy had changed. Would she recognize him? Would she be as glad to be reunited with her family as he was?
He’d find out damn soon, he thought, as he cut down the street between Hein’s Grocery and Doc Franklin’s house.
Mrs. Gant’s boardinghouse sat the next street over, but the elevation made the walk seem farther. He bounded up the steps then paused at the door to steady his breath.
The climb was nothing, but the excitement pounding inside him made it hard to draw a decent breath. He blew out the air trapped in his chest, inhaled deeply, and stepped inside.
Mrs. Gant was in the parlor, serving tea to a lady seated on the stiff Victorian sofa. Neither seemed to have heard him come in.
That was fine by him, for it gave him time to study his sister. Her golden hair had darkened to a rich honey. Her features were still delicate and refined, but she didn’t resemble their mother or father.
She wasn’t a cute little pixie anymore. Nope, she’d grown into a beautiful woman with all the curves in all the right places. But it was the odd combination of grief and fear in her eyes that gave him pause.
“I am so sorry to be the one to tell you that Lester has passed over,” Mrs. Gant said, verifying what Dade suspected had caused his sister’s distress. “I didn’t know where you’d gone, but when you didn’t come back last fall like you said you would, I thought maybe you’d heard.”
“No, I had no idea,” Daisy said. “What happened?”
“It was just awful,” Mrs. Gant said. “This ruffian came to town, intent on robbing the bank. Lester was there, and before he could turn and confront this no-account, the ruffian shot him dead.”
Daisy pressed a hand to her mouth, clearly horrified by the news. Mrs. Gant’s version was close enough to the truth that Dade didn’t see the need to comment.
“I tell you truly,” Mrs. Gant said, “I shudder to think what would’ve happened if Dade Logan hadn’t stepped in like he did and ended the robber’s reign of terror on our town. No telling who else would’ve been gunned down if not for your brother’s courage.”
Dade winced. The townsfolk had taken to embellishing the events of that day to the point Dade cringed every time he heard it. Now was surely no exception, for Daisy’s face had leached of color at the mention of his name.
“W-what?” Daisy said in a voice that was way too high.
“Yes, indeed, your brother is a hero.” Mrs. Gant launched into telling Daisy the details.
This surely wasn’t the reunion he’d had in mind. A sound of disgust must’ve slipped from him for Mrs. Gant glanced his way and smiled.
Daisy, on the other hand, looked ready to bolt as her head snapped up and her gaze clashed with his. Instead of recognition lighting her eyes, they narrowed with suspicion and something bordering on dread.
Mrs. Gant patted Daisy’s hand. “It’ll be all right now, dear. You have family to help you through this difficult time.”
Daisy shook her head. “No! I’m an orphan.”
Dade scrubbed a hand across his nape, frustrated and more than a mite worried about his sister’s increased distress. He wasn’t surprised that Daisy hadn’t recognized him after twenty years, but forgetting that he existed signaled something else entirely.
“You saying you don’t remember me?” Dade asked.
She shook her head, her gaze focusing on his tin star before lifting to his face. He hadn’t thought she could get any paler but he’d been wrong.
“Don’t you remember that Pa left us at the Guardian Angel’s Orphan Asylum?”
She shook her head and stared at him with troubled eyes.
“You recall being in the orphanage?” he asked.
She frowned. “Some. Mostly I was scared.”
So was Dade, but it did him no good then or now to admit it. How could her memory be that bad?
She’d cried and screamed for Dade after their pa had dumped them there, and put up more of a ruckus when they’d been separated—boys in one wing of the drafty old building and girls in the other.
They’d seen each other precious little after that, but she hadn’t forgotten him then. She’d pitched a fit when they took her away on the orphan train, to the point that they’d had to restrain him from going after her.
As the wagon pulled away, he’d vowed he’d find her and keep them together as family. But he hadn’t been able to keep his promise.
“Reid, Trey, and I tried to find you,” he said, but though they’d run away from the orphanage a few months later, they’d failed to pick up the trail of the orphan train that Daisy had taken west.
He’d failed his sister.
“Reid and Trey. Are they family?”
“They’re as close as brothers to me.” Or were. “But they aren’t blood kin like we are.”
Daisy didn’t look the least bit relieved. In fact, she acted more leery than before as she turned to Mrs. Gant.
“Is he really my brother?” she asked the older woman.
Her trust in a stranger was a gut punch to Dade. It didn’t ease his mind none that Mrs. Gant was giving him a long assessing look either. He knew trouble was coming before she voiced an opinion, which the lady always had on everything.
“Well, he says he is. But all we have is his word.” Mrs. Gant pinned him with a squinty stare. “You have any kin in these parts?”
He hoped to hell not. The last thing he needed was for his outlaw pa and uncles to show their faces. He’d be lucky to get out of town without getting shot.
“No kin left but me and Daisy,” he said, and he reasoned that could be true. Any day he expected to get word that his old man and renegade uncles had been gunned down.
He swore under his breath, damning his pa again for abandoning his family. Daisy had only been four years old when they’d arrived at the Guardian Angel’s Orphan Asylum. She’d just turned five when she’d been put on the orphan train.
“Forgive me for being skeptical.” Daisy swallowed hard and looked up at him. “But I was told that I had no family.”
“That’s a lie,” Dade said. “You’ve got me.”
Daisy grimaced and seemed not the least bit repentant about her aversion to him. “If you’re telling the truth.”
Dade scrubbed a hand over his mouth to smother a curse that ached to burst free. What the hell could he do to convince his sister of the truth?
“Well, this is quite an interesting turn of events,” Mrs. Gant said. “You don’t favor each other at all. Pity you don’t have a photograph of when you were children. We’d likely be able to put all doubts to rest then.”
Truer words were never spoken. “There was one,” he said, barely recalling the day it’d been taken but knowing it had happened all the same. “Ma kept it in her locket.”
Daisy was clearly uncomfortable with his recollections for her cheeks turned pink, and she began fidgeting with something at her throat. He gave a passing glance at the blue cameo broach pinned to her bodice, then just gaped at the locket.
Cowboy Come Home Page 33
