Kit Gardner Read online

  His widow had a narrow waist beneath her loose-fitting dress, an undeniable length of legs hidden under those flapping skirts, full breasts that swelled from a narrow sweep of ribs.

  Frank Wynne had bedded that woman, on this bed.

  Rance heard his teeth click together, and he tore his gaze from the four-poster, forcing himself to his feet. He steeled himself against the inevitable pitching of the floor beneath his feet, gripped one of those fat mahogany bedposts, only to find himself staring at Frank Wynne, a dapper, sleekly combed Frank Wynne, framed in gilt and poised in loving memory upon a dressing table directly across the room. There he sat, Frank Wynne, amid several crystal flacons and an ivory-handled hairbrush, all cushy and cared-for upon a delicate sweep of white lace. A most precious spot for a departed husband to be revered from the stool set before that dressing table. A stool where his wife no doubt perched every night to brush all that curling gold hair.

  And then Rance met with his reflection in the dressing table mirror. Big and dark, unshaven and smelling like his horse. He didn’t belong here, in this room, in this house. He’d killed the woman’s husband, left the boy fatherless.

  Why the hell had he come here?

  “You’re bigger than my pa was.”

  The boy peered up at him through his bangs. Rance shifted his teeth and released his grip upon the bedpost. Slowly he moved across the room and through the open doorway. He balled his fists, and pain shot through his left arm. He entered a short, dark hall, then ducked into a small parlor when the place started spiraling about him. He took two steps toward the curved settee as Christian scooted around him.

  “You can’t go in there,” the boy said, his chin tilted with its characteristic stubbornness. “Mama doesn’t let nobody in the parlor. Not even Reverend Halsey.”

  And certainly not a man who smelled like a horse. Rance leaned his good shoulder against the door jamb and willed the spinning to stop. No, he wouldn’t want to disturb her parlor, with its precisely pleated white curtains hanging at the windows, the creamy satin settee and nearby overstuffed armchair. A soft, womanly room. The furnishings were sparse, the knickknacks few, but each had its proper, exact location. And the room bore not a trace of dust, was laced instead with a fleeting lemony scent. Somehow he’d expected the house to be as gray and bleak and dry within as it was from without, not cool and fragrant, smelling of bleach and lye soap, of sunlight and roses, of woman.

  Rance regarded tiny, grimy Christian. “Where’s the door?”

  Christian jabbed a finger toward the hall behind Rance. “In the kitchen.”

  Rance turned about and again ducked into the shadowy hall. Damned ceilings were too low. The whole damned house was too clean, too damned small. He felt like a murderous trespasser. He had to get the hell out of here. He needed air.

  Again Christian squeezed past Rance, reaching the sagging back door with a boastful half smile, as if he’d just won a most prestigious race. Yet with every step Rance took toward him, the grin faded beneath a cloud of suspicion descending over that dirt-smudged face. The boy seemed to be peculiarly fascinated with Rance’s bare chest, the bandaged shoulder.

  Rance’s boots scraped against white floorboards, and he jarred a table set far too close to the door for a man to navigate with any ease.

  “Look what you did,” Christian said, shoving a finger at the water sloshing out of a delicate vase of lavender flowers resting in the center of that table. “You got Mama’s doily wet. And you have to take off your shoes. See? The floor’s all dirty. My mama will be mad at you.”

  “Yet another reason,” Rance muttered, twisting his way around the table and chairs. He paused in the sagging door frame, one boot poised upon the stoop. From a good four feet below him, the boy leveled a challenging look at him, which Rance returned before shoving the door wide and lurching through it.

  He had to pause beneath all that sun and dusty heat that suddenly filled his lungs and set the blood pounding in his temples. His shirttails flapped in the hot breeze, yet perspiration instantly dotted his forehead and wove thick rivulets down his chest. His shoulder throbbed. Damned woman. She’d nearly killed him.

  The boy materialized before him, squinting up at him, one thin arm jabbing at the ground. “Mr. Stark, your knife.”

  Rance glanced at the black handle protruding from the dead rattler lying at Christian’s feet. His throat was parched, closing up on him, and the sweat burned his eyes. “Don’t touch it.”

  The boy thrust out his lower lip, blond brows diving indignantly over his nose. “I didn’t.”

  Rance forced his gaze about. “Where’s your well?”

  Christian lingered over that snake, over that knife, and Rance thought he was weighing the risks of disobeying. And then he darted past Rance with such a flourish that he nearly toppled him in the dust. Rance made it to the well and, without hesitation, plunged his head into a full bucket of cool water resting upon the stone ledge. He surfaced, eyes closed, mouth opened to retrieve the water that spilled down his face. The water plunged down his dry throat and washed over his chest and into his waistband. A growl tremored through him, and again he dunked his head, surfacing to sputter and spew water with a vigorous shake of his head. Another growl rumbled through his lungs. That done, he leaned his elbows on the well’s edge and hung his head, listening to the droplets plopping deep into the well and the fading of the blood rushing in his ears. He forced the stones into focus. They blurred, then focused again.

  He listened to the lonely creak of the wooden windmill.

  There. Now he could ride. He’d be fine. Just fine. He’d been shot before, dammit, and he’d survived, though he vaguely remembered he’d found recuperating a hell of a lot more appealing than mounting his damned horse and galloping off into the barren prairie, particularly when recuperation meant a week spent beneath the gentle ministrations of some soft and eager little saloon gal.

  His horse. Where the hell had he left his horse? Why couldn’t he remember?

  He gripped the ledge and forced himself upright, then turned. Frank Wynne’s wife stood not two paces from him, an empty bucket in one hand. But no rifle.

  A peculiar tightening filled his chest as the wind whipped her hair about her face and her eyes darkened to a deep blue. He wondered if she might try to kill him again. One hit on the head with that bucket could do it.

  “Mr. Stark, you should be lying down.” Her gaze darted to Christian and narrowed.

  “I didn’t do anything, Mama. He woke up.”

  “You don’t look well, Mr. Stark.” He wished she’d stop calling him that. And looking at him like that, as though she feared he might topple into the dust at any moment. She seemed about to move a step nearer, and he gripped the ledge behind him.

  “Ma’am, my horse. And I’ll be going.”

  She blinked at him and dropped the bucket. “I rather think you won’t be going at this moment, Mr. Stark. You’re not fit to sit a horse. Your eyes are glassy. Your face is white as death, and your wound...” Her full lips compressed, then parted, and Rance was reminded of a pink rose in full bloom. “It’s beginning to bleed through the bandage. You might die out there on the hot prairie, and I would then be a murderess.”

  “You didn’t seem to give that much thought, ma’am, when you shot me.”

  “I thought you meant to harm my son, sir. I would gladly kill anyone with such a purpose.”

  Yes, he believed she would, this small woman with the proud chin and tilted nose, even if she couldn’t shoot, or even hold a rifle. Not at all the sort of woman Rance would have ever envisioned married to Frank Wynne. How the hell had she allowed herself to become the man’s wife?

  Something dripped into his eye. Water... No, the sweat again, beading on his brow. He felt the heat pulsing in his skin. The world resumed its spinning. Damn.

  Frank Wynne’s wife moved swiftly, her grip surprisingly firm upon his good arm. A warm, lemony scent seemed to emanate from her, so fleeting he would have been
compelled to lean closer to her to fill his lungs with the elusive scent. Rance felt his chest expand, and fiery talons clawed at his shoulder.

  “Ma’am.”

  “Hush, please, Mr. Stark. You need to rest. And get out of this sun. I do rather owe you, do I not?”

  Owe him? If only she knew.

  “No, ma’am, you don’t owe me.” He tensed his arm, resisting her tugging, and she glanced swiftly at him, a frown of concern hovering over her brow. He stood a good eight inches taller than she, and a soft haze had fallen over his eyes, yet he could detect the dusting of freckles upon her nose. As if she had been kissed by the sun. She looked God-almighty young.

  Her gaze locked with his, then skittered away. Color bloomed through her face and spilled down the slender length of her neck. Still she tugged upon his arm. “To the house, Mr. Stark. I’m afraid I can’t drag you there again.”

  “I helped,” Christian chirped, dancing about in the dust. “Didn’t I, Mama?”

  “You helped like a big boy,” Frank Wynne’s wife murmured. She took a step, and Rance resisted, trapping her hand between his forearm and his biceps. “Mr. Stark—”

  “I can walk, dammit,” he growled.

  She stared at him, full pink lips compressing. “I’d rather you didn’t speak like that, sir.”

  “Quit calling me sir. And let go of my arm.”

  “I won’t. You’ll topple like a felled oak, Mr. Stark.”

  “Logan.” He forced the word through his teeth, though he couldn’t fathom why this was suddenly important to him. “Call me Logan.”

  “See there, you’re swaying and I’m still holding onto you. Really, sir, is your pride worth so much to you that you would risk your life?”

  What could this woman know of a man’s pride?

  He closed his eyes. “I’m just dizzy, and someone is pounding a very large drum inside my head. Annoying, but hardly a threat to my life.”

  “Your pride could be, sir. As you wish. There. I’ve let go. How do you feel?”

  Damned stupid. Swaying and dizzy and remarkably stupid for allowing himself to be shot by Frank Wynne’s wife and for coming here in the first place.

  He took a step, what he thought was a well-done step directly to the front. But the wind blew again, filling his shirt, and the ground rose up and angled crazily beneath him. This time, he reached for her, his fingers gripping the fragile length of her upper arm.

  “Christian, get the door. That’s it, Mr. Stark. Lean on me. One step at a time.”

  He complied, though it ate like hell at him. And he let her take him back into the house and into her room, again, despite his protests.

  “Where do you sleep?” he asked the hovering Christian.

  “Upstairs,” the boy replied. “But you can’t sleep in my bed. Mama says a made bed can’t be messed up till nighttime.”

  “Hush, Christian.”

  “I prefer the floor,” Rance muttered, falling rather solidly to that hooked carpet on which he’d earlier bled. He stretched his legs and closed his eyes. What could only be described as a groan of relief spilled from his lungs before he could snatch it back. Frank Wynne’s wife adjusted the pillow beneath his head, and he opened his eyes to find her leaning over him, peering closely at his shoulder. She blurred, and one golden, lemon-scented curl plopped upon his nose, then skimmed like silk over his chest, leaving a trail of fire in its wake.

  Her voice seemed to swirl about him, and he closed his eyes again and immersed himself in it. Oddly comforting, it was, that and the calming warmth of her breath upon his grimy face. Hell, only a fool would find comfort in these circumstances. On this day, he knew of no bigger fool.

  “Sleep, Mr. Stark. I’ll tend to the bandage. Allow me. I’m...” Gentle fingers touched his skin, and those fires threatened to consume him. “I’m so very sorry, sir. You saved my life. And Christian’s. I’ll be forever grateful. Yes, just sleep.”

  * * *

  The kitchen door slammed, accompanied by the scrape of boot heels upon scrubbed floorboards. Yanked from sleep, Rance opened his eyes and stared at a ceiling in dire need of paint. He blinked. The ceiling remained in focus.

  “Jessica!” A man’s voice ricocheted through the house. “God help me, Jessica, where are you?”

  Jessica. The name left Rance’s lips in a hoarse whisper. Her name was Jessica.

  “Jessica, my dear, are you there?”

  The kitchen door slammed again, and Christian’s agitated voice retorted, “I told you she’s in there.”

  “But I can’t go in there, in her... I mean, that’s your mother’s private...private.”

  Bare feet plunked purposefully upon the kitchen floorboards. “He’s in there.”

  “Who’s in there?”

  “The outlaw.”

  “The what?”

  “He robs trains and stagecoaches. He has a knife.”

  Rance shoved himself to a sitting position and instinctively reached for the weapon he kept in his waistband. Only none was to be found. He’d left his gun in his saddlebag with his misplaced horse, and his knife stuck in that rattler. Unarmed and wounded, he felt grossly incomplete and too damned vulnerable, particularly because this man’s voice rang with the sort of puffed-up indignation that typically preceded a brawl. Or a gunfight. And then heavy footfalls echoed through the short hall, just moments before a dark head peeped around the door jamb.

  “Good God in heaven,” the man said, his voice choked, his narrow face paling.

  Rance watched the man’s Adam’s apple work frantically in his throat and wondered why he felt so damned compelled to apologize. For being in this room? For killing Jessica Wynne’s husband? For taking a rifle shot through the shoulder? Or perhaps for the sudden surge of protectiveness stealing through him?

  Christian scooted into the room. At his side dangled a waterlogged white cloth that left a puddled trail in his wake. “Oh, you’re awake. Here. This is for your head. Where’s Mama?”

  “Get away, Christian,” the man bellowed from the doorway with all the self-righteous pomp Rance could have imagined. Christian didn’t move from Rance’s side. In three staccato strides, the man stood tall and angular, trembling and red-faced, not two feet from Rance’s boots. He was no younger than Rance, perhaps only an inch or two shorter, and boasted the long, slender limbs common to men of leisure. He was narrow of shoulder, cleanly shaven and shorn, with round wire-rimmed glasses perched regally upon his beaked nose. A gentleman, garbed in a gentleman’s collar and coat and smelling like mothballs, of all things.

  “Do you want to get up, Mr. Stark?” Christian whispered for all to hear. “Are you gonna fight Reverend Halsey?”

  “I demand an explanation of you, sir,” Halsey bellowed. “You there are in my fiancée’s private...private. You are aware of this?”

  Rance grunted and managed to get to his feet, only once gripping the four-poster, which seemed to provoke the good reverend beyond measure.

  “Avram! Good heavens, Avram!” She materialized, Jessica, breathless, flushed and flustered Jessica, her hair a wild golden halo about her face. She twisted her hands in her blood-smeared skirts and donned a smile that Rance couldn’t take his eyes from. Halsey barely favored her with a glance. His jaw, however, sagged open and he shoved an accusing finger at Rance.

  “Good God, Jessica, you’ve a half-naked intruder in your private...private...and you stand here and smile at me?” Halsey ran a shaking hand over his protuberant brow. “My dearest, surely some sort of explanation is in order here.”

  Jessica blinked and raised her brows. Her eyes darted to Rance, all over him, actually, and this shot a heaping dose of pleasure through him. Yes, more of that and he would be a well man in no time. Hell, his shoulder felt better already.

  She held a hand toward him. “Why, Avram, of course I’ve an explanation.”

  “You’ve a black beast of an animal eating what remains of your front yard, Jessica. You’re aware of this?”

  Agai
n, Jessica blinked. “Why, no.”

  “My horse,” Rance said.

  “Your shirt, if you would.” Halsey sniffed at Rance with decided repugnance. “Jessica, perhaps you shouldn’t look, my dear. It’s highly offensive that a man should bare himself before a woman who is not his wife in the Lord’s eyes. Particularly when a man is fashioned in the form of the very devil himself.”

  Jessica’s smile quivered on her lips. “Why, yes, he’s... Well, he cannot help that, Avram. Besides, he’s wounded.”

  “Wounded?”

  “Yes, well, a minor catastrophe. All my fault. But later, Avram. Not to worry, though. Mr....I mean, Lo—Mr. Stark, that is, has very good reason for being here.”

  “He killed a snake with his knife,” Christian offered.

  Halsey ignored that. “He’s in the room where you sleep, Jessica.”

  “Is he? Why, yes, yes, he is, isn’t he? And well he should be, Avram. The ceiling, yes, the ceiling needs paint and the floor requires stripping and a new coat of beeswax and—”

  “Indeed it does, my dear, and that’s the very least of your worries. I say all the more reason why you should come to your senses before our wedding and agree to rid yourself of this nasty, flea-bitten farm.”

  “It is not!” Christian yelled.

  “Christian, don’t argue with Reverend Halsey.”

  “But, Mama—”

  “Avram—”

  “Now, Jessica, my dear, this man here. Direct your scattered thoughts to him, if you will. Who is he?”

  Her eyes met with Rance’s. His narrowed. And then she turned to Halsey and thrust out her cleft chin. “His name is Logan Stark. He’s my new farmhand, Avram. Say hullo, would you, and do be polite. Mr. Stark shall be with us for some time.”