shot at me first. I was only defending myself,” Rafael said. Grimacing, he pressed his palm against his upper chest.
“If you weren’t shot, I’d shoot you myself,” muttered Daniel. He jerked down the poncho he’d pulled over his face.
When Rafael had taken his new rifle, Daniel had followed him to get it back. Only he’d had to saddle a horse and then chase after Rafe for miles. He’d nearly caught up to his brother when they’d both seen the stagecoach rolling toward Stockton. Rafe had shouted back he was going to stop it, then spurred his horse toward a ravine the road ran through. Daniel hadn’t wanted any part of stopping the stage, but his protests had been ignored.
“I knew you’d help.” Rafael managed a smile despite the blood dripping down his poncho.
“I was just trying to keep you from being killed.” Daniel jerked back on his horse’s reins and caught the other horse’s bridle, pulling it to a walk.
Daniel’s head spun. He had to get Rafael away from the scene and back home before a posse was sent after them. “They could have recognized us or our horses, or, damn it, you could have killed someone.”
A vee appeared between Rafael’s eyebrows, and his eyes narrowed. The look of pain cut short the berating Daniel wanted to give him.
The enormity of what he’d done—they’d done—poured over him in a cold wave, worse than the time they’d gone to the ocean and Rafael had pushed him into the frigid surf and left him gasping for air. Not for the first time he felt old, much older than his twenty-two years. Older than the hills, older than his reckless brother.
There were times Rafael didn’t make sense. Over the past year, he’d been almost totally disengaged from the process of getting an Anglo bride, but he’d said he needed one to help their land case in the district court. Now he was acting ridiculously anxious. Daniel hoped a wife would temper Rafael’s drinking, disappearing for weeks on end and gambling in the raucous San Francisco farther west. Holding up a stagecoach was far worse than anything Rafael had done before.
“Don’t think I killed anyone,” Rafael observed as calmly as if he were talking about shooting bottles.
“Did you hit any of them? And where is my rifle?”
“Dropped it when I got hit. I can’t believe my bride shot me.”
The moment Daniel had stared at his brother’s fiancée he’d felt a punch to his gut. For a second it was as if time had stopped and he couldn’t look away. They’d been too far apart for him to see the color of her eyes, but the way the sunlight caught in her hair, lighting gold and copper strands, had caused a shift inside him, almost as if the ground shook underneath him. “Well, at least she’s pretty.”
Rafael coughed and slumped in his saddle. “Not so much. Probably freckled.”
“You’d better hope she doesn’t recognize us.”
Rafael’s mouth tightened, and pale lines bracketed it. He coughed again.
As if Daniel had been lassoed the same way he’d roped the outrider, his chest squeezed tight. “How badly are you hurt?”
“Through and through.” He spit. “Might have nicked a lung.”
“I should have left you to die.”
“You should have,” said Rafael before he slumped forward.
My father wants me to marry one of the respectable bankers or businessmen he has presented to me, but I find them all boring. I dream of living in the land of milk and honey, but I am accustomed to certain standards. Please tell me the size of your home and how many servants you retain.
“Hey, he dropped that rifle,” shouted the artist from behind the boulder where the first robber had taken cover. The artist had run up the road as the two robbers galloped away. “I think you hit him, Miss O’Malley. There’s a bit of that cape here with blood on it.”
The sunshine dimmed, and the ground tilted. Selina grabbed her. “Don’t faint now.”
She’d shot a man. Goodness, what if she’d killed him? No, he’d been shooting at them. She’d done what she had to do. But there was a world of difference between shooting rabbits or squirrels on the outskirts of the city to supplement her family’s meager diet and shooting a human being.
“That was a great shot, ma’am,” the outrider remarked, awkwardly bending to pick up his rifle. “Where’d you learn to shoot?”
“My brothers taught me,” Anna managed. A lady never would have shot at anyone. Likely a gently bred lady never would have come close to a gun. Back in Ireland, her brothers had insisted she learn because they’d believed America was still beset by wild savages and knowing how to shoot would save her. They hadn’t encountered any wild Indians in New York. But when her next-in-age brother couldn’t see well enough to shoot the small game she pointed out, she had been able to take the shots for him.
“Right fine shooting, ma’am.” The oldest farm boy had his hand clamped over his right arm. “You saved us. Thought we were goners when all of us had to reload at the same time.”
Anna shook her head. How likely was it that a young woman of breeding would know how to shoot a gun? But then the green silk dress didn’t cover a lady, just another poor immigrant whose family had fled Ireland after the potato famine ruined them. “I just got off a lucky shot when the robber left his cover.”
The soldier stared at his bleeding forearm, probably hoping he wasn’t about to lose his remaining arm. That wasn’t right. A fiery ball fisted in her stomach. Selina turned toward him. The miner leaned against the stage and cussed a blue streak.
“Sirruh,” objected the preacher.
If she were really a lady, she likely would have fainted dead away at his language.
“Damn,” Anna muttered. And she certainly wouldn’t have known any swear words, either. Dropping to her knees beside the shot farm boy, she lifted her dirtied skirt, ripped off a clean petticoat ruffle and wrapped it around the young man’s injury.
How was it all the men bore wounds in their right arms? Their shooting arms. And only the men who’d had guns. The artist, the preacher and the youngest farm boy had not been wounded. The middle farm boy picked up the bent gun from where it had been shot out of his hand.
She twisted, taking in details. How could the man’s shots have been so accurate? Dear Lord. Her heart pounded and her hands shook as she secured the makeshift bandage around the young man’s arm.
“There were at least three of them,” said his middle brother.
Her dry mouth tasted like copper and dirt.
“Or four,” added the youngest farm boy, bouncing on his toes, his eyes bright.
His excitement sickened her. Lives had been on the line or at least the life of the man she’d shot. She’d aimed for his chest, but it looked like he’d intended to just disarm the men shooting at him. Which was pure foolishness. Any gunshot could prove fatal. Including the one that had come from her.
Nausea churned in her stomach while hot shards throbbed in her veins. She shook her head. “No. There weren’t. There were two.”
One hadn’t fired a single shot. No, he’d roped the outrider and yanked him from the roof before he could shoot a second time.
She fumbled with the makeshift bandage. Her hands wouldn’t hold steady. She couldn’t have hit the side of a building if she tried to shoot the rifle now. She could barely tie a knot.
“She’s right. There was the one behind and the one in front,” confirmed the guard, who couldn’t seem to straighten