on his head. When her mother died of pneumonia, he and Archie and Reese had sworn to take care of her. Mac, though, had been the one closest to her. He was the one who wiped her tears, taught her to ride and protected her.
Then, months ago, Reese had suggested Montana as a possibility to give Sam “more opportunities.” He’d been there years earlier and talked grandly about the land. It didn’t hurt that there were numerous mining communities to be picked, as well. But until recently, the Sioux and Blackfeet had both been active in the territory. Now that the army was conducting a major campaign against them, he felt this was the time to go. Land was available under the Homestead Act, and it could be supplemented by open range to graze cattle.
Sam didn’t care about the kind of “opportunities” her godfathers were considering. Marriage was what they meant, and she wasn’t sure that’s what she wanted. Surely a husband would expect her to be like other wives. He would frown on her riding astride and helping Archie doctor folks. She wasn’t reassured by any marriages she’d seen in Gideon’s Hope. Worn women who looked decades older than their real ages waited at home with multiple children while their husbands drank and gambled what little money they had. Hadn’t her mother done just fine on her own after Sam’s father died?
But maybe, just maybe, Sam could learn more about medicine. The farther Mac was from Colorado, the safer he would be.
She had dropped her objections then, and they made plans. Reese would take one last round of the mining camps to raise money. She would can the early vegetables they’d grown in the garden. Mac would bring in game and they would smoke it, and Archie would take what gold they’d panned to Denver and get cash for it. They would need it to buy cattle along the way.
But Archie was beset with rheumatism, and Mac had become restless. He didn’t think anyone would recognize him. He’d grown a beard, and the trip to Denver would be in and out.
Someone did recognize him, though, and now the marshal threatened everyone she loved. Mac. Archie. Even Reese, who’d been harboring Mac all these years.
She led the marshal’s roan into the stall. Burley fetched a bucket of water from the well in back, and together they gave him fresh hay.
“I’ll unsaddle and rub him down,” Burley said, eager to make amends.
She took the marshal’s saddlebags and bedroll, then stood back. Maybe there would be some clothes in them. She didn’t want to keep seeing his nakedness. It was bad enough that the image lingered in her thoughts. She didn’t like the heat that drove through her when it did.
Nor the churning in her stomach when he looked at her with those cool, dark blue eyes.
HAD HE IMAGINED a gentle hand touching him? Even caressing him?
Cool. It had been a brief moment of relief in his fevered world. Soothing.
Sarah? He’d thought that for a moment, then remembered. Sarah was gone. Had been gone for years.
Jared slipped in and out of consciousness. He preferred the darkness to the fire racing through his leg. When he was conscious, he tried to think of anything but the pain.
The woman. Think of the woman! Must have been her hands he’d felt. He had to learn more about her, and her relationship to the man she called Mac.
His life depended on it. Maybe she hadn’t intended to kill him, but from everything he’d heard about MacDonald, he couldn’t count on the same from the outlaw.
He tried to remember what she and the old man said about MacDonald, but the words slipped in and out of his memory. Nothing he’d heard, though, fit the image of the man he was hunting.
The poster had been in his pocket. Probably a bloody mess now, but he’d been tracking the man on and off for nearly ten years. The man she called MacDonald had been named Thornton when he took part in the stagecoach robbery. Jared had confirmed that when he caught one of the men who’d robbed the coach. The man claimed Thornton was the one who’d shot and killed Emma. He’d hung anyway.
He’d tracked the man for six months, then lost the trail, although Thornton had never been far from his thoughts. Occasionally over the years he would get a lead, but it never panned out. Someone had thought he’d seen Thornton in a mining town in central Colorado, but that was years ago. Then he’d heard that Thornton had changed his name to MacDonald. Finally, a week ago, a young would-be gun hand heard someone say a wanted outlaw was spotted in Denver. He gathered two friends and went after him. Only one of the three returned.
It was enough to give Jared a head start. He’d heard that the young gun hand’s father was hiring men to avenge his son’s death. He didn’t think the others knew exactly where Thornton was hiding, but they would figure it out.
Now he was damned close to the man and couldn’t do a blasted thing about it. Not at the moment anyway.
Why was a woman living in a nearly deserted ghost town some seventy miles away from the nearest civilization? Young and…intriguing, even in a man’s garb. Had to be Thornton’s mistress. An outlaw’s mistress. A killer’s woman. Or was she simply an outlaw herself? Part of Thornton’s band?
Sam raised herself. The old man had used his words sparingly.
But now she was full grown. Without the coat, it was obvious that she’d reached womanhood. Her breasts pressed against her shirt, and there was a long-legged grace in her movements. And her eyes. God, they were remarkable. He wondered how she would look in a dress.
He tried not to think about the jolt of awareness that had shot between them in the street despite his pain. Nor did he wish to think about the gentleness of her fingers when she was assisting the old man. Efficient but gentle. It was obvious that she had tended wounds before.
An odd combination for an outlaw. Or an outlaw’s woman.
He moved slightly. The pain was so excruciating that he wanted to sink back into oblivion. He looked down at his bandaged thigh. The wound felt hot and angry and burned like the furies from hell. The barest movement sent fresh frissons of agony through him.
He tried to ignore it. He glanced around the small room. The door was closed. His gun? Neither it nor his holster was in sight. A bowl sat on the table, along with a pitcher and cup. Nothing else.
His throat was parched. He reached for the water, but it was beyond him. With a massive effort he tried to move his legs from the bed to the floor, and the room started to swim. Will. All it would take was will.
He lowered his legs to the floor, his teeth clenched to keep from crying out. He was so damned weak. A step. Just a step. Water.
He stood, wavered, then crashed down, his body hitting the bed and knocking over the table. Then everything went black again.
SAM LEFT Burley unsaddling the horse and carried the marshal’s possessions to the saloon. She thought about opening the door and checking on him, but she hadn’t been gone that long and she wasn’t sure she was up to another encounter with him. She didn’t fear him, but she was wary of the way she reacted to him.
Instead, she put the saddlebags and bedroll on a table and opened the bedroll first. She wasn’t spying, she assured herself. He needed some clean clothes after all.
A heavy jacket fell out, along with a rain slicker. Then she looked through the saddlebags. A pair of leg and wrist manacles. They felt hard and cold and ugly in her hands. She carefully placed them on the table and continued looking. There was a pair of pants, an extra shirt, socks and one set of clean underwear. A container of matches wrapped in oilskin. Then she found a well-worn book by someone named Victor Hugo.
Books were precious to her. She looked at the title. Reese had never mentioned this one. She put it down and continued her search. Some hardtack and coffee. No photographs or miniatures. No other personal items.
She folded the clothes and put the manacles back in the saddlebags. They might just need the latter.
Archie would be up with Mac, just as he had been these past few days.