“Go away,” she tried one last time. “No one here but a few ghosts.”
“And you.” His dark gaze seemed to search her soul. “What’s he to you?” He was trying to disarm her. She knew it, even as she realized it might be working. She widened her stance slightly and didn’t bother to answer. Instead, her fingers inched closer to her holster. Don’t stand there talking, Mac had taught her. Some gunmen will try to distract you with talk.
“Don’t know what you mean.”
“Why isn’t he here? Why is he letting a kid protect him?”
She didn’t reply. She had the terrible feeling that every time she did, she revealed more than she intended, that he saw under the disguise she’d so carefully assembled.
“I just want to take Thornton to trial. It will be fair.”
“Not bloody likely.”
He raised an eyebrow at that. “Then Thornton is here.”
Blazes. She’d said too much.
She hadn’t had much time to plan after a friend of Mac’s from the old days had ridden in three hours earlier to warn him that a marshal named Evans was on the way. He’d moved on after issuing the warning. The man had a price on his head, as well.
Evans. She’d known that name. He’d been dogging Mac for years. A vendetta, Archie said once.
She tried to keep her hand from shaking as she stared into the marshal’s eyes. She didn’t want to kill him. Blazes, she didn’t want to shoot him at all. But she could. She knew she could. She was fast. As fast as Mac had been in his heyday, and she’d beaten him to the draw more than once.
But this was no game between teacher and student.
The lawman took a step toward her, his arms at ease. He obviously didn’t believe she would really draw.
Her heart quaked. If he reached her, he could easily disarm her. She was strong for a woman, but he was well over six feet and she suspected his lean body was all muscle.
Now.
“Draw!”
Her hand dove to the butt of her Colt. She saw a change in his eyes. He believed her now. His hand started toward his pistol, as well. A gust of hot wind caught her coat and flung the other side open.
Her finger pulled the trigger at the same second she realized his hand had stopped moving.
She heard the shot echo down the dirt road and saw the surprise in his eyes as his body buckled and he went down.
2
THE IMPACT of the bullet took Jared Evans by surprise.
Blood flowed from his right leg as it started to fold underneath him. The pain would follow. He knew that from too much experience. He prepared himself for it, even as he stared at the woman who had shot him.
In that split second as she went for the gun, the wind brushed open the coat and outlined the slim body. A woman. God damn, a woman. He’d been distracted just long enough…
He looked at her. She stood where she’d fired, gun firmly clutched in her hand.
He still held his gun as he fell to one knee. Instinct. Never let go. His fingers tightened around the grip. He tried to stand again, but his leg was deadweight. The dirt beneath him seemed to move, or was it him? He looked at his leg. Blood. Too much blood. An artery must have been hit.
He debated trying to return the shot. The woman still pointed her gun at him. He didn’t know her intentions. She might come in for the kill. But he’d never shot a woman. He dropped the weapon and reached for the bandanna around his neck. Tie off the leg….
A woman, dammit….
The sun beat down on him as pain hit him. Sudden, searing pain ripped through his thigh as blood continued to flow from the wound and puddle on the ground. He finally tore the bandanna from his neck when he saw the shadow of the woman. If she shot again…
He looked up. She stood above him, her right hand still holding the Colt. He looked at his own gun. He could try to defend himself. But he’d seen enough wounds to know he didn’t stand a chance if he didn’t stop the bleeding. And his fingers didn’t want to work….
She kicked his gun away and placed her own on the ground well out of his reach. Then she knelt beside him. She took the bandanna from his hands and without a word tied off his leg just above the wound and quickly twisted the cloth into a makeshift tourniquet. He noticed she did it expertly, as if she’d had more than a little practice.
“Hold that while I get something to keep it tight,” she demanded.
He obeyed, even as the pain grew more intense. Think of something else. He concentrated on the woman’s face, and his eyes met hers. Golden eyes. A light golden-brown, almost amber with flecks of gold. And the expression? Regret? Something more than that? An instant awareness flowed between them. Its power stunned him, left him dazed. The wound. It was the wound and the loss of blood.
But for an instant, her fingers froze on his leg. He knew from the intake of her breath she felt that odd pull, too. She hesitated, then breathed in deeply. Shaking her head slightly as if denying any reaction, she took a knife from a sheath on her gun belt and cut the trouser leg until she saw the wound.
He followed her glance. The bullet had driven cloth from his trousers into the flesh. He fought a wave of unconsciousness, even as he noticed her hands were callused. And gentle.
“The bullet’s still inside,” she said, confirming what he’d already suspected. Her voice trembled a bit, and he realized she wasn’t as sure of herself as she tried to project. And her eyes weren’t hard now. They were…worried.
For him?
Hard to believe.
He leaned on his arm, trying to muster his strength. He wanted to pull her down to him and demand answers. She couldn’t have been aiming for his leg; it would be far too dangerous. He could have killed her. And why was she now determined to help him? He tried to sit up but nothing was cooperating.
“Stay still,” she said sharply.
He struggled to focus. The golden eyes were hard to read, and he was usually very good at judging people. Her hat was gone, and short tendrils of damp fawn-colored hair clung to her face, softening it. Pretty, he thought. How could he ever have taken her for a lad? Even for a moment.
He hurt too damn much to notice anything else. Neither was he in a position to question her help at the moment. The leg burned like hell, and he was fading.
“What the Sam Hill happened here?” Another shadow appeared in the late-afternoon sun. An old man sidled next to the woman and brushed her aside to examine the wound. Time had worn trails in his cheeks and forehead. A gray beard reached to the collar of his red shirt. He scowled as his rheumy eyes inspected the wound.
Jared tried to sit, but he fell back. He could barely keep his eyes open. How much blood had he lost in those few seconds?
“Damnation, girl, what did you go and do?” the old man asked.
Her face flushed. “He came for Mac,” she said simply, as if that were answer enough.
“Mac ain’t gonna like this,” the old man said as if she hadn’t spoken. He loosened the tourniquet, and the bleeding started again.
Jared wondered whether he meant the woman should have killed him. Or that he intended to do it himself.
“I’m a U.S. Marshal,” he said. “The Denver sheriff knows where I was going. If I don’t return, you’ll have a posse up here.”
“I’m real afeared,” the old man said, as if swatting off a fly. He waited a few seconds after loosening the tourniquet, then tightened it again and muttered something indecipherable. He