Lawman Page 14

  Her only possible defense was subterfuge, and Megan meant to use it. Forcing her fear-stiffened limbs to cooperate, she drew her heels beneath her body as though preparing to get up—and then slumped face-first in the dirt, in her finest approximation of a dead faint.

  No, just a plain garden-variety faint, she amended to herself, trying to keep her breathing steady. With luck, once the bandito behind her saw her collapsed on the ground, he’d skedaddle for livelier pickings straightaway.

  That, or he’d peg her as an easy mark and come closer.

  Filled with fear at the thought, Megan kept herself motionless and waited. Seconds later, she heard boot heels stamp across the alleyway. Her nose filled with the dust his footfalls raised, and she struggled not to sneeze. The scent of tobacco smoke drifted toward her. Sensing his nearness, she held her breath.

  His shadowy bulk loomed over her. She cracked one eye open. The scuffed length of what she took for a boot trod past her nose, then stopped. Its mate joined it, as though the bandito stood beside her shoulder, deciding what to do with the fallen lady before him.

  Megan needed no such lengthy deliberations.

  Quick as she could, she snaked out her arm. She grasped a handful of trouser leg, boot, and ankle, and yanked with all her might.

  The bandito lost his footing every bit as quickly as Mose always had, back at Kearney station when he’d taught her this trick. With an incoherent yelp of surprise, the man smacked into the ground—no less painfully than he deserved, she felt sure—and lay momentarily motionless.

  It couldn’t last. Heart hammering, Megan surged to her feet and ran full-bore down the alleyway. Never mind getting over the wall and eluding agent Winter—she had bigger fish to fry now. It was almost enough to make her wish for the Pinkerton man’s solid, undefeatable presence.

  Almost.

  Panting, she raced further. Was that the sound of footsteps following her? She couldn’t stop to find out. Fearful that it was, Megan risked a backward glance over her shoulder…and ran straight into something hard, immovable, and undeniably human at her front.

  She shrieked, and a pair of warm strong arms closed tight around her. She’d escaped one bandito, only to be captured by another of his cohorts? Screaming, Megan struggled against her captor’s iron grip. His hand clapped over her mouth, sealing off her screams. Seconds later, she felt herself being lifted and carried to the alleyway’s darkest corner.

  Her backside met cold adobe bricks. At her front, the new bandito pressed his body against hers with undeniable intent. His rapid-fire speech flowed over her, sounding hoarse and oddly familiar.

  “Meg? Meg?” His hands roved over her, squeezing her shoulders, pulling her close, burying in the tangled mess of her hair. “Christ, I heard you scream and I couldn’t get back here fast enough. What happened? Are you hurt?”

  Dazed, she recognized Gabriel Winter’s soothing brogue, acknowledged the blissfully familiar warmth of his hands stroking her hair back from her face. Whatever answer she might have made stuck in her throat, held there by the shock of hearing her name spoken so softly by him.

  Meg, Meg. No one had ever called her that…and certainly not with such tenderness packed into the words. Relief, and something more she didn’t dare consider, poured through her with all the sweetness of a sarsaparilla on a hot August afternoon.

  “Are you hurt?” Gabriel asked again, stepping backward a bit to take a closer look at her. “I swear, if you’re hurt I—”

  “It’s nothing,” she whispered, drawing her trembling hand to her lips. Lord, but he looked wonderful, even in the moonlight. Even in an alleyway, with a fallen bandito probably sneaking up behind them and danger ‘round every turn. “I’m fine now.”

  “You’re not.” His gaze seared through her. “Any fool can see you’ve been weeping.”

  From the frustration of trying to escape you in time, Megan recalled, and decided to keep that revelation to herself. She didn’t want to think about that now. All she wanted was a little more of the concern she’d heard in his voice, a little more of the safe feeling she’d experienced upon realizing it was Gabriel’s arms that held her.

  “Would you say it again?” she asked softly, unable to resist. “Would you please call me ‘Meg’ again, just once? I know I—”

  His grasp stiffened, cutting short her words. “I never called you that.”

  She might have slapped him, for all the sweetness Gabriel showed her now. What was wrong with him?

  “You did!” He had, and with the most beautiful bit of caring in his voice, besides. But she could hardly bring herself to ask him to say it nicely—not when he was being so intolerably stubborn about saying it at all. “You called me Meg just now, when you yanked me off the—”

  “Yanked you? I kept you from running yourself full-chisel into that bakery building over there, or worse. That’s what I did. You’re lucky it’s too late for buggy traffic.”

  “You’re lucky I don’t call out the sheriff and charge you with lewd conduct, after the way you manhandled me!”

  Mad at herself and at him, Megan shoved away from the wall. Whatever had possessed her, to wish for kind words from Gabriel Winter’s lips? He was her enemy, and yet she continually forgot that fact. She should have known better than to ask him for anything at all.

  It was disheartening to realize that, even as a spinster of twenty-eight, part of her still yearned to rely on someone other than her own lonesome self. Apparently her foolishness knew no bounds.

  Feeling defensive, she looked up to see Gabriel gaping at her. His expression of disbelief didn’t improve her mood.

  “Lewd conduct? Manhandled you?” Shaking his head, he grabbed her arm and started tugging her down the alleyway in his wake. “Never mind telling me about how you’re fine. I can see that for myself plain enough, since you’re arguing like a fishwife. You’re fine as you ever were.”

  Outraged, Megan jerked her arm from his grasp. “Fishwife?”

  “Yeah.”

  And the fool man seemed pleased about it, too! If she hadn’t known better, she’d have sworn Gabriel savored his arguments with her. Was he mad?

  He gave her an audacious smile. “Yeah,” he repeated, nodding his head. “I’d say ‘fishwife’ about taps it.”

  He was mad. Why, everyone knew a respectable man wanted a woman who’d comply with his wishes, and never argue at all. Not being sure she could manage such a feat was one reason Megan had never pursued marriage.

  The other was the fact that no man had courted her seriously, not with her father and Mose and all the other men at Kearney Station guarding the path to her door. Something about being like a sister to a dozen or so station hands tended to discourage gentleman callers—at least Megan hoped that was why they hadn’t come calling.

  She stopped in the middle of the wagon wheel tracks dividing the path and put her hands to her hips—the better to glare at agent Winter. Undaunted, he glared right back.

  “You seem as though a fishwife is what you want,” Megan challenged. “Fool as the notion may be.”

  A new grin softened Gabriel’s features. “Fool to be sure. Seems I can’t help myself when you come ‘round.”

  He moved closer, then reached out his hand and tucked back a wisp of her hair. His fingers followed the curve of her ear, lingered, then lowered again. Looking into his face so near to hers, for the first time tonight Megan glimpsed the weariness in his expression. Logic told her to press her advantage, maybe even escape him while she had the chance to go and warn her papa on her own.

  She didn’t have the heart to do so.

  Especially not when Gabriel said such things to her as he had just now. Seems I can’t help myself when you come ‘round. His admission was enough to set any feminine heart aflutter. She had never felt more powerful…or more at risk of exposing her own mixed feelings to him.

  “Then it’s a good thing I still have my wits about me,” Megan said, “seeing as how you’ve misplaced yours.”

/>   Gabriel sighed. To her surprise—surely it wasn’t disappointment she felt—he didn’t rise to the bait she’d tossed him. Instead, without speaking, he put his finger to the sensitive nape of her neck, then trailed it down the line of her locket’s gold chain. He skimmed over her collarbone, little impeded by the open neckline of her calico dress.

  Why didn’t I put on something less mousy? Megan thought suddenly. Next to the ladies on Maiden Lane, she surely had all the elegance of a darned sock amidst fine embroidered silks.

  But Gabriel, a man obviously more fond of the homespun in hand than fancies for sale at a price, didn’t seem to care. He followed her locket’s gold links still lower, setting her atremble with the slow surety of his touch. The subtle pressure of his hand gliding across her chest was an exquisite torture—something Megan had never in a million years expected to endure.

  At last he reached the oval locket at her bosom. She felt him scoop it into his palm, felt the backs of his fingers brush over her bare skin as he cradled it.

  He looked up. “I do want you,” Gabriel said. “T’would be more than dangerous to deny it. I’m weary of fighting, and to tell you truly, more sorry for this than you’ll likely believe.”

  “Sorry?” He was apologizing to her? Her thoughts boggled at the notion. But to be truthful with herself, more than his apology might have been at fault for that. The gentle back-and-forth contact of Gabriel’s hand against the topmost slope of her bosom made all but the most rudimentary thought impossible. “Sorry for what?” she managed.

  “In your shoes, I’d likely behave exactly as you have,” Gabriel said, inexplicably—and uselessly, when their situation couldn’t possibly be reversed and his comment didn’t begin to answer her question.

  He rubbed his thumb over the carved flowers inlaid on her locket, then let it fall to her chest again. “But that doesn’t mean I can let this go on, now does it?”

  Megan wrinkled her forehead, trying mightily to make sense of his words. Seeing her confusion, he held out his hand, palm facing.

  “Give me your hand.”

  He wanted to hold her hand? Perhaps he meant it as a prelude to an apology made on bent knee. After all that had transpired this night, she could almost believe it. There had hardly been a moment during their shared acquaintance when the Pinkerton man had failed to surprise her. Why should this moment be any different?

  Already anticipating the sense of victory to come, Megan held out her hand. “This really isn’t necessary, agent Winter. I realize you’ve simply done your job, and—”

  “Good. I hope you’ll keep that in mind.”

  Something heavy and cold circled her wrist. An instant later, it snapped into place, dragging her hand down with its weight. Handcuffs.

  “No!” Ineffectually, she yanked her hand back.

  Gabriel Winter’s hand followed, thanks to their shared bonds. With no apparent effort at all, he pulled her hand back near his and clasped their fingers together in a mockery of affection.

  “Behave,” he warned, his eyes gleaming with galling amusement. “I’d hate to have to shackle those pretty ankles of yours, as well.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  His eyebrows raised. “Care to test me? I was about to go check on the fellow you clobbered—” He jerked his head toward the alleyway behind them, where the fallen bandito’s motionless form could still be seen beside the courtyard wall. “—but I could be persuaded to let the poor knuck lie there a while longer. Criminals get no pity from me.”

  And neither would her father, Megan knew, however innocent he must be. She brought her infuriated gaze to bear on Gabriel’s face, and knew she could not let his comment pass unremarked upon, any more than she could accept his infernal manacles.

  “I’m no criminal, and neither is my father.” She shook her arm, feeling the awkward pull of the handcuffs, and wished she could use them to cosh agent Winter over the head with. “These infernal things belong on the likes of him—” She nodded toward the bandito. “—not me.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe not.” He began walking toward the indentation in the wall that housed the fallen man, towing her along like a mutt on a leash. “But you’ve earned them, I’d say, between escaping from McMarlin, tailing me through town—”

  “What? I beg your pardon, but I—”

  “—don’t bother to lie about it.” He held up his free hand to stop her automatic denial, then went on, “And assaulting men in the streets. I think you’ll keep your handcuffs, at least a little longer.”

  Loud snoring drifted toward them as they reached the bandito’s temporary hideout. At least he’s alive, Megan thought, shaken by the realization that he still hadn’t moved. He must have struck his head on the courtyard wall when he’d fallen. Either that, or she’d sent him tumbling to the ground with more force than she’d thought. She’d never in her life walloped anyone so hard.

  Mose would have been proud.

  Gabriel stopped suddenly, forcing her to stop as well, else have her wrist yanked out of joint by the handcuffs. Glaring at them, she didn’t notice at first the sudden stillness that had come over the Pinkerton man. When she did, Megan had the sense he had been standing silent for quite some time, as though waiting for her to notice something.

  He nodded. “Yep, you’ll be keeping your handcuffs,” Gabriel repeated, staring thoughtfully at the man snoring near their feet. “I think Mr. McMarlin here will be wanting it that way.”

  Chapter Eleven

  The refined elegance of the dining room was a point of pride at the Cosmopolitan Hotel, and when Gabriel entered it the next morning, he could see why. Immediately he felt welcomed, soothed by the familiar rustle of newspapers being read and the murmur of travelers’ conversations all around him. The scents of brewed coffee and bacon sharpened his appetite, and lent a keen edge to his already-prickly disposition.

  He hadn’t been forced to wait for a woman in years.

  He was none too happy to be doing so now.

  Frowning, he poured himself a cup of coffee from the silver-plated pot standing ready in the center of his table, then ordered breakfast for three—Megan, McMarlin, and himself. That accomplished, Gabriel turned his chair to better face the room’s entrance. If he knew Megan Kearney, she’d take every moment he’d allocated to prepare herself for the day, and likely tack on half again as much time, too—just to prove she could. He’d never met a more vexatious female.

  Or one who intrigued him more.

  Damnation, but she got under his skin. At every turn she defied him. At every juncture, she tried to best him. The last opposition he’d expected to face was his suspect’s spinster daughter. He didn’t want to like her, but he did. Megan’s determination and loyalty impressed him. Even knowing they were misplaced wasn’t enough to change that.

  He didn’t know how long it had been since he’d believed in anything as strongly as she believed in her father’s innocence.

  Shaking his head, Gabriel opened his report book and propped it on his knee, then set to work penciling in an account of the work he’d done yesterday. Typically, he prepared the daily accounting required from each Pinkerton operative at night, and posted it to the Chicago office each morning. Last night, he realized as he stared at the half-filled page before him, had been the sole exception of his career.

  Gabriel paused, pencil in mid-stroke. Was his lapse due to his growing dissatisfaction with a detective’s lonely life of lost and found, hunter and hunted? Or was it because his attention had been on Megan, with her wily woman’s ways and her penchant for troublemaking?

  Neither, he decided. His handcuffs were at fault—along with the damned insistence he’d felt on using them. With McMarlin still sleeping off the combined effects of the lump on his head and the Irish whiskey that had allowed Megan to put it there, Gabriel had thought it prudent not to leave their suspect’s daughter on the loose. Who knew what sort of havoc she’d wreak?

  Undoubtedly, she’d have climbed from the window yet again
, and gone to alert her father. The woman was tireless, clever …and entirely too appealing between the clean-scented sheets of a hotel room bed.

  It had been years since he’d stayed till morning with a woman. Still longer since he’d spent the entire night simply sleeping with one. Something about the feel of Megan’s warm, lithe body beside his, about the way she’d cuddled unknowingly against him in her sleep, left him unsettled.

  Gabriel had enjoyed sharing his bed with her—even perforce—and not even McMarlin’s snoring presence on the horsehair sofa just a few feet away had been enough to change that.

  Neither had Megan’s typically combative sleeping habits. When she’d first set to thrashing in her sleep, he’d thought her flailing arms and legs yet another ruse to earn her escape from him. Then he had suspected her moans and murmured cries a gambit to force McMarlin into intervening on her behalf. But when both had gone on past the few moments it had taken to awaken him, he had realized her restlessness was real.

  As real as it was short-lived, once he’d coaxed her into his arms. Gabriel wanted to smile at the memory of Megan’s body easing against his. Happy as a woman newly pleasured, she’d laid her head on his shoulder and breathed evenly once more. Possessive as a child with a favored toy, she’d spread her hand across his chest to keep him beside her, and lapsed into a deep, easy sleep.

  And he, aroused as a man who’d spent years without knowing a woman’s touch, had lain wakefully beside her…hard and ready and needful.

  Just as she’d planned him to, he’d wager. There was nothing he’d put past anyone who’d proved herself as sly and determined as Megan.

  His scowl deepened. Refocusing on the page in his lap, Gabriel put aside thoughts of the lady for a thorough accounting of his search for the lady’s father. He finished his report, folded and sealed the pages, then slipped them into his coat pocket for later mailing.

  His fingers touched the thick folded paper already waiting there. The wanted poster he’d drawn on the train. Withdrawing it, Gabriel sipped his coffee and considered his case. His client, the foreman of a Tombstone mining outfit, had hired Pinkerton operatives to track a missing shipment of payroll, sent special delivery on a stage that regularly passed between the mine and Kearney Station. The strongbox had arrived safely in Tucson several days later—but the ten thousand dollars inside it had not.