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  Unfortunately, no quantity of explaining how the trio of cheroots she gifted him with was meant as a goodwill gesture had been enough to persuade McMarlin to actually smoke one.

  Gabriel grinned to recall the agent’s parting words. Probably packed with dynamite, knowing that wily miss.

  As someone who had been on the wrong side of too many of Megan’s ideas since he’d met her, Gabriel had to agree.

  In her company, vigilance was decidedly necessary.

  Beside him, Megan yawned loudly. Looking more like a girl who’d count endless cut-tin stars than the devious conspirator McMarlin had made her out to be, she abandoned her attempts to fan herself cool and dropped her painted fan to her lap.

  “Ahhhh. This shade is wonderful, isn’t it?” Her bright gaze invited him to agree, but she didn’t wait for an answer. “No matter how much papa and I come to town, I never seem to get to Levin’s Park often enough.”

  “This place suits you.” Gabriel took in the skittering cottonwood-leaf canopy overhead and the tumbling fountain waters behind them. He breathed in the shifting scents of earth and brewed ale, wet stones and burning mesquite. “It’s as changeable as you are.”

  She paused in the act of unbuttoning her gloves to deliver him a frown. “You sound as though you believe that’s a bad thing, agent Winter.”

  “Gabriel.”

  “Of course.”

  The mischievous tilt of her head left little doubt she meant to ignore his correction forever, if necessary. She would ‘agent Winter’ him to death, if she chose to, and nothing he did would stop it. If he wished her to call him by his given name, that was the one thing Megan would never do.

  Naturally, her resistance only compelled him to make sure she did call him Gabriel. Freely. Openly.

  Soon.

  She tugged off one of her gloves, finger by finger, then let it fall atop the fan in her lap. Gracefully turning up her other wrist, she worked at the row of buttons there.

  “However could you hope to give anyone what they needed, if you weren’t willing to change yourself to do it?” Megan asked. She shook her head doubtfully. As though in agreement, her hat’s feather bobbed in the breeze. “I can’t imagine it. Why, I’d turn myself green if I thought it would help my papa.”

  Gabriel wondered what else she’d be willing to do for the sake of having her father remain free. To be sure, Joseph Kearney didn’t deserve a daughter as trusting as Megan. Not if everything he’d learned of the man was true.

  Mindful of a sudden, ridiculous urge not to reveal those things to the woman beside him—not to disappoint her with the truth—he only said, “There’s not enough changing in the world to accomplish some things.”

  A sorrowful expression crossed her face. “I know,” she whispered.

  The loneliness in her eyes struck him like a blow. He recognized that feeling, ached with it himself. It was nothing he would wish on a woman like Megan.

  “It’s fortunate you are, then,” Gabriel said, ladling cheer into his words with hopes of easing some of the ache inside her. “Since you’re nigh perfect as you are.”

  “Hmmph.”

  Apparently unimpressed with his praise, she only arched her brow and pulled at the last unruly finger of her glove. It was caught somehow, refusing to be peeled from her skin.

  “So says the man with no blarney in his soul. If I ever hear the truth from your lips, agent Winter, I’ll know for sure that enormous changes are possible.”

  She tugged harder. Her glove stuck fast. Frowning in impatience, Megan dipped her head and, with utmost delicacy, snagged the pale tip of her glove’s finger between her teeth.

  He’d never before thought to envy a slip of fabric and thread. Somehow, now he did. Her quicksilver motions, her faintly pursed lips as she prepared to tug anew, suddenly seemed impossibly erotic. Gabriel’s breath caught.

  Megan heard. She glanced up, looked chagrined at having been caught in an action so unrestrained…and then grinned around her mouthful of glove.

  It was a glimpse into a side of her he’d never witnessed before. This was a Megan both uninhibited and shy, aware and innocent. In a woman as appealing as she was, the combination was a heady mix.

  With a quick twist of her head, she pulled free her glove and dropped it with its mate in her lap. Gabriel looked longingly at the pile of things she’d made atop her skirts, and grinned at the bawdy thoughts they inspired in him. A man could die happily to be cradled so well as her fan and gloves were now.

  Raising her arms overhead, Megan yawned anew, arching her back in a feminine, elegant gesture that made all Gabriel’s weariness vanish. For one long, breath-stealing instant her breasts thrust upward, their lush curves limned in sunlight.

  She had to be taunting him apurpose.

  All the same, he found looking away was impossible.

  Captivated, he watched as she lowered her arms. With elbows straight as her usually defensive posture, Megan braced herself in place with her palms cupped around their stone seat’s edge. Gabriel watched her fingertips play over the water-worn roundness beneath her hands, and felt the cool smoothness of the stones as plainly as if he’d touched them himself.

  She breathed deeply and lifted her face to the sky. The sunset washed her face with golden light, gilding her freckled cheeks and shadowing the delicate hollow at her throat. He’d touched her there, he remembered, feeling again the warmth and softness of her skin beneath his hand. He’d stroked his tongue against hers, kissed her long and hard, and felt her throat vibrate with the moan of pleasure that kiss had called from her.

  Would it feel as good to kiss her again?

  Or would she refuse him—this time, with no stage station to protect from his investigation? Megan had been in his arms to divert him from his search, he remembered. Nothing more.

  Harshly, Gabriel steered his wonderings in a new direction. Thoughts like this—feelings like this—would only distract him from his case.

  Winter brings in the right man at the right time.

  At this rate, he’d be going back to Chicago empty-handed. The notion struck a peculiar sense of bitterness within him. When had his vaunted reputation as an agent become more of a burden than an accomplishment?

  Megan shifted beside him, letting her starched blue skirts brush against his leg. “I do believe you were a tremendous success with the ladies in town today,” she said. “It’s a shame I don’t truly design men’s clothing. I’d have more orders than I could handle—at least if your reception was anything to go by.”

  Her words came freely, formed with a sort of strict casualness that Gabriel was beginning to suspect only came about when she felt strongly about something…and didn’t want him to know it. If she was to be any help to him at all, he needed to learn to read Megan Kearney. To understand her.

  And, eventually, to see her faith in her father destroyed.

  He couldn’t think about that now. Instead, he fixed his attention on Megan’s face, in profile as she watched a group of Mexican musicians assemble their instruments nearby, and found it took little effort to shove aside his thoughts of what would come between them. Her eagerness for the musicale to come brightened her face and her smile, and touched a place in him that Gabriel had thought long abandoned.

  “Do you mean to say your designs aren’t always greeted with that kind of enthusiasm?” he asked. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Believe it. I’ve never seen anything like what happened today.” She narrowed her gaze, momentarily abandoning the musicians’ display for the sake of looking Gabriel up and down. “Those ladies were on you like a pack of ravening wolves. I’m surprised your clothes survived it.”

  He smiled. “Jealous, Megan?”

  “Jealous? Of what?”

  “The ladies in town, of course.” Gabriel gave her a teasing grin. “I’ve been thinking that maybe you were wanting to have your hands all over me too, like they did today.”

  “Bosh.” Megan lifted her chin and returned to
watching the musicians with a rapt interest he didn’t believe for an instant. “Over the past two days, my hands have been close enough to you to suit me for a whole lifetime,” she said, in blatant referral to the handcuffs they’d shared. “If it meant I could go on my way without you, I’d be perfectly happy to let you capture someone else.”

  “Ahh, but I didn’t need to break out shackles to keep those ladies nearby,” Gabriel pointed out. “Why do you suppose that is?”

  She shrugged. “Your appeal certainly doesn’t lie in an excess of humility.”

  He laughed. “And yours doesn’t hide itself in sweet-tongued talk. Sugar, you seem a mite prickly…for a woman who professes not to care who touches me.”

  “I don’t care.” Megan’s back straightened. Over her shoulder, she pursed her lips and gave him a mock-sympathetic look, then added, “I’d meant to spare you this, agent Winter. But the truth is, it was mere curiosity that had Ida and Hattie and the others squeezing your shoulders and trying to take off your suit coat this afternoon.”

  “Curiosity?”

  “Yes. I’m quite certain I heard them whispering about horsehair-padded shoulders.” Her gaze spanned the width of his shirt, then raised to his face. “An understandable conclusion, given your size. Anyone might wonder about it.”

  He boggled at the implication. “Might wonder if my shoulders were genuine?”

  She nodded.

  “Men with fake shoulders.” He shook his head, imagining the absurdity of it. “Women stuffing earmuffs beneath their dresses. I don’t know what the world is coming to.”

  “Neither do I. But then, many things aren’t what they seem, agent Winter,” Megan said. “You, of all people, should know that.”

  She was right, at least as far as her logic went. Faulty conclusions could be made. Mistaken impressions could be had. He was willing to admit that much. It was part of the reason Gabriel insisted on facts, not faith. It was part of the reason he hadn’t already reported to the agency what he’d learned about Megan’s lengthy days at her father’s station…or her need for money to open the dressmaker’s shop she longed for.

  Leaning forward, Gabriel rested his forearms on his thighs and loosely clasped his hands together. One of the colorfully costumed musicians passed by carrying a lighted lantern. His rapid-fire Sonoran speech rose and fell as he transferred the light from his hands to those of one of his partners. Then, in a fluid motion, he raised his guitar and plucked at the strings. Melancholy notes crossed the short distance dividing the troupe from the fountain where he and Megan sat.

  The sound stirred something equally melancholy in Gabriel. Too incomplete to be called a melody, it seemed to yearn for completion…just as he did.

  “Did you wonder about it?” he asked Megan. “You hardly seemed ready to tear off my coat upon our meeting.”

  She looked at him, her face pinked with the sunset’s light—or with the blush that came with an embarrassing truth she wanted to hide. Ridiculously, he found himself hoping Megan had been curious about him. He wanted her curiosity and her encouragement, her challenging words and her star-filled beliefs.

  He had rights to none of them—especially not when Gabriel should have wanted nothing more than her surrender.

  “Well, I am a dressmaker by trade,” she demurred, smoothing a wrinkle from her skirts with unsteady fingers. “Any curiosity I had about your shoulders—that is, whether or not you used padding sewn into your suit shoulders, of course—was strictly a matter of professional interest.”

  “Of course.”

  Megan folded her arms. “You don’t believe me?”

  I don’t want to believe you. To accept that she’d been so indifferent to him, so blind to him as a man, was the last thing Gabriel wanted.

  Aloud, he said, “I don’t believe anything I can’t touch or see or prove.”

  “Because you’re a Pinkerton man?”

  He nodded, feeling the muscles in his jaw clench painfully. Her question could only bring others just like it. At the prospect of answering them, wariness fisted inside him.

  Why then, did a part of him yearn to be asked?

  She frowned. “Haven’t you ever wanted any other kind of work? You must be good at a great many—”

  “I’ve never done anything else,” Gabriel interrupted. “Never needed to.”

  “Oh, but surely you’ve wondered about it?”

  He had. He’d wondered about it, imagined what it would be like to live another life…and in the end, had done his best to discard the false hope those notions had brought him. Given his past, he was lucky as hell to have the life, the work, and the respect he did. He’d be damned if he’d reveal his yearnings for something more. Not to Megan. Not to anyone.

  And especially not with his hopes so unlikely to be made real.

  Gabriel remained silent.

  In the fading daylight, her gaze searched his. As though not liking what she found in his expression, Megan lowered her face. Briskly, she gathered up the drawstring purse she’d dropped on the stone wall beside her parasol. Prying apart the gathered fabric, she reached inside and withdrew a folded packet of paraffin-coated paper.

  “No? You’ve never even wondered what else you might do?” She raised her eyebrows, then paused to unwrap the white bundle in her hand. The sound of paper crinkling against itself whispered between them. “I only ask because it’s plain, as I saw today, that you could have yourself a very fine job as a mannequin. If you wanted one.”

  Gabriel couldn’t help laughing. It was almost as though Megan had guessed at the downward bend of his thoughts, and had set out to cheer him.

  “A mannequin? Impossible,” he said, shaking his head. “After just one day, my teeth ache from so much chatter. My arms hurt from holding them out like a scarecrow.” He smiled at the memory of Megan’s hands on him, propping him into one ‘stylish’ position after another for the benefit of the ladies. “It will be weeks before I can look a cup of tea straight-on again.”

  “Me, too! I’ve never drank so much of it in my life.”

  They shared a co-sympathizer’s smile. To be bonded with her, even in such a small fashion, gladdened him in ways he’d never have guessed at. It made no sense. But for once in his life, Gabriel realized, he cared more for the feeling itself than the reasons behind it.

  At ease now, Megan finished her unwrapping. The rich scent of chocolate wafted toward him as, with a triumphant smile, she raised the blossom of crumpled waxed paper and offered him its contents.

  Fudge. He recognized the neatly piled squares he’d helped Hattie McDaniel stir, pour, and cut in her small Ochoa Street kitchen. He’d just managed to escape the gaggle of parlor-bound women long enough to wrangle a gulp of fresh air and a much-needed piss when Mrs. McDaniel had lassoed him into helping her. It had begun with him hefting her enormous cast-iron cookpot onto the stove…and ended with him, sore-armed, spooning out the finished fudge into a pan.

  He’d relished all of it.

  He’d sooner eat his boots than admit it.

  “If you can’t decide, I’ll choose one for you,” Megan offered. She examined the chocolate pieces held cupped in her hand, as though deliberating which would taste sweetest, then selected one. She held the bite of fudge aloft, poised a few inches from his mouth. “Open up.”

  The surprising intimacy of her suggestion was enough to part his lips on its own. Gabriel did as she asked, watching with his mouth open and waiting as she brought the morsel of fudge closer. Its heady aroma teased his senses, sparking a hunger he hadn’t been aware of until now. Anticipation stirred, making him angle his head still closer.

  Slight as his movement was, Megan saw it. Her eyes widened. She stopped, their faces mere inches apart, with the treat she’d selected still suspended between them. Don’t stop, he wanted to whisper, suddenly afraid she’d realized the dangerous nature of their position and would end it too soon. Come closer.

  Her gaze slipped to the fudge, then to his waiting mouth. He felt
caressed, as surely as if she’d touched his lips already. A tremor shuddered through him, quick and harsh.

  He wanted to taste her, not the candy. Wanted the feel of her mouth, pliant and warm beneath his, wanted a depth of joining between them that he’d only imagined until now. Feeling naked in his need, Gabriel could endure her teasing no longer. He edged his tongue forward, sorely tempted to dip his head and take the fudge between his teeth as she’d taken her glove’s fabric between hers. Would Megan find the gesture as erotic as he had?

  Moving closer, he sensed the warmth of her fingertips, felt the brush of his lower lip against her soft skin…tasted blossoming sugary flavor as she hurriedly popped the candy into his mouth.

  She slid across the stone wall, putting distance between them just as Gabriel’s mouth closed. Like a man awakening, he became aware again of the people surrounding them. The hum of cicadas grew louder, as did the mellow strumming of guitars from the Sonoran musicians. Their song hinted at completion, rose on a cooling breath of wind, and carried further to join with the burble of the tumbled-stone fountain.

  Everything was as it had been.

  Everything…except the flavor of Megan’s gift.

  Chocolate melted on his tongue, rich with cream and sugar and buttery texture. He nearly groaned aloud at the pleasure of it—and did, when he saw that Megan still watched him…and had unthinkingly slipped her fingers into her mouth to suck them clean.

  Transfixed, Gabriel imagined the soft pressure of her mouth, the velvet sweep of her tongue. His body leapt with eagerness. With one innocent gesture, Megan reduced him to a needfulness he’d never known. He ached with wanting her, trembled with an urge to drag her into his arms.

  Before he could move, she withdrew her fingers from between her lips. Her blush-stained cheeks revealed her embarrassment at having been seen in a pose so abandoned. With eyes grown large and luminous, she stared from her half-lowered fingers to the bundle of fudge still held aloft in her other hand. An uneven smile tilted her mouth.