Dawson Bride (Wolf Brides Book 3) (20 page)

He swung fiery eyes on Luke and a vein throbbed at his temple. “Dammit, Dawson, what am I supposed to do with this one?”

Luke shrugged like he couldn’t care less as long as the answer wasn’t
arrest me
. “She’s Gable’s mate. She’s one of us, Hawkins. She’s an innocent who caught the fancy of a bad man with a big reach. We’re open to suggestions.”

“Where’s Gable?”

“Escorting a tribe of Ute to the reservation.”

The sheriff’s exasperated expression for each Dawson in turn was almost humorous. “Do you boys have your hands in everything around here?”

“Well,” Luke drawled. “It ain’t like we go lookin’ for trouble.”

Sheriff Hawkins snorted. “Every time one of you brings home a new wife, there’s bloodshed.”

Luke’s smile was predatory. “We like our women challenging.”

Kristina finished tying the laces to my dress and my knees buckled. Sitting down wasn’t exactly what I meant to do, but I think I pulled it off well. I grabbed the bowl of potatoes and plopped a blob on my plate. The table stared at me like I’d turned into a fruit tree.

“Would you mind terribly if I kept this?” I held up the poster. “I haven’t any pictures of myself and I’m sure Gable would love to carry this around in his pocket.”

The sheriff barked a surprised laugh and rubbed his face like he hadn’t slept in a long time. “Daisy, I swear if you ever get yourself on a wanted poster, I’m gonna buy you a horse and make you ride it.”

“You could try,” she grumbled.

“Let me see that.” Kristina snatched the poster out of my hand and squinted at it. “It don’t look nothin’ like you.”

“It’s a little off,” Sheriff Hawkins amended, “which is why I think you’ve avoided the townspeople sending a telegram and outing you. The description of your hair at the bottom’s gonna give you away sooner or later though. This Bastrop fellow—how dangerous is he?”

“Very. Or at least he was in England. I assume he has important contacts here too, or how else would he finagle a wanted poster on a charge that’s only evidence against me is that I survived?”

Sheriff Hawkins sighed and took an offered plate of hot rolls from my hand. “So what’s the end game here, Dawson? Are you going to get him to trial or kill him?”

Luke took his hand from his pistol and joined us at the table. “Both.”

Lucianna

I traced the fine grain of the wooden wall beside Kristina’s guest bed with the tip of my finger. I wasn’t sleepy at all after the disturbing dinner conversation earlier this evening. Round and round my mind went on plans of how not only to survive Ralston, but how to protect my new family as well.

A soft knock wrapped on the door and I pulled the blanket up to cover my shift. “Come in.”

Luke opened the door, muttering, “If you bite her, I’m gonna shoot you my damned self.”

My huge, snow colored wolf loped into the bedroom. His nails clicked across the floorboards as he approached the bed.

“Night,” Luke said before the door snapped quietly closed behind him.

“Goodnight.” I didn’t say it loudly but it was enough he’d be able to hear. Gable sat and watched me with a clear, liquid blue gaze.

“Is he okay?” I asked.

He ducked his head and pressed his nose under my arm. I ran my fingers through the thick fur at his neck and closed my eyes as I bathed in the relief that came with being near him. “I missed you.”

He whined and licked my forearm once before he bounded over me. The bed caved noisily under his weight and he flopped down beside me. He inhaled and released and explosive sigh before his eyes closed. Fine, snow colored hairs outlined his dark eyelids, and I traced a fingertip up the soft fur that led from his nose to between his eyes. Twitching, his ears seemed to pick up a hundred things I probably couldn’t hear and I leaned closer and rested my head on the pillow beside him. The rise and fall of his chest slowed and his muscles relaxed.

And in no time at all, in the shadows of night with the one who kept me safe and warm, sleep found me, too.

****

I don’t know where Gable found his clothes, but the next morning when I woke, he was watching me from a rocking chair in the corner. He’d even managed to find time to shave. When I looked at bright morning sunlight streaming through the window it was apparent why.

“Why’d you let me sleep so late?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

“You seemed like you needed the rest.”

“Did you see Oupita?”

His eyes darkened. “Yes. Are you angry?”

I waited for anger but it didn’t come. Nothing came. “No. She’s the mother of your child and you’ll always worry over her. The boy’s safety depends on hers so I understand.”

“They’re safe on reservation land. Or as safe as they can get, I suppose.”

“Were you scared?”

He nodded. “I thought I wouldn’t be able to get to him in time.”

“Like with Bryant?”

Another nod.

I handed him the folded wanted poster from the night stand.

“What’s this?”

“A picture of me, so anytime you need to run off into the night, you’ll have something to remember me by.”

He opened it excitedly like I’d actually drawn a picture of myself for him, but an expression of shock and rage filtered across his features when he saw what it was. “Ralston?”

“Yep. Sheriff brought it by yesterday.

With a tilt to his head he said, “You look a lot prettier than your wanted poster.”

I squeezed my eyes closed and shrugged my shoulders. “Flatterer.”

“Well, okay. We knew he’d catch up at some point so maybe it’s time we take matters into our own hands. Control the situation a little better. He was a good hunter in England, but America’s different. America has packs of werewolves.” The fire in his eyes said he was hatching a plan that I likely wouldn’t appreciate. “Go on get dressed. I need to go talk to Luke and Jeremiah.”

When I emerged into the early afternoon sunlight, which successfully singed my eyes, the Dawson brothers were nowhere to be seen. The distant sound of gunfire was a little unsettling, so I asked Kristina about it. She sat on the front porch, sweating freely as she churned butter.

“They’re target shooting. It’s a nasty habit to let get rusty.” She stopped mid-churn and lit up like a lightning bolt. “You should go beg a lesson. Lorelei and I know how to shoot and the ability has come in handy more times than I can count out here.”

“Will they be mad if I interrupt their, you know, man time?”

“No. Gable should’ve already put a gun in your hand before now anyway. Go on.”

Slinging pistols wasn’t something they taught in finishing school. In fact, other than Kristina and Lorelei, I hadn’t ever met another woman who shot pistols or even carried knives around in the pockets of their dresses. I stumbled on the last porch step and hobbled for the noise of gunfire.

It was quite apparent I was slowly morphing into a man.

Through the woods I stalked until I came to a meadow. Luke and Jeremiah reloaded matched pistols while Gable took shots at a trio of wooden targets they’d set up. He flicked his wrist until the pistol pointed and the sky and turned. The white of his smile against tanned skin was enthralling.

“You want to shoot?” he asked.

Luke jerked his head. “Don’t be shy around the weapons. We’ll teach you how to handle ’em safely.”

Gable put the metal in my hand and it nearly dropped my arm to the table. It was much heavier than it looked.

“This here’s a single action Colt Navy revolver. We used these in the war and it’s still my pistol of choice. Now, this is a six shot. It’s important to remember that. Always keep a tally in your head, Lucianna. Knowing how many shots another man has could mean the difference between life and death.”

I jumped as Luke stood beside me and rattled gunfire into the targets, using the palm of his passive hand to slam the hammer back between rounds. He didn’t miss a one.

“Six shots. Right.”

Gable moved around me and held my arms up straight in front. “When you get ready to pull that trigger, hold your breath so you don’t move, and lightly pull it back like your touching the side of my face. Look down the sight. Close your left eye, that’s right. And when you have it lined up, gently squeeze that trigger.”

The sound was thunderous and the gun recoiled in my hand like an angry rattle snake. Through the terror, the smoke cleared and I squinted at the target.

“She hit it,” Luke whooped. “I bet you won’t hit it the second time though. You’ll be anticipating that recoil and you’ll jerk it.”

Jeremiah rolled his eyes and slammed the cylinder in place on his own pistol. “Don’t listen to him.”

“You want to bet she misses?” Luke said as he shoved another six rounds into his gun.

“Stop putting pressure on her, you dipweed,” Gable grumbled.

“I’ll bet you I hit it,” I said bravely. Someone should put Luke in his place at some point.

“Oh, yeah? What’ll you bet?”

“I’ll brush out your horse for a week if I miss.”

Amusement danced in Gable’s eyes as his glance bounced from me to Luke and back again.

Luke asked, “And what do I have to do if you hit it?”

****

I sat happily on the porch with Kristina and Lorelei, blowing on a steaming metal coffee mug when Luke appeared out of the barn. He wore a pretty red dress with no laces in the back to save him from ripping it. The hem came up to his knees.

Kristina sipped the steaming brew with a half-cocked grin. “Now, how’d you get him to wear my dress during mornin’ chores again?”

Luke did a fine attempt at a curtsy as he hauled buckets to the water pump.

“He said I couldn’t hit a target twice and I did. Of course he didn’t specify which one, and the entirety of the thing was the size of the broad side of the barn, so my aim wasn’t exactly on but it was good enough to win the bet.”

Kristina’s giggle was downright wicked. “You’d make a pretty woman,” she called.

I snorted. A pretty bearded woman. The man hadn’t shaved in three days, at least.

Gable whistled from the roof of our nearly finished house and waggled his eyebrows. “Lookin’ good, little sister.”

I couldn’t hear exactly what Luke grumbled but it sounded suspiciously like,
shut up
.

Even Jeremiah sported a grin that stretched from ear to ear as he hopped the steps and kissed Lorelei. “Y’all come on in. I need to talk at you.”

We sat at the wooden dining table except for Luke, who stood with his hands on his hips in a way that clashed his masculinity with the feminine dress.

“Take that dress off,” Jeremiah said. “I can’t take you seriously in that get-up.”

Kristina pouted but her husband disappeared down the hallway and reappeared in his western garb again. Gable leaned back on two legs of his chair and draped an arm around my shoulders as Jeremiah began.

“We need to figure out what we’re going to do about Ralston. We can’t just sit on this forever. The longer we wait, the greater the chance he’ll show up on our land, and we can’t have that.”

My insides revolted at the thought of him here, and I agreed. “No, we can’t. He’s a fan of burning homes. There’s been enough fire on this land to last a lifetime. He can’t make it this far.”

“Let’s use Lucianna as bait,” Luke said.

Gable leaned forward until all four legs of the ladder backed hickory chair were on the floor again. “I don’t like that.”

“How else do you suppose we draw him where we want him?”

“I said I don’t like it. I didn’t say no.”

All right, my heart was going to gallop right out of my chest. I raised my hand tentatively. “What’s the bait supposed to do?”

Gable picked apart a scrap piece of paper with a distracted furrow to his brow. “You’ll stay where we designate and lure him in.” His eyes drifted to his brothers in turn. “Then we’ll kill him.”

I swallowed hard. “Where?”

It was Jeremiah who answered. “Up near the pass, there’s an open clearing half way up the mountain. It’ll leave her easily visible and well away from the homestead. That’s where those outlaws were hiding that we hunted down. They damn near killed us but this time it’ll be different. We’ll be the ones who know the area.”

Lorelei had been quiet with her arms crossed over her still flat stomach. “There’s still the problem of the wanted poster. If you just kill him, she’ll still be dragged to trial eventually, and the man who really killed her family will be dead and unable to confess.”

“He wouldn’t ever confess in a trial,” I assured them.

“No, but he’d confess to you,” Kristina said as she turned to me. “If he’s as terrible as all this, he won’t be able to resist rubbing it in your face that he won. All you need is a couple of witnesses to attest to it.”

“Okay.” I rubbed my bleary eyes and rested my cheek on my palm. “How will we get him out onto the mountains? We have to figure out a way to let him know where I am in a way that doesn’t spook him. He can’t send men to do it this time. We need him to come thinking he needs to finish the job himself.”

Gable kissed the back of my hand. “That’s where Sheriff Hawkins comes in. I think it’s time we pay him a visit.”