"You're either going to have to teach me to ride or find a saddle for two," Evie complained from her position behind Tyler. She shifted her arms around him as she tried to find a comfortable seat.
"The thought of you on a horse by yourself gives me the shivers, Mrs. Monteigne. I'll think about the saddle first."
She pinched him through his shirt, and Tyler laughed. It felt good to laugh again. He felt as if an immense burden had been lifted from his shoulders. He couldn't remember the last time he'd slept, but the knowledge that Evie was behind him sent energy singing through his veins. He could conquer mountains the way he felt this morning.
But it wasn't a mountain kicking up dust down the trail in front of them. If it was Tom and his gang of thieves, they were in a mountain of trouble instead, but Tyler tried not to let Evie sense this. Tom ought to be in the sheriff's custody by now. And after their hiding place was blown to pieces, the thieves ought to be halfway to Kansas. That line of dust represented trouble of a different sort, he suspected.
It didn't take long for recognizable shapes to ride out of the dust. Tyler brought his horse to a halt, checked that his gun was within reach, and wrapped his big hand around the small one at his waist. "Here they come, Evie. This is your last chance to get rid of me."
He felt her teeth nip into his shoulder and smiled. She had her claws into him deep, and he ought to be shaking her free. For her own good, he ought to push her out of his life. But he was a selfish bastard and he didn't intend to give her up without a fight. After five long years of ambling peaceably through life, he was ready for a knock-down, teeth-spitting battle.
The sheriff led the pack. Right behind him rode Jason and Kyle Harding. Tyler frowned at the strangers behind them, the ones riding next to the lawyer, Hale. They looked surly and half-drunk. He could guess whose side they were on. His gaze drifted to the stragglers in the pack: Peyton and the real preacher from the church, quite a combination.
"There he is! Arrest that man, Sheriff. I told you to keep him away from the lady. My word, if he's molested her in any way..." Hale signaled for his cronies to move in.
Tyler had his gun in hand and aimed at Hale before the strangers could pull out of the pack or draw on him. He rested it calmly against his saddle horn as he met the sheriff's gaze. "I thought we'd come to an understanding last night, Powell. What is it you want now?"
Powell lifted his big shoulders against his tight shirt. "Hale says you're a danger to Mrs. Peyton. Claims he brought her out here for her protection until the two of them can get married." He threw a look at Evie peering from beneath Tyler's arm, not looking any too frightened.
Tyler shifted his position so Evie could see around him. The glitter of his eyes was decidedly dangerous as he looked down at her. "Is that right, Mrs. Peyton? Am I keeping you from your nuptials?"
She dug her thumb into the sensitive spot beneath his arm and made him twitch. "Actually, Mr. Monteigne," she answered sweetly, "these gentlemen are interfering with my plans. But since they so kindly brought the preacher along, perhaps that situation can be rectified. Reverend, my husband and I want to confirm our vows. Can you do that for us?"
Hale shouted in fury, and while confusion reigned, his surly companions moved in for the kill. The one closest to Tyler raised his gun, but it went flying out of his hand before he could pull the trigger. He screamed with pain and grabbed his wrist.
Tyler aimed at the other two thieves and their gun belts went skittering into the dust as their horses reared. Fighting to keep their seats, they had no time and little thought for retrieving their weapons.
Returning his smoking gun to its original position on his saddle horn, Tyler turned an unpleasant smile back to the lawyer. "You were saying, Mr. Hale?"
While the Hardings closed in on the would-be assailants, keeping them from retrieving their weapons, Hale turned his rage to the sheriff.
"You can't let him do this! He's keeping an innocent young girl from her home and family. All he wants is Miss Howell's money!"
The name Howell instantly swung the attention of both Hardings to the couple on the horse. "Howell?" they echoed each other.
Evie smiled at them a trifle shyly. "Evangeline Peyton Howell. I was afraid of being murdered in my sleep if I gave my full name."
"Evangeline..." Jason choked on the name and turned a glare to Hale. "Howell?" The word was more demand than question.
Hale swallowed nervously. "I only just found out. She's been leading me a merry chase."
"And that's why you brought the good reverend out here? To end the chase?" The elder of the Hardings was wound up now. He inched his horse closer to the quivering lawyer. "You were going to use us to make her marry you? Just when did you mean to tell us who she was? After the wedding? When you owned half our ranch?"
Kyle grabbed the terrified lawyer's collar and lifted him bodily from the saddle. He silenced Hale's screech of terror with a shake. "What'll we do with him, big brother?"
"Put him down, Kyle," Tyler called wearily. "We'll need him to straighten out the god-awful mess he's created. Evie and I don't want your damned ranch. We just want to get back to the kids."
Peyton spurred his horse up next to Powell's. "My daughter is in need of a legal husband, Sheriff. I suggest we get the lot of them back to town and see that she has one before the day is out.
Comprende
?"
Having spent a long sleepless night himself, the sheriff was only too willing to turn his horse back to town. He only glanced to Evie for assurance.
"Are the children all right?" she inquired, seemingly unfazed by the snarling men surrounding her.
"If you call blowing up half the damned town all right, sure." The sheriff swung his horse around and started home.
Tyler watched with a frown as the thieves made a hasty departure in the opposite direction. They would have to round up those three one of these days, but it didn't have to be now. Squeezing the arms wrapped around his waist, he set off after the shouting, squabbling men in front of them.
* * *
"I'd be a damned sight better husband for her than you are, Monteigne," Kyle grumbled as he straightened his tie with the use of the mirror over the bar.
"Yeah, and then you'd own three-quarters of the ranch and would probably try to drive me out." Jason spread his long legs across the barroom floor and examined his boot toes. "At least Monteigne won't stay put long enough to cause me any trouble."
"I don't want your damned ranch," Tyler repeated wearily, for the thousandth time this day. "Right now I've got half a saloon, half a damned livery, and half a wife. I don't need half a ranch, too."
The Hardings ignored him. "It would be good to have a woman around the house again," Kyle said. "The place is beginning to look like a derelict barn."
"And we still need a schoolteacher. Monteigne will most likely cart her out of here before the dust settles." Jason bent to polish a speck of dirt on his boots.
Sighing, Tyler slammed a deck of cards on the bar. "All right. High card wins Evie. And the kids. And her father. And Daniel. And hell, why not half the saloon and Starr and the damned livery? I'll just shuck the whole damned place off my heels if I lose."
Kyle stared at him in horror. "The kids? You mean those hellions come with her? They blew up half a damned town, Monteigne! Nobody's going to touch those kids."
"Actually, Daniel did that," a new voice answered laconically.
The men at the bar turned their attention to the black man and the boy studying their cards unobtrusively at a table by the wall. The boy with the crutch leaning on his chair reddened.
"Daniel blew that hole down the middle of the street?" Tyler stopped worrying at the frills of his cuff and stared.
Ben shrugged and discarded a card. "He threw the dynamite. Would have sailed right out into the street and just made a little bang if the bastards hadn't tried to block the door with hay. Then Jose knocked over the lantern, and one thing led to another..." He shrugged again and went back to his game.
Evie chose that moment to sail into the saloon and catch Ben's words. Smiling, she wrapped her arms around Daniel's neck and hugged. "The boys told me everything. He's a hero. He saved them all. And saved the bank, too. The sheriff said Tom and his gang were planning to tunnel into the bank and steal all our money. They would have done it, too, if Daniel hadn't stopped them."
Tyler cleared his throat rather loudly. "I don't suppose I get any credit for keeping Tom tied up at the saloon while Daniel worked his dastardly deeds?"
Magnanimous in her approval, Evie released Daniel—much to his obvious relief—and sailed into Tyler's arms. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled his head down and kissed him soundly. Then she stepped back, crossed her arms, and glared at him. "Why aren't you over at the church? The preacher is waiting."
"Because your stepbrothers here can't decide who gets to be your husband." Tyler threw the Hardings a disgruntled look and straightened the cravat Evie had loosened.
Wide sloe eyes turned an incredulous look in the Hardings' direction.
Kyle stepped back and held out his palms. "Don't look at me. I was just interested in keeping the peace. What would I do with a passel of kids?"
Tyler caught Evie's waist and steered her toward the door. "Besides, she lies and cheats at cards. Better leave her to me."
Evie balked. "I do not cheat at cards, Tyler Monteigne! I don't even know how to play."
Tyler looked down at her calmly. "Yes, you do, too, Evangeline Monteigne. You stood right there and smiled every time Dorset had a bad hand and frowned every time he had a good one. That's cheating."
Evie scowled. "Ben called them kings and queens, but they all looked like knaves to me. They weren't wearing any clothes, Tyler! I didn't like it when those cards showed up."
Tyler stared down at her with dawning understanding, fighting to keep the laughter from boiling up inside of him. Cautiously, he turned to Daniel who was watching this display with an amazing lack of expression.
The boy shrugged at the inquiry in Tyler's eyes. "Nanny wouldn't let us play cards. She said they were the devil's playthings."
"She didn't know they were high cards?" Tyler still couldn't believe he was hearing this right. This whole damned adventure had set out on the assumption that Evie was something she was not. Why did he have such a hard time believing that?
"She doesn't even know what a high card means. But we know what card cheats are. We read about them in..."
"... In a Pecos Martin book." Tyler finished the sentence with him, throwing up his arms in defeat. "I give up. I'm marrying into a family of lunatics." He punched Daniel's shoulder. "The preacher's waiting. You're standing up with me, remember?"
Sheepishly, the boy grasped his crutch and pulled himself up. "I wasn't sure you meant it. I mean, Ben ought to be the one..."
Tyler looked at the black man rising from the other chair. "Ben's the one who ought to be giving me away." Tyler pulled out the sheaf of papers he'd won from Dorsett and shoved them into Ben's hand. "But he's going back to Natchez."
Catching Evie's arm, Tyler began dragging her from the saloon. They only made it as far as the boardwalk outside before Ben caught up with them.
He jerked Tyler backward, shoving the papers in his pocket. "What in hell am I supposed to do with the damned place if you ain't goin' back?"
Tyler pulled his arm free. "Burn it to the ground for all I care. Sharecrop it. Put all your industrious relatives to work. It doesn't make up for your sister or pay what I owe you, but it's a start." He started to walk away.
Ben grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around. "That was your daddy's place. You can't do this."
Tyler met Ben's dark gaze with aplomb. "It was your daddy's place, too."
Evie and Daniel stood out of the way, their gazes flying back and forth between the two men, one black and lanky and possessed of a singularly unhandsome face, the other golden and compact and blessed with all God could give a man. Yet there was a resemblance there, if only in the proud way they held themselves and the independence of their thinking.
Ben scowled. "He was maybe my father. My mama wasn't a discriminating woman and your father was a philandering man. But he wasn't Cissie's father. You know that, don't you? And what happened to Cissie weren't any fault of yours."
"I left her, Ben." Tyler shrank into the shadows of the porch, away from the stares of the people he had come to love and respect. "I walked out on her when she needed me. The babe was mine, and the fault was mine. Tell your mama I'm sorry, and I'm trying to be a better man."
Ben swung around to meet Evie's concerned gaze. "He was seventeen years old, Miss Evie. My sister kept after him, followed him everywhere. There ain't a boy that age can resist a willin' woman. Cissie was young, but she knew what she was doin', and she was more than willin'. Tyler was grievin' over his father's death, and she took advantage. She only told him they'd made a baby just afore he left to find his brother. There wasn't nothin' he could have done different if he'd stayed. She would have died birthin' that baby no matter what he done. It ain't any of his fault. Make him understand that, will you?"