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And yet, a quiet voice inside his head whispered, Here comes trouble, and the cynic he’d become paid close attention.
Chapter Two
“Gideon Fox?” Her voice floated toward him on the slightest hint of a breeze.
How’d she know my name? he asked himself, stunned.
Gideon spoke not a word while the woman moved gracefully toward him. When she came close enough for him to make out her facial features, which were surrounded by that shiny mass of flame-gold hair, the astonishing sight of her stole his breath right out of his lungs. Alert golden eyes, rimmed with a thick fringe of black lashes, focused intently on him. She had a creamy complexion, a pert nose and plump pink lips ripe for kissing.
Hell and damn! He couldn’t recall another time in his life when he’d been so awed by the sight of a woman. He couldn’t seem to look away, just stood there wondering if he had set off a trip wire, died and ended up on the spiritual pathway to the Osage Afterlife and didn’t know it yet.
“Are you real?” Clem chirped, obviously as hypnotized as Gideon by the unexplained appearance of the bewitching creature that had materialized out of nowhere.
She glanced at Clem for a half second then fixed those captivating golden eyes on Gideon and said, “My name is Lorelei Russell and I need your assistance, Marshal Fox.”
The fairy-tale image shattered like broken glass. Gideon had heard that name the previous day in marshal camp. A messenger had arrived to alert the lawmen that a woman had murdered her lover then fled into the rugged Osage Hills. Apparently, she hadn’t realized the network of information passed quickly among the roaming bands of deputy marshals who patrolled Indian Territory.
If she thought to attach herself to him, after cleverly making use of the fog and sunlight to bewitch him, then she thought wrong. No matter how lovely and captivating she was—and she definitely was—she wasn’t getting her hooks into Gideon Fox. His hardscrabble life had taught him to be wary and suspicious. Dealing with ruthless criminals made him excessively cynical and cautious. Gideon wasn’t falling into her trap, either.
To ensure Pecos Clem couldn’t escape, Gideon double-checked the ropes that held the outlaw to the saddle. He’d be damned if he let himself be distracted by sinful temptation at its best—or worst, depending on how you looked at it. He did not intend to lose one prisoner while capturing another.
“What can I do for you, Miz Russell?” Gideon asked as nonchalantly as he knew how.
“I would like for you to escort me to my father’s trading post near Winding River so I can clear up a misunderstanding and track down a murderer who killed my friend.”
So she planned to use him as her protective shield, did she? He wasn’t surprised. Half the people in this world expected him to do favors for them. With the exception of his two younger brothers and his sister-in-law, he amended. Then again, even they could become demanding on occasion.
The other half of the population tried to avoid him before he hauled them to Judge Parker’s federal court.
“I’m in the middle of an arrest, Mizz Russell.” He turned directly to face her—and wished he hadn’t. The woman looked like she should be against the law and her effect on him was staggering. Gideon tried exceptionally hard to pretend indifference but it wasn’t easy.
She shifted her weight from one booted foot to the other, drawing his unwilling attention to the curve of her hips and her long, shapely legs. “Couldn’t you leave your prisoner with other marshals? I know your mobile headquarters and jail wagon must be around here somewhere.”
“I could,” he acknowledged. “But I’m nine miles west of headquarters.”
She nodded pensively, causing a riot of red-gold curlicue strands of hair to bobble around her exquisite face. “I’ll fetch my horse. After we drop off your prisoner we can head west.”
Gideon had no reason to mistrust her intentions—and no reason not to. “I’ll go with you to retrieve your mount,” he insisted as he tethered the gray horse to a tree. “Clem isn’t going anywhere until I get back.”
Letting Lorelei lead the way wasn’t such a good idea, Gideon decided a moment later. The seductive sway of her hips hypnotized him. Worse, he found himself speculating how this wicked, murdering angel looked naked.
He could picture that curly mane of flame-gold hair spilling over the grass as he settled himself exactly above her. He could imagine the feel of those well-proportioned legs hooked around his waist as he buried himself inside her and fell into the depths of those thick-lashed golden eyes. It would be like flying into the blistering heat of the sun….
The erotic thought blazed through his mind and scorched his body, leaving it sizzling with forbidden desire. Ruthlessly, Gideon ignored the tingling sensations and reminded himself that no matter how appealing this sinful angel was, she had murdered her lover.
The only reason he’d reacted so fiercely to her was that he’d been away from women too long. His forays to capture criminals in Indian Territory—that encompassed seventy thousand square miles—usually lasted six weeks. He’d been in the wilderness for five weeks. Any female would look good to him by now, he tried to convince himself.
Unfortunately, this particular woman possessed excessive feminine appeal. The fact that Lorelei had murdered her last lover and wanted Gideon to get her off, scot-free, should have repelled him. But it didn’t, damn it.
“What are you doing out here alone?” Gideon asked as she hiked up the hillside.
“I’m hiding from the two men chasing after me.”
An honest lady outlaw? Interesting. He wondered what her angle was. Everyone had an angle, after all. There was always a catch, always a trap. A man had to stay on his toes to avoid tripping himself up.
“Why are they chasing you?” he asked—as if he didn’t know.
“Because they were ordered to do so by the person who mistakenly thought I committed a crime. Which I didn’t,” she said emphatically as she led the way up a rocky ridge.
“Uh-huh,” he mumbled neutrally.
She approached the sturdy strawberry roan gelding that looked to be too high-spirited for a woman to handle. Apparently, Lorelei Russell could handle men and horses with the same degree of skill—and he better not let himself forget that. Instinct and intuition had warned him at first sight that she was trouble. Sure enough, he’d been right.
The instant she turned her back to reach for the horse’s reins Gideon pounced. He snaked his arm around her waist and slammed her curvaceous body against his, entrapping her. Instant awareness shot through his body when she squirmed against him in a fierce effort to escape. He was doing a fine job of holding on to his alluring captive and controlling a flaming case of lust until she gouged her elbow into his chest with such force that he couldn’t draw breath. Then she kicked him in the knee—and she would have landed a disabling blow to his crotch if he hadn’t reacted instinctively by jackknifing his body and spinning away.
Growling, Gideon recoiled, then lunged at her when she squirmed from his arms and tried to leap onto her horse. He launched himself through the air and tackled her around the knees before she stuffed a booted foot in the stirrup. She yelped when he forced her facedown on the ground and crawled atop her. She spat out a mouthful of gravel and dirt and cursed him soundly as she tried to buck him off.
“So much for the angelic image you tried to project, hellion,” he growled at the back of her curly head, while she wormed and wriggled ineffectively beneath him.
“What is the matter with you!” she yelled at him.
“There’s a warrant out for your arrest and a price on your head. I’m arresting you for murder,” he snapped as he rolled her to her back and pinned her wrists to the ground.
Wide amber eyes swept up as her full breasts heaved from exertion. Gideon noticed the second button on her shirt had come undone during their scuffle. Before his overly active imagination ran away with itself—again—he retrieved the spare set of handcuffs that hung on his double holster.
“How did you know about that already?” Lori panted as he snapped the metal bracelets in place.
“I’m a Deputy U.S. Marshal and I’m half Osage. I know all and see all. I can sure as hell see you for what you are,” he muttered as he hauled her abruptly to her feet.
This could not be happening! Lori thought in dismay. She had come to Gideon Fox for help and he had turned on her without giving away the fact that he knew who she was. He had been waiting to pounce on her, damn him.
“Nice horse,” he complimented as he picked her up and tossed her onto the saddle. “Did you steal it?”
“No, Drifter is mine. A gift from my father, in fact.”
She glowered at the brawny marshal whose stubbled beard and collar-length raven hair gave him the appearance of the dark angel of doom. His vivid blue eyes missed nothing as he looked her up and down while he retrieved a coil of rope from his back pocket to lash her foot to the stirrup. She was poised to gouge Drifter the instant Gideon circled to restrain her other foot.
“Don’t try it, honey,” he ordered. “You’re wanted dead or alive, just like Pecos Clem Murphy. Apparently you know what it’s like to shoot somebody so you know it’s messy business. I don’t want to have to do that to you unless necessary.”
“You’d shoot an innocent woman?”
His long, thick lashes framed his steady gaze. He focused on her while he secured her foot. “I have before. The innocent part was up for debate.” He stared pointedly at her. “It is now, too.” This was not the kind of man Lori had hoped to contact to help her clear up the horrible misunderstanding that left her running for her life—and now captured. She needed sympathy and compassion. She needed a man with an open-minded attitude.
Instead, she had tangled with this hard-edged, stone-hearted lawman of mixed heritage. The part of him that carried Indian blood probably resented all white intruders on tribal property. She doubted he cared one whit that she and her father had a special trader’s license to sell goods and transport travelers across the river.
In addition, Gideon Fox had taken one cynical look at her and judged her guilty of the charges mistakenly leveled against her. But then, who was she to criticize? she asked herself. She’d only known him fifteen minutes and she disliked him already. Not because he had his booted feet in two separate civilizations. Not because he was rough around the edges, abrupt mannered and didn’t look the least bit sophisticated or dignified. But because he had wrongly misjudged her and he cared only about the reward he could collect when he hauled her and Clem to Fort Smith for trial.
When Gideon bounded up behind her in the saddle, she stiffened. He was whipcord muscle and imposing strength and she resented the feeling of helpless frustration riveting her. She forgot to breathe when he tucked his chin on her shoulder and wrapped both swarthy arms around her to hold her manacled hands to the pommel of the saddle.
He must have sensed her discomfort because he said, “Easy, honey. I’m only making double damn sure you don’t gouge me in the chest and emasculate me with a blow to the crotch. What little virtue you have left is safe with me.”
“I am not now, nor will I ever be your honey,” she snapped, unsettled and annoyed by the betraying sensation of pleasure that having him wrapped around her provoked.
“Nothing but a careless endearment, I assure you,” he breathed against the side of her neck, setting off another round of tingles that had no business whatsoever assailing her when she so disliked this heartless lawman.
“Would you prefer that I call you witch or hellion instead of honey?”
“I would prefer that you release me.” She shifted restlessly in the circle of his sinewy arms. “Get your own horse, Marshal. Drifter doesn’t like having you riding him and I’m not fond of it, either.”
“You don’t want me riding you?” he asked with entirely too much teasing amusement in his rich baritone voice.
Lori was grateful that he couldn’t see the beet-red blush that worked its way up her neck to splash across her face. “Certainly not!”
His rumbling chuckle reverberated through his broad chest and vibrated against her back, increasing her awareness of him to the extreme. “But if you and I rode together, you would expect me to favor you with a quick release from your handcuffs so you could dash off again. Just so you know, I don’t like to be propositioned by lady outlaws.”
“That was as far from a proposition as it could get!” she huffed as she nudged him—hard—with her shoulder. “Give me some space, Fox. I don’t like any man crowding me.”
“Is that why you shot your former lover?”
“I didn’t shoot Tony!” she all but yelled at the infuriating man. “He was bushwhacked and I was nearly a victim caught in the cross fire. In fact, I think maybe you gunned him down to collect a reward.”
“Me? Hell and damn, woman. I was nowhere near the west side of Osage reservation. I’ve been tracking Pecos Clem.”
“Well then, if not you specifically, then another glorified executioner for hire whose only concern is the price on a person’s head.”
So there, she thought spitefully as they approached Pecos Clem, who had been secured so effectively he couldn’t have gotten loose if his life depended on it. Now Gideon knew what she thought of bounty hunters wearing the sanctioned labels of Deputy U.S. Marshal. Maybe the marshals who patrolled the territory were the unsung heroes who tried to enforce law and order. But some of them—like Gideon Fox, obviously—were only interested in collecting bounties and relying on decrees of dead or alive to make their job easier.
“If you think I’ll sit here and endure a lecture from a feisty, smart-mouthed murderess then you’re wrong,” he growled in her ear. “You can tell your story to Judge Parker. I’m not the least bit interested in what you have to say. My job is to bring you in. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
“But I need to return to the trading post to reassure my father that I’m all right,” she protested hotly. “That is the very least you can do.”
“I’ll send him a note…if I get around to it.”
“That will not suffice,” she snapped at him. “The real murderer is running loose. He might have killed Tony for the bounty on his head.”
“Your former lover was an outlaw? Why am I not surprised.”
“I don’t know if he was or not,” she muttered, exasperated. “Tony was secretive about his past and I’ve been wondering if he’d had a brush with the law and hid out in the territory. He might have been using an alias, for all I know. But what I do know is that he was nice to me. It’s up to you to find out the truth. And for your information, he wasn’t my lover. He wanted to marry me and I—”
Lori dragged in a steadying breath. The awful scene exploded in her mind’s eye and the horrid memory of watching Tony collapse after the sniper shot him, while trying to shield her from harm, bombarded her with killing force. She choked back a sob, refusing to dissolve into tears in front of this hard-hearted marshal.
No doubt, he’d think she was putting on an act to milk his sympathy. As if he had a sympathetic bone in his powerful body—one that he pressed up against her as if he were her own shadow.
“He wanted to marry you so you shot him?” he remarked caustically. “You could have just said no.”
“Damn it, Fox. You are an ass!” she sniped furiously and blinked back the tormenting tears that threatened to destroy her crumbling composure.
“And you are a cold-blooded killer,” he said in a steely voice. “If there’s such a thing as a femme fatale, you’re it.”
“You are going to be eternally sorry when you discover that I’m telling the truth. I lost a dear friend to an unknown assailant.”
“Right,” he said, and smirked.
It was pure torment for Gideon to use his body to surround his alluring captive. With each movement of the horse beneath him, he could feel Lori’s rounded rump brushing provocatively against his crotch. He could smell the appetizing scent of her body and it threatened to cloud his senses the same way the fog clogged the Osage Hills.
The sooner he delivered this sinfully seductive siren and Pecos Clem, the horse thief, to headquarters the happier he’d be. She could spout her lies nonstop, but Gideon wouldn’t fall prey to them—or her. He’d heard hundreds of convoluted claims in his day. The jail in Fort Smith was teeming with inmates who shouted their innocence to high heaven. They lied through their teeth—anything to ensure they could escape justice.
Gideon glanced at Clem, who was still secured to the horse and the tree. He veered right and breathed a gigantic sigh of relief when he reached the spot where he’d left his horse, Pirate. The black-and-white pinto-and-Appaloosa crossbreed had a patch of black around his right eye—hence the name. Gideon was exceptionally fond of his well-trained, reliable mount. Like himself, Pirate was of mixed breeding. The spirited stud was part of the prize herd Gideon and his brothers, Galen and Glenn, raised on their combined properties near Heartstrings River.
Ignoring his thoughts, Gideon dismounted Lori’s horse but kept a firm grip on the reins in case she tried to thunder off and force him to chase her down. He suspected she was skilled at losing herself in the wild tumble of mountains and rock-filled ravines in the Osage Hills.
Which is why the two-man posse chasing her had no luck overtaking her, he reminded himself.
However, Gideon had grown up in the Osage Hills and he’d tracked hundreds of outlaws across Indian Territory. He was damn good at his job, even if he did say so himself. His reputation preceded him. It provided him with an edge because most outlaws thought twice about crossing him. Of course, there were those—most of them dead and buried—who challenged him to back up his threats.
That wasn’t to say Gideon hadn’t been shot up, shot down and knifed on occasion—especially when the odds were stacked against him. Yet, by the grace of God and the Indian deities that were part of his culture, he was still alive and kicking.
“Nice horse,” Lori said when Gideon grabbed Pirate’s reins. “Did you steal him?”
“Very funny, hellion,” he muttered when she threw his sarcastic comment back in his face.
“Did you take the stallion as a trophy of war from a dead man, perhaps?” she asked flippantly.
Gideon slung his leg over the saddle then moved Pirate beside Drifter so he could check Lori’s saddlebag. “Wha’d ya know,” he drawled as he retrieved the pistol stashed in the leather pouch. He spun the cylinder to find one cartridge missing. “You must be a fair shot if you plugged your former lover with one bullet. I’ll remember that.”
“For the last time, I did not shoot Anthony Rogers,” she growled at him, her golden eyes flashing like hot sparks. “And yes, I am a skilled markswoman. Hand me the pistol and I’ll show you how accurate I am when provoked—”
He arched a brow and smiled wryly when she slammed her mouth shut so fast she nearly bit off her tongue. “That’s as good as a confession in my book, honey.”
When she sputtered furiously, he smothered a grin. He had to hand it to this fiery minx. She had spirit galore. Gideon appreciated that in his horse. He hadn’t thought he’d appreciate it quite so much in a woman. But he did, even though he really didn’t want to admire any qualities in this particular female. He was unwillingly attracted to her already.
That was more than enough to shatter his peace of mind.
He’d wrestled her to the ground, sprawled on top of her luscious body and shared a horse with her while she sat between his legs and in the circle of his arms. Being close to her had a disturbingly arousing effect on all his senses. His sixth sense included—the one that had helped him cheat death on several occasions. Now it warned him that this woman was a serious threat to him so he’d better watch out.
Leading Lori behind him—and checking over his shoulder at irregular intervals, just in case—he trotted over to retrieve Pecos Clem. The outlaw was overly distracted. Clem was staring blatantly at Lori’s enchanting face and her arresting feminine assets. For the life of him, Gideon didn’t know why Clem’s devouring gaze annoyed him. Gideon took up a position between his two prisoners so Clem couldn’t ogle Lori constantly.
“What’s your crime, sugar?” Clem drawled as he leaned around Gideon to give Lori the once-over again. “Being too damn pretty for your own good?”
To Lori’s credit, she met Clem’s leering gaze and said, “No, I was accused of killing the last man who looked at me the wrong way.”
Gideon concealed his laughter behind a cough when Clem shot her a glare and resettled himself in the saddle.
“I’d like a private word with you, Marshal, when we stop for a break,” she requested.
“I don’t schedule breaks.” He picked up the pace. “Camp is two hours away…if we set a fast clip.”
She scowled at him, but he ignored her as he trotted across the meadow and headed for the rugged hills.
