The Bounty Hunter's Bride

“You live up here?” he asked.

With a shake of her head that sent her hair tumbling into her eyes, she said, “I live halfway down the mountain in a little town called Hawk Hollow. I came up here to be by myself. It’s lucky for you my father and brothers are such narrow-minded fools.”

Kane didn’t come close to following her logic. He didn’t see what her father and brothers had to do with him, but he supposed she was right about one thing: He was lucky he’d stumbled upon this cabin when he did. He was lucky the place had been warm, and he was lucky somebody had been here to get him into bed and make him as comfortable as possible. Although he hated to admit it, he supposed he had to admit that he was lucky to be alive.

Studying the narrowness of her shoulders and the thin body underneath the blanket and thick flannel gown, he said, “You must be stronger than you look if you managed to strip a man my size.”

“You are a big one, Kane, that’s for sure. And you’re right. I’m stronger than I look.”

Her smile hit him right between the eyes. He hadn’t realized he’d closed them until he tried to wrestle them open again.

“It’s okay, Kane,” she whispered, placing a hand on his good shoulder. “Relax. That’s it. Just rest and think about the things you like.”

Her hand was warm and narrow and surprisingly soft where it rested on his bare skin. He liked the touch of her hand, and the sound of her voice, and the way she said his name. “I’m afraid I’m at a disadvantage,” he murmured through the darkness swirling toward him from every direction.

“What disadvantage is that?” she whispered.

“You’ve seen me naked and I don’t even know your name.”

“I guess we’re just going to have to even things up a little now, aren’t we?”

His eyes popped open all by themselves. Something that had no business stirring in a dying man stirred low in Kane’s body. His eyes delved hers as she tucked the quilt under his chin.

Holding his gaze, she said, “My name’s Josie McCoy. You didn’t really think I’d strip down right here and now; did you?”

Kane closed his eyes, wondering when his thoughts had become so transparent. “Can’t blame a man for being disappointed.”

“Mister. I mean Kane, I’d be disappointed if you weren’t disappointed.”

His mind was fogging up, making it difficult to concentrate. Just in case he didn’t wake up again, he said, “I don’t know if you saved my life or made dying easier. I owe you either way.”

Moments before the darkness claimed him, her voice came one more time, far, far away. “I’m not going to let you die, Kane, and don’t worry. I have every intention of allowing you to repay me. We might have to do a little bartering. We’ll talk more when you’re stronger.”

Bartering? he thought, slipping into that warm, dark place where there was no pain. Images, erotic, hazy and fanciful, shimmered through his mind. Maybe he was dreaming. No, Kane Slater never dreamed.

Something told him he wasn’t dying, either. And he had Josie McCoy to thank for it. There was obviously more to her than met the eye.

“You’re really a modern-day bounty hunter?”

Kane did his best to keep the growl deep in his throat from escaping. He didn’t nod his head for fear that the razor in Josie’s hands would do serious damage to his face. Not that he would have minded a scar. It was more pain he was trying to avoid.

“Yes,” he grumbled when she lifted the razor from his flesh. “That’s what I said.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean why?” Teeth clenched, he held perfectly still as the razor made a clean pass along the edge of his jaw.

Swishing the razor in a pan of warm water, Josie said, “Why would a man who claims to have an undying devotion to the great plains and majestic mountains of Montana traipse off in the middle of the night to places unknown? Pistol drawn, you kick doors down and get lost in mountains you say aren’t really mountains during blizzards and God only knows what else. My daddy always says everybody’s got a reason for doing what they do. Believe me, he knows what he’s talkin’ about. Why?”

The razor had made four more passes down Kane’s face before he’d figured out what her “why?” pertained to. This time there was no stopping the growl from erupting from his throat.

Two nights ago he’d fleetingly wondered if there might be more to Josie McCoy than met the eye. There was more to her, all right, and every last bit of it was driving him crazy. When she wasn’t singing, she was talking, and when she was talking, she was usually asking questions. She asked them while she was putting wood on the fire, while she stirred something in a big pot on the stove, while she fed him warm broth and sweetened tea. Kane hated sweet tea. He hated talking and singing. He hated answering questions most of all.

He knew better than to bite the hand that fed him. His shoulder still hurt like a son of a gun, but the wound was starting to heal. It was too soon to tell if there’d been any nerve damage, but at least the bullet hadn’t hit a major artery. Still, he’d lost a lot of blood, and it was going to take a while to regain his strength. God help him, he needed his strength to keep from telling Josie what she could do with her tea and her songs and her never-ending string of questions.

“Do you have people frantic with worry over you?” she asked.

“People?”

“You know. A wife, kids, parents.”

The razor landed in the metal pan of water with a loud plop. Leaning back, Kane closed his eyes, listening to the scrape of the pan as she slid it away from her across the wood floor.

“No,” he said. “No wife, no kids, no parents. Karl Kennedy, the head of the bail enforcement agency in Butte is probably wondering whether I’m dead or alive, but he’s wondered that before and won’t get real concerned for another week or two.”

“Is he going to be upset that your bail jumper got away?” Josie asked.

“Not half as upset as I am. This guy wasn’t just a bail jumper. He tried to kill me. Not that I’d ever be able to prove it.”

“Then you didn’t actually see him shoot you?”

“I got my first inkling about the same time the bullet was kissing my shoulder goodbye.”

“That’s not funny,” she murmured, closer to his ear than he’d realized. “Here. Put this over your face for a few minutes.”

She placed a hot, wet towel in his left hand and slowly lifted it to his face. Moist heat seeped into his skin, his groan turning into a deep, contented moan. “Ah, Josie, if you need something to do when you’re a little older, maybe you could bring back the old-fashioned shave.”

“What do you mean when I’m a little older? I’m already a grown woman. Why, back in Hawk Hollow I’m considered an old maid.”

She lifted the towel from his face. He opened his eyes, fighting an uncustomary urge to grin. Josie was leaning over him, her gray eyes flashing, her lips parted in indignation. She had a personality big enough for ten women, but there wasn’t much to the rest of her. Her light blond hair was tied back in a lopsided ponytail. Her skin was unlined and smooth. Without a stitch of makeup, she looked about thirteen.

Shaking his head, he said, “You’re not old enough to be an old maid.”

“I’m twenty-three.”

“You are?”

“I look younger, I, know. I think it’s because I’m on the thin side. Dripping wet I barely weigh a hundred and ten.”

The lift of his eyebrow must have made her feel guilty, because she said, “Okay, a hundred and five.”

Kane didn’t want to think about what she would look like dripping wet. He didn’t want to think about the fact that she was older than she looked and therefore of legal age. He didn’t want to think about how close she was and how alone they were, and, aw, hell. “Josie,” he said, exasperated, “women lie about weighing too much, not too little.”

“I can lie about anything I want to lie about. But I really am twenty-three. How old are you?”

Questions. Always more questions. “Thirty-four.” His answer was thin and hollow and as worn as his patience.

“So, you’re a thirty-four-year-old bounty hunter from Montana. No wife. No kids. No parents. Do you have any brothers or sisters?”

Leaning his head back, he closed his eyes. Maybe if he went to sleep she would stop talking.

“Well, do you?”

Then again, maybe she wouldn’t. “Two brothers. Trace and Spence.”

“Only two? I have four. Billy, James, Roy and J.D. They’re the main reasons I came up here. That, and I wanted a little time to myself to think. Do you ever need time to yourself to think, Kane? What am I saying? You must have all kinds of time to think when you’re not breaking down doors and collecting bounty money. What else do you like to do? Back in Montana, I mean. Just a minute. I’ll be right back.”

She bustled away to the stove where a kettle of water was beginning to boil. Kane welcomed the reprieve. All these questions were making him feel naked. Of course, he was naked.

He was a grown man, yet he’d slept like a baby most of the past two days. He hated being helpless and he hated being weak, but until his shoulder healed and he regained the use of his right arm and he was strong enough to make it down the mountain, he was at Josie’s mercy. The shave, shampoo and bath had been her idea. He was the first to admit they’d felt good, and the first to admit that he was an ornery cuss most of the time. It was an effective tool in holding people at a distance. Josie didn’t seem to mind. Hell, she didn’t even seem to notice.

He could tell by the soft thud of her shoes that she was nearing. Turning his head, he watched as she stopped at the edge of the ancient bathtub and promptly added the water she’d heated on the stove. Before he’d gotten in, she’d stirred some sort of healing agent into the water, making it milky white and impossible to see through. Breathing in the steam rising from the surface of the water, Kane felt himself relaxing. “Okay, Josie,” he said, drowsy from the blessedly warm water. “I can take it from here.”

The sound of her hand gliding through the water brought him instantly wide-awake. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Forgetting his injury, he reached blindly for her hand, only to wince in pain.

“There. See what happens when you try to do things yourself? And I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t swear. It’s not as if you have anything I haven’t seen before. I’m the one who got you out of your clothes the first night you were here, remember? Besides, you’re not the only male I’ve ever seen naked. Billy’s two-year-old runs around with nothing on half the time. Daddy’s always yellin’ for somebody to put some pants on that boy. You’re gonna like my daddy. Just you wait. His name’s Saxon. I swear to God I’m not making that up. Shoot. I just lost the soap. Hold on, I’ll find it.”

Kane was all set to tell her that in case she hadn’t noticed there were a few differences between him and her two-year-old nephew, but her fingers skimmed something that most definitely was not the soap, and he forgot what he was going to say. Josie, on the other hand, didn’t even miss a beat in her story.

“I have to say I don’t think much of their taste in men. Why, my father and brothers want me to marry Obadiah Olson.”

Deciding that for once it might be best to keep her talking until he could get things under control, he said, “Obadiah?”

“Obie for short.”

“And you don’t want to marry Obie?” Kane asked.

“Heavens, no.”

“Do you have a reason?”

“He lies through his tooth.”

Kane surprised himself by laughing. “Then what do you want? If it isn’t to marry Obie and his tooth?”

She brought her hand out of the water, her thumb moving over the soap in a most tantalizing way, wiping out every last bit of progress he’d made below the water’s surface. Her face was close to his, moisture clinging to her cheeks. She was on her knees, her elbows resting on the edge of the bathtub. The top two buttons of her shirt were open, awarding him a clear view of her throat and the delicate ridge of her collarbone. Lower, he could make out the outline of one perfectly shaped breast.

Without conscious thought, he lifted his left hand out of the water and slowly raised it. Her face was so close to his he could hear the sound of her breath catching in her throat. Her eyes were the color of dawn. Her lips were full and moist and unmoving.

Will wonders never cease.

He almost commented on her silence, but his hand came into contact with the soft fabric of her shirt, and he didn’t feel much like talking. A heartbeat later he knew he was going to kiss her. And then his mouth was covering hers. Her lips were warm and soft and the tiniest bit trembly. She kissed him back, but tentatively, as if she wasn’t sure what to do. Kane couldn’t remember the last time he’d kissed a woman who didn’t take over, who didn’t push for more, who simply seemed to savor what was happening at that very moment.

It was a heady sensation, one that wiped out all but the last shreds of coherent thought. Burying his fingers in the loose fabric at her throat, he finally drew away slightly, ending the kiss.

A man had to be careful what he said at a time like this, because there wasn’t a lot of blood left above his shoulders. Breathing deeply, he murmured, “I feel a little sorry for poor Obie.”

The air whooshed out of Josie, the area surrounding her heart turning to mush. She’d been experiencing those butterfly sensations on and off for two days, but she’d been questioning the possibility that she could really have fallen in love with a man she barely knew. She’d begun to wonder if she’d imagined her feelings for him. She wasn’t imagining them now.

She’d known Kane was looking inside her shirt. If he’d been any other man, her first instinct would have been to cover herself. But Kane wasn’t any other man, and she’d held her breath, waiting. When his hand had come out of the water, those old butterflies had fluttered in anticipation of his touch. Rather than touching her breast, he’d kissed her, drawing the lapels of her shirt together at the same time. He might have claimed he was no gentleman, but she knew differently. And she knew, without a doubt, that her love for him was real, which brought her to the brink of what she wanted to say.

Lathering up the washcloth, she smoothed it over his left shoulder, slowly moving it across his chest. His muscles flexed beneath her hand, his voice little more than a husky rasp as he said, “I’ll take it from here, Josie. You’ve already done more than I’ll ever be able to repay.”

She relinquished the washcloth to him, saying, “I’ve been wanting to talk to you about that, Kane.”

His eyes narrowed, his hand stilling. “About what?”

She cleared her throat and swallowed the knot that had formed around her voice box. “About repaying me.”

“You want money?”

She shook her head. “No. But there is something you can do.”

“And what might that be?” His voice had taken on an ominous ring in the silent room.

She’d been rehearsing this for two and a half days. Suddenly she didn’t know how to begin. Calling on the angels for courage, she looked directly into his eyes and said, “I’ve been dreaming of getting off this mountain for as long as I can remember. If what you said is true and you want to repay me, I’d like you to take me with you back to Montana. I could do almost anything you asked. I’m a virgin, but I’m a fast learner.”

Chapter Two

“You’re a what?”

Kane yelled too loud and moved too fast. One hurt his eardrums and the other sent pain shooting through his shoulder. He didn’t care. It beat the wounded look crossing Josie’s face that very instant.

“I’m a fast learner,” she said, lowering her eyes.

That wasn’t what he’d asked her to repeat. She’d said she was a virgin. Come to think of it, he didn’t want her to repeat it. Once had been enough.

Other than a log snapping on the fire, the room was more quiet than he’d ever heard it. Too quiet. He tried to remember some of the things his older brother had said after he’d hurt his wife’s feelings. Spence wasn’t very good at making amends. Hell, Kane was worse. “Look,” he said. “You’re young and—” he swallowed “—innocent, but you don’t even know me.”

“I know I love you.”

“You know you—” The blood flow to the lower half of his body came to a screeching halt, right after the blood flow stopped to his brain. It was a good thing Kane had steady instincts. Otherwise he never would have caught the slight hand that was inching dangerously close to certain anatomical parts that would respond no matter what his brain said.

“No, Josie.”

Round gray eyes stared into his. “What do you mean no?”

“I mean,” he ground out, “I live alone. I work alone. I travel alone. And I’ll die alone.”

“But you don’t have to—”

“Yes, I do.” Without another word, he clutched the side of the old claw-foot bathtub with his good hand and pushed to his feet. Water sluiced down his body. Being careful to keep his back to Josie, he reached for a threadbare towel. He felt a little dizzy, but he managed to keep the towel firmly in front of him as he stepped down to the floor.

She was still watching him, still speechless. Wisps of light blond hair had escaped the band on the back of her head, damp tendrils curling over her ears and forehead. She was wearing blue jeans, hiking boots with thick wool socks and a gray-and-blue flannel shirt. He could see the outline of her breasts and the dime-size circle in the center of each of them. Kane had no business noticing, no business responding. And she had no business looking good in that kind of outfit.

Suddenly she moved toward him, her hands reaching around him, drawing the ends of the towel together at his side. Her fingers shook slightly as she tucked the edges underneath. Slowly she raised her gaze to his. “There’s plenty of time to think about it, Kane.”

Kane was struck speechless all over again. He thought he’d faced the biggest shock of his life when that bullet had sliced through him three days ago. It had been a week of firsts. That had been the first time he hadn’t been able to dodge a bullet, and this was the first time anyone had offered him a virgin sacrifice.

“I don’t need to think about it, dammit. I already told you I live alone. Besides, you’re too young and too skinny.”

Josie felt the floor shake as he stomped away. His words might have hurt her feelings, if she hadn’t caught a glimpse of—what was it her mama used to say? The proof is in the pudding. Whether Kane Slater knew it or not, she’d seen living proof that he didn’t find her nearly as repulsive as he claimed.

While he banged around on the other side of the one-room cabin, tugging on his own clean jeans and shrugging into the makeshift sling she’d concocted from one of her brothers’ shirts, she drained the bathtub and tidied the place up a little.

He swore loudly and often. Josie let him cuss. His orneriness didn’t faze her. Good heavens, she was closely related to five of the grouchiest men on the planet. She’d always wanted a sister, but now she was beginning to think it had been a good thing she’d been exposed to so many grumpy men. She’d been educated by the best. Consequently she shouldn’t have too much trouble dealing with Kane’s ornery side.

She loved him. She was sure of it now. That made this serious.

She’d thought it would never happen to her. And yet here she was, sitting in a quiet cabin on a quiet mountain, her heart brimming with quiet emotions that simply refused to settle down. She loved a man from Montana, a man who’d risked his life and who claimed he needed no one. No matter what he said, he seemed more lonely than loner.

Fishing the soap out of the bottom of the bathtub, she reminded herself that Kane was very, very stubborn. It just so happened that she held the title for that one. A few years ago she’d gone on strike, refusing to cook meals for her brothers and wash their dirty clothes. All because she’d gotten sick and tired of their slovenly ways and lack of manners. At first they’d been downright snide about their refusal to change, but when they were hungry enough and smelly enough, they’d given in. Oh, they were still a little on the slovenly side, but at least now they said “thank you” when she served them their supper and “excuse me” when they belched.

Luckily Kane wasn’t slovenly or rude. She was just going to have to find a way to win him over to her way of thinking. Food had been the straw that had broken her brothers’ backs. Remembering the way Kane had kissed her and what that kiss had done to his body set off a new round of flutters deep in her belly. Something told her that in order to win Kane over, she was going to have to whet his appetite. Not necessarily for food.

She hummed to herself while she added a log to the fire. By the time she’d added carrots and celery to the venison roast she was cooking in the oven, she had broken out in song. Casting a surreptitious glance at Kane, her tune trailed away. He was stretched out on the bed, one leg dangling over the side. Evidently he hadn’t been able to manage the shirt on his own. He’d given up, an arm in one sleeve, his other shoulder and arm bare. Eyes closed, he looked pale, his chest rising and falling evenly.

Pressing one hand over her mouth and the other over her heart, she thought, He’s beautiful in repose. Striding closer, she imagined herself watching him sleep thirty years from now, thinking the same thing. Of course, he would be older, his face more lined, his body a little thicker. But his chest would still be as broad, his jaw as square, his lips as enticing. She would have liked the freedom to kiss each of those features.

Someday, she told herself. First she had to get to know him better, to become familiar with the little quirks that made up his personality. She wanted to figure out what it took to make him smile and what was behind the low rumbling sound he made deep in his throat.

Covering him with the quilt, she whispered, “Rest now, Kane. You’re going to need all your strength for what I have in store for us.”

She glanced around the sparsely furnished room before strolling to the window. Outside, the wind had piled the snow in huge drifts, some of them reaching all the way to the branches on trees. She’d uncovered most of the woodpile and had shoveled a path to the outhouse, but the rest of the area was untouched.

The sky was a vivid blue, the sun glinting off the white surface, causing her to squint. It was almost April, and the sun was already trying to melt the snow. Wondering how much longer she would have before Kane insisted he was strong enough to make it down the mountain, she decided she’d better not waste any time. She would begin winning him over as soon as he woke up from his nap.

“I’ve never even seen Graceland. Can you believe that? Opryland, either, for that matter.” Head tipped over, Josie smoothed the brush over her damp hair with long, slow strokes. She couldn’t see much beyond the square of floor directly in front of her. Therefore, she couldn’t tell if Kane was listening to her or not. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d found herself talking to herself when she’d thought she was talking to him. Resigning herself to the possibility, she said, “I guess there are a lot of things I haven’t seen in this great big old world.”

“You should try to get out of the house once in a while.”

She felt her eyebrows go up. “Get out of the house,” she repeated, encouraged by his attention. “I get out of the house every day. I just don’t get very far in my travels. A storytelling festival takes place in Jonesboro every October. J.D. and Billy tried to get me to go there to spin my tales one year.”

“You didn’t go?”

“Nah. I’d rather talk to folks I know. I mosey on up to Picket Pass to talk to Nellie Peters every morning after breakfast. Minerva Jones says she can set her clock by me. That woman really appreciates punctuality....”

Kane shifted in the hard-back chair, trying to get comfortable and trying not to notice the way Josie’s hair swished with every stroke of her brush. Two days had passed since she’d made her suggestion regarding the method of repayment for all her help. Although she’d talked about everything else under the sun, she hadn’t mentioned her, er, virginity again. He squirmed, scowling, because he’d thought about it a hundred times. Her hair crackled; his fingers flexed, his imagination picturing those silken tresses gliding over his skin.