Once Upon a Mail Order Bride - Linda Broday Page 0,3
on the price on his head and too many narrow escapes.
Two figures drew his attention, moving erratically about twenty yards ahead. At first, he thought they were drunks holding each other up. But upon taking a harder look, he noticed one was a man, dragging a woman by one arm toward a dark alley.
Before he could wrestle her into the space, the woman managed to get to her feet. She walloped the man about the head and shoulders with a shoe until he turned her loose. The varmint tried to reach for her again only to have her sidestep his grasp. She lunged, grabbing his shirt, then before he could blink, slapped him across the face with the shoe. The sharp sound ricocheted up and down the row of dark buildings.
“You little slut!” the man shouted, backhanding her. “I oughta kill you!”
Without a word, the petite woman kept hitting him. Her hefty companion, or accoster, whichever he might turn out to be, cowered on the ground. Ridge chuckled. She had more grit, more fight in her than ten women.
But when she faltered, the man leaped up and grabbed her again. “I’ll show you what happens to someone with your temper, you bitch.” He put a hand around her throat and lifted her high in the air, her feet dangling above the ground.
Ridge pulled one of his twin Colts and rushed forward. He jammed the barrel of the gun to the back of the man’s head and snarled, “Turn her loose and let her down easy.”
The man’s shoulders tensed. The piece of horse dung released her and slowly turned. “This ain’t none of your affair.”
“I’m making it mine.” Ridge held the pistol on the man and made a half turn. “Are you all right, ma’am?”
Anger filled the scrappy woman’s eyes. She nodded and jerked her shoe from the ground, holding on to the side of the building for balance while sliding her foot into it. Though her bottom lip trembled, she didn’t cry. She didn’t appear to be a working girl, her clothes far too simple and plain for someone who sold her body. She looked young, and too soft to have been part of that life. Although he couldn’t tell what color her eyes were, he was struck by the shape and size and the fringe of black lashes framing them like expensive Spanish lace.
Some women were only pretty in the dark, and he’d seen plenty of those, but he got the feeling she’d also be pretty in daylight.
He softened his voice. “Are you lost, ma’am?”
Another pert nod. He got the impression that if she’d had something more than a shoe to fight with, she might not have needed his help at all.
“Keep going west on this street, and you’ll get out of this neighborhood. Or tell me where you’re headed, and I’ll take you myself.”
“I saw her first!” the man yelled. “Me an’ her was gonna get acquainted.”
“There isn’t a ‘you and her,’ you imbecile. Got that?” Ridge twisted the man’s arm behind his back and returned his Colt to the holster. “Bother her, or any other woman, again, and there won’t even be a ‘you’ anymore.” He shoved the man against the side of the building and was rewarded with a loud grunt.
The poor excuse of humanity shook his head to clear it of drunken cobwebs then stumbled off, cursing the woman, Ridge, and himself. But by the time Ridge swung around, the lady with gumption had disappeared. After looking up and down the street for her, he had little choice but to pray she reached her destination without further incident.
The hotel beckoned again and he set off, his thoughts remaining on the silent angel who’d lost her way.
Two
Two Weeks Later
The Good Book touted that the truth would set a man free.
Ridge Steele snorted. Not when lies served people better. Most believed whatever they wanted. The truth hadn’t aided him any when he’d desperately needed a good helping.
The swift fall from preacher to outlaw had rocked him to his core and turned his life into one he didn’t recognize. He winced at the memories of the unjust accusation, the crime that had driven him from his faith. He couldn’t bring himself even to say the ugly words.
Memories swarmed like a hive of bees inside his head. The dead man lying with his head on a rock. The mob’s angry yells, the girl’s ripped dress, the rope whirring out of the darkness, the tree. No questions asked. No thought