Wildstar

"It's my risk to take."

"Well, it's our mine. You work for me and I'm going!"

He shook his head adamantly. "I'm riding alone, Jess."

Taking a deep breath, she tried another tack. "You can't succeed alone. You need me. You don't know the moun­tains north of here, and I do. I've ridden over them before and I know the terrain."

That gave Devlin pause, but only for an instant. "I'll ask the marshall to accompany me."

"That lily-livered coward? You must be joking. Even if we could trust him, he wouldn't lift a finger to help us. Besides, you don't have the time to waste looking for him."

"True. But that's all the more reason why you can't come. I don't have time to wait for you."

"I can be ready to leave in ten minutes."

Devlin eyed her grimly. He'd never known a woman who could get ready for anything in ten minutes, but then he'd never met a woman like Jessica Sommers, either. "I'm not going to argue with you, Jess. You're not going, and that's final."

"And I won't try and change your mind. If you ride without me, I'll just follow you."

She didn't wait for him to reply, but turned to Florence O'Malley. "Flo, you're in charge here. I'm counting on you to take care of Riley and Clem while I'm gone. I've got to get home and pack," she added as she marched from the room.

Devlin looked after her with a narrow-eyed expres-sion that was half scowl, half exasperation. He did not want Jess tagging along with him as he tracked three gunmen who'd already proven they weren't above killing indis­criminately. Besides the fact that he didn't want her any­where near that kind of danger, he absolutely did not want to be alone on the trail with her. He'd already demon­strated that his usual legendary control vanished whenever he had Jessica to himself. But short of tying her down, he had little choice but to accept her company.

"How do you stop a hellion in full march?" he mur­mured to no one in particular.

Flo grinned broadly at him. "I've always admired pluck in a girl, haven't you?"

His mouth twisted in a rueful glance. "Pluck? Is that what Jess has? That's like calling a Kansas twister a sum­mer breeze."

Reluctantly he followed Jess outside, catching up to her on the street just before she entered the small house she shared with her father. He was counting on Riley to forbid her to go.

Jess wisely saved that announcement for last, however, first telling her father about the disaster up on the moun­tain. Still bedridden, Riley wasn't prepared to withstand this new blow.

Wearily, with an air of defeat, he closed his eyes. "Maybe it might be wise to consider selling out to Burke, Jess."

"Over my dead body!" she vowed. The thought of meekly letting Burke drive her father to capitulate stuck in her craw. She wasn't a quitter, and neither was Riley.

She turned to Devlin, a look of entreaty on her face. "Tell him he shouldn't sell out."

Devlin nodded. "I think it's too early to give up just yet," he observed dispassionately. "Let me see what I can do to find the men who were behind the attack."

"What do you mean to do then?"

"If I can catch them, I'll bring them back to town for the marshal to arrest."

"I'm riding with him, Riley," Jess interjected. She knew her father would try to stop her, but she didn't intend to give him a choice in the matter. She couldn't stand any longer to live with the threat of death hanging over their heads without even lifting a finger to prevent it.

As she expected, Riley did not take kindly to the idea. "Jess, that's plumb crazy!" he exclaimed.

"No it's not. Devlin needs help. One man alone won't stand much of a chance against three hired guns. And you're certainly in no condition to go with him." "Then let Clem do it!"

"By now Clem will have already downed half a bottle. You know how worthless he is when he's been drinking." "Well, find somebody else!"

"There's no one else to ask. Even if we could find any­one with the gumption to ride after a gang of gunmen, it would be too late. We'll lose their tracks if we wait much longer. I have to go, Riley. We're wasting time. Flo will look after you while I'm gone."

She didn't stick around to finish the argument, but left the room.

"Jess, I forbid it! Do you hear me?" Riley shouted after her. He couldn't leave his bed, but he struggled to sit up as he continued to complain loudly. Jess fetched her clothes from the wardrobe in Devlin's bedroom and car­ried them to the sitting room without interference. Through the connecting door, she heard Riley promising to blister her hide, but he hadn't paddled her since she was little, when she'd sassed her mother, so she wasn't wor­ried.