The Invitation (Montgomery/Taggert 19)

“Probably hanged for murder for killing the bastard,” he said under his breath.

Dorie smiled. She knew he disliked her father because her father had been unkind to her.

Smiling contentedly, she snuggled against him. “I like you,” she said. “I like you very much. You’re a good man.”

She had no idea that her words startled him. Several women had told him they loved him, but never had a woman told him that she liked him or that he was a good person. And yet somehow, when Dorie said the words, he almost believed them.

He held her close to him, feeling her warmth and the purity of her. It was odd, but when she was near he felt like a good person. All the gunfights in his life seemed to have happened to someone else. And when Dorie looked up at him he felt as if he could do anything.

“I’ll get you out of this, sweetheart,” he whispered.

She didn’t answer because she was asleep. She trusted him so much that she had fallen asleep in his arms. Cole knew that he’d die before he allowed anything or anyone to harm her.

Chapter Nine

I’m not going,” Dorie said, standing beside the horse she and Cole were riding, her arms folded across her chest, her eyes straight ahead. “I won’t do it and that’s that. You can shoot me or not, but I will not do it!”

Cole decided that every good thought he’d ever had about Dorie, about women in general, was the devil’s work. Only the devil could have made him have good thoughts about a creature as stubborn, not to mention stupid, as this one.

When Ford got over his shock—few men and no women had ever told him no—he pulled his gun out of his holster. That was when Cole came off his horse and put his body between Dorie and the bullet that might come her way.

I must be calm, he told himself. I must reason with her, try to persuade her. Women like sweet words. “Damn you!” were the first words out of his mouth, words said with his teeth clenched together. “Don’t you realize the seriousness of this? You could be killed. You could—”

“I won’t tell him where the gold is even if he kills me,” Dorie said, not even looking at Cole. Her mouth was set in a line so rigid it could have been used for a buckboard seat.

“Dorie,” he began, then said, “What the hell,” put his arm around her waist, and started to forcibly put her on the horse.

She was little, true, but she was fierce, and he had the use of only one arm. When he tried to pick her up, she fought him by flailing her arms and legs, then by making her body rigid, then by pushing at him with both her arms and her legs.

Within seconds they were in what seemed to be an equal contest of muscle against stubbornness.

It was the rusty old laugh of Ford that made Cole drop her in order to try to get a better grip on her.

“Let her go,” Ford said.

Immediately Cole set Dorie on the ground and put his body between hers and Ford’s. “You’re not going to hurt her,” he said, his eyes glittering.

Ford snorted. “Hunter, I think maybe you two lied about not likin’ each other.”

At those words, Cole felt a chill run up his spine. If Ford found out they had lied about this, he’d figure out they’d lied about other things, too. He’d soon realize that there was no reason to keep them alive.

Right now he thought he could cheerfully strangle Dorie. For days he’d been thinking that for the first time in his life he’d met a woman who had some sense. But then this morning she’d shown that she was the…well, the most female of females. That was the worst thing he could think to call her. She hadn’t a brain in her head.

This morning, after a mere two hours of sleep, they’d been told to mount their horses. They’d ridden hard for three hours until they came to a ridge overlooking a little town that seemed to consist mostly of opportunities for sin. There had once been a reason for the town, but that had died out so long ago that no one remembered, or cared, why the village was there. But in the dying embers of the town’s life, after the people who wanted to earn a living had left, the gamblers and murderers had moved in. Now it was nothing but a place for men—or women—to lose their money or their lives. It was, of course, Winotka Ford’s home base, the only place on earth where he felt safe.

They lingered atop the ridge overlooking the few broken-down buildings long enough to make sure that there was no sheriff’s posse there, no soldiers, no one who might give them trouble.

It was while she and Cole, still mounted on their horse, were looking down into the town that Dorie spoke. “Are we going down there?”

“Yes,” Cole said, trying to think how he could get out of the place. He had no money for bribes; he couldn’t shoot his way out. Once they got in, how were they going to get out?

“I can’t go into town wearing a nightgown,” Dorie said, sounding as if she might cry.

“No one will notice,” he said in dismissal, wondering if there were any people he knew in town. If there were, he hoped he hadn’t killed any of their relatives.

“You don’t understand,” Dorie said. “I can’t do this.”

Why was she bothering him about things that didn’t matter? “Dorie, you have been traveling across the state of Texas for two days wearing nothing but a nightgown. What difference will a few more hours make? We’ll get you something to wear when we ride into town.” He had no idea what he was going to use for money to buy her a dress, but he couldn’t say that to her.