The Cowboy from Christmas Past. Tina Leonard
He didn’t think he could totally ignore her, any more than he could ignore a wasp stinging his buttocks. “How far west are you going?”
“I was thinking New Mexico,” she said, her tone breezy. “But you can choose, if you like.”
“I don’t really care,” he said with a growl, stopping himself from saying, but if you try to take my baby, I’ll find you. “One condition,” he said.
“What?”
He took a long, hard look at her, trying to see inside her soul. He had pretty good success with reading people; if you didn’t have that sixth sense, you could wind up dead. “No more mothering this baby.”
She drew herself up, clearly hurt. “Fine, cowboy. You can take care of that child all by your little old self.”
“Good.”
“Fine.” She swept past him on the stairwell. “Let me grab my things. I don’t have much, and I’m paid up through the month here.”
Now was his moment to take off, get away from her and her spell. But she piqued his curiosity in the worst way. What if she was somehow instrumental to his existence in this century? He had to find the key to getting himself sent back. “How do you pay by the month at a place like this?”
“By understanding the travel industry. Anyway, you let me handle the arrangements, cowboy. You mind the angel.”
Fine. He didn’t really want to know any more about her than he had to, anyway.
Only her traveling secret, and she’d just now given herself away. Auburn understood the travel industry, both in this dimension and some others.
He felt pretty smart at figuring her out so easily.
MEN COULD BE IDIOTS. Auburn tried not to swear under her breath as she tossed her Louis Vuitton luggage into the trunk of her car, annoyed that Dillinger had tried to leave her high and dry. Steal his baby? Hah! She wasn’t completely certain that was Dillinger’s child, but he’d turned bearlike, protective of his cub.
She wouldn’t touch his silly old baby, if he was going to be such an ass about it. “Get in the back,” she told him crossly, “and strap that carrier in correctly, please.”
She sounded bossy and she knew it, but he complied, fumbling a bit with the straps before correctly tightening the baby backward in the seat. Auburn smiled a little at Rose, stiffening when she caught Dillinger looking at her. “You’re getting better at that,” she said airily.
“Like you’re an expert at it, yourself.”
Turning on the car engine, she said, “I was trying to give you a compliment. Obviously, you’re the kind of man whose ego won’t let you accept one gracefully.”
“Probably.” The rearview mirror showed him gazing with interest at the buildings downtown as they passed, not paying a whole lot of attention to her as she drove from the city. Auburn picked the highway marked West and pressed the pedal as hard as the speed limit would allow.
THIS WAS LIKE A magic carpet ride, or a train that could go full-speed across the country. Dillinger was fascinated by the way Auburn flew past the cars and signs on the highway. It was amazing! There were things overhead she called airplanes—he didn’t let on that he had barely heard of flying machines—and so much to see that his head was whirling. She was the reason he was here, he was positive.
He had to convince her to send him and Rose back. They were not suited for living like this. First, he had to return Rose to her rightful mother, even if it meant helping them financially. He felt certain no mother would abandon a baby on his porch unless the woman was destitute.
The only thing he couldn’t understand was why the mother had chosen his porch. He was miles from town. He had a bad reputation. He didn’t darken the doorway of a church. And this was no frontier baby. Her clothes were store-bought. Her socks were knit of the finest lace and cotton, not rough country socks made for warmth and work, like his. Rose should be placed with a family of wealth, not stay with him, if he couldn’t manage to find her birth mother. He knew it was imperative that he get the baby home as fast as possible.
What if he could talk Auburn into taking him and Rose back home to the ranch, and going with them? She said she needed to hide away. She’d be safe at his ranch. No one would ever find her there.
But did he want the opinionated woman in his home, where Polly had brought him such warmth and contentment?
For Rose’s sake, he could do it.
He’d opened his mouth to broach the question, when suddenly he felt himself being jerked against the seat belt.
PIERRE TOSSED THE EARRING across the room. He’d fallen asleep in a chair in Dillinger’s den, and had awakened annoyed that the man hadn’t yet returned. The snow outside was piling up, making a mess of the dirt road. If he wasn’t careful, he’d get snowed in and trapped here for God only knew how long. Anger built inside him. He felt outsmarted by the gunslinger, and he hated it. Maybe the man had planned to be gone for weeks, months.
Pierre felt bad for throwing his sister’s earring. He picked up the delicate bauble again, giving it one last shake. His heart heavy, he vowed to return next week, when Dillinger might be home and the snow and ice not threatening to encase the house in a chilly tomb. Why the man chose to live out here when he could have lived in town was puzzling, but he’d had Polly all to himself this way. A beautiful flower like his sister hadn’t deserved to wilt out here in the uncivilized wilderness.
Pierre put the earring back on the writing desk, staring at it for a long time, tempted to take the trinket with him. Maybe the charcoal drawing of his sister would ease the ache in his heart more. But no, it didn’t truly capture the fire Polly had possessed.
He left everything just as it had been, so the gunslinger would never suspect someone had been waiting here, planning to kill him.
Chapter Four
Dillinger tried not to gasp as his body strained against the seat belt. It was as if he were being jerked by a strong, invisible hand trying to tear him from the car. Only the straps kept him restrained.
“Is something wrong?” Auburn asked, staring at him in the rearview mirror.
“No,” he said, grinding out the word.
She checked the road, then glanced back to his reflection. “Are you sure? You don’t look good.”
He unhooked the belt, relieved when the pressure subsided.
“You have to wear that,” Auburn said. “It’s against the law not to wear a seat belt.”
He grimaced at the pain in his stomach and across his chest. “Do you think that’s a strange thing to tell a gunslinger?” He checked the belt again. This time it was acting as it should. Maybe the thing had malfunctioned. Maybe there hadn’t been anything supernatural trying to drag him from this car.
“You know, about that gunslinger business, maybe we should figure out some other livelihood for you, when people ask what you do,” Auburn said, her voice bright.
“Why? Who’s going to care?”
She shook her head. “No one, most likely. But if anyone asks, why don’t you tell them you work for…I don’t know.” Her gaze lit on him in the mirror again. “You can say you’re an unemployed model.”
He laughed. “I don’t think so.”
“Well, just say you’re a ranch owner.”
“I am.”
“You are?”
She sounded so shocked that he frowned. “I told you. I own a ranch outside of Christmas River.”
“But