Lone Wolf's Woman. Carol Finch
hell, he reckoned that she deserved something for all the trouble of looking him up. The least he could do was accompany her back home to check on her wounded brother.
He pivoted on his heels. “Okay, I’ll saddle my horse and make sure you get home safely.”
“Thank you.” Her voice quavered and he thought he heard a muffled sob. “Now I owe you a tremendous favor.”
Chapter Two
A few minutes later, Lone Wolf mounted his piebald pony and watched Julia swing gracefully into her saddle. “Which direction are we heading?” he asked.
When she pointed east he took the lead to use the cross-country shortcut that bypassed town. Considering what a skilled rider she was he didn’t think she would have trouble keeping her seat while moving over the uneven terrain.
“I’m sorry if I seem as much of a nuisance as Harvey Fowler,” she said as she followed behind him. “My brother keeps telling me that I don’t know when to shut up and back off. I didn’t mean to sound so pushy and demanding, but this is very important to me. My brother is all I have left.”
“What’s your name, daredevil?” he asked as he reined his gelding into a rock-strewn ravine.
“Julia Preston. My brother is Adam.”
“Doesn’t ring a bell.”
So, why am I riding off into the night with you? he asked himself bewilderedly. There was no question that he had other places to go, come morning. He could use some shut-eye. But the damnedest thing was that Julia had impressed the hell out of him when she had faced off against that pesky kid. Plus, no one had ever stood up for him before. Ever.
It was that one unexpected deed of courage that refused to let him send her off alone in the darkness. He might have earned the reputation of being the toughest son of a bitch in the state—which was probably the reason her brother wanted to hire him—but he wasn’t so hard-hearted that he could completely disregard a desperate woman.
It was a fact that Julia was the prettiest female he’d ever laid eyes on. Her admirable character traits and strength of will appealed to him as much as her physical attributes. She was pure and wholesome and he found that altogether irresistible.
Nothing would come of his temporary fascination, of course, but she was easy on the eye.
“Just one thing, Miss Preston.” He drew his horse to a slower pace so she could ride beside him.
“What’s that?”
“Although you proved yourself to be daring more than once tonight, don’t plant yourself between me and a potential threat again,” he said. “If that drunken brat named Harvey had decided to draw down on me—with the firearm that he probably didn’t think I saw tucked in the waistband of his breeches—you could have gotten your head blown off. That wouldn’t have done your brother much good.”
Julia sighed heavily. “Sorry. I haven’t been thinking straight since Adam got shot two hours ago.”
She still wasn’t thinking straight, he decided as he studied her shadowed profile. Because of her situation, she was treating him as an equal, a potential friend. Her kind usually regarded him as a second-class citizen and steered clear of him. Ordinarily, he could have cared less, but he had the instinctive feeling Julia was one of a rare breed of woman.
Damn good thing he wasn’t planning to spend more than a couple of hours with her. Even if she was a one-of-a-kind female he had no intention whatsoever of getting emotionally attached. Not to her or anyone else. He had accepted his life for what it was and he was comfortable with it.
He cast his shapely companion a sidelong glance, then decided a short-term diversion wouldn’t hurt before he rode off to Colorado tomorrow.
“How bad was your brother hit?” Lone Wolf asked five miles later.
“He suffered a serious chest wound.”
“Did you get a look at the sniper?”
She nodded. “I was standing on the front porch when he appeared from a copse of cottonwood trees to the west, just as my brother approached the ranch house. The sniper was wearing a long canvas coat and wide-brimmed hat. He was riding a dun horse with three white stockings and a white blaze on its muzzle.
“I wanted to storm up to the man that I suspect is responsible for the shooting and repay him in kind, but Adam sent me to fetch you. I suspect he was trying to divert my quest for revenge and shoo me away, in case his condition worsened,” she added sourly.
“Smart man, your brother,” Lone Wolf praised. “You might have played into your adversary’s hands.”
She huffed out her breath. “That’s what Adam said. But if he doesn’t survive—”
He could tell by her quivering voice that she was holding onto her composure by a slippery thread so he changed the subject. “I need background information, Miss Preston. What do you think prompted this ambush?”
“Julia. Call me Julia.” She managed a watery smile. “When a woman bawls her head off in front of man and exposes all her weaknesses she should be on a first-name basis.”
When she glanced sheepishly at him he caught sight of her features. He felt another thud of unnamed emotion thump him in the chest. Lone Wolf fiercely resisted the unfamiliar sensation and turned his attention to the business at hand.
He watched Julia inhale a restorative breath and gather her thoughts. His traitorous gaze dropped to her breasts and he hurriedly jerked his attention back to her face. Which didn’t help much because, damn it, he found himself studying each enchanting feature.
“We have been involved in a feud with our nearest neighbor for three years,” she stated, her voice growing steadier with each word. “It began when my father and our neighbor’s wife were found dead in our wrecked wagon at the bottom of a ravine. Our neighbor was as overwrought as Adam and I were.”
Or did her neighbor simply pretend to be overwrought because he was the one who’d orchestrated the murders to repay his wife’s infidelity? Lone Wolf wondered.
“The scandal turned him bitter and vindictive,” Julia continued. “He swore our father had humiliated and cuckolded him. He wanted to buy our ranch, sell every head of cattle with the Preston brand on it and wipe away the family name, along with the ugly memory of the supposed affair.”
“You don’t sound convinced that something sordid was going on between your father and your neighbor’s wife.”
Julia shook her head emphatically. Moonbeams glowed in the curly cascade of red-gold tendrils. Lone Wolf looked the other way when another jolt of unwanted awareness shot through him. This woman was too distracting.
“My father was devoted to my mother,” Julia maintained. “After my mother died from cholera, Papa spent the next four years until his death devoted to raising Adam and me. He showed no interest in other women.”
She shrugged helplessly. “I can’t explain why Papa and our neighbor’s wife were together that night. Neither do I know why her buggy was left beside the road after she had ridden into town to be a midwife for her friend. But I do not believe for one minute that my father was romantically involved with Rachel.”
Lone Wolf didn’t comment. He couldn’t say for sure but it sounded as though Julia’s undying loyalty and love for her father had clouded her judgment. He thought there was a strong possibility that a clandestine affair might have been going on, whether Julia wanted to accept it or not.
“Adam and I were determined to hold the ranch together, but it hasn’t been easy. Incidents of rustling began not long after Papa died. We had no substantial proof that our neighbor was involved, but he was our prime suspect. He seemed to hate us.”
Julia continued. “To complicate matters, our neighbor’s daughter was our childhood playmate, and