An Unwilling Husband Read Free

dark stubble on his jaw. Tall and trim, he had piercing blue eyes that seemed to bore into her very soul. They didn’t make them like that in the city. Her heart pounded when his gaze swung to her and drank in her dress, face, hair and hat.
    His horse was still fidgety from the run, sidestepping. The man tilted his head toward a corral filled with cattle and addressed Roy. “Those the ones you’re driving into town?”
    Roy nodded. “Yep, sure are. You drivin’ some too? I heard the prices are decent right now.”
    “Yes, sir. Day after tomorrow. We only have eight hundred head so I figured we could take yours up too, if you want. Tell me how many you have and I’ll get you the money after we get back. Save you the trouble.”
    “Mighty kind of you. I’d appreciate that.”
    She was staring. Indeed, hadn’t been able to take her eyes off him long enough to notice the other two riders. Now he glared at her with a flash of annoyance.
    Roy glanced at her and cleared his throat. “This is—”
    “Maggie Flemming,” she said, smiling broadly.
    The man waited a half second too long to be polite. “Garret Shaw. Come on, Roy. Let’s go take a look at the cattle we’re taking.”
    Then he rode off around the side of the house. Her heart pounded in her chest and ears to the rhythm of the receding hoofbeats. Garret Shaw. Bloody hell, the man was her childhood friend.
    Roy shrugged and untied the gray horse from the post. He rode off behind Garret and left her to control her shock enough to face the other riders. To her surprise, both were Indians, and one, a young woman around her own age, though her mannish dress made it difficult to tell at first.
    “ Háu , I’m Bear Claw,” the man, who was older, said with an amused smile.
    “Is your name really Bear Claw?” How perfectly thrilling! She had read books about the Wild West and Indians, though she had never met one.
    The woman laughed and Bear Claw’s mouth widened in a grin, showing white teeth against his tanned skin. “No, it’s not. People call me Cookie,” he said in a deep, velvety voice.
    “But what is your real name?”
    “Some people say you should never give your real name to someone else because then they have power over you.”
    “Fair enough. I’m Maggie Flemming,” she said with a smile.
    Cookie grinned and nodded at the woman behind him. “This is Lenny.”
    “Hello, Lenny. Nice to meet you.”
    “She doesn’t have any English, but I’m sure she understood,” he said.
    Garret rode around the side of the house with the confidence of a man who knew his place in the world. He was powerful and alluring, with the masculine fluidity of some deliciously dangerous, half tamed predator. And those brilliant eyes! They could trap a woman’s spirit with their intensity.
    Roy appeared behind him on the gray, and she made a conscious effort to clack her mouth closed. Cookie waved, then he and Lenny headed down the dirt road. Garret turned to leave but must have changed his mind because he wheeled around to the porch so unexpectedly, his horse rolled its eyes until the whites shone. The disappointment that he would leave so soon was replaced by a fluttering in Maggie’s stomach.
    “Roy, I don’t know who she is, but you and I, of all people, know a lady don’t belong out here.” Garret kicked the skittish mount under him and gave her a fiery glare, turned his mount and took off after the rest of his party. He left a trail of dust in his wake.
    He didn’t remember her. Not only that, but he had, in so many words, told her to leave. Why did those words, coming from someone she hadn’t seen since childhood, sting so badly? His anger echoed through her bones. Aunt Margaret had said worse on a daily basis, but the power of her insults didn’t hold a candle to the careless reprimand that had come from his lips. It was hard to breathe.
    As they disappeared, Roy’s eyes softened with sympathy. “He’s had a hard life, Magpie. After his momma