Her Knight in the Outback Read Free Page B

saved.’
    â€˜I’ve dealt with rednecks before.’
    â€˜Yeah, you were doing a bang-up job.’
    â€˜I have every right to put my posters up.’
    â€˜No argument. But you could have just walked away and then come back and done it in ten minutes when the drunks were gone.’
    â€˜But there were thirty people there.’
    â€˜None of whom were making much of an effort to help you.’ In case she hadn’t noticed.
    â€˜I didn’t want their help,’ she spat, spinning back to face him. ‘I wanted their attention.’
    What was this—some kind of performance art thing? ‘Come again?’
    â€˜Thirty people would have read my poster, remembered it. The same people that probably would have passed it by without noticing, otherwise.’
    â€˜Are you serious?’
    She snatched the papers and staple gun back from him and clutched them to her heaving chest. ‘Perfectly. You think I’m new to this?’
    â€˜I really don’t know what to think. You treated me like a pariah because of a bit of leather and ink, but you were quite happy to face off against the Beer Gut Brothers, back there.’
    â€˜It got
attention
.’
    â€˜So does armed robbery. Are you telling me the bank is on your to-do list in town?’
    She glared at him. ‘You don’t understand.’
    And then he was looking at the back of her head again as she turned and marched away from him without so much as a goodbye. Let alone a thankyou.
    He cursed under his breath.
    â€˜Enlighten me,’ he said, catching up with her and ignoring the protest of his aching leg.
    â€˜Why should I?’
    â€˜Because I just risked my neck entering that fray to help you and that means you owe me one.’
    â€˜I rescued you out on the highway. I’d say that makes us even.’
    Infuriating woman. He slammed on the brakes. ‘Fine. Whatever.’
    Her momentum carried her a few metres further but then she spun back. ‘Did you look at the poster?’
    â€˜I’ve been looking at them since the border.’
    â€˜And?’
    â€˜And what?’
    â€˜What’s on it?’
    His brows forked. What the hell
was
on it? ‘Guy’s face. Bunch of words.’ And a particularly big one in red. MISSING. ‘It’s a missing-person poster.’
    â€˜Bingo. And you’ve been looking at them since the border but can’t tell me what he looked like or what his name was or what it was about.’ She took two steps closer. ‘That’s why getting their attention was so valuable.’
    Realisation washed through him and he felt like a schmuck for parachuting in and rescuing her like some damsel in distress. ‘Because they’ll remember it. You.’
    â€˜Him!’ But her anger didn’t last long. It seemed to desert her like the adrenaline in both their bodies, leaving her flat and exhausted. ‘Maybe.’
    â€˜What do you do—start a fight in every town you go to?’
    â€˜Whatever it takes.’
    Cars went by with stereos thumping.
    â€˜Listen...’ Suddenly, Little Miss Hostile had all new layers. And most of them were laden with sadness. ‘I’m sorry if you had that under control. Where I come from you don’t walk past a woman crying out in the street.’
    Actually, that wasn’t strictly true because he came from a pretty rough area and sometimes the best thing to do was keep walking. But while his mother might have raised her kids like that, his grandparents certainly hadn’t. And he, at least, had learned from their example even if his brother, Rick, hadn’t.
    Dark eyes studied him. ‘That must get you into a lot of trouble,’ she eventually said.
    True enough.
    â€˜Let me buy you a drink. Give those guys some time to clear out and then I’ll help you put the posters up.’
    â€˜I don’t need your help. Or your protection.’
    â€˜Okay, but I’d