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  Ruby threw open the door and danced out onto the porch. “Deke! You came back.”

  “Hello, Miss Ruby,” he said, his voice a low, deep drawl as he tipped his hat. “Annabelle. Meg.”

  Throwing his leg over his horse, he slid to the ground. “How are you?”

  Annabelle and Ruby were smiling at Deke like he was Santa Claus in the flesh.

  “We’re great,” Annabelle said, her voice a sultry mix of sweet Texas twang and southern comfort.

  Ruby twisted her hands behind her back, pushing her breasts out toward the man. “Perfect as sweet peaches and cool lemonade.”

  Meg resisted the urge to give them both a good swift kick in the skirt. They couldn’t have been more obvious with their eyes all dreamy, their voices dripping with honey, and their faces lit up like he was delivering presents. “Okay, ladies, why don’t we invite the gentleman into the house.”

  “Come in, Deke. We were just about to sit down to supper,” Ruby invited.

  “There are still a couple of pieces of buttermilk pie left that I fixed for dinner last night,” Annabelle promised, her smile gracing her face, her hazel eyes all warm and soft, like she would melt in a puddle at his feet.

  “Thanks, ladies, I’m famished.” He unstrapped his saddlebags, removed them from his horse, and carried them in his right hand.

  Ruby stood back and waited for him to reach her side, where she promptly threaded her arm through his. He looked down at her, startled.

  Oh, this was going to be an interesting night. One poor helpless man and two women chasing after him like they were cats in heat.

  Annabelle opened the door and frowned at Ruby.

  Meg followed them, shaking her head at her sisters’ antics. This poor man had no chance around these women. It was a wonder they didn’t smother him with their sultry looks and sweet as molasses voices.

  “Did you catch James Rivera, the man who hurt our Papa?” Annabelle asked no sooner than the door closed behind him.

  Deke smiled and sat his bags on the floor, letting his arm go limp. Ruby had to remove her hand. He opened the flap and pulled out several bundles of cash. Meg stared in disbelief as he raised and handed them to her.

  “Your papa’s part of the bounty. I caught the bastard down in San Antonio. After a brief struggle where he suffered a couple of black eyes and sore ribs, I turned him into the sheriff. ” He smiled as he took off his dark cowboy hat and laid it on top of his things.

  The girls squealed with delight.

  “Oh, my gosh,” Meg said, as she stared at the cash in her hands. It had to be several hundred dollars. Tears welled up in her eyes, closing her throat as her chest squeezed tightly. She refused to cry. She would not cry. She could not appear weak. Here was the bounty money her father lost his life over.

  “Your papa was the one who convinced me to go after him and showed me how to find Rivera. Without his help, I would never have caught this bastard. You girls deserve his part.” His warm emerald eyes pleaded with Meg to take the cash.

  The cash felt dirty lying in her hand, and nausea clenched her gut. Blood money. Accepting part of the bounty was the last thing she wanted to do, but they were almost desperate. They were one week away from the bank taking the farm. “Deke, you deserve this cash. You caught that man.”

  “Take it, Meg,” Annabelle beseeched. “That man is the reason our papa is dead.”

  Meg took a deep breath, knowing this would make their lives so much easier. They needed this cash. This was what her papa was trying to earn to pay the note on the farm. She must accept the money; she had no choice. “Thank you, Deke.”

  Ruby threw her arms around Deke and pressed her young woman’s body against him.

  Annabelle moved toward Deke, but frowned as she watched her younger sister in his arms.

  “Thank you, Deke,” Ruby gushed. “Thank you for catching that man and helping us out.”

  Annabelle stepped back and stared at the bounty hunter.

  When Ruby unfurled her young body from the man, Annabelle whispered, “Thank you. How can we ever repay you?”

  He smiled at the group. “You can feed me. I’m starving.”

  For a moment, Meg thought she should warn Deke about her sisters, but then decided he was a grown man and he’d probably faced perils far more dangerous than two women. Ruby was vivacious, young, and flirtatious. Annabelle was just lonely and longed for a man of her own.

  “Coming right up.” Annabelle went into the kitchen where she started putting food on the table. “Ruby, can you help me please?”

  Ruby sighed and went into the kitchen, leaving Meg alone with Deke. “Thank you, Deke. We were down to the blanket.”

  The money could help feed them and prepare for the spring planting season. It would do a lot for them, but it still seemed like blood money. The blood of her father.

  His eyes widened in shock. “You were broke?”

  “Yes, we were about to lose the farm. Papa went back to bounty hunting to make the balloon payment to the bank,” Meg said, thinking what a generous man he was to bring back their papa’s portion of the bounty. The very bounty that had killed him.

  “Then I’m glad I could help,” he said, his voice sincere, and she couldn’t help but think if he married one of her sisters, he’d be a good man to have around.

  “Dinner’s ready,” Annabelle called.

  They all gathered around the table, and Deke took her papa’s seat, where last night Zach had sat. Soon, she hoped Zach took her father’s place in the family, but as her husband. They needed a man in their lives, and she wanted a husband. And Zach was a man whose kisses stirred her in ways she hadn’t expected. In ways that left her reeling and wanting more.

  Deke would be a worthy mate for one of her sisters, if he took the bait.

  “Deke, let me fix your plate,” Ruby said with a smile that could have charmed a snake.

  Annabelle frowned at their younger sister and then held onto the ham plate until she could put the piece of ham on Deke’s plate.

  Oh my God, she was going to kill her sisters before this night was over!

  Once they’d filled their plates, Meg asked the question that had been troubling her since Deke arrived. “How did you know where to find James Rivera?”

  He smiled at them, his gaze blazed with warmth. “Your Papa told me wanted men at times return to where they’re from. Usually wherever their families are, they would go back, even if they didn’t stay long. If they had a wife and kids, they would want to see them and give them money.”

  Meg listened with interest. That made perfect sense for a man to take his earnings and give them to his wife for her to use to buy food. Or even to return to his family to learn how everyone was doing.

  “So Rivera went back to his family?” Annabelle asked.

  Deke smiled at Annabelle and loaded his plate with the leftover ham and green beans. “He went back to his mother’s farm. I’d heard his mother had taken ill, so I sat back and waited. I let him see her, but when he got ready to leave, I was waiting.”

  “Oh, I bet he was surprised to see you.” Ruby gazed at him with awe and wonder in her big blue eyes.

  “He’ll be thinking about me for a long time in prison.” Deke took a bite of the ham.

  The girls weren’t fussing about the ham now that Deke was here enjoying it. No one had refused to eat the meat tonight. But for now, Meg would no longer have to steal. They had cash; they could buy food.

  Annabelle stared at him, her eyes all soft. “It’s what he deserves. After all, he killed a bank teller, and our father lost his life chasing him.”

  “How many outlaws have you caught?” Ruby asked.

  “About ten. But I don’t plan on doing this forever. I’m hoping soon I can quit, buy me some land, and raise cattle.” Deke smiled at the women, and Meg couldn’t help but wonder if he was interested in either of the younger women.

  Ruby flipped her long blonde curls over her shoulder and flashed her sapphire eyes and
brilliant smile at him. “Maybe even get married.”

  She was wearing Meg’s lipstick. Where had she gotten the lipstick and where had she learned to be such a flirt?

  He glanced over at her and smiled. “Maybe.”

  Good grief, if this was flirting, then no wonder Meg had never had a real man court her. She never would. It seemed silly to play the coquette. Why couldn’t the man just accept her the way she was? Why did men want some silly flirtatious woman like Ruby?

  “Why did you and Papa decide to go after Rivera? Why him and not some other criminal?” Annabelle asked.

  Meg had to know the answer to this question, as well. What had been the decision making process when they’d decided on which outlaw to go after? Learning as much as possible about chasing criminals had suddenly become important.

  “Your father insisted on not being too far away from you girls. So he always went after the men who were wanted in this area,” Deke said.

  “So how do you go about finding a man who’s wanted by the law?” Meg asked.

  He frowned and looked at her. “You find out where he was last seen or what his last job was and then if you can find out where his family lives, that’s a good indication. You talk to people he talks to and then you go from there. If he’s a bank robber, you look to see what banks he’s hit and which ones he’s missed. It’s a grown up’s version of hide and seek with guns.”

  Meg liked games. They were a challenge. And she liked to win. In fact, she insisted on winning.

  Ruby pushed her plate away and leaned toward Deke, her chin resting on her palm, her eyes dreamy, and her bosom straining her dress. “Sounds so interesting.”

  Deke glanced around the table at the three of them, his eyes shifting nervously. “You’re not thinking of doing some bounty hunting, are you?”

  Meg looked at him shocked. “Of course not. We’re women.” Like that would stop her. Being a woman would probably help her catch the bastards.

  Annabelle and Ruby laughed and shook their head.

  “Oh, no,” Ruby said, her painted lips in a perfect pout.

  “We wouldn’t know what to do with a criminal if we caught him,” Annabelle exclaimed, pushing her chest out.

  Good grief!

  He laughed. “Yeah, that was kind of silly of me.”

  In that second, Meg’s mind went a thousand different directions, but she refused to acknowledge the idea.

  “We miss our papa, and when you talk about your life, it reminds us of him.” Ruby turned her lips into a smirk as she looked at her sisters.

  Meg knew that look, but she refused to recognize that Ruby was thinking in the same direction as Meg. She wasn’t ready to face that knowledge just yet. She needed more time.

  “Let me get you some pie,” Annabelle said.

  “Oh, I’ll do it. You sit down, Annabelle.” Ruby started to rise from the table.

  If those two didn’t fall to the ground and have a catfight over this man, it would be a miracle. “Why don’t you both remain seated, and I’ll bring the pie to the table.” Meg stood, smiled at the women and Deke, and went to the kitchen.

  Maybe they weren’t looking at all their options. Maybe the three of them becoming bounty hunters was a way to keep from losing the farm. They had the necessary money to pay the loan, but what about next year?

  Could they hunt men and turn them in to the law?

  ***

  Dutifully, Ruby went to her job every day, though she secretly longed to do anything besides this boring scullery maid work. Even school had been more entertaining than scrubbing toilets and floors. What she really wanted was for her and Deke to run away, escape, and for the two of them to travel the world together. As she scrubbed the outhouse, she dreamed of how his body would feel laying naked against her own. Just the idea had her heart racing and her breathing quickening. God, she couldn’t wait until they were man and wife.

  Ruby finished cleaning the Mullen’s outhouse and was now on her way back to the main house to do the dusting. So far today, she’d swept the floors, mopped the kitchen, and once she completed the dusting, she would find the head housekeeper and ask what else needed to be cleaned.

  The work was not hard, just tiresome. Dealing with a cranky old housekeeper who came behind her and criticized everything she did was difficult. Okay, so maybe sometimes her work wasn’t top notch, but if the housekeeper always found fault anyway, why try for perfection?

  Opening the door, Ruby stepped into the hallway right into Clay Mullens, and his arms circled around her.

  “Hello, beautiful.” He pulled her up tight against him.

  “Excuse me, sir, but this isn’t appropriate.” Fear strangled her like a gut line at a hanging, as he crushed her against his chest. Her lungs constricted making her breathing tight. She struggled against him.

  “A girl who charges for kisses isn’t exactly a proper young woman, is she?” he taunted, his voice deep and low against her ear. “I promise you, you’ll enjoy this way more than you did those schoolboys in the play yard.”

  Dear God, how had he learned of her silly antic to raise money?

  “That was a mistake,” Ruby said, her voice suddenly shaky. She tried to put her arms between them, but he had them trapped down at her sides.

  “Instead of paying you your housekeeping salary, what if I pay you to fuck me.” He backed her up against the wall, pressing his erection between her legs.

  She pushed him, but he was stronger than her, and he didn’t budge. “Get off me! I’m not a calico queen you can use for your pleasure.”

  He reached up and grabbed her breast.

  Revulsion swept through her, leaving her nauseous. “Stop! I told you no. I’m going to scream. Get off me.”

  “Relax, it will be fun. I’ll make you feel good,” he promised.

  She opened her mouth to scream, and he covered her lips with his palm, silencing her. She yelled as loud as she could, and he slapped her. Stars appeared before her eyes and her cheek burned. She feared she would faint.

  “I like a fighter,” he whispered in her ear. “Do it again, so I can hit you again.”

  His hand over her mouth held her captive, fear clogged her throat like a man drowning in the river. She knew she was running out of time. Somehow she needed to outsmart him.

  His lips kissed her neck, working their way down to her breasts. She tried again to push him away, but he was too strong, pinning her against the wall. The smell of him had nausea rising up in her throat. She couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t taste, but the sickening sour smell of him had her gagging. He sucked on her breasts through her clothing, gripping her hands in one of his large ones. He moved his body down hers and reached for her skirt.

  She had to reach her gun before he discovered the holster beneath her skirt. Now she understood why her father had given them all shooting lessons and insisted they wear a gun at all times. Often she’d been tempted to leave the clumsy thing at home, but today she realized why he’d instructed them on how to take care of themselves.

  The voice of the housekeeper and his mother coming toward them had him quickly pulling her into a closet and shutting the door. He leaned against the wall with her body pulled up against his own. In the darkness, he put his hand back over her mouth. “Shhh. Quiet. They’ll soon leave, and then it will be just you and me, g’hal.”

  With one of his hands over her mouth and another on her wrists, she nodded her head, trying to make him think she was agreeing with him. He let go of her hand, and she tried to slip it beneath her skirt, but he grabbed her wrist again. Slowly, her eyes adjusted to the darkness and a sliver of light that came from a window above their heads.

  “They’re gone,” he whispered. “Now for the fun.”

  No, no, no, they couldn’t leave. They couldn’t abandon her with him. She could feel her holster beneath her skirt, but she couldn’t put her hand on the gun.

  He placed her hand on his pants, and she could feel his rigid, hard member and fought against the
urge to vomit. “Turn around and lift your skirt.”

  Ruby happily complied, reaching beneath her skirt and pulling her blue-lightnin’ persuader out of its holster. Before he could undo his trousers, she whirled around to face him and cocked the trigger.

  The sound had him backing away from her as he stared down at the pistol.

  “Touch me again, and I’ll put enough holes in you, they won’t need to bury you.” Ruby promised as she walked away from the wall, trying to reach the door.

  He laughed. “Do I need to remind you that you need your job? Your father’s dead. There’s no one to defend you. You’re a housekeeping whore.”

  When Clay walked toward her, she pointed the gun at him. “Stop!”

  Revulsion swept through her, and she fought the urge to empty the chamber of the gun in his head. His family was wealthy, and the thought of swinging from a noose gave her itchy trigger finger pause. She had no one but her sisters. He had a wealthy family who could buy the law. Killing him was not an option.

  “Put the gun away, you probably don’t even know how to fire the thing.” He laughed at her in the darkened closet.

  Ruby’s hand shook as she tried to rein in her anger, the need to kill him strong within her. Why tempt an armed woman with such a stupid comment? She raised the gun, took a deep breath, and steadied her arm. He needed to learn a lesson.

  “Oh, yes, I do,” she promised and pulled the trigger. The explosion in the closet almost deafened her as wood flew from the wall behind him. He screamed like she’d shot him, his face white, his eyes wide with fear, his hands shaking.

  “You stupid bitch. The bullet went right by my ear.”

  “Consider yourself lucky. If I’d aimed for your head, you’d be dead right now.”

  His eyes were almost black as he stared at her, frightened. She didn’t care. He looked at her like a man ready to run. He’d almost raped her, and she needed to inflict some of that same fear on him.

  “I don’t work for your family any longer. I don’t need any job where I’m raped. Come toward me again, and the next bullet goes into your tallywhacker,” she promised, more determined than she’d ever been in her fifteen years. No man was going to take what was hers to give and that included this lily livered skunk.