Three

Usually, by two o’clock in the morning, Marshal J. Corbet Harlow had finished his last circuit of Burdeen’s streets and alleyways. Then he liked to sleep until eight or nine o’clock the next morning. After finishing Hobie’s jail-brewed coffee he might go for a shave at Hamm’s barbershop and make another round before lunch at Abernathy’s restaurant. But on account of having Miss McQue in his jail, he hadn’t gone out the night before. He didn’t want to leave her alone in case Tangus tried to break her out. Tangus was a dangerous man. Corbet wanted him in custody, alive. Jodee, too.

Feeling irritable, Corbet sat at his desk, studying Ben Nobley’s battered gold pocket watch. Miss McQue sat on her cot, still struggling with her tangled hair. After a few attempts she let her left arm drop. Patsy was right. He shouldn’t keep a female in his jail, but what was he supposed to do?

He thought about the items already recovered from the outlaws he’d killed and brought back to town. Depot agent Ben Nobley’s nickle-plated watch and pocketbook. The Ashton Babcock agent from back east—Chester M. Clarkson—his engraved gold pocket watch, stick pin and pocketbook, torn. No sign of his sapphire pinkie ring. Avinelle’s cash box, still locked, and most of her jewelry. Her mother’s things. The cash was at the bank, some still missing, but he’d figure that out soon enough. He scooped everything into his desk drawer and locked it.

Miss McQue needed the doctor, he thought, pocketing the desk key. Stronger men than that scrap of a girl had died of gunshot wounds. He couldn’t just turn her loose. She might yet tell him more about Tangus.

When Abernathy arrived with another tray, Corbet seized his chance. “You’re in charge—I’ll be right back.” He grabbed his hat. “If you see Hicks, tell him I need him here, and sober.”

Before Abernathy could protest, Corbet was out the door. He plowed headlong into a homely stranger scarcely taller than Hobie. The man grabbed his bowler hat and grinned, “Whoa there, Marshal.” His pock-marked face sported a day’s whiskers. His trousers and coat were green plaid, dull as dead cactus. He carried an imitation leather sample case.

A half dozen drovers swarmed past, too, boldly crowding Corbet into the street. There had been a time when Corbet knew every face in town. There had been a time, he thought, glowering at the drovers, when folks showed him respect and stepped aside when he passed. Now families arrived from the southern states and back east. Cow hands, salesmen, and telegraph linemen packed the streets, but Corbet rarely encountered troublemakers now. He had enough money saved he could buy a few acres north of town if he wanted, but he hadn’t signed his name to a bill of sale yet. Buying land meant staying. Staying meant Avinelle Babcock had him in a harness.

He could do worse, he reminded himself.

At the stage office, Corbet came up short. He should’ve asked that green-clad drummer’s name. Just because he pictured Tangus as tall and wearing pistols didn’t mean he should ignore bandy-legged strangers in ill-fitting bowler hats.

After sending his morning’s telegraph messages, Corbet scanned the street, spotting the cactus green among the brown and dusty black that townsfolk wore. He veered toward the cluster of ladies surrounding the grinning, talkative stranger displaying his wares. Button salesman. Annoyed by the distraction, Corbet hurried on, dismissing the man from his mind. Moments later he found the doctor’s office closed. At the Robstarts, was scrawled on a slate hanging alongside the locked door.

Taking chalk dangling on a string, Corbet wrote, Come to jail soon as you can. Urgent!

He stormed on toward the barbershop. What was he going to do about Miss McQue? He had no reason to hold her. He himself found the buckskin bag on the cabin floor when he lifted her into his arms. At the time he’d thought the bag must be hers. He’d stuffed it in her knapsack, but he believed her now when she vowed on her dead parents she hadn’t been part of the holdup. Besides, Nobley and Clarkson both swore in their statements in Cheyenne City that six men robbed them, not seven. Jodee McQue would’ve made seven.

Should he turn her out? What would she do then, serve hash to cowhands at Artie’s? Dodge drunkards at the Whitetail Saloon? “Board” at Rella’s?

He caught sight of himself in a storefront window, a tall scowling man with no friends. He admitted to himself why he was keeping such a close eye on his female prisoner. To him, the most important thing was to protect those too weak to protect themselves. In doing his bang-up job as marshal, he had shot a defenseless girl.

Well, she hadn’t been entirely defenseless. She’d had that heavy old pistol and plenty of spunk.

Corbet plunged on, racked with regret. She looked so darned cute in those britches that clung to her backside like his hands wanted to—he immediately banished that thought. He’d never seen a woman wearing pants. The sight tended to keep a man awake at night.

It wasn’t only that. It was her sun-colored hair, wild around her face like she’d been romping in a haymow. It was those eyes, big and blue and baffled by the cruel world she’d been born to. And that tear in her shirt wasn’t helping matters. Best send her on her way. Buy the ticket himself. Good riddance.

At the barbershop Corbet sank into the cracked leather chair that stood prominently in the single front window, affording barber Walter Hamm a full view of the street.

“I need a trim, too,” Corbet said.

“Glad to see you back from your man-hunt, Marshal. Glad them outlaws is gettin’ planted today, too. I hear Virgil Robstart is crazy with fever.”

“If you see Doc, tell him I got a wounded prisoner who needs attention.” He wanted to quiet the barber so he could think.

Walter’s eyes flashed. “I hear she’s a regular spitfire.”

Corbet wouldn’t have described Jodee McQue quite like that, but then, he hadn’t known her long. She seemed more like a lost kitten. “Who said that of her?”

“It’s all over town she rode with them hellrakes like she was born to it. Would make quite an attraction, hangin’ a female in this town.”

Corbet pushed the barber’s razor from his face. “A man shot the stage driver, Walter, not a woman. She wasn’t there. Nobley and Clarkson as well as Mrs. Ashton and Mrs. Babcock said so. Sworn statements. The first I knew of her was when I waded through outlaws I gunned down and found her bleeding on the floor. She hasn’t done anything to be hanged for, for God’s sake.”

Grabbing a towel, Corbet wiped the lather from his face and hurled himself back into the morning cold without his shave. Hang her? Where did this town’s sudden blood thirst come from? This was not what he had been planning to do when he’d headed west. It certainly wasn’t what he was going to be doing for the rest of his life. Maybe it was time to move on. Let some other puppet dance at the end of the Ashton-Babcock tether.

With relief, Corbet saw the doctor trudging up from the direction of the Robstart’s cabin. “You better head for the jail, Doc,” he called in a none-too-pleasant tone.

The weary man looked up. “Delirious?”

“No, but she needs that dressing changed.” Corbet’s belly knotted. Virgil must be bad off.

The doctor passed Corbet. “Change it yourself. I have to get to my office for more supplies. I’ll be catching Patsy’s baby tonight if she doesn’t let up.”

• • •

The man from the restaurant stood watching Jodee so intently she couldn’t go on trying to comb her hair. What was his name? Artie? Sitting on the cot with her head down, her hair thrown forward because she had been working at the knots in back, she muttered, “What’s so interesting to look at?” Maybe her gruff tone would put him off.

Artie Abernathy looked to be around Burl’s age, late twenties, Jodee thought. His hairline receded to ginger curls. His mustache was a clumsy attempt at a handle-bar style which accentuated the pale fullness of his face, but he looked nice enough.

“I’ve been cooking around here almost four years,” he said grinning. He settled his haunch onto the corner of the marshal's desk, tipping it slightly. “Started out cooking in a tent. You know, I can’t believe it’s in a woman's nature to run with outlaws. You were forced into it, ain’t that right, Miss McQue?”

Before Jodee could answer, the hard-eyed Deputy Hicks sauntered in. “What the hell’r you doin’ here, Abernathy?”

Artie straightened and brushed the front of his apron. “You weren’t here, so the marshal asked me to watch over Miss McQue.”

Deputy Hicks rolled his tongue around his teeth. “Well, I’m here now.” He winked at Jodee.

Jodee shrank back, loathing the sight of the man.

“Anything special you’d like for lunch, Miss McQue?” Abernathy shuffled toward the door.

Jodee shook her head. As Abernathy went out, she noticed a man in a black bowler hat passing by outside. The man looked in, straight at her, and then strutted on. She didn’t recognize the clean-shaven face but she knew that walk. Shaking, and feeling sick, she pressed herself against the wall. That was Burl! But clean-shaven and wearing a green suit? It couldn’t be. Was he crazy? Surely Burl was a hundred miles away by now.

When she opened her eyes, Hicks stood at her cell door, blocking the view of the open door.

“What’s ailin’ you? In them britches, a person’d take you for a saddle tramp, excepting for that long hair. And certain other things. Need some help combing that hair?”

When she didn’t reply, he kicked the bars with a dirty boot.

“I’m talking to you. Ever been down Cheyenne City way?” He spat a stream of tobacco juice into the corner.

Jodee knew better than to speak.

He pulled a flask from his hip pocket and took a long pull. Whiskey that early in the morning meant nothing but trouble. “I used to frequent a gal down Cheyenne way had hair like yours. You got any connections with that line of work?”

She hoped she looked fierce. Gun shot and without a weapon, she had no defense against a man like him. At the slightest sign of weakness, the deputy would have her cell door unlocked, doing what came natural to vermin.

“Come to think of it, you smell like you ain’t had a bath in a year. Ten dollars says I meet up with you at Rella’s one of these nights. You’ll smell better then.”

Jodee twisted away. She had cleaned up at the hideout camp, but that had been days ago. She’d traveled many a mile since. She listened while the deputy rifled through the marshal’s desk drawers and yanked hard at one that was locked. She heard him saunter into the sleeping room and browse through things he had no business touching. She felt indignant on the marshal’s behalf.

Finally the deputy dropped onto the chair behind the marshal’s desk and tipped it against the wall. When the jailhouse door opened, Jodee’s hopes lifted.

“Hard at work, I see, Hicks,” a stranger said.

“I do more work than you any day of the week. Sniffin’ out a story, are ya’, Inky? Well, there she is, our very own lady outlaw, but you’ll find little to grab the attention of readers. She’s as boring as slop and about as pretty.”

“How would you know what might interest my readers?”

Warily, Jodee sat up. She pushed her torn shirt back into place.

The newcomer was an attractive man in a striped shirt and high-buttoned coat jacket. He swept off his hat. “I hope I’m not disturbing you, Miss McQue. I’m George Hatcher, Burdeen City Dispatch. It’s only a one page newspaper, but I have ambitions. May I ask a few questions? I promise to be fair.”

“Fair about what?”

“Why, in presenting your case to the public. How is it you came to be riding with those outlaws after the holdup?” Moving closer to the cell, he plucked a tablet from his breast pocket and stood poised with pencil, ready to write. “You might make a name for yourself back East if your story’s interesting.”

“Better make one up then, ’cause it ain’t.”

Hicks snickered. “Spoken like a real lady.”

“Tell me where you hail from, Miss McQue,” Mr. Hatcher said. “I heard you were born of a red-haired lady of the evening in San Francisco.”

“Who told you that?”

“I hear you’re every bit as violent as the men you rode with, that you helped plan robberies and even pulled a few yourself dressed as a schoolgirl.”

Jodee struggled to stand. “That’s a lie!”

“Then tell me your story so I can set the record straight. I can’t begin to describe the harm you’re doing to your reputation, staying in this cell without benefit of a lawyer. If you’re innocent, why’re you being held?”

She glared at the newspaperman, knowing she dared not trust him. But what could she do when folks were spreading lies about her? The lies sounded like things Burl Tangus might say just to be mean.

“I was born in Arkansas.” She watched him scribble. “How do I know what you’re writing?”

“I’ll bring a copy of the story straight from the press. Can you read, Miss McQue?”

“Of course I can read. I went to school. I attended Sunday school, too, if that matters to you. I can recite and cipher and sign my name.”

“And you’re a dead shot with a pistol, they say.”

“A body gets hungry enough, she can shoot near anything.” Jodee could only manage to sit primly on the edge of the cot. “I grew up on a farm. I hunted eggs. I was learning to darn socks.”

“Then one night outlaws raided your sleepy hometown, shot your family, and captured you. You’ve been their prisoner ever since. Is that right, Miss McQue?”

Deputy Hicks kicked the chair by the door. “She weren’t no prisoner, Inky. She is Miss McQue, as in T. T. McQue’s own born daughter. That innocent-looking face of hers don’t fool ol’ Jimmy Hicks, here. You print that story—eggs and Sunday school—I’ll tell everybody it’s a fool lie.”

They didn’t believe her. Jodee wilted. “You print lies about me,” she hissed, “I’ll come gunnin’ for you.” Too late she realized she sounded like an outlaw!

Before the newspaperman could retort, the door swung wide. By the thunderous expression on the marshal’s face, he’d been listening on the far side of it for some time.

Ducking his chin into his collar, the newspaperman looked embarrassed to have been caught questioning the marshal’s prisoner without him present. “I was just leaving, Marshal, but if you please, Miss McQue, one last question. Which man shot Willie Burstead during the holdup? The stagecoach driver.”

“I don’t know! I wasn’t there.”

“We hear Burl Tangus rode with your father and the Rikes. Nobody’s seen him. Where is he? Is he coming for you?” the newspaperman asked.

Balling her fists, Jodee flinched as her shoulder blossomed with pain. “I ain’t nothin’ to Burl Tangus, so why would he come for me?”

She hoped Burl was gone, but she feared he was in town, following her, making up stories about her, waiting to break her out and steal her back to the outlaw life she hated so. Why would he bother?

“That’s not what I heard. I heard you and him had an understanding.” Mr. Hatcher cocked his head, one eyebrow raised. “You’re his girl.”

Jodee struggled to her feet. The cell spun in front of her eyes, unsettling her stomach. Trembling, she advanced on the newspaperman, whose face lit with excitement. He stood poised on the other side of the bars, ready to write.

“I ain’t nobody’s girl, but I have to wonder who you been talking to. Maybe Burl Tangus hisself? Did he promise you a good story if you pestered me?”

Sputtering, Hatcher made his excuses to the marshal and fled the jailhouse. The marshal followed him outside. Jodee heard a heated exchange. When the marshal returned and sent Hicks away, he wore a turbulent expression. “Just tell me one thing, Miss McQue.”

“Oh, please,” she snapped. “I’m weary of all your polite talk. Just call me Jodee.”

“Jodee,” he said more gently, approaching her cell like she was a dangerous mountain cat. “What does Tangus look like?”

Making her way back to the cot, she dropped onto it. “Runty man. Stringy dark hair, dirty beard, weasel eyes. Thinks he’s as smart as a whip. Walks like he owns everything.”

“Any chance he might be in Burdeen?”

Her heart leapt into her throat. Why would he ask that? Did she dare say what she suspected? “Honest, Marshal, on my ma’s grave I ain’t nothin’ to Burl Tangus. He ain’t nothin’ to me. He turned Pa back to outlawing and ruined what chance we had for a decent life. I wished him dead more’n once, and that’s a fact. That night when we were hiding at the cabin, I heard him brag that he shot the stage driver. They was laughing at him on account he couldn’t bust some safe open. When he shot at it he claimed a bullet ricocheted and near to hit one of the ladies. He bragged how it made her jump and scream. She isn’t dead, is she?”

The marshal pulled a telegraph message from his pocket. “The bullet tore through her clothes, she writes. Something like that would surely upset a woman like Avinelle Babcock. She was probably wearing something new. You say Tangus’s face is pock-marked?”

He was baiting her, and she knew it. What a snake. “I never seen Burl without a beard. Don’t you listen? He never took pains to look decent.” She thought about the man she’d seen strutting past the doorway earlier. That couldn’t have been Burl. Just a curious passerby.

The marshal unlocked her cell. She shrank from him, fearing her clothes smelled dirty like the deputy suggested.

“Take it easy, Jodee,” he crooned, crouching. “I need a look at your wound. Doc’s been up all night with my deputy and his wife, so I have to look after you myself.”

Jodee shook her head. I can’t bear for you to touch me. “I’m fine. Please.”

He was so close she could see the flecks of gold and black in his eyes. Something melted inside her, leaving her tingling in ways she had never felt before. He looked back at her, caught momentarily, and he swallowed.

Oh, Marshal, she thought. You are the damndest looking man I ever saw.

“I’m keeping you here for your own safety, Jodee. You understand that, right? Until I have Tangus in custody, you’re at risk.”

“Burl don’t care about me, I tell you.”

“But you saw him shoot the driver.” He held her gaze with electrifying intensity. “Your testimony could send him to the gallows.”

“I told you,” she said, with equal intensity. She fought to keep her lips from quivering. “I wasn’t at the holdup. I didn’t see him do nothing. I heard him talking about shooting the driver. Afterwards. At the cabin. Burl’s in Cheyenne City or Denver by now, looking for some other fool like my pa to follow his schemes. He can’t do things by himself. He needs men stupid enough to help him. To make him look big. I saw you got most of the loot back. Burl won’t come after it. Why would he? He’s gone. Even if he broke in here, I wouldn’t go with him. I hate him. I’ve always hated him.”

The marshal stared and stared and stared at her until finally, blessedly, his gaze softened. “All right. Settle down. You’re right. I’ve recovered almost everything taken during the holdup. Lay back. Let me see.” He pulled aside the bandage and sucked in his breath. Did it look that bad? He was just doing his job, she told herself. He didn’t care about her. He wasn’t worried.

“You let me out of here, I’ll take myself away,” she whispered. “You won’t have to bother with me anymore.”

He shook his head, his eyes pinched with pity. “Where would you go? Is there really a family farm back in Tennessee?” He was so close she could’ve kissed him.

Her face went hot. Looking away, she bit out, “Arkansas!”

“Anybody still there?”

“I don’t know. Ma used to tell me that when Pa came for us we were going to go off with him no matter what, so when he came, even though Ma was gone six years, I went with Pa. In all the years I been gone, nobody ever came after me. I figured they were glad I was gone.”

“Who?”

“My grandmother,” Jodee said, surprised that she still felt hurt after so long. “Aunt Mardee, Uncle Jeb.” So few people to care about her, Jodee thought. She felt so alone. “Grandmother was too old to come after me, I reckon. Aunt Mardee had my young cousins to tend. Uncle Jeb had the farm. They didn’t want me. Really, they didn’t.”

“What happened to your mother?”

“She took sick. I was six. Then Granddaddy died…out in the barn, during a storm. Times got hard. I was a burden.” Jodee couldn’t say more. She watched the marshal’s coffee brown gaze. He was listening, but she couldn’t tell if he believed her.

“I just want you to know, Jodee, me asking Rella to help you was not meant as an insult. I’m not much use to you. I felt you needed a woman’s help. I don’t want you to consider her kind of life.”

“I ain’t turning into no fancy woman, Marshal. I know good from bad.” To cover her embarrassment, Jodee gave a laugh. “Just look at me.” She meant she was not pretty enough to become a fancy woman.

Abruptly the marshal stood. “With your shirt torn like that, Jodee, maybe you’d like one of mine to wear.”

She clutched at the torn fabric and shook her head. She longed to be covered, clean and decent, but felt ashamed to accept something belonging to him. “I couldn’t.”

The marshal went out of the cell, leaving the door open wide, and returned moments later with a folded blue shirt with no collar. He brought the water pitcher and basin from his sleeping room. By the furrows in his brow, he looked like he thought she might be dying.

When he left her alone at last, she pressed the clean shirt to her face and breathed in. It smelled of washing soap and reminded her unexpectedly of her mother. A flood of anguish rushed over her. Ma, gone so young. Now Pa. She was an orphan. In jail. She might end up in prison for something she hadn’t done.

All she had ever wanted was a decent life, she thought. She wanted to hear her name held in regard. She wanted a cabin to keep tidy and a family to love and love her back. She wanted neighbors, church socials, book learning, friends, and a clean bed to sleep in. She wanted a bath, a cook stove, and white dimity curtains.

With the last of her strength, Jodee pulled the marshal’s shirtsleeve up her aching right arm and over her blazing shoulder. Then she lay down to sleep, wrapped in the marshal’s clean scent.

• • •

The remainder of the morning Corbet worked at his desk, finishing his report of the stagecoach holdup while Jodee slept. At noon she woke to eat and wash her face. With her hair slicked back she looked no more than fifteen years old. Corbet was stunned by the simple beauty of her delicate features. He hadn’t suspected she’d turn out to be so sweet-looking. It complicated matters.

He’d better get her out of his jailhouse, but quick. She hadn’t been at the holdup—he was certain of it—but Tangus had killed Willie Burstead. Corbet belonged on the trail, tracking Tangus, not here, hovering over a bedraggled orphan. But he made no move to unlock Jodee’s cell to let her go. He couldn’t turn her out onto the street. She needed him. It was that simple.

Jodee was still asleep when Hobie came by after school. “Aw, Marshal, somebody spit in the corner. If you ask me, Hicks ain’t fit to wear a lawman’s badge. He drinks on the job, too. I want to be your deputy. I’ll quit school. I got no use for college next year.”

“By the time you’re old enough to be a deputy, I’ll be long gone,” Corbet said, surprising himself when he said it. He’d thought himself ready to settle down. The prospect of starting over somewhere new filled him with dread. “College will make you a better man than me.”

“You can’t leave Burdeen, Marshal. There ain’t a man in town fit to take your place. Mr. Robstart won’t never be marshal now. Folks say he’s crippled permanent. Besides, he wasn't never as tough or cold as you.”

Corbet didn’t like being thought of as cold. He remembered the look on Patsy Robstart’s face when she opened the door to his knock earlier that day. Instead of being her stalwart friend, he’d become her enemy. Without a word she’d closed the door in his face. He understood, of course. It was on his account that Virgil’s life was in jeopardy. But her blame hurt him worse than he liked to admit.

Folks were wrong about him. He wasn’t cold. He just kept his feelings private. A man might suffer guilt and remorse, loneliness and longing, but a marshal couldn’t afford such. This mess was his to bear alone. The McQue gang holding up that stage, and him following with a posse of overzealous townsmen…that had all been his fault. Now Virgil was riddled with fever. His fault, too. Patsy Robstart hated his gizzard. His fault. Jodee lay in her cell looking like a motherless calf. His fault.

Putting aside his report, Corbet thanked Hobie and urged him to run along. “First thing tomorrow, check the depot for telegraph messages. I’m waiting for information about Miss McQue.”

A wily grin spread across Hobie’s young face. His teeth were a scramble. “If you thought a telegraph message was coming, I’d be at the stage depot waiting right now. There ain’t nothin’ comin’ on her, is there? Because she’s innocent. You’re goin’ to let her go.”

Corbet let his gaze settle on Jodee, sleeping on that narrow cot. His heart did a strange jig. Hobie was right. He had to let her go.

To go where?

“Keep your eyes open, Hobie. Early this morning I saw a man in a bowler hat. A button salesman, carrying a case. If you see him, get back to me. I’d like to talk to him.”

“You think it’s Tangus?” Hobie gasped, his eyes wide. “Right here in Burdeen? Will there be a shoot-out? I remember that first one, Marshal. Everybody in town remembers. I was only twelve, but you—”

Corbet put up his hand to silence the lad. He didn’t deserve praise for those first battles that settled the town.

“Will Tangus try to take Miss McQue?” Hobie gasped. “You can’t let him! She don’t want no part of him.”

“Don’t tell anybody about this, Hobie. I don’t want a panic.”

“Don’t you worry. If Tangus is in Burdeen, I’ll find him.”

“That is not what I meant,” Corbet exclaimed, alarmed at the lad’s rash idea. “He’s a dangerous outlaw.”

“But think what the Ashton-Babcock reward would mean for Ma.”

That damnable reward, Corbet thought, scowling at Hobie. He’d just found out about the two hundred cash dollars offered for Tangus by the Ashton-Babcock Stage Line. He took hold of the lad’s shoulders. “You make the slightest effort to find Tangus by yourself, I’ll fire you for good and all. Don’t make me sorry I took you on.”

“Sorry, sir. I didn’t mean it.” Hobie looked every bit his fifteen years as he fought disappointment.

Corbet sent the lad out the door into the late afternoon sunlight. The snow had melted, but the temperature was dropping. The muddy ruts in the street were freezing. He liked that boy. If anything happened to him he would never forgive himself.

When Artie brought the dinner tray a half hour later, Corbet noticed Jodee scarcely roused long enough to take more than a few bites. Eating his own dinner, Corbet fumed. Hicks hadn’t returned. Corbet couldn’t go on rounds. Every word Patsy Robstart spoke earlier haunted him. Jodee McQue’s presence in his jail complicated everything.

As dusk fell, Corbet could do nothing but sit and watch his prisoner sleep. How could he let her go, a lone girl dressed in ragged men’s clothes? He grew full of urgency looking at her and knew, suddenly, that he was attracted to her in a way he must never reveal or indulge.

It was late when Corbet felt ready to turn in for the night. He’d searched his files, written a dozen letters and struggled to think of a solution to Jodee’s predicament. He barred the door and latched the window shutters. He checked the locked gun rack. He sat a while on the edge of his low-slung bed, studying his hands, remembering slipping socks on Jodee’s thin, cold feet the night before. It had been hours since Jodee had been awake. A whole day and still the doctor hadn’t come. Virgil must be bad off. Patsy, too. If either died, he’d quit marshaling. Simple as that. Walk straight out of town. To hell with everything.

Pulling off his boots, he resisted what he wanted to do—check on Jodee. What if she’d died and he didn’t know? His stomach rolled over. Taking a half empty bottle of whiskey from his bedside stand, he padded into the main room in his stocking feet.

“Jodee?” He got a clean kerchief from the drawer and the cell key.

He shouldn’t go into her cell, he warned himself. That was the very thing folks suspected of him. What kind of man did they think he was? Didn’t they know—he could picture himself gathering her into his arms—didn't they know how helpless she was? He shook himself. Didn’t they know how important it was to protect the weak and friendless? He wouldn’t let himself think of her lithe young body beneath his hands. He’d never take advantage. That wasn’t the way of a real man.

Unlocking the cell door, Corbet stepped inside. What if someone came along and saw—the jailhouse door was barred. An army couldn’t get in.

“Jodee,” he whispered.

His body responded to the nearness of her, to the faint, musky fragrance of her, to the sight of her slim body lying so still in the darkness under the hotel blanket. He hadn’t felt such urges in a long time.

She didn’t stir.

Sick with dread, Corbet moved aside the tray on the floor with her partially eaten meal on it. Then he crouched beside the cot and gingerly touched her shoulder. He was braced for the shocking feel of cold and death. The astonishing heat of her body on the palm of his hand stunned him. She blazed with fever.

Corbet laid the back of his hand against her cheek, then on her scorching forehead. It felt like the worst fever he’d ever known. His hands began to shake. She lolled onto her back, nearly rolling off the cot into his arms.

Scooping her up, he carried her quickly into his sleeping room. Appalled by the waxy hollow look of her face, he laid her on his bed. Wetting his kerchief in the wash basin, he wiped her face, feeling immense relief when she twisted away. He wiped her slim throat—she was so fragile-looking—and then pushed aside the collar of his blue shirt that she was wearing over her own torn and bloody shirt. The dressing had come loose from her wound. It looked bad. Soaking a fresh kerchief in whiskey, he laid the dripping cloth over the puckered hole in her skin.

Jodee writhed and moaned.

“I’m sorry.”

Her eyelids fluttered and then, slowly, she opened her eyes and looked at him. Beautiful dark blue.

Corbet’s heart began thundering. He couldn’t think. Could she see him?

“Marshal,” she whispered so softly he almost didn’t hear her. It was the most arousing sound he’d ever heard. She looked at him with eyes glassy with bewilderment. Before he could think, she lifted her left hand and encircled his neck. She pulled him close. “Marshal.”

He couldn’t believe she’d been able to keep herself innocent for so long in the company of outlaws. Maybe she’d tell him where Burl was hiding. He leaned close enough to feel her breath hot on his face. Her hand burned his neck, sending tingles of arousal through his body like heat lightning. Without warning she arched up to place her sweet, hot mouth on his.

It was the most tender kiss he’d ever known. It was the kiss of a girl, the kind of sweet kiss he’d dreamed of as a boy. It was a kiss of longing and loneliness. Corbet felt Jodee’s tenderness flow into him straight to his heart.

“Marshal,” she whispered against his mouth, her breath hot.

His response was frightening in intensity. This mustn’t happen. He watched tears gather in her eyes. What if everything she’d said was true? What if she really was completely and totally innocent?

Jodee’s lips told Corbet all he needed to know. This was her first kiss.

And she had bestowed it upon him.