Outlaw Wife. Ana Seymour

full canteen of water lying on the ground next to him. He would hardly have been able to half walk, half stumble his way into town without it.

      It was a mystery. And it made his head throb to think about it.

      Cissy laid a cloth on his forehead, and this time he didn’t resist as she traced her fingers through his hair. “Go to sleep, Simon,” she said soothingly. “I’ll wake you when Father comes back.”

      

      But when he awoke Cissy was gone and the earlymorning sun was streaming in through the jail window. He’d slept the entire night. He closed his eyes and took a quick inventory. From the waist down, he seemed to be in tolerable shape. From the waist up, to put it directly, he wasn’t.

      “I thought you were going to sleep till next spring like a mama bear.”

      John’s booming voice pierced right through Simon’s temples. Simon took a minute to let the air slowly into his sore chest before answering, “Hell, John. I figured I could sleep in this morning, knowing our fearless sheriff was out rounding up those varmints and getting me back my horse.”

      John snorted. “You think I want to end up looking like you? I ain’t that crazy, son.”

      Simon rolled his eyes and found the movement tolerable. “Excuse me. I guess I just kind of thought that’s what sheriffs were for. To get the bad guys.”

      “Nah,” John drawled. “We leave that to the marshals mostly. After all, they’re the ones who get all the glory in those dime novels the kids sneak into Cissy’s school.”

      “So where does that leave my horse?”

      “Well, we’ll just have to tell Marshal Wyatt Earp about it the next time he comes riding through town.”

      Simon glared. “You’re getting to be an old man, John.”

      The sheriff pushed himself out of his chair and walked toward Simon. “And I plan to continue right on that path, lad. Which means I don’t intend to get myself shot or end up like you with my skin showing all the colors of the rainbow.”

      Simon lifted his head and looked down at his body. This time the movement was not so tolerable. He fell back against the mattress. “I look pretty, do I?”

      “Prettier than a prize pig at the town fair.”

      Simon smiled. “Help me up.”

      “Cissy says you’re not supposed to move from that bed for three days.”

      Simon lifted an eyebrow. “Listen, old man, unless you’re planning to take up nursing in your old age, I need to get up and take a trip out back.”

      John looked embarrassed. “Oh.”

      “I suppose you could call Cissy back to help me out with a bedpan. That might be interesting.”

      “Not likely, you randy bastard.” There was the faintest trace of humor in the sheriffs voice and it felt good to both of them. When Simon had decided that his feelings for Cissy were never going to be more than those for a beloved sister, it had been almost as hard for him to tell her father as it had been to tell her. This was the first time he and John had been able to make any reference to the breakup without the hurt feelings surfacing.

      “Well, give me a hand, then.”

      Together they managed to get him to the outhouse and back again, but the trip convinced Simon that Cissy had been right, as usual. There was no way he’d be riding for at least a couple of days. Fortunately he’d finished his business in Laramie quickly, not liking to be away from home for long these days. His father wouldn’t start looking for him until the end of the week.

      “So what did you find out about the bunch who waylaid me?” he asked as the sheriff helped him settle back into bed.

      “Sounds like the Davis gang. Old Seth Davis has been keeping himself and his boys one step ahead of the law for years now.”

      “Seth!” In his haze yesterday, Simon had forgotten that he’d heard a couple of the outlaws’ names. “They called the leader of the group Seth. And there was another man named Jake.”

      “That’d be Jake Patton. A real mean sidewinder from down South somewheres. Has a reputation for being fast with guns and charming with women.”

      “Somehow I missed the charming part.”

      “Is he the one who kicked you?”

      Simon nodded.

      John’s eyes went from Simon’s mangled face to his bandaged ribs. “We’re going to get them, Simon,” he said grimly.

      “I thought you said you were too old for chasing criminals.”

      “I am. But we’re going to get them just the same.”

      He looked out the window at the sound of a commotion out on the street. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

      “What is it?” Simon knew better than to try turning his head that far.

      “If my eyes weren’t too old to depend on, I’d say that looks an awful lot like Marshal Torrance.”

      “Did you send him a wire?”

      John ignored the question. “And the horse with him looks an awful lot like your Rain Cloud.”

      Simon rolled over on to his hands to boost himself up enough to see out the window. Sure enough. A man he didn’t know was tying Rain Cloud to the hitching rail out front. She looked none the worse for wear, he saw with relief.

      “And I think they’ve got at least some of your outlaws,” the sheriff continued jubilantly. He raced to the door, flung it open and disappeared out into the street.

      Simon groaned as he heaved his legs over the side of the bed and straightened up. His side screamed in protest, but he ignored it as he swiftly calculated the number of steps it would take him to reach the door. Six. Seven, maybe. He could do that. And then another two across the sidewalk to Rain Cloud.

      He held one hand tightly against his bandage and put the other out to balance himself. He didn’t even want to think about how much it would hurt to fall. As it turned out, they were more shuffles than steps, and it took about ten. Finally he reached the door and leaned heavily against one side of the frame.

      When he looked outside, the first sight to greet him was Rain Cloud, lifting her head with a soft nicker of recognition. Then he turned his head and saw her. His vision. The heavenly features and glorious hair. She was real. And John Walker had the barrel of his revolver pressed tight against her head.

      “She kicked me,” he explained as he saw Simon’s expression.

      “She’s a hellion, all right,” agreed the man standing next to John. He had a double-holstered gun belt on and a tin badge displayed prominently on his black shirt. Simon supposed that he must be Marshal Torrance.

      The scrawny outlaw he had thought was a boy was a girl dressed in male clothing. But she didn’t look like a hellion to Simon. She looked young and scared. “Just keep your hands off me,” the girl muttered into her oversize neckerchief. Simon shook his head. He must have been half-asleep not to have seen it. Even in jeans and a heavy wool jacket she was obviously female. The jeans molded around legs that were long and slender. The jacket filled out at just the right places. And then there was that face. He’d been blind not to have realized.

      He tore his gaze away from her and held on to the door frame for support as John and the marshal ushered their prisoners past him into the jail.

      “I’d rather keep this as quiet as possible,” Marshal Torrance was saying. “The rest of the gang’s still out there, and they might decide to spring these two.”

      His back pressed against the door, Simon surveyed the scene. The other man with the marshal was evidently a deputy. They’d caught only two of the outlaws—the old man and the girl. That left