Lawman. Diana Palmer

      Praise for the reigning queen of romance

      DIANA PALMER

      “Palmer’s talent for character development and ability to fuse heartwarming romance with nail-biting suspense shines in Outsider.”

      —Booklist

      “A gentle escape mixed with real-life menace for fans of Palmer’s more than 100 novels.”

      —Publishers Weekly on Night Fever

      “The ever-popular and prolific Palmer has penned another sure hit.”

      —Booklist on Before Sunrise

      “Nobody does it better.”

      —New York Times bestselling author Linda Howard

      “Palmer knows how to make the sparks fly…heartwarming.”

      —Publishers Weekly on Renegade

      “Readers who enjoy stories by authors who know how to pack an emotional wallop will add Palmer to their list.”

      —Booklist on Renegade

      “Nobody tops Diana Palmer when it comes to delivering pure, undiluted romance. I love her stories.”

      —New York Times bestselling author Jayne Ann Krentz

      Also by Diana Palmer

      The Morcai Battalion

      Winter Roses

      Trilby

      Lacy

      Heart of Winter

      Outsider

      Night Fever

      Before Sunrise

      Lawless

      Diamond Spur

      Desperado

      The Texas Ranger

      Lord of the Desert

      The Cowboy and the Lady

      Most Wanted

      Fit for a King

      Paper Rose

      Rage of Passion

      Once in Paris

      After the Music

      Roomful of Roses

      Champagne Girl

      Passion Flower

      Diamond Girl

      Friends and Lovers

      Cattleman’s Choice

      Lady Love

      The Rawhide Man

      DIANA PALMER

      LAWMAN

      In memoriam

       To Gene Burton, Our neighbor, our friend

LAWMAN

      Contents

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      1

      THE OLD JACOBS PLACE was in disrepair. The last owner hadn’t been big on maintenance, and now there was a leak in Garon’s study. Right over his damned computer, in fact.

      He glared at it from the doorway, elegantly dressed in a gray suit. He’d just arrived in Jacobsville from Washington, D.C., where he’d been taking a course at Quantico on homicide investigation. It was his new specialty, that area of law enforcement. Garon Grier was a career FBI man. He worked out of the San Antonio office, but he’d recently moved from an apartment there to this huge ranch in Jacobsville. His brother Cash was the Jacobsville police chief. The brothers had been alienated for some time. Cash had disowned his family over his father’s remarriage just days after his beloved mother’s death from cancer. That long feud had only just ended. Cash was newly, happily, married to Tippy Moore, the “Georgia Firefly” of modeling and motion picture fame. She had just had their first child, a little girl.

      Cash thought the child was the crown jewels. To Garon, she looked more like a little red prune with flailing fists. But as the days passed, she did seem to grow prettier. Garon loved children. No one would ever have guessed it. He had a demeanor that was blunt and confrontational. He rarely smiled, and he was usually all business, even with women. Especially with women. He’d lost his one true love to cancer. It had eaten the heart out of him. Now, at thirty-six, he was resigned to being alone for the rest of his life. It was just as well, he decided, because he had nothing to give to a woman. He lived for his job. He would have liked a child of his own, though. A little boy would be nice. But he had no desire to risk his heart in pursuit of one.

      Miss Jane Turner, the housekeeper he’d hired, came into the room behind him, her thin face resigned. “There aren’t any construction people available until next week, Mr. Garon,” she said in her Texas drawl. “We’d best put a bucket under it for now, I reckon, unless you want to climb up on the roof with a hammer and nails.”

      He gave her a superior look. “I don’t climb up on roofs,” he said flatly.

      She looked him over in the suit. “That doesn’t surprise me,” she muttered, turning to go.

      He gave her a shocked look. She must think he never wore anything but suits, when he’d grown up on a sprawling west Texas ranch. He could ride anything with four legs, and he’d won prizes in rodeo competitions in his teens. Now, he knew more about guns and investigation than he did about rodeo, but he could still run a ranch. In fact, he was stocking purebred black Angus cattle here, and he planned to give his father and brothers a run for their money in cattle shows. He had in mind founding his own champion herd sires here. If he could lick the problem of getting qualified cowboys to work for an outsider, that was. Small towns seemed to draw into themselves when people from other places moved in. Jacobsville had less than two thousand people living in it, and most of them seemed to watch Garon from behind curtained windows every time he walked around town. He was surveyed, measured up and kept carefully at a distance for the time being. People in Jacobsville were particular about letting strangers join the family, because that was what they considered themselves—a family of two thousand souls.

      He glanced at his watch. He was already late for a meeting with his squad of agents at the San Antonio FBI office, but last night his flight had been unexpectedly delayed in D.C. by a security hitch. It was early morning before the plane landed in San Antonio. He’d had to drive down to Jacobsville, and he’d barely slept. He walked out onto the wide, concrete front porch with its gray floor and white porch swing and white wicker furniture and cushions. Those were new. It was late February, and his housekeeper said they needed someplace for his company to sit when it came. He told her he wasn’t expecting to have any. She snorted and ordered the furniture anyway. She was an authority on everybody who lived around here. She’d probably become an authority on him in short time, but he’d told her graphically what would happen if she dared to pass on any personal gossip about his life. She’d just smiled. He hated that damned smile. If he could have gotten any other spinster