Lawman In Disguise. Laurie Kingery

      

      The Lawman’s Secret

      When her son discovers an injured outlaw in their barn, the mysterious stranger instantly turns widow Daisy Henderson’s world upside down. But Daisy senses Thorn Dawson’s a good man...and there’s more to his story than he can tell her. So she can’t turn him away before he heals, even if she’s falling for him—something she swore she’d never do again after her husband died.

      An undercover lawman, Thorn never lets himself get too close to anyone. But that’s before he meets single mother Daisy and her spirited son. Now Thorn has to protect them from the Griggs gang—a gang that’s come to accept him as one of their own. And if he can’t keep up the charade, the woman of his dreams might just pay the price.

      “You’re a good mother,” he assured her. “You let him know you care about him, that he’s important to you. Not like my father...”

      He hadn’t meant to say those last four words, but it was as if they had been ripped from the deepest part of his heart.

      “Not like your father? What do you mean, Thorn?” she asked, her face puzzled, her eyes searching the depths of his gaze.

      Perhaps it was time to get it out in the open. No wound could heal if it was left to fester.

      “My birth cost my mother her health,” he told her. “She was never well afterward, and she died before I was old enough to remember her. She’d wanted to name me Thornton, after her father, but after she was gone, my father just called me Thorn. He made sure I knew it was because I was a thorn in his side...”

      “Oh, Thorn!” she cried. And suddenly she had thrown her arms around him as she began to cry.

      He was so astonished—and moved, because no one had found him worthy of weeping over before—that he could only wrap his arms around her and pull her close...

      LAURIE KINGERY is a Texas transplant to Ohio who writes romance set in post–Civil War Texas. She was nominated for a Carol Award for her second Love Inspired Historical novel, The Outlaw’s Lady, and is currently writing a series about mail-order grooms in a small town in the Texas Hill Country.

      Lawman in Disguise

      Laurie Kingery

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy path.

      —Proverbs 3:5–6

      To Deb Siegenthal and Rhonda Gibson, the best encouragers anywhere, as well as being fine novelists themselves, and as always, to Tom

      Contents

       Cover

       Back Cover Text

       Introduction

       About the Author

       Title Page

       Bible Verse

       Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

       Chapter Five

       Chapter Six

       Chapter Seven

       Chapter Eight

       Chapter Nine

       Chapter Ten

       Chapter Eleven

       Chapter Twelve

       Chapter Thirteen

       Chapter Fourteen

       Chapter Fifteen

       Chapter Sixteen

       Chapter Seventeen

       Dear Reader

       Extract

       Copyright

Chapter One

      Simpson Creek, Texas

      August 1870

      He was at the end of his strength, and he supposed this barn behind someone’s Simpson Creek house was as good a place to die as anywhere else. At least Ace, his horse, was apt to find some forage before he gave up on his master and wandered off. Thorn only hoped that if the law connected the riderless horse to the outlaws involved in the bank robbery, they wouldn’t be able to find him here, or they’d be apt to string him up before he could explain.

      Sooner or later, he knew that he’d have to talk to local law enforcement. He’d explain that he was a State Police officer, assigned to infiltrate the infamous Griggs gang and collect enough evidence to bring them to justice for their many crimes. He was prepared for the local sheriff’s skepticism. Thorn just hoped it didn’t come at the end of a loaded gun. This town had shot him enough already.

      Weakened as he was by the loss of blood, his dismount turned into an ungraceful collapse into the aisle between the stalls, observed by no one but a trio of chickens scrabbling along in search of bugs and stray oats. The chickens fluttered and clucked in alarm when he collapsed, and he groaned as the fiery pain of his wound punished him for the violent movement. But once they finished their squawking, they seemed content to leave him be. Ace sidled away uneasily before spotting a mound of hay in the corner with a bucket atop it, and ambling toward it, his injured rider forgotten.

      Though his vision was blurry, Thorn could see that he was lying right in