The Marshal Takes a Bride. Renee Ryan

      

      Underneath her schoolteacher starch, Katherine Taylor was a lovely, courageous bundle of beauty.

      Even when they clashed, Trey admired her moral fortitude and persistence. She’d triumphed over a scandalous childhood. She was, quite frankly, a woman worthy of his respect.

      With the wind snapping tendrils of black hair from her confining hairstyle, she looked like an avenging angel sent to demand his reckoning.

      It was always like this between them—volatile, unpredictable, confusing—more so over the last few months.

      Alarm spread through him, the reaction shocking him. The corresponding ache in his gut warned him that he’d made a mistake challenging Miss Taylor this time.

      “Relent…Marshal,” she spoke.

      The impossible had happened. Trey Scott, defender of justice, protector of women and children, had just suffered defeat. At the hands of a schoolmarm.

      RENEE RYAN

      Renee Ryan grew up in a small Florida beach town. To entertain herself during countless hours of “laying-out” she read all the classics. It wasn’t until the summer between her sophomore and junior years at Florida State University that she read her first romance novel. Hooked from page one, she spent hours consuming one book after another while working on the best (and last!) tan of her life.

      Two years later, armed with a degree in Economics and Religion, she explored various career opportunities, including stints at a Florida theme park, a modeling agency and a cosmetic conglomerate. She moved on to teach high school economics, American government and Latin while coaching award-winning cheerleading teams. Several years later, with an eclectic cast of characters swimming around in her head, she began seriously pursuing a writing career.

      She lives with her husband, two children and one ornery cat in Georgia.

      The Marshal Takes a Bride

      Renee Ryan

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.

      —Romans 12:19

      To my critique partners, Cindy Kirk and Terry Hager. You have no idea how much I appreciate you both. And to my twin, Robin. Thank you for showing endless mercy and forgiveness to a sister who loves you dearly but fails you often. And to my mother, Elsie, who went home to the Lord before she had a chance to read this one. I miss you, Mom!

      Contents

      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

      Chapter Eighteen

      Chapter Nineteen

      Chapter Twenty

      Chapter Twenty-One

      Chapter Twenty-Two

      Chapter Twenty-Three

      Epilogue

      Questions for Discussion

      Chapter One

      Denver, Colorado, June 1880

      Cornered and nearly out of ideas, U.S. marshal Trey Scott refused to consider retreat. Not while he had a five-year-old little girl counting on him to triumph against the misery that assailed her. What had started as a mere game to the others was a matter of tragic proportions to the child.

      Trey would not let her down.

      Shivering, Molly Taylor pressed her tiny body closer to him. “You gotta save me, Mr. Trey.”

      Those big round eyes and that trembling lower lip punched through the last remnants of his resolve to remain neutral in this standoff. He would stick by the kid throughout this battle of hers.

      Softening his expression, Trey knuckled a long black braid off her shoulder. “I won’t let them get you, kitten. Just stay close.”

      He scooted Molly behind him, mutiny twisting in his gut. No one would stand in his way as he protected the girl from her dreaded fate. The troubled child deserved some peace and joy in her life.

      “Leave this child alone.” He fixed an uncompromising glare on the leader—a woman of uncompromising valor—and ignored the half dozen or so others crowding closer.

      The pale-eyed, persistent female held firm against him in their battle of wills. Apparently, this was no game to her, either.

      Trey widened his stance and folded his arms across his chest, settling into the standoff as though he had all the time in the world. He wrestled against the knot of regret tangling inside his anger. At one time, he’d considered this woman beautiful, godly—even fair-minded.

      He’d woefully miscalculated.

      At least Molly had him on her side. A swift glimpse to his left revealed an opening in the hedge that ran along the perimeter of the yard. Mentally, he measured the dimensions and came up victorious. The hole was the perfect size for a forty-pound slip of a girl to glide through to freedom. He’d catch up with her before she made it halfway down Larimer Street and long before she hit the bedlam of horse-drawn taxis on Tabor Block in the business district.

      Comfortable with his plan, Trey inched across the grass, tugging Molly along with him.

      The boss matched him step for step.

      Shooting the woman a warning glare, Trey then turned to Molly and cocked his head toward the thicket. “You know what to do,” he whispered.

      Tears wiggled just below long, sooty lashes. “What if they catch me?”

      He lowered his voice. “I’ll create a diversion.”

      “What’s that?” Molly asked in a whisper loud enough to be heard two counties over.

      “Never mind. When I say run, you run.”

      But the leader—wrapped in that deceptively feminine package—pulled around to the left, effectively closing off the escape. “Don’t even think about it.”

      At the end of his temper, Trey swallowed back a bitter retort.

      As though hearing his unspoken words, inflexible blue eyes cut through the distance between them.

      “The game is over…Marshal,” the woman said.

      Although he had at least a hundred pounds on the stormy-eyed sprite, Trey had to stifle the shocking urge to withdraw. He’d stood up against cannons, gross injustice, crooked judges and vicious criminals, but nothing compared to the disapproval of Katherine Taylor—schoolmarm, official custodian of the Charity House trusts and Molly’s overprotective sister.

      With that inflexible look on her face, Trey knew he could no longer count on the fact that Miss Taylor would set aside her volatile feelings for him and be reasonable,