by Pam Crooks
He searched his mind for something intelligent to say. Or something humble, considering the predicament he was in. Either way, her wounded silence was proof she wasn’t going to make it easy for him.
She refused to look at him. Just stood there in front of him with her fingers twined tight together, slender and female and still properly miffed.
If Ross didn’t know better, he’d never guess Lark was who she was. Or had been. The transformation from a reckless young outlaw to a grown-up, beautiful woman with principles was intriguing.
To say the least.
“You look nice today,” he ventured.
Her gaze flew to him.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked, her eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Just what I said.” He made a vague gesture. “Your dress and the way you did your hair. Nice.”
“As opposed to what I used to wear? Pants and a pair of Colts hanging on my hips?”
“Yes. I mean, no. Hell, Lark. Just take the compliment for what it’s worth. You look nice, that’s all.”
Her reluctance to accept the praise puzzled him. Hadn’t she been flattered by a man before?
She regarded him, as if trying to decide his motive. Finally, she nodded, accepting his attempt at conciliation. “Forgive me for jumping to conclusions, then. Thank you for—for your kind words.”
His mind worked over the possibility no man in Ida Grove claimed the privilege of courting her. If that was true, why not?
“You’re welcome,” he said.
He’d have to ask Chat about it. Might be she knew something about Lark’s personal life and the men she favored.
Not that he should even care.
But he did.
“This is what I wear to the bank,” Lark said, smoothing her skirt self-consciously. “Nothing fancy.” A delicate pucker formed at her brows. “I don’t recall seeing you there. Chat a time or two, yes, but not you. I—I would have remembered.”
“I don’t frequent them,” he said.
“Banks?”
“Swore off ’em years ago.”
“Oh. I see.”
She didn’t, of course. How could she? She’d learn the ugly truth soon enough. When he found the money stolen from the Muscatine treasury.
The thought sobered him, and he rooted through the papers on his bench. He had work to do. Standing here talking to Lark—thinking about her—wouldn’t get it done.
“So this is your workshop?” Her gaze swiveled around the place, a small-scale factory of sorts he’d built himself.
“Yep.” He found the sheet he was looking for, frowned at the numbers he’d jotted down last night.
“It’s big.”
“Has to be. Furniture takes up space.”
“What do you make? Besides bedroom sets?”
“You name it, I can build it.”
“Really?”
She sounded impressed. Ross glanced up. She’d meandered to the far side of the shop to see the projects he had scattered in organized confusion throughout the open area, all in various stages of construction.
“Really.” Her awe gave him pause. It wasn’t often someone unfamiliar with carpentry came into the shop.
“How?”
“How what? Do I build things?”
“Yes. You must start somewhere.” She strolled closer, her gait graceful. Relaxed.
“I start with a design.”
“Do you draw your own?”
He nodded. “Mostly. Sometimes the customer buys one. From a company out East, maybe, that sells the design only. Then he’ll hire me to build the piece for him.”
“But sometimes the customer needs you to draw the design, too.”
“That’s right.” Again, he perused the numbers, but her presence shot his concentration.
“I suspect your customers are not just from around Ida Grove.”
“Some are. Some are from Omaha. A few from Chicago and St. Louis.”
“I see.” Again, she stood before him, in front of his workbench. “You have quite a business going for yourself, don’t you, Santana?”
The huskiness in her voice stroked him. “Keeps me busy, if nothing else.”
Her mouth curved. “From a bounty hunter—” her arm swept outward “—to this. How did you learn it all?”
“My father.” Ross ignored a nibble of grief. “He was a master in the trade. Taught me when I was a kid.”
“But you really wanted to chase outlaws.”
“Yes.” Much to William Santana’s disappointment.
“It’s amazing all you’ve accomplished.”
He grunted. “As if I had a choice.”
“Because of your eye?”
Her frank perception unnerved him. No one, with the sole exception of Chat, spoke as openly about his loss as Lark did. And lest he be accused of feeling sorry for himself again, he kept his mouth shut. She didn’t need his response.
But his mind crept inward to the past, to the despair that had descended upon him when his surgeon gave him the news. Despair which had turned him into a recluse and inspired a fierce devotion to furniture-making.
Because furniture didn’t stare. Furniture didn’t think of him as a has-been bounty hunter. Furniture didn’t ask nosy questions. Or mock him.
Or pity him, most of all.
“Seems to me there’s a world of good that’s come out of losing that eye, Santana,” she said quietly. “A lucrative business being at the top of the list.”
“Don’t make it sound easier than it’s been, Lark.”
“Lucrative,” she insisted. “And you don’t even have an account with Mr. Templeton. Why?”
He stiffened. “I have my reasons.”
“You could be investing the profits. Mr. Templeton is very good—”
“I choose not to. And what business is it of yours what I do with my money?”
She drew herself up a little taller. “You’re right, of course. It’s none of my business. None at all.”
Ross heard the hurt in her tone, and he plowed a hand through his hair in frustration. She had his best interests at heart, nothing more, and why did she manage to bring out the worst in him?
“If you think I’m plotting a way to steal your money or—or something, then you’re—”
“Hell, Lark. I’m not. Why would I think that?”
“Because you’re always so blasted cross with me. You’re suspicious, too, and I am not the person I used to be, and until you’re able to accept that—”
“I’m sorry.”
The words came out easier this time. He was getting good at it, apologizing to a woman twice in one morning, yet the need to take her into his arms, to use his body instead of words, ran strong within him.
If not for the workbench that stood between them, he would have.
“Well.” She drew in a breath, let it out again. “We’re having a difficult time of it, aren’t we?”
He vowed to go easier on her. They had the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon together, just the two of them, and if they were to get through it, he’d have to think before he opened his mouth and be more…likable.
“I can show you what I’m working on. If you’d like to know, that is,” he said stiffly.
She blinked at him in surprise. “All right. Of course.”
“A revolving bookcase.” He came around the workbench to stand beside her, bringing the design and its measurements with him. He laid it all in front of her. “The project is in its earliest stages, but the sketch will give you an idea of what it’ll look like when it’s finished.”
“Oh, how beautiful,” she breathed.
Her admiration stroked his ego, his pride. Compelled him to keep talking.
“The case will be three shelves high and have beveled glass here and here.” He bent a little toward her, caught her clean scent, like prairie grass in the spring. “As soon as I’m finished figuring the measurements, I can get started.”
“The d
esign looks complete to me,” she said, her fascinated gaze taking in every detail. “What do you have left to finish?”
“The second tier is figured wrong.” He reached for his calculations. “I need to find the mistake before I go any further.”
“May I see?” She leaned over the paper, a slight frown of concentration tugging at her brow. In what seemed only a few moments, she smiled in triumph. “There.” Her finger tapped the page. “You carried a one instead of a two when adding your fractions. That’s where your mistake is.”
He saw his error and shook his head. “You know how long I’ve been trying to find that?”
She angled her head toward him, her mass of curls narrowly missing his chin. “I’ve always found numbers easy to cipher.”
It’d been a long time since he’d stood so close to a woman, and Ross had no desire to pull away from this one.
“Lucky for me you do,” he murmured.
Their gazes locked, and damned if time didn’t stand still. He could lose himself in those eyes of hers, that intriguing blend of brown and mahogany. He could lose himself in her scent, too. Just breathe the freshness of her all day long. He could take her mouth to his and taste its softness….
But of course, he couldn’t do any of those things.
He stepped back, snatched up his design and wondered how in the hell he was going to keep his hands off of her for the rest of the day.
Chapter Nine
Catfish Jack huddled in the shadows of the Hungry Horse Saloon and pulled a sack of Bull Durham from his shirt pocket. He needed both hands to get the tobacco on the paper, and even then, some of it drifted into the dirt. He licked the seam and pinched the ends closed, found a match and scraped the tip across his thigh. The flame leapt at the end of the cigarette, and Catfish drew in deep.
Yesterday, he could’ve rolled his smoke one-handed while sitting on a spooked horse in a high wind. Today, his head hurt, his hands shook and his eyes saw two of everything he looked at.
All because of Wild Red.
After she knocked him out cold back there in her sleeping room, he came to and found her gone. The red-haired witch had always been a fighter. Catfish had forgotten that, her being a fighter.
He wouldn’t forget again.
She was hiding somewhere, same as he was. She had too much at stake to run just yet, what with the new life she’d built in this peashooter little town. She’d be scared, too. And real careful. But he’d find her, all right. Give her a taste of her own medicine for what she’d done to him.
After she told him where the money was.
Might be she didn’t think ol’ Catfish meant what he said, helping her find the Muscatine loot, splitting it fifty-fifty. Didn’t matter what she thought, though. Or if he ever did what he’d said he’d do. He needed that money she’d taken. Needed it bad.
He had to get to South America. The law was after him in most every state this part of the country. If he got caught, they’d have him gargling on a rope fast as lightning.
Just thinking about it made his skin get up and crawl.
A ticket south was the only thing that would keep him alive, and if he couldn’t find Wild Red, make her talk, maybe even lead him to the money, then he was good as dead.
“Hey, Catfish. You starin’ at that boardinghouse again?”
Catfish started. He’d been so deep in his ruminating he didn’t hear Jo-Jo Sumner come up behind him.
“Keep your fool mouth shut, boy. Too many folks around to hear you.”
“Sorry.”
Catfish took another drag on the cigarette and hid his annoyance. He had to tolerate the kid. His pa, Eb Sumner, owned the Hungry Horse Saloon. He’d been letting Catfish sleep in the supply room at the back since the day he rode into town to scout for Wild Red. Charged him a tall penny for the privilege, but kept quiet about it, at least. Catfish figured the deal was worth it, except he was almost out of money, and what would he do then? There was no other place he could stay as banged up as he was.
His hope lay in the kid. Jo-Jo was somewhere on the shy side of eighteen, born lazy, bored with life in Ida Grove and itching for some excitement. Meeting Catfish had given him some of that, Catfish guessed. Might be the kid could convince his old man to let Catfish hide out in the saloon for a little while longer after his money ran out. At least until he learned something about Wild Red’s whereabouts.
Catfish focused his sights on the boy. Lanky, with crooked teeth and a drawling way of talking, he was eager to please and real curious about Catfish’s outlook on life. His tricks of the trade, so to speak.
Some of Catfish’s annoyance faded. The kid liked him for his law-breaking tendencies. ’Course, Jo-Jo had broken a few laws of his own. Petty stuff, mostly. Nothing of Catfish’s caliber yet enough of an irritation to be a thorn in the side of the local sheriff.
The thought helped Catfish feel better. Superior, too, which made it easy to be a mite more friendly toward him.
“You really think she’d come back?” Jo-Jo asked, keeping to the shadows, same as he was.
Catfish stared at Kelley’s Boardinghouse, across the street and one block over from the saloon. It’d been against his better judgment to tell Jo-Jo who Wild Red really was, but when Catfish had stumbled into the back room of the Hungry Horse with his skull cracked open and bleeding after his run-in with her, he didn’t have a choice but to take the kid into his confidence. He’d kept back pertinent details, of course—he wasn’t that stupid—but he’d revealed enough about her to keep Jo-Jo interested.
“It’s where she lives,” Catfish said. “And she’s a woman, ain’t she? She didn’t have time to take anything with her last night. She’d want to come back and pack up some gear if she was intendin’ to leave town.”
“Hard to believe Miss Renault used to ride with the Reno gang,” Jo-Jo said. “Folks just ain’t going to believe it when they find out.”
Footsteps sounded on the boardwalk just beyond the saloon’s shadows. Catfish slid his hat lower over his face, hiding the bandage wrapped around his head. An elderly couple walked by, arm-in-arm, oblivious to their presence. After the footsteps died down, Catfish smacked Jo-Jo against the shoulder.
“Keep quiet!” he snapped. “The whole town’s looking for me. I ain’t got a hankering to get caught just ’cuz you can’t keep your voice down when we’re hidin’ out like this.”
The kid was smart enough to look alarmed. “Sorry!”
“Don’t you go openin’ your mouth about Wild Red just yet, either,” Catfish warned. “When the time’s right, and not a minute sooner!”
“I won’t!”
Catfish slid a disgusted breath through his teeth and lifted his hat brim to better see the boardinghouse again. A buckboard wagon pulled up in front, and a young girl got down from the driver’s seat.
He’d seen her before. Real pretty, she was. From what he could tell, she was a friend of the daughter of the lady who owned the place. He’d seen them together most every day since he’d been in Ida Grove, watching for Wild Red.
Catfish prided himself on remembering details, and his gut told him the girl was one detail he should remember. She carried a basket in her hand, and from the way she was swinging the thing, it was empty. She climbed the stairs, opened the door to the boardinghouse just as free as you please, and disappeared inside.
Jo-Jo’s thin lips curled in a lusty grin. “Sure would love to get under her skirts, wouldn’t you?”
Catfish wasn’t particularly discriminating when it came to the female gender, but he drew the line at one so young.
“Who is she?” Catfish asked after a thoughtful pull on his cigarette.
“Her name’s Chat Santana. Lives with her brother outside of town.”
Santana. A common enough name.
Catfish frowned. Or was it?
“What else you know about her?” he asked.
Jo-Jo shrugged. “Not much, ’cept she’s got all the boys pantin’ after her. She’s best friend
s with Sarah whose ma owns the boardinghouse.”
Santana. Chat Santana…
The name stuck with him, raised the hairs on the back of his neck some.
He shook off the uneasy feeling.
“So have you done it yet with her?” he asked.
Jo-Jo blinked in confusion. “Done what?”
He sighed. “Gotten under her skirts yet.”
Jo-Jo shuffled. “Hell, no. Her brother would filet me alive if I did.”
“Her brother.” Catfish smirked. If he wanted a woman bad enough, no one would stop him from having her, didn’t matter who he was.
“Ross Santana,” Jo-Jo added in hasty defense against that smirk. “Word is he used to be a bounty hunter.”
Catfish nearly choked on his own spit.
“You heard of him?” Jo-Jo asked.
Catfish needed some time to recover, get his heart to beating again. “Yeah, I’ve heard of him.”
Most every outlaw this side of the Missouri had heard of Ross Santana. Catfish recognized him that day at the Turf Club. Acted fast when he did. A blast from his shotgun had thrown Santana to the floor. Sure the man was dead, Catfish took the opportunity to run, but in all the confusion—damn.
Santana was alive and kicking. Right here in Ida Grove.
He’d have a score to settle with ol’ Catfish for shootin’ him, for sure.
Catfish swallowed hard at the nasty wrinkle in his plan to find Wild Red.
“What do you know about Santana?” he demanded.
“Not much. He don’t associate with folks. Only thing that brings him to town now and again is if he has an order to pick up from Bowman Lumber, that’s all.”
“But his kid sister comes in.”
“Most every day. Sells butter and eggs at the dairy.” Jo-Jo shifted his attention back to the street. “She’s coming out again, and ain’t that strange.”
“What?” Catfish demanded.
“She’s comin’ from the back of the house, like she doesn’t want no one to see her.”
Catfish strained to focus. That was her all right, carrying the basket on her arm. But this time, there was something in it. Heavy, too, by the looks of it. She seemed in a real hurry to stuff the basket under the wagon’s seat, but then she just stood beside the rig, waiting, acting real nonchalant. Her friend—Sarah—came out, they both got in the wagon and rode off.