Untamed Cowboy (C Bar C Ranch Book 1)

by Pam Crooks

Woollie, looking grim, stepped away from the plate glass window. Carina whirled toward him with a shocked gasp.

  Suddenly, Rogan leaped toward her with more speed, more agility, more cunning than any of them could have expected. His body rammed against hers, and thrown off balance, she cried out. He whipped the Colts from her holster, flung his arm around her neck and pressed the nose of one to her temple. Holding the other in a white-knuckled grip, he kept her body tight against his chest.

  One after the other, C Bar C hammers cocked.

  Barrels leveled.

  Fingers stroked triggers….

  “Don’t shoot!” Penn roared. “Don’t shoot!”

  Sweet Mother. If any of them missed, if any of them shot Carina…

  The horror rolled through him in waves. His perfect plan for revenge had been knocked to its knees. Carina being here, at the worst possible moment, had given Rogan the bait he needed to save himself.

  “I’m so glad you’ve come, Carina, dear,” he said against her ear, his voice as smooth as oil. “Call off your wolves for me, will you?”

  “Let me handle this, Carina,” Penn grated.

  Her bosom heaved; her eyes, cold, a little wild, turned on him. “Callie Mae is more important to me than your revenge could ever be to you, McClure. You’re not going to make an arrest until I have what I need out of him.”

  “And maybe not even then,” Rogan cooed.

  “Tell us what you want us to do, Mr. McClure.” Ronnie moved away from the potted fern, Billy beside him, both their weapons aimed and steadied. “Just tell us.”

  “Easy, boys,” Woollie said, tense, his hand up. “Back off.”

  “Carina, listen to me,” Penn said. He had to convince her. He had to make her understand. “She’s here, in Dodge City. I swear it. Just trust me to—”

  Something red streaked in his vision. His head whipped toward it. Specks of color through the plate glass window. There one moment, gone the next, and then the door burst open. Callie Mae, out of breath, excited, jubilant, barreled into the bank lobby at a full run.

  “Mama, Mama!”

  Even with the Colt against her temple, Carina jerked her head around, a scream tearing from her throat. “Callie Mae!” She strained against Rogan’s grip, her arms reaching for her daughter. “Oh, Callie Mae!”

  Callie Mae skidded to a halt. Her eyes rounded like moons, and her dirty face scrunched. She shrieked in fury.

  “Let her go, Rogan! Let her go!” she screamed.

  Like a cornered she-cat, she flung herself at Carina and grasped her hands, pulling, pulling to break her free.

  “Take her away!” Rogan shouted, sidestepping to evade her, dragging Carina with him. “You hear me? Take her away from here!”

  “Sweetheart, sweetheart.” Tortured tears streamed down Carina’s face, her anguish from her daughter seeing her like this. Captive. Helpless. “I’ll be all right.”

  “Come here, Tea Cup!” Woollie rushed forward, scooped her into his arms. Callie Mae screamed. Her fists flailed, her feet kicked, her back arched in protest. “You can’t be in here right now, honey.”

  He had his hands full with her, but he managed to get her out the door and spare her from the harshness of her father’s sins. Jesse and Stinky Dale, Ronnie and Billy, each stood immobile, stricken from the grief of their she-boss, the little girl they loved as their own, their uncertainty about what to do next written on their sun-brown faces.

  Rogan held Carina in a tighter grip to her neck, hard enough to turn her breathing ragged.

  “Make them drop their guns, Carina,” he commanded. “Or I’ll shoot. You got the girl, don’t you? But I don’t have anything. You hear me? I don’t have anything. So you’re going to write me another check. A real, genuine bank draft this time. Every dime that your precious herd is worth. Else you’ll die right here. I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you!”

  She clutched his arm with both hands, her body rigid. Her gaze lifted to Penn, her violet eyes deep pools of torment, of raw dignity. She all but tore his heart out of his chest.

  “You heard him, McClure,” she said.

  Beautiful Carina, too strong to beg for her own life. To order her men to defend her when she needed it most.

  Her pride, her courage… Penn had never loved her more.

  He lowered the Peacemaker. Tossed it somewhere off to the side, out of reach. The gun clattered against the floor. Soon, four more shooting irons followed. The C Bar C outfit, completely unarmed.

  “Penn.” Harv’s throat bobbed above his white shirt collar. “Are you sure?”

  “Drop yours, too.” Penn’s voice snapped the order.

  The agent’s gun joined the rest with a hard thunk, a fitting punctuation to the vow pounding in Penn’s head.

  Unheeled, he’d find a way to save her. He’d get back at Rogan for what he’d done. Show no mercy…

  “Let’s go, Carina.” Rogan inched toward the door, pulling her backward with him. “You know I’ll shoot you, don’t you? So don’t do anything stupid, like try to get away or anything. Nothing stupid, no, sirree. I’ll kill you.”

  He was almost there, through the door. Onto the boardwalk, his horse tethered right outside.

  “What do you think your mother would say if she saw you now, Rogan?” Penn asked. He kept his tone easy, as if he spoke about the weather. “Might be she’d cut you out of the family fortune if she knew about all your crimes. You suppose she’d do that, Rogan?”

  Rogan flinched. “Leave her out of this!”

  “She’ll need to be notified of all you’ve done, you know. No matter what happens.” Penn persisted, homing in on a weak spot a man like Rogan had. “’Course, she’s guilty of a little blackmail herself, isn’t she? She may even have to testify against you in front of a judge and jury. Think about it. The respected Webb name, dragged through the dirt. She won’t want to do that, will she?”

  “Shut up!”

  “You’re the only family she has, except Callie Mae. Guess your daughter will get all the Webb money some day. Because you’re going to be in jail the rest of your life, Rogan. Or dead. You decide which.”

  “Just shut the hell up, McClure! You hear me?”

  “Might be the Treasury Department will cut you a deal.” Penn took a step closer to the door. To Carina. “Tell everything you know about the counterfeiting underworld, and well, things might get better for you.”

  A drop of sweat trickled down Rogan’s cheek.

  “You’re not going to get away with stealing C Bar C money, Rogan.” Ruthless, Penn kept on. “Not a chance. The Secret Service, the police, they’ll be crawling all over the country looking for you. No place big enough for you to hide, so you may as well give up now, while you’re still alive.”

  He detected the faintest weakening in the man’s grip on Carina. She seemed to breathe easier from it, at least. Penn moved a careful step closer.

  “Word’s going to spread fast around here about you, Rogan. No cattle buyer is going to do to Carina what you want him to do. He won’t write her a check when he knows she has to give it to you. No one will pay her blackmail. No one.”

  Rogan’s breathing quickened into agitated pants that revealed him hovering on the breaking point. The truth he was fighting.

  “What’s it going to be?” Penn halted. Only a few yards kept him from Carina. “Make up your mind, and make it fast.”

  Rogan’s teeth bared. “Damn you, McClure!”

  Suddenly, roaring in fury, he yanked his arm from around Carina’s neck and shoved her away, the unexpectedness of it sending her hurtling toward Penn before she could right herself. Instinctively, his arms opened, and he took her staggering against him.

  Rogan stood outside, on the boardwalk, one of Carina’s Colt pistols aimed at Penn, the other at her, his expression black with vengeance. But before he could pull the triggers, the deafening bark of a bullet from somewhere outside reverberated throughout the bank lobby. Rogan’s body arched from the force. His eyes, once b
lue as the summer sky, darkened and rolled back in his head. He dropped into a heap and didn’t move.

  For a moment, no one acted. No one understood.

  Orlin appeared, then. In the doorway. A revolver hung loose in his hand. The acrid scent of gunpowder clung to him.

  Carina twisted to see the man who had saved her life and Penn’s.

  “He weren’t no better than them Injuns that killed my family, Miss Lockett,” he said quietly. “I did it for them.”

  The nightmare was over.

  Carina sagged against McClure. She needed a few moments to recover, to allow the aftershocks of the violence to quiet throughout her body.

  She needed his strength, too. Hers was all but gone, and she’d yet to brace herself for what would come next.

  McClure leaving.

  Her eyes closed, hating it.

  “You could have told me, you know,” she said against his shoulder. “About the forged check.”

  “You would’ve refused to go along with the ruse. You would’ve been afraid for Callie Mae in case anything went wrong.” His mouth moved against her hair as he spoke, his voice hushed, somber.

  His recklessness unnerved her, that untamed part of him which gave him the cunning to lay the trap for Rogan. She shivered.

  His embrace tightened, warming her. Giving her comfort.

  “Tell me I figured you right,” he murmured.

  She soaked him in. “You did. I never would’ve agreed to it.”

  “It was the only way to capture him, Carina. Beat him at his own game.”

  “He could’ve shot you. Or me. Where would that have left Callie Mae?”

  “I knew it could happen. I laid awake at night worrying that it would. But I had to try.”

  She suspected his plan took shape after he left the Western Trail to tend to Durant’s body. He’d been gone for days, she recalled. The time he’d taken to set Rogan up.

  He did it for himself, she knew. For the case he’d been determined to close. The revenge he needed to satisfy.

  But he did it for Callie Mae, too. And her.

  Especially her.

  Carina’s eyes opened. Gathering up her will, all the strength she possessed, she drew back.

  His hand lifted to her cheek in a gentle caress. His expression turned grave, oddly vulnerable. “Carina.”

  The words he needed to say, the life he needed to live, hung in the air between them. Unspoken. But as blatant as if he’d shouted them out.

  Penn McClure was destined for great things, a prize for the government that meant so much to him. Driven to enact justice against those who chose to take the wrong side of the law.

  Her destiny included things far simpler. A ranch. A herd of cattle. And being a mother.

  God, she loved him.

  The Secret Service agent, Harvey Whalen, cleared his throat. “Excuse me, Penn. Sheriff Sughrue would like to talk to you.”

  She had no more time left. Her heart all but tearing in two, Carina stepped out of his arms. “Go on, McClure. You’ve got a job to do.”

  He didn’t move. “I’m not finished with you yet, Carina.”

  “There’s no reason for you to stay. Your debt to me is paid in full.” She managed to smile. “The saloon damages, remember?” She steeled herself against the fierceness in his gaze. “You’re free to do all the office work you want. You can—” Her throat worked. She refused to cry. To let him see her pain from letting him go. He didn’t need her to tell him what he could do, besides. He’d decide well enough on his own. “You were a hell of a cowboy, you know,” she said instead.

  “Rogan being dead hasn’t changed that.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  “It’ll always be in my blood, playing cowboy for you.”

  “Will it?”

  The admission stirred up the ache in her heart and made her wish he’d be with her, for always. A permanent and loyal part of her outfit. Her life.

  “I’m going back to the C Bar C with you, Carina.”

  She didn’t move, but the sound of his voice spun in wild circles around her brain, leaving her confused and certain she hadn’t heard what she thought he said. “You’re going where?”

  “These past few weeks have showed me there’s more satisfaction in working hard under the sun with the woman I love than there is in an office fighting crimes I hate.”

  She blinked. With the woman I love…

  “A hell of a lot more,” he amended with a growl.

  Hope warred with the confusion. “But your case against Rogan and counterfeiting—”

  “Stopped being my case the day I walked away from the Secret Service and headed to Texas.”

  “But—” she said again.

  “The case is Harv’s. Has been since I left. I just took care of the revenge end of it.”

  She swiveled toward the gray-suited agent, who seemed to understand her bewilderment.

  “That’s right, Miss Lockett,” he said, smiling. “But don’t let him tell you he didn’t have a big part in helping me close it. He did, and the Treasury Department owes him plenty for it. We’re going to miss him, that’s for sure.” He turned toward McClure. “I’ll let the sheriff know you’ll be out shortly.”

  “Thanks.” The door closed. “I love you, Carina.”

  She swung back toward him. Her heart grabbed onto the words and held on tight, the fear running through her that he might not mean them. Or say them again. She lifted shaking fingers to her lips. “You’ll change your mind. You’ll be bored tending cattle. You’ll want to work in an office again and catch criminals and—”

  “I don’t want anything but you in my life.” At some point, he’d moved closer. So close their bodies nearly touched. “I couldn’t walk away from you if I tried. Which I’m not going to. Not ever.”

  Carina forgot to breathe, her hopes, her yearning for him soaring.

  “I want to build the Lockett legacy with you,” he murmured. “Make it stronger for Callie Mae. For all our children. Starting today. Now.”

  Her eyes brimmed. Her fears began to dissipate, like cool mist beneath the hot sun. “Oh, McClure.” She slid her arms around his neck. Easily, as if he’d done so a hundred times before, he fitted her into his embrace. “I love you. More than I ever thought I could love a man before.”

  Their mouths met, hungry and wet. Again and again. And after long moments of hungry kisses, his dark head lifted.

  “Carina,” he said in mild exasperation. “Wives don’t call their husbands by their last name. You’re going to have to start calling me ‘Penn.’ Every day. For the rest of our lives.”

  Incredibly happy, she laughed. She was about to embark on a new beginning, having him in her life. He’d be the center of her world, and she’d devote herself to him for always.

  But as for his name, she made no promises.

  Some habits were harder to break than others.

  Epilogue

  Late Summer

  Carina dipped the knife into a bowl of water and carefully smoothed the powdered sugar frosting with the wet blade, a trick Sourdough taught her to make icing a cake easier.

  Lord knew she needed all the help she could get.

  Baking and cooking never ceased to be a challenge. Sometimes a disappointing one, at best, but she was getting better at both.

  Callie Mae’s finger guided her reading of the recipe.

  “‘Frost each layer and sprinkle with grated coconut.’” She glanced up with a grin, showing the gap from the tooth she’d lost just yesterday. “Is that why they call it a ‘Snow Flake Cake’? ’Cuz the coconut is supposed to look like snow?”

  Carina set down the knife and eyed the results of her handiwork. “Guess so.”

  “Can I sprinkle the coconut on?”

  “Sure.” Carina handed her the bowl heaped with the shredded fruit meat. “Make it pretty.”

  Callie Mae carefully scattered the flakes until the top and sides were covered. Carina marveled at the end result. The ca
ke really did look as if it had snow on top.

  “Can I have a piece?” Her daughter eyed the dessert as if she’d never tasted one before.

  “Absolutely not.” She slid the plate toward the center of the table so the icing could dry. “You can have one after supper. How about that?”

  “Can I go out with Grandpa then? He’s waiting for me.”

  “When there’s dishes to do?” Carina asked, her brows arched, her tone half teasing, half chiding.

  Callie Mae sighed dramatically. “I’d rather play checkers with him.”

  “I’m sure you would.” She gave her a playful swat with a towel. “Go ahead. But you’ll do dishes later, for sure.”

  “I will. I promise. Thanks, Mama!” Grinning again, she reached up for a kiss. Carina gladly obliged. “I love you. Bye!”

  She took off at a full run out the back door, the hems of her flowered cotton dress trailing behind her. Carina peered through the kitchen window and watched her go, her gaze clinging as her daughter happily loped across the yard. A beautiful bundle of energy. Of spirit and innocence. Grandpa sat beneath the ash tree with his checkerboard already laid out, and he greeted her with a hug.

  Carina’s heart swelled with love for both of them. At the thought of how different being a family was these days.

  Being a wife, too.

  And mother.

  Again.

  The tiny life growing inside her had made itself known a couple of weeks ago. She hadn’t shared the news with anyone but her handsome husband yet, but the swelling of her belly would make it a necessity before long. Callie Mae and Grandpa would be as excited as a couple of jaybirds when they found out. Carina decided then and there she’d break the news while they were all having a piece of Snow Flake Cake tonight after supper.

  The heat of the afternoon beckoned her from the kitchen to the porch to rest a spell. She filled a cup with steaming coffee, added a good portion of canned Borden’s milk and stirred it in, then strode through the front room and out the door, her concentration locked on the coffee sloshing to the cup’s rim and the threat of burning her thumb. She didn’t see the woman standing at the top of the step until she almost ran into her.