other direction when he found out about the recent crime spree. Hodge liked rattling about his feats and the wait to pull his next theft must have been eating at his ego.
That was the one thing Gage could count on. Lack of bragging rights would lure Hodge from his snake den to make a quick strike before things got too dull. Gage knew that was when he’d catch him off guard. The outlaw had been curled up and cozy too long now. Gage sensed the man would be getting anxious, and the woman pacing across the street might just be the pretty twist of petticoat Hodge would use to carry out his next crime.
He sure hoped not, but she wouldn’t be the first woman he’d had to lock up.
As a man who saw the world as dark and the people in it as ready to do whatever they could to get away with something, Gage rarely gave the benefit of the doubt. He’d learned the hard way that a woman could be just as nefarious as any man.
But a man was his focus now. Gage rubbed the scars beneath and around his eyes, feeling the raised flesh and vowing vengeance once more upon the man whose actions were forcing him to choose a new way of life for himself. Being a Ranger was everything to Gage. If he lost that, he would be nothing. His failing eyesight would take his soul, his heart, his whole life. If a man looked weak, he’d forever bow down to others. Gage couldn’t bear the thought of losing his whole identity.
Stanton Hodge had stolen something far more precious than the horses Gage was tracking him for.
He pushed aside his self-pity, and despite the clouded day and the threat of rain echoing in the thunder that rumbled above, he squinted hard to define this new arrival’s approximate age.
Long years of riding saddle all over Texas made distances seem farther than they appeared, but she couldn’t have been more than forty or fifty feet from where he stood. Still, he couldn’t quite catch the color of her eyes or whether she had freckles. All he noted was that she was in her late teens or early twenties, and she had stealth to her walk, which revealed a long stretch of legs and decent health.
Maybe she would prove the break he was looking for in the case. Hodge often chose a young, impressionable gal able to travel fast.
Gage decided he’d watch her, find out her identity and make sure she was not sister, sweetheart or any other connection whatsoever to the man he would bring to justice.
The wind got up again, wailing through the alley and buffeting him hard enough that he had to rock back and forth on his spurs to catch his balance. A quick glance at the pretty lady revealed she fought the gale, as well, swatting down her billowing skirt.
A loud crack of thunder echoed across the sky. Then within seconds, large pellets of rain splattered the ground, leaving rows of golden eagle–sized dots. Grayish-yellow clouds dipped so low he could almost touch them, signaling their weight would not be contained any longer. High Plains was about to receive an onslaught of hard, pounding rain that would become a gully washer by the time it ended. Best to seek shelter until the Texas sky finished its tantrum.
Most folks took heed and headed inside the closest door available. Not the newcomer. She put her hat back on and glanced up at the sky, swiping at the dangling feather as if it were a pesky fly biting her. The wind suddenly spun her around so fast she fell to her knees. Gage bolted toward her to help, but she jumped to her feet and shook the dust from her skirt.
The steam of her anger seemed to radiate across the thoroughfare as the downpour came, soaking her from hem to haphazard hat.
The bull of a blacksmith ran out of his quarters and spoke to the woman. Gage halted in his tracks, waiting to see what she would do. The smithy pointed to his home, but she shook her head and elected to disappear inside the livery instead.
Gage’s curiosity got the better of him as he watched the blacksmith dash home. Feather Hat’s stubbornness made him wonder why she refused the better place to wait out the rain. He’d met Bear and his wife not long ago. Both were kind people who seemed to be well liked by everyone. That meant Feather Hat wasn’t from around here. She was a stranger who didn’t know them well enough to trust their hospitality. All the more reason to find out her identity and connection to Hodge, if any.
Soaked to his boot tops, Gage took off at a dead run for the livery. If she questioned his presence there, he would just tell her that he’d taken shelter in the nearest place he could find. That should allow at least some polite conversation between them and maybe he might learn a few things about her.
He stepped out of the rain and shook water from his duster, then tilted his hat to empty its brim. The sound of a match being struck against wood flared his nostrils as the pungent odor of sulfur and hissing kerosene filled the air.
“Ouch, that hurt!” exclaimed a female voice, then, “Oops! No! Oh, please, no, not that!”
Instinct made Gage look for a stove or a lantern, but reality flared in front of him as flames crept up one of the stall walls.
She had dropped the match.
* * *
A low, angry voice cut the air like a whip. “See if there’s water in any of those buckets. Hurry!”
Willow heard the man’s command before she saw him. He didn’t sound like Bear. Not taking time to look at him or wonder who he was, she did as instructed and ran into the first stall ahead of her. Sure enough, one of the water buckets remained half-full.
“Here’s one.” She thrust the pail toward him and assumed he would take it.
“Throw what you’ve got over the flames and grab another,” he ordered. “I’ll beat out what I can with this.”
She heard him beating something against the wall and, with a quick glance backward, realized where he’d come from. He’d taken off the trail coat she’d noticed earlier when she studied him in the alley.
Will Ketchum to the rescue, she thought, wishing this stranger could be the man she dreamed might someday come true.
“I—I broke my nail when I struck the match against the board.” She shook her forefinger, embarrassed that such a small pain had caused all this. “It made me drop the match.”
Horses whinnied in their stalls, their powerful legs dancing to get away from the threat that sent gray vapor spiraling into the air.
The stranger kept beating his coat against the wall. Orders fired in rapid succession. “Find another bucket, lady. Be careful. Don’t go near the horses. They’ll stomp you to death. Got to get this out before it reaches the loft. That hay goes up, we’ll all go up with it.” One glance in her direction told her he wasn’t worried about the finger she still held up.
She hurried, only to find nothing in the next three stalls. All that remained were the feed tins with the horses. Thunder roared overhead and a crack of lightning rent the air, telling her that it had struck close by.
Please, Lord. Don’t let this happen to me. Don’t let me burn down the livery on the first day here. And while it’s raining, at that. If You’re going to let it rain, let it be enough to put this out, please.
“There’s no more. What do I do?” She searched for the blankets Bear had said were stored somewhere and found them on a shelf above where her baggage had been set.
Why hadn’t she just grabbed one of them to keep warm instead of trying to light a lantern so she could see to make a
