Under the blazing Colorado sun, a miracle happened. Soulless Jake Malone began to care about Alexandra Merritt, an indomitable, heaven-sent beauty, and the small, squalling life she’d helped bring into this world. But could she help Jake forgive himself his past so that they could have a future?

“Just what the hell do you think is going to happen between us? You think I’m just going to stop with a kiss?”

“Yes. I know you, Jake.”

He shook his head, as if she’d said she could fly. His boots scraped at the ground as if he wanted to run but couldn’t. Something wild rose up in Alex. Her deepest instincts told her that this man needed to be touched—gently, deeply, often.

She’d put up with too much today. “Listen to me! You’re not nearly as bad—”

He snatched her hand and held it tight. “I’m warning you, Alex. Stay away from me.”

Of Men and Angels

Harlequin Historical #664

Harlequin Historicals is proud to introduce

debut author VICTORIA BYLIN

#663 TEXAS GOLD

Carolyn Davidson

#665 BEAUCHAMP BESIEGED

Elaine Knighton

#666 THE BETRAYAL

Ruth Langan

Of Men and Angels
Victoria Bylin

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Available from Harlequin Historicals and

VICTORIA BYLIN

Of Men and Angels #664

Dedicated to my father,

Jack K. Bylin

This one’s for you, Dad,

for the encouragement,

the coffee,

everything.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I’d also like to thank my husband and sons for their love and support, my mother for just being herself, and my community of friends for sharing this journey with me.

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

Epilogue

Chapter One

Western Colorado Plateau

June 1885

The rain hit without warning.

The mules balked as a flash of lightning cut through the sky, and the driver spurred them with a crack of his whip. “Haul your sorry butts outta here, or you’re gonna be swimming in that goddamn river!”

That wasn’t what Alexandra Merritt wanted to hear.

After a week on a crowded train from Philadelphia and another three weeks in a dirty Leadville hotel, she was almost home. She had given up waiting for repairs to the Denver Rio Grande train tracks and booked passage to Grand Junction on the worn-out stagecoach being used to deliver the U.S. mail.

Waiting another month had been unthinkable. Like a clock that needed winding, her father’s heart could stop without warning. She couldn’t stand the thought of never seeing him again. With the letters they had exchanged over the past ten years, a bridge had been built. William Merritt knew her better than she knew herself. She hadn’t thought twice about leaving her post as president of the Philadelphia Children’s League, or postponing her marriage to Thomas Hunnicutt. She had to get home.

Thunder boomed across the plain, and the stagecoach lurched like a staggering beast. Sitting across from her on the lumpy seat, Charlotte Smith stirred from an exhausted sleep. “What’s happening?”

Alex pulled back the leather flap covering the window. Cool air and the heavy scent of mud rolled into the coach. Charlotte had been as eager as she to get to her destination, and her reason was just as urgent. Alex’s fellow passenger was close to nine months pregnant and eager to reach her sister before the baby came.

“It’s raining,” Alex answered, raising her voice over a staccato burst of hail. “I think the driver’s worried about the road.”

“The road!”

Below them, a streambed writhed with the muddy runoff. Alex could see the water rising, slashing at the sides of the gorge. A shriveled juniper tore loose in the flood, and a man-size boulder tumbled after it.

“Hold up, you beasts!” the driver shouted. The coach skidded but didn’t stop. Gravity flung Alex against the seat just as the driver pounded on the roof.

“Mrs. Smith! Miss Merritt! Hang on!”

The stage lurched as if it had been tipped by an unseen hand. Charlotte screamed. Alex pulled the woman into her arms, but she couldn’t keep her grip. They were bouncing like stones, and the next thing she knew she was weightless, floating in the air like a bird, until the coach hit rushing water with a splash, throwing her against the door with a bone-crunching lurch.

Pain shot through her shoulder. Thunder ricocheted like a rifle shot, and the wheels spun with the rushing water. The mules screamed and kicked in a worthless effort to wrench themselves free. Water seeped through the wooden seams of the coach. It soaked her shoes and pooled at her ankles. Her white blouse was torn at the elbow, and the cool air stung the strawberry scrape on her arm.

Charlotte grabbed her stomach with both hands.

“Help us!” Alex screamed, pushing at the door over her head. “Smitty! Hank!” There was no answer, so she climbed through the opening and sat with her feet in the door well, hanging on to the frame for balance as waves of brown water pounded the brittle wood.

By a stroke of luck, the coach was wedged against a huge rock and a slab of mud. The torrent whipped through the wheels and raced down the gorge, ripping at boulders and exposing tree roots, taking what it wanted. The mud wall melted like chocolate in the sun, and the coach scraped along the bottom of the streambed, moving in inches that threatened to become feet.

“Charlotte, we’ve got to get out of here. We’ve got to hurry.”

Bracing her feet against the door frame, she grabbed Charlotte’s arm and pulled. The coach lurched and slid a foot closer to the wall of the ravine. A juniper branch scratched her face with prickly green needles and Alex grabbed it, pulling to test it with her weight. The trunk was just a foot away. The makeshift rope would have to do.

“Charlotte, grab that branch. Now!”

Sheer terror yanked Charlotte out the door and into the vee of the trunk. Alex hoisted her skirts and followed. It was like climbing a tree as a child except the water had been doing its work, and the coach had slipped farther downstream.

Grabbing the branch with both hands, she clamped it between her knees and shimmied toward the relative safety of the trunk. Rough bark scraped her thighs and soft palms. The weight of her sopping skirt pulled her down, but she kept a firm grip on the bark, sliding to the trunk in inches until she reached Charlotte.

The water was ebbing, and the coach was twenty feet away. By some miracle, Charlotte was still wearing a coy red hat with a bobbing feather. From her perch Alex looked for the drivers, but she didn’t see either of the gray-bearded men. Two of the mules were still screaming with pain. The other two had drowned.

Turning to see how well the tree was rooted, Alex saw what had happened. A slab of mud had wiped out the road, and the hillside had collapsed into the watery torrents. It was a stupid place for a road, she thought. A stupid place to be.

“How are you doing?” she said, reaching for Charlotte’s blue-veined hand. The pregnant woman looked like a very fat sparrow. Until a few days ago, they had been strangers, but the boredom of travel had made them acquaintances if not friends.

Charlotte moaned and clutched Alex’s fingers as she doubled over, squeezing back her tears.

Alex rubbed her shoulders. “It’s going to be all right. You’ve just had a scare.”

“I hurt.”

“Where?”

“My middle. The baby’s kicking.”

Dear God, no. Not now. Not yet.

Alex knew about orphans and babies, but she had only witnessed one birth in her life. It hadn’t been easy, and her cousin had nearly died.

“Maybe it will stop,” she said. “We’ve both had a shock.”

The rain lessened to a drizzle, and the water ebbed as quickly as it had risen. Where had the storm come from? It had been so sudden, uncontrollable and devouring. Dampness chilled the air. The women had goose bumps, and night was coming fast.

The third mule had died, and the fourth was on its side, heaving with exhaustion. The stream had thinned to a ribbon, leaving puddles that looked like dirty mirrors.

“Charlotte, I’m going down to look around.”

“No, stay with me!”

“I’ll only be a minute.” Alex squeezed her hand and slid out of the tree. Mud oozed over her high-buttoned shoes as she sloshed to the coach. As if nothing had happened, their trunks were still lashed to the baggage rack, and she thought about the silly shoes she had packed. She needed sturdy boots and walking clothes. She needed help. Maybe even a miracle, but she’d settle for what she could find.

Standing on a rock, she peered through the window and saw the ruined contents of her food basket floating in a foot of water. Holding back an ache of worry, she walked to the driver’s boot and opened the small door. Water gushed down her skirt, but she found a wad of men’s clothing, a knife, a pistol and a box of bullets. Could she possibly hunt for food? The thought was laughable, but she took everything, and in a second compartment she found two canteens of water and a sack of apples. They would have to last until help came.

Help…but when would that be? Surely someone would come looking for them when the stage didn’t make it to Grand Junction, yet delays were common.

“Alex! I need you now.” Charlotte’s voice cut through her thoughts, and she turned back to the tree just in time to see the woman’s face go white with pain.

Setting the meager supplies on a rock, Alex stretched her arms upward as if to catch the woman if she fell. “Let me help you down,” she said gently.

Charlotte’s belly was huge. Her eyes widened with fright and, choking back a sob, she said the one thing Alexandra Merritt was afraid to hear.

“My water just broke.”

The last thing Jackson Jacob Malone wanted to hear was singing, especially a woman singing in a high, sweet voice that reminded him of angels he didn’t believe in. The words drifted to him from the bottom of a rocky gorge, and he wondered if he was still drunk. The singing was bad enough, but as the trail dipped and curled, he recognized the words. She was singing a hymn, and for a moment he thought he’d died and gone to hell.

Two seconds later a scream burst out of the ravine, and Jake heard the devil himself in that cry. It tore through his head like a bullet burning flesh. A bead of sweat broke across his brow and he wiped it away.

“Hang on, Charlotte! Hang on for the baby!”

The angel’s voice reminded him of sleigh bells on a winter morning. Hopeful and bright, they defied the cold even as it settled into a man’s bones, and he wondered if the angel had ever shivered in the dark. Somehow he doubted it, and he was sure when she started singing again, even louder than before.

“Oh, come, let us worship and bow down,

Let us kneel before the Lord, our God, our maker…”

The noonday sun stung his skin and cast shadows through the sage. His jaw throbbed just below his ear, as if the pain in his bruised eyes had leaked down the side of his face. He clenched his teeth against the misery of it. He didn’t want reminders of his brother’s fist slamming into him, the mess he’d left in Flat Rock, and especially not the melancholy hope of a woman singing in the desert.

“Oh, no! It’s starting again!”

“Breathe easy, Charlotte. Easy…”

“I can’t!”

A moan rose from the gorge and snaked around him.

“Try to pant,” the angel crooned. “Like this…hhhhh…hhhhh…hhhhh…”

It was the sound of sex, of life being formed, of need and desperation, and he recalled the pleasured cry of the last woman he’d bedded. He didn’t know her name, but he remembered her breasts, the taste of her, and he felt himself going soft inside. He had to get away from Charlotte and the angel before he did something stupid. Grimacing, he nudged his horse into a faster walk.

The trail twisted around a boulder rimmed with goldenrod, then cut straight across a hard slope. A dry mud slide blocked the way, as if a huge hand had pushed the trail into the mountainside. Tugging his hat low, he nudged the bay with his knees. The horse shimmied nervously, sending ripples of apprehension through Jake’s thighs and up his spine.

The heat of the day pressed against him, and the stench of bad meat was unmistakable. His stomach nearly heaved, and he squinted into the gorge where pale green sage made a fence along the streambed. His gaze followed the trickle of water down the ravine to the graceful curve of a red stagecoach. The front wheel spun as if set in motion by an invisible hand, and someone had draped women’s clothing over the rocks and bushes.

The bay splayed his forelegs and balked.

“Whoa, boy,” Jake said softly.

He’d just won the horse in a card game, and the animal’s distrust was mutual. The bay was likely to buck, but Jake took a chance and nudged him forward until he had a wider view of the gorge. The women were nowhere in sight, but he saw three dead mules tangled in the harness. The fourth was lying on its side, braying like a forgotten pet. Sensing the presence of the bay, it raised its head and snorted before falling back against the sand.

“For He is our God,

And we are the people of his pasture,

And the shee-eeee-eeep of his hand…”

The singing was closer now, as resonant as a howling wind, and his stomach clenched. He wanted a drink. He wanted to block out the rotting mules, the women, the god-awful singing. Suffocated by dust and sweet sage, he dug his heels into the bay, bracing himself as the animal coiled and lurched over the slick of dry mud.

The crust collapsed beneath its hooves, and Jake fought for balance as the horse jerked its head and pedaled backward.

“Breathe, Charlotte! Don’t squish up your face. Breathe like me…hhhh…hhhh…hhhh…”

The voice was clearer now, and as the sagebrush thinned to a veil of green lace, Jake saw the angel. She was less than ten yards from him, on her knees in front of the other woman’s sprawled legs, splattered with blood and birth water. Her hair was the color of Arbuckle’s coffee, and it fell over her shoulders in a tangle. Her blouse was torn at the shoulder, and he could see a hot pink crescent where the sun had burned her skin.

Trails of sweat streaked her dusty face. The high collar of her blouse was loose and gaping, and he saw the curve of her breasts as she laid her hand on the birthing woman’s belly, leaned down and peered between her legs.

Pushing back the woman’s dark blue skirt, she said, “Don’t push, Charlotte.”

“I’ve got to!”

“It’s too soon. You’ll tear.”

Jake cringed. The woman moaned, and the mix of grunting and agony turned into a wail. Her pain was terrible to hear. The bearing down of her hips and the writhing of her belly was the most horrible thing he had ever seen.

“Breathe, Charlotte!”

But the birthing woman was beyond understanding. Instead of listening to the angel, she curled her spine, grabbed her knees and screamed. A bullet to the head would have been an act of kindness, and yet he couldn’t look away.

There was no singing now, only the blue skirt and streaks of bright red blood on the petticoat spread beneath her hips. His gaze traveled from her thighs to her belly, and then to her ashen face. He had never seen a baby being born but he’d seen a few men die, and Charlotte plainly needed more help than any man or woman could give.

Her face registered shock and stark fear. “My baby! Oh God, my baby!”

For a man who didn’t give a damn about anyone or anything, he was dangerously close to tears. He prodded the bay with his heels, but the animal refused to budge, giving an angry chuff that carried through the gorge.

The angel raised her face toward the blistering blue sky. Her eyes locked on him, and for one painful second she stared at him with fierce brown eyes.

“Go away! Go away, you son of a—” Her lips locked together, as if she had never spoken a curse word in her life. He nearly laughed at the stupidity of it. She needed help. If not now, then later when she had to get to a town.

Jake wasn’t enough of a gentleman to feel honor-bound to stay, but he was enough of a rebel to pick a fight. He held the bay at the top of the trail. At this point he wasn’t going anywhere.

“Alex! Help me—” Charlotte grabbed her bare knees and grunted like a crazed animal.

“It’s coming! The baby’s coming!” The angel touched Charlotte’s belly as a low cry poured from the woman’s throat. Weeping and laughing, she said, “I see the head. Push, Charlotte! Push.”

Jake held his breath.

“Charlotte! You can do it! Push!”

The torture went on for a small eternity, until the baby squirted out of the womb and landed in the angel’s hands. Covered with blood and a waxy white cream, it seemed small and gray in the vastness of the plateau, and far too quiet to be alive. The angel reached into the baby’s rosebud mouth and cleared away the mucus. She held it upside down and slapped its bottom, and still there was no sound.

He saw panic in her eyes, but she choked it back and blew oh-so-gently into the baby’s mouth. He heard a cough, then mewling, and then a healthy wail. Tears spilled down her cheeks, and he blinked away his own.

“Alex…” The mother’s voice was weak.

“It’s a boy, Charlotte. He’s little but he’s perfect.” The angel set the baby on the mother’s belly. “We’ve got to get the afterbirth.”

From his vantage point on the trail, Jake saw the angel cut the cord with a knife. The afterbirth followed the baby, and fresh blood gushed from Charlotte’s womb. The angel’s eyes burned with fear. She reached for a cloth to stanch the bleeding, and in a minute it was soaked.

A cloud shifted. A dark shadow fell over the three of them. He saw Charlotte’s face relax. Her fingers stilled and her chest sank emptily against the sand. The only sign of life was the baby stirring on her belly, its mouth opening and closing like a blooming flower.

The angel pressed her hands to her cheeks and wept.

There wasn’t a thing Jake could have done to keep the woman alive, but he could dig her grave. Silently he climbed off the bay and led the horse into the ravine. The woman named Alex looked up at him.

“If you tend to the baby, I’ll see to the mother,” he said.

“Who are you?” Her voice was hoarse, and he could see every minute of the past twenty-four hours in her face. Something stirred in his gut, and an un-characteristic urge to be kind softened his eyes.

“My friends call me Jake.”

“I thought you were…” She shook her head. “I thought I imagined you.”

She looked as if she could still hear Charlotte’s moans, and he wondered if she would ever sing that hymn again. He looked at her eyes, red rimmed and inflamed with the dust and the sun, and somehow he knew she would sing it again this very day, just to make a point.

Brushing off her hands, she rose and smoothed her skirt. Jake tethered the bay to the stagecoach and inspected the mule writhing in the harness. If the animal could walk, perhaps the woman and baby could ride it.

“Whoa, boy,” he said, but the beast didn’t want anything to do with him. A broken foreleg told Jake all he had to know. He pulled his Colt .45 from its holster, cocked the hammer and put the animal out of its misery.

The angel gasped at the sudden blast. He expected her to be hysterical or sentimental about the animal, but she didn’t say a word and he had to admire her. She had been a fool to travel the Colorado Plateau alone, but she wasn’t softhearted about life.

Jake holstered the Colt and opened the driver’s boot. The mail was ruined, but the tools were in place and he took out the shovel. He wondered about the driver and man on shotgun, but the watermarks in the gorge made the facts plain. The two men had drowned in the flood.

Jabbing the shovel into the ground, Jake took a pair of leather gloves from his saddlebag and looked for a suitable grave site. He wasn’t about to bury Charlotte where a flash flood could steal the body, so with his black duster billowing behind him, he climbed over the cascade of rocks on the far side of the gorge.

The iron-rich plains stretched for a million miles, but just a few feet away he saw a sprig of desert paintbrush. It was the best he could do, and he started to dig. When the hole was deep, he collected rocks from the streambed and piled them nearby.

Two hours had passed when he wiped his hands on his pants and looked at the sky. The sun was lower now, as bright as orange fire, and above it, flat-bottomed clouds boiled into steamy gray peaks. Another storm was coming, he could smell it in the air.

He jabbed the shovel into the earth and strode down the rocky slope. The angel was holding the baby, crooning to it in that sweet voice of hers. It was bundled in something clean and white, and she had managed to dress the mother in a fashionable traveling suit.

Without a word, he brushed by the angel and scooped Charlotte into his arms, rocked back on his heels and rose to his full height.

He felt the angel’s gaze as he walked past her, and rocks skittered as she followed him. As gently as he could, he laid the dead woman to rest, picked up the shovel and replaced the dirt. He half expected the woman named Alex to pray or say a few words, but she settled for a mournful humming that made him think of birds in autumn and the wail of the wind.

Down in the valley, the valley so low,

Hang your head over, hear the wind blow.

One by one he piled jagged rocks on the loose earth. Alex didn’t flinch. The child mewled now and then, but her humming soothed him. It should have soothed Jake, too, but it didn’t. His head had started to pound, his back hurt, and his stomach was raw with bad whiskey.

A few hours ago he had been on his way to California, or maybe south to Mexico. He was alone by choice, and now he was stuck with a woman and a child. His life had taken a strange turn indeed.

He set the last rock on the grave with a thud and took off his gloves. Studying the angel’s profile, he said, “I’m done.”

She turned to him, and in her eyes he saw the haunted look of a person seeing time stop.

“I suppose you should say a few words,” she said.

His mouth twisted into a sneer, and he stared at her until she understood he had nothing to say. Bowing her head, she uttered a prayer that told him Charlotte was a stranger to her, this child an orphan, and the angel herself a woman who had more faith than common sense.

A determined amen came from her lips. The baby squirmed and, cocking her head as if the world had tilted on its axis, she looked at his face.

“You’re hurt,” she said.

He shrugged. Bruises were common in his life, like hangnails and stubbed toes. Bending down on one knee, he straightened a rock on the grave. “She had a bad time.”

The angel’s skirt swished near his face. He stood up and she sighed. “I’ve never seen someone die before.”

“I have.”

She gaped at him, and he felt like Clay Allison and Jesse James rolled into one. The corners of his mouth curled upward. He wasn’t in the same class as the James Brothers, but with his black duster, two black eyes and a three-day beard, any sensible woman would have crossed the street at the sight of him. He could have scared her even more with the truth. He’d shot a man, and depending on Henry Abbott’s stubbornness, Jake was either a free man or wanted for murder.

“Death isn’t a pretty sight,” he finally said.

She went pale. “My father is ill. I have to get to Grand Junction. Could you take us there?”

If he didn’t take her, the baby would die. Was there even a choice here?

There’s always a choice, Jake, and you’re making the wrong one. Lettie Abbott’s angry face rose up from the hot earth, shimmering with accusations, and he didn’t answer.

The angel was close to begging. “I have to get home as soon as I can. I know it’s out of your way, but I could pay you.”

He considered taking her up on the offer, but the stash in his saddlebags gave him a rare opportunity to be charitable.

“There’s no need,” he replied. “Can you ride?”

She shook her head. “I haven’t sat on a horse in ten years, Mr….?”

“Call me Jake.”

“I don’t know you well enough to use your given name.”

“You will soon enough.” With four dead mules and one horse, they’d be sharing a saddle and he’d be pressed up against her shapely backside for hours. With a lazy grin, he added, “Lady, you and I are going to be intimately acquainted before nightfall.”

Her eyes went wide, and beneath her thick lashes he saw dark circles of exhaustion, sheer terror and rage. Her loose hair caught the sun, and her eyes hardened into agate. “I doubt very seriously that’s going to happen.”

“Are you afraid of horses?”

She answered him with a glare and Jake eyed the bay, wondering how the animal would feel about the extra weight. From the corner of his eye, he saw her shift the baby and reach into her pocket, probably for a handkerchief to wipe away the day’s sweat. He pushed back his hat and blew out a hot breath as he turned to look at the angel.

“Do you think you can—”

A muddy Colt Peacemaker was aimed at his chest. Hell, she had hidden it in her pocket and he hadn’t noticed.

“Get out of here, or I swear I’ll shoot,” she said.

“Go right ahead. It’ll be a short trip to hell at this range.”

Her eyes flickered, and he knew she couldn’t possibly send a man to his death, let alone eternal damnation.

“Leave! Now!”

“I don’t want to.” The angel’s challenge pulled him in like a moth to a flame. “Lady, it’s just plain stupid to stay here. You might make it for a week or two, but Charlie there won’t.”

The baby was pressed to her breast, his head nestled at her throat. She looked up at Jake with frightened brown eyes and his common sense kicked in.

Lady, you and I are going to be intimately acquainted before nightfall.

His eyes settled on the angel’s face, and he wondered why on earth he had said something so stupid to a woman stranded in the desert.

The baby’s lips went crazy against her neck, and he knew why. The angel was beautiful. She radiated goodness, a kind of light that made his heart ache. He adjusted his hat so that she could see his face.

“I won’t hurt you, miss. You can call me Jake, or Jacob, or Jackson or even Mr. Malone if it makes you feel better.”

“Jacob…” Her voice went to a whisper, and she lowered the gun. “I’ve always hated that name.”

He felt insulted, but if the truth be told, he hated his name, too. Jake the rake, Jake the snake, Jake the fake. She seemed to like formalities, so he tipped his hat. “Jake Malone at your service. And you are?”

“Alexandra Merritt. Alex for short.”

A man’s name. It didn’t fit the dark-haired angel staring at him with those sweet brown eyes.

“Well, Miss Merritt, I don’t like your name, either.”

Chapter Two

“How long have you been out here?” the stranger asked.

“Almost two days. A storm washed out the road. I don’t know what happened to the drivers.”

“They’re dead.”

Coming from the man Alex had taken for the Angel of Death, it was a statement of fact. When she looked up from between Charlotte’s legs, she had seen a black ghost sent to take a life, a messenger from the darkness that came with the raging waters that had sent Charlotte into labor.

On the first day, the pains had lasted from dusk to dawn, but then they’d stopped as suddenly as they had started, except for a mushy ache that made Charlotte moan in a fitful sleep. Last night, the baby changed his mind again and decided to come into world. Charlotte woke up screaming, clutching her belly and begging God for mercy.

Alex had stayed calm until she’d seen this man silhouetted against the sky, a crow in black, with wings that billowed as he climbed off the bay and walked in her direction. Only when she saw his face, with two black eyes and a purple lump on his jaw, had she realized he was a man and not a hallucination brought on by heat and fatigue.

Even now he didn’t seem quite real, but she could see he was tall and lanky, loose jointed in a way that suggested he was quick on his feet, perhaps because he had to be. She was tall herself, and her eyes just reached his shoulder. His nose was straight in spite of the puffiness across his cheeks. His lips had a masculine thinness, and black stubble covered his jaw. Wisps of soft dark hair grazed his frayed collar. He needed a haircut, badly.

He was staring back at her. “Have you eaten anything?”

Alex shook her head. “Our food baskets got soaked in the flood. We lost everything except a few apples.”

“Then you need to eat.” The outlaw strode to his horse and came back with jerky and a canteen. “Take this,” he said, opening the jug and handing it to her.

She reached for it with one hand, but the weight was too much and he didn’t let go as she guided it to her lips. The brackish water trickled down her throat like melted snow. She tilted her head and guzzled.

“Don’t overdo it. You’ll get sick.” His eyebrows knotted as he closed the canteen and handed her a strip of jerky.

“Chew it slow. It’ll do you more good.”

The dried meat tasted wonderful, rich and brown like her mother’s gravy. She sighed with pleasure.

Satisfied that she wasn’t going to faint, the man looked from her face to the top of the baby’s head. It was still caked with blood and birth fluids, and a gamy smell rose from his skin.

“Is he okay?” he asked.

“I think so. He’s pink and angry. That’s a good sign.”

The outlaw handed her the canteen. “You need more water.”

The jug was lighter now, but she had short fingers and she couldn’t hold it steady with just one hand.

“Here, let me help you.”

He tilted it to her lips, and she drank until she couldn’t hold another drop. Thanking him with a smile, she said, “I feel better.”

“That’s good, because we’ve got to get going. There’s going to be another storm this afternoon.”

Alex glanced at the western sky. A wall of clouds towered in the distance. “I need to get a few things for the baby.”

“I’ll do it.” He left her standing with the canteen and began gathering the clothing spread on the rocks. The fine silks and lacy unmentionables belonged to Charlotte. The cotton drawers and everyday skirts were hers.

“Which stuff is yours?” he asked, picking up a red silk petticoat and holding it up for inspection.

Irritated, Alex shook her head. “Just take cotton things for the baby.”

As he picked up her plain drawers, a night rail, and a white petticoat, his lips quirked upward.

No man in the world had seen her underthings until now, and her skin prickled. “You seem fascinated by my wardrobe, Mr. Malone. I take it you’ve never seen a lady’s undergarments before.”

“Actually I have. Quite a few as a matter of fact.” He brushed right by her and stuffed the clothing into his saddlebags. “I’m not bothered if you’re not.”

She shrugged. “I don’t suppose it matters at this point. Some compromises in life are necessary.”

“That’s true,” he said, tightening the buckle with a jerk. “We can be in Grand Junction tomorrow if we start out now. Of course that’s assuming you don’t mind sitting in my lap for a long ride.”

“I don’t have a choice, do I? Of course we’ll both ride your horse,” she answered steadily.

“Fine, but you can’t wear that skirt. The bay’s too skittish.”

“Is that so?”

“God’s truth. I won him in a poker game last week. He’s not fond of me, and I don’t want to find out what he thinks of your skirt chasing after him.”

Alex didn’t like it, but glancing at the bay, she suspected he was telling the truth. He went back to the clothing on the bushes and selected a pair of striped britches that looked far too wide in the waist for her.

“Those belonged to the driver,” she said.

“They’re yours now. You can change behind the coach.” Stifling a smile, he added, “I won’t peek, miss. I promise.”

His words said one thing, but his eyes another, and Alex forced herself not to care about something as small as modesty. “Can you hold the baby while I change?”

His eyes twitched, and he shook his head. “I’ll pack up, but you’re on your own with Charlie.”

He’d named the baby after its mother, and tears pressed behind her eyes as she walked to the stagecoach, knelt behind it and set the baby down in the shade. His tiny face puckered, and an angry squall cut through the air as she stepped out of her skirt and pulled on the baggy pants. The length was tolerable, but the driver had been as round as Charlotte, and the waist was a foot too wide.

Pulling the drawstring as tight as she could, she tied a sturdy knot. Then she tucked in her blouse and knelt down to pick up the baby.

She would be holding him for hours, and so she took one of Smitty’s huge shirts off the impromptu clothesline. Laying the baby in the folds, she fashioned it into a sling. It wasn’t ideal, but the baby would be secure against her chest.

“I’m ready, Mr. Malone.”

He was waiting by the horse. “I’ll lift you up.”

She had no idea that horses were so tall. “He’s big, isn’t he?”

“Just average. Now take the horn with your left hand, hold the baby with your right, and put your foot in the stirrup.” His face knotted as he whispered to the horse. The bay was every bit as skittish as he had said.

“Here we go,” he said. “One—two—three.”

He flung her right leg over the horse’s rump, and she landed in the saddle with a thump. A second later he was behind her with the reins loose in his hands.

She felt like jelly spilling out of a jar as she clutched the baby with one hand and the saddle horn with the other. The animal seemed ready to take flight, like Pegasus shooting through the sky.

“We’ve got to get out of this gully,” Jake said. They were headed west into the sun where dark clouds were billowing near them.

“It’s going to rain, isn’t it?”

“Probably.”

Alex nestled the baby closer. How would she keep him dry? Her heart lurched. She’d shield him with her body as best as she could, but soon he’d lose the resources God gave a newborn, and he’d need milk to survive. At the mercy of the elements and Jake Malone’s good graces, she could only pray they’d reach Grand Junction in time.

The baby whimpered, and the heat of his pink skin soaked through her blouse.

“Can’t you make him shut up?”

“I’ll try.”

Alex hummed until the baby settled against her chest, soaking the last bit of strength from her bones. She had gone without sleep for two days, and the bay swayed like a rocking chair. She couldn’t keep her eyes open, and she slumped against the outlaw.

Jake Malone squeezed her waist and she jerked awake.

“I won’t bite, miss. Just lean back.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Even as she spoke, Alex knew it was wishful thinking. Sheer exhaustion had robbed her of the ability to sit up. She was a little girl again, a sleepy child being carried to bed by strong arms, and she curled against Jake Malone’s chest.

His forearm rested on her hip, and she could feel his fingers just below her breast. With the slightest pressure, he held her in the saddle. She felt every inch of him pressing against her back, every twitch in his arm, and the strength in his thighs as he nudged the horse into a faster walk.

It was the closest she had ever been to a man. She had kissed Thomas on the lips, but they had never been hip to hip, knee to knee. She had no idea if Thomas’s muscles were hard or soft, if his back was straight or slightly curved, if his waist was thick or narrow.

But she knew all these things about Jake Malone. There wasn’t a spare inch of flesh around his middle, his thighs were long and lean, and his forearms were all muscle. She could also smell his breath, a sour whiskey odor she remembered from a bad time in her childhood, and she knew he could change as quickly as the weather. Safe one minute, dangerous the next.

Alex stiffened. She wanted to push his hand away from her waist and sit up straight, but she was exhausted beyond the strength of her will. She sagged against him, and with his arm holding her steady, she closed her eyes to the orange sun and faded into a dream.

She heard Charlotte’s cries, the baby’s wail, the roar of thunder, the rush of flooding water. A whimper rose in her throat as a raindrop jarred her awake. They were out of the gully, on a plain dotted with boulders, and a silvery curtain of water was racing toward them. She clutched the baby against her chest.

The outlaw pulled the horse up short. The bay almost bucked, but he settled the animal with his voice.

“I’ve got a slicker.” He reached behind the saddle and untied the rawhide laces holding a black oilcloth. She scooted forward to give him room to maneuver, but it was a mistake. The bay sidestepped.

“Stay still, dammit.”

She didn’t know if he was talking to her or the horse. She had seen what angry men did to their wives and children, and she remembered the night she learned that monsters sometimes wore familiar faces.

With a grunt, he unfurled the slicker, draped it over her legs and held up the center. “Put your head here,” he said.

Rain was already beading on the oilcloth. Eager to cover the baby, she shoved her head through the opening and spread the garment as best she could over herself, the baby and the outlaw’s knees.

“You’re going to get wet,” she said.

“It won’t be the first time.”

Lightning slashed the sky, thunder shook the air, and a burst of rain drenched her hair. The baby howled with misery. She wanted to feed him mother’s milk and wrap him in a clean diaper. She would have given a year of her life for shelter for them all, even Jake Malone.

She had prayed for an angel to rescue them, but God had sent her a flesh-and-blood man instead, a man who was dark, worn-out and dangerous. Hours had passed since they had buried Charlotte, but she could still smell liquor on him. He wore a revolver on his hip and carried a rifle in a leather scabbard. And then there had been that remark about seeing men die.

He hadn’t intended to stop, either. Jackson Jacob Malone wasn’t a hero, and probably not much of a gentleman. But an unseen force had compelled him to watch as Charlotte gave birth, and another force, something sad and human and decent, made him put down the mule and dig the grave.

Alex could feel the rise and fall of his chest against her back. She believed him when he said he wouldn’t hurt her, but she could hear her fiancé’s words, too.

You’re far too trusting, Alexandra.

Thomas may have been right, but her faith had always been rewarded. She sowed seeds of trust with her orphans, her friends, everyone she met, and not once had she been lied to or betrayed. It was her gift, this special kind of encouragement, and Jake Malone was no different from any other needy soul.

Except she was sitting in his lap, and he was a grown man and not a child. Except he owned two guns, had two black eyes and smelled like whiskey. Except his hand was too close to her breast, and the dampness of his shirt had soaked through to her own skin.

The rain gave him a strong musky scent. She could smell the baby’s dirty diaper, and she hoped the slicker would keep the odor away from the outlaw’s nose. His patience seemed thin to start with, and the tension in his body told her it was getting thinner by the minute.

As suddenly as it started, the rain stopped and the clouds blew apart. The sun turned the earth and sky into orange glass, a hot sea of glistening light.

“Oh my,” she whispered, squinting in the fiery glare. Perspiration poured from her skin, and the baby wailed.

“Can we stop?” she asked.

“If you’d like.”

He maneuvered the horse toward a boulder and climbed down from the bay. She pulled the oilcloth over her head and handed it to him. The cool air felt like a damp cloth, and her skin tingled.

“Hand me the baby,” Jake said. “Your legs might not hold you.”

As he lifted the tiny thing with his hands, she saw shock in his eyes, then something dark and clear as he cradled the baby against his chest. Holding him with one hand, he spread the slicker and a petticoat by the boulder, put the baby on its stomach and came to help her.

“Swing your leg back like I did.”

She tried, but her knee wouldn’t move. The bay shifted its weight. She could have sworn it growled, but she knew that was impossible. A second later she felt Jake’s hands around her waist, lifting her, pulling her close as he dragged her away from the skittish horse.

He set her on her feet, but her legs buckled and she fell against him. Her knees wouldn’t straighten, and she wondered if he would have to carry her. She was facing him, and she couldn’t take her eyes off his wet shirt sticking to his chest and dark hairs curling at his throat.

She looked into his liquid blue eyes and froze at what she saw. It was the same hard light she saw every day in the eyes of hungry children, the need for something so basic she couldn’t put it into words, a need she had never known because she had always been loved and cared for, safe and fed.

The darkness in his eyes made her shiver. She didn’t believe in lost souls, loneliness or pain that couldn’t be chased away by love as easily as dust disappeared with a broom. The darkness of night always turned into dawn. It was the unfailing truth of her life.

Until now. Until the baby’s needy wail clawed at her insides and she had no way to feed him. Until her own hunger blurred her vision and made her shake. Until her wet clothes chafed her skin and she could barely stand. Until she thought of her father and his failing heart and of Charlotte buried in the desert by strangers. Until the terrible truth that she was wet and hungry and lost took possession of her.

Tears welled in her eyes and her lips trembled. She pressed her dirty hands against her cheeks to hold back the flood, but it was too late. The pressure built to a throbbing ache that exploded in a throat-tearing sob.

Wrapping his arms around her, the stranger pulled her close. His breath echoed in her ear, and she smelled the rain and whiskey on his skin. She struggled to hold her breath, but she couldn’t hold back the tears.

When her knees buckled, Jake Malone did what no man had ever done for Alexandra Merritt. He held her while she cried.

Jake needed a drink.

The angel was crying her eyes out, the baby was bawling along with her, and between the noise, the dark spots floating in his eyes, a headache, and the misery in his groin that came from rubbing up against her, he was in a sorry state.

He knew how to comfort most women. You let them cry, then you kissed him and said you had to leave because you weren’t good enough for them.

Most women bought that line without a fight, and he suspected they were relieved to see him go. He was sure that deep down, Lettie was glad to see him leave even if she said otherwise, even if her brother had other ideas.

But the situation with Alexandra Merritt was entirely different. She expected comfort from him, and he wanted to comfort her, simply because he could. For all of her courage and confidence, she was a garden rose in the desert. She needed him, at least for a while, and it felt good in a deep, silent way.

She was sobbing like a train, all force and steam against his chest. Her fingers were digging into his arms but her legs had yet to take her weight. Holding her close, he learned that she had a man’s name and woman’s body. She was as soft as any woman he had ever held, and judging by the way her breath touched his bare throat, she was far too innocent to be held by someone like himself.

Jake wasn’t a patient man, but he didn’t move a muscle until her sobs turned into steady breaths. She shifted in his arms, but he didn’t let her go. Instead he reached into his back pocket for his bandanna and wiped her face.

God, she was a mess. Her cheeks were sunburned and dirty, and the tears had left streaks that glistened in the light. Her nose was running, too. She wasn’t the kind of woman who cried pretty, meaningless tears, and Jake wasn’t at all surprised when she straightened her back and stepped away from him.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out her own filthy handkerchief. She was shaking, and he kept his hand on her shoulder as she blew her nose, loudly and without apology. “I don’t usually fall apart,” she said simply.

“You’re safe now. That’s usually when the shakes hit.” She looked pained, and he felt a strange urge to make her smile. “There’s no need to apologize. I’ve made lots of women cry.”

She gave him a serious look that told him she wasn’t used to flirting, then she nodded, as if making women cry was a confession she heard every day. Her loose hair grazed his knuckles. It was far softer than it looked, even dirty, wet and unbrushed.

“Can you stand now?” he asked. “I think Charlie needs some cleaning up. I can handle gunshot wounds and dead bodies, but the diapers are up to you.”

Blood must have rushed to her feet, because she managed to stumble to the baby. “Can you get something clean from the saddlebag?”

Jake pulled out a white petticoat and tossed it to her. “We’ll camp here tonight. My horse needs rest.”

“All right,” she answered, deftly wrapping the baby in the cotton and cradling him in her arms. She held him close to her chest, sharing her body heat.

Jake made a fire, cooked coffee and opened his last can of beans. He hadn’t been prepared to leave Flat Rock. His stash had included some jerky, a few canned goods and a flask of whiskey, most of which was gone.

As soon as the can was warm, he handed it to her with his only spoon and poured coffee into his only cup.

“You go first.” He was about to say Save me some, but the ravenous look in her eyes made him bite his tongue. She barely got out a polite thank-you before she nestled Charlie in her lap and reached for the can.

“Careful, it’s hot.”

Their fingers touched as he maneuvered the hot pad into her palm. Even before he could stand up straight, she was shoveling beans into her mouth. She closed her eyes as if she were dining on pheasant, moaned with pleasure, swallowed and licked her lips.

All over a can of beans.

There wasn’t a doubt in Jake’s mind he’d go hungry tonight, and if it meant listening to the angel sigh with pleasure, he’d do it gladly. Night fell as he unsaddled the bay, set his gear near the fire and slouched against the saddle with his hat pulled low. He heard the spoon scrape against the tin can, then it stopped with a rattle.

Alex cleared her throat. “I’ve saved half for you.”

“I’m not hungry.” But his wayward stomach chose that moment to growl.

She must have heard his hunger pangs, because she was holding back a smile. “If you’re not hungry, I’ll put the rest out for the birds.”

“Finish it,” he said. “You haven’t eaten for two days.”

She shook her head. “You’re a lousy cook. I don’t want it.”

She was dangling the can in front of him like bait, and she looked as if she’d die if he didn’t eat something. His stomach rumbled even more loudly, and she smiled. “Please, Jake. I really can’t eat any more.”

His name rolled gently from her lips, and he liked it.

“All right then.” He reached across the fire and took the can in his bare hand. The metal was cool now, but still warm where her fingers had been. As the angel picked up the baby, he polished off the meal in four bites and poured coffee.

Charlie was squeaking like a kitten, and Jake washed down an unfamiliar lump of worry with the dregs from the pot. “Is he all right?”

“Just hungry. Can you hand me the canteen?”

He picked up the flask, stretched his arm as far as it would go and he handed it to her. She took it in both hands, tore off a piece of the petticoat, twisted it into a teat, and soaked it with water. Tickling the baby’s chin, she slipped the cotton into his mouth.

“With a little luck, he’ll figure this out,” she said.

The baby’s lips moved in that birdlike way, and he started to suck. Jake breathed a sigh of relief.

As Charlie’s jaws worked the makeshift nipple, Alex rocked him. “He’s fairly big for a newborn.”

Jake looked doubtful. He’d seen plucked chickens with more meat on their bones. Curiosity loosened his tongue and he sat higher against the saddle.

“Isn’t it kind of crazy for a woman to be traveling when she’s so far along?”

“It is, but she didn’t have much choice. She was stuck in Leadville for weeks because of the bridge being out over the gorge. If the train had been running, we would have reached Grand Junction a month ago.”

“Do you know anything about her?”

“Only that her last name was Smith and that she was a widow from Chicago. She mentioned starting a restaurant with her sister in California, but we talked mostly about the weather and the miserable ride. She seemed like a very private person.

“Being a widow named Smith sounds pretty convenient to me,” Jake said.

“I thought so, too.”

Charlie started fussing, and Alex dipped the cotton in the canteen. The baby made tiny sucking sounds, and the angel started humming, a lullaby he recognized in some hidden depth of his soul. The sun was gone, and in the firelight he watched the baby fall asleep in her arms.

Her eyelids were drooping too, and he kicked himself for noticing the thick lashes that shadowed her eyes. With thoughts of warmth and sweetness nipping at him, Jake stood up and spread his bedroll near the fire. “You and Charlie can have the blanket.”

“I’m not cold.” She pulled the baby closer and scooted against a rock.

Jake dropped the blanket over her shoulders, but she shrugged it off. He glared at her. She was making things more difficult than they had to be. “You’re either stupid or a liar. Which is it?”

“I’m too polite for my own good.”

“Then you’re both.”

She grinned at him, and he saw both truth and humor in her eyes. “Actually, I’m neither, but you’re still wet and I’m dry enough to be comfortable by the fire.”

He left the blanket lying in the dirt. For a man who didn’t have a considerate bone in his body, he was acting like a fool. He should have taken the blanket, gotten his whiskey from the saddlebag and concentrated on forgetting the past two days, but this woman made him irritable.

“You like to argue, don’t you?” he finally said.

“It’s a family trait.” Her eyes darkened. “How soon before we get to Grand Junction?”

“A day or so.”

“I’m already a month later than I wanted to be.”

“What’s waiting for you?”

“Family,” she said. “My parents. I haven’t seen them in five years.”

The baby was quiet, and Alex was on the verge of sleep. In less than a minute her head rolled forward and her breathing blended into the deep rhythms of the night. He spread the slicker on the ground and urged her down so that she was on her side with Charlie cradled in her arms, then he covered them both with the blanket.

As for himself, he had other ways to keep warm. Crouching by his gear, he pulled the whiskey flask out of the saddlebag. It was half-empty, but it was enough to help him sleep.

Behind him, the angel rustled beneath the blanket. Smoke from the fire wafted to his nose. Lowering the flask, he turned to make sure she hadn’t rolled too close to the coals. Still curled around the baby, she was staring at him as if he’d grown two heads. A nightmarish fear beamed in her eyes. No matter how thirsty he was, she looked like she needed it more.

“Do you want a swallow? It’ll help you sleep.”

“No, thank you.” She closed her eyes and blew out a lungful of air. He could almost see her measuring her next breath, taking it in, and forcing the fear out with it, until she went back to sleep.

The flask dangled in his hand as he breathed in the night air and its peculiar mix of smoke and emptiness. The baby cooed at her side, and a familiar stone shifted in his gut. He would have given ten years of his life, hell, all twenty-five years, just for five minutes of that kind of peace.

The flask grew warm from the heat of his hands. He had never cared for the taste of stale whiskey, and the dregs had been cooking for two days now. He heard the angel sigh in her sleep, saw her feet twitch, imagined her dreams of a fiery red desert and a baby being born.

And then he had thoughts of his own, of the crimes he’d committed, of Lettie, and his brother Gabe, of the last night in Flat Rock. He had been close to vomiting for two days now, and he knew if he took even a swallow of the warm liquor his guts would spill at his feet. He’d shame himself in front of her, and she’d be on her feet in a heartbeat, holding his head while he puked up his guts.

He couldn’t bear the thought of the angel hearing him vomit, so he put the whiskey back in his saddlebag and walked into the darkness. Stopping at a boulder silhouetted by the moon, he rolled a cigarette, slipped it between his lips and struck a match.

The tip glowed and faded, an orange flower blooming in the darkness, too bright to be real and too beautiful to last.

Chapter Three

She was dreaming of cicadas chanting on a summer night, but the rattle in her ears wasn’t quite right. It stopped and started while cicadas made a noise that never ended. The crickets got louder as the night lengthened and they always sounded far away. This rattle was too close to be a dream, then she heard the click of a rifle, the baby’s sudden wail and a man’s low voice.

“Hold still, Alex, real still.”

Something slithered over her feet. Her eyelids flew open and she saw Jake Malone’s dirty boots planted three feet away from her face.

“Don’t move, honey.”

Dear God, how could she hold still with a rattler rippling over her feet? The baby was wailing now. Only the bundling kept him from thrashing and attracting the snake. His red face was next to hers, but she didn’t dare move. The rattling stopped, and the silence was more frightening than the hiss of its tail.

“He might leave, so stay still. He’s looking kind of bored right now.”

Was that supposed to make her feel better?

“I can’t shoot him from this angle so I’m going to move behind you. This fella is as good as dead. He’ll make a nice band for the hat I’m going to buy for you.”

Her legs were shaking, and her jaw throbbed. Tears squeezed out of her eyes, and she looked down without moving her head. The snake studied the baby with its slitted eyes. Its flat head swiveled, and she wondered if snakes could hear, and if the baby’s wails would make it strike.

Fresh terror pulsed through her. She would die, the baby would die, or Jake Malone would save them both.

“He’ll be tasty for breakfast once I nail him,” the outlaw said.

The man was out of his mind.

“They taste like chicken.”

Her stomach lurched. Hot tears streaked her face.

Sssss…Sssss…Sssss…

Jake’s shadow touched the coils. “I’m going to shoot on three.”

He raised the rifle and took a step. “One…”

The baby kicked inside the bunting.

“Two…”

The snake’s fangs glistened in the sun.

“Three.”

The rifle blasted hot metal. The snake lunged for its prey, and Alex flung herself in front of the baby. Razor-sharp fangs sliced through her arm. Blood and bits of the snake spattered her face and hands.

“Oh, God! Oh, God!”

Charlie’s mouth was moving, but she couldn’t hear him cry. Her sleeve was in shreds and covered with blood. She struggled to her knees. The snake was a bloody rope at her side, and Jake Malone was in front of her, pulling on her arm, ripping at the red cotton sticking to her skin.

He was talking, but she couldn’t hear him. She wanted to tell him everything would all right, that the snake was dead, but she couldn’t force the words out of her throat. She could barely breathe, and when he ripped the sleeve up to her elbow, she saw two red gashes where the rattler’s fangs had ripped her skin.

“Alex? Can you hear me?”

He was shouting, but she could barely make out the words. Not trusting her voice, she nodded to him.

He had a knife in his hand. It was short, with the sharpest silver blade she had ever seen, and his eyes were glued to her forearm where the red streaks were oozing blood. The knife shifted in his fingers.

“No!”

She tried to pull her arm away, but he had a firm grip on her elbow. The blade sliced into her flesh just above the two gashes, and a second later he was sucking the blood. He spat one mouthful on the ground, then two more. With a jerk of his hand, he tore the rest of the sleeve, made a tourniquet and twisted it just above the bite.

Wiping her blood away from his mouth, he grabbed her elbow and squeezed. “Talk to me, Alex. Does your whole arm hurt or just where it’s bleeding?”

“Just—just the bite.”

“Does your arm tingle? Is it going numb?”

She was trembling with pain and terror, but she managed to shake her head.

“Here’s the situation, honey. I don’t think the snake shot you full of venom. Those were scratches, not puncture marks. I had to cut you, though. I had to be sure.”

His eyes were as wide as hers. If the snake had shot its venom, she would die, and no amount of hope or letting of blood would stop the progress of the poison.

She blinked and saw her father’s face. She tasted ripe peaches and her mother’s homemade jam. Charlie’s wail pierced the silence, and Jake’s breath rasped as he pressed his fingers against her throat and felt her racing pulse.

A sob exploded from her chest. Regrets buzzed in her mind like insects with ugly black wings and she couldn’t swat them away. Her body was a shadow, empty and gray, but her vision sharpened and she saw the bright beauty of the arid plateau. Her ears pounded with the vastness of the silent earth. There was so much of life she had missed, so much she hadn’t tasted, touched, understood.

“I don’t want to die,” she said, choking on the dryness of her own mouth. A thunderous tremor traveled from her toes to her scalp. Her whole body shook with it, except for her injured arm being held steady in Jake’s strong hands.

“Can you still feel your fingers?” His eyes were the brightest blue. She hadn’t noticed that until now.

“My—my arm doesn’t hurt—except for the bite.”

“Are you sick? Can you breathe?”

She sucked in air and nodded. “I hear Charlie.”

“He can wait a minute.”

She saw the baby kicking on the blanket. As faint as his wail seemed to her ears, it was distinct, as welcome as the first strains of a symphony. Jake let go of her arm and went to the saddlebag. The buckle flashed in the sun, and he came back with the flask and one of his own shirts.

“Sit back,” he said. “This is going to hurt.”

She leaned against the boulder and stuck her arm out as if she were a child with a skinned elbow. Sweat beaded on her face, and she gritted her teeth against the speckled light spinning through her head. Closing her eyes, she clutched at Jake’s sleeve to steady herself. He rested her bloody arm on top of his, cupping her elbow and trapping her fingers between his chest and biceps.

He splashed alcohol over the wound, and she shrieked. She thought of her mother blowing on her skinned knees, then she felt soft cotton on her torn flesh and the heat of his hand. The wound stung terribly, but she was breathing more easily.

“We’ll wrap it up, and then we’re gonna beat all hell for Grand Junction,” Jake said. He sliced the shirt with his knife, wrapped her arm as tight as she could stand and tied the ends. “You stay still while I pack up.”

His eyes were full of a glassy blue light, and Alex knew that hers were just as watery. He wrapped the baby in a fresh petticoat and tucked him in the crook of her good arm. Then he rolled up the blanket and the slicker, kicked sand in the ashes of the fire and vanished behind a boulder.

She figured it was nature calling, but then she heard a low moan, a single cuss word, and the sound of a man losing his breakfast and his pride. She wanted to go to him, but her legs were too weak. It struck her then that some things were private, and this was one of them.

When he came back, he took a swig of water and spat it on the ground. Taking Charlie in the crook of his arm, he pulled her up with his other hand. He didn’t let go, and she didn’t want him to.

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

“I’m just shaken up.”

“Can you ride?’

The bay was tethered to a scraggly juniper on the other side of the campsite. It was a foot taller than she remembered and twice as skittish. She worried even more when it curled its lips and snorted at her.

“He’s not as mean as he looks,” Jake said, tugging on her good arm.

Her feet refused to budge. “He doesn’t like me.”

“It doesn’t matter what he likes. I’ve got to get you to a doctor.”

Something ornery and hysterical took root just below her ribs, and she shook her head. “I want to walk.”

“You want to what?”

“I’m going to walk to Grand Junction.”

“Okay,” he drawled. “I’ll take Charlie, and you can meet us in town. How’s that sound?”

“That sounds good.”

“I’ll even wait around and buy you supper when you get there. That should be in about a week, that is if you don’t fall in a ditch and break a leg, or die of thirst, or starvation. And don’t forget bobcats and rats. You know about rattlers, but coyotes can get mean, too.”

“I’ll be careful.”

“You’ve got outlaws and Indians to consider, and then there’s sunstroke. You’ll have to sleep during the day and walk at night. It gets pretty dark, but there should be a full moon in a few days.”

“Anything else I should worry about?”

“Scorpions. Tarantulas are just big hairy spiders, but scorpions sting like hell. Now centipedes are downright cute.”

Laughter bubbled in her throat. The entire situation was beyond all reason, beyond anything she had ever imagined. She was sobbing and laughing at the same time, and Jake was grinning like a man who had wrestled a bear and won. His eyes glowed, and she saw that in spite of his toughness, he liked to laugh.

In her most formal voice, Alex said, “Considering the tarantulas, I suppose I’ll take my chances with your horse, Mr. Malone.”

“A wise decision, Miss Merritt.”

With a bold-as-brass smile, he slipped his hand around her waist and pulled her to his side. His body was warm and strong against hers, and with a tiny smile, she said, “I feel better.”

His fingers cupped her waist, and somehow she knew that everything would be all right.

But it wasn’t all right. Pressure built deep in her chest, and something wild and insane took root low in her belly. The trembling came back with an energy of its own. Maybe the snake had left its mark. Maybe that was why her legs went weak and she couldn’t breathe.

Maybe it was the snake, and not the shimmering light in Jake Malone’s eyes, the sheltering wing of his arm and the parting of his lips. Slowly, like a drop of rain trailing down a leaf, he lowered his mouth an inch closer to hers. Closing her eyes, Alex faced the certainty she was about to be kissed and acknowledged the truth that she wanted him to do it.

Only she couldn’t possibly want that. She was engaged to Thomas. Jake Malone and his shimmering eyes and soft lips had no place in her life, but he was already kissing her and she couldn’t pull away.

Kissing him was unthinkable. A betrayal, a lie, and she couldn’t do it. Except her lips had come alive, and she shivered as his tongue grazed them. The kiss was tender, searching, like Charlie’s rosebud mouth looking for his mother’s breast.

Her hand flew to his chest and she felt the beat of his heart. A soft hum rippled through him as he eased his tongue past her lips. She had never kissed a man like this before, never felt his need mixing with her own. The strange and glorious closeness of his soul made her tremble, and she liked it.

But it had to be a lie, an aberration borne of fright and danger. She loved Thomas. He needed her. She had no right to kiss an outlaw in the desert. She had no interest in kissing him, and yet a small squeak, a tender cry of need, escaped from her throat.

Jake pulled her closer, and she wanted to laugh and dance and touch the sun, to feel the hardness of his muscles and the coarseness of his beard. She wanted to pour herself into him, to fill the hidden corners of his soul, and so with the morning air on her face and the sun blazing across the plain, with her aching body daring her to do it, she filled the hot emptiness of his mouth with her breath.

The moment turned both tender and fierce. His free hand traveled down her spine, past her waist, down to the small of her back, and a notch lower. His fingertips drew a slow circle that deepened with each turn of his wrist.

When he touched her bottom, she gasped. He hesitated, but she couldn’t force a single word past her lips and so he went on kissing her. His tongue dove deeper, his lips became hungrier. Everything about this man was confident now, and in a rush of hot, wet panic, she planted her hands on his chest and pushed.

“What the—”

He staggered backward, struggling to keep his balance with the baby cradled in one arm. Charlie shrieked, and Jake landed on his backside like a rodeo clown.

He glanced at the baby, tucked the cloth over its head, then rose to his full height and squinted at her. Rimmed with purple shadows, his eyes seemed wise and all-knowing, scarred by life’s battles and experienced with its pleasures.

“Jeez, Alex, what did you think I was going to do? It was just a kiss.” His voice softened. “It’s just nature.”

Shaking her head and close to tears, she held up her hands to stop him. “I’m not an idiot. I know exactly what it is. And it isn’t an excuse for what I just did.”

His blue gaze pinned her to the spot. “You wanted to kiss me. You want to prove you’re alive and kick death in the teeth. Whorehouses always fill up after a gunfight.”

What in the world was she supposed to say to that? That she had never needed to kick death in the teeth before now, that everything in her world was orderly and simple, because she worked very hard to keep it that way?

Or should she tell him that until now, she had never lost her mind while kissing a man; that her insides felt like warm milk and she could still taste the salt of him on her tongue? Alex bit her lip. She had to keep the moment in perspective.

“Frankly, Mr. Malone, I just made an embarrassing mistake. You see, I’m engaged to a man in Philadelphia, and well, I—uh—”

“You just got carried away.”

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Whatever you say.” He shrugged as he held out the baby. “Here, you take him. I’ll check on the horse.”

For some reason, his opinion mattered, at least for today, and Alex followed him to the bay. “My fiancé’s name is Thomas Hunnicutt. We work together. With children.”

Jake fiddled with a stirrup. “Is that so?”

“He’s kind and thoughtful. We’ve known each other for years, and when his wife died, it seemed right to get married. She was my best friend.”

The desert air hurt her lungs, as if it were too thin to support a human life, and she took a deeper breath. He glanced at her, and a fleeting shadow passed over his face.

“Thomas Hunnicutt is a lucky man, Miss Merritt. I apologize for my earlier indiscretion.” His manners were impeccable, his voice as sincere as a prayer, but something about the tilt of his head made Alex tremble all the more.

The horse fidgeted next to her, but she no longer cared. She would have climbed on a kicking mule to get away from this man. But what would she do with this terrible ache? This desire to touch his face? Even now her heart felt swollen with a need to taste more than the desert air, to feel more than the heat of the earth rising through the soles of her shoes.

There’s more to life, Alex, so much more….

Her father’s words came at her like a forgotten promise and a strange realization seized her heart. Not once had she been hungry or thirsty, in need of clean clothes, or desirous of a man’s kiss. Until the stage crashed in that torrent of muddy water, she hadn’t felt fear. Until the snake bite, she hadn’t felt pain. And until Jake kissed her, she hadn’t tasted desire.

Standing by the bay, with her arm wrapped in his shirt, with her sunburned skin stinging from the salt of her own perspiration, Alex felt her nerves rippling like grass in the wind. Did misery really sharpen a person’s senses? Did sugar taste sweeter after a mouthful of sand? She had to hope so. What else could explain the trembling in her bones?

Jake Malone saw it all in her eyes, and she could only pray the heat pulsing in her veins was nothing more than shock, an illusion, something that wouldn’t last, because her feelings for this man turned her well-planned future into a wasteland.

She belonged in Philadelphia. She belonged anywhere but here. And that meant she had to push back the glittering mirage of passion and see the true dryness of the desert.

Jake had heard of people going insane on the Colorado Plateau, and Alexandra Merritt had as much cause as the next person. It gave him a reason to be charitable, but temporary insanity was no excuse for bad manners. She hadn’t said a word since he lifted her onto the saddle, and he didn’t take kindly to being shoved on his butt.

Between the baby’s hungry wail and the fact he hadn’t had a drink for two days, Jake was brimming with indignation. They had a half day’s ride ahead of them, and as long as Alex wasn’t in desperate need of a doctor, he was grateful for the chance to sort through his thoughts.

At the very least she owed him an apology, but if the truth be told, he wanted a lot more than that. The angel made him hungry for things he’d never had, simple things like respect and a clean bed, and dangerous things like her body, and even her trust.

There wasn’t much in his life that made Jake proud, but killing the snake with a perfect shot was one of them. Wishing the snake would slither back to its nest but knowing it wouldn’t, he’d grabbed the Winchester and aimed. Instinct had forced the snake to strike, just as a piece of Jake’s own nature, a piece he had either forgotten or wasn’t sure he had, made protecting Alex and the baby as necessary as breathing.

An hour had passed since that moment, and they had all been amazingly lucky. Lancing the bite had been the most awful thing he had ever done. He would never forget the terror in her eyes or the taste of her blood.

Nor would the softness of her lips fade from his memory anytime soon. She had to be the luckiest person he had ever known, and the most pitiful at the same time. How could Thomas Hunnicutt look at himself in the mirror, when it was as plain as the desert sun that Alexandra Merritt didn’t know the first thing about kissing a man?

Jake didn’t understand men who treated women as if they were merely useful, like an extra right arm or a hot-water bottle for their beds. He knew from experience that something wondrous happened when the right man and the right woman got naked together.

He had been nineteen years old and not fully grown when a widow hired him to work her ranch for the summer. By July his muscles were hard and he was sharing her bed. She was close to thirty, but he would have married her if she hadn’t sent him away.

Leaving her cut him to the bone. The widow liked having him in her bed, but she didn’t want him in her life. A few months later, she’d pushed him away like a bum calf, and he remembered the taste of snow as he rode away.

And then there was Lettie Abbott. He’d broken all of the rules when he’d taken her to bed.

“You’ve got to pay for it or marry it,” his brother Gabe used to say, but Jake had done neither with Lettie. It had been nothing more than meeting a man’s need. Not once had he imagined she would conceive a child.

With spots drifting like flies in his field of vision, Jake had to admit there was more than one way to ruin a woman’s life. He had nothing on Thomas Hunnicutt when it came to using a woman. He had spent one night with Lettie for the pleasure of it. It wasn’t even worth remembering, except for the baby she’d conceived.

With the angel pressed against his thighs, the memory of Lettie’s pregnant belly tweaked what was left of his conscience. Never mind that she had invited herself into his bed. He had taken less than she had to give, and Jake knew in his gut how it felt to be treated as less than the person he wanted to be. Gabe did it to him all the time.

You worthless piece of trash. What makes you think you belong in school? You’ll never get it right, little brother. Smart kids read books. Dumb ones shovel shit.”

For a while, he had read them anyway.

Ma would die if she saw you puking like that….

Yeah, but Ma was already dead.

Rolling his hips in the saddle, Jake shifted to give the angel more space. He knew how to skulk through life. He was hardened to his own misery, but what would happen to her if her husband made her feel worthless and weak?

His stomach clenched around its own emptiness. Alex deserved all the joy life could bring. Pure goodness radiated from her bones as she cuddled the baby. Warmth rolled off her back, and Jake couldn’t stop himself from wrapping his arm around her waist.

She stiffened, but he didn’t loosen his hold until she relaxed and leaned against his chest. His mind took off for places it had no business going, and his eyes followed suit. He gazed at the curve of her neck where her blouse gaped, and he could see a line where her white skin ended and a fiery sunburn began. She was on the verge of blistering, so he tugged her blouse higher on her neck. She tensed beneath his fingertips. “What are you doing?”

“You’re starting to look like a tomato.”

His fingers brushed her skin, not by accident, and she sat straighter, as if her backbone had grown back.

“I’ll be glad to get home,” she said.

“Must be nice to have a home to go to.”

Her voice softened. “Where are you from?”

“Nowhere in particular.”

“You must be coming from somewhere,” she probed. “What do you do?”

It was the kind of thing a woman would ask at a dinner party. “You don’t want to know.”

“Yes, I do.”

He grumbled at her. “Didn’t anyone tell you it’s rude to ask questions?”

She didn’t answer, and he felt bad for scolding her. The woman made him prickly all over, and he gave in to a strange wave of pity. “I pretty much go where I want.”

“Where were you headed when you found us?”

“California,” he replied.

“Do you have family there?”

She was like a child rummaging through a box of puzzle pieces, looking for ones that fit, excited at the prospect of a pretty picture. Irritation leaked into his voice. “What I do isn’t anyone’s business but mine.”

“Maybe not, but Charlie and I are alive because you stopped. I won’t forget what I owe you.”

“You don’t owe me anything except an apology.” Her cheeks flushed, and it charmed him enough to be kind. “It’s not smart to kiss a man and then knock him on his butt.”

“I guess I had a sudden urge to kick death in the teeth, or something like that,” she said with dignity. “I am sorry, though. I behaved badly.”

“No offense taken.”

Alex turned in the saddle and looked at him with those rich brown eyes and sunburned face. With a sweet smile, she said, “You’re a good man.”

He wasn’t anywhere close to being good. His eyes drifted to her pink lips. Lightning shot to his groin and ricocheted to his chest. Pure lust would have been easy to put in its place, but Jake knew his reaction wasn’t that simple. Yes, he wanted to show Alex a thing or two about kissing a man, but he also wanted to keep her safe, to be someone she would want to know.

But he was on the run. He had no business lusting after an angel, even if he had kissed her and seen need in her eyes, curiosity, and the hunger that comes with a child’s first taste of sugar. Even if she asked him for more, he had nothing to give except a glimpse of pleasure, and that wouldn’t be enough. She deserved more from life, and so did the baby in her arms.

His jaw tightened as he thought back to Lettie and the baby she was carrying. He didn’t love her, not even a little bit, and the child would be better off without having a son of a bitch like himself for a father.

Charlie was propped on Alex’s shoulder. Patting his back, she crooned a vaguely familiar melody, and with a dim ache behind his eyes, Jake recognized the hymn she had been singing when he found her. The baby’s face was red, and his wispy hair, the same dark brown as Jake’s, was damp and matted. His eyes were blue slits, glassy with tears, and needy enough to make a grown man cry.

It was more than Jake could stand. He would take Alex to her family in Grand Junction, then he’d find a saloon, order a bottle of whiskey and drink himself senseless. He had plenty of money. He could drink all night if he wanted, and maybe even find a woman to share the pleasure.

The miles passed quickly once he had a plan. The trail dipped through a canyon full of sage and scraggly junipers until the ravine widened into a thrusting desert plain. Grand Junction rose in the distance, and Alex stretched to see the rows of buildings.

Charlie let out another wail, and Jake sighed. He could already feel the whiskey tickling his throat.

“We’re here!”

Her joy flowed through him. He really had saved her life, and he wondered if saving an angel made up for the rest of the misery he’d caused through the years. He even let himself wonder what Gabe would have said about his little brother riding into town with a woman and a baby.

With the thought of Gabe, his good mood soured like old milk. His brother would have told him he was a fool. He would have called him a drunk and a cheat and told him to keep his dirty hands off of Miss Merritt’s slender waist, to mind his manners, brush his teeth and get a job.

Jake was scowling when they reached the middle of town where Waltham’s Emporium was doing a brisk business. A large man with silver hair walked down the steps toward a loaded buckboard.

“Papa! Papa!” Alex cried.

She squirmed like a kid at Christmas, and the old man froze in his tracks. Jake saw shock in his eyes, then a blossom of pure joy. He half expected the man to break into a run, but he couldn’t seem to get his legs to work any faster.

The bay chuffed, and Jake reined him in at a hitching post. Sliding out of the saddle, he reached for Alex. She shoved Charlie into his arms and slid off the bay. Half staggering with her arms spread wide, she ran to the silver giant of a man.

“Oh, Papa! You won’t believe what happened.”

The old man hugged his daughter like there was no tomorrow, and Jake stood by the horse with Charlie squalling in his arms.

He needed that drink worse than ever.

Thank God. Thank God. Thank God.

William Merritt was a man of great emotion on even a quiet day, and having his daughter home at last was enough to make him shout with joy. It had been five years since he had seen her and more than ten since she had lived at home. It had been her mother’s idea to send Alex to live with her aunt in Philadelphia. William had fought the idea, but Kath insisted on giving their daughter a taste a taste of Eastern sophistication, including the opportunity to meet educated young men and wear stylish dresses. As always, Kath had stood her ground, and he’d given in.

And so he and his daughter had written letters, and because of the strange intimacy of paper and pen, William knew his daughter better than she knew herself. He had an uncanny ability to read between the lines, and for the past six months, he’d been worried about her engagement to Thomas Hunnicutt.

But those worries could wait. He squeezed her shoulders and something between a laugh and a roar ripped from his throat. She leaned back, her hands still in his, and he saw a thousand questions in her eyes.

“I’m fine,” he said. “Just slowing down a little.”

But the dark circles under his eyes went beyond a man feeling his years, and if the truth be told, the pounding of his heart at the shock of seeing her scared him just a little.

More time…more time…more time…

Dear God, he’d be grateful for every minute.

“Papa, I’ve got so much to tell you.” She stepped back and William took a long look at her. Her face was red and near blistering. Baggy trousers hung from her hips, and a sleeve had been torn from her white blouse. Dried blood caked the bandage on her arm.

He grabbed her shoulders. “My God! What happened?”

“The stage crashed in a thunderstorm. There’s a lot to tell, but there are two people you have to meet first.”

William’s gaze roved to the man holding the baby. With his black eyes and black duster, he seemed more like a shadow than flesh and bone. Hard living, and only God knew what else, had etched deep lines in the young man’s face, and he had a thirsty look in his eyes.

William knew the craving when he saw it, and he felt a stab of sympathy for the young man. With his stubbled jaw and bruised face, he looked like a rounder, but the baby turned him into something else. He looked like a father, too, and William dared to hope his daughter had found a diamond in the rough.

The cowboy stepped toward Alex and she reached for the baby. Holding the infant against her breast, she nodded at the stranger.

“Papa, this is Jackson Jacob Malone. He saved my life. Twice.” Smiling, she held up the baby. “And this is Charlie.”

“Who does he belong to?”

“No one right now.”

William felt a twinge of disappointment that the cowboy wasn’t the baby’s father, and he cringed when he saw a light in his daughter’s eyes that reminded him of his wife as a younger woman.

I want another baby, Will.

Any man who had fathered a child by choice knew that look, and most of the time a woman got her way. Peeling back the white cloth shielding the baby’s head, he peered into his tiny face. “He looks brand-new.”

“He is. His mother died giving birth.”

“And his father?”

Alex shook her head. “She never said.”

William watched as the cowboy took off his hat and wiped his forehead with his sleeve. The man was ready to hightail it out of town, but someone had hammered good manners into him, and he didn’t even twitch while he waited for Alex to finish talking.

He had the air of a perfect gentleman, but William saw through him. He was polite because it had been beaten into him, and beneath his hooded gaze, William saw a man who cussed God and took comfort where he could find it.

He had known countless men like Jackson Jacob Malone over the years. He’d prayed with them and even buried a few of them when things went bad. He knew these men in his bone marrow because he had been one himself. Kindness would only make a man like Malone run, so William got tough and mean.

“This kid looks just like you, son. What lies are you telling?”

Anger rose from his black duster like smoke. “Let’s see, old man. The last woman I bedded was a whore in Glenville, and that was a lot more recent than nine months ago when Charlie here got started. Let me think….” Jake rolled his eyes skyward and twisted his lips into an insolent grin.

William saw right through the ploy. The young man wanted to shock him.

“As I recall,” Jake continued, “a sweet young thing spread her legs for me about then, but she was a blonde with big tits and the woman I just buried—”

“Stop it!” Alex glared at them both, then zeroed in on Jake. “How dare you speak like that about someone you—”

“Bedded?”

“I can ignore the language, but not the disrespect.”

William wasn’t surprised when his daughter turned on him next. “Papa, that question was out of line. You have no right to question Jake’s integrity.”

So it was already Jake and not Mr. Malone.

The young man didn’t say a word, and William, who never kept his mouth closed and only rarely regretted opening it, wasn’t at all sorry for riling him. He believed that “fight” and “flight” were God-given instincts, and Jake Malone was a fighter.

“My daughter’s right, Mr. Malone. I have a rude streak a mile wide. I owe you far more than gratitude for saving her life. She’s a treasure.” He stuck out his hand and waited for the man to take it.

William guessed he still wanted to get drunk and throw a few punches, but at the mention of Alex, Jake Malone’s eyes shimmered with a tender light. He took William’s hand with a firm grasp.

“The privilege was mine, sir.”

Alex smiled up at the cowboy, and William saw the precise moment when the fight in Jake Malone turned to flight. His eyes lingered a moment too long on her face. His mouth softened, and in his old bones William felt the young man’s longing for something pure and good.

Glancing at Charlie, the cowboy almost smiled, but instead he tipped his hat to Alex. “Miss Merritt, I wish you all the best.”

Turning on his heels, he walked way.

Alex shot after him and tugged on his sleeve. “Jake! Wait! You can’t just leave. At least stay for supper.”

Malone didn’t stop walking, and William didn’t know whether to respect him for wanting to protect Alex from the likes of himself, or if he despised the man for a lack of courage.

Either way, there was hope for Jake Malone, and once the cowboy found that out for himself he’d beat all hell out of Thomas Hunnicutt as a son-in-law. He knew where the young man was headed, and he wasn’t going anywhere as long as William had anything to say about it.

“I’ve got a bottle of twenty-year-old whiskey with your name on it, son.”

The cowboy stopped dead in his tracks. Dust billowed at Alexandra’s feet, and William prayed he hadn’t just made the biggest mistake of his life.

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