LITMIR.BIZ

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      “She’d better be able to.” Jack Murphy separated himself from the crowd. Judging by his solemn expression, he’d been informed of Marielle’s situation—and had heard her own gloomy pronouncement of her prognosis, too. He pushed a glass in her hand. “Drink this. I’ll send the doctor to you straightaway.”

      “This is a double whiskey!” Marielle objected.

      “It’ll help. Trust me.” Jack turned to Hudson, even as the Dylan-Coyle-centered melee went on behind him. “She’ll do better at home, where it’s quiet. Make sure she gets some rest.”

      Irked, Marielle cleared her throat. “I’m right here!”

      “I’ll listen to you,” Jack informed her with a devilish gleam in his Irish eyes, “after you down that medicinal snort.”

      Expeditiously, she did. It burned all the way down. Ugh.

      Eyes watering, Marielle persisted. “I already told Hudson to take me home, Jack. You needn’t interfere. I have this well in hand.” A surprising warmth spread through her, kindled by the liquor she’d consumed. “I’ll be back within days. Don’t worry.”

      Hudson took away her glass. He nodded at her. “Ready?”

      Marielle murmured her assent. She held out her hand, ready for her brother to help her to her feet in a dignified fashion.

      Instead, he saved time by scooping her outright into his massive arms, then cradling her to his chest. Marielle couldn’t help whooping in surprise, then clutching him. She gave him a swat, feeling relieved and displeased in equal measure. She loved Hudson. She knew he’d care for her, however inexpertly. But she didn’t like being treated like a helpless child.

      “Days,” she promised Jack sternly, desperate to make sure he wouldn’t hire someone to replace her. “I heal quickly.”

      “You’ll take as long as you need,” her boss countered.

      But Marielle knew she couldn’t do that. “I can’t afford to stay home languishing! You know that. Without a steady income—”

      But Jack Murphy had an answer for that, too.

      “I’ll give you half pay, for as long as you’re laid up—”

      “What?” She was astounded. His offer went above and beyond what any dancer could expect. “That’s so generous of you.”

      “—as long as you rest up and follow orders.”

      Humph. Marielle wrinkled her nose. Naturally, there were conditions attached to Jack’s munificence. It was almost as if they all expected her to flout doctor’s orders, charge ahead on her own authority and handle this situation however she liked.

      It was almost as if they all knew her, Jack included.

      Dratted know-it-alls. No adult man would have had to agree to “follow orders” under threat of penury. Why should she?

      She could take care of herself and darn well would.

      “Making a cranky face,” Jack observed, “is not agreeing.”

      “Don’t you think I know that?” Marielle asked.

      Hudson chuckled. She felt the vibration of his laughter.

      “That’s why I’m pressing the issue,” Jack said. “We’ve known each other for years now, remember? My saloon was just a wee upstart when I brought you and your troupe to Morrow Creek.”

      Marielle remembered. Daniel McCabe had built the stage she danced on with his own two blacksmithing hands. Catching a glimpse of Jack’s expectant expression, she knew what he wanted.

      She wasn’t ready to give him her agreement, though.

      “You all think you’re so clever, don’t you?” she groused.

      “I don’t.” Holding her in his arms, Hudson shrugged. He gave her an endearing grin. “But I agree with Jack about this.”

      “Traitor.” Stubbornly, Marielle frowned at them both. But a second later, her head began swimming with the aftereffects of the whiskey. It was the only explanation for what happened next. “Fine,” she agreed. “I’ll behave myself! I promise. All right?”

      “All right.” Jack nodded. So did Hudson.

      Then he swept her out of the saloon and into the night.

Chapter Three

      At some point, Dylan realized that Doc Finney had left the cluster of men surrounding him. Until that moment, he’d been keeping a firm eye on the reedy physician. It was imperative to get the doctor’s treatment for the dance hall girl. But between one joke and the next—between one urgent statement about the dire emergency facing the town and the next—Dylan lost him.

      He hadn’t expected to be swamped by Morrow Creek’s take-charge menfolk, all of them eager to get his attention—and his opinion on the crisis they’d discussed at the men’s club that evening. Truthfully, when Dylan had spied the group of men coming into Murphy’s saloon, he’d thought they were there for Marielle Miller. Especially the doctor. It had certainly looked that way. As one, they’d turned their heads toward the dance hall girl’s position, perked up, then beelined straight there.

      It turned out, though, that they’d beelined toward him.

      Since that turn of events, Dylan had been unable to avoid all the backslapping, camaraderie, jokes and gossip they’d surrounded him with. He hadn’t invited it. But he also hadn’t been idly jawing to Miss Miller earlier. He did know these men. They knew him. During his short stay in Morrow Creek, he’d taken part in some important goings-on, mostly involving his employer at the Morrow Creek Mutual Society, the conniving brute who’d followed her West and the thugs that reprobate had employed.

      In the aftermath of that incident, Dylan and the other men—Murphy, Copeland, McCabe, Corwin and several more, along with his fellow security men Seth Durant and Judah Foster—had assembled a posse and seen that justice was done. Rightly so.

      But if they now believed that his onetime participation in a single necessary manhunt meant he wanted to join their damn men’s club and spend his days being gradually nailed down to one place, fenced in by friendship and obligation and belonging...

      Well, they needed to think again.

      “...Caffey is still on the loose. The bastard got away,” Miles Callaway was telling everyone, explaining the emergency that faced them to those listening saloongoers who, like Dylan, hadn’t been at the meeting that night. The dance hall girls had taken their usual midevening break to change costumes. The saloon had quieted somewhat, even as the faro games and drinking continued. “Deputy Winston wasn’t so lucky,” Callaway went on. “The federal marshals already took him off to Yuma Prison.”

      “He deserves it. Caffey deserves worse.” Clayton Davis, the lumberman who said so, made a grim face. There was no love lost between him and the deputy—or the sheriff, for that matter.

      As near as Dylan could gather, Caffey had absconded a few days ago under mysterious circumstances. The townspeople were still trying to understand what could have made their longtime sheriff leave his badge and his post. He’d skedaddled just steps ahead of the marshals who’d closed in on his hapless deputy.

      None of them, though, would miss Caffey. They were right not to, Dylan knew. The lawman had abused his authority, plain and simple. More than a few of the good men present had themselves been unjustly detained by Caffey at one time or another, under one fabrication or other. Even one woman had spent copious time in the jailhouse for her rabble-rousing and protesting: Grace Murphy, the saloonkeeper’s suffragist wife.

      All of which explained Jack Murphy’s particular zeal to attend the men’s club meeting and have the sheriff’s

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