Authors: Leigh Greenwood
Colorado Bride
THE HEAT OF PASSION
“You ought to head back East,” Lucas declared, steeling himself against the agonizing thought of never seeing her again. “You’re a woman trying to do a man’s job, and you’re a woman alone in a country where no female is safe without a man.”
“I can see you’re just another one of those men who think females are good for nothing but cooking, cleaning, and having babies,” Carrie said furiously. “I suppose it’s a waste of your precious time to even talk to a female, especially one from back East.”
“Ma’am, I never said time spent with you was wasted.” There was a light in his eyes that sent a thrill through her whole body; it seemed to be equally divided between pleasure and apprehension.
Without warning, Lucas took her by the arms and kissed her soundly on the lips. Then, thinking better of it, he took her in his arms and kissed her in a way Carrie didn’t know a woman
could
be kissed.
There was nothing gentleman like about this kiss; it was rough, demanding, and completely devastating, and his hard, muscled body pressed against the length of her merely added fuel to a fire that blazed out of control before Carrie even knew what had started it….
Other books by Leigh Greenwood:
THE RELUCTANT BRIDE
THE INDEPENDENT BRIDE
SEDUCTIVE WAGER
SWEET TEMPTATION
WICKED WYOMING NIGHTS
WYOMING WILDFIRE
REBEL ENCHANTRESS
THE CAPTAIN’S CARESS
SCARLET SUNSET, SILVER NIGHTS
The
Night Riders
series:
TEXAS HOMECOMING
TEXAS BRIDE
BORN TO LOVE
The Cowboys
series:
THE MAVERICKS
JAKE
WARD
BUCK
DREW
SEAN
CHET
MATT
PETE
LUKE
The
Seven Brides
series:
ROSE
FERN
IRIS
LAUREL
DAISY
VIOLET
Colorado
Bride
Leigh Greenwood
Copyright © 1990, 2011 Leigh Greenwood
Contents
Green Run Pass, Colorado, 1868
Carrie Simpson took several slow breaths, forcing herself to inhale deeply to steady her nerves. It was absolutely essential that no one see the doubt at the back of her eyes or suspect the churning fear that had turned her insides to mush. Her whole future hung on what would happen in the next few minutes, and she was determined that neither her uncertainty nor female frailty would rob her of this chance to create a new life for herself. So closing her eyes long enough to direct a brief prayer to heaven, Carrie garnered up her skirts, took a firm grip on the door to steady herself, and stepped down out of the stagecoach into the full glare of the Colorado sun.
The brilliance of the midday sun blinded Carrie to her surroundings, and she was relieved that for a few extra moments she could postpone the announcement that she had come to dismiss the present manager and take over the running of the Green Run Pass Stagecoach Station herself. This was going to be her home. She had come to stay.
A coarse, booming voice bellowed a welcome from the station house, and Carrie looked up to see a monster of a man roll out of the door and down the steps, his bulging bloodshot eyes savoring the picture of feminine loveliness she presented. Her courage nearly deserted her on the spot. Baca Riggins was a bear of a man, standing over six feet four and weighing close to four hundred pounds, much of it fat, and he looked as though he hadn’t changed his clothes or taken a bath in weeks.
It had been difficult enough to leave her family home in Virginia and travel to St. Louis by herself without having to face Baca Riggins alone. She was terrified. And the memory of what the passengers had said of the man’s character during the last miserable leg of the journey did nothing to bolster her courage. Her first impulse was to turn around and go back to St. Louis, but she had to stay; she had nowhere else to go.
“Grub’s on the table,” Baca informed the disembarking passengers with a morose growl. “Help yourself.”
“Last time I tried to choke down some of the stuff you serve up, I had a bellyache for a week,” complained Bap Turner from his seat in the driver’s box.
“Nobody’s forcing you to eat,” growled Baca, indifferent as to whether anybody ate or not; his eyes were on Carrie.
“You might have a care for the passengers,” Bap continued, feeling braver in the driver’s box than he would have on the ground. “They didn’t know they had to eat enough for two meals at breakfast.”
“Then you should have told them. I’m shorthanded today so you’re going to have to fetch out your own team. You’d better hustle if you want to keep to your schedule.”
“What’s wrong with Buck doing it, or you? It’s what you’re paid for.”
“Buck’s laid up with a cold, and I’ve got to see to this here little lady. Do it yourself or drive them horses another sixty miles. It makes no difference to me. Course you could ask Lucas to give you a hand,” he said over his shoulder as he turned his attention to Carrie. “He ain’t never doing nothing half the time.”
Involuntarily Carrie’s eyes turned in the direction Baca had indicated and she saw a man seated under a tree, his chair leaned back against the trunk, his feet hooked into the bottom rung, and his hat pulled down over his eyes. He seemed to be dozing and completely unaware of their presence.
“Looks like I’d have to wake him up first,” Bap said as he dismounted from the box with a string of pungent curses. “One of these days, somebody’s going to throw you out on your ass, Baca, and it won’t be none too soon for me” Baca turned a threatening gaze on the little man.
“You aiming to try?” he asked, bringing his bulk close enough to Bap to emphasize the difference in their size.
“I just drive this dang-blasted stage, but Duncan Bickett ain’t the kind of man to put up with you running one of his stations like this for long. This place looks worse than a squatter’s shanty.” Carrie guessed the buildings had been painted at one time, but the whitewash had pealed off by now; the yard was unkept and the windows were thick with dust. She shuddered to think what the inside must look like.
“I like it here,” Baca said, unmoved by Bap’s censure. “And when I like a place, I stay.”
Carrie listened to this exchange with a sinking heart. Her first look at the sullen, bad-tempered station manager had warned her he wouldn’t take his dismissal meekly. Now she suspected he’d fight, and she had to face him without Robert at her side. She had to do it all by herself. Carrie cleared her throat.
“Excuse me,” she said, speaking as calmly as she could. “Are you Mr. Riggins?” Baca turned around slowly, like a big grizzly, cautious but secure in the knowledge that he was too powerful for anyone to be a danger to him; the frown lifted from his unshaven face.
“Yeah. You better hurry inside if you expect to get anything to eat, little woman,” he said, coming as close as he ever did to smiling. “No matter what Bap here says, folks’ll eat up every scrap of that food.”
“That’s because there’s never enough for more than two or three people,” Bap said irritably as he started to lead away the team he had just unhitched.
“You want to change that team, or are you going to bicker all afternoon?” Carrie turned in surprise at the sound of a wonderfully resonant bass voice. The man they had called Lucas was no longer under the tree. He had brought up a fresh team, and now he was just standing there, negligently resting his weight on one hip, waiting. One look at this impassive stranger, and all of Carrie’s carefully rehearsed words went straight out of her head.
Though Lucas lacked less then two inches of being as tall as Baca, at one hundred and ninety-five pounds he should have looked almost puny next to a behemoth like Baca, but it was immediately apparent there was nothing insignificant about this man. His worn Levi’s clung tightly to well-muscled legs and thighs, his belt was cinched in tight over a flat stomach, but his shirt, open at the throat to expose a thin cover of brown hair on his chest, hung loose, giving his broad, heavily muscled shoulders room to move freely. His battered hat was still pulled down over most of his face, but Carrie could see a firm jaw and thin lips in a tanned face. He gave the impression of quiet, almost insolent power, an impression that was heightened by the lazy impudence of his voice.
There was something about his presence that Carrie found reassuring. It didn’t matter that she had never seen him before or that he could have been one of the outlaws her father had warned her about when she told him of her decision to go west. She felt less alone than she had at any time since leaving St. Louis, and from what she had seen of Baca Riggins, the presence of any stranger who was not actively hostile was a blessing not to be spurned needlessly.
“I’m coming,” Bap said, disgust apparent in his voice. “I don’t have time to talk anyway. What little food Baca does set out is greasy and tasteless, and the passengers will be back out in five minutes, hungry and anxious as hell to get to the next station.” He handed the reins of the used-up team to Lucas and started to back the new team into position.
Even though she couldn’t see his eyes, Carrie had the eerie feeling this strange man was watching her, and that unnerved her. She didn’t know why she should notice him any more than the dozens of other strange men she had encountered in the last week. At least he wasn’t openly staring at her, and nearly everybody else had. She was petite, barely over five feet, and the rigors of the trip had reduced her to a wraith, but Carrie Simpson was a beautiful woman, and her appearance had caused a sensation at every stop since leaving St. Louis.