Johanna Lindsey - Angel

“John Brown,” Cassie said quickly, cutting Angel off.

But that got only a chuckle from Frazer. “You can do better’n that, Miss Cassie.”

She blushed, then paled as Angel tried again. “My name is—”

Her shoe heel stomping on the toe of his boot stopped him this time — and got her released. She heard him swear beneath his breath and lost even more color, though Frazer was having a fit of laughter now.

“Reckon it don’t matter all that much,” Frazer got out when he wound down, but there was a wicked twinkle in his green eyes as he added, “Maybe we’ll be having us another wedding ‘fore you head back north. Pa just might get a real kick out of that kind of just deserts.”

Cassie ignored his humor-in-full-swing. “But can I count on being left alone now?”

“From Pa? Maybe. Don’t know about Morgan, though, since he believed you ‘bout your friend there. Ain’t seen him so mad since Clay came home to tell us what he’d done — and your part in it. ’Course, the Catlins are another matter, aren’t they?”

With a last irritating chuckle, Frazer tipped his hat and rode off, and Cassie was left with the horrible realization that she was alone again with Angel. After what she’d just done to him — oh, God, the enormity of it, the outrageousness — she wondered if she could just run into the house and slam the door in his face. No, she owed him an apology first—then she’d run inside and slam the door shut.

She swung around, only to find him just behind her right shoulder, and too damn close under the circumstances. She started backing up along the length of the porch, away from the door, which couldn’t be helped because he didn’t stay put, but slowly followed her. He didn’t look furious, yet there was a menacing determination in the way he stalked her that set her heart to pounding as hard as it had when she’d thoughtlessly started that kiss.

“I’m sorry,” she began in a squeak, then continued in a rush. “I’m really sorry about your foot. I didn’t mean to — well, I did — no, no, I shouldn’t have. But their finding out who you are — I was afraid if d make things worse. And—”

She gasped as her backside came up against the side railing, ending her retreat. But he kept on coming, until the front of him was pressed to the front of her, at least the bottom half was. She still leaned back, stretching as far as possible over the railing to keep some distance between them, if only a little.

His hands slapped down on the railing on each side of her as he ground out, “I told you I’m not known down here.”

“You — you don’t know that for sure. You’d be amazed how a reputation like yours gets around. There’s no point in taking a chance that they might not have heard of you. That wouldn’t help matters at all.”

“And you think your little lie and demonstration did? Honey, all it accomplished was to show me how sweet-tasting your mouth is. We’ll have to try it again sometime without an audience.”

The color came, bright flames of it across her cheeks. “You’re madder than you look, aren’t you?” she guessed miserably.

“My toe’s still throbbing, lady. I figure you owe me for that.”

Cassie groaned, “Please, I’m a lousy subject to seek revenge on. You saw how unsatisfying the MacKauleys found it. And I never would have stomped on your foot — or done the other — if I’d had time to think about it. But I panicked. I wasn’t thinking clearly. I was afraid—”

“You still are, and it’s starting to annoy me. You had enough gumption to stand up to three large Texans, two of ‘em madder’n hell. I’m just one man.”

“But you’re a killer.”

She really wished she hadn’t said that. It rang out like a death knell, hers, and the silence that followed was excruciating. Cassie felt like she’d actually struck him, when all she’d done was state a fact. But the emotion that gathered in his eyes…

“You think I’d hurt you?”

Truth time. He wasn’t just asking to hear the answer. He was forcing her to hear it, too, and accept it once and for all — and stop acting like a silly goose every time he got close to her. Deep down she’d known the answer. She just hadn’t been listening to her own instincts.

“No, you wouldn’t hurt me — so back off.”

She shoved against him as she said the last, and slipped past him to head for the front door. Her temper was rising by the second as she thought about what he’d just done to her, playing on her fears to get even, then making her aware of it. If she had to say one more word to him…

“Miss Stuart?”

She whipped around, ready to blast him with her now simmering anger, but she was forestalled by his expression, so intense, with his eyes fixed on her mouth.

“I’ll wait a while to collect on that debt.”

Her breath caught in her throat. “I–I thought you just did.”

He shook his head, a slow, unsettling grin forming on his lips, the first of any kind of humor she’d seen out of him, and this she would have preferred not seeing. He didn’t say anything else. He simply sauntered down the side porch and out of her sight.

Cassie went inside the house and closed the door quietly instead of how she’d intended to. It was her heart that was doing the slamming.

“I don’t start fights, but I don’t back down from them, either.”

Cassie wished she weren’t still nervous around Angel. Yesterday they had established that he wasn’t going to hurt her, so this continued unease whenever he got close to her didn’t make much sense. She wasn’t in fear for her life. She wasn’t even in fear for her virtue. That parting threat he’d made yesterday hadn’t held much substance, she’d decided after she’d had time to think about it. After all, she knew her attributes, and attracting handsome men wasn’t one of them — at least men not interested in ranching. And insinuating that he was going to kiss her again to get even, well, the threat of it had obviously been the getting-even part. He wouldn’t actually do it.

But this morning when Angel had insisted on riding out with her to check on the herd, Cassie had gotten all nervous and flustered again. And this time it came out in chattering that had suddenly turned serious when she’d asked him how many men he’d challenged. His reply hadn’t been the answer she’d been looking for. But now that she’d opened the subject, her curiosity wouldn’t let her abandon it.

“They say you’ve killed more than a hundred men,” she pointed out as nonchalantly as she could manage.

“They say a lot of things about me that aren’t true,” he replied.

They were riding side by side. She glanced over at him, but his expression didn’t warn her off. He looked quite indifferent, actually.

“Have you kept count?” she asked.

He met her eyes for a moment, and she could have sworn there was a spark of humor in them as he replied, “I hate to disillusion you, but the number isn’t so high I can’t keep track of it.”

He obviously wasn’t going to share that figure with her. “Were they all fair fights?”

“Depends on how you define fair. I’ve killed a few who didn’t see it coming. But then, I have no qualms about shooting a man who’s got a rope waiting for him somewhere. I’ll give him the same chance the hangman does— none.”

“You don’t call that murder?”

“I call it roundabout justice. You think these low-life bastards give their victims a chance when they rape, rob, and kill ‘em?”

He was no longer indifferent to the subject. In fact, there was enough heat in that statement to make Cassie wish she’d left well enough alone. So she was appalled to hear herself ask, “How many is a few?”

“Three.”

“And the reasons?”

“One tried to hire me to shoot his partner in the back. Figured if he paid to have it done, he wouldn’t be accountable. I don’t see it that way. His partner wouldn’t have, either. But I would have turned that one over to the sheriff if he hadn’t made the mistake of telling me the local lawman was on his payroll.”

Which was nothing she hadn’t heard of before. Caully’s own sheriff was more or less in Dorothy Catlin’s pocket, since he happened to be her nephew. But then, last term the sheriff had been one of the MacKauleys’ cousins.

“So nothing would have happened to that man,” Cassie guessed.

“Nothing at all, and the partner, who happened to be a decent, honest man, would have been murdered some night just because he’d gone into business with the wrong man. I didn’t feel like letting that happen.”

Cassie wondered if she could have made such a decision. Thank God she’d never had to. “And the other two?”

He stopped suddenly. When she noticed, she pulled up and had to twist around to look at him. He was leaning forward against the saddle horn, staring straight at her, his face more shadowed at that distance.

And he stared for a number of tense seconds before he asked, “You sure you want to know?”

Put that way, in that tone of voice, she knew she ought to say no. But she’d latched onto this notion that the more she knew about Angel, the less frightening he’d be. So far it wasn’t working, yet her meddling instincts wouldn’t let her quit. Still, she couldn’t quite get the word out, so she had to nod her answer.

He set his horse to motion until they were riding side by side again. He wouldn’t look at her as he spoke. “A couple of years ago I happened upon this man forcing himself on a farm girl. It looked like he might have dragged her out of the field she was working. You could see her farm in the distance with the fields running right up to this river I was following to the next town. He had her on the opposite bank, far enough up behind the trees that I wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t heard her screaming.