And then there was Wes, the man with the scar. He talked rough and acted angry most of the time. But he’d saved her from the cage and held her so gently before dawn that the memory of his arms still lingered against her skin. Now he stood beside the doorway, listening to all the shouting as if he were strong enough to rush out and help his brother. He tried to steady himself along the wall and held in the pain at his side with his free hand. Allie knew he was too weak to fight.

She glanced down at the ring on her finger. Her mother had worn such a band of gold. She’d told Allie once that when a woman puts such a ring on she never takes it off-not ever. Allie knew what it meant. She and Wes were married. Daniel had said so. She knew it wouldn’t be for long. A fight was coming and when it did Wes would die early in the battle. He was a warrior weakened by his injury.

Her gaze fixed on Wes, really looking at him for the first time. He was a good man, she decided. Honored by his brothers, who came to fight at his side. She’d gladly help him if she could, but two knives would do little in a war with guns. So she made up her mind that when the time came, she’d hold him as he died, and when the battle was over, she’d stand proud to be his widow. There was great dignity in being such a man’s wife and honor in being his widow. She’d wear the ring forever in honor of his bravery.

Shouts rang from the hallway. The sound of stomping boots echoed, making the intruders seem legions more. She lowered slightly, awaiting the storm.

‘‘Weston McLain, we know you’re in there!’’ someone yelled from beyond the door.

Allie heard Wes swear beneath his breath. She didn’t have to understand every word to know how he felt. They’d come for him.

‘‘Let the wild girl go, and give yourself up!’’ an angry voice echoed off the hallway walls.

‘‘Come and get her!’’ Wes answered as he straightened. ‘‘I’ve never backed down or given up. I’ll not come out without a fight.’’

‘‘Stop stalling!’’ another yelled. ‘‘You haven’t got a chance.’’

Allie moved past the bed to a few inches behind Wes. If he was going to fight, the least she could do was cover his back. She drew the other knife.

Mumblings came from the crowd as Adam retreated into the room like a man avoiding the ever-rising wash of a wave. Only this wave was a line of well-armed, dust-covered men.

Adam’s hands were held high, to make peace, but no one was listening to his reasoning. Wes and Daniel flanked him with their guns at gut level. The brothers moved to the center of the room.

‘‘You’re not taking the woman,’’ Adam said in a controlled voice. He lowered his hands slowly and pulled the pistol from the band of his trousers, showing the men how fully he meant his statement.

Allie jumped back to keep from being stepped on as the McLains formed a wall around her. She stayed just behind Wes, waiting for the time when she’d be needed. If any man in the crowd fired at her husband, the shooter would have a knife in his heart as fast as she could raise her arm.

She guessed that since Adam, the gentle brother, had pulled his weapon, the time to fight was near. She twisted one knife until she held the blade in her fingers, ready to throw.

The crowd tumbled into the room like a noisy pot boiling over. Allie fought to keep from shaking as she recognized the tall preacher in his flowing black greatcoat. A few of the cowhands who’d beaten Wes in the alley stood beside him.

She didn’t miss the fire in Preacher Louis’s eyes. She’d seen it more than once after a sermon when he was full of the spirit and himself. She knew what was to come. He’d rant and rave for sometimes hours, then he’d grab whatever was near and hit her. If she yelled, he’d beat her for screaming; if she didn’t, he’d think he wasn’t hitting her hard enough. He’d continue the beating until he grew tired, or she no longer responded to the pain.

Allie moved closer to her new husband. She wouldn’t go back to the preacher. She’d die with Wes and his brothers first. Maybe a bullet would pass through Wes’s body and kill her. Maybe the crowd would shoot her when she threw the knife. She didn’t care. All she knew was that she wasn’t going back to the cage. She was no longer a throwaway woman. She was a wife. The wife of a brave man. Somehow, that made her brave also.

Tension thick as sap hung in the air as Allie fought to draw in a breath. The McLains stood their ground and so did the men behind the preacher. She could see the madness in Louis’s eyes and knew he was in a hurry for the fight to begin even though he moved to the side of the crowd.

She didn’t know if he did so to encourage more men into the room, or to be in line as the first to run if the battle should turn against him.

‘‘This man interfered with my work! He’s Satan’s handyman!’’ Louis’s voice could be heard above all the others as though sheer volume gave him heaven’s ear. ‘‘He’s walked off the straight and narrow onto the wide road of sin. And he’s taken this poor lost child with him. A soul so wild she doesn’t even know she’s human.’’

Allie moved closer to Wes. Louis was building, letting his words bubble across the crowd. Soon he’d boil over into full rage.

She wished she could warn Wes, for he seemed to face the preacher without fear. He’d never be able to fight and win against such a man. The McLains were greatly outnumbered. If she had any sense, she’d step away from them now, before the firing started.

But she needed Wes’s strength in this last hour, and somehow she sensed he knew she was near. Weak as he was from loss of blood, his rifle was steady and pointed directly at Louis.

Just as the preacher raised his hand to point a condemning finger at Wes, Nichole walked into the room as casually as if she were greeting guests in her home. The tall, beautiful woman drew everyone’s attention. She was striking in her starched white high-collared blouse and deep blue skirt, thick with pleats at the front.

The insanity of her action didn’t surprise Allie, but the gunbelt high on Nichole’s waist did. This fine lady had come to fight, and there seemed no doubt in the room that she’d be able to use her weapons. The matched set of pearl-handled Colts fit into a finely tooled gunbelt that looked to have been made for her.

‘‘Gentlemen.’’ She smiled toward everyone except the preacher. ‘‘If you came to kill a McLain, you’ll have to kill us all. For I am one, just as is the woman you seek.’’

‘‘Nichole,’’ Adam whispered. ‘‘You should have stayed safe, darling.’’

Allie saw worry in the doctor’s eyes but no reproach. He was not a man who’d practiced ordering a woman and had no skill to do so now.

‘‘No. I belong here with the father of the child I carry. Honor should be doubled with him inside me, not lessened.’’ Nichole joined the line of McLains, her hands only an inch from her Colts. ‘‘If you gentlemen intend to take my brother-in-law or new sister-in-law, it may not be as easy as you think.’’

The men in the crowd were mean and primed by the preacher for blood, but not one doubted he was in the presence of a lady. They lowered their weapons and slowly took off their hats as their own mothers had taught them to do long ago. Not only was she a fine lady, she was with child, and no one wanted to show anger in front of her.

A man with a badge pinned to his duster stepped forward. ‘‘We don’t come to kill nobody.’’ He gulped out the words. ‘‘And we didn’t mean to frighten you, ma’am. But Wes McLain stole a ward of the preacher. Almost killed a man in doing so. We come to get the lost creature back.’’ He put his rifle behind him, as though embarrassed to have it out in Nichole’s presence. ‘‘The preacher says she’ll kill somebody if we don’t get her back caged.’’

Adam winked at his wife, realizing she had done what he’d been unable to. She’d tamed the mob.

‘‘She’s not his ward.’’ Adam’s low voice could now be heard. ‘‘The woman the preacher calls wild is my brother’s wife.’’ He looked at Nichole. ‘‘Just as this brave lady is mine.’’

Anger turned to confusion in the crowd.

Allie slipped her knives into the cape’s pockets. In all the tension, she’d been the only one watching Wes. He’d fought a gallant fight to keep from slumping or showing his pain, but she knew he was losing the battle. Just as he crumbled, she moved beneath his shoulder, offering him the support he needed to remain standing. One arm crossed behind his back while the other braced him in front. As his arm came around her shoulders, her head rested on the bandage covering his chest.

He was her brave husband, she thought. He would stand and face death just as she would.

‘‘Look!’’ someone said as Allie moved into view. ‘‘That’s her.’’

‘‘She doesn’t look like a wild woman to me!’’ another cowhand shouted. ‘‘I wish my wife looked that good in the morning.’’

‘‘She’s got a wedding band on. Ain’t no wild woman gonna wear a band.’’

‘‘It don’t appear to me she’s been kidnapped.’’

‘‘She ain’t no unwilling wife, that’s for sure. Look at the way she cuddles to him!’’

‘‘Stop yelling, Phil, you’re scaring her!’’

‘‘I ain’t the one with the bright idea to storm this place!’’

‘‘Who said this little woman was wild? She looks more worried about her husband than dangerous.’’

Allie couldn’t listen anymore. All her energy channeled into holding Wes on his feet. She was vaguely aware the mob left the room yelling at and chasing the man they’d followed in. Suddenly Louis looked the villain for trying to take another man’s wife.

Louis screamed to Wes that it wasn’t over, but Wes wasn’t listening.

Adam’s calm voice drifted through Allie’s panic. ‘‘Get him to the bed, Dan. Nick, bring more bandages.I think he’s broken the stitches. He should have listened to me and stayed down.’’