Their Reckless Bride

Chapter 1

1

GRACE

“You’re on the wrong side of the law, Sheriff.” Father’s voice carried to where I was positioned, hidden thirty feet above on the bluff. His voice was rough and deep, full of evil intent as it echoed off the rock. His clothes were old and tattered in spots. He was filthy, the hot sun making rivulets of sweat slide through the dust on his neck.

“Wrong side of a gun,” Travis replied, standing beside him and laughing, then spitting a huge wad of chewing tobacco onto the dirt at his feet. I didn’t have to be close to him to know he smelled to high heaven. Even if the creek behind the house had been flowing instead of all but dried up this time of the year, it wouldn’t matter. This man simply refused to bathe.

Father laughed, confident that while they’d been chased by a two-man posse, he and my brother were the ones who were waving their weapons. It was as if they were on the right side of the law and not part of the infamous Grove gang who’d just robbed the bank in Simms.

I slithered closer to the edge of the bluff, the tall grass shielding me from sight. Below was the bend in the creek and where Father and Travis had hidden in the grove of cottonwood trees that lined the bank, waiting for the sheriff to catch up, then ambush.

The two lawmen had been forced to dismount and now their horses were drinking from the water, unaware their riders’ lives were being threatened.

“Should we kill them, Travis, or perhaps shoot ‘em and leave ‘em for the buzzards?”

Father would. He was a mean, cruel man who’d shoot a man and leave him to suffer a slow death, bleeding out and dying alone in the middle of nowhere.

It would be a shame though. The men who stood with their hands raised, their weapons tossed on the ground at their feet, were fine specimens worthy of life. Worthy of taking my time to study, and not after Father put bullets in their bellies.

From my vantage, I could easily discern the tin star on the sheriff’s broad chest. His hat shielded his eyes from the sun, so I couldn’t tell what color they were, but he had dark hair that curled from beneath the hat. His mouth formed a thin line, his square jaw clenched tight. He wasn’t happy. Despite being hidden by his snug shirt and trim pants, every muscle in his body was taut. His hands were by his sides, his long fingers flexing and curling. It was as if he were tightly coiled, awaiting the moment when he could strike. If he weren’t being held at gunpoint, his size and weight would make him a formidable opponent. I wasn’t short, quite tall for a woman, but I estimated I’d come up to his nose, at most. My father and brother were short of stature and lean, making their weapons the only leveler of this showdown.

Looking at the sheriff stirred something in me. Awakened it. Made me see a man with different eyes, those of a woman interested in a man. Attracted to one. Why him? Why now? I’d never felt any kind of stirring of desire before this moment. My heart had never skipped a beat, my breath never catching from just a glimpse. While I was most definitely a woman—my tightly bound breasts were proof of that—I’d never behaved as one. Not with being raised as the only female in the family. I never imagined I’d ever be like one… wearing comely dresses, corsets, pretty sun bonnets, let alone wanting a man.

Every one I’d come across had been mean, ornery and ugly.

Was this sudden keen interest the reason for why I found the man standing beside him equally appealing? I’d never set eyes upon a man with red hair before. He wasn’t wearing a hat, so the dark auburn locks curled and fell over his forehead in a rakish manner. Even from the distance between us, I couldn’t miss his green eyes, the same color as the grass I laid upon. He didn’t look afraid or panicked. He looked… livid. His anger toward my father and brother was obvious.

I crawled a little closer to the edge, the soft grass a cushion beneath me, pulled my gun up beside me. Ogled. Perhaps because I was used to Father’s threats and menace, I remained calm in such a dire situation and studied the handsome duo. Oh my. They were virile. Intense. Imposing, even staring down the barrel of a gun.

Father and Travis felt like men when they were waving their guns. They needed the weapons to make them powerful. The other two… they exuded it naturally.

Knowing they were chasing after some of the Grove gang, eager to bring them to justice, only added to their appeal. They weren’t like my family. They were better. More. And that made me that much more intrigued by them. For the first time in my life, I wanted to run my hands over a man. Two men. I wanted to feel their hard bodies, cup their jaws with my palm and feel the rasp of their whiskers. I wanted to feel small, feminine. I wanted to feel. With them, I knew I would. But they wouldn’t remain passive like they were now. They’d take what they wanted from me.

The idea of that was so wrong, for Father did just that. Oh, not in the same way, but he took. And took. Father—and Travis as well— made my life utterly miserable. I’d cooked and cleaned like a servant. Slave, more like it, since I was never paid for my efforts. When Father took to drink, I hid, discovering he liked to take out any anger he had on me. Travis never protected me, only told me I’d deserved it. That I was just a useless woman.

Their control over me had me constantly teetering between the right and wrong side of the law. I’d never committed any of the crimes my family name was known for, but I was definitely guilty by association. I could have gone to the sheriff at any time and turned them in, told them exactly where they could be found, when their next robbery would occur. But I hadn’t, not once, because I was afraid for my life. Father wasn’t a man to hug. No, he was a man who hit.

And then, he’d discovered how a mere woman could be of value. The only way he thought a woman could be worthy. The asshole.

That was why I was here now. The lawmen weren’t the only ones seeking retribution.

“Give it up, Grove,” the sheriff said. His voice was as sharp as a knife blade.

Father and Travis laughed, clearly believing they were the ones in control in this moment, that they held the power, that the lives of the two men were theirs to extinguish if they desired.

“You’re not in a position to make any kind of threats, Sheriff,” Travis said. “We’re the ones holding the guns.”

They weren’t the only one. Staying low, I settled my weapon before me, aimed. I was more familiar with my rifle, but the Colt I’d taken from Barton Finch would work. Thinking back, I should have shot him with it. Stupid mistake on my part, leaving him alive after what he’d intended. I’d been so angry with Father that I’d stormed off. Tracked him and Travis down.

I’d dreamed of killing what was left of my family for a long time. Lain in bed at night and imagined how I would do it. Longed to be free of them. Father had taught my brothers how to shoot, and he’d humored me by allowing me to practice beside them, but he probably never imagined I’d aim the gun at him. And fire.

I had a hatred for them that practically festered.

I might share the same blood, might live in the same ramshackle house, but I wasn’t anything like them. My dark thoughts were solely focused on them, no one else. I didn’t wish anyone else harm. I wouldn’t let them kill two innocent men. Not men doing their job, trying to keep the peace. Trying to mete out justice.

“Time to meet your maker, Sheriff.” Father c****d his gun.

So did I. And I fired first.

The loud report made the sheriff flinch, but it was Father who fell to the ground.

“That’s for giving me to Barton Finch,” I whispered, watching Father writhe as he pressed his hand against the bullet hole in his thigh, the blood seeping around his fingers. He shouted out in pain, swearing, searching for where the shot had come.

I took the moment where Travis stared down at him, stunned and confused at what had just occurred to c**k my gun again. It wasn’t hard to aim; Travis was an unmoving target, much larger than an empty whiskey bottle I was used to. Fired.

He fell where he stood.

“And that, Travis, is for being an asshole.”

The sheriff and the other man instinctively crouched to try to make themselves smaller, but went over to Father and Travis, grabbed their weapons so they were no longer a threat.

I hadn’t killed them, but there was no way Father or Travis would hurt the other men now. Ending their lives would be too good for them, too easy. I shot them just as they’d have done to the sheriff and other man. But unlike my family, I’d made sure the wounds I inflicted were survivable injuries, if seen to promptly. We were a few miles from Simms. The sheriff could drag their bleeding bodies back to town to be tended to by the doctor, then hanged. Or, he could leave them to rot. It was his choice. Either way suited me just fine.

Tucking the weapons in the back of their pants, the sheriff and the other man picked up their own guns, whipping about to point them in my direction. Their gazes searched once along the edge of the bluff for the shooter. For me.

Perhaps I was as cruel as my father to leave him and Travis to suffer, but after what he’d done to me? After he gave me to Barton Finch this morning, I had no mercy left. I’d escaped being raped. Barely. I just hadn’t expected revenge to come so quickly. Now, I had it. I stood and adjusted my hat, looked down at the scene one last time, a smile on my face seeing Father and Travis suffer and writhe. f**k, I should have finished Barton Finch when I had the chance, then all of the Grove gang would be either dead or hanged soon enough.

When the two other men saw me, I stared at them for one brief moment and wondered what it would be like to be theirs, knowing it was never to be.

Two men didn’t want one woman, and I barely behaved like one. I didn’t even own a dress. My hair was long and wild, always in a braid and tucked up beneath my hat to stay out of the way. If that weren’t unappealing enough, there was one thing even worse. I was a Grove.