Beautiful Bandit (Lone Star Legends) by Loree Lough

problems that she hadn’t asked. Yet, unless he’d robbed a bank and murdered innocent civilians, he was still too good for the likes of her.
    Kate sighed, tired of whipping that same, dead horse. Self-pity was an ugly thing, and she needed to shed it, and shed it fast. What this situation called for was a healthy dose of acceptance. Maybe then you can stop dwelling on thoughts about “poor, poor, pitiful me.”
    An hour later, as the scents of male sweat, wet leather, and strong coffee mixed with the sticky air, Kate didn’t so much as crinkle her nose. What business did she have complaining about anything? Days ago, she’d escaped the vicious hands of the vile Frank Michaels and staggered into a stranger’s camp, and she hadn’t wanted for a single thing since then, thanks to Josh.
    He was sitting in the chair he’d ended up sleeping in, tilting back on two legs and leaning against the wall nearest the door, with both arms folded over his broad chest and one booted foot crossed over the other. As Kate gazed at his weather-worn, lightly whiskered face, she fought the affection smoldering inside her. If he did have a wife, how much like a princess she must feel to wake beside him, care for him, and be cared for by him. That, Kate decided, was the stuff fairy tales were made of!
    A thought popped into her head so suddenly that it evoked a tiny gasp. It was a good idea, too, a selfless act that would at once show him how sincerely she appreciated all he’d done for her.
    As she gathered up the empty breakfast plates and coffee mugs, she heard the Rangers say that they planned to head for Fort Stockton, where they’d join up with some other Texas lawmen and uniformed soldiers. They were none too happy about Governor Hogg’s command to round up the banditos who’d been terrorizing the citizenry, because, as Gus pointed out, “We’ve got our own rotten fish to catch right here.”
    By “fish,” he meant Frank Michaels and his gang. Kate knew that as surely as she knew her name wasn’t really Dinah Theodore. Frank deserved to be caught, deserved to pay for the death and destruction that clung to him like a depraved shadow.
    “Soon as we’ve mollycoddled the governor,” Gus had snarled, shaking a fist, “them low-down varmints are ours.”
    Hopefully, with the Rangers hot on his trail, Frank would be too busy keeping his own throat out of the hangman’s noose to hunt Kate down and slit hers. Still, it was only slightly comforting to know that while the Rangers were doing their duty at Fort Stockton, she was safe from them.
    There was just one thing left to worry about, as she saw it: separating from Josh before her precarious situation put him in real jeopardy. There’d be plenty of time, once she crossed the Rio Grande, to worry about how she’d repay the man who could never return the affection she was beginning to feel for him.
    But, oh, if only he could….
    Suddenly, he was standing right in front of her.
    “You all right?” Josh whispered, interrupting her musings.
    Kate met his eyes and knew in an instant that she’d better run far and fast if she hoped to stay one step ahead of her feelings for this man. Unable to trust her voice to sound steady, she only nodded.
    He gave her shoulder an affectionate squeeze. “I’m a man of my word, remember?”
    Of course, she remembered—that was part of her problem!
    You’ll be all right, she told herself, once you don’t have to look into his beautiful eyes, once he is no longer near enough to touch, once—
    “No reason to fret, Dinah. You’re safe as a baby in its mama’s arms.”
    If only, she thought again.
    There was no harm in dreaming it was possible for an upright man to love a woman with a sullied past and an uncertain future. Those dreams would get her through many a long, lonely night. They would simply have to be enough.

    11
    No sooner had the Rangers ridden off than the pounding downpour resumed. Josh had endured similar scenarios enough