Free The Counterfeit Cowgirl by Kathryn Brocato

horse didn’t kill me.” She smiled at the driver of the truck. He was a black man in his mid-fifties, short and wiry. “I’m terribly sorry that wild horse of Mr. Whitaker’s spooked your truck. If you had ended up in the ditch, it would have been all his fault.”
    The man looked from her to Aaron with a startled expression on his dark face, then his lips parted in a huge grin. “I’m Chance Breaux, ma’am. Pleased to meet you, I’m sure. You rode that wild horse like a real pro.”
    Felicity thought it was a shame everyone, no names mentioned, couldn’t be as sensible and as decent as Chance Breaux.
    “We’d better get her home,” Aaron said, frowning.
    “Sure thing, Aaron,” Chance said, still grinning. “I’ll help you. Then I’ve got to call my lawyer about the suit I’m going to file on you for letting your wild horse scare the life out of my poor little truck.”
    “If you want to give a lawyer your money, why don’t you just mail him a fat donation?” Aaron responded. “He’d be very grateful, and I wouldn’t have to speak to Sheriff Darby about the way you race that miserable truck of yours up and down the road in front of my house.”
    “I’ll testify that truck was doing less than twenty-five,” Felicity said. “Too bad I didn’t break a leg or something. Just think of the huge settlement I’d get.”
    Aaron straightened and glared down at her. “You’re lucky you weren’t killed,” he rumbled. “Hell, so am I. What a chance for all your greedy relatives to descend. They’d probably clean me out like a freezer full of Blue Bell vanilla ice cream.”
    “They still might,” a vibrant female voice said from behind him.
    “Oh, no,” Felicity whispered. “
Mama
.”
    “I just knew something was goin’ on around here with horses,” Becky Lozano said, brown eyes flashing with outrage. “I just knew it.”
    Aaron turned. It was obvious he recognized Becky at once.
    “And just what have you been doin’ to my baby, you low-down rat snake, you?” Becky demanded, hands on hips. “I ain’t gonna just clean you out like an ice cream freezer. I’m gonna
skin
you, and then I’m gonna hang that nasty-tempered hide of yours out to dry.”

Chapter 5
    Aaron stood quietly to one side and tried not to call attention to himself. It wasn’t easy in Lureen Tucker’s tiny, junk-filled living room.
    “You can quit being mean to him now, Mama,” Felicity said from her reclining position on the sofa. “He’s let you order him around like a slave for the last ten minutes, so let him go home, please.”
    Becky ignored her daughter and ignored Aaron, who stood ready to offer any help Becky might need. It was, he figured, the least he could do after what had almost happened to Becky’s daughter.
    “Law, that woman was the meanest old witch that ever lived,” Becky said, disgusted. “Just look at this mess.”
    “You’re lucky I’ve cleaned off the sofa,” Felicity said. “But it’s going to take a lot more time than I thought to go through everything. You should have waited another two weeks, Mama.”
    “I want you getting rid of all this nasty, moldy old furniture. Ain’t nobody gonna want it. You, there.” Becky stood in the center of the living room, alternately glaring at the room and at Aaron. “Go fetch my baby an ice pack for her poor little forehead. And while you’re at it, make her a cup of that chamomile tea.”
    “My head is fine, Mama. Let Mr. Whitaker go home.”
    Becky sped Aaron on his way to the kitchen with a ferocious gesture. “He ain’t leaving this house until I’m sure my baby is all right. I knew something terrible was going to happen to you when you came down here to this place. I just knew it. That old witch cursed everything she ever touched.”
    “Now, Mama, it’s time to let bygones be bygones.”
    “Nothing doing,” Becky said. “I ought to go spit on her grave.”
    “Now, Mama — ” Felicity began.
    “Don’t you ‘now, Mama’