Free Whirlwind Wedding by Debra Cowan Page A

away to pick up his saddlebags and carry them over to the chair beside the bed. “Maybe you’d like a clean pair.”
    â€œThank you.”
    Jericho waited until she left before he pulled out another pair of drawers, along with a folded piece of paper. The page contained the McDougals’ names, as well as Andrew’s, along with physical descriptions, height, speech peculiarities, eye colors. He had copied everything down from the “Crime Book” or “Bible Two” as his captain called it.
    The gray paperback booklet was made up of information sent by sheriffs to the adjutant general, then furnished to each Ranger camp. Jericho studied his notes, but he saw Catherine’s sweet face in his mind.
    He shouldn’t tease and try to coax her pretty smile out of hiding. She could make him forget why he was here, forget that he needed to heal as fast as possible and get back on the trail of those murderers. The McDougals and Andrew were the ones Jericho needed to worry about. Not the woman whose touch played havoc with his body. That was reason enough to leave her be.

Chapter Five
    A fter Catherine left, Jericho dozed off for a few minutes. He woke with his mind rolling over the events of last night. He knew sure as shootin’ that Andrew Donnelly was connected to the McDougal gang. Whatever secrets the boy was hiding were likely related to the outlaws, but Jericho didn’t know a blasted thing about Catherine’s secrets. Was she sweet on a McDougal? Protecting one or all of them?
    He might be able to figure it out if his mind would stop drifting to what she looked like beneath the starched day dress and apron she wore today. The gown he’d seen her wearing last night before she pulled on her wrapper had covered, but not hidden her full breasts. And he could still smell the sweet, subtle scent of her skin, which rose around him when they touched. Things he would do well to forget.
    The sound of light footsteps on the front porch had him looking over his shoulder and out the window. Catherine walked out into the yard carrying a basketful of clothes. She stopped in front of a huge kettle about five yards from the house and deposited the basket on the ground. A fire had already been laid and she poked it with a stick, then tested the water in the kettle by dipping in a finger.
    No doubt Jericho’s blood-soaked drawers were already soaking in cold water. He didn’t really want to think about her hands on those, or how much he wanted her hands on him.
    She dunked several pieces of clothing into the water, then scooped up a handful of soap and slanted the washboard into the pot.
    The morning sun glinting on her black hair made it look like hot silk. She wore it up today, the simple chignon exposing her elegant neck as she bent over the washboard. Her pale blue bodice pulled taut across her back, outlining slender shoulders and a slim waist. He’d felt the delicate lines of both last night through the light cotton of her wrapper and gown. Jericho’s body hardened.
    What was it about this woman? While it had been excruciating to lie still as she stitched him, he had been in his right mind enough to admire the fine texture of her creamy skin, the rose-pink lips she worried too often with her teeth. More than once he’d imagined loosening her hair and burying his hands in the silky thickness, feeling it slide over his chest and belly. No other woman had ever gotten to him like this.
    His fascination wasn’t just because he wanted her. She intrigued him. She was shy about his body and yet she doctored him as well as any medicine man he’d known. Her stitches were more even and smaller than Dr. Butler’s. Jericho’s scar would be big but maybe not hideous.
    And he had observed that she managed to keep him talking, while revealing little about her own past. Being raised in New York City explained her Eastern accent. Maybe it also explained the shadows he