Free Dorothy Garlock - [Wyoming Frontier] by Nightrose Page A

wasn’t the demonstrative type. Whores had said it, and a few of the women in his life had professed love for him. He had never taken the words seriously before.
    “She means it.” Katy stared at him, trying to read his thoughts. “Don’t get too close to her. We’ll be leaving here soon and I don’t want her hurt.”
    “Why would she be hurt?”
    “She adored her father, but he had little time for her. She’s looking for a substitute.”
    “He must be a real bastard.”
    “He’s just like all the other get-rich-quick gold-seekers. We’re leaving here as soon as we can. Theresa needs to go to school with other children.”
    “Mary said she was going to wait for her husband.”
    “We’re not going to wait for that fly-by-night to come back. We could be old, gray, and toothless by the time that happens,” she flared. Katy’s temper had never been easily harnessed and now she became flushed with anger.
    “Where will you go?”
    “Laramie. We have friends there. I can get a job.” Her shoulders lifted in an imperial shrug.
    “What kind of job?”
    “Teaching. Our friends have an orphanage on their ranch. Mary and I can work there.”
    “You know the Gallaghers?”
    Katy lifted her eyebrows. “Do you?”
    “I know of Pack Gallagher. He was a bare-knuckle fighter. Now he raises longhorn cattle. I heard that he and his wife had built an orphanage on their land.”
    “If we don’t go there, we’ll go back to Montgomery where people are civilized.”
    “I intend to make Trinity a civilized town.”
    “Ha!” She raked her hair over her ear with her fingertip and shot him a contemptuous glance. “Another cow in the tree.”
    “What do you mean by that?” he said, thinking that she was wonderful to look at.
Blue is the color she should be wearing instead of that dreary brown. The color of her dress is all wrong, but it fits. Good Lord, how it fits her slim waist and soft breasts!
    “It means you have as much chance making this a civilized town as you have of finding a cow in a tree.”
    He grinned. She had a quick mind. Life with her would not be dull. “Stay and help me.”
    “No. After we leave this town, I never want to see another miner or another mine.”
    “Do you prefer a man with soft hands, a white shirt, and shiny black shoes? Do you have one waiting for you?”
    “Goodness, no!” She said the words with such speed and force that he had to smile at her quick answer to the unexpected question. She stood still under the steady gaze of his black eyes. The frown of disapproval she shot at him did nothing but intensify his stare.
    “That’s one hurdle we’ll not have to cross, not that I think it would complicate matters. Do you know what reincarnation means?”
    Katy had turned away to look at the mountains. On hearing the question, her head swiveled around, and she looked at him to see if he were serious.
    “Of course. I’m not stupid. I’ve known men who were snakes in their former lives and some who were buzzards.”
    He threw his head back and laughed. With her wit, her laughter so effortless, and her slow, liquid drawl, she was enchanting. He had been waiting for her all his life. They could no more halt the tide of coming events than they could stop the sun coming up in the morning. Triumph moved through him.
She was his.
With his triumph came the need to hold her, love her, soothe and protect her. Love in the romantic sense wasn’t something he was familiar with, and it wasn’t something he had sought. Until he had met Katy, it hadn’t occurred to him that he would love a woman with all his heart and soul. He was dangerously close to doing that now.
    “What would you say if I told you that I’m sure you and I have met in former lives?” He made the question a challenge, and his eyes gleamed with amusement as her mouth fell open and remained agape.
    “I’d say that bullet that creased your scalp did more damage than I thought.”
    “It’s very possible that we have been