Lindsay Buroker: Flash Gold

She started to shake her head and say he didn’t owe her anything, but he had wrenched up her plans. Or rather, his presence had turned her into someone who wrenched up her own plans.

“Once you’ve got your thousand dollars, you could go,” Cedar said. “Or you could stay. I sure wouldn’t mind having you around to help on the day I do find Cudgel.”

Kali fiddled with the sack. “I don’t know what to say. I’m not that comfortable with the idea of killing folks, criminals or not. I have this belief that heads look better when they’re attached to bodies. I can’t see myself as a bounty hunter.”

“How about an assistant bounty hunter? I’ll find the scalawags, and you hand me some fancy invention of yours to help wrestle them into surrendering.”

She scratched her jaw. “Dawson, huh?” Maybe she could go for a while and see how life went. The Lord knew there was nothing for her here. And she was bait going forward no matter what. She might stay alive longer with a decapitation-specialist bounty hunter at her side. “I guess it might be more interesting than dinner with Nelly’s girls.”

“That I can promise.”

She pointed a finger at his nose. “This doesn’t mean I trust you.”

Cedar’s blue eyes crinkled at the corners. “Naturally.”