Debra Cowan - Whirlwind Groom

“We’re fixin’ to find out.”

His silky voice did things to her insides that she couldn’t recall having ever experienced with her late fiancé. “I don’t have a gun. I told you I want to learn how to shoot.”

His gaze slid down her body, then back up to meet her eyes. “Do you want me to search you?”

She gasped. “You wouldn’t dare!”

“I will if you don’t show me what you’ve got hidden.”

“What kind of man are you that you would put your hands on me?”

“The kind who wants an answer,” he said hotly. “Now, either show me or I’ll get it myself.”

The thrill that shot through her veins told Josie she did not want this man touching her. She instinctively knew she wouldn’t forget it…!

“Penning great emotional depth in her characters, Debra Cowan will warm the coldest of winter nights.”

—Romantic Times on Still the One

“Debra Cowan skillfully brings to vivid life all the complicated feelings of love and guilt when a moment of consolation turns into unexpected passion.”

—Romantic Times on One Silent Night

“The recurrent humor and vivid depiction of small-town Western life make Debra Cowan’s story thoroughly pleasurable.”

—Romantic Times on The Matchmaker

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To guys in white hats.

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

West Texas, 1884

T oday was the day and Josie Webster’s nerves were as twitchy as fat on a hot skillet. In the building September heat, she watched the jail of Whirlwind, Texas, and waited for her chance. Only a minute or so now, and she would have it.

Covered by shadows, she stood across the street from the sheriff’s office. The alleyway between the livery stable and saloon was warm, but at least out of the sun. Main Street, wide enough for two wagons to travel at once, bustled as people made their way through town for supplies or business. On the east end of town toward Abilene, a church at the center point of Main and North Street served as the school and had opened its doors to students almost two hours ago. The telegraph and post office as well as the Whirlwind Hotel shared the same side of the street as the jail.

Three doors to her left a thin, older man swept the porch in front of Haskell’s General Store. Directly across from her was the blacksmithy. No one paid a lick of attention to her.

Heart hammering in her chest, she patted the scalpel tucked inside the special sleeve she’d sewn into her bodice. Her doctor father had taught her and her mother how to use the instrument as a weapon after an attack by an old beau had nearly gotten her mother raped. The blade was a reassuring reminder that Josie would never be at the mercy of a killer like the one who sat in the jailhouse across from her.

Nearly two years ago, Ian McDougal had murdered her parents and fiancé in Galveston. Because of a corrupt judge, the outlaw had walked away without spending one night in jail. He and his brothers had resumed their killing spree throughout Texas. When the other three had been killed a few months ago in a shoot-out near Whirlwind, Ian had escaped. He had finally been captured near Austin by a U.S. Marshal. Now he awaited trial in this small town hundreds of miles from Josie’s home.

She had arrived the end of August, and in the four days since she had reached this breezy dry town on the other side of the vast state, she constantly felt parched, her throat gravelly. The stark air was quite a contrast to the thick, liquid air of her home on the Gulf.

So far, Whirlwind’s sheriff had followed the schedule Josie had observed the past few days. He had already finished his first cup of coffee, taken the prisoner out to relieve himself in the outhouse behind the jail and whittled something. Now it was time for the sheriff to leave his deputy in charge and go over to the Pearl Restaurant for the piece of pie he had every morning at nine-forty-five.

After distracting the deputy, she would be in and out of that jail before the sheriff finished his pie. Then she would finally be able to rest easy for the first time since the cold-blooded murders of her parents and fiancé, William Hill.

As the second hand on her watch clicked into place, the jail door opened and the sheriff stepped out. His fawn-colored cowboy hat didn’t hide the rugged lines of his face or the strong profile. He probably wasn’t more than eight or nine years older than Josie’s own twenty-one years and he looked like a man who could easily talk a girl out of her drawers. He was handsome in a powerful way with a disarming smile that might be able to tempt her to forget serious things and enjoy herself.

Thank goodness she wasn’t tempted. All she cared about was the lower-than-snake-spit murderer inside Whirlwind’s jail. For the past four days, she had seethed as the sheriff took a leisurely stroll after his morning break before going back to his office. Impatience prodded at her, but she wanted to do this right. McDougal was in jail just waiting for her and he wouldn’t have to wait much longer.

The lanky sheriff sauntered down the steps, his boots finally touching dirt. A breath eased out of Josie, releasing some of the pressure squeezing her chest. The man paused, one thumb hooked in the waistband of his denims, one resting on the butt end of a gun strapped to his lean hips.

Go. Go on, she urged silently, her pulse spiking. She still had to get past the deputy, but that wouldn’t be hard.

The sheriff adjusted his hat, lifted a hand in greeting to the giant black man hammering an anvil at the smithy next door to the jail then turned toward the restaurant at his right.

But he didn’t head for the Pearl as she had expected. Instead he went the other way and started across the wide main street…straight for her!

His gaze narrowed on her like a gun sight. Her breath backed up in her throat. She would have run, but he had already seen her. Hightailing it out of there would only make him suspicious. She had no idea what she was about to do, but she had better come up with something.

When had he spotted her? This morning or before? She had thought herself well concealed and inconspicuous in the shadowy alley.

As the sheriff neared, she pasted a smile on her face. Her stomach shriveled into a knot.

“Howdy, ma’am.” He stopped inches away.

Her gaze crept up from dusty boots over long, long legs, lean hips and a massive chest to blue eyes. She hoped she was still smiling. “Hello.”