Arizona Renegades Read Online Free

slowly eased back down, feeling the warmth of her body against his. He guessed she was in her early to mid-twenties. Her oval cherubic face, darkly tanned, hinted at lots of time spent outdoors. She wasn’t one for fashion. Her nails were short and unpainted, her dress rather plain, her shoes unpolished.
    “Were you trying to kill yourself?”
    The blonde squirmed deliciously as she sat up. “Pshaw! If it weren’t for that trunk, I’d have made it up there. Then all I had to do was jump onto one of the last horses, grab hold of the ribbons, and bring the Concord to a stop.”
    “Is that all?” Fargo said, smirking.
    “You think I couldn’t? I’m a farm girl, mister. I learned to ride practically before I learned to walk. Anything a man can do, I can do. Usually better. Just ask my six brothers. I could outride them, outshoot them, even outfight them.” Pausing, she brazenly placed a hand on his left arm and squeezed his biceps. “Care to wrestle?”
    Fargo wondered if maybe all the bouncing around had rattled her brain. “How’s that again?”
    “You don’t know what wrestling is?”
    “Of course I do, but—”
    “But ladies don’t wrestle, is that it? Well, this gal does. You’ve got more muscles than my brothers and you’re a heap bigger than they are, but I’ll bet I can pin you quicker than you can bat an eye. What do you say?”
    The door opened. A portly man whose cheap suit and dusty bowler branded him a drummer declared in amusement, “Honestly, Miss Pearson. If I’d had any idea Missouri women were so forward, I’d have settled there long ago.”
    “What’s so forward about asking a fella to wrestle, Mr. Tucker?”
    Tucker glanced at Fargo, “Do you see what we’ve had to contend with since leaving St. Louis? I tried to give her my seat behind the boot to spare her from having to sit on the middle bench. And do you know what she said?”
    The blonde finished for him. “I said my backside is just as hard as any man’s and can sit anywhere a man’s can.”
    Fargo and Tucker both laughed. Fargo moved the Ovaro away from the coach so the passengers could alight. As he was lowering Miss Pearson, the bearded man who had been on the other side filled the doorway and glowered like a bear roused too soon from hibernation.
    “What in hell is so humorous? We could have been killed just now, gentlemen, and you act as if we’d taken a carriage ride in Central Park!”
    “Oh, please, Mr. Hackman,” Tucker said. “What we just went through was nothing. You should do as much traveling as I do. I was on a stage once when a wheel came off while we were going around a curve high in the Rockies. Another time, a driver lost control on a grade and the stage crashed into a stand of trees.”
    Hackman, indignant, stepped down. He wore a suit and a straw hat. “I really don’t care to hear any more of your silly stories. Why is it drummers feel compelled to talk people to death, anyway?” Before Tucker could answer, Hackman turned to Fargo and jabbed him in the leg. “As for you, climb on up and turn the coach around. Hurry it up. We can retrieve the others and be on our way with scant more delay.”
    Fargo rested his hands on the saddle horn. “There are two things you should know,” he said.
    “Eh?” Hackman’s forehead knit. “What are you talking about?”
    “First off, I don’t work for Butterfield. The stage sits where it is until the driver gets here.” Fargo leaned down so only Hackman, Tucker, and Miss Pearson heard his next comment. “Second thing, if you ever poke me like that again, you son of a bitch, I’ll break off your finger and shove it down your damn throat.” With that, he dismounted.
    Hackman turned apple red.
    Tucker started to cackle, then smothered his mirth with a hand.
    Miss Pearson nodded. “About time somebody put you in your place, Mr. Hackman. If you don’t mind my saying so, you’re just about the rudest person I’ve ever met.”
    From the door tinkled