Margaret Brownley Read Online Free Page B

thanks I get for giving you shelter?”
    The knife lowered. “This is your cabin?”
    He scowled. What a nuisance she was turning out to be. It riled him that she had him over a barrel. If she were a man, she’d be flat on the floor by now and thinking twice about ever trying to get the best of him again. But a woman, especially one with child… how was a man supposed to defend himself against such a combination?
    “I think you’d better put the knife down.” He held his hands out, palms up. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
    “And I don’t want to hurt you,” the woman countered.
    He almost laughed aloud. Did she really think that a possibility? “I’m mighty relieved to find we’re in accord.”
    “Just tell me where my clothes are.”
    “What’s left of your clothes will be of no use to you. They’re wet and muddy and bloodied from your wound.”
    The knife lowered another notch.
    Suspicion crossed her face. “What wound?”
    “The one on your shoulder. You were shot.” Her eyes rounded in disbelief and he hastened to reassure her. “It was just a graze. You were lucky. It was your left shoulder or you’d have more of disadvantage than you do now.”
    She felt her shoulder with her free hand, her fingers lingering on the square of buckskin covering her wound.  Apparently satisfied that he spoke the truth, she set the knife down.
    “Who s-shot me?” she stammered.
    He shrugged. “Someone with a gun, which pretty much covers everyone in town.”
    “I-I can’t stay here,” she said. “Is there a hotel?”
    “”fraid not,” he said. “The only one we had burned down. Like it or not I’m all you got.”
    She swayed slightly but remained stubbornly in place.
    His patience spent and with one sweeping motion he lifted her in his arms. i
    “Let me go…” Before she had time to spew out more than a half-dozen choice names, he whisked her across the room and laid her on the pallet.
    “You can’t hold me against my will,” she said indignantly, and he held back the urge to point out he was doing exactly that. In fact, he was on the bed, straddling her.
    “Quit moving before you stir things up. The cabin ain’t big enough for three of us.”
    She stopped fighting him.
    Biting back the pain in his leg, he grimaced and adjusted his weight. “If you promise to stay put, I’ll let you go.” He couldn’t believe it. He was bargaining with her. His only salvation was that there were no other trappers around to witness his disconcerting predicament. He’d never live this one down, that’s for sure.
    Wanting to give her every opportunity to comply with his wishes, he waited with patience foreign to him. It wasn’t altogether an unpleasant wait, despite the added discomfort to his leg. His head was so close to hers, he could feel her warm soft breath against his skin.
    He’d all but decided he was going to have to tie her to the bed for her own good when she nodded ever so slightly. Relieved that he would not have to resort to such drastic tactics, he immediately released her wrists and stood.
    He grabbed a chair and set it down next to the bed, straddling it backward. It felt good to get the weight off his leg. He laid his arms across the back.
    “I think we need to get a few things straight. Mrs. Summerfield, is it? My name is St. John. Logan St. John. You can start by telling me where Mr . Summerfield might be?”
    If her husband had a sensible bone in his body, he’d be on a foreign continent somewhere, living under an assumed name. No matter. He intended to track the man down and make him live up to his responsibilities. The sooner, the better.
    She eyed him cautiously. “My husband is waiting for me in Centreville.” She folded her arms across her chest. “And when he finds out how you manhandled me, he’ll come after you.”
    Logan considered this for a moment. “And your baby…” He hesitated. He’d never discussed such a delicate matter with a woman before.
    At mention of the