Bride By Mistake Read Online Free PDF Page B

inconsolably in his arms.
    “Hush now, little one. It’s all over,” Luke murmured helplessly, over and over, rubbing a soothing hand over her back and wishing to hell there was another female here who would know what to do.
    Female tears always unmanned him, and these were not even the easy tears he was used to from his sisters. Each sob came hard won, wrenched, scalding from her. The bony little body shuddered against him as she fought her tears.
    He held her tight and made soothing sounds. After a while she gave a long, quivery sigh, stilled, and became quiet.
    “Thank you,
señor
. I apologize for… my outburst,” she said politely in a cold little best-manners-at-teatime voice that contrasted almost shockingly to her situation. “You may put me down now.”
    His coat lay bundled on a patch of soft grass next to the bank. Luke set her down beside it. “Stay there and rest,” he told her. “Put the coat on to keep warm, and spread the shirt out to dry. It won’t take long in the sun. I’ll finish the grave.”
    He resumed digging. A little later he heard a sound and glanced up. His horse was grazing quietly on the soft grass near the stream. The girl approached Brutus, murmuring softly and holding out her hand as if there was food in it.
    Brutus stretched his neck out curiously, then, as the girl came close, shook his head and trotted skittishly out of reach. Luke grinned and returned to his digging. That game could go on all day. Luke had trained his horse to come only to him.
    Luke had nearly finished the grave when he heard a movement behind him and turned.
    She wore his shirt. It hung to just below her knees, crumpled, still damp. She had long legs, skinny rather than slender, gawky like a newborn filly. Her small feet were bare and dusty. Her damp, dark hair was plaited tightly and inexpertly in a crooked coronet around her head.
    He ached for her vulnerability. Over his shirt she wore his coat fastened tight to the throat. It was a short coat, cut to finish at his waist. On her it reached below her nonexistent hips. The shoulders bagged, and she’d rolled the sleeves back as best she could. A little girl playing dress-up.
    Only the set look on her battered little face said otherwise.
    Even without the marks and swellings from the brutal blows of her attacker, she was an odd-looking little thing; a mismatched collection of features with those big golden eyes, a mouth too wide for her face, a pointed chin, and the sort of strong, bold nose that was the legacy of some ancient Roman ancestor. With her crooked hairdo, split, swollen lips, a bruised cheek, and a rapidly blackening eye, she looked downright tragic, like something new-hatched and vulnerable fallen from its nest.
    Luke had been rescuing fallen hatchlings and strays all his life.
    “Feeling better now, little one?” he asked gently. The pinched face tightened. Stupid question—of course she wasn’t. He gave her a reassuring smile and took a step toward her.
    “Don’t move,
señor
,” she said and pointed a pistol at his heart.
    The deserter’s pistol. She must have hidden it in the folds of his coat. Spent, but she wouldn’t know that. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I wouldn’t hurt you for the world.”
    In answer she cocked the pistol. With casual expertise.
    He raised his brows. “I see you have some familiarity with pistols. But that one isn’t loaded.”
    “
Sí
, it is.”
    “No,” he explained. “The ball was spent when he fired at me. See, he grazed my neck.” He showed her the place that still burned.
    “I know. I saw him shoot you. I reloaded the pistol.”
    “You
what
?”
    She jerked her chin in the dead man’s direction. “I took the shot and powder from him.”
    His jaw dropped.
    “He is dead,” she said defensively, as if he’d accused her of stealing.
    “I know. I was just surprised that you know how to load a pistol.”
    She shrugged as if it was nothing special. “My father taught me to use a pistol