Wild Texas Rose Read Online Free PDF Page B

flash of his teeth.”
    It was a description that fit a hundred men in Presidio County.
    And a description that fit Thorn.
    She had to warn Patrick. She didn’t want to, for Patrick knew a good sight too much about her and Thorn and their early, silly passion, but it wouldn’t be fair if she didn’t. Abruptly, she said, “Thorn is back.”
    Patrick almost swallowed his cigarette. “The Maxwell boy? Here?”
    “He was at the dance tonight.” Lowering her gaze, she watched her hands as they formed a noose with the end of the rope. “I wondered if he was our horse thief.”
    “No, I’d heard rumors he—” Patrick stopped. “How long has he been back?”
    “He wouldn’t tell me. He sidestepped the question.”
    “I’m surprised he hasn’t visited ye here yet.”
    Rose glanced at the house, and thrust the rope into her capacious apron pocket.
    “Ye did send him to prison, Miss Rose, and him thinking ye were so sweet on him, ye’d let him take what he wished. And he does have a history of thieving.” Patrick puffed until the cigarette tip glowed, then blew a lungful of smoke across the corral. “Stealing the horses, heh?” He nodded. “Ye might have a point, Miss Rose. Ye might have a point.”
    “I know,” Rose said sadly. She bade Patrick goodnight and, feet dragging, made her way to the house. It didn’t welcome her as the stable had. It hadn’t been more than a place to stay since her parents died — a spinster’s home, a barren place.
    But tonight it seemed different, almost as if a fresh breeze had blown through and wiped the musty air away. She lifted the lantern and glanced around, trying to put her finger on the difference, but nothing was out of place. Nothing, except … the hair lifted on the back of her head.
    Her bedroom door. Her inner sanctum. The place where she dreamed a girl’s dreams and wept a woman’s tears. She never closed it, yet now it was shut tight. Moving toward it, she clasped the doorknob in her hand and felt the vibration, the presence of a foreign being.
    She almost backed away, but nothing could make a coward of Rose Laura Corey. Prepared to fight, she flung open the door.
    The door bounced against the wall, rousing the figure that rested on her bed.
    “Rosie, darlin’, you don’t have to be so rambunctious,” Thorn rebuked her, pushing his dark hat back off his eyes. “I would have woken up for you regardless.”
     
     
     
    CHAPTER FIVE
     
     
    Grim, frustrated, and trembling, Rose stared at Thorn. “What are you doing here?”
    His long figure covered the bed from headboard to footboard. His broad shoulders obliterated the pillow. “Why, Rose, you’re whispering again. You got a cold or a sore throat?”
    “Patrick is out there, and I don’t want him to know you’re in my bedroom.”
    “Ah, you’ve still got Patrick, do you?” Thorn’s face twisted. “Is he as nosy as ever?”
    “Yes. So,” — she pointed toward the window — “get out.”
    He pouted. “You sure are unfriendly considering the favor I just did you.”
    “Favor?” Remembering the dance and the gossip that would result, her voice rose, but he lifted his finger to his lips. Dropping her voice again, she repeated, “Favor? What favor?”
    “I rode all the way here to protect you.”
    “You followed right behind me?”
    “No, I stayed back a ways. Didn’t think you’d want me intruding on your fun.”
    “What fun?” she demanded.
    “Riding so wild and fierce, like a goddess in some pagan tale.” Lifting his head from the pillow, he tossed his Stetson aside and ruffled his dark hair. “You really need a breastplate and a Viking helmet with horns. That’d scare the wolves off your track.”
    She recalled her own heady excitement. The knowledge that she’d been observed left her feeling raw and exposed. “I have no doubt it would take something more substantial than a breastplate and horns to dislodge the largest wolf.”
    “You mean me?” His wide eyes and tangled