Page 84 of Native Hawk
Miss Hattie was shaking her head. “Never trust a gambler. I should have known better. And I should have warned you.”
“It cannot be true,” Catalina insisted. “He said he was going to marry me. He gave me a ring.”
But even as she said the words, they sounded hollow and meaningless.
“I’m so sorry, Catalina.”
Miss Hattie’s pity made Catalina’s heart ache. But she wouldn’t cry. She wouldn’t give Drew the satisfaction. “Where did they go?”
“It might be best to just let the bastard go,” Miss Hattie advised. “A man like that ain’t worth cryin’ over. He certainly ain’t worth wastin’ a bullet.”
“Where did they go?” she repeated.
The madam bit the corner of her lip and eyed the gun uncertainly. “Now you don’t want to be doin’ anything foolish.”
Catalina’s eyes flattened. “Tell me.”
“You don’t want to be shootin’ him, Catalina,” she warned. “They’ll hang you. It don’t matter how bad a man he is.”
Catalina was growing impatient. “And will they hang me if I shootyou?”She arched her brow at the madam.
Miss Hattie swallowed, glanced again at the gun, and reconsidered. “They said somethin’ about the jail.”
“The jail?” Catalina scowled. Why would they be going to the jail? “You are certain?”
“That’s what she said. She meant to take him to the jail.”
Then the jail was where Catalina would go.
She swept past the madam and headed down the stairs.
Standing half-naked outside the jail in the middle of the night, Drew decided this was the most reckless thing he’d ever done. And for Drew, that was saying a lot.
His twin, Chase, had definitely gotten himself into a heap of trouble. He’d been arrested by Sheriff Campbell and wound up in the town jail. And now it was up to Drew to spring him, no matter what ridiculous lengths he was going to have to go to to do it.
He just wished he hadn’t been so careless, leaving his gun in Cat’s room. He was fine running around the woods in nothing but his drawers. It wasn’t so different from the way he’d dressed as a youth in Hupa. But he felt naked without his forty-five.
From what Drew had been able to decipher of what he’d heard so far, a lot had happened in the past few days. While Drew was preoccupied with the beautiful Catalina, Chase had gone to exact revenge on Samuel Parker, the Paradise rancher who’d enslaved their grandmother.
When Chase had left The Parlor that night, Drew had assumed his brother was too liquored up to even find the ranch. But not only had he found it. He’d managed to break into the ranch house, kidnap the rancher’s daughter, and ride off with her to parts unknown.
That was the “little girl” Samuel Parker and his obnoxious accomplice had been looking for when they’d burst into Drew’s room that first morning.
Only it had turned out she wasn’t so little.
Claire Parker was definitely full-grown. His brother must have appreciated that fact too. In just a few short days, he’d managed to fall in love with his pretty little captive.
The crazy thing was she loved Chase back, even though he’d abducted her and dragged her all over kingdom come.
But the girl’s father had finally hunted her down and intended to bring Chase to justice for kidnapping…and probably worse. Hell, if Sheriff Campbell had been the one to haul him in, he’d probably mistake Chase for Drew and add cheating at cards to his list of crimes.
The sweet little blonde had sneaked away in the middle of the night. She’d come looking for Drew, calling herself “Chase’s woman” and begging for his help in springing Chase out of jail.
How could he turn her down, especially when she looked as helpless as a lamb and when her big green eyes started filling with tears?
He was just glad Catalina wasn’t awake when he left with the woman. He’d have a devil of a time explaining who she was and what he was about to do.
As it turned out, Claire Parker wasn’t quite as sweet and innocent as she appeared. Chase must have told her his twin brother was a dead-eye gunslinger. She fully expected Drew to behave like a dime novel hero and rescue Chase by shooting his way out of jail.
But though Drew was good with a gun, he didn’t like wasting ammunition. Besides, he didn’t want to disappoint the lady, but his brother Chase was the one in the white hat. Drew was nobody’s hero.
