The Gunfighter and the Heiress (14 page)

“I didn't know him well enough at the time but I never liked him. He seemed too pretentious to me, but he complained to Mother that I was jealous of her affection for him and I didn't give him a chance.

“When Mother became ill, he was the picture of devotion.” She glanced bleakly at Crow. “Marsh sent me off to boarding school in Natchez where I later became a teacher. He claimed he was sparing me the anguish of watching Mother wither away from a mysterious disease that even the best doctors in the city couldn't name or treat.”

“And it didn't occur to you until yesterday when I warned you against gathering poisonous plants that your mother might have been poisoned and left to die from one dose after another?” Crow questioned intently.

“No,” she murmured, swallowing hard. “I was young, naive and too far from home to realize what might have happened. I was wrapped up in my own grief about being alone in the world if my mother didn't survive. By the time
I returned home six months ago my mother was…” She inhaled a steadying breath and continued, “practically skin and bone.”

“You didn't become suspicious of your stepfather's intent until he arranged your betrothal to your unwanted fiancé?” Bart asked.

“Yes, he was
too
insistent in making the arrangements quickly, while I was upset about losing my mother. I overheard a few conversations that sounded like whispered conspiracies to contract my family's fortune.” She looked directly at Crow and said, “You have no idea how difficult it is to tell if someone actually cares about the person you are on the inside when so much wealth is at stake. Some people will do and say anything to attach themselves to fortunes. Which is why I have so little faith in men and why I withheld my name from you.”

“So you made arrangements to leave New Orleans without Marsh knowing your intent,” Bart presumed.

Natalie nodded. “I have no doubt that I would have died shortly after my forced wedding to Kimball. It would have been too easy for Marsh to claim that I suffered from the same mysterious disease that befell my mother.”

She walked over to replace the marriage license in her satchel. If Crow pushed through the divorce, the document would do her no good whatsoever as protection against Avery Marsh.

“Before I left town, I contacted my own lawyer and paid him generously to remain loyal to my interests. I instructed him to serve an eviction notice to my treacherous stepfather two weeks after I left town. Also, I asked him to buy up Kimball's gambling debts from his creditors and demand that he pay the IOUs immediately.”

“If what you're telling us is true, I recommend that you
send a telegram to your lawyer so he won't believe this newspaper article,” Bart counseled.

“I intend to. In addition, I will alert him that, in the event of my premature death, Marsh and Kimball should be considered primary suspects.”

Natalie stared determinedly at Bart. “After you draw up the divorce papers Crow requested, I would like to hire you to bring formal charges against Marsh for the deliberate poisoning of my mother. Also, I would like you to conduct an audit of the shipping company's accounts to see how much money that swindling bastard has embezzled the past four years.”

Bart didn't reply immediately, but eventually he nodded.

Crow glared at him. “
Now
you believe her?” he muttered. “You're the one who buzzed up here by stagecoach to wave that newspaper article in my face.”

Bart studied Natalie critically for a long moment. She lifted her skinned chin and met his gaze squarely. She refused to beg or plead to be believed. If Bart turned against her, too, then she would sneak off in the middle of the night and take her chances with marauding outlaws. She wasn't waiting around for Crow to accuse her of theft so Bart could file formal charges. Crow was now a closed chapter of her life.

“I'll check into the suspicions of murder,” Bart agreed. When Crow snorted in annoyance, he tossed him a somber glance. “I think she really is Natalie Blair, heiress to the New Orleans shipping fortune. I will, however, make a few contacts to verify her claim.”

Natalie's shoulders sagged in relief. “Thank you.”

“I'm not completely convinced,” Crow said, and scowled. “I want more proof—”

His voice evaporated when the windowpane shattered and a rock bounced across the floor.

“Ooofff!”
Natalie's breath came out in a pained whoosh when Crow shoved her down to the carpet and sprawled on top of her. She hadn't noticed that he'd drawn his pistol until she raised her head to see the barrel aimed at the broken window.

“It's only a rock,” she panted as she squirmed beneath his heavy weight. “You should have let it hit me in the head. I'm sure that would have pleased you to no end.”

“Maybe not as much as you might think,” he muttered, still focused intently on the window.

“If it had killed me you would have the Robedeaux-Blair fortune all to yourself,” she reminded him.

“I don't want your money.” He crawled onto his hands and knees, then inched cautiously toward the window.

“Why not? Everyone else does. They're willing to
kill
to get it.”

He swiveled his head around to stare at her with those unnerving silver-blue eyes that once burned with passion and now sizzled with distaste. “All I want is a divorce because you lied to me.”

“So you only want half of what I own, do you?” she smarted off. “Fine, you can have it then I will sic Marsh and Kimball on you. But I don't advise you to eat or drink anything my stepfather serves because I'm convinced the main ingredient will be poison.”

“Children, please,” Bart mocked while he crouched on the opposite side of the window, his pistol at the ready. “We'll haggle over the devil's details later. First, let's figure out who pitched the rock. Anyone going to volunteer to stand up, look outside and take the sniper's first bullet?”

“I nominate Crow,” Natalie said with a smirk. “Stub-born as he is, the bullets will bounce right off him.”

The comment earned her Crow's frosty glare. Not to be outdone, she flashed him a smile that dripped icicles.

“W
ell, that didn't work.” Marsh sent the henchman named Fred Jenson a disapproving glower. “I found out what room Natalie was in but your bright idea of luring her husband to the broken window was a disaster. Now they will be suspicious and on guard for a possible attack. Might as well have sent them an engraved invitation!”

“Crow is smarter than I thought,” Fred Jenson said, then spit a wad of tobacco into the dirt.

Marsh made a mental note not to step in it. Scowling, he veered toward the back of the livery stable to reach the spot where his second hired gun, Taylor Green, waited.

“I'm hungry,” Green complained. “We haven't eaten since this morning. I work better on a full stomach.”

Marsh stared pointedly at Green's protruding belly that spilled over his belt buckle. He was sure the gunman took outside jobs, just to satisfy his gluttony. The man had talked about the best places to eat in Louisiana most of the trip.

Damn it, Marsh just couldn't hire good help when he
wanted someone murdered—and not be blackmailed for it when the deed was done.

“Might as well feed your face.” Marsh veered toward Turner Hotel, where he and his cohorts rented rooms. “We'll launch another attack tonight.”

He strode off with Green lumbering behind him and Jenson bringing up the rear. Now he had to round up Kimball. The prancing dandy had gone to a saloon to clean out the pockets of hapless cowboys at the poker table.

Not for the first time, Marsh wished he'd had the good sense to poison Natalie instead of her mother. The cunning female was leading him on a frustrating chase.

 

Van inched his head up high enough to peer down on the street below. He was sure the flying rock had come from the corner of the livery stable—and no one had better bother Durango, or Van would lift scalps. That horse was reliable, loyal and dependable. Unlike some people he knew. Van glared pointedly at Natalie, who had pushed into a sitting position to grab the rock that had sailed through the window.

“No note attached,” she said. “A shame the person didn't identify himself so Crow would know who to shoot.”

“Cut the sarcasm, Marquise. Or whatever you call French royalty,” he added snidely.

She rolled her eyes at him, then rose agilely to her feet. “I'll prowl the streets, dressed as a boy to see what I can find out. You are too high-profile and a much larger target.”

Van stared her down, for all the good it did. And
she
called
him
stubborn and bullheaded? Ha! “You aren't going anywhere, Your Highest of Highnesses.”

She elevated her skinned chin. “You can't tell me what
to do.” She shrugged on an oversize vest that concealed her feminine curves and swells. “I
paid
you for your completed assignment. We are officially separated—at
your
insistence. Bart can draw up separation papers before the divorce settlement.”

She crammed her hair beneath her cap and yanked it down until her ears stuck out from the side of her head. Then she smeared soot from the lantern on her face.

With one final burn-in-hell's-biggest-bonfire glare, she swept from the room. A moment later, she returned to retrieve her piddly two-shot derringer, then tucked it into her waistband and left again.

“A week of married life and look what a disaster it's become,” Bart remarked. Then grinned.

“As I mentioned earlier, you're the one who showed up here, waving the newspaper, insisting my wife is a charlatan and criminal,” Van remarked as he bolted to his feet, careful not to stand in front of the window.

“You are my friend,” Bart defended, rising to his feet as he shoved his drooping spectacles back in place. “Naturally I wanted to verify Natalie's story. If there is as much money at stake as she insists, then she could be in grave danger. This Marsh character sounds ruthless. He might kill anyone standing in the way of the Blair fortune. You first, I suspect.”

Van scowled as he raked the broken glass into a pile using the side of his foot. “The only reason you believe her now is because she offered you a job investigating and trying a case of possible murder.”

“No, I plan to hire
you
to investigate the allegations of murder,” he commented.

“Ha!
No,
” Van declined adamantly. “I'm not going anywhere near New Orleans.”

“You should.” A wry grin twitched Bart's lips. “You'll own half of Blair Shipping after the divorce settlement.”

“I don't want her money, if in fact she actually has any beside what she stashed in her clothes and satchels.”

“May I ask you something?” Bart said while using the newspaper to scoop glass into the trashcan.

“No.”

He went on as if Van hadn't spoken. “What put you and Natalie at each other's throats? As I recall, you seemed agitated with her before I showed the article to you.”

“I told you, I found the jewelry and excess money,” Van prompted.

“What else?”

He knew Bart, being a lawyer, would keep firing questions until he was satisfied with the answers. He was as relentless in a courtroom as Van was trailing criminals. “I don't want to talk about this right now,” Van said with finality. “I intend to find out who pitched the rock and why.”

“Could be the Harper brothers,” Bart speculated. “I received another message from them before I boarded the stagecoach to find you. They said your days were numbered.”

“Pfftt!”

“Maybe Marsh and Kimball are here,” Bart suggested. “They could have tracked Natalie, just as she feared they would.”

“I hope it is. They can verify who Natalie is.”

“You would take the word of possible liars, swindlers and murderers over her?” Bart challenged. “I contend Marsh and Kimball will lie through their teeth if they think it will help them get their greedy hands on the Robedeaux-Blair fortune…. Where are you going?”

“Hunting.” Van breezed across the room. “It might take all night but I'll find the rock thrower. Count on it.”

With that, he shut the door behind him, leaving Bart to deal with the rest of the shards of glass that littered the floor in Natalie's room.

 

Natalie skulked down the fire escape of the Wildhorse Hotel, then clung to the shadows as she scurried silently through the alley to find the culprit. She wished she hadn't been so irritated with Crow, for she might have remembered to ask him for a physical description of the Harper brothers who were out for his blood. They would have to get in line, she mused sourly.

It wouldn't take the gang long to find out if a high-profile gunfighter like Crow was in town. It made sense the Harpers would attack immediately.

“What was I thinking?” she muttered under her breath as she crept along the side of the livery stable. She should have married a nobody and slipped into anonymity right alongside him. But no, she thought she needed someone capable of defending her in case of trouble.

Her reasoning had been skewed since the beginning, she realized. Worse, she was attracted to the wrong kind of man. Donovan Crow was the biggest mistake she'd ever made. He was also a walking contradiction. One minute he was kind and considerate, and the next minute he was harsh and insulting.

Although granting Crow the divorce he demanded would complicate her situation with Marsh and Kimball, she wouldn't fight it. She could only hope Bart and her attorney in New Orleans could gather evidence to ensure those two conniving devils paid their dues.

Another solution occurred to her as she tiptoed around the side of the general store to reach the boardwalk. To
escape Marsh and Kimball, she might stage her own death and take Natalie Blair completely off the front page—and out of the picture—for good. She could become Anna Jones or anyone else of her choosing. She could leave instructions to place her fortune into a trust that she could use to cover her living expenses while she moved from one locale to another, seeing the sights she had only read about in books.

In time, she hoped to see Marsh and Kimball locked in the penitentiary. Then she would have nothing to fear from them.

Pain stabbed at her heart again. Crow hadn't wanted her for who she was on the inside. She'd been the time he was killing. The thought prompted feelings of anger and rejection. She thought she had selected the perfect husband, but she was no more than a temporary release for him, a completed assignment with fringe benefits.

Damn him! Besides all that, he refused to believe the truth about her identity. He had hurt her and mistrusted her. Which only proved what she had learned the past few years. Men were a lot more trouble than they were worth—

Natalie snapped to attention when she heard a familiar voice wafting from Rattlesnake Saloon. To her frustration, she saw Thurston Kimball III ensconced at the corner table, engaged in a poker game with three scruffy-looking men wearing ragtag clothing and sombreros. They had tied red bandanas around their thick necks. Since they had their backs to her, she couldn't identify them. If they were Marsh's henchmen, she wouldn't be able to recognize them on sight.

She sucked in her breath and ducked her head when she saw Avery Marsh on the street. With his storklike legs and a goatee that made him look like a billy goat, he was easy to spot. Marsh moved quickly down the boardwalk
toward her. He seemed intent on poking his head in the door of each of the three saloons he passed. When he spotted Kimball, he veered inside without giving Natalie more than a passing glance. Thank goodness!

Natalie lingered by the swinging doors to watch Marsh walk up beside Kimball. She was tempted to grab her derringer and blast away at the bastards. Unfortunately, she hadn't perfected her shooting skills and one of the henchmen might blast her back.

Biding her time, Natalie crammed her hands in the pockets of her breeches and clomped down the boardwalk, calling as little attention to herself as possible. Two men lumbered from the café and collided with her. Natalie reeled sideways but she couldn't regain her balance. She stumbled off the boardwalk and slammed into the horse tethered at the hitching post. The horse threw its head and leaped sideways when she sprawled facedown in the dirt.

“Serves you right, brat,” said one of the men, smirking.

Natalie kept her mouth shut and glared at the bully. He was tall and lean with baby-fine dark hair, a hawklike nose and dark eyes spaced too close together. He wasn't dressed like a cowboy. Nor was he wearing the fancy trappings Marsh and Kimball favored. Just worn breeches and a dingy white shirt with an open collar.

“Yeah, stay out of our way, kid,” the second man sneered as he looked down his long nose at her.

She spared the man with the oversize belly, round face and full jowls a quick glance. His gray eyes were dull and flat—to match his intelligence, she suspected.

Tiring of their intimidating game, the twosome swaggered down the boardwalk, then entered Rattlesnake Saloon. Before Natalie could climb to her feet, a firm hand clamped around her forearm, hoisting her upright. She muttered under her breath when she realized Crow
had come to her assistance and that he had witnessed the incident.

“I thought you said you could take care of yourself,” he mocked as he ambled along beside her.

“I just did.” She dusted off her clothing and checked to make sure her cap still covered the hair pilled atop her head. Thankfully, it did.

“You have a funny way of showing it,” he replied.

She squared her shoulders and tilted her skinned chin to a proud angle. “I'm in one piece and those bullies didn't realize I was a woman, so I consider it a smashing success.”

“Come on,
kid,
let's get you off the street before some other bully decides to rough you up for sport.”

“What do you care if he does?”

“Didn't say I did.”

Crow directed her to remain within the shadows of the boardwalk, then nudged her into the alley to use the metal fire escape for the hotel. Natalie decided, there and then, she was leaving town immediately. Darkness had settled over the countryside so she could flit off without being noticed. Plus, being with Crow after he'd hurt her feelings a dozen different ways was too painful. She was entirely too sensitive and vulnerable around him.

In addition, she didn't need Marsh, Kimball and the three henchmen taking shots at Crow. Aggravated though she was with him for thinking the worst about her, she didn't want him injured—or worse.

She decided to lead Marsh and Kimball out of town—away from Crow and Bart so they wouldn't be in danger. This was her battle now, and she was on her own.

“Did you figure out who threw the stone through the window?” Crow asked as he escorted her to her room.

“No,” she lied, but she suspected Marsh, Kimball and
the three scraggly looking hombres at the poker table in the saloon were responsible. No doubt, Marsh had hired the men to dispose of Crow so he could focus on finding her and stealing her fortune.

Crow stopped short when he stared at the broken window in her room. “Since the owner hasn't repaired the pane you'll have to spend the night with me.”

“No, I won't. I love fresh air,” she said breezily.

Crow walked over to scoop up her satchel and carpetbag, then clutched her arm. Natalie set her feet—and cursed him soundly when he uprooted her from the spot and quick-marched her down the hall to his suite.

“Fine, I'll stay with Bart,” she insisted. “He believes I am who I say I am.”

“No, he doesn't. He's just being nice. Now me? I believe every word you say,” he replied sarcastically.

Natalie glared daggers at him when he shoveled her into his suite—always the best accommodations available while Crow was in town. Maybe he was more like Marsh and Kimball than she realized, she thought bitterly.

Shaking loose from his grasp, she walked through the sitting room to the bedroom. She peered out the window at the street below, while Crow lit a lantern. She could see Rattlesnake Saloon and she tensed when Marsh, Kimball and five men exited together. Sweet mercy! Marsh had assembled an army of assassins. She couldn't expect Crow to take on
five
mercenaries and survive. Granted, Bart was an expert marksman, too, but his arm was still on the mend and he would be useless if it came to hand-to-hand combat.