Give My Love to Rose(1st in Outlaw Series)

Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Unloading the supplies didn't take long and Marston knew it was time for him to be moving on. He made his way to the gray and was preparing to hoist himself into the saddle when Langley came barreling out of the barn.

"Mama! Patty is gone!"

Rose came out of the house and Marston noticed instantly that she had removed her bonnet and her long red curls were in a long braid hanging down her back. Marston's hand still burned from her touch and that unnerved hm. Damn, he wanted to lay with her.

But that couldn't happen. Not only because he still didn't complete trust a woman who would marry such an old man but also because that voice in his head kept saying crazy things about how he was starting to care about the woman and her annoying son.

"Who's Patty?" Marston asked.

Rose sighed. "Our horse."

"That skinny nag that was in the corral yesterday?"

"Yes. She must have escaped the corral."

Marston snorted. "Not much of a corral to speak of."

Rose's blue eyes flashed with temper reminding him of yesterday when she had held him at gunpoint. "We do the best we can!" she snapped.

"Mama, we have to find, Patty!" Langley insisted. "She's lost and scared."

Marston grumbled under his breath and tried to turn his back on them. Not his problem. Not his problem. Not his problem. These people were not his problem.

"I'll find your damn horse," he muttered, before swinging himself into the saddle and heading off into the woods, following the horse tracks in the muddy ground.

He didn't to travel too far before he found her. "There you are, you flea bitten old hag," he grumbled as he jumped to the ground. Her halter had gotten tangled on a branch and she was just too old and weak to do much about it.

Marston crossed the wet ground and held up his hands when the mare tossed her head nervously. "It's alright, girl," he purred gently. "I won't hurt you."

Only with animals did Marston ever let his softer side show. He'd had a soft spot for critters ever since he'd been a young boy. He had once found a kitten when he'd been a boy. The kitten had been starving and cold and so he'd brought it back to the orphanage with him. He had hidden it in his dresser and snuck it milk and water. Each and every night, he would get that kitten out of the drawer and it would curl up to him and purr.

He had loved that smelly, skinny, ugly feline.

Then the headmaster had discovered it and had laughed at the pathetic excuse for a cat. In an attempt to assert his dominance with the children and teach them not to hide things from him, the headmaster had bashed that tiny kittens head open against the brick wall beside Marston's bed.

Marston had learned an important lesson that day about life and death. Weak meant dead. Marston would be damned before he ever let himself be seen as soft or weak. The minute you got soft, someone slammed your head against a wall and put your brains on display for the world to see.

Marston grabbed the mare's halter and broke off the branch it was tangled on. He rubbed her thin head to help soothe her and led her over to his gray. He used his rope to secure the horses together before using his hands to check the mare's body for injuries. Other than being terribly malnourished, the horse seemed to be fine.

He wondered what in the world had spooked her into leaving the safety of her corral.

As if on cue, the gray and the mare both perked their heads up and began sidestepping as they tossed their heads. Marston's senses sharpened and he heard a twig snap just before a terrible growling filled the air. He turned just in time to see the coyote lunge at him.