Blaze of Glory (2 page)

Jonathan
reached out and steadied the tall woman in the light blue dress. It was formfitting, leaving her
creamy
breasts thrust up like an offering on a platter.
Had he not been a respectable man, he might have entertained
the idea of
sampling them. As it was, he’d come for one woman only.

Parker growled and for a moment
Jonathan
thought the man might actually snatch the woman up and shout “mine.”
Since that wasn’t something his older brother was prone to
doing
,
Jonathan
chanced a glance at him.
Parker
stared out from silver eyes at the woman.

Yep,
the word
mine
i
s definitely on the tip of
my
brother’s tongue.

“Molly, come, it’s not safe,” Preacher Cogan said, reaching out to the woman who was still pressed to
Jonathan
.

Jonathan
stiffened. “Molly?”

The woman looked up. Huge blue eyes stared back at him and he shook his head. “Molly?
No.
You’re not
—
”

Something akin to fear flickered through her eyes. “Coming,
D
addy.”

She turned and was whisked away
toward
the
shelter of the
G
eneral
S
tore
. Parker moved up next to him and let out a low whistle. “Hot damn, little brother. If you don’t want to fuck her, I will.”

“Fuck who?” he asked, staring at the wom
a
n claiming to be Molly. Granted, she looked damn close to what
Jonathan
could remember of the fiery vixen, tall,
slim
, brown hair with wisps of golden blond
e
running throughout it
,
but
she
wasn’t
Molly
. He knew Molly’s scent. Had memorized it—imprinted it on his mind
, his body
.

The woman, while close, was not his Molly.

My Molly?

“Ain’t ya gonna yell at me for talking about Molly that way?” Parker asked, poking him slightly.

“Show some respect for the lady, Parker
,” he said.
“
I’ll
kick your damn teeth down your throat if you ever talk about Molly that way. She’s mine.
Understand that now.
I won’t tell you again.
”

Mine? What?

“Yours?” Eli asked, coming up on his other side. He took his hat off and held it in his hands
as he watched the scene before them
. “Looks to me
like
we’ve got ourselves some outsiders here.
They don’t seem like a friendly bunch either.
Reckon that means we don’t have to pretend to be the welcoming sorts.
”

“Aww, and I had my
‘
Prospect Springs is the greatest place in the territory speech
’
all ready to go. Big, fancy words and all,” Parker added, laughing softly.
“Damn shame I’m not going to get to use it.”

Jonathan
glanced at the rather large group of unsavory characters across the way, noticing them for the
first
time since his arrival.
Instantly, his predator
y
instincts
kicked in, signaling danger. They also signaled something else. Molly was near. The
real
Molly
Cogan
. He could smell her sweet peaches
-
and
-
cream scent as it carried on the breeze.
He could also smell his mark on her. The one he’d never told her she carried.
The one that
if he were ever to take her to his bed would mean she was his wife.

His palms began to itch at the thought of bedding Molly, of being with his mate. It would likely be an experience he would never forget and never get enough of. Molly’s scent assailed him.
His nostrils flared as his cock hardened.
It was all he could do not to shift forms and hunt her.
“She’s here.”

“Who?” Eli asked, eyeing up the group of outsiders.

“Molly.”

Parker snorted. “Uh
, no shit, really? My dick is still hard after seeing her in that blue dress.
I wanted to lick the tops of her breast
s
before sinking deep into her.
I always knew she was a looker
,
but she never had that sort of effect on me.
”

“That was
not
Molly,”
Jonathan
bit out.
“If it had been, you’d be trying to find your head because I’d have knocked it clean off.”

Jud
g
e
William
Wheeler
walked straight for
Jonathan
.
The
man’s
brow
n
hair blew about in the breeze and he appeared to be
a
model citizen in his dark gray suit.
Jonathan
knew better. He knew the judge was anything but normal
—he
was also a great man.

He didn’t really want to stop and deal with the judge but it wasn’t looking like he had much choice in the matter. “Evening, Judge.
It’s quite a turnout your niece has got here. A lot of folks must be happy to see her come home after all these years.
”

Namely himself
,
but
Jonathan
left that part off.

William nodded. “Evening
.
”
H
e pushed in close to
Jonathan
and dropped his voice low
.
“
M
y niece is in grave danger. I believe these men who appeared out of nowhere are seeking her.
I’ve heard rumors about a price on her head. Looks as though they’ve come to try
to
cash in on it.
”

Parker growled. “No one is layin’ a hand on her.” He stared in the distance in the direction the woman in the blue dress had headed off in.

William smiled. “I believe the men think as you do, Parker, that the woman
in blue
is my niece. She is not.”

“Told ya,”
Jonathan
said, grinning. It was
juvenile
but he did it all the same.
He focused on William. “What do you mean,
they
appeared out of nowhere?”

“They transported here, Jon
, without the use of a Frontier Stall
.”

Oh shit. This is bad.

“Outlaws?” Eli asked, voicing
Jonathan
’s next question.

William nodded. “I suspect so. They didn’t travel by means of regular transport so I assume they don’t have the right papers. There’s something else.” The older man leaned in close to
Jonathan
. “If my niece should reveal herself
here
,
none of you boys are to let the people she’s with know what you are. Understand?”

“Meaning?” Parker asked.

William leveled a hard gaze on him. “Meaning, I have always known the
MacSweeny family is different. You know that. Keep it to yourselves, boys. I’ve no idea what her companions’ views are on the supernatural. I would like to think she’d only surround herself with open-minded individuals but I never thought I’d receive news that my lil’ princess ran away from boarding school and disappeared without a trace.”

Jonathan’s chest tightened to the point that drawing in air seemed an unlikely possibility. Ran away? Disappeared without a trace? He’d asked William about Molly often and was always told the same thing. She’s happy. She’s living the life she always wanted. She’ll come home at some point. Never once did missing come up. Jonathan would have dropped everything and searched for her. He’d have dragged her back to Prospect Springs and made her his wife.

William must have sensed Jonathan’s confusion because he patted his shoulder and nodded. “Son, I have known you since you were just a baby. I knew you’d try to find her. I also knew my niece needed to find herself before she gave herself to a man for the rest of her life. She required time to heal. To grow. To become a woman, Jon.”

What was William trying to tell him? Did he know Molly would never accept him? Did he think the fact he was a werewolf would make Molly run from him? Or was it something else? Could it be he thought his niece was ready for a family? Ready to acknowledge all Jonathan had to offer?

William didn’t give Jonathan a chance to voice his concerns as he continued on. “Now, I have managed to find a few things out about her and her acquaintances. I know enough to warn you all not to reveal you’re anything but human. I’m not sure she can protect you all if put in the situation to have to. Lord knows the girl would die trying.”

That made Jonathan laugh. “I’m sorry, Judge, but did you just comment on Molly protecting us? She’s just a woman, what—”

A group of
outlaws
surged forward, each pulling out
weapons. Some had double
-
action revolvers. Others had rifles, cocked and ready
. One smiled wickedly
as he fired several rounds into the air, catching everyone’s attention.
“We’ll not hurt any of you nice folks if ya just point us in the direction of a Miss Molly Cogan
or her fiancé
,
Cole Griffin
.”

Her fiancé?
Cole Griffin?
She’s engaged?

Jonathan
stiffened. He
did not
just hear that right.
His hands burned with the need to shift shape,
unsheathe his
claws and kill something. No way in hell was his Molly marrying anyone
but him
.

Me? I’ve plum
b
lost my mind. The woman doesn’t want me. If she did, she’d have come back long ago. And I’m not ready for that sort of a commitment
just
yet.

Gerald
Wilson
spun on his heels and glared at the group of outsiders. “
I
am Molly’s fiancé.”

“Like hell you are,” a male voice called out from the other side of the crowd
, stealing the words from
Jonathan
’s mouth
.
All eyes went in that direction. A man, at least as tall as
Jonathan
,
stood there glaring at the outsiders. He
adjusted his wide brim brown leather hat and
pushed back his long
,
matching jacket, showing off a Special Marshal
-
issued weapon
and badge
.

“Who the hell are you?” Gerald asked, stealing
Jonathan
’s question
again
.
As sheriff of Prospect Springs
,
he should have been faster with comments but the
thought
of Molly Cogan had him a mental mess. She’d always done that to him.

The man smiled, and Jonathan knew instantly that the m
an was deadly just from the way
he carried himself. When he winked and spoke, Jonathan added touched in the head to that as well. “I’m Cole Griffin. The man
those
dirt
bags
are looking
for.”

Cole Griffin? The fiancé?

The
dirt
bags
in question all drew upon him.
Jonathan
entertained doing it himself but held back.
The man didn’t seem to notice or care
that he was standing on the wrong end of countless guns
. In a flash, the woman in the blue dress was rushing out and
toward
the man. “Cole, what’s going…?”

She froze as the men leveled th
eir weapons on her. “That’s her
! That’s Molly!” on
e
of
them shouted. The woman licked her lower lip and Parker let out another throaty growl. Had th
e woman
really been Molly,
Jonathan
would have decked his own kin over a grunt that full of lust.

It didn’t really matter who the girl was. She was in danger and his sense of honor wouldn’t let harm come to her. Pulling his own
black
leather jacket back, Jonathan touched his side arm.
Over thirteen
inches of perfection.
He never left home without it.
The urge to sh
o
ot the man identifying himself as Cole Griffin was still there.
Jonathan
resisted.
“All right, folks. It would appear we have a slight problem here. As Sheriff
, I’d
like to take a
—
”