Oklahoma Wedding Bells

When Josie heard more thrashing in the underbrush, she whirled around. Her yelps had drawn attention, apparently. A dozen men, weapons at the ready, appeared.

“You okay, Miz Malloy?” Orson Barnes, the leader of the group, asked worriedly.

“I am now,” she assured the rescue brigade.

The settlers glared at the drunkard, who had slogged ashore and stood there dripping wet, glowering at Tremain.

“There was no call to rough me up,” he muttered, then gingerly examined his bloody lips. “I was just having a little fun.”

“Well, I wasn’t!” Josie huffed indignantly. “If my fiancé hadn’t shown up when he did, I would have been mauled.”

For the life of her, she didn’t know why she blurted that out. Maybe because she had been mulling over the prospect during her ride back to camp. She had planned to see what Muriel thought of the idea, but they hadn’t gotten around to the topic before they arrived and found themselves swarmed by four eager-to-please suitors.

For certain, Josie had shocked this latest group of men speechless. Whiskered jaws dropped. Eyes popped. Weapons sagged in the men’s hands. In synchronized motion, the would-be settlers’ stunned gazes swung to Tremain, who stared at her with that poker-faced expression he wore so well.

“Your fiancé?” the crowd crowed in unison.

“That’s right,” she confirmed, as she turned her back on them and walked up to Tremain. “My fiancé.”

She cast him a please-don’t-deny-it stare, then slipped her hand into his before she pivoted to face the baffled men. She noted that Muriel had arrived on the scene, along with another dozen men. The recent arrivals looked as shocked by the announcement as the first group.

Muriel didn’t appear the least bit surprised, however. She stifled a grin of wry amusement and hung back from the congregation of men.

“That true, horse trader?” someone called from the middle of the crowd. “You proposed and she accepted your offer over everybody else’s?”

Josie held her breath, wondering if Tremain planned to humiliate her in front of their captive audience, or play along with her impulsive announcement.

“Didn’t she just say so?” he asked, his deep, resonant voice carrying over the crowd.

She nearly swooned in relief, but tried her damnedest not to let her reaction show. Her relief turned to amusement when the men quickly switched their attention to Muriel, who flung up both hands and said, “Don’t look at me as a potential wife. I accepted Commander Holbrook’s proposal an hour ago, while we were riding.” She flashed a beaming smile. “Josie and I are planning a double wedding after the land run.”

Beside Josie, Tremain leaned down as if to whisper sweet nothings in her ear. “Are you proposing to me? Isn’t that unconventional in white society?”

“Where is it written that a woman can’t propose?” she challenged quietly.

“Nowhere I know. It’s what I’d expect from a misfit like you … so I accept.”

He draped his arm over her shoulder, drawing her closer. Ordinarily, she was inclined to step away when a man crowded her. She’d learned early on not to accept displays of affection, because suitors always wanted more than she intended to give. Oddly enough, however, she didn’t object to Tremain’s feigned interest. She felt safe and protected after her run-in with the foul-smelling drunkard, who would have molested her if Tremain hadn’t shown up when he did.

“Does Holbrook know he recently became engaged?” Tremain murmured against the side of her neck, causing goose bumps to pebble her skin.

“I don’t know,” she replied, her voice a little on the unsteady side. “Muriel and I didn’t have a chance to discuss anything privately. Four men approached the minute we dismounted in camp.”

“You know this is going to cost you, don’t you?” Tremain whispered devilishly. “Muriel, too, I suspect.”

“How much, Tremain?” Josie asked, when she saw the wicked gleam in his sea-green eyes and the ornery grin twitching his lips. “I’m saving my funds for improvements on my homestead, if I manage to stake one.”

“We’ll work something out, trust me.”

She flashed a smile for the benefit of the attentive males watching their every move. Then she said in a low voice, “Just so you know, I don’t trust any man’s intentions….”

Her voice trailed off when Tremain’s raven head came slowly and deliberately toward hers, as if giving notice that he was going to kiss her in front of God and everyone watching. Not only that, but he was staking his claim on her. Josie waited, unsure if she wanted to know how he tasted, to know if he kissed the same way he fought—roughly and forcefully.

“You’re a smart woman not to trust a man’s motives,” he murmured, his lips a hairbreadth from hers. “I myself don’t trust anyone’s motives, yours included. Just so you know …”

Then he kissed her, satisfying her curiosity—and stirring something wild and hungry deep inside her. She hadn’t expected tenderness from a man who had reminded her of the flapping buzzard of doom a quarter of an hour earlier. Yet tenderness was what she received from Solomon Tremain. Though he was amazingly gentle, molten fire simmered beneath the surface. It seeped into her blood, bringing it to a quick boil, triggering white-hot sensations she hadn’t wanted—or expected—to feel.

She didn’t realize she had curled her arm around his neck to inch closer until she was there, enjoying the feel of his powerful body meshed familiarly against hers. She found herself wanting something she couldn’t explain, and until this very moment hadn’t realized existed.

Josie was sorry to admit she was dazed, dumbfounded and aroused by the gentler side of Solomon Tremain. Desire thrummed through her, raising her temperature another ten degrees. When he lifted his head and let loose a dimpled smile, it knocked her for another loop … until he looked over her head at the crowd of men and grinned in cocky male triumph.

“And you are going to pay for that, Tremain,” she warned as she tossed him a smile for appearance’s sake.

“Then we will have to owe each other, won’t we, blue eyes?” he murmured huskily.

He dropped a featherlight kiss on her lips, then stepped away to quick-march her assailant to camp. The rescue squad fell in behind him, leaving the two friends alone together.

“Well,” Muriel said. “I hope this scheme of yours doesn’t blow up in our faces.” She stared curiously at Josie. “What did Tremain say when you proposed to him?”

“I didn’t actually propose.” Josie shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other and avoided her direct stare. “It just sort of popped out of my mouth that he was my fiancé, after my ordeal with the drunkard.”

Muriel gasped in amazement. “You gave him no warning? Just blurted it out in front of everyone?”

Josie nodded her tousled head. “You and I discussed the possibility this morning. Tonight seemed the perfect time to set the plan in motion,” she reasoned. “The news will buzz around camp this evening and tomorrow we can enjoy some peace and quiet. For once.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t have yielded to the same reckless impulse,” Muriel said worriedly. “Now I have to ride out to the garrison at night to confer with Holbrook … and face possible rejection. The captain might not play along the way Mr. Tremain did.”

“You could send Tremain to propose for you,” Josie suggested.

Her friend’s shoulders slumped in relief and she bobbed her head. “I hope he’ll agree to speak in my stead, because I’d rather not face Holbrook. I hope your pretend fiancé can square it with mine.” There was a long pause as she stared anxiously at Josie in the gathering twilight. “Do you think we might have acted too irrationally with this scheme of desperation?”

“Most likely,” Josie admitted. “But what’s done is done. Hopefully, we have resolved the problem of so many unwanted proposals.”

Her friend inhaled a bracing breath, squared her shoulders, then spun on her heel. “I’ll go ask Tremain to be the bearer of surprising news.”

“It’ll probably cost you,” Josie called after her. “It’s what you should expect when you bargain with a wily horse trader.”

Sol escorted Josie’s assailant into camp, intending to tie him up, retrieve Outlaw and gather the horses he had stopped by to sell at the settlement. Damn good thing he had arrived when he did, he mused as he glared at his unkempt prisoner. Sol recognized the man as one of the six gunmen he’d seen loitering around the Saddle Burr Saloon earlier in the day.

“What’s your name?” he demanded sharply.

“None of your business,” the shaggy-haired hooligan said with a scowl.

“I’m making it my business,” Sol snapped. “You tried to molest my fiancée, and we both take offense to that.”

Fiancée? Damn, that sounded odd. Never in his wildest dreams had he expected to have one of those—ever. He knew absolutely nothing about dealing with females, especially one as high-spirited and quick-witted as Josephine Malloy.

“If that hellion is yer fiancée you shoulda kept closer tabs on her,” the attacker snorted.

Sol scoffed. How many desperadoes who blamed him for their shortcomings had he encountered over the years? More than he cared to count. The bastards never wanted to own up to their sins and transgressions.

“You go near Josephine again and I’ll shoot you a couple of times,” he growled threateningly. “If you try to retaliate against her for fighting back, I’ll slit your throat. If you touch her, you’re a dead man. Do you understand me?” He stared at the hombre with fierce intensity. “And make no mistake, you won’t be the first man I’ve killed, and you won’t be the last. Now … what’s your name?”

The defiant ruffian thrust out his stubbled chin and clamped his swollen lips shut.

Sol untied one of the horses he had for sale, then stabbed his forefinger at the prisoner, silently ordering him to climb aboard bareback. Scowling, the man mounted up, then swore foully when Sol coiled a rope around his neck, tied it to his wrists, then hooked it around the mount’s neck and belly.

“We have our own ways of dealing with men who mistreat women,” said a voice behind them.

Sol half turned to see the frizzy-haired, self-appointed leader of the rescue brigade, which had formed a semicircle behind him. “This man is headed for the stockade at the garrison,” Sol declared authoritatively. “This area is under martial law, and vigilante justice is prohibited here and everywhere else.” Damn, he sounded like a lawman, he realized. Sol told himself to watch what he said and how he said it in the near future.

The stocky man, whose face was covered with so much brown hair that he reminded Sol of a buffalo, lumbered forward to extend his hand. “Orson Barnes is my name. I guess you have a right to do as you see fit with this molester of women. And congratulations on your betrothal to Miz Malloy,” he added begrudgingly. “You are the envy of all the single men in camp. I’m surprised she changed her mind, though. When I proposed to her this morning she said she wasn’t ready to settle down anytime soon.”

Sol smiled faintly as he looked past Orson and noted that he was receiving plenty of annoyed glances from Josephine’s jilted suitors. The competition for a woman’s affection in these mostly male tent communities was fierce, he reminded himself. “I must’ve caught her at a weak moment.”

“Didn’t know she had any weak moments.”

Sol doubted she did, either.

“That’s a lot of woman you got there, Mr….?” Orson waited for Sol to fill in the blank.

“Tremain. I’m a horse trader.” He inclined his head toward his prisoner. “Do you happen to know this hombre by name?”

“Harlan Kane,” Orson replied. “He shares a tent with three other scruffy men on the north side of camp.”

“Do you know their names?” Sol questioned.

“Bernie Hobart, Wendell Latimer and Ramon Alvarez.” He rattled them off.

“You’d do well to mind your own business, too,” Harlan muttered threateningly at Orson, who shrugged, undaunted. “My friends might pay you a visit when you least expect it.”

Sol narrowed his gaze at his prisoner. No doubt threats of violence were this gang’s specialty.

“You want me to keep an eye on Miz Malloy until you get back from the fort, Tremain?” Orson volunteered as the crowd of men behind him dispersed.

“Good idea. Thanks,” he said as he mounted Outlaw. “I won’t be back tonight, so tell my fiancée to sleep with her pistol under her pillow and one eye open.”

When the man lumbered off to become Josie’s temporary protector, Sol headed west. He halted Outlaw when he saw Muriel scurrying toward him, waving her arms to flag him down.

“May I have a private word with you, Mr. Tremain?” she asked anxiously, panting to catch her breath.

“Sol,” he corrected. “Give me a minute to secure my prisoner.”

Smiling to himself, Sol dismounted. He had a pretty good idea what Muriel wanted. He had to hand it to these two spirited women; there was nothing passive about either of them. They didn’t sit and wait for the world to come to them, but grabbed the proverbial bull by the horns.

Sol predicted that any man who got tangled up with them would never experience a dull moment.

But hell, he wouldn’t know what a dull moment felt like, even if it walked up and slapped him in the face, Sol mused. He existed in a rough-and-tumble world where flying bullets, slashing knives and hellish weather conditions prevailed. Becoming engaged—even to a lively spitfire like Josephine—couldn’t be that bad … could it?

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