The determination etched on his features made her breath come fast and short. If he hadn’t been about to get them both killed, his concentration would have been a beautiful thing to behold.

He closed one eye.

His finger tightened on the trigger.

He fired.

The hat flew off, making one of their assailants yelp like a girl.

Esmerelda frowned in bewilderment as the yelp gave way to a confusing muddle of grunts and curses, followed by the sounds of a minor scuffle.

A timid voice wafted across the canyon. “That you, Billy?”

Billy collapsed against the wagon wheel, paling as if he’d been mortally wounded. Weakened by relief, Esmerelda crawled to his side and sagged against him. “Friends of yours, I gather.”

“Worse.” The grim set of his mouth banished her exhilaration. “Relations.”

CHAPTER TEN

The Darling gang came charging down the embankment, whooping and hollering like schoolboys on the first day of summer. For a moment, Billy appeared to be nearly as paralyzed with shock as Esmerelda was.

Then he snatched her up by the shoulders, forcing her to meet his frantic gaze. “You’ve got to do whatever I say, gal. Swear you will.” When she just gaped at him in dumb surprise, he gave her a slight shake. “Swear it, Esmerelda. Your life may depend on it.”

It wasn’t the strength of his grip that swayed her, but the desperation in his smoky green eyes. In that one elusive moment, Esmerelda would have promised him anything.

At her tremulous nod, he reached over into the bed of the wagon and snatched down a length of rope. Before Esmerelda could so much as murmur a protest, he had the thick length of hemp twined around her wrists. He jerked a knot in it, binding her hands in front of her.

“What in heaven’s name do you think you’re doing, sir? I never intended—”

“You promised,” he reminded her sternly.

“I don’t care what I promised! You have no right—”

“Shhhhh.” He laid a finger across her lips, stilling them in midsputter. Their tense silence only emphasized the sound of his brothers stampeding across the canyon like a herd of drunken steers. Billy shook his head at her, his gaze softened by tender regret. “If you don’t hush, sweetheart, I’m afraid I’ll have to gag you.”

“But I—”

As quick as that, Billy plucked the lace handkerchief from the breast pocket of her basque and stuffed it into her mouth. If she hadn’t still been reeling from shock, she might have been able to spit out the wad of cloth before he secured it with the dusty bandanna he’d been wearing around his neck.

As he knotted the bandanna at her nape, his warm breath stirred her hair. “You’ll thank me for this later,” he whispered, causing her skin to tingle with an awareness that had as much to do with his absolute power over her as her sudden helplessness.

She was left with no recourse but to stamp her feet in outrage and emit a muffled shriek.

He circled back to the front of her, a crooked grin tugging at his lips. “That’s perfect, angel. Pretend you hate me.”

Even through the gag, it was possible to make out Esmerelda’s mumbled “I do hachoo.”

His brothers were nearly upon them now. Billy studied her through narrowed eyes. “Your color’s sure high enough, but we might need to make a few minor adjustments.”

She glared daggers at him as he dragged off her poor beleaguered bonnet and carelessly tossed it aside. He plucked out her hairpins and raked his fingers through her coronet of braids, sending her hair spilling in a wanton tumble around her shoulders. As galling as that assault upon her person was, it was nothing compared to the shock of his lean fingers dancing down the high-necked collar of her basque. His deft skill with the tiny hooks only served to remind her that he’d probably had more experience undressing women than she had.

He didn’t falter until the back of his hand brushed the naked swell of her breast, betraying the fact that she wasn’t wearing a camisole, corset, or much of anything else, beneath the basque. His gaze flew to her face. Esmerelda felt a perverse flare of triumph at his stunned expression, his quick, indrawn breath.

His knuckles lingered against her skin in a motion too uncalculated to be called a caress. Yet it shivered Esmerelda to the bone. As their eyes met, the distant roaring in her ears drowned out everything but the harsh rasp of his breathing and the wild throb of her pulse.

“Where the hell you hidin‘, Billy? Ain’t you glad to see us?”

The nearby shout startled both of them out of their reverie. A fierce scowl shadowed Billy’s brow. His fingers flew back up her basque, hooking with even more haste than they’d unhooked only seconds before.

“We want you to look ravished, not ravishing,” he muttered between clenched teeth, securing the hook beneath her chin with such enthusiasm she feared she might choke to death. “And try to look terrified,” he commanded as the hoots and curses swelled to near deafening volume.

Esmerelda didn’t have to fake it as he grabbed her by the elbow and shoved her ahead of him. But her worst fears were never realized. Before the scream building in her throat could escape the gag, Billy was snatched away from her and enveloped by a howling, back-thumping circle of men. One of them yodeled a rebel yell while another fired a volley of reckless shots into the air. They all reeked of whiskey, making it easy to understand why none of their shots had struck true.

Esmerelda stumbled to a halt, standing forgotten and invisible on the fringes of their reunion. The moon drifted over the lip of the canyon, giving her her first clear look at the notorious Darling gang.

The largest of the four men, a burly giant of at least six feet six, slapped Billy on the back hard enough to stagger him, then swept him up in a bear hug and swung him in a wide circle. “I knew that had to be you. Nobody but my baby brother could make a shot like that.”

From the shocks of gray at the man’s temples, Esmerelda deduced he must also be the oldest Darling. She might have been touched by the genuine affection in his embrace if Billy hadn’t hung so stiffly in his arms.

He finally managed to struggle free, his nostrils flaring with distaste. “Hell, Virgil, with all the stagecoaches you’ve been knocking off, you could at least spare a nickel for a bath and a shave.”

Virgil threw back his head and roared with laughter, his white teeth gleaming through his sandy beard in a wolfish grin. Even Esmerelda had to admit he was handsome, in a brutish sort of way. “Now, Billy, you know Jasper’s always been the pretty boy in the family. Shaves twice a day. Splashes on so much lilac water he ends up smelling like a two-dollar whore.”

“Better a whore than a hog,” retorted the man Esmerelda assumed must be Jasper.

His jibe initiated a brief shoving match with Virgil.

Esmerelda cringed, fearing the two towering men were going to come to fisticuffs.

But Billy pushed his way between them without betraying an ounce of apprehension. “I wouldn’t care to be downwind of either one of you.”

Jasper knocked off Billy’s hat and ruffled his tawny hair. “Where you been hidin‘, little brother? If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you been avoidin’ your own kin. Your very own flesh and blood.”

A shudder rippled through Billy as he retrieved his hat and dusted it off, too faint to be noted by anyone but Esmerelda. He was spared from answering by Sadie, who bounded out of the wagon and began to sniff at Jasper’s feet.

“Still got that mangy old mutt of mine, I see,” Jasper said, nudging her away with the toe of his boot. “The bitch is too old to hunt or breed. I still don’t know why you stopped me from shootin‘ her that time.”

“Because I didn’t want to have to kill you,” Billy replied darkly.

As the two men stood glowering at each other, toe-to-toe and nose-to-nose, it was Virgil’s turn to step in and avert a potential altercation. “Our little brother here has been one very busy feller,” he said, turning to one of the two men lurking behind them. “Enos, where’s that paper I gave you for safekeeping?”

Beneath his straggly hair and ragged yellow whiskers, Enos looked washed out, like a smeared charcoal draft of his older brothers. He blinked his red-rimmed eyes, shook his head, and jerked a thumb toward the nearly identical man who slumped next to him. “W-w-weren’t mine to keep. No, ”s-siree. You give it to Sam.“

Sam looked blank for a moment, then fished a folded square of paper from his dusty chaps. He handed it to Enos who handed it to Jasper who handed it to Virgil.

Virgil shook it open with all the pomp of a governor making a formal declaration. Even from where she stood, Esmerelda recognized the sketch in his hand. She’d studied it with her eyes a thousand times, traced it with her finger until it haunted her every dream.

It was the poster branding Billy Darling a wanted man.

Virgil studied the poster, then scowled down at Billy. “I had hoped for better, son. I’m disappointed in you. What would Ma say?”

At the mention of their mother, all the brothers except Billy sighed in unison, then drew off their hats and pressed them over their hearts.

After a moment of respectful silence, Virgil slapped his hat back on and winked at Jasper. “Ah, who cares what Ma would say? I say it took him too dadburned long to get his picture in the family album.”

“Amen!” the others chorused, surrounding their prodigal brother for yet another round of hugs and backslapping.

When Esmerelda realized they were congratulating Billy for being wanted for murder, she was appalled by their bloodthirstiness. But she was even more appalled by the cocky grin Billy wore as he accepted their gruff accolades. It chilled her to realize how much trust she had placed in a man who was little more than a stranger to her. As he basked in his brothers’ fellowship, she recoiled without realizing it, taking several steps backward.