One Wild Rose
by Geri Borcz[ Romance ]
Roselyn O'Neill's mother--a saloon singer with unfortunate taste in men--may have ensured her daughter's childhood was a colorful adventure, but after years of one-horse towns and embarrassing scrapes, Roselyn is ready for a quiet life. Settling down will have to wait, however, because her mother's in trouble again, and to get her out of it Roselyn must retrieve a stolen pouch of jewels. It seems simple enough--until Roselyn meets headstrong Texas Ranger Madsen Bold. Madsen is a man of his word, and a man of the law. He doesn't take kindly to swindlers or cheats--even when they're disguised in as tempting a package as Roselyn--and he's promised to find the missing diamonds for an old friend. But getting rid of Roselyn is as hard as a stale biscuit, and before he knows it, Bold's got the unlikeliest partner he could have imagined. Trouble is, every minute spent with her makes him ache for more--until it seems a lifetime in her arms won't be long enough...
One
People are like shoes--everyone's got a mate somewhere.
--Old saw
* * * *
Colorado Territory, 1867
Saturday night in Deadwater. Judging by the sounds, every moonshiner, hard-rock miner, and Union rowdy within fifty miles crowded the one and only saloon, the kind of hell-raising water hole where an hombre looking to lay low could throw off the trail without attracting attention.
Dogging the cold tracks of such an hombre, Madsen Bold tied up at the hitch rail just as a brawl between two hard cases slammed out the batwing doors and onto the slushy street. Not knowing the gents, Madsen stomped the snow off his boots while he waited for the odds takers to vacate the vestibule.
A white-haired old rooster jostled his way through the crowd and offered to stable Madsen's horse, so he nodded and tossed him a coin. Then Madsen eased his way into the noisy saloon and elbowed a spot near the end of the plank-board bar.
The barkeep was a burly man wearing a dingy apron and chewing on the end of a one-cent cheroot that was stuck in the side of his mouth.
"What's yer poison, mister?" he said. "Whiskey or beer?"
"Coffee," Madsen said.
He propped his Sharps rifle on the floor against the bar, eased his saddlebags off his shoulder, and peeled off his leather gloves and stuffed them into his coat pocket. Under his sourdough coat, a brace of pistols hung low on his hips.
Without batting an eyelash, the barkeep upended a cracked glass and sloshed in two fingers deep from an unlabeled bottle.
"Here," he said, shoving the tumbler toward Madsen. "Wrap yer teeth round that. This ain't no damned restaurant."
Madsen palmed the glass before it tipped and said, "Ever hear the old saw 'The customer is always right'?"
The barkeep removed the cheroot and then offered a cheap smile filled with stumpy teeth.
"Ask me if I give a rat's ass," he said.
Madsen glared back, figured the coffee wasn't worth the trouble, and scanned the rough interior for any familiar mugs.
The ramshackle building resembled a thousand others that he'd seen while on the trail of Teddy Lee Rawlings and his accomplice. Thrown together with spit and vinegar, the shack boasted crude furniture down here and rickety stairs on the far wall that most likely led to the den of sins above.
Three sporting gals, each one looking like ten years of hard times, worked the tables.
"Don't let a quail fly through this place," Madsen mused aloud to the barkeep, "'cause those three would strike a point."
Dressed in wilted purple feathers and dingy white frillies and none too steady on their feet, the only gals in the place each draped themselves over a smelly cowboy who had an itch he'd waited all week to scratch.
"You ain't seen nuthin'," the barkeep said.
And Madsen hadn't, not until she appeared at the top of the stairs, wearing a short red dress and an arresting smile.
"Sweet baby Jesus," Madsen breathed.
The barkeep barked a knowing laugh.
"Told ya. Some sight, ain't she? Rosie's sure bin good for business this last week."
Why would a looker be in Deadwater?
Only one answer popped into Madsen's suspicious mind. Teddy Lee's accomplice was reported to be a blonde of average height and easy on the eyes.
Unless Madsen missed his guess, he was staring at her. If he played his cards right, Madsen could use her to find Teddy Lee.
She certainly knew her trade, for Madsen couldn't peel his gaze away from the stairs. He watched her through air thick with tin-pan piano music, smoke, and innuendo.
"A week, you say?" he asked.
The whiffy barkeep leaned closer and nodded.
"Since word got out 'bout sweetie pie yonder, ever' saddle tramp in the territory has hightailed here to smell her sweat and get hornier'n a three-peckered billy goat. She struts in and flags fly at half-mast like a friggin' parade. Harharhar."
Legs up to her armpits and with a painted face, she wasn't Madsen's type, but she would do for tonight. It was his guess she'd do whatever he wanted, real well.
He leaned a forearm against the bar's edge and cut across the barkeep's rumbling chuckles and polecat smell.
"Where in this one-street town can I get a room and a bath, pronto? Or are you the wrong one to ask?"
Madsen blamed his gruff tone on the blonde. No, on her legs. No, on her dimpled knees. Dimples he'd wanted to wrap around his bare flanks the instant he'd spied them.
He had chased every sunrise to claim dimples like those, preferably attached to an innocent young thing who turned hellcat in bed. Just his luck, his dream dimples advertised a fancy piece.
With barely a pause in spit-polishing a glass, the barkeep gestured up the stairs with his stained rag.
"The room'll cost ya six bits, mister--"
"A day's pay? That's mighty rich."
