Read Calico for Free Online

creature.”
    Looking him over, Dutch straightened. “You ain’t bloody, so I guess it couldn’t have been all that bad. And I had damn good reason to leave. I had the feeling.”
    “A week’s pay, then,” McCready conceded, knowing Dutch’s
feeling
was nothing to toy with. “Can you get the beastie away so that I might once more stand like a man?”
    “Ain’t fair, boss, losing my pay. You’re lying there—”
    “I didn’t have a choice, man. The mongrel was lying on top of me, barely allowing me a decent breath, much less a move.” McCready eyed Dutch’s hand, absently patting the dog. “Don’t be rewarding her. Get her the hell out of here.”
    “Sure thing, boss. C’mon, girl,” he coaxed, holding the dog by the ruff. “Go home to Maggie.”
    Once Dutch had shown Satin the door, he returned to the end of the bar to watch McCready finish brushing the sawdust from his hair and clothes. There was a tight set to his boss’s mouth that boded ill. McCready poured them both a drink, sipped his, then demanded to know where Dutch had been.
    “Unlike you, I’m not trusting those men you hired away from Quincy to kidnap him. Figured if they sold out to you, they might sell back to him. Went up to the cabin to make sure they were gonna keep him there until I went for him. It was a good thing, too. He was set on upping the ante to bribe them into letting him go.”
    “I paid them plenty to—”
    “I know. I know, boss. But Quincy was talking money. Big money for his freedom. Double what you paid them was the last I heard. I warned them but good just what you’d do to them if Quincy showed his face around here before you were ready for him.” Dutch shook his head. “Still can’t understand why you didn’t just tell Maggie the truth. She wouldn’t want to tie herself to a man who’d do anything to get those claims. She should’ve been told that Quincy planned to have himself kidnapped, and when she came looking for him, they were going to demand she sign over the claims for his life.”
    “They’re my claims, Dutch. Stop forgetting that.”
    He eyed his boss. Ah, McCready was sure getting touchy about Pete’s claims. Dutch decided to abandon talk about them. “You got to admit, boss, that Maggie sure looked pretty dressed in a gown. Didn’t she?”
    The drink that McCready was nursing burned his throat. The glass hit the planked top of the bar. Liquor sloshed over his hand. “Don’t,” he grated from between clenched teeth, “dare mention that creature’s name in my saloon if you value your hide.”
    “Didn’t say a thing about Satin, boss. I was talking about Maggie looking so damn good she—”
    “By the bones of the bonny prince, shut up!” McCready’s eyes closed tight. Once again he saw Maggie’s luscious figure so firmly implanted in his mind that he knew he would never forget it. One of the sins on his most unforgivable list was being duped. Maggie’s offenses through the last year had multiplied until he gave her a priority listing of her own. One that demanded for the sake of male pride that he take some revenge.
    Dutch sensed he had stumbled onto something more than all the past heated confrontations between McCready and Maggie. Like a man probing a throbbing tooth, he couldn’t resist another gingerly made thrust.
    “That woman’s got a right fine figure. Surprised me, I’ll freely admit.”
    “Dutch.”
    Ah, he was right. McCready’s voice was soft. He sipped his drink, cupping the glass to warm the liquor, and kept his gaze pinned to the bottles lined up neatly against the wall.
    “I did some thinking while I rode out to the cabin. Figure with the right educating in manners, she’d be a woman any man would be proud to have on his arm.”
    “I’m fair warning you.”
    “Yes, sir,” Dutch continued, ignoring him, “Mary Margaret has finally grown up.” Smacking his lips, Dutch turned and watched as McCready opened his eyes and faced him. It was a shame that