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you hiring those bad men, Rock Creek is done for."
    "Bad men?" Mary frowned. "They aren't bad men. They've come to help us."
    "Papa says they've come to rob us, most like." Frank took up the tale. "And he says it's all your fault for bringing them here. You're no better than a harlot, going off on your own and paying them to come to town. He says you're asking for it. What are you asking for, Miss McKendrick?"
    Mary studied the two boys. They were only repeating what they'd heard at home, despicable as it was. In years past, any child who spoke like that to a teacher would have been thrashed. Mary had never seen the necessity for physical violence in her classroom, and she wasn't going to start now, even with the Sutton twins.
    Instead, she resorted to the stern voice that had served her well over the eight years she'd been teaching, "Do your sums, boys. Immediately."
    "No. If you're no better than a harlot, then we don't have to listen to you. And neither does anyone else."
    They stood. So did the rest of the class, but as they filed toward the center aisle, they bumped into one another when the Sutton twins stopped dead.
    Reese lounged in the doorway. Dressed in black once again, his Colts gleamed in the afternoon sun. How had he entered without her hearing a thing?
    His green gaze flicked to Mary, and the fury she saw there revealed he'd heard at least the last part of the exchange. When he pushed away from the door and stalked into the room, the nervous shuffling of the children warred with the thunder of Mary's own wildly beating heart.
    "Sit," he murmured.
    No one moved.
    "Sit, sit, sit!"
    The children scattered.
    "Is there a problem, Miss McKendrick?" He kept moving toward the front of the room, his boot heels tapping slowly, like the ticks of a clock in the depths of the night.
    She glanced at the children. All eyes had gone wide and were trained upon Reese. "Nothing I can't handle."
    He reached the head of the room, turned, and leaned against her desk. How was it he seemed to fill the building? Neither she nor the children could look anywhere but at Reese.
    "Really? Seemed to me your charges were having a bit of a problem with today's lesson." He fixed his eyes on Jack. "Is that so?"
    "No, sir."
    Reese switched his gaze to Frank. "And you?"
    "Not me, sir."
    "Hmm. I must have been mistaken. I thought I heard the word harlot ." The children gasped. "But that couldn't be correct, because no gentleman would use a word like that in front of a lady, now, would they?"
    No one answered.
    "Would they?" He didn't raise his voice, but the repetition of the question rolled like thunder through the stillness in the room.
    Ten heads shook frantically. Reese's smile was thin. "I didn't think so." He flicked a hand at the door. "Go."
    They all ran for the door. "Stop!" Mary shouted. She did not have the ability to make everyone listen with a murmur and a glare, but her shout got through, and they did stop. "We have a reading lesson to complete before day's end."
    A collective groan swept the class. They all glanced at Reese. He shrugged. "Sit"
    They sat. Mary moved to the front of the room. Reese kept lounging against her desk like a great black cat. When he didn't move, she went about her business, listening to each child read the lesson. The teaching of reading was a challenge in a room with five different grade levels, but she managed. Mary always managed.
    As she passed Reese on her way to the other side of the room, a harsh, wavering sigh made her glance at him sharply. At first, he seemed completely relaxed, until she peered closer and observed the white lines about his mouth, then heard the tap-tap of his boot. When he raised a hand to pull his hat lower, Mary could have sworn his fingers trembled. She tilted her head so she could see his face beneath the shadow of the black brim and discovered him staring at the children as if they were trolls come out of a dark forest.
    "Reese?"
    His gaze flicked to hers, and for a minute he