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help but think about her sweet curvy bottom or just how good it felt nestled between his legs.
    She scooted a little closer, and he bit back a groan when she twisted in the saddle and faced him. “I’m Charity Wilde. I’d shake your hand but a formal introduction seems a little redundant now.” A slight smile touched her lips. Luscious lips that matched her luscious body.
    “Mike Flynn,” he said, aiming his gaze at the wide-open stretch of prairie in front of them. But even though he was looking straight ahead, he couldn’t miss the frown forming on Charity’s face, and then her wide-eyed surprise when she realized they’d crossed paths once before.
    “The minister?”
    “That’s right.”
    Her frown deepened. “We’ve met, haven’t we?”
    “I suppose you could call it that.” He’d thought about asking her to dance the night of Lauren’s wedding, thought about holding a woman close for the first time since Jessie had died. But Charity had walked right past him and latched on to another man.
    They were sitting so close right now that he could feel her gulping down her embarrassment, could feel her entire body tense. Without a doubt, everything she’d said and done that night was coming back to her.
    “I thought you lived in
Florida
. I thought you’d been hired to perform Max and Lauren’s wedding, that no one would ever see you after that.”
    “You thought wrong. I live here.”
    She swallowed again. “You didn’t hear what I said to Max and Lauren at their reception, did you?”
    Sarcasm wasn’t his usual style, but he hit her with it anyway. “You mean about not liking ministers?”
    “I don’t think those were my exact words.”
    “Close enough.”
    “I suppose you’re going to hold that against me?”
    He wasn’t a vindictive man. It went against his nature, but Charity didn’t need to know that.
    “Maybe.” He grinned. “Maybe not.”
     

Chapter 3
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    Actually, it wasn’t ministers Charity didn’t like. It was the
preaching
. The moralizing. The lecturing. And most of all, the constraints. Her father’s hell-fire-and-brimstone sermons weren’t just for show. He didn’t espouse one thing on Sunday and something else during the week. Oh, no. Chaplain Mattingly ruled his household strictly. His word was gospel and heaven forbid anyone disobey.
    Pastor Flynn seemed to see things in the same light. He felt that wild horses needed to be constrained and controlled; so did wild women, which meant she and the good pastor were doomed to butt heads. Too bad, because he was the most devilishly handsome creature she’d ever encountered.
    He didn’t look like a preacher, nor did he look like the kind of man who could stand at a pulpit—or anywhere for that matter—and lecture about right and wrong, about righteousness, morality, or the sins of the flesh. He looked and acted like he could break every commandment except “Thou shalt not kill”—but then, there had been a few moments tonight when she thought he might be capable of doing just that.
    He had an amazing way of controlling his temper—there was that control factor again—but she could see it seething beneath his surface. There had been no doubt at all that he was hotter than hell when she stood between him and Satan, and ready to explode after Satan got away. She figured Mike could easily strangle her for instigating that fiasco.
    But here he was taking care of her, in spite of her waywardness. She supposed that was the ecclesiastical thing to do, but there was no telling what was going through his mind. He probably assumed she was a trollop, a no-account showgirl who’d go to hell for sure. Her father and mother thought that, in spite of their love for her, so why shouldn’t he?
    She let go of her frustration on a sigh, knowing full well that it didn’t do any good to brood over the disdain her parents felt for her profession, a career that meant everything to her.
    “Something