Read The Redhead and the Preacher: A Loveswept Historical Romance for Free Online Page A

purse but her carrying case as well.
    “You stole my money,” she accused as she watched the stranger grit his teeth and force himself to a standing position.
    “You forget, ma’am. I was underneath you.” He glanced around the coach. “Your purse is probably somewhere along the trail with my gun, flung out the window when the coach was being dragged by the horses. Horses!” He caught hold of the carriage and looked around. Without horses they could be in big trouble.
    His worst fears were realized. There was no sign of anyliving thing. They were alone. Night was coming and with it the intense cold of the prairie. At least the woman had a warm cape. Still, they couldn’t survive long out there. They’d have to face the elements and possibly Indians as well. With the Arapaho and the Pawnee at war there were too many hostile Indians in the area.
    He’d spent the best part of his life staying away from innocent, headstrong women. Now here he was, stuck with one who didn’t have sense enough to know the difference between the back and the front of a dress, who was worried about her missing purse when they didn’t even have a gun.
    Bran lifted himself through the open door and slid over the side to the ground, wincing as the jolt set off a fresh round of pain in his head. He touched his head, feeling the sticky evidence of his wound. Apparently his hat had gone the way of his companion’s purse.
    Macky saw him flinch and felt a twinge of guilt that she’d been responsible for the accident. She scrambled out of the fallen carriage, strode to the back of the coach where Bran was studying the surroundings.
    “Everything is lost,” she whispered. “Even my travel case—”
The wages of sin
.
    “No,” Bran corrected her. “It’s behind us. I can see something back down the trail where the coach turned over. If I’m lucky, my gun and my hat will be there.”
    But Macky had already started back toward the patch of color. She could see the wheel, lying where it had rolled to a stop. And something else, a bundle that took shape as she came closer.
    “The driver.” Macky ran toward the man and dropped to her knees beside him. He was still alive, a bullet through his shoulder. “Are you all right?”
    “As all right as a man who’s been shot can be,” he rasped. “Sorry about what happened, ma’am.”
    “Can you walk?”
    “You’re durn right I can,” he blustered. “I was just lying here gettin’ my strength.”
    She helped him to his feet and watched as the preacher picked up something, then walked slowly toward her, taking in the driver and studying the landscape around.
    “What about your head wound?” she asked as he neared.
    “I’ll live.”
    “Unless whoever tried to hold us up comes back. We have a stage, but no horses.”
    “So we walk.”
    “A preacher with a Bible, but no gun.”
    “So, we’ll pray.”
    “I don’t have a lot of confidence in that,” she said.
    “Neither do I,” he snapped.
    She didn’t answer. She didn’t really want to believe that the men chasing them were after the stolen money in her travel case. Instead she looked around for the blue velvet drawstring bag and the preacher’s hat. They were nowhere to be seen.
    “Good shooting back there,” the driver said. “Do you see any of the outlaws?”
    Bran shaded his eyes and searched again. “No. I guess the one who got away must have picked them up.”
    “Who were they?” Macky asked guardedly.
    “Probably that gang that held up the bank back in Promise,” the driver answered. “The ticket agent told me that one of them was riding a horse with a silver-trimmed saddle.”
    “Surely it wasn’t the same man,” Macky said. “There could be more than one saddle like that around.” She tried to convince herself that Pratt couldn’t have known she was on the stage. Still she couldn’t be sure and the thought of being stalked out here in the desert was daunting. “I mean …”
    She looked up at the two