A/N: Here's the next chapter, everyone. I am so glad that the western, complete with sexy cowboys, is still alive and well, judging by the amount of reads and comments this story has received. Please make sure you vote, fan and comment, to move this story up the ranks. Thanks so much to everyone!
Margaret Mary O’Malley was a great judge of character. Her late husband had said so nearly every day, right up until the afternoon he’d been killed in a marauding Indian attack several years earlier. And Margaret Mary had believed him.
“Margaret Mary, me-darlin’,” he’d say with that twinkle in his sky blue eyes that she dearly loved to gaze into and missed seeing ever since his death, “ You can tell a weasel of a man from a prince even before he opens his mouth, and that’s the truth. Ye have The Sight, my love, and that’s no blarney.”
Whether that was really true or not Margaret Mary couldn’t really say, being God-fearing and all. But she did realize she understood people.
So when the dusty, lanky stranger showed up on her boardinghouse doorstep asking for a room one day, looking defeated and trail-weary, it only took the Irish woman a split second to agree. Gazing into his silver, snake charmer’s eyes she’d seen death, suppressed anger, and sorrow. And while each of those emotions examined separately might have tempted her to turn him away, taken collectively Marge found herself accepting him as a boarder, with her usual stipulations.
“Rent’s due on Fridays. You miss the deadline, sheriff’s out here haulin’ your sorry carcass off to jail for trespassin’ the followin’ morning. Meals are at seven, noon, and six. I expect clean hands and boots, and no spurs at the table or in the house. There’s no smokin’ in bed, no entertainin’ anyone in your room, and if you chew, make sure you don’t miss the spittoon; I don’t cotton to stains on my clean floors.”
Taking a breath while steadily holding the gunman’s gaze, Margaret Mary was surprised to see a glint of humor behind those icy orbs, most likely put there by her rules. Well, the next one would wipe that amusement right off his face…
“And when you’re in the house your guns get locked in my downstairs safe. Everyone’s. No exceptions. If that’s a deal-breaker, then adios.”
Yup, there it went. The gunfighter’s face turned to stony disbelief, blue eyes widening as he carefully licked his lips in preparation to speaking. Margaret Mary found herself wondering which argument he would use—
“You’ll take my gun?”
Margaret Mary’s Kelly green eyes sizzled into his while she replied unequivocally, “Yessir. There’s no need to have one in your room. Ain’t nobody comin’ into your space, Sir. Not in my establishment. An’ I have a shotgun at my disposal for any thievin’ varmints. Can shoot the rattle right off a rattler at thirty yards, so don’t you go worryin’ none about your virtue, Mister. It’s safe with me.”
Margaret Mary laughed uproariously at her own joke while the gunman settled his hypnotic stare onto her. Wouldn’t matter; she’d stared down tougher hombres than this man, and would do so again.
Meeting him look for look she continued, leaning a negligent shoulder against the white painted door jam, “Now, you can keep your gun if you want to bed down out in the barn with your horse; which, by the way, you have to take care of yourself. I have the feed, but muckin’ and feedin’ is your responsibility.”
The gunslinger shrugged, commenting dismissively, “That’s fine; I do it anyway. But…my gun?”
His frown was comical to Margaret Mary. Lordy, but men treated their weapons like—well, like an extension of themselves!
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