"Better taste it," he told her.

She sipped from a jar. "Strong and cold."

"Passable?"

She smiled. "Yes."

"Miss Gibbs," he began.

She looked up uncertainly.

A nagging hesitancy kept him from committing himself by asking if she'd consider allowing him to court her. The words would make a planned relationship seem final, and that finality didn't sit well with him. He couldn't explain his discomfort, but it held him in check.

He felt as though he had to be careful around her, in what he said and the way he presented himself, and he was mildly uncomfortable with the restriction. Something inside just wouldn't let him promise more than he was ready to give.

"Perhaps we could take a Sunday drive," he ventured.

Her gray-blue eyes seemed to assess his intent. "We could have a picnic after church," she offered.

He nodded, at ease with that arrangement.

"Will you join my family in church this week?" she asked.

Was this some sort of test? "Want to make sure you're not...spending time with a heathen?" he asked.

She blinked in surprise. "No. I mean, I don't think so. I just thought...well, that it would be a way to...show your good intentions."

That brought him up short. Good intentions?

CHAPTER EIGHT.

WHAT WERE HIS INTENTIONS? He wasn't sure, and he didn't like the feeling of not being certain of his next move. Planning well and taking precautions had kept him employed and alive for a good many years. He was out of his element in this town and with this young woman, but he wanted the change. Now he had to acclimate to it.

He set the filled jars on a wooden tray. "What do you think I intend, Miss Gibbs?"

"I'm not sure, Sheriff." Her cheeks were ablaze with embarrassment.

"I assure you I don't have designs to sully your reputation or your...innocence," he stated bluntly, because he didn't know any other way. "I just hoped to get to know you."

She wouldn't meet his eyes. She nodded. "I believe you."

"I'll come to church," he said, making up his mind. If he was going to be part of the community, he needed to take part in their activities.

Still without looking at him, she nodded.

Nate picked up the wooden tray, and she followed him through the house to the porch.

LATER THAT NIGHT, once he'd seen Evangeline and Tess back to the Gibbses' home and Joel had gone his own way, Nate toured the boardwalks. The saloons were just closing up, and at the Shady Lady, Big Saul swept dust out onto the walk and then off into the street.

"Evenin', Sheriff," Big Saul said with a boyish grin.

"Busy evening?" Nate asked.

"Yes, sir. Got a peck o' miners in town lately."

There had been an influx of miners since Pete Jenkins had announced a strike nearby.

"Not too late for a drink," a female voice said from the doorway, and Nate glanced over to see Lily silhouetted in the opening. She wore a wine-colored dress with a low neckline and her arms were bare.

Nate took her up on her offer, entering the saloon and moving a stool to the end of the bar.

Lily made them each a rye and cider and sat beside him.

"I hear you're gonna be in the livery business," he commented.

She turned to face him. "Seems so. The town knows already?"

"Not yet. I just found out from the mayor today. Joel Lynch was with me, so by tomorrow plenty more will have heard."

Lily's lips curved into a self-satisfied smile. "I'd love to see a few particular faces when they hear."

"Howard...or Blythe Shaw?"

She tilted her head with a smile.

"Wade Reed...or Meriel?"

"Most definitely, Wade and Meriel."

Nate couldn't help a chuckle at the thought. "Might be worth tellin' 'em myself."

She shrugged. "Suit yourself."

"Is it true, then, that Reed turned you away?"

"It's a fact. Said it wasn't anything personal, that he had to live with his wife and she'd make his life hell."

"Seems he might be sorry."

"I intend to make certain." She sipped her drink. "Until our rigs are here, I'm paying for deliveries from the train depot to my place. Spooner charges an arm and a leg to use his wagons."

"How long do you think it'll be?"

She lifted the hair from her neck with a tired sigh. The warm evening had created charming corkscrews of curls around her face and ears. "Another week or two." From the bar, she picked up a black fan edged with lace and fanned her face. "I can't even go for a ride until I have my own horses and a place for them."

"Can't go for a swim, you mean?"

"I'll get by. It's just a nice quiet way to end a hot crowded night in this place." She dropped her hair back down and shrugged. "My private time in summer. Though I've dipped a time or two when the stream was frigid in the spring and fall."

Without thinking, Nate said, "I can take you. To the stream."

She stared at him. "You?"

He nodded. "I'll give you a ride."

He thought she was going to say no, because she tilted her head and lowered her chin as though she would shake her head, but she surprised him. "Okay."

"Now?" he asked.

"Give me a few minutes to lock up."

Nate finished his drink. "I'll saddle up. Meet me out front."

She picked up their glasses, and with a nod to Saul, Nate headed out.

Wade Reed had given him a key to the stables, so he let himself in, saddled his horse and rode out without disturbing the man.

With toweling over her shoulder, Lily waited on the boardwalk. He rode right up beside her and slid his left foot out of the stirrup, so she could use it to climb up. She settled behind him, her hands at his waist, and moved her foot so he could get his back in the stirrup. He turned the horse's head and urged their mount away from town.

The bright moonlight revealed Lily's bare knee, where she'd drawn her dress up so she could sit behind him. If he reached down, he'd be able to touch her skin. He thought of the vast difference between this woman and the one he'd been with earlier that evening. Lily's reputation was never in question. She wouldn't in a million years think of asking for a chaperone while in his company.

She'd once stood before him in her underclothing, and though it had been dark, he would bet a month's wages she hadn't blushed. There was a painting of her bare naked over the bar in her saloon, after all. Nate suspected any number of men had been alone with Lily, seen her naked, and had paid to enjoy her intimately. Once the erotic image of Lily with a man had formed in his head, he couldn't dislodge it.

Unwise thoughts to allow while in the saddle, he admonished himself as he slid into extreme discomfort. But he couldn't resist looking at her knee again.

His physical reaction was undoubtedly due to the fact that the only women he'd known over the past years were of Lily's sort. He had to redirect his thinking if he was going to make a different life and think about a new wife and family.

They reached the tree-lined stream, and Nate led the horse down the gently sloping bank. He raised his leg over the horse's neck, so he could dismount first and help Lily down.

"I'll wait right here," he told her.

"Sure you don't want to swim?" she asked over her shoulder as she made her way toward the stream. "There's plenty of water, and it's nice and cool."

"I had a bath today," he said, but she was already gone. This wasn't about bathing, this was about cooling off and relaxing. Why not? He hung his hat on the butt of his rifle in its sheath.

Nate walked in the direction she'd gone and found Lily's garments on the flat rock. He tugged off his boots and unbuckled his holster, then removed his shirt. Closer to the bank, he stripped out of his trousers and waded into the cool water a safe distance away from where Lily splashed. In the middle of the stream where the water was over his head, he spent several minutes diving down and then coming up to leisurely float on his back.

Their activity had disturbed the small creatures that normally would have been croaking and chirping, and the night seemed eerily still except for the sound of the water splashing on stones farther up the stream and the hoot of an owl.

He explored the smooth rocks along the stream bed with his feet, while deliberately not turning to see what Lily was doing. Eventually, though, he couldn't resist and looked for her.

She had stepped out of the water and was drying herself behind a clump of shrubbery that permitted glimpses of her skin through the skimpy branches. As she moved he saw a thigh, her back, her foot and ankle...and his mind filled in the rest.

"I usually sit on the bank and dry a little before I put my clothes back on," she called to him.

"Don't let me bother you."

With one length of toweling wrapped around her, she took a seat on the grass and dried her hair with another.

"You gonna let me borrow that?" he asked, standing nearby in waist-high water.

She tossed the towel toward him, and it landed on the bank. She turned to look the other way, and the fact amused him. He chuckled as he waded out and grabbed the towel.

"What's so funny?"

He dried himself as well as he could with the already-damp towel, then wrapped it around his waist. "You. Acting shy."

"What makes you think it's an act?"

"Your body is in plain sight over the bar for all to see."

"Yours isn't."

He laughed again.

He sat down a few feet away from her and let the tantalizing warm night air flutter over his skin and hair.

After a few minutes, the creatures resumed their normal night noises, frogs jumping into the water and croaking from the banks, crickets chirping and animals making tiny rustling sounds in the tall grass.

Lily sat with her face turned up to the sky. "Peaceful, isn't it?"

He agreed. The sounds were familiar and comforting. "I've spent most nights of my life camped under the stars, good weather and bad."

"You've always been free to do as you wish," she said.

There was a measure of envy in her voice. "I reckon so. What about you?"

"I'm free now."

"There's somethin' to be said about now. New starts and all."

"Is that what you're truly doing? Starting over?"

Nate nodded. It was strange how he always ended up talking to this woman. Saying things he never intended to say, things that he'd never said to anyone before. He guessed the quality made her good at her job. She made a man comfortable, set him at ease.

Her shapely shoulders and slender arms were pale in the moonlight, and she sat with her knees drawn up. She wasn't wearing a stitch but that towel. He wished it was daylight so he could see her eyes, the shape of her delicate feet, the way her hair shone.

He needed a woman. Plain and simple. His powerful reaction to this one made the fact obvious.

"You ever think about starting over, Lily?"

She turned to face him, and he wasn't sure if his use of her name delayed her response or if it had been the question. "I did start over, Sheriff. The Shady Lady is my second chance. My independence."