Branded by the Texans [Three Star Republic] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Read online

  BRANDED BY THE TEXANS

  Three Star Republic

  Savanna Kougar

  MENAGE AMOUR

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  ABOUT THE E-BOOK YOU HAVE PURCHASED: Your non-refundable purchase of this e-book allows you to only ONE LEGAL copy for your own personal reading on your own personal computer or device. You do not have resell or distribution rights without the prior written permission of both the publisher and the copyright owner of this book. This book cannot be copied in any format, sold, or otherwise transferred from your computer to another through upload to a file sharing peer to peer program, for free or for a fee, or as a prize in any contest. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. Distribution of this e-book, in whole or in part, online, offline, in print or in any way or any other method currently known or yet to be invented, is forbidden. If you do not want this book anymore, you must delete it from your computer.

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000."

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Ménage Amour

  BRANDED BY THE TEXANS

  Copyright © 2010 by Savanna Kougar

  E-book ISBN: 1-60601-338-6

  First E-book Publication: August 2010

  Cover design by Amanda Kelsey

  All cover art and logo copyright © 2010 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter from Savanna Kougar

  Regarding Ebook Piracy

  Dear Readers,

  Please remember my books with Siren-BookStrand are copyrighted and are, therefore, only for sell from legitimate vendors.

  While I love writing and I love the mental adventure of creating my erotic love stories, still, this is my profession. I work exceptionally hard at it. Often, I agonize over just the right word or phrase ~ or, how to construct a particular paragraph, because I want my story to be the best it can be. I want you to enjoy it as much as possible.

  Also, I ask you to respect me as an author-artist. I believe I have a right to earn my living this way. And, I can’t do that if my e-books are stolen by those who don’t respect the stories I have painstakingly created.

  With deep gratitude,

  Savanna Kougar

  DEDICATION

  This is dedicated to all the cowboys and cowgirls I grew up watching on television and on the silver screen. I owe you this story.

  BRANDED BY THE TEXANS

  Three Star Republic

  SAVANNA KOUGAR

  Copyright © 2010

  Chapter One

  Escaping Jail

  Midwestern city,

  the downtown police station

  April 18, 2009

  Kylie’s tears slid down her over-heated cheeks. Squeezing the bars of the jail cell harder, she mentally shoved down the desperation that threatened to make her start screaming and not stop. As she watched her knuckles turn to a sickening shade of white, she felt the cool metal heat rapidly.

  Forcing her fingers to loosen, she prayed again. Please, please, get me out of here, God. From the moment she’d been arrested, Kylie had vacillated between downright panic and feeling freaking surreal, as if she were watching a movie, one she didn’t want to see.

  For the thousandth time, she asked herself how the fucking hell she was getting out of this mess. She’d done nothing wrong. Yet, here she was, alone, in jail.

  The stench of un-flushed human waste gagged her repeatedly. She’d tried covering her nostrils with the bottom of her T-shirt. Only now, her skin and clothes had been saturated. Nope, the horrible smell assaulted her constantly, burned her eyes, and caused her stomach to clench in painful knots.

  Not caring who witnessed her despair, Kylie wept harder. Trying not to choke, she grabbed breaths of the freshest air she could. Not that crying did her any good whatsoever.

  Bill, her housemate and ex-lover, couldn’t help her. He’d taken off for the weekend to visit his undergraduate buds at some good-times geek hangout outside of Charleston, West Virginia, some seven hundred fifty miles away.

  Kylie halted her tears and stiffened her jaw. Refusing to sniffle, she tried to think even though her brain felt like the overcooked oatmeal at a diner her friends frequented. Staring straight ahead, she realized she saw nothing.

  Since it was Saturday night, her friends were out and about. It’s not like she’d memorized their cell numbers, even if she’d been allowed the so-called one phone call. No, she’d been denied.

  The officer, who reminded her of a street thug, had gripped her upper arm and roughly pushed her toward a large cell filled with obvious prostitutes and pathetic-looking alcoholics. The sour smell of vomit had been so vile that Kylie had merely nodded her acquiescence and allowed him to lock her inside a smaller cell. So, no phone call.

  Glancing at her bloodless knuckles, Kylie wondered if she should be feeling pain by now. Oh God, help. The words were torn from her core. Briefly, she rested her forehead on the bars, repeating them in her head while every TV show and movie she’d ever seen with a prison scene flashed before her mind’s eye, including the old Paul Newman classic, Cool Hand Luke.

  She moaned to herself. What we have here is a failure to communicate. Yeah, crap, she was in serious fucking trouble. Not one officer had shown the slightest interest in her innocence.

  Kylie swallowed past her tight raw throat and tamped down her urge to retch. Forgetting to keep her breathing short and shallow, she sucked in a large breath and nearly heaved from the nasty odors that permeated everything around her.

  Worst of all, it wasn’t like some overworked and underpaid public defender would do her any good, even if a judge forced her to get one. At least, though, she’d remained completely silent when they’d badgered her over and over to confess to a crime she hadn’t committed. No, she wasn’t falsely confessing to anything, or signing anything either.

  She’d had a firsthand view of how “the system” worked when her baby sister had been accused of assaulting her ex-husband. Only a neighbor coming forward with a video of her ex wielding a baseball bat and giving it to the lawyer her parents had paid for by mortgaging their house to the hilt had finally saved her sister from being sent to prison.

  Fucking damn hell. There was no way she could afford a lawyer. All her money had been spent on her university graduate classes and her botany experiments. Her experiments. Yep, the very reason claustrophobia clawed her belly and she felt scared down to her numb toes.

  Apparently grow lights in a basement and a larger-than-normal energy bill meant an automatic raid from the city’s SWAT team. News to her, though not exactly surprising, given the YouTube vids she’d watched recently of cops abusing innocent people.

  Once again, tears seeped betwee
n her clenched eyelids as scenarios of a hideous future spent in prison seized her mind. Before she could stop herself, her tongue caught the wet saltiness flowing faster by the second.

  The two cops who’d interrogated her had already demanded she give up all the names of the people she sold her pot to. For a few nightmare moments, she’d thought about giving them false names for all of her non-existent customers, that is, until she realized there might be someone with that name who would now be accused of something they hadn’t done. Like her.

  Kylie clamped her eyelids together, then pressed her forehead against the cool unyielding bars. Oh God, Goddess…Whoever…

  The metallic slam of a door caught her attention. Cracking open one of her swollen eyelids, Kylie followed the progress of an African American

  woman officer. She appeared to be out of her domain by the way she tentatively gazed around. Besides, her uniform looked more clerical and crisp than what Kylie had seen the cops wearing earlier.

  Also, elaborate braids crowned her head, and two super long braids draped over her ample bustline. No, she definitely wasn’t a patrol officer.

  Kylie blinked. It looked like the woman was headed her way. Had someone come to help her? Someone she didn’t know about? The woman stopped, glanced around again, then looked over her shoulder as if she feared being discovered. Moving fast now, she stopped close to Kylie’s cell.

  “Kylie Susan Wexler?” she asked in a whisper.

  Kylie stilled, then felt destiny shake her. “Yes, why?”

  “It must be the Lord’s work they put you in here, away from all the others.” Without hesitation, the woman unlocked her cell door, then pierced Kylie with a full-on gaze.

  “Must be.” Kylie inched toward freedom.

  “You’ve got to get out here now while I got the cameras down.” She spoke in a loud rush of her voice. “They’re planning to hang your young pretty butt out to dry. And, from the report I read, you aren’t guilty.”

  All Kylie could do was stare as the cell door eased open. No words worked themselves past her constricted throat.

  “Take my advice, honey. Get the hell out of town any way you have to. And don’t ever come back.”

  Kylie slid through the narrow opening, with escape her only goal at this point.

  “Now listen to me, and you listen good. I can lose your paperwork for a while. By my reckoning, you’ve got about four hours before someone discovers something is wrong. I’ve got your purse and a taxi waiting.”

  The woman spun around on her heel. “Come on,” she loudly ordered for everyone to hear. “Your lawyer is here.”

  Blinking as if she was beneath a spotlight, Kylie followed. Better this than going down for a crime she didn’t commit. Run, rabbit, run. The phrase took over her mind as she kept pace.

  “Your best option is to find some small out-of-the way town, a couple of states away.” Her savior paused. “You understand?”

  “I understand,” Kylie automatically replied.

  The woman halted abruptly. “In here.”

  Kylie peeked inside before moving to enter. Seeing only her purse, she rushed inside, grabbed it up and whirled back toward the exit.

  “Do you know your way out?” The woman’s gaze shone with concern.

  “Just point me in the right direction.”

  “Go to your right, take the stairs, then follow the corridor. If anyone says anything…never mind, they won’t. You just act like you’re supposed to be leaving. I figure if you gotta a car, pack up whatever you can as fast as you can and leave. No one will be watching your place.”

  “I do...have a car.”

  “Don’t gas up in town. Drive for as long as you can before filling up. You understand?”

  Kylie nodded and clutched her large purse against her chest like a shield. “Thanks,” she whispered, “thanks so much.”

  Pivoting, she kept her stride as normal as possible while her heart pounded frantically. At the same time, gratitude for the woman’s compassion and bravery welled up inside her.

  With fear gnawing at her insides like some sort of ravenous beast, Kylie rapidly negotiated the station. No one glanced in her direction as she walked toward the front entrance, except for a couple of twenty-something men, who looked like they’d been at a beer-guzzling party.

  Freedom called her name big time. Still, she forced herself to act casually, strolling out the station’s front door. Greeted by the slight breezes of late evening and the hanging half-moon, Kylie paused and heaved in several breaths. A sense of relief flooded through her. Seconds later, it was lost to her rising panic.

  Looking for the taxi, she saw one parked not far from the sweep of the granite steps. God, hopefully, it waited for her. With her heart thumping to a heavy metal beat, she walked down the steps, stiff as a mannequin. As she neared the bottom step, a cold sweat bathed her.

  Crap, she felt like an escaping criminal when she wasn’t one. Firming her chin and putting a death grip on her handbag, Kylie focused on the taxi. To her surprise, the driver got out, a tall good-looking African American man.

  Subtly nodding to her, he opened the passenger door as she neared. Kylie nearly dived inward. Once he’d closed the door, she clutched her purse, her hand shaking uncontrollably. Shit!

  Sliding into his seat, her driver gazed at her in the rearview mirror. “Where to, ma’am?”

  Kylie spoke her address, unable to halt the quiver in her voice.

  “Harold.” He said his name, his voice deep, and with a rolling resonance she liked.

  “Kylie.”

  Easing he cab away from the curb, he flowed into the minimal traffic. This part of downtown, where skyscrapers owned the horizon, remained deserted at night. Hugging herself, she sank against the seat, her mind racing with what she’d need to pack up, so she could make a run for it.

  Run for it. Run for the border. The stock phrases captured her brain. Kylie knew without doubt, she’d make a run for it, even if she couldn’t find a safe place to live. Anything was better than prison.

  “Kylie,” he repeated, his manner reassuring. “I’m Liza’s significant other.”

  Liza, the name on her savior’s name tag. “Nice to meet you. I can’t say how grateful I am for her bravery.”

  “Liza can’t stand injustice. She’ll stop it any way she can.”

  “Not too easy in today’s world, is it?”

  “No, ma’am. Some of us are forming a group like the underground railroad to help those who are innocent and have no chance in the justice system.”

  “God bless you. I wish I could stay and help.”

  “Kylie, you’ll be helping us best by getting yourself outta here.” Harold turned right onto the gently winding thoroughfare that would take them near her house.

  “Don’t have much choice,” she muttered loud enough for him to hear her.

  After concentrating on finding his lane, Harold gazed at her in the rearview mirror. “How old are you, Kylie?”

  “Twenty-seven.” She sighed raggedly, freeing her handbag from her squeezing fist. In the next instant, realization smacked her upside the head. “Well, there’s goes my PhD. Down the drain. Gurgle, gurgle.”

  “You got the skills. That’s what matters.”

  She took a few moments to think about his words. “You’re right in one way. A PhD in this economy may not mean much. Several of my friends are already struggling and can’t find the career jobs they want.”

  There was a long moment of silence as Harold maneuvered the cab to make a left-hand turn. “It would be best if you didn’t contact any of your friends or family for a long time.”

  Kylie nodded, an automatic movement while her stomach plummeted to her toes, then imitated a pretzel. He was right. Somehow, she’d have to try to start over somewhere far away.

  Scenes from the old TV series Northern Exposure flashed through her mind. Even though the show was one of her faves for her downtime, Alaska was out of the question. Kylie had never been a fan of co
ld weather, except for skiing trips. “Yeah, it would be best.”

  “That’s the first thing they’ll do. Question your family and friends.”

  Once Harold cruised down her neighborhood street, he scanned their surroundings carefully. “Soon as you get packed, go to the nearest ATM and withdraw as much of your money as you can. Then, go stock up on groceries and anything else you can think of that will be of use. Do it fast. Only use your credit cards, if you have any. Once you’re close to running out of gas, use your credit card for the first gas fill up. After that, find the nearest commercial Dumpster and toss in your credit cards, any paper checks, and your ID, including your driver’s license. Leave some bait so someone will find them and start using your identity. You understand?”

  His gaze in the rearview mirror pierced her.

  Feeling icy inside, Kylie nodded. “Yes, I understand.”

  “Once you get rid of everything that could identify you, and I mean everything, use mud or paint that looks like mud to cover your license plates. Not completely…”

  “I get it,” she interrupted softly. “I’m on the run even though I’m innocent.”

  “There are still areas in the country where you can get lost. Where people don’t care why you’re there.”

  “I hope so.” Her voice sounded forlorn to her own ears.

  At a snail’s pace, Harold drove toward the front of her house, then parked. “Nope, no cops around. If you have a flashlight or candles, use them, Kylie. Best not to turn on the lights. Oh, and don’t leave a note for anyone. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going. Or how you’re out of jail.”

  “I won’t. I promise. Thanks. Really, thanks. I’m sorry if I don’t sound thankful. I’m starting to feel numb inside.” She reached for the door handle.