The Men of Pride County: The Rebel by Rosalyn West

again. She, too, was wondering. Though she didn’t think they’d been attacked by a force of more than three or four, that was a large enough number to whittle them down to a like-sized group.
    Then Juliet gave a gusty sigh of relief when she heard a beautiful sound wafting on the dusty air.
    The bugle from Fort Blair.
    So that’s Indian-fighting .
    Until that moment, Noble hadn’t realized how truly ignorant he was about the situation he’d committed himself and his men to.
    Cautiously, he lifted himself out of the dirt. His system hummed from the familiar rush of excitement and horror that came after battle, but those sensations were now mixed with afeeling of awe. He and his men had come up against some of the best military forces known to history. They themselves were no strangers to hit-and-run warfare. But he’d never engaged an enemy he couldn’t even see in territory so wild and foreign. All his knowledge of conflict came from set-piece battles fought on wooded terrain against an opponent he could second-guess. Nothing prepared him for this wily enemy, who struck without warning from a seemingly empty wasteland, then disappeared when the fight was no longer to his advantage.
    Holstering his pistol, its chambers still warm, Noble suppressed his uneasiness when presenting his unprotected back to the wasteland, but he allowed himself to slip into the mode of efficient commander. Forgetting that he was not in charge, he called to his second.
    “What are our casualties, Captain?”
    Bartholomew’s count was far from good news. “Privates Washburn, Morgan, Long, and LeRoy. Corporal Stevens.”
    Refusing to let himself feel for those men or even to conjure up their faces until it was safe to do so, Noble ordered, “Have a detail prepare them for travel. We’ll pay our respects to them once we get to the fort.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    The fast-approaching dust cloud became an identifiable force of men on the horizon. A company from Fort Blair, no doubt, come to the rescue of raw recruits and Southern foolswho were equally scared and ignorant of how to keep themselves safe on the frontier.
    The column of dusty soldiers drew up, and its major dismounted to address Crowley with a sharp salute and a crisp, “We came as fast as we could once we heard gunfire.”
    “I applaud your haste, Major. And I welcome your escort back to Fort Blair.”
    No sooner had the major replied with a “Yes, sir, thank you, sir” than there was a delighted feminine cry.
    “Miles!”
    Juliet Crowley threw herself into the arms of the grinning major, who hugged her up and whirled her about unashamedly. Noble blinked in surprise, the unseen hostiles, the bundled bodies that were once friends momentarily forgotten.
    He’d never thought … He’d never considered …
    When he’d seen Juliet standing in shock, lost in an hysterical daze, an easy target for an Apache arrow, something had snapped inside him. Enough. He’d seen enough innocents die, and he could not bear to see Juliet Crowley’s indomitable spirit added to that number. Without thought to his own safety, he’d raced across open ground to push her out of harm’s way, but that’s where honor aided.
    How good she’d felt in his arms. Soft where a woman was meant to be soft, yet strong with the lean, hard muscle of an active life, a combinationthat sent all sorts of arousing signals through him.
    He’d grown up around and had courted his share of women, the most beautiful, dainty, and refined creatures the Middle States had to offer, women trained to reflect well upon the men they married. He was used to gentle blushes and coquettish manners and had thought that was what he desired in the opposite sex—until he’d met the colonel’s headstrong daughter and she’d knocked all his notions of desirability askew.
    Not that he was in the market for a wife. His life was carefully regimented, meticulously planned down to the slightest detail. Once he got out of this army, he’d