Dinca’s review of The Gunfighter and the Heiress by Carol Finch
Historical Romance published by Harlequin Historical 19 Jul 11

A delightful, fast-paced trip through the bad lands of Texas, you will not find a dull moment in this book. The characters are strong and independent and butt heads as well as lips along their wild journey.

Donovan Crow has completed his last assignment and all he wants to do now is sleep. When he receives a telegram telling him his fiancé is arriving, he thinks it is a trap to kill him. What woman in her right mind would want to marry a half-breed Indian gunslinger/bounty hunter? After having a look at the sassy, determined women with the most spunk he’s ever seen, he decides this might be the easiest money he has ever made.

Natalie  Robedeaux Blair is determined to save her family fortune from her greedy stepfather who is trying to marry her off to his handpicked pawn. After her mother’s death she devises a plan too and finds her own handpicked husband and bodyguard. When Bart, Crow’s business manager, is shot, she realizes that anyone who tries to help her is put in harm’s way, so she rethinks her plan and tries to go it on her own so no one else gets hurt because of her.

Marsh, Natalie’s stepfather, adds another name to his list of people in his way to get his hands on the Robedeaux-Blair fortune – Donovan Crow. He will still make her a widow and carry on with his plan to marry her off to the simpering wimp with gambling debts that he’s found. As soon as the Robedeaux-Blair fortune is signed over to him, neither Crow nor Natalie will be left alive, so his secret is safe.

There are a whole slew of bad guys, too many to mention here without going on and on. Bad guys that should be good guys and Indians being bad to do good and Texas Rangers, I am sure, who will, in turn, have stories of their own. If you don’t have this book, get it. If you have it on your TBR list, put it at the top. You will not be disappointed.

Grade: A

Summary:

From hired gun to hired groom…

Money can’t buy love…but it can buy marriage for on-the-run shipping heiress Natalie Blair. Her vicious stepfather’s scheming ways have the Louisiana beauty fleeing to Texas to seek out legendary contract gunfighter Donovan Crow. He is dark, dangerous, and marrying him would be the perfect protection…

For Van, the price is right and the spirited woman is impossible to resist. Soon the hardened bachelor can’t tell what’s more challenging—keeping their
legions of enemies at bay or keeping his hands off his fake wife!

Read an excerpt.