Rose leaned back from Archie as he leaned forward, wrinkling her nose slightly in distaste. Accustomed to invasions of personal space she was, but that didn't mean she had to tolerate his kind of behavior.

At least until he said the words [i]'ten thousand dollars.'[/i] Her mood had never changed so fast.

"You mean—?" she started, but never finished, eyebrows raised almost to her hairline. Oh, yes, she'd seen enough bounty hunters to understand what Archie was trying to tell her. She glanced him over, eyes narrowing slightly as she reevaluated her sudden thrill—she'd never seen the man shoot, and if he grazed one of her customers trying to rake in ten grand...

"I want seven thousand," she said briskly, in an undertone low enough to be inaudible to anyone but him. "You're gonna be shooting up [i]my[/i] saloon, after all. And if you breathe a word of this to anyone else, I'll have you run out of town faster than you can say 'Rampinella,' understand?"