Wanted is a Western with a former outlaw as the heroine. After a long stretch of reading nothing but European Historicals, it was kind of nice to read a book set in the West. This one was decent enough, but nothing exceptional.

The Reno gang has fallen on hard times. While the ringleaders languish in prison, the rest of the gang fight with each other and look over their shoulders for the Pinkertons. One of them, Catfish Jack, tries to move in on Little Red – the only female member of the gang – but she refuses him. He might have tried something more, but the Pinkertons move in with guns blazing.

Five years later Little Red Reno is out of prison and on the straight and narrow. She changed her name to Lark Reneau and works as a teller in a bank – a job she loves and is good at. She has totally turned against the outlaw life and hidden her past from everyone. One evening at her boarding house, Lark is visited by Catfish Jack, who wants her to tell him where the money is from a long-ago (before he joined the gang) heist. Lark knocks him out and runs to the local priest, who tells her to go see Ross Santanta.

Ross Santana is a former bounty hunter who had to give it up when he lost an eye to a shotgun blast. Now he lives with his sister Chat and makes furniture. He is not all that happy to take in a former outlaw, but Chat takes a liking to Lark and she soon settles in. It turns out that Catfish Jack was the one who shot out Ross’s eye, and Jack is still out there. He wants that heist money and he wants it now – and Catfish can be very dangerous.

Ross and Lark took some time making up their minds about each other. They are attracted, but spend an awful lot of time giving each other suspicious looks while thinking, “Outlaw” and “Bounty Hunter” until they finally agree to work together. Lark’s respectability is everything to her, and she plans on going to the bank and confessing her past to the owner. Ross goes along to guard her since Catfish Jack is still on the loose, but Catfish got to town first, threatened the owner of the newspaper, and now a story about Lark’s past has been published. The only way that Lark can be free is to capture Catfish, so she and Ross set out to do just that.

This isn’t the best western romance I’ve ever read, but it’s not bad. I enjoyed it even though there are a lot of coincidences in the book that almost strained my easygoing self to the breaking point. Lark and Ross were a decent couple, though they are going to have to work really hard on communicating with each other. The bank president’s little boy, who is obsessed with outlaws and all but idolizes Lark when he finds out she is one, is a cute character and Ross’s sister Chat is pleasant as can be. I can’t call Wanted a masterpiece, but it’s a decent enough book that kept me entertained while I read it.