The Brides 0f Purple Heart Ranch Boxset, Bks 1-3

by Shanae Johnson

  She had surprised him. But why had her voice taken on a sour note? Reed noticed that Sarai’s gaze had slid past him and was now darting at something behind him. At someone behind him.

  Eva stood watching the whole exchange with interest. Reed knew this whole incident would be spread around the ranch in just a matter of seconds once she whipped out her phone and texted Fran. That was the payoff for living in close quarters.

  He didn’t blame Eva. He’d do the same if he had a juicy tidbit about one of the others. It was something Sarai would have to get used to when she came into their group.

  A thought entered Reed’s mind. A thought he hadn’t dared to consider until now. There was time.

  There was enough time to convince Sarai that they were right for each other. Not for right now but for always. He had just over a month to take her on a few dates, sweep her off her feet, and then pop the question. Not because he had to, but because he wanted to.

  Reed didn’t knock arranged marriages and marriages of convenience. But this—what he felt for Sarai—this was something else. He couldn’t call it love at first sight. Even though this was the first time he was seeing her live and in the flesh. He’d fallen for her just through their conversations, and he believed she’d done the same.

  So why was she fidgeting and not meeting his gaze? Because her gaze was still darting behind him. At Eva.

  She couldn’t think that— That he could possibly— Didn’t she know that he wasn’t the kind of guy to lie or cheat?

  Reed reached back with his prosthetic and motioned to Eva. “Sarai Austin, I’d like you to meet Eva DeMonti, Fran’s wife.”

  “Fran’s wife?” said Sarai.

  Reed heard the relief rush through her voice. She had doubted him. He couldn’t understand why. He’d have to work harder to make sure she knew how much she meant to him.

  Eva stepped forward with a welcoming, non-threatening smile of a woman who was not after a man. The two women shook hands. Then Eva’s eyes went large.

  “Wait?” said Eva. “Sarai Austin? The model?”

  It was almost imperceptible. Reed probably wouldn’t have noticed it except he was staring so intently at Sarai. He saw her shoulders hunch at Eva’s recognition.

  Reed had known Sarai was a model. She’d mentioned it in her profile. But he couldn’t remember them talking about it in any of their conversations. She’d only ever mentioned her beauty blog.

  “That was a lifetime ago.” Sarai wrapped her arms around her figure as though she were trying to hide herself.

  “I know,” said Eva. “Now you do a makeup blog. You taught me how to do the smoky eye.”

  Eva waved her fingers in front of her eyes and widened her gaze. Reed hadn’t noticed that there was coloring on the lids of Eva’s eyes until just now.

  “It looks really good,” said Sarai, a small smile on her face as she narrowed her gaze at Eva’s eyes. “You have a really nice tilt to your eyes. You should elongate the corners with a thin pencil to accentuate that.”

  “Good tip,” said Eva.

  Reed had no idea what the two women were on about. He only knew he wanted to spend more time with Sarai, preferably alone so he could start his campaign to win her hand.

  “Maybe you could show me how sometime?” Eva continued. “If you ever come to the ranch.”

  Sarai looked uncertainly at Reed.

  “Yes, you should come out to the ranch,” said Reed. “I was just about to take Eva back. You could come with us.”

  “Oh, I’m not dressed to go out,” said Sarai.

  She looked beautiful to him. Even in the jogging pants and the oversized sweatshirt. Besides, the ranch wasn’t a place for fancy dressing. But he didn’t want their first time in each other’s presence to be spoiled by meeting his entire squad and their even more meddlesome wives.

  “Why don’t you come to grab a bite at Patel’s with us,” said Reed. “It’s the least I can do since I’m responsible for ruining your dinner.”

  “It’s okay,” she said, looking down at the curry-stained paperback on the sidewalk. “It wasn’t for me. I mean, I shouldn’t have gotten it anyway.”

  Reed frowned at that statement. Instead of pursuing dinner at the restaurant, which she did not seem open to, he decided on another route. “Can I give you a lift home?”

  Sarai blinked at him, as though she didn’t understand the question. Her gaze slid down his arm, his prosthetic arm.

  “I do have my driver’s license.” He felt his jaw tighten and tried to loosen it.

  But Sarai didn’t look at him in shock. Realization dawned in her green eyes. A small sigh escaped her lips. He knew that sigh. It was the sound she made before she launched a counter-attack on whatever debate they were having.

  “Oh, no,” she said. “It’s just that I’m not that far. I live in walking distance.”

  “Well, can I walk with you?”

  Sarai took a deep breath this time. This sound was new to Reed. It sounded to him as though she were summoning courage. He couldn’t imagine what there was to be brave about.

  She squared her shoulders, stepped back, and opened her arms. “Are you sure?”

  Reed didn’t hesitate. “Of course I’m sure.”

  Sarai’s hands dropped to her sides. Reed couldn’t see her curves due to the excessive cloth covering her skin, but he knew they were there. He was more intent on looking into her eyes. He could get lost in her gaze.

  With her arms at her sides, she still looked at him as though she were confused. But then she nodded in acceptance. “Okay then.”

  Reed turned to Eva and handed her his car keys. “Order mine to go. I’ll be back in a bit.”

  “Take your time.” Eva grinned.

  Reed turned back to Sarai. He offered her his arm. His heart stopped when she hesitated again.

  But she wasn’t looking at his prosthetic. She was looking into his eyes, searching for something. He supposed she found whatever she was looking for because she slipped her hand in the crook of his elbow where he still had flesh. Reed’s entire body came alive with just that small touch.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sarai kept her arms wrapped tight around her middle. She hoped against hope that the maneuver had a slimming effect on her rotund body. But she doubted it.

  With every lift of her foot, she felt the jiggle of her upper thighs rubbing together. With every foot placed in front of the other, she heard the ground shake. Could Reed hear it too?

  He must have with the way he was fidgeting. He tugged at his ear with his right hand. Then he adjusted a mechanism on his prosthetic.

  Sarai marveled at how realistic the fingers looked. The only thing that gave them away was the fact that they weren’t twitching like the fingers of his right hand. Reed reached the apparatus out to her and Sarai jerked, embarrassed that she’d been staring.

  “I’m sorry.” Reed pulled his hand away. “It’s just that you’re walking on the outside of the sidewalk and closer to the cars. My father beat into my head that a gentleman always puts himself in front of danger for a lady.”

  Sarai hadn’t been considering her safety when she’d chosen which side of the sidewalk to walk on. She’d only been considering her angles. Her right side was her best side. She’d learned through her years of modeling. She needed every advantage she could get.

  But she allowed Reed to cross over to the left side of her. He placed both his arms behind his back as they walked. Sarai busied herself trying to angle her body as she walked so that he got a view of her right side, her better side. Her machinations had her walking straight into a pole.

  Reed put his prosthetic arm out in front of her, between her and the tree stump of a pole. Her belly impacted the prosthetic and bark scraped against the fake arm.

  “I’m so, so sorry.” Sarai stepped back, rearranging her sweatshirt to hide the evidence of the rolls. But she knew he’d already felt them. Or if not felt them, he had to have felt the impact. There were wood chippings along
the arm.

  “Did I hurt you?” he asked.

  Shouldn’t she be asking him that question? But he simply flicked the pieces of bark from his prosthetic and focused his gaze on her. Again, on her face, not her body.

  She wasn’t even wearing full makeup, but he didn’t seem to notice. She’d never believed that about guys, that they didn’t notice makeup. But it must be true with Reed. His smile was bright and genuine and … interested.

  “How was your flight?”

  Sarai gulped before she let loose the lie. Her tongue was feeling heavier than her frame. “It was fine.”

  “Nasty airplane food? Is that why you were at Patel’s?”

  “I shouldn’t have gone there. I’m on a diet.”

  Reed frowned down at her, finally looking somewhere that wasn’t her eyes.

  Sarai held her breath. She sucked it in. But who was she kidding?

  Reed shook his head. “I’ve never understood the concept of diets. It must be a girl thing.”

  Sarai stared at him. Maybe he was blind? Did he not see the colossal weight she was carrying around?

  “I’m sorry, was that sexist?” he said with a deprecating smile. “I just don’t believe in depriving myself. That’s why I wanted to see you sooner rather than later. You know I was actually contemplating flying out to Paris this weekend?”

  Sarai’s heart quickened, faster than it had when she’d been moving along to that exercise video. Could falling for a guy be considered as a workout? Because if so, she would lose the weight in no time under Reed’s attention.

  “Anyway, Patel’s is one of my favorite restaurants,” he said. “I’m there all the time.”

  “I used to go there all the time during therapy.”

  “Therapy?”

  Her racing heartbeat slowed as her chest tightened. She didn’t want to tell another lie. They were starting to weigh her down more than her weight. “I told you that I was a model. I had to deal with a lot of rejection. So my parents sent me to a psychologist.”

  “Rejection? I don’t see how when you’re so beautiful.”

  “Are you blind? I’m not even wearing blush.”

  Reed peered down at her cheeks. “Would that make a difference? Maybe I am blind. They say the physical vanishes when you see a person for who they are inside.”

  And now she was out of breath. Yes, falling for Reed Cannon was definitely a workout. If not the pounds, she would surely lose her heart to this guy. “It was called food therapy. Mindful eating.”

  “That sounds like something Dr. Patel would make his patients do.”

  “You know Dr. Patel?”

  Reed nodded. “He works on the ranch. And he’s my psychologist.”

  “Mine, too. Or at least he was. I finished therapy a year ago.”

  “How do we have all these connections in real life and yet we meet online?”

  “It’s crazy, isn’t it?”

  “Obviously must be if we’ve both needed a psychologist,” he grinned. “Dr. Patel helped a lot with my PTSD and coping with the loss of my limb.”

  He held up his prosthetic arm. He was watching her face again, carefully. Sarai wasn’t sure what he was looking for. She only hoped that he found it.

  “This is me,” she said as they came up to her place.

  “It suits you,” Reed said looking at the townhouse she shared with Mason.

  Sarai wasn’t watching where she was going again, and she stumbled as she came to the stairs of the stoop. Reed reached out for her with both arms. She felt the hard, cold material of his prosthetic at the fleshy parts of her side.

  Oh, no. Her sweatshirt had ridden up. Reed was touching her fat. Sarai jerked away.

  Reed pulled his prosthetic arm away from her and then placed it behind his back. “I’m sorry.”

  “No, I’m sorry. This isn’t what I planned. It’s not how I planned to meet you. I thought there would be more time for me to prepare for this.”

  He looked down at his arm. “I understand.”

  But Sarai didn’t think he did. He deserved to know the truth. She didn’t want there to be any more excess layers between them than there already were. She needed to come clean.

  “Listen, Sarai, there’s something I haven’t told you.”

  And she would come clean. Right after he did. It was polite to take turns.

  “There’s a reason I went to the dating site in the first place. It was to find a wife.”

  He paused and in his pause Sarai blinked her eyes rapidly searching for clarity. She would’ve tugged at her ears to be sure she’d heard him correctly.

  Did he just say that he was looking for a wife?

  “I need to get married to stay on the ranch,” Reed continued.

  “You’re getting married?”

  “I’ll need to if I want to stay there.”

  She knew it was too good to be true. The guy of her dreams was getting married. Her heart should’ve slowed to a complete halt. Instead, it continued to race as though it could run after him and hold onto him for herself.

  “Anyway, I’ve got six weeks,” he said. “I need to find a bride in a little less than six weeks or move.”

  Need to? As in present tense? So he hadn’t found someone? She wasn’t too late? “Six weeks?”

  “I know it’s fast. I know it’s sudden. But I think there’s something here, between us.”

  “Us?”

  “Yes, us. My plan was to date you, to woo you, and then to pop the question.”

  Sarai couldn’t swallow past the lump in her throat. She tried to force out something more than a single syllable but failed.

  “I realize that six weeks is too sudden,” Reed continued. “So, I’ve decided that I can wait.”

  The words burst out of her now. “Wait? Why? Why wait?”

  “I just … Well, you don’t think it’s too soon for us? We literally just met.”

  “You were thinking of asking me to marry you?”

  “Well … I … it’s just that we’re so compatible. Statistically speaking, I won’t find a better match than you. So, it just makes sense on an analytical level.”

  Now her heart did stop. Her breathing stopped. She stopped blinking. Sarai held entirely and completely still in this moment, committing every detail to memory.

  The way Reed chewed at the corner of his lip. The way he ran his right hand through his hair. The way his left arm was behind his back, as though he were prepared to bow like a gentleman of old days. And the way he looked at her like she was something special.

  No one had looked at her like she was something special in so long.

  “And,” he continued, “there’s the fact that I really, really like you.”

  Sarai nodded. She took a deep breath in as she contemplated his words. When she had her answer, she spoke slowly and surely. “If you ask me in six weeks, the answer will be the same. So, logically, you might as well ask me now and be able to stay on the ranch.”

  Reed stared at her. He took a step back, looking her up and down. Sarai began to squirm and fidget under his perusal. Was he finally coming to his senses?

  No. He was going down on bended knee.

  “Sarai Austin, you captured my attention with your profile blurb. Then you held it with our chats and conversations. Will you do me the honor of becoming my partner IRL?”

  This was happening. It was really happening. Sarai pushed past the lump in her throat and managed a choked yes.

  Reed’s smile was so big, so huge. Sarai wanted to make him smile like that for the rest of her days. And she would. She would be the woman he deserved to have. Inside and out.

  Six weeks had been unrealistic for such a life-changing event. They had time now. She had time now. Time to be the woman she knew she could be.

  Chapter Thirteen

  One thing that was hard for a one-armed man to do was to tie a knot. On this big day, for Reed, a clip-on simply would not do. Xavier wound the fabric around Reed’s neck and made a noose.<
br />
  “You sure about this?" asked Xavier as he tightened the tie.

  "I've never been more certain.” Reed held still as his friend perfected the knot. He tilted up his chin so he could glance in the mirror at his reflection.

  “You just met this girl. Are you sure you know everything you need to know about her?”

  "I've known Sarai for almost a month. That’s longer than Dylan knew Maggie, or Fran knew Eva and looked how that worked out for all of them. Then there's the math.”

  “Right, the math.” Xavier gave a tug of the knot. “The basis of every good relationship.”

  “Math doesn't lie."

  "Math is quantitative,” said Xavier, “not qualitative. What do you really know about this girl?"

  "We have a lot in common."

  "The fact that she knows obscure facts in the Whoverse does not necessarily make you compatible."

  "She gets me," said Reed. "I get her. Neither of us is perfect. But what faults may come about either of us, I’m still ninety-eight percent sure she's the one for me.”

  “Not one-hundred?”

  “It’s statistically impossible to get a perfect score.”

  From the corner of the room, Soldier barked as though he agreed. Reed bent down to the dog and offered his hand. The dog hopped up on his hind legs and tapped Reed’s open palm with his sole front paw in their version of a high five.

  “I am not going to be upstaged by a dog.” Xavier held out his palm and Reed clasped it in his own. “All right. I'll have you’re back."

  With his free hand, Xavier gave Reed a firm pat on his back. Reed didn't return the favor. That's where Xavier’s scars were. They weren’t painful any longer. But like all of the soldiers that came to this ranch, Xavier was cognizant of his own wounds.

  “I know you’ve got my back, bro,” said Reed. “I just wish you'd consider staying here."

  Xavier shook his head. “You know marriage isn't for me. But don't worry. You'll still get shared custody of me. You guys will have me on the weekends."

  There was a knock at the door. Reed thought for a second that it might be one of the other soldiers, but he dismissed that idea. None of them would bother to knock. They’d just barge in.