“I have some unfinished business.”
“Then I’m going with you.”
Bret looked startled. “Why?”
“If you won’t stay in Texas, I have to go to Boston. I don’t want to leave the ranch, but I’ll follow you wherever you go.”
His expression was odd. She’d wanted to see delirious happiness. She’d hoped for a smile that would start in his eyes and gradually transform his face. At the very least, she’d expected surprise. It looked more like pain.
“I’d never let you move to Boston. You’d hate it there.”
“I’ll hate it here without you.”
The pain seemed to deepen. That was when she knew his plans didn’t include her. The truth hit her like a fist, brutally and without warning.
“After I’ve finished what I need to do,” Bret said, “I’m leaving.”
“How long will that take?”
“I don’t know.”
“What will you do when you’re finished?”
“Come back to Texas.”
Emily thought her chest would explode with happiness. After being certain she’d lost him, he was coming back.
“But not here,” Bret said.
The bottom fell out of her world. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
Emily had to swallow a couple of times before she could speak. She was relieved he’d decided he belonged in Texas, but she’d hoped he’d want to be with her enough to learn to think of her ranch as home. She could almost dislike Jake and Isabelle because he loved them more than he loved her. “What are you going to do about your half of the ranch?”
“I’ll have that deeded to you as soon as I get to Fort Worth. I never wanted it, and I don’t intend to keep it. Your father may have thought it was a way to keep us together, but I won’t take what’s yours or force you to work with me. That’s no way to convince two people they ought to marry.”
Hawk had told them her father had named Bret to handle her inheritance because getting to know Joseph had convinced him he couldn’t trust Joseph or Silas. Furthermore, he’d wanted Bret to marry Emily and hoped that by forcing them to share the ranch, they’d have time to fall in love.
“I want to work with you,” Emily said. “I want to marry you.”
Bret didn’t answer, but he didn’t have to. She knew what stood between them. She was sure he’d tried, but he couldn’t forgive her for thinking he’d lied and tried to steal from her. What was worse she’d believed Joseph, the man who had lied and tried to cheat her. She’d explained that she’d only believed it because she was upset and confused about the will, but it hadn’t made a difference.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
“Jake has been spending nearly every penny he makes buying up land so all of us can have ranches close to each other. He must own a whole county by now. Zeke says Isabelle’s house is slowly being overrun by grandchildren at Christmas. I’ve missed so much of that. I don’t want to miss any more. It’s a perfect place for Jinx to grow up. Ward has a couple of boys close to his age.”
Emily could feel the shadow of loneliness settle over her. Despite Bertie’s efforts, Christmas had been a sad season since her mother’s death. It would be even worse this year without her father. Now she would not have Jinx or Bret, either. Even though they’d been at the ranch only a short time, she felt like that they belonged there. It was nearly impossible to think of the future without them.
“What about me?” Emily asked. “You know I love you, and I know you love me. Don’t you want me to be part of your future?”
“More than you’ll ever know, but—”
“There is no but. I told you I was too upset to think clearly. You must remember how you felt when your father died.”
“I remember all too well. That’s what has driven me every day since then. It’s what I allowed to lead me in the wrong direction. Coming back to Texas was the best thing that ever happened to me, but I need time to adjust. I think I know what I want, but I’ve got to take a little time to make sure.”
“I don’t need any time. I know what I want.”
“Your life has changed just as dramatically. You need time to think as well. I know I have to return to the hill country. This ranch can never be my home. I want you to go with me as my wife.”
Emily was so shocked she couldn’t move. Bret wanted her to be his wife! She’d been thinking he was going to leave her. Instead, he wanted to marry her and take her with him. Her heart beat so wildly she could hardly breathe. It was all she could do to keep from throwing herself at him.
“You need time to decide if that’s what you want. You’ll be stepping into my world, into my family.” He smiled suddenly, and she could tell he was reliving some cherished memory. “Believe me when I say it can be a little overwhelming.”
He had to be crazy to think exchanging one ranch for another would stop her from wanting to be his wife. How did men get these weird ideas? She’d finally learned that if a woman loved a man, it didn’t matter where they lived, only that they lived there together. “What do you want me to do?”
“I’ll write and tell you when I’m coming back. If you decide you love me enough to trust me with the rest of your life, meet me in San Antonio. If you’re not there when I get back, I’ll know you decided I asked too much.”
If he only had any idea what she’d do for him. But she wouldn’t tell him now. Maybe never. It wasn’t good to spoil a man too much.
“Now I want to spend the rest of the evening kissing you,” Bret said. “I want to leave you something to remember me by.”
Emily didn’t need any reminders, but she wasn’t going to tell him.
Two months later
“Are you sure Will can find Bret?” Emily asked Isabelle. “He didn’t look like he wanted to go.”
“Will never likes to do anything when he can get away with doing nothing,” Isabelle said. “But if he agrees to do something, nobody will do it better.”
Emily had been at the Broken Circle for a week, and she still couldn’t see Will Haskins without a little gasp of astonishment. She knew her love for Bret was deep and solid when Will’s incredibly handsome face never once dislodged Bret’s image from her thoughts or her dreams.
She’d had an unbelievably busy two months since Bret left. Even before she got the deed transferring Bret’s half of the ranch to her, she started looking for a buyer. She hated to leave. It was the only home she could remember, but she would have given up even more to be with Bret. Before he left Fort Worth for Boston, Bret had helped Hawk find her a foreman. The foreman had introduced her to a man interested in buying her ranch. She had signed the papers before she left.
Jinx and Bertie had accompanied her to the Broken Circle. Isabelle had been shocked, then delighted when she heard Bret was coming home. Bertie had immediately made herself at home in the kitchen—much to Isabelle’s amusement—and Jinx acted as if Christmas and every other holiday had come at once. He finally had a real home and real playmates. Almost as good, he was surrounded by real cowboys who were willing to teach him anything he wanted to know. Today, however, he was waiting just as anxiously as Emily for Bret. He had gone with Will. Isabelle had said that was okay. They both acted the same age.
“I know you’ve told me at least three times everything that happened,” Isabelle said, “but I still find it hard to believe. I never thought we’d see Bret again.” She took Emily’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “If it hadn’t been for you, I’m sure we never would have.”
Emily squeezed back. “It was a close call. I nearly ruined it.”
When Emily first met Isabelle, she found it hard to believe that a woman as young, beautiful, and feminine as Isabelle could have corralled a houseful of men. A week later she knew it was the love Isabelle had for these men that made them willing to move heaven and earth for her. A little jealously, she wondered if Bret would ever feel that way about her.
They had been seated in chairs o
n the front porch of Isabelle’s large and comfortable home, but Emily was too anxious to remain seated. She stood at the railing, peering at the spot along the trail where Will and Jinx would reappear after they sighted Bret. She’d wanted to go with Will herself, but Isabelle had held her back. She said it wasn’t a good idea for a woman to throw herself at a man’s feet. It gave him an exaggerated opinion of himself. But after watching Jake and Isabelle together, Emily decided Isabelle wasn’t very good at following her own advice.
“Are you sure you don’t regret selling your ranch?” Isabelle asked.
“Not at all. I want us to do everything together, own everything together, build everything together. I don’t want him ever to have a reason to believe I don’t trust him implicitly.”
“I can see you’re going to spoil him,” Isabelle said with a smile.
“I won’t have a chance. Bertie will do it for me. She adores him.”
“So does Jinx. You know he’s going to want to live with you when you build a house, though I expect he’ll be at Ward’s place enough to give you a few moments alone.” There were ten boys in the extended Maxwell clan, ranging in age from one to nineteen. Jinx still hadn’t gotten over his excitement.
“Did Bret tell you what he was going to do in Boston?” Isabelle asked.
“No. I was more interested in what he was doing right then than what he was going to—”
Jinx suddenly rounded the bend in the trail, waving his arms frantically and running as fast as his legs would carry him. “He’s coming,” he shouted at them. “He’s coming.” Then he turned to run back down the trail to meet Bret.
It was instinct that made Emily reach for Isabelle’s hand and grasp it hard. “Sometimes I was afraid this moment would never come. Now I’m so choked up, I’m about to cry.”
“I think it’s okay,” Isabelle said. “I’m already crying. Another of my boys has come home.”
Bret’s pulse beat a little faster as the landmarks along the trail brought back memories of the years he’d spent riding through these hills. Almost every rocky outcropping, ridge, or stream tumbling down a hillside pulled him gently back into the world he’d loved, and away from the one he’d thought would be his future. At last he was absolutely certain of what he want. And most of all he wanted Emily to be his wife. He hoped she’d wanted to live with him here in the hill country, but he’d decided before he’d gone halfway to Fort Worth that he’d live anywhere to be with her.
Boston had been even more of a turning point than he’d expected.
Joseph had reached Boston before Bret, but Bret had already corresponded with his cousin Rupert through a series of long telegrams. By the time Bret reached Boston, the battle lines were drawn and the ramparts firmly in place. Uncle Silas had the most votes and seemed to have control of the situation. The first crack in his support came when Bret was able to prove that Silas had stolen his ideas. His uncle had steadfastly denied it, calling Bret and Rupert unconscionable liars. The roof had fallen in on his head when his own mother said Bret had explained his ideas to her more than six months earlier.
When Bret showed how much of the dwindling company profits Silas had been paying to himself and Joseph in salaries, he lost support from the Abercrombie side. In the end, he lost his position as head of the company as well. The family wanted Bret to take over but settled for Rupert when Bret said he was going back to Texas. His grandmother was mollified only when Bret promised to bring Emily to see her.
Emily hadn’t been in San Antonio, but there had been a message from Isabelle, saying it was crucial for him to get to the Broken Circle immediately. He considered going to see Emily first anyway, but Isabelle wouldn’t have left such a message if it wasn’t important. He was worried that something had happened to Jake or somebody else in the family, but he couldn’t stop wondering why Emily wasn’t in San Antonio. He didn’t know whether she hadn’t gotten his telegram in time or if she’d changed her mind. He’d spend as little time as possible at the Broken Circle before he left to find Emily. He wouldn’t make any conditions this time. Well, only one. She had to love and trust him. Everything else was immaterial.
He hadn’t stopped thinking of her while he was in Boston. Everything that happened, nearly every word said, confirmed he had made the right decision. His parents were beyond help and he didn’t need retribution. His future lay in Texas. He had returned to Boston to finish what he’d begun, not because he needed to prove anything to himself, but because he’d made promises to Rupert and his grandmother. And because improving the company’s chances of remaining in business was part of taking care of Emily’s inheritance. And that of the children he hoped they would have together.
He urged his tired mount into a canter. He wanted to see Isabelle and Jake, to make sure nothing was wrong with anyone in the family, but he wanted to head back to Emily as soon as possible. Thoughts of seeing her, holding her, and kissing her filled his dreams every night. Thoughts of making love to her were even now making him uncomfortable in the saddle. He had wasted too much time in his life. He was in a hurry to start making up for it.
He knew practically every rock and tree in the bend in the trail ahead. He’d ridden the trail more than a thousand times, always anticipating the view of the house when it came into view. Today that turn was more important than ever. It would mark the end of the first stage of his journey home.
It was hard to say what he noticed first. Certainly he saw the house. It was impossible to miss anything that big. At first he was distracted by a child waving at him, shouting something he couldn’t understand, and coming toward him in an odd stride that seemed to be a combination of running, jumping at random, and skipping from one side of the trail to the other. If he hadn’t been so distracted by the boy, it wouldn’t have taken him so long to notice the two women standing on the porch. In the same second that he realized the boy was Jinx, he recognized the woman standing next to Isabelle.
Emily.
With no regard for the condition of his tired mount, Bret urged him into a slow gallop. He didn’t need words to know Emily’s decision. Her presence—and Isabelle’s note—told him that even though he’d made a questionable decision in leaving her as he had, things had come right in the end. If he kept trying, maybe he could get this right. Emily was not only his promise of a future, but she’d also freed him from the misery of his past.
As Jinx drew closer, Bret figured out the boy was trying to tell him everything that had happened since he’d arrived at the Broken Circle.
“—every night,” he was saying. “I have my own bed in my own room.”
Bret was anxious to reach Emily, but he stopped long enough to swing Jinx into the saddle behind him.
“Will took me with him to watch for you,” Jinx said between gasping breaths. “I was way up on this big rock, and I wasn’t even afraid.”
Jinx wrapped his hands around Bret’s waist and rattled on, but as Bret drew closer to the house, Bret’s attention zeroed in on Emily. Her expression told him all he needed to know. She was smiling, leaning forward over the railing, wanting to see him as much as he wanted to see her. Will stepped forward when Bret brought his horse to a halt and lifted Jinx from the saddle.
“You’ll get your turn in a minute,” he said to the boy. “This is one of those times when kids should neither be seen nor heard.”
Bret was barely aware of Will’s laconic comment or that Isabelle had stepped away from Emily’s side. He saw only Emily waiting for him in the home of his heart, her arms held out to him, her face wreathed in smiles. He was surprised to see her eyes swimming with tears, her lips trembling with emotion. Yes, she loved him. More than he’d ever imagined any woman could.
He bounded up the steps two at a time, ready to begin the first minute of the rest of his life.
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A Texan's Honor Page 31