The Marriage Stampede (Wranglers & Lace #5)

by Julianna Morris

  “I feel terrible coming up here like this. You’ve been so nice, and I’ve been so awful, but it’s about Chip.”

  She blinked. “Chip?”

  Gloria crumpled to the swing beside her. “I love him,” she wailed. “And he won’t marry me.”

  “Oh.” Merrie shook her head, trying to clear it. She still hadn’t been able to imagine Gloria and Chip having any kind of relationship, much less the kind that led to marriage. “Er, you’ve talked to him about it?”

  “Over and over. I can’t believe I fell in love with him. Daddy would never approve.”

  If it had been her, Merrie would have said “the heck with Daddy.” But she wasn’t Gloria. “Gosh, I’m afraid Chip isn’t the marrying sort.”

  “Neither is Logan, and he proposed to you.”.

  “Uh, yeah.” Merrie closed her eyes in defeat. What was that old saying? About tangled webs and deception? “But that’s different.”

  You’ll never know how different.

  “Actually, it was Daddy’s idea about us getting married, because that way he’d never leave the company. Daddy was just so determined.” Gloria sniffed again. “I know it wasn’t nice of me, chasing Logan like that and upsetting his vacation. But it’s okay now, because he’s engaged to you and I don’t have to worry about it anymore.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Merrie said, trying to sound sympathetic.

  “To be honest,” Gloria continued in a confidential tone. “Logan always scared me. He’s so smart and intense about everything. He’s much better off with you, because you’re smart, too, and can talk to him about stuff.”

  Merrie bit the inside of her mouth to keep from asking what the society girl could possibly have in common with Chip, and what the two of them could ever talk about besides trading insults.

  “I need someone more basic.” Gloria’s voice wobbled again. “Chip isn’t complicated like Logan.”

  That was certainly true. Chip was real basic. Love was unpredictable. It was strange and stupid and made your heart do nutty things. Merrie should know, because she’d stupidly fallen in love with Logan, despite her best attempts to prevent it.

  Tarnation.

  She’d gone and admitted it to herself.

  She was just as dumb as Gloria, falling for a man who didn’t believe in marriage and lived in. an entirely different world than herself.

  Shaking her head wryly, Merrie patted the other woman’s back as she wept. There wasn’t much she could say. Chip wasn’t about to give up his single life-style for anybody, much less a city woman with more money than sense. And even if her background wasn’t a problem, most cowboys didn’t make enough money to support a family.

  “I don’t know what to do,” Gloria sobbed. “I’d even live in Montana, if that’s what he wants.”

  Well, hell.

  Merrie sighed. Gloria was still a twit. She lacked a backbone and couldn’t tell one end of a horse from another. But she was kind of likable after all.

  “Hi, Pidge.”

  Tucked into a narrow, hay filled space between the last horse stall and the barn wall, the gray cat hissed a warning.

  “It’s okay,” Merrie soothed. “I’m not going to hurt them. I just want to look.”

  “So, you found where she’s been hiding,” commented Logan from behind her and she stiffened.

  It had been easy to avoid Logan in the bustle of visitors saying goodbye and heading out in their respective vehicles. Gloria had gone, too, with many wistful backward looks at Chip. Merrie felt sorry for her, but she was certain the cowboy hadn’t made any promises. He probably hadn’t even been the aggressor. Chip had a laissez-faire attitude about women—he figured if he just waited around, they’d come to him.

  “I’ve been wondering...how does a cat get a name like Pidge?” Warmth from Logan’s body radiated through her as he crowded closer, ostensibly to look at the proud mama with her babies.

  “Pidge has six toes on each foot,” Merrie mumbled. “She looks pigeon-toed when she walks.”

  “Oh.” Logan put his hand on Merrie’s arm. He’d spent the entire night kicking himself for acting like an idiot.

  Merrie was too compassionate and straightforward to ever do the hurtful things he’d seen happening between his parents. She had an essential sweetness...even Gloria had gone to her for comfort. He’d stood in the darkness beyond the porch, listening to the two women talk, and feeling ashamed. Merrie was a friendly, outgoing person who enjoyed people—that’s what made her so successful as a wrangler.

  “Honey, I was a big jerk,” he said.

  “Yes,” she agreed baldly.

  “I just keep feeling more and more...cornered.”

  Merrie sighed. “Cornered? This isn’t a trap, Logan. You can leave anytime you want. Say the word and I’ll fly you to the airport in Rapid City.”

  He stroked her arms with his hands, wanting to pull her against his chest and make everything all right. Except it wasn’t all right, and he couldn’t pretend otherwise. “You don’t understand. The closer we get, the more I care about you. It scares the hell out of me, Merrie.”

  She was silent for so long, he didn’t know if she was angry or disgusted, or debating on ways to take his head off.

  “How do you think I feel?” she said finally.

  “At least you’re more honest than I am.”

  Merrie laughed humorlessly. “Honest? I wasn’t flirting with anyone last night. But deep down...I guess I was trying to make everything seem normal again. Treating all the guests the same, as though you weren’t any more important than anyone else—pushing you away because it was safest.”

  “Why, Merrie?”

  “Why?” She turned her head and looked at him incredulously. “You’re a smart man, Logan. Figure it out. I don’t want to choose between you and the ranch. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life loving someone who doesn’t love me back.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Getting to her feet, she edged past him to the center of the barn. “Keep your apologies. We let things get out of hand, and it’s over. Go back to Seattle, and after a while I’ll tell my grandparents that we broke things off.”

  “No.”

  Merrie looked at him warily.

  “I may be slow and incredibly dense, but I’m not a coward. We’ve got to figure out what we feel for each other.”

  “I know how you feel, you already told me. Remember? I’m too...dramatic. Too emotional to be your kind of wife. Hell, I’m a real woman, that’s your problem.”

  “For God’s sake, Merrie. We were arguing. I said some irrational things.”

  “But deep down, that’s how you think of me.” She rubbed her temples, looking tired rather than angry. “Marriage is messy, Logan. It isn’t a pristine house and quiet rooms. Do you think my grandparents never fight? They fight, and they make up, knowing eventually they’re going to fight again.”

  “But planning to—”

  “No, listen. Unexpected things happen and you get into an argument. Not by plan. But you always plan to make up—because you know nothing in the world is more important than what you share together.”

  A truck with a horse trailer pulled up outside the barn and a horn tooted. “Merrie?” called Grant Steele. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  “I’ll be right there.” Merrie looked at Logan for another long minute, pain etching her mouth.

  “Honey...please.”

  “No.” She smiled sadly. “Playtime is over—I have to get back to my life.”

  Her quiet refusal shook Logan. He’d always gotten what he went after—from college, to a high-profile job, to the kind of financial security most people only dreamed about. But Merrie wasn’t some kind of prize he could put on a shelf or count in a bank ledger. And she was determined to walk out of his world, as though she’d never touched it at all.

  His world... her world...it was as though they lived on different planets.

  Moodily he walked outside and watched M
errie. Was he the only one who noticed that her smile didn’t reach her eyes, or that her natural sparkle was subdued?

  “Your grandfather picked him out,” Grant was saying as he opened the back of the horse trailer. “As a birthday present. But we didn’t want to bring him over while everyone was here...he’s still rather excitable.”

  He stepped inside, and emerged with a high-stepping stallion, gleaming a coppery red in the sunlight.

  “Oh, Grant...he’s beautiful.”

  “His name is Foxfire. He isn’t fully broken, but I figured you could take things from here.”

  Merrie didn’t say anything, but wonder and delight had softened the pain in her face. “Come here, beauty,” she murmured in a low, firm tone, putting out a hand so the stallion could get her scent. The horse sniffed her fingers, then dipped his head for a rub on the face. Twelve hundred pounds of horseflesh, and he was putty in her hands.

  “Morning, Kincaid,” Grant said, leaning on a nearby fence. “Ever see anything like that? Merrie is a damned Pied Piper. If she wasn’t so all-fired anxious to own the Bar Nothing, I’d hire her to break all my horses.”

  Logan spared him a deadly glance. “Don’t even think about it.”

  Steele grinned. “She’s a free agent And I can’t see Merrie promising to obey. Can you?”

  “That’s between Merrie and me.”

  Clucking softly to the horse, Merrie turned to lead him into the barn, when suddenly there was a frenzied commotion of a dog barking and feline hisses from within. A second later Bandit came streaking out in a flat run for the house.

  The stallion reared, his nostrils flaring in alarm. He danced back on his hind legs, his forefeet pawing the air above Merrie’s head.

  God, no.

  Logan dived forward, only to be sent rolling by a tackle from Grant Steele.

  “Are you crazy?” Logan shouted. “He’ll kill her!”

  “Dammit, man, look.”

  Merrie had let the long halter rope slide through her fingers, without releasing her grasp. And she’d already brought the stallion down again, though he continued to nervously step from side to side.

  “Silly boy,” she said, both soothing and gently scolding him at the same time. She went back to rubbing his face and neck as though nothing had happened. “That’s just Bandit and Pidge. I’ll bet Bandit wanted to say hi to her new babies, and Pidge didn’t like it one single bit.”

  Foxfire cocked his head, listening as though he understood every word.

  “You need to become friends with Bandit,” Merrie continued, walking him toward the barn again. “We’ll be working together out on the range, and he can teach you a lot.”

  The horse followed, as docile as a kitten.

  “You’re going to have heart failure if you keep overreacting,” Grant said as he rose and dusted himself off. “There was nothing to worry about—Merrie’s handled tougher situations with her eyes closed.”

  “She could have been hurt.”

  “This is a ranch, not a boutique. Get used to it.”

  “Get used to it?” Logan ground his teeth. “You’re not in love with Merrie—you don’t have anything to say about it. I’m not letting my wife get killed by some damned horse.”

  “What I’m saying,” Steele said precisely, “is that Merrie won’t ever be your wife if you can’t live with the ranch. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do on my own spread.” He called a goodbye to Merrie and climbed into his truck.

  Dammit.

  Logan slammed his fist into a fence post. The blow hurt, but not enough to absorb the adrenaline still racing through his veins. His heart had stopped when he’d seen that horse rearing over Merrie. She meant that much to him.

  Everything.

  She meant everything.

  And he was a blasted fool for not seeing it before. If anything happened to Merrie he might as well crawl into a hole and die, too, because he surely wouldn’t want to keep breathing. He didn’t want her in danger, not ever again.

  Logan went to the barn and looked inside—Merrie had put Foxfire into a stall and she was wiping a soft cloth over his body. The entire time she kept talking, in a voice as smooth and warm as mulled wine. The incident in the yard had been nothing out of the ordinary...just another day’s work.

  His jaw tightened.

  I don’t want to choose between you and the ranch.

  Lord, when it came right down to it, he didn’t want her to choose, either. The Bar Nothing was part of Merrie—as much a part of her identity as her name or smile. Take away that dream...and she wouldn’t be the woman he loved.

  But how could he live each day, knowing the dangers she would face? And what about his plans...his goal to live in New York? It didn’t seem very appealing anymore, yet he wasn’t certain that moving to Montana was the answer.

  After long minutes of wanting her to say something...anything, Merrie finally looked up and smiled faintly. “where you and Grant playing football? Or just being clumsy?”

  He should have realized she’d seen Steele’s tackle. Not too much got past her. “He was running interference. Seems I thought you needed help, and he disagreed.”

  “He was right.”

  “Yeah. I kind of figured that out.”

  Merrie rubbed Foxfire’s nose. “You’re just like Granddad. You think a woman can’t handle ranch work.”

  “That’s not what I think, and I’m not sure your grandfather does, either. Honey, did you ever imagine that he was just protecting you? Or maybe he was just protecting himself, because he didn’t want to see you get hurt?”

  “I don’t need protecting.”

  Logan clenched his fists. She was a damned stubborn woman. “Maybe you don’t, but a decent man protects his family. What if you were pregnant? Do you think your husband should let you dive into a stampede or rush out in a blizzard to feed the cattle?”

  She glared at him. “Let me?”

  “You know what I meant.”

  “Huh. I want a partnership, not a castle to live in.”

  Merrie lifted Foxfire’s legs one by one to clean his hooves. Logan knew it was to get him accustomed to her touch and scent. His mouth twisted ironically. He’d been captured the same way...by touch and scent, by laughter and warmth and a need so strong it tore him apart.

  Pain lanced through Logan’s head and he sighed. When everything was said and done, he wanted Merrie to have her dream, even if he couldn’t share it with her.

  “Honey, where’s your grandfather?”

  She looked at him warily. “He went for a ride out toward the airstrip. Why?”

  What was that old gag—I need to see a man about a horse? Or in this case, he needed to see Paul Harding about a ranch. “Just some business. I want to discuss... cattle futures with him.”

  “Futures? Is that some kind of stockbroker term?”

  “Yeah,” Logan muttered. “Exactly.” He led Dust Devil from his stall and quickly saddled him.

  He and Dust Devil had become good friends, and the horse gently snorted and nudged his chest, hoping for a carrot.

  “Just a minute, boy.” Logan went to the half-whiskey barrel where apples and carrots were kept as equine treats...the Bar Nothing didn’t overlook the smallest detail. Or rather, Merrie didn’t. The wranglers had told him she returned to the ranch every year, bubbling with ideas for improvements. Paul Harding apparently hadn’t figured out that his granddaughter was the reason the dude ranch had become so wildly successful...and Logan planned to tell him.

  “My offer is still open,” Merrie said after he’d fed the carrot to Dust Devil, then mounted up.

  “What offer?”

  “To fly you out.”

  Logan smiled grimly. There was some comfort in knowing he wasn’t the only one confused and worried about the future. “No, thanks. I still have two weeks left of my vacation...and I plan to spend every minute of them here in Montana.”

  “It would be smarter to leave.”

  “Not a chan
ce, honey. Not one damn chance.”

  “Merrie says I’m old-fashioned and hardheaded, and that’s why I won’t sell her the ranch,” commented Paul Harding as he rode his horse alongside Logan.

  “Is that why, sir?”

  “Nope.” The older man fingered the reins for a long minute. “I love all my grandchildren,” he said finally. “But Merrie...she’s different. She has a feel for the land.”

  “So why haven’t you been willing to sell her the Bar Nothing?” Logan asked grimly. “Of anyone, you should understand how important it is to her. You should have agreed to the sale a long time ago.”

  Paul smiled faintly. “Son, I love this ranch, but it won’t hold you when you’re grieving, or rejoice with your blessings. It’s hard enough for a man to find someone who’ll pull up roots to share his life...and damned near impossible for a woman—the world may be changing, but it hasn’t changed that much. Things might have been different if she’d married Grant Steele. But they never felt that way about each other.”

  “Oh.”

  Suddenly everything became a lot clearer to Logan. Paul Harding didn’t distrust Merrie’s ability to run the. ranch, he just didn’t want her to be alone. “Well, that’s not so much of a worry now, is it?” he said, somewhat uncomfortably.

  Harding regarded him shrewdly. “I’m not a dang fool, son. You talked her into that story about gettin’ married, didn’t you? Got her to go along somehow.”

  Logan sighed. This conversation wasn’t going the way he’d planned. He just wanted to give Merrie the collateral she needed for the ranch. No strings attached. No balloon payments or foreclosure hanging over her head.

  Hell, Logan would never let anything happen to Merrie or the Bar Nothing. If push came to shove, he could find a hundred investors willing to back them up. Not all of his clients were obnoxious. When he thought about it, a lot of them were pretty darned nice. And they enjoyed new and different kinds of investment opportunities.

  “What do you have to say for yourself?” Harding prompted.

  “You’re right, the engagement wasn’t real,” Logan said quietly. “It started off as a joke, and got out of control. But I’m in love with your granddaughter, and I think she’s in love with me. Except we don’t have a prayer of sorting things out while she’s worried about the Bar Nothing’s future.”