The Cowboy Wins a Bride (The Cowboys of Chance Creek)

by Seton, Cora

  With a wild cry she bucked against him and Jamie came, too, caught up in her abandon. He swallowed his groans but he couldn't stop his orgasm. It rocked through him from toe to tip, leaving him shaken, shuddering, and longing to do it all again.

  Claire slumped forward against him and it killed him he couldn't embrace her and whisper all his thoughts into her ear. When she sat up again and disengaged from him, he smiled weakly.

  "That was nice."

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The moment they reached the stable, Jamie knew something was wrong. Autumn was waiting for them, a worried frown creasing her face. Rob and Ethan were already seeing to the other horses. The guests were trailing up to the front porch. He and Claire had ridden the rest of the way home silently, but quickly, twin silly smiles on their faces. Jamie had no idea what had happened back there. Was Claire only trying to win the bet? Or had her sensual attack meant something more? He'd hoped she would tell him before they got back to work, but from the look of things, any discussion would have to wait.

  "Claire? Can I talk to you?" Autumn said.

  Claire turned to him. "Can you take care of the horses?"

  "Sure – go on." But as he watched her walk away, he wanted to stay by her side. Autumn hadn't brought good news – that was obvious – and he didn't want Claire to face whatever it was alone.

  Jamie got to work. The horses needed to be unsaddled, rubbed down and checked to make sure their hooves hadn't picked up any stones during the ride. As he pulled the saddle off of Storm and went to put it in its place, he was surprised to see Adrienne leaning against the stable door, waiting for him.

  "Can I help you?"

  "We didn't get a chance to talk today. Claire was monopolizing you."

  Jamie shrugged. "We had some things to discuss."

  "But I'm the one who's paying for your time. How about you give me a little attention." She touched his arm, running her hand over his muscles.

  "That's not exactly what you're paying for, is it?" he said, pulling away with a quick look over his shoulder. He didn't want Ethan to see what she was doing. "And if I don't see to these horses, they're going to suffer for it."

  She pouted. "I'm not so hard to look at, am I? That's all I'm asking for – a little of your attention."

  He stopped and met her gaze. "Really? That's all you're asking for?" He refused to look away until she was the one that broke the staring contest.

  "Fine. You got me. I am asking for a little more. This is my vacation – my chance to get away and blow off steam."

  Jamie returned to the horses and began to undo Storm's saddle. "I bet you usually don't have any problem finding someone to help you with that." When he looked her way, she was smiling.

  "No. Not usually. You're proving a harder nut to crack, though."

  "Maybe you ought to be trying to crack another nut."

  Adrienne laughed. "Maybe. But I like a challenge. I think I'll keep trying to crack you." She intercepted him as he crossed the stable again. "Come on. No one has to know."

  "Look, Adrienne. You're a pretty woman. You know that – you don't need me to come on to you so you can feel good."

  "You're right, I don't. But I do need you to fuck me so I can feel good." She put both her hands on his chest and rose up on tiptoes to kiss the underside of his chin. "I bet you can make me feel real good."

  Wow. He had to put a stop to this, fast. Obviously, she wasn't the one who'd left him the note – she wasn't patient enough to wait for midnight. All he needed now was for Claire to walk in on them.

  He caught both of her hands and pushed her aside. "I don't want to be rude, Ma'am, but you haven't given me a choice. I've got a woman already, and I'm not looking for any more company."

  "Who – Claire? What's a man like you want with a cold fish like her? She's not going to keep you warm at night."

  "You'd be surprised." He hauled the saddle off of Walter and put it in its place. "I've got work to do, Adrienne. I'll see you up at the Big House."

  "Fine. Be a wet rag. There's plenty more where you came from." She stalked out of the stable and Jamie heaved a sigh of relief. He hoped that was the end of it – at least with Adrienne. He needed to keep Rob closer to hand for emergencies like this one. At least he'd fend off his midnight caller's advances. Maybe it was time to hire all the Matheson brothers on for the rest of the week. That'd be four guests kept busy. And Angel wasn't going to bother anyone.

  * * * * *

  "What is it? What happened?" Claire asked, her heart beating hard. She was still shaken from her interlude with Jamie – shaken in a good way. She'd never made love to a man like that – taking all control. It had been one of the most sensual experiences of her life. Maybe someday they could turn the tables – what would it be like to be entirely under Jamie's mastery? The thought left her a little breathless.

  "There's a police officer on the phone for you. From Billings," Autumn said and led the way indoors, handing her the house phone when they got to the kitchen.

  "Hello?" Claire said.

  "Claire Cruz? I'm officer Bradley with the Billings PD. We got a call from your subletter – Carrie Ellis. There's been a break-in at your condominium. We tried your cell, but couldn't get through. I'm glad we got a hold of you."

  "Oh, my God. When? What'd they take?"

  "This morning, we think. And we hoped you'd be able to help us figure out what's missing. Carrie mentioned you had a lot of boxes in the main living area? How many of them were there?"

  "They took the boxes?" Claire said, her heart sinking. "Oh, my God. Oh, no."

  "What is it? What was in them?" Autumn said.

  Claire shook her head. "What about the garage?" All those materials. All those pieces of furniture. Thousands of dollars' worth of supplies.

  "The garage was empty, too. Ms. Ellis said you had things stored in there. Is that true?"

  She thought she was going to faint. How much money was tied up in those purchases? She'd meant to send most of them back just as soon as she'd made up her mind which ones not to use. They couldn't be gone. They just couldn't be.

  "I'll be there as soon as I can."

  "Just hold on a minute, ma'am. I have a few questions."

  "They can wait." She clicked the phone off, slammed it down on the counter and headed for the front door.

  "Claire," Autumn called after her. "When will you be back?"

  "I don't know."

  * * * * *

  At nine o'clock Claire still hadn't come home and she wasn't answering his phone calls, either. Jamie paced the small living room in his cabin and tried to decide whether or not to go after her. She could very well be on her way back already, so if he drove off to Billings he could start a wild goose chase that would go on for hours.

  "She was really upset. Give her time to figure out what to do," Autumn had advised him earlier. The Mathesons were playing cards in the Big House with the female guests and he'd decided he could slip out early to the quiet of his own home. No telling how late that party would last.

  Rob promised to stop by his cabin on his way to meet the mystery woman at the stable. While he was curious as to who it would be – his money was on Liz or Maddy – he cared far more for how Claire was getting on in Billings.

  No wonder she was upset. Nothing was worse than getting robbed.

  Maybe she'll move back to the ranch for good.

  He sure wanted her to, but not under these circumstances. And what was with the boxes? Autumn said she was upset because she'd had things stored in her house and now they were gone. What was she storing?

  Something expensive? He hoped she had insurance.

  He checked his phone again. Where the hell was she?

  Nine oh one.

  That was it. He was going after her. He headed for the door, but when he pushed it open, it smacked into someone on the other side.

  "Ow!"

  A definitely feminine someone.

  "Christine? Is that you?" He peered through the
gloom to make out the small woman who teetered on his front porch in jeans, a strappy t-shirt and high heeled shoes. How the hell had she made it all the way from the Big House in those?

  "Jamie. I need you." Unlike Adrienne, she didn't wait for foreplay. She lunged at him, slid her hand down the waist of his jeans and searched his crotch like she was fishing car keys from the bottom of a purse.

  "Whoa! Hold on there." He unceremoniously yanked her hand free and shoved her away. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

  "No one loves me," Christine wailed. Heck, she was drunker than a cow in a poppy field. "My husband doesn't love me."

  He did not need this right now. Not when he needed to go after Claire. "I'm sure your husband adores you. You should go back to your room and call him."

  "He asked me for a divorce," she wailed.

  Shit. "Do your friends know?"

  "No! Of course not. I can't tell them my marriage is tanking. How could I face them?"

  "They're your friends." He turned her in a circle and pointed her toward the steps down to the path. "They're supposed to support you when times are tough."

  She snorted. "Not bloody likely. They'll say all the right things to my face, then talk about me behind my back."

  "Then they're not your friends." He began to frog-march her back toward the Big House. As she wobbled along he considered carrying her. It would sure be faster.

  "I don't have any friends," she wailed.

  How he got through the next fifteen minutes he couldn't say. Thank goodness Claire wasn't there to see Christine alternately paw him and push him away. He deposited her on the front porch and got Autumn. "She's a mess. I'm sorry to dump her on you but I've got to find out what's happened to Claire."

  "Morgan went after her," Autumn said.

  "I'm still going."

  "I'm not going to stop you." Autumn patted Christine's head and smiled. "Somehow I thought running a guest ranch would be more fun."

  "Me, too."

  "Ready to quit?"

  "Not quite." He ran a hand over his face. "How about you – you doing okay?"

  "Yeah. I'm hanging in there. Go on, find Claire. I hope everything's all right."

  "So do I."

  * * * * *

  "It's got to be Daniel," Claire said when the police finally left. She stood with Morgan in the stark square living room of her Billings condo. The police had questioned her for what seemed like hours when all she wanted to do was throw herself on the ground and cry. Carrie had been all tears and apologies. She'd been at her boyfriend's house when the thieves struck. Claire didn't blame her. She hadn't stipulated Carrie needed to remain on site at all times. When she couldn't take the girl's tears anymore, she sent her home.

  Finally she'd had the place to herself, but moments later another knock sounded on the door. She'd thought it was the police returning to ask even more pointless questions, and she'd been ready to give them a piece of her mind. But when she opened the door, there stood Morgan, and to her surprise she found she was glad for the company. Morgan was practical, and she had a temper to match her own. She wouldn't stand around asking stupid questions. She'd be ready to act.

  "Did the police say they'd talk to him?"

  "Yeah, but when I asked if they'd search all his properties they said no. They thought it was just a regular robbery. They kept telling me to watch eBay or Craigslist to see if my stuff turned up there. How the hell would I tell if it was mine? It isn't antiques that got stolen – it's building materials, brand new in their boxes."

  "How much do you think you lost?"

  Claire bit her lip. She didn't want to tell anyone, let alone Morgan, but all her secrecy had gotten her nowhere so far. A favorite saying of her father's flashed through her mind: when all else fails, you've got your family. Funny, she'd never thought to follow that advice.

  "Thirty thousand dollars' worth. Maybe more. I'm not sure." She hesitated. "Maybe fifty thousand."

  Morgan cocked her head. "Are you always this vague about money?"

  "No. This isn't like me at all." She waited for Morgan to react with shock or disgust, but she didn't. She surveyed the room again, her expression focused.

  "Fill me in – on all of it. Start at the beginning. Seriously," she added when Claire began to protest. "Don't frill it out with a million details – just give me the bare bones. It'll go faster than you think. Once I know the history of you and Daniel, I can help make a plan."

  Hesitantly, Claire began, but as she told Morgan about her fights with her mother, her desperate bids for attention, catching her with Mack and then leaving home to move to Billings, going to work at Ledstroms and falling for Daniel, she warmed to the story. Morgan listened avidly, asking one or two questions, but otherwise keeping silent. Claire went on to describe working with Daniel, becoming his lover, how his betrayal hurt her, but she saved the company and continued to run it under the same name. How he came back and took it away from her. His threats.

  "And you saw how he was in the parking lot," she added.

  "Yeah, high as a kite."

  "Really? You think he was high?"

  Morgan shook her head at her. "You know, on the one hand you're tough and practical. On the other hand, you're kind of sheltered, aren't you?"

  Claire bristled. "Victoria isn't exactly Compton Heights from what I've heard. I bet you're pretty sheltered, too."

  "I've seen a thing or two," Morgan said. "I know when someone's on something, and he was definitely on something. Cocaine, maybe."

  Claire thought back to her time with Daniel, thoroughly taken aback. She'd never seen him do drugs. Sure, he'd been erratic, but most creative people were. He'd kept her separate from his other friends, but she'd taken that as a compliment at the time – that he hadn't wanted to share her with them. Had he actually not wanted her to know what they were doing?

  He was secretive. Sometimes he'd gotten phone calls and left the room to take them. Other times he went out and wouldn't tell her where. She hadn't liked it, but he was her boss as well as her boyfriend and had one hell of a temper. He'd definitely had all the power in their relationship. Afterward, she'd assumed those phone calls and meetings involved Edie.

  Maybe not all of them.

  "I'm still not sure I believe that," she said finally.

  "Suit yourself. I'll bet a bundle I'm right. I bet he's into other trouble, as well."

  "So what do we do?"

  "You tell me. If Daniel was going to hide a whole bunch of boxes, where would he store them?"

  "Not at the office – he knows I'd tell the police to look there." She tapped her foot. "At his Mom's house. It's out on Old Hardin Road – outside Billings. Her health is failing, and she moved into a care facility last year, but he hadn't sold it when he ran off."

  "Let's go check it out."

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Jamie was just about to pull out of the driveway when Jake Matheson jogged up beside him and called through the open window, "Want some company?"

  "I thought you were entertaining the ladies."

  "Autumn told me what you were up to. I thought I'd come along, just in case."

  "In case of what?"

  "In case of trouble," Ethan said, coming up beside Jake. "Morgan told me Daniel was hassling Autumn yesterday. I don't like the sound of it. Now her house has been broken into. Too much of a coincidence to me. I'm coming, too. So's Rob."

  "Rob?"

  "Don't worry, I've got Ned covering for me with your mystery midnight caller," Rob said, catching up to them.

  "I'm surprised Luke isn't along for the ride, too," Jamie drawled, tapping his fingers impatiently as they climbed into his truck.

  "He's helping Autumn," Jake said.

  While Jamie had always been closest to Rob, the rest of the Mathesons hung around a lot when he was growing up, so he knew Jake well. They rode to Billings in a comfortable silence, although as the minutes ticked away, he worried more and more about what they'd find when they got there.


  "Have you talked to her?" Jake asked when they were more than an hour into the drive.

  "No. She's not picking up her cell."

  "I've got Morgan's number. She programmed it into my phone today," Ethan said, perking up. He pulled out his phone and punched a button. Jamie kept his eyes on the road. He knew Ethan never used the thing, hated gadgets and technology. But couldn't he have thought of it just this once? Would have been helpful to have that bit of information long before this. "Hey. It's Ethan. Are you at Claire's?" He listened a moment. "You're what? Bad idea, Morgan. We're on our way – we'll be there in half an hour. Just sit tight, okay?" He was silent again. "I don't care how close you are, I don't want you going any farther until we get there." A short pause. "I say so. I'm your brother, that's who. Sit tight. Fuck – she hung up on me."

  "Sounds like she takes after Claire," Jake said.

  "Both of them are insane. They're going after this Daniel guy – just the two of them. Claire thinks she knows where Daniel put her stuff."

  "Where?"

  "His mom's house. She said something about Old Hardin Road. Near Noblewood."

  "That's not much to go on; there's got to be a hundred houses near there," Jamie said.

  "Give me that," Jake said and took the phone from Ethan. "I'm surprised you know how to work this thing."

  "I don't," Ethan grumbled. "Morgan showed me which button to push to reach her."

  "That's a top of the line model," Rob said, leaning in to look at what Jake was doing.

  "Claire bought it. She wanted another way to boss me around."

  They all laughed, but the atmosphere in the truck remained tense in spite of it. They didn't know anything was wrong, Jamie thought. Not in any concrete sense. Daniel might not have had a thing to do with the break in. But that didn't matter, because every man present had the gut feeling trouble was brewing, and if all four of them felt it, they were probably right.

  "Here. I've got it. Ethel Ledstrom, 6500 Old Hardin Rd. I'll give you directions when we get closer."

  Jamie pushed the accelerator down. "Call Cab. Tell him what's going down."