The Wrangler's Bride

by Justine Davis

  “Things will work out,” his mother said with her usual optimism. “So how is your guest doing?”

  “Mercy?” As if there were somebody else, he thought wryly. But he didn’t have an answer to the question, so he was stalling.

  “Mercy? My, I haven’t heard that since you were kids.”

  “I… We’ve kind of gotten back in the habit.”

  “Is she doing all right? Kristina was very worried about her.”

  “I think she’s dealing with…that.”

  “That’s good to hear. She’s a wonderful girl—I hate to think of her hurting. Is she there? Kristina will be here in a minute, and I’m sure she’ll want to talk to her.”

  “Er…she’s outside. Wait a second.” He set the receiver down and got to his feet. “Gambler,” he said as he walked toward the door. The dog, who had been dozing on the small rug in front of the sink, scrambled to his feet. “Mercy,” Grant said. The dog trotted across the room as Grant opened the door. “Find her, boy. Find Mercy.”

  Gambler gave the muffled yip that meant he understood. He watched the animal dart through the door, then lope toward the barn as if he knew exactly where she would be. No doubt he was right, Grant thought. She’d been enchanted by the new foal. Besides, Gambler always knew the whereabouts of everyone in his world. His nice, ordered world.

  Grant suddenly wasn’t sure the dog wasn’t a lot better off than his supposed master.

  Twelve

  Mercy didn’t know how long she’d spent standing there watching the foal, who was now fairly steady on her feet, when Gambler appeared at her side again. He yipped as if to get her attention, then trotted toward the door. He paused, looking back over his shoulder at her expectantly. Then he yipped again, took a few more steps, and repeated the pattern.

  “I’m supposed to follow you, right?” Mercy said. She took a couple of steps toward the dog, and he immediately barked in approval and started off again. Mercy laughed, unable to help herself. “Lead on, dog. I’ve always loved Lassie movies.”

  It was quickly obvious that the animal was heading back to the house. For a moment, when she remembered the last time Gambler had issued a summons, her heart sped up. Was something wrong? Had Grant been hurt, or—?

  She broke off her thoughts with a wry quirk of her mouth. You’ve watched too many of those Lassie movies, she told herself sternly. Still, she picked up her pace as she followed the mottled gray dog as he led her around to the kitchen.

  “—much better, I think.”

  She heard his voice the instant she stepped inside and was, perhaps foolishly, relieved to see him sitting in one of the chairs at the oak table, the telephone cradled on his shoulder.

  “Yes, she is,” he said, glancing over at her. “Here, she can tell you herself.”

  He got up and held the receiver out to her. Mercy blinked, startled.

  “Kristina,” he said. He bent to scratch Gambler’s ear. “Good boy,” he said.

  Mercy’s eyes widened. “You really…sent him for me? And he did it?”

  “He knows who you are, and he knows the command ‘Find.’ It’s nothing special, for him.”

  She knew it was only her touchy mood this morning that made her read more than he’d meant into that “nothing special,” as if he’d meant it to apply to her, as well, but that didn’t stop the sting of it. She took the phone none too gently, ignoring Grant’s startled look before he left the room to let her talk in private.

  “Meri?”

  It took her a moment. She’d gotten used to Mercy, and the other name sounded odd now. “Hello, Kristina. Merry Christmas.”

  “You, too,” her friend said. “I tell you, it’s been quite a time here. There’s so much going on. Dad’s in shock about Uncle Jake and Grandfather, Mom’s trying to help him…but Grant can tell you all that. Mom just told him everything. Tell me about you. How are you doing?”

  “I’m fine.” It wasn’t really a lie, she thought. As far as what Kristina was worried about was concerned, she was fine. It was the rest of her life that had suddenly gotten confused.

  “You don’t sound fine,” Kristina said.

  Mercy, shrugging off her heavy jacket in the warmth of the kitchen, hastened to head her off. “I am, really. I feel…much better about Nick now. I’m handling it.”

  “No more nightmares?”

  Mercy’s hand tightened around the receiver as she remembered the night the horrid dream had chased her from the house. Remembered the way Grant had gently, almost tenderly, held her, soothed her, until the ugliness faded.

  “They’ve gone, I think,” she said softly.

  “Then it did help. I thought it might. You always were the type who had to go off alone and work your way through things.”

  Sometimes Kristina’s perceptiveness surprised her, Mercy thought. It was easy to dismiss her as a spoiled, beautiful princess, but there was more to the pretty blonde than that.

  “And Grant’s a good listener,” Kristina added.

  Yes, Kristina was full of surprises. “Yes,” she agreed, “He is.”

  “We really miss him, but I’d hate to think of you alone out there. I’m glad he stayed.”

  Mercy’s throat was suddenly tight. “I’m sorry if I…kept him from his usual plans.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s more important that you’re not alone. And it’s not like Grant likes it here. He only comes every year to see us.”

  She’d suspected this, perhaps even known it. The clues had been clear; the men’s reaction to the Christmas preparations, Rita’s comments, all of it, but still, this confirmation that Grant had forgone his usual family visit for her sake, so that she wouldn’t be alone, moved her almost beyond words.

  “If he had his way,” Kristina said, her tone one of bewildered affection, “I don’t think he’d ever leave that silly ranch of his.”

  Mercy swallowed hard, past the lump in her throat. “I want to thank you for…suggesting I come here. It’s been wonderful. Peaceful. And it’s so beautiful.”

  “Beautiful? Peaceful I’ll believe, but beautiful? Don’t forget, I’ve been there.”

  “It’s really quite lovely. With the snow—”

  “We’ve got snow here, too, but at least it’s covering something interesting. Not just barns and fences and cows.”

  “Cattle,” Mercy said.

  “Oh, Lord, you sound like Grant. Don’t tell me you actually like it there? There’s not a decent store in what passes for the nearest town, and not a decent manicurist for miles.”

  “Spoken like a true city girl,” Mercy said, then wished she could call back the words.

  But Kristina only laughed. “Well, I am.” Then, suddenly serious, she asked, “That sounds like Grant talking again. Is he still…bitter?”

  “Bitter?”

  “About city girls.”

  “I… He doesn’t seem to like them much.”

  “After what that Carter witch did, I’m not surprised.”

  Mercy held her breath. She’d known there had to be something, or someone, behind Grant’s dislike; it had seemed far too specific and concentrated for there not to be.

  He has his reasons.

  Rita’s words came back to her again. Obviously, one of those reasons was a woman named Carter.

  “Carter?” Mercy asked, trying to keep her tone one of only mild interest, and hoping Kristina’s natural volubility would do the rest.

  “Constance Carter. She belongs to my father’s country club. That’s how she met Grant, a few years ago. She acted like she was really taken with him, but he was nothing but a curiosity to her, somebody she could drag to parties and show off as her latest novelty, a handsome, wealthy cowboy. But when she found out he had no intention of leaving the ranch and living in the city as her…trophy husband, she dropped him. Said she couldn’t believe he’d really expected her to live in such an uncivilized place.”

  Kristina’s voice rang with remembered outrage; most might see only the surface beauty an
d the easy charm, but Mercy had always known family loyalty ran strong and deep in Kristina Fortune. So strong that she didn’t even see the irony in her own words, since she felt the same way about the ranch as did the despised Constance Carter.

  “Well, it is pretty isolated out here,” Mercy said.

  “You don’t have to tell me,” Kristina said with a laugh. “I’ve been there, remember? When Grant asked me to stay one whole summer, I lasted about three weeks. I don’t know how Mom lived there as long as she did. She’s much happier in the city, with people around.”

  It hit Mercy then, hard. The three women Grant had cared for most in his life, his mother, his sister, and a woman he’d apparently loved enough to propose to, and he’d lost them all to the city. Or so it must seem to him. No wonder he was bitter, no wonder he spoke those words city girl like an epithet. And she found she couldn’t blame him.

  It wasn’t until she had finished her conversation with Kristina, and said a brief hello to Kristina’s mother and wished her happy holidays, that something else struck her. She hung up the phone, picked up her jacket and walked slowly back outside, thinking. Wondering.

  Had Grant’s reaction this morning, his words about expecting nothing more from her except that she would go back to her other life, not been meant as a warning after all? At least not for her? Had it rather been a warning aimed at him, a reminder that she, like all the women in his life, would go back to the city? Had he merely been anticipating what he saw as inevitable, and trying to make it less painful for both of them?

  What he saw as inevitable?

  Her own thoughts rang in her head. She walked on, pulling her jacket on and buttoning it against the brisk air.

  He was right, wasn’t he? It was inevitable. She would go back. She had to. Not just to face Nick’s killers when they were captured, but to face her own demons, unleashed in the moments when she had realized she was too late to do anything to save him, the moments when Nick had breathed his last, rasping breath in her arms.

  She shivered, violently, and it had nothing to do with the cold; the sun was bright and warm, even on this winter day, with snow all around. She sped up her steps, even though she knew that it would do little to warm this kind of chill.

  Of course she would go back. Her life, her work, was there. What else would she do? Hide out here forever? A burst of unexpected longing exploded within her at the idea of staying here, forever, with Grant.

  “Coward,” she snapped at herself, and began to walk even faster. “You really did leave your nerve back in that warehouse, didn’t you?”

  Her jaw tight, her head down, she hurried until she was almost running. Finally her gasping lungs forced her to slow down, reminding her again that good shape in barely eight-hundred-feet-above-sea-level Minneappolis didn’t necessarily translate to good shape in a state where the average elevation was seven thousand feet.

  She hadn’t consciously realized where she was heading, but when she at last noticed her surroundings, she wasn’t surprised. She kept on, wishing she had Joker’s long legs and power to carry her, but realizing she would never dare take the big horse out alone. And alone was what she needed to be right now.

  She’d never felt so overwhelmed by so many conflicting emotions in her life. She’d been devastated by Nick’s death, consumed by her own feelings of guilt over it, her own doubts about the path she’d chosen. But she’d been handling it. Perhaps not well, but she had been handling it.

  It was only when she came here, only when the peaceful beauty of this place and the powerful presence of the man who owned it were added to the brew, that it had all boiled over, spilling in so many directions. She felt so scattered she didn’t know if she could ever pull herself together again.

  She had to take her hands out of her pockets to make the short climb up to the protected shelf that overlooked the ranch, but she shoved them back into the warmth as soon as she reached it. It was here, of all the quiet places Grant had shown her, that she had found the most peace.

  Was it odd, that where others seemed to find only isolation, she found a welcome solitude? Was there something strange about her, some missing part that made her find serenity where others had found only loneliness? That while others seemed to talk out their problems unceasingly, she preferred a quiet, secluded place to think about her life…and what she was going to do with the rest of it?

  I used to come up here a lot. When my dad was sick, I used to…hide out up here, when things got to be too much.

  Grant’s words flowed over her as if he were there, speaking them again, in that tone of quiet understanding. He knew, he felt the same way. She wasn’t really alone. And perhaps she wasn’t as odd as she’d feared.

  But she’d been right about the scars he carried. Although he carried them so much more gracefully than she, Mercy thought with a sigh as she looked out over the landscape that was so familiar now, yet no less pleasing for that.

  She drew her knees up in front of her and wrapped her arms around them, tucking her hands into her sleeves. She’d stopped to change into a warmer sweater and a pair of heavier socks—and a bra, because going without reminded her too vividly of the moment when Grant had first bared her breasts and groaned in pleasure—but she’d managed to forget her gloves in the process. But it wasn’t nearly as cold here in her granite shelter as it was out where the wind was all too willing to show its opinion of people who hadn’t the sense to stay inside where it was warm.

  Well, if she’d had any sense, as her father was wont to say, she wouldn’t have become a cop in the first place. And she wasn’t sure he hadn’t been right, although once she’d made it, Gordon Brady had been as proud of her as if the uniform had been his own dream for her all along.

  She sighed, feeling a tug of longing for her father’s wry wisdom and her mother’s quiet support. But if she’d gone to them, she wouldn’t have had this time with Grant. And whatever happened now, she didn’t think she would ever want to give that up. Not for anything, despite the confusion she’d been hurled into now, would she give up the memory of what had come to life between them. Especially when it might be the only thing to get her through what could be some dark, grim days ahead.

  She let out a long sigh. In the beginning, she’d always been glad to get back to the job after days off, and more so after a vacation. But lately, the constant contact with nothing but the negative side, nothing but the misery, had begun to wear on her, to erode her very faith in people’s innate goodness, until there was very little left, until she dreaded going back to work.

  Her colleagues told her that was life on the job and she’d better get used to it, but she didn’t know if it was possible to get used to the ugliness, day in and day out, if it was possible to deal with it and not have it rub off on you one way or another. You either became so hardened to it that you didn’t care about anything anymore, or you let it eat at you until you hated not only your fellow human beings, but yourself, as well. Either way, you were no good to anyone after that. In fact, you were a danger. There was only one thing worse.

  A cop who’d lost the nerve.

  She shivered, rubbing at her arms for a moment. She wondered if maybe she should start back; she’d been out here for—

  A snorting whinny interrupted her thoughts. Joker, she thought, amazed that she, who had known next to nothing about horses such a short time ago, could now pick one out simply by the sound, with perfect certainty.

  And if it was Joker, then of course it was Grant. She bit her lip, and with an effort managed to keep her expression even as she waited. A moment later, man and horse appeared. Grant pulled the big Appy to a halt in the same spot he’d stood in before. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, and so neutral she knew it had to take a conscious effort.

  “I thought you might be up here.”

  “I…needed to think.”

  Something flickered across his face, some emotion she couldn’t pin down before it vanished.

  “Mercy, if it’s about thi
s morning—”

  “No. I mean…not entirely,” she added honestly. “That’s part of it, but it’s really—” she waved her hand rather vaguely “—everything.”

  Grant was silent for a moment, looking at her. “Everything?” he finally asked, his voice still quiet and soft.

  She stared past him, out over the snowy ranch, and on to the horizon. Only the bases of the mountains were visible today, as clouds clung to the peaks.

  “I feel like…I’ve found myself and lost myself at the same time,” she murmured, knowing even as the words came out that they made no sense at all.

  Grant said nothing. What was there to say after a silly statement like that? Mercy wondered. But then he nudged Joker, and the horse executed a neat sidling step, until Grant’s knee was nearly touching the edge of the rocky shelf. Grant swung his right leg over the horse’s back, and with one small movement was sitting beside her. He tossed the reins over the horse’s head, and Joker’s head dropped as he settled in to patiently wait.

  For a while, they just sat there, each staring outward. As if they were both afraid to look at each other, Mercy thought, wondering if it was true.

  Grant cleared his throat. She glanced at him in time to see him open his mouth as if to speak, then close it again. He let out a breath, then tried again.

  “Coming here was supposed to…help you,” he said.

  “It has,” she said earnestly. “It’s helped so much. I can think about Nick now and…not cry. I don’t have the nightmares about what happened, not anything like before. I’ve found peace here, Grant. A peace I never expected to find.”

  “If that’s what you’ve found…” He hesitated, as if he didn’t really want to ask the question, and when he went on, his tone was forced. “What have you lost?”

  Mercy sighed. Grant went still. He waited for a moment, then said stiffly, “None of my business, right?”

  “No, it’s not that!” She drew up her knees again, and hugged them to her. “It’s just that…when I think of going back, of going out there on the job again, it’s not like it used to be. I knew that, even before Nick, but I kept telling myself it was only temporary, that I was going through burnout, like every cop does at one time or another.”