The Cowboy's Mail Order Bride

by Carolyn Brown

  There was no way she was going to scrub the floor at Lightning Ridge. It would offend Dotty if she found Emily on her knees working on an already clean floor. Or else Clarice would think she was crazy and send her packing. The thought of leaving Lightning Ridge put a painful catch in her chest.

  She tried reading, but that didn’t work. She turned on the television and it bored her. She checked the clock. Only fifteen minutes had passed since she first came up to her room. Lord, it was going to be a long night if she didn’t find something to do.

  Finally she put on her boots and work coat and slipped out into the hallway, down the stairs, out the back door, and to her truck. She remembered the way to the horse stables, and there was always leather that could be cleaned in the tack room.

  The north wind rattled through the bare mesquite branches and seeped through her coat, chilling her from the inside out as she ran from truck to stables. A few horses snorted as she passed their stalls, but a quick check said their stables had been done that day and were in good shape. Down the center aisle she could see a sliver of light coming from under the door of the old tack room. Had she left it on when she returned the wheelbarrow and shovel? That was days and days ago.

  She peeked inside the window and there was Greg sitting at the old weathered table in the middle of the room. She rapped on the window and waited for him to look up. He motioned her inside, so she opened the door.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “Had trouble sleeping and thought I might find some good hard work to wear me plumb out. What are you doing here?” she asked.

  “Making peace.”

  She pointed. “Is that your grandpa’s saddle?”

  He nodded.

  “You should be whupped for letting it get like that.” She removed her coat and gloves and rolled up her sleeves, stuck her hand down in the bucket of water beside the saddle, and brought up an extra cleaning sponge. She squeezed out most of the water and then rubbed in the saddle soap until it was lathered up.

  He fished a second sponge from the bucket and started working on the stirrup leathers. “I couldn’t make myself come back in this room until tonight. And I told the hired help not to touch his saddle when they took things from here to the new room.”

  “I’m surprised it’s in as good a shape as it is.” She made sure she got soap into all the nooks and crevices of the saddle. “I would have expected it to be dried and cracked.”

  “He’d treated it before he put it in the closet over there. He rode the day before he died,” Greg said.

  She gave the saddle a once-over and then picked up a dry rag to wipe all the excess lather away, then stood back and looked at it again. “Where’s the oil sponge?”

  He tilted his head toward cabinets on the left side of the tack room. She quickly found it and poured a generous amount of oil into one of the old sponges. He did the same and together they rubbed enough into the leather to make it just slightly damp. Their fingers got tangled up and the touch of his warm, wet fingers brushing against hers shot delicious shivers through her veins.

  “And now the conditioner,” he said.

  Did that bit of hoarseness in his voice mean that he was affected as much as she was? She looked across the table and their gaze met, but he quickly blinked and picked up a couple of clean rags.

  She started the final step while he conditioned the stirrups and then he joined her, rubbing the conditioner all over the saddle. The air in the tack room reminded her of the way it felt right before a tornado struck out in west Texas. Everything would suddenly go so still that it was downright scary. The next sound would be an electrical crackle in the air like power lines falling. And then all hell would break loose.

  The hair on the back of her neck prickled. The stillness was eerie and the quietness deafening as she waited for the storm to hit. The air fizzed around them. She wanted him to say something, anything to fill up the weird emptiness in the room, but he just stared at the saddle.

  The fabric of his thermal knit shirt stretched across his chest and biceps. He’d pushed the sleeves up to his elbows to keep from getting them wet, and the dark hair on his arms was plastered against his skin. His fingers were long and his hands broad, like a working man’s should be.

  Emily had never wanted to touch a man more than she did at that moment, but the timing wasn’t right. His thoughts were on his grandfather, not the woman in front of him.

  Finally, he cleared his throat and said, “Thank you.”

  “Gramps used to say that hard work would help a person figure through their problems,” she said.

  “Grandpa said the best way to get to know a person was to work along beside them.” He smiled.

  “Couple of wise old men, weren’t they?”

  “Wonder what they would have thought of each other, what with them both loving the same woman at different times in their lives?” he mused aloud.

  “Shows they both had good taste in women.” She smiled.

  “Guess it does. Want to go for a moonlight ride?”

  “Horses or four-wheeler?” she asked.

  “Four-wheeler. Easier to get out and put back and we wouldn’t have to rub it down or saddle it up,” he said.

  “You sure you’re ready to leave this room? Want some more time alone? I can go on back to the house.”

  He picked up his cowboy hat, settled it on his head, and held the tack room door open for her. “I’m good now, and I really need some company.”

  Her heart floated. Lord, it was good to be needed again, even if it was just for company. Until that moment, she hadn’t realized the big hole her grandfather’s passing had put in her heart simply because she was alone in the world.

  ***

  The warmth of Emily’s body snuggled up against his back chased away the chill of the night air whipping around the speeding four-wheeler. At times the dark clouds shifted and stars popped out from behind them, but it didn’t take long for the clouds to cover them up again. The headlights on the four-wheeler showed a path that was little more than tire tracks and dead grass, but Greg knew exactly where he was going. He’d been there so often that he could have driven there blindfolded in the pitch-black dark with no lights at all.

  When he braked in front of the old log cabin, Emily hopped off and clapped her hands together to warm them. Even with good lined leather gloves, they felt numb.

  “What’s this?” she asked.

  “Grandpa’s old hunting cabin. I haven’t been up here since he died either. Thought I might as well do up the evening right and get it over with,” he said.

  “Are you going inside?” she asked.

  “If you’ll go with me. I haven’t been inside since… well, you know. The hired hands come up here during deer season and stay a few days at a time whenever they want to, but…” He let the sentence dangle.

  “Looks like the perfect place to set up a moonshine still back here in all these trees. No one could spot the smoke or smell it,” she said.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Moonshine?”

  “Gramps kept one going on his place until he got sick. His dad made it during Prohibition and they used the money he made to buy the ranch out in west Texas. That’s why it’s called Shine Canyon Ranch. Gramps and I stilled off one batch every fall. Stump liquor, he called it,” she said.

  He stepped up on the porch and opened the door. “And did you like that moonshine, Emily?”

  “Not particularly. It burned like pure fire going down, but I sampled it with him and we always used it for a New Year’s toast.”

  He picked up a box of matches and lit an oil lamp. The cabin was a sixteen-foot square with bunk beds on one side, a broken-down sofa facing a fireplace in the center, and a table with a few pots and pans and mismatched dishes on the other side of the room. Behind the sofa was one of those old red tables with chrome l
egs and four matching chairs.

  He removed his hat and hung it on a nail beside the door. “Want to set up a still?”

  “Oh, no! Not me! I could make a batch, but Clarice would throw me off the property if I led her fair-haired boy into temptation.” She sat down on the sofa and pulled her coat tighter around her body. She wondered just what those sixteen women would look like and what he’d do when he figured out that they thought they’d been chatting with him for all those months.

  “I’m not fair-haired, but she might get mad at us if Dotty got into the ’shine. It’s cold in here. Let’s build a fire.”

  “But then we’d have to stay until it went out. Did you come up here to hunt?”

  Greg sat down on the other end of the sofa and patted the place beside him. “Every single year. We stayed for three days and went home the evening before Thanksgiving. Grandpa said that gave the women folks time to cook and fuss around in the kitchen without us underfoot and it gave us some time to eat beans out of the can and chocolate cupcakes whenever we wanted.”

  She sat but kept a foot of space between them. One touch would kindle a fire that could only be put out one way, and as much as she wanted to be tangled up with him under the quilt on one of those bunk beds, her heart said the timing was still wrong.

  “You hunted with your grandfather. I made ’shine with mine. Two different men altogether, but I think they might have liked each other.”

  He stole glances at her while they sat in comfortable silence. He’d never brought another woman to the cabin, but if he had, he couldn’t imagine a single one of them waiting patiently for him to bury his ghosts and say good-bye to his grandfather.

  “Good memories,” he said finally.

  “That’s all we got when they are gone.”

  “You ready?” he asked.

  She turned toward him. “When you are. I’m not in a hurry if you need some more time. And all this brought back memories of my grandfather. We didn’t have a cabin, but we did have a campsite.”

  He stood up and held out his hand. “Emily Cooper, you are one in a million.”

  She put her hand in his and let him pull her up. “That could be a compliment if I’m the best gold piece in a million. But it could be something altogether different if I’m one in a million when they measure cow patties.”

  He chuckled. “You do have a way with words.”

  He pulled her close to his chest and tipped her chin up with his knuckles. His lips were cold, but the kiss was pure red-hot fire that heated her from the core of her heart all the way to the tips of her fingers that were splayed out on his chest. She could hear his heart thumping in unison with hers. She wasn’t sure how he managed it, but suddenly his gloves were gone and his bare hands cupped her cheeks, fingers making lazy circles on her temples as he deepened the next kiss. She opened her mouth to grant him entrance and pressed closer to him. She jerked her gloves off and dropped them on the floor so she could feel the skin on his neck. Who knew that fingertips could be an erotic zone?

  “God, Emily,” he said.

  “I know,” she said.

  He made the first move to step back and said, “We’d better get going. One more of those and we’ll never leave this place.”

  “Oh?”

  “There wouldn’t be anything left but ashes in the morning.” He grinned.

  “I bet the ashes would be hot for a long, long time.” She smiled back.

  He retrieved her gloves and kissed her fingertips before he put them back on her hands, then he picked his up from the sofa and jammed his hands back into them. “Ready?”

  “No, but I expect we’d better leave anyway.”

  Emily hugged up close to his back, her arms around him and her cheek against the rough texture of his work jacket. The roar of the four-wheeler engine was nothing compared to the noise of her heart thumping against her ribs. The first flakes of wet snow peppered against her face as Greg braked and brought the machine to a stop just inside the lean-to on the side of the sables.

  “Looks like we are going to get in on that storm like they said. It always happens on the weekends when help is short. You going to be up for moving cattle or feeding tomorrow morning?” he asked.

  Weather! How could he be talking about the damn weather when all she could think about was hot kisses, wild sex, and more hot kisses?

  “Miz Clarice says that I’ll be driving her and the ladies to church,” she said.

  “Not if this keeps up. When it snows or ices the preacher calls off church. He lives outside of town and he doesn’t drive in the bad weather. It only happens about once every two or three years at the most, but I’d be willing to bet that tomorrow is slick enough that there won’t be services,” Greg said.

  “If we don’t go to church, then, yes, of course I’ll help. Time to go now or…” She let the sentence hang.

  “Guess we’d better,” he said.

  They walked side by side, hands brushing, but neither of them made the first move to grasp the other. He opened the truck door for her and hurried to his own truck, hopped inside, removed his Stetson, and brushed the snowflakes from the brim before putting it on the passenger seat beside him. He waved for her to go ahead of him, so she started the engine and turned on the windshield wipers. The snow had gotten serious and the wind had picked up. The swirling snow made a black-and-white kaleidoscope in the headlights, but Emily was so deep inside her own thoughts that she didn’t even appreciate the beauty.

  She parked, hopped out of the truck, jogged up on the porch, stuffed her gloves and stocking hat into her pockets, and hung her coat on a rack inside the kitchen door. Greg had parked out front and she heard him stomping the snow from his boots on the porch before he came in through the front door.

  Greg met her in the foyer. He’d hung up his coat and hat and left his boots by the hall tree. He traced her jawline with his forefinger, then tipped her chin up and brushed a sweet kiss across her lips.

  Dotty yelled, “Hey, Greg, come on in here. Prissy stopped by.”

  Emily’s phone rang and she smiled up at Greg. “Bad timing. Be there in a minute.” She fished it out and said, “Well, hello, Dusty, darlin’. No, it’s not too late to call. It’s only eight o’clock. I’ve missed you too. I’d love to go to the Valentine’s party with you…”

  ***

  All the passion turned to instant jealousy in Greg’s heart and soul. Dammit, anyway! She’d said she wasn’t involved with anyone, so who in the hell was Dusty, darlin’?

  “Do I hear you out there too, Emily? Come on in and have a cup of hot chocolate with us. Prissy came by this evening to help me with a computer problem,” Clarice said.

  Emily whispered something and shoved the phone back in her pocket.

  “Hi, y’all.” Prissy smiled. “We were just talking about the Valentine’s party. Want to go with me, Greg?”

  “Oh, I have a date for the party,” he said.

  “And who is that?” Clarice asked.

  “Just someone that I really, really think a lot of,” Greg said.

  Prissy smiled. “Well, rats! I thought we could go as friends so we wouldn’t be all alone. If you’ve got a date, I’m not going. Thanks for the sweet tea, Miz Clarice. If you have any more trouble with that pesky site on your computer, just call me.”

  Greg’s phone rang and he dug it out of his hip pocket. “Okay, okay, I’m on my way.”

  He hung up and said, “Max needs me to come to the bunkhouse and help him fix the hot water tank down there. See y’all later.”

  “Glass of sweet tea?” Clarice looked at Emily.

  “I’d love some, but I really should return my cousin’s call. She called to ask me to go with her to the Valentine’s party out at Happy and I left her hanging. I don’t want to make that long drive. Thank you, though. See you in the morning for church?”

 
; “Madge already called. No church tomorrow, so I guess you are on your own,” Clarice said.

  “I promised Greg I’d help him with feeding if we weren’t going to church,” she mumbled.

  Blast her promises all the way to hell! She didn’t want to spend the morning with Greg in dozens of feeding lots full of cows in the cold weather when he had a date with another woman for the Valentine’s party. He’d kissed her and he’d told her that he wasn’t involved with anyone. How could he not be involved if they were going to something as big as a Valentine’s dance together?

  Dammit! How in the hell can things get so complicated in such a short time? Shit! I sound like Dotty.

  Chapter 7

  “Sorry about that,” she apologized when Dusty answered the phone.

  There was no answer, so Emily thought she’d lost the connection. “Dusty?”

  “Sorry, I was… I wish you’d come on home where you belong, Emily. I don’t want to tell you bad news on the phone.”

  “What bad news?” Emily went to the window and pulled the curtain back slightly, just in time to see a cute little black sports car with its headlights lighting up the snowflakes. “Crap!” she mumbled.

  “What did you say?” Dusty asked.

  “It’s not you.”

  “Someone out there in that godforsaken part of the state has upset you? Well, what in the hell are you still doing there? You know how to drive in bad weather. Come home and we’ll go up to the Golden Spurs in Amarillo and have a drink.”

  “I’ve still got eighteen days to think about things,” she said.

  “Well, think how damn far you are from home, Emily. Taylor wants that land, but we all want you to come back, whether you ranch or work somewhere in town. You can live in your house even if you sell the rest of the ranch to Taylor. You are family and it’s your home until you die if you want to live there. We miss you, girl.”

  “I miss all y’all too, but I don’t want to talk about that tonight. Now what did you say about bad news?”