Texas Brides Collection

by Darlene Mindrup

Chet squeezed her lightly, and she laid her head against him. “Thank you. I’ll love her good and proper.”

  Pa raised a brow. “I know you will ’cause you won’t want to tangle with me.”

  Chet chuckled, sparking a lopsided grin from Pa.

  Pa peered into Serena’s face. “Happy birthday, Little One. Guess you got a little more than what you bargained for.”

  “A husband, a blessing, and a palomino,” Serena said, bending to touch his whiskered cheek. “Best birthday I ever had.”

  The Niall family joined them in the afternoon, with Dugan returning home for an Irish cure to soothe Pa’s pain. By then, the three men were buried, but the tale only needed telling once. None of them felt boastful over the morning’s happenings.

  “I have an announcement to make,” Pa said, long toward evening with the effects of Dugan’s elixir easing the burning in his body. “Chet and Serena are fixin’ to be married.”

  “When?” roared Dugan.

  “I reckon as soon as we can get a preacher here to do the ceremony,” Pa said. He cast an approving glance toward Serena and Chet. “Guess I’ll have me a son and a lieutenant. Seems to me, I’m one lucky man.”

  Later on, after the celebration ceased and Pa slept, Serena and Chet sat on the porch and watched the stars break through a night sky.

  “I need to ask you in a fitting way to marry me,” Chet said, his hand clasped firmly into hers.

  She said nothing—but waited.

  “You aren’t going to make this easy for me, are you?” he asked with a nervous chuckle.

  “No, I plan to savor every word, so speak nice and slow.” She drew her knees up under her dress and rested her chin on them. She had long anticipated his endearing words and a promise of a life together. Now, at this moment, she wanted it all to last forever.

  He cleared his throat. “Serena…what’s your middle name?”

  She straightened up and gazed into his face, wishing she could see his eyes. “Hope.”

  “Hmm. I like that; it’s right pretty.”

  Another long minute passed as they were serenaded by a family of locusts and purple martins.

  “Serena Hope Talbot, I love you—imagine I have for a long time, just didn’t have sense enough to recognize it. I used to have this peculiar idea of what I needed in a woman. Strength, I called it, and I thought it meant physical strength. But I made a terrible mistake, for in many ways you are a stronger person than me. I need you, Serena, for now and always. I know God planned for us to be together as man and wife. So I’m asking if you will marry me—be a Texas Ranger’s wife.”

  She sighed and formed a smile she could not conceal. “I’ve loved you since the first day Pa brought you home and introduced you as a new ranger recruit over two years ago. I knew I wanted to marry you then, and I’ve not changed my mind since. Yes, I’ll marry you and be a ranger’s wife.”

  He pulled her closer and lightly brushed a kiss across her lips. “Our lives won’t be easy. Trouble is always springing up somewhere, and this feud between the Republic and Mexico over Texas’s boundaries isn’t going to be settled without fighting.”

  “I know. You’re a ranger.”

  “And you’ll still marry me, knowing I’ll be gone for days at a time?”

  “Yes, Chet. I agree to it all. I love you, but…”

  “What?”

  “Please don’t call me skinny.”

  He kissed her again. “I will never call you skinny, just my precious Serena.”

  “You’ve got me, Lieutenant Chet Wilkinson, and I’m never letting you go.”

  THE RELUCTANT

  FUGITIVE

  by Darlene Mindrup

  Dedication

  To the two newest members of my family, Ryan and Joniessa.

  I love you both.

  Chapter 1

  West Texas, 1859

  April Hansen set a glass of milk next to her twin brother’s plate, then took a seat across from him. She studied the hard lines of his face and wondered just what had happened to him over the last two years.

  The chilly November wind whistled eerily outside the cabin, the mantel clock above her fireplace chiming the hour of midnight. She shivered, waiting for the heat from the Franklin stove to warm the air around her.

  “So tell me, Ted, what you’ve been doing with yourself. Did you find the gold you were looking for?” she asked, pulling her robe tightly around her to help ward off the chill.

  He grimaced, tucking into the plate of stew, seemingly oblivious to the cold around him. “Not really. How about you?”

  She pushed a strand of coal black hair behind her ear and shook her head slightly. Her sky blue eyes met an exact replica when they collided with his.

  “Not really. I am making good money as a seamstress, though.”

  He smiled slightly, pushing the cleaned plate away and downing the glass of milk. “That doesn’t surprise me. Mother always said you had real talent.”

  For a moment, his face darkened. He turned away, looking out the paned-glass window of her kitchen. The wind found its way through cracks in her small cabin where the chinking had dried and left small holes, causing the hurricane lamp to flicker slightly.

  April laid her soft white hand on his darker, harder one and gently squeezed. “They’re with the Lord now, Ted.”

  His blue eyes were like chips of ice when they met hers again. “Why? Because He needed them more than we did?”

  Seeing the pain he caused her, he relented. “I’m sorry, April. I just can’t help wondering if my life would have been different if only they had lived.”

  “We were sixteen when they died, Ted. If you didn’t have their beliefs embedded in your heart by then, what makes you think you would have if they had lived longer?”

  “It wasn’t their beliefs that I needed!” He jerked his hand from hers, glaring a message she refused to heed. She hadn’t seen her brother in two years, and she wasn’t about to miss this opportunity. He needed to come back to the Lord if he wanted any hope of a normal life.

  “You can’t blame God for the way you choose to live your life.”

  He jumped to his feet, his hands clenching into fists at his side. There was a haunted, unhappy look about him that touched her sisterly heart.

  “Can’t I? Can’t I just! Keep your God. I don’t need Him!”

  She got up and reached out to touch him, but he jerked away from her. Her hand fell uselessly to her side.

  “Don’t you, Ted?”

  For a brief instant his eyes were filled with an intense yearning. April seized the moment.

  “Don’t you remember how good it was to go to church every Sunday and sit together as a family? Remember, too, the day you accepted Christ into your life?”

  His lips twitched slightly. “I remember. It was October and the water in the river was extremely cold.”

  She smiled. “That day you were baptized, you said that God would be the master of your life.”

  The smile fled from his face, and he turned angry eyes to her. “Have you ever heard of the slavery in the South? When a master is mean, the slaves sometimes run away.”

  April’s face paled. “Don’t say that. God is never mean!”

  She could see that her brother was rapidly losing control. He closed a fist and shook it at her.

  “I needed them, and He took them away!”

  “Ted…”

  “No! I don’t want to hear any more. Say another word and I’ll leave!”

  April closed her lips on the angry torrent of words begging for release. Tears threatened her composure.

  “What about me, Ted? I needed you, and you left me.”

  She couldn’t read the expression that flashed across his face. “You’ve never needed anybody,” he disagreed, his voice lacking inflection.

  How wrong could a person be? Had she seemed so self-sufficient to him? After her parents had died of the fever, she had quickly taken charge of their lives. Having been apprenticed to a wond
erful seamstress at the age of twelve, by the time her parents died four years later, she had developed quite a reputation of her own. She had an uncanny knack of mixing just the right colors and styles to make women look their best. Her business had thrived, bringing in the money they needed to survive.

  It was only when Ted had started getting into trouble that she had listened to the advice of one of her customers and come west to Abasca, Texas. The woman had told her that it was a growing, thriving area yet still free of many of the vices of larger, more settled towns. Thinking to remove her brother from the temptations to which he had so readily succumbed, she had quickly made arrangements and left Chicago far behind.

  She had hoped to influence her brother to make the right decisions, but somehow or another, she had failed miserably.

  Having lived on his own in Chicago for four years, the constraints placed upon him by the remote location of Abasca had finally gotten to him. After two years here and thinking that he was man enough at the age of twenty, he had set out on his own to make his fortune. The loss of her parents had been devastating enough, but losing her brother as well was almost more than she could bear. Still, she had survived, though her lonely heart often ached with the need of someone to love.

  That had been over two years ago, and she couldn’t help but wonder what had brought her brother back now.

  “Does it ease your conscience to believe that?” she asked quietly. He looked away, and for the first time, she noticed the Colt revolver holstered on his hip. Her eyes widened, lifting quickly to meet his enigmatic look.

  “What do you need that for?” Her voice squeaked. “What have you been up to, Ted?”

  Taking her by the shoulders, he tried to calm her. “It’s for protection, all right?”

  She wanted to ask him if that protection included killing people, but she didn’t have the courage. Seeing the set look on his face, she was afraid to find out.

  “I need your help, April.”

  The very words she dreaded hearing. How many times had she heard them in the past and lived to regret it.

  “What…what do you need? I have a little money.”

  Tenderness filled his eyes, and he smiled. “I don’t need your hard-earned money, sis.”

  Releasing her, he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and began to unwrap it. When he held it out to her, she drew back, gasping at the beautiful diamond necklace nestled among the blue and white folds.

  “Where did you get that?”

  “A friend gave it to me to keep. I want you to keep it in the bank for me.”

  April threw him a suspicious look. “This friend, why couldn’t she keep it herself?”

  He chuckled. “You sound almost like a jealous wife.” The smile slid from his face and he became all at once grave. “She had to go somewhere in a hurry. The only thing she has left in the world is this diamond necklace, and she’ll need it when she gets back.”

  April wrapped her arms tightly around herself, her teeth chattering with the cold seeping into the cabin. “W–why can’t she j–just put it in the bank…herself?”

  Seeing her shivering, Ted pulled her close, holding her against his warmth. She snuggled closer, as thankful for her brother’s love as for the heat from his body. She had missed him terribly, even though he was forever causing her pain by his crazy shenanigans.

  When her teeth finally stopped chattering, he told her, “I’ll make up the fire and we’ll talk.”

  They huddled around the cheerful blaze, neither one looking very cheerful themselves. There was something serious on her brother’s mind, and April’s suspicions were rising by the minute.

  Ted told her that his friend, Darcy, was being hunted by a man who thought she owed him money. Since the man practically owned the town, she couldn’t put her jewelry in the bank where she had been living. Afraid for her life, she had fled, leaving Ted with her necklace and a promise to reclaim it.

  Though there were holes in Ted’s story, April’s heart went out to the young woman.

  “So you want to put it in the bank here?”

  He nodded, his look fixed intently on her face. “I know it will be safe with you.”

  “What about you?”

  He shrugged, looking away. The rocking chair creaked when he rose, the only other sound the crackling of the fire as he added more wood and the soughing of the wind through the pine trees outside.

  “I’ll move on, too, once the necklace is safe.”

  “Why can’t you just stay?” she asked him softly.

  He lifted his head slightly, still not looking at her. She could see his shoulders tense. “Maybe I will.”

  April felt a little thrill of hope. If only she could reach her brother and remind him of the boy he had once been. The boy whose sole hope was in Jesus Christ. Surely he could still become the man the Lord meant him to be.

  She dropped her gaze to the gold-and-green braided rug between them. “You are more than welcome to stay with me.”

  He looked at her then, something indefinable in his eyes. Again, there was that look of desperate yearning. He opened his mouth to say something, then quickly closed it.

  “Thanks,” he told her, his voice lacking emotion. “And thanks for letting me stay tonight and feeding me.”

  “You’re welcome. Anytime, Ted. You know that.”

  His shining eyes smiled into hers. “Have I ever told you just how much I love you?”

  “No, but there’s always a first time,” she told him, grinning impishly.

  He got up from the chair and knelt beside her. Lifting a finger, he stroked her cheek. “Just in case anything happens to me, I wanted you to know.”

  At the husky tone of voice, April felt a prism of fear clawing its way up her stomach. What was he trying to say? Just exactly what did he expect to happen?

  “I’ll get my bedroll,” he told her, “and camp out here in front of the fireplace.”

  He left her sitting there worrying over what he had just said like a dog worrying over a bone. When he returned, she pulled chairs aside so that he would have ready access to the floor in front of the fireplace.

  She opened her mouth to ask him about what he had just said, but she noticed the weary lines graven into his face. She decided it could wait until morning.

  “ ’Night,” he told her, and she heard the sluggishness in his voice.

  “Good night. See you in the morning.”

  She went to the other side of the cabin, and placing her robe on the wall peg at the foot of her bed, she climbed beneath her double wedding ring quilt.

  Though she had much to think about, the rattling of the shutters by the wind soon lulled her to sleep.

  When they entered the bank the next morning, Mr. Dice, the bank manager, saw them coming and quickly rose to his feet. He looked immaculate in his business suit, his dark hair parted in the middle. It had surprised April when she had first met him to find out that he was so young yet held such a responsible position.

  She exhaled softly. For several weeks now Jason Dice had been paying marked attention to her. At first she had been delighted, never having had much attention from the male set before, but then she had overheard Jason talking to another gentleman when he didn’t know that she was just around the corner.

  “Marry April Hansen? Sure. A man can overlook a woman’s lack of good looks when she has a sufficient bank account.”

  His greediness had repelled her more than his thoughtless words. Since she knew that she was not pretty like other girls, his remark had left her unfazed. She had enough confidence in her abilities not to worry about good looks. What were good looks when you had to make a living? Though she had never mentioned the conversation to Jason, she had studiously avoided him as much as possible. The trouble was, he didn’t take subtle hints very well.

  Now he crossed to their side, assessing Ted as he came. There was an ambiguous look to his face when he finally stood before them.

  “Miss April. What can I do for you?�
��

  April motioned to her brother who was carefully scrutinizing the other man. She could tell by the look on his face that he had appraised Jason’s character in that all-inclusive look and found him lacking.

  “Mr. Dice, this is my brother, Ted Hansen.”

  Looking relieved, Jason held out his hand. At first, April thought her brother was going to ignore it, but then a sudden sparkle lit his eyes and he suddenly crushed the banker’s hand in a mighty grip.

  Rubbing the offended appendage, Jason quickly moved to April’s side and out of Ted’s way. April gave her brother a reproving look.

  “Mr. Dice, my brother has something he wishes to place in your vault.”

  “Indeed?” he glanced at Ted doubtfully, slipping his fingers into his vest pockets and puffing out his chest pompously.

  Ted pulled the handkerchief from his own pocket and held it open for the banker to see. An avaricious light entered Jason’s eyes. His demeanor changed instantly, becoming almost fawning in his attempt to please.

  “Come this way. I’ll help you fill out the paperwork myself, since April is such a good friend of mine.”

  April barely kept from rolling her eyes at the ceiling.

  “If it’s all right with you, Mr. Dice,” Ted interrupted hastily, looking suddenly uncomfortable, “April has a few things she needs to attend to at home.”

  Both Jason and April glanced at him in surprise. “They can wait, Ted,” April disagreed, frowning. “I’d like to spend time with you.”

  He looked from her to Jason, and April sensed his nervousness. His jaw tensed, the muscles working convulsively.

  “That’s all right, sis. You can go ahead. I’ll come straight home when I’m finished, and we can have that long talk.”

  The bell jingled over the door and a tall man came in. His dark, stringy hair looked like it hadn’t seen a washing in many a long day. April saw her brother’s face pale. He tried to push her toward the door.

  “You go ahead.”

  April resisted. There was something mighty strange going on here, and she wasn’t about to leave now.