by Paige Tyler
Easier said than done, Kayla thought. She never realized that there were so many steps involved in firing a pistol. And it didn’t help to have Cord standing so close to her. She could feel the contours of his body pressing up and down the length of her. Concentrating hard, she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She tried to keep her eyes on the target, but instead she shut them tightly in anticipation of the noise, and squeezed the trigger.
The revolver jumped in her hand, which in turn made her jump, and she would have dropped the pistol if Cord’s hands hadn’t been supporting hers.
Afraid to look, she turned her head to talk to Cord. “Did I hit anything?” she asked.
Soft laughter drifted to her ear. “I’m pretty sure it’ll it hit the ground…someday. If it doesn’t hit a bird first.”
Her eyes flew open and she gave him a sheepish look. “You don’t think…?”
He laughed again. “No. At least you didn’t drop the gun,” he said, and then added. “I’m just teasing you, sweetheart. It wasn’t bad for your first time. But you might want to try keeping your eyes open next time.”
Kayla blushed. Lifting the revolver again, she aimed it at one of the cans and slowly squeezed the trigger. She still jumped a little, but her hand was steadier this time. Keeping her eyes open definitely helped, too. Though she didn’t hit the can she’d been aiming for, she was at least able to see where the bullet hit when some dirt kicked up along the hillside.
The next few shots were the same and Cord had to reload so that she could try again. After putting more bullets in the pistol, he once again took up his position behind, which only made it more difficult to concentrate, and she couldn’t resist rubbing her bottom up against him in between shots.
“Hey,” Cord admonished gruffly, lightly smacking her behind. “This is serious stuff. Pay attention.”
Knowing full well the effect that she was having on him, Kayla only smiled as she aimed at her target again. This time, the bullet pinged against the can, knocking it off its perch, and she laughed with delight.
She turned to see Cord grinning at her. “Maybe I should spank you more often,” he said.
Blushing at his teasing, Kayla turned back to try her hand at shooting the rest of the cans. Much to her delight, she managed to hit all of them, and when she was done, she turned to Cord, a smile on her face.
“That was actually more fun than I thought it would be,” she said, handing him the pistol. “Can we come out and do it again?”
He laughed. “Whenever you want,” he agreed.
He spent a little bit of time teaching her how to load and unload the pistol before announcing that they were done for the day.
As she watched him place the gun back in the holster that was belted around his trim hips, she couldn’t help but notice that he was hard beneath his denims. Dragging her gaze away, she lifted her head to find him regarding her intently. Blushing, she looked away, but he caught her chin with his fingers and gently forced her to look up at him. He made no other move, but stood gazing down at her, and she held her breath. Then, finally, he bent his head to kiss her.
Kayla melted against him with a sigh of pleasure, her lips parting under his, and they were both breathing hard when Cord lifted his head.
“I’m so hot for you that I don’t think I can wait much longer for our wedding night,” he said, his hoarse with need. “When is that dress of yours going to be finished?”
Kayla, still heady from his kiss, looked up at him with fluttering lashes. “I should have it done in a day or two,” she said breathlessly.
He kissed her again, tugging gently on her lower lip. “Then what do you say to getting married on Sunday?”
Smiling, she nodded in agreement, but before she could speak, he kissed her again.
It was a long time before they got on their horses and went back to the house.
Happier than she would have thought it possible for one person to be, Kayla went into town the following day to put the finishing touches on her wedding dress. As was usually the case, Rachel was busy with customers when she walked into the store, so she went directly upstairs, eager to get to work.
Attaching the lace to the hemline was an easy task and after she was done, she tried on the dress, excited to see how it looked. It fit perfectly, the design accentuating her slim waist and curvy figure, the fine lace barely skimming the floor as she moved. She was just studying her reflection in the full-length mirror when Rachel walked in.
“Kayla, you look beautiful,” the blond girl said as she came into the living room. “And that dress is absolutely amazing. Cord won’t be able to take his eyes off you.”
Kayla smiled, exhilarated by the thought of Cord seeing her in her wedding dress. “I certainly hope not,” she said, admiring the way the dress swirled around her feet when she moved back and forth. “We’re getting married on Sunday.”
Rachel walked over to the sofa and sat down, her brow furrowing as she looked up at Kayla. “You haven’t told Cord the truth yet, have you?”
Kayla turned to look at her friend. “I’ve thought about it, but I just can’t. Not yet. Maybe not ever.”
“You’re not serious!” the other girl exclaimed. “Do you really want him calling you Abigail on your wedding night?”
Kayla’s heart ached at the thought, and she bit her lip. In the beginning, pretending to be Abigail had been easy, but now every time Cord said the other girl’s name, Kayla felt as if a knife was being plunged into her breast. That alone was enough to make her want to tell him the truth. But then she thought of the alternative. If she told him the truth, and he rejected her, she didn’t think she could take it. It would be better to let him call her Abigail for the rest of her life.
“You have to tell him, Kayla,” Rachel said quietly.
“And what exactly do I say, Rachel?” she demanded. “How do I tell him that my name is really Kayla Mathison, and that I’m from New York? Do you really think he’ll care that I was running away from an arranged marriage to a man named William Delmont, the man my father wanted me to marry? How is he going to react when he learns that I lied about being his mail-order bride, that I’ve been lying to him all along?” She answered without giving the other girl a chance to say anything. “I’ll tell you how he’s going to react. He’ll be furious and he won’t have anything more to do with me.”
Rachel frowned. “You don’t know that, Kayla.”
She shrugged. “But I can’t be sure, so I won’t take that chance.”
Her friend sighed. “And what if Cord finds out from someone else that you lied, Kayla? How is he going to react then?”
Kayla hesitated for a moment, and then shook her head. “There’s no way that he could find out, Rachel. Unless you tell him, of course, and you already assured me that you wouldn’t.” Impulsively, she sat beside the blonde and took hold of the girl’s hands. “Please promise me that you won’t say anything to him,” she pleaded.
Rachel gave her a small smile. “You know that I won’t, but I’m telling you again that this is a bad idea,” she said, and then sighed at the look on Kayla’s face. “You really will make a beautiful bride.”
Anything that Kayla would have said was interrupted by the sound of footsteps on the stairs.
“Rachel, are you up here?” a male voice said from the top of the stairs, and both Kayla and Rachel looked in the direction of the open doorway to see Dalton Jeffries looking into the room.
Kayla’s heart thudded in her chest. What was he doing here? she wondered. After the other night, she didn’t even like to be in the same room with him. Especially when he was eyeing her so boldly.
“Well, Miss Murray, Holderness sure is a lucky man,” he said.
Beside her, Rachel got to her feet. “What are you doing here?” she demanded icily.
He chuckled. “Can’t a man visit his own sister?”
Not wanting to be in the room with Dalton Jeffries for another minute, Kayla stood up and nervously smoothed h
er dress. “If you’ll excuse me, Rachel, I think I’ll go change.”
Ignoring Dalton Jeffries, she made her way across the room and into the bedroom Rachel shared with her husband. Through the door, she could hear muffled voices coming from the other room, and though she changed into her other dress quickly, she waited until she was sure that Dalton Jeffries had left before going back out.
Rachel’s face was flushed, indicating that she was clearly agitated by her brother’s visit. “Do you know that Dalton actually had the audacity to ask me when your wedding is? As if you and Cord would want him there!”
Kayla’s stomach churned at the thought. “You didn’t tell him, did you?”
The other girl shook her head. “But it doesn’t matter. Copper Creek’s so small that everyone, including Dalton, will know when the wedding is soon enough.”
That was probably true, Kayla thought. “Your brother came by the other day to make an offer on the ranch,” she said. “Cord wasn’t too pleased. I thought they were going to get in a fight right there.”
“I’m not surprised,” Rachel said.
“What is it with those two? Is it just because your brother wants to buy Cord’s ranch?”
“That’s part of it,” Rachel said, going into the small kitchen to heat water for tea. “But by no means all of it.”
Kayla followed, her brow furrowing. “Then what?”
Rachel sighed. “Cord came to Copper Creek a few weeks after Dalton got married. Hannah was the daughter of another rancher, so it was natural that her father gave his blessing when Dalton asked to marry her.” She two mugs down from the shelf beside the stove and set them on the table. “When Hannah saw Cord, though, she immediately fell in love with him.”
Kayla knew where Rachel was going with this, and though she didn’t want to hear about how much Cord had loved this other woman, she had to know. “And he loved her.”
Rachel shook her head. “No, he didn’t,” she said, much to Kayla’s surprise. “Cord’s too honorable for that. He was Hannah’s friend, and that’s all. But my brother refused to believe that. I suppose it didn’t help that Hannah spent as much time with Cord as she could. A lot of people say that she wanted to leave Dalton, which I imagine is probably true. I also think he became so furious with her that he beat her a few times, though no one really knows for sure. What everyone does know for sure, though, is that she left Dalton’s ranch in the middle of a terrible rainstorm. Everyone thinks that she was trying to get to Cord’s ranch as fast as she could, but with the darkness and rain that night, she never got there. They found her body the next morning at the bottom of a rocky gorge just above Cord’s ranch house,” she explained. “Maybe she became confused in the dark, or maybe she was just scared and running from my brother. Either way, she shouldn’t have been in that gorge. As Dalton sees it, Hannah was cheating on him, and so he blames Cord for what happened to her, whereas Cord believes that Hannah never would have been in that gorge if she hadn’t been running from an abusive husband. They’ve hated each other ever since then.”
Kayla chewed on her lower lip. She could certainly understand why Cord was so protective of her now. And she could almost guarantee that she knew exactly which gorge Rachel had been talking about.
Rachel made their tea and set the mugs on the table, but didn’t sit down right away. Instead, she excused herself and went into the bedroom, only to come back a few minutes later. Taking the chair across from Kayla, she smiled.
“Every bride needs something borrowed on her wedding day, so I thought that perhaps you’d like to wear this,” the other girl said, opening her hand to reveal a beautiful locket on a gold chain.
Kayla reached out to take the necklace, carefully holding it in her hand. “Rachel, it’s beautiful. Thank you.”
“I wore it on my wedding day, and I want it to bring you and Cord as much luck and happiness as it has Matthew and me,” her friend said.
Kayla smiled, but said nothing. The necklace was beautiful and she would be honored to wear it, especially since it had brought Rachel such good fortune in her marriage. With all the lying she had been doing to Cord, she thought wryly, she would need as much good fortune as she could get.
Chapter Five
When she awoke on her wedding day, Kayla could think only of one thing. By evening, she would be Mrs. Cord Holderness, and she couldn’t be happier. Somewhere in between the moment she’d first stepped off the stagecoach, the picnic that day he had taken her riding, and all the spankings he’d given her, Kayla had fallen in love with Cord. And though it probably should have made a difference to her that he would be marrying Abigail Murray today instead of Kayla Mathison, strangely enough, it didn’t. She would be Cord’s wife in every way that mattered, she told herself. What was in a name, anyway?
After taking a warm bath, Kayla padded barefoot over to the washstand where she brushed her long hair until it shone. She then piled it atop her head in loose curls before slipping into her wedding dress. Surveying her reflection in the full-length mirror, she then left the room to make her way downstairs. Cord was waiting for her in the foyer, and he turned at the sound of her footsteps.
He had dressed for the occasion in dark-colored trousers and a crisp white shirt with a long string tie, over which he wore a matching vest, and Kayla didn’t think she’d ever seen him look more handsome. In his hand, he held a bouquet of freshly picked daisies.
Looking at his bride, however, Cord forgot all about the flowers in his hand, and simply stared at her. She was so lovely that it took his breath away, and it was several moments before he could speak.
“You look absolutely beautiful,” he said softly.
She smiled, blushing at the compliment. “I’m glad you think so.”
Suddenly remembering the flowers in his hand, he held them out for her. “These are for you,” he said simply.
“They’re lovely,” she said, reaching out to take them. “Thank you.”
Embarrassed to realize that her hands were trembling, Kayla looked away, only to feel Cord’s fingers beneath her chin. She lifted her head to find him regarding her intently.
“When I put in an order for a mail-order bride, I didn’t expect to fall in love, Abigail,” he said softly. “But then you stepped off that stagecoach, and I fell head over heels for you from the first moment I saw you.”
Kayla caught her breath, unable to believe what she had just heard. “You…you love me?” she stammered, her voice barely above a whisper.
His mouth quirked. “Are you really that surprised, sweetheart?” he asked.
She flushed, Rachel’s words of advice to tell Cord the truth suddenly coming back to her. “I…there’s something I have to tell you…” she began, but her voice trailed off.
“You don’t have to say it; I understand,” he said when she didn’t finish. “I wasn’t expecting you to feel the same way. In time, perhaps, but for now, it’s enough that you’ve agreed to marry me.”
She blinked. “But…that’s just it,” she said quickly, going up on tiptoe to kiss him on the mouth. “I do love you, Cord. I love you so much. It’s just that…”
His brow furrowed. “What is it, Abigail?”
She couldn’t tell him, she realized. She simply couldn’t do it. Tears suddenly sprang to her eyes, and she blinked them back. “I…it’s nothing,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m just so happy, that’s all.”
Cord looked like he wanted to prompt her further, but after a moment, he smiled. “Then we’d better get going, before we’re late.” So, wearing something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue, and using the name, Abigail Murray, Kayla Mathison married Cord Holderness that afternoon. Most of the town had come out to witness the ceremony, as well as to congratulate her and Cord at the reception held outside in the churchyard afterward. Kayla had been half-afraid that Dalton Jeffries would come to the wedding, and she was relieved when she didn’t see him among the guests.
Several of the townsfolk
had brought musical instruments with them, and so after the meal, which was a simple menu of roasted chicken, potatoes and vegetables, Cord took Kayla’s hand and led her onto the makeshift dance floor. Their guests eagerly joined in, though Kayla barely took notice of the other dancers around them, so captivated was she by her husband.
In fact, she was so caught up in dancing with Cord that she didn’t notice Dalton Jeffries standing beside them until he had placed a hand on her husband’s shoulder.
“Mind if I cut in?”
Kayla blinked, not sure if she were more startled by the man’s question, or his presence at her and Cord’s wedding. She looked at her husband nervously. Cord’s jaw was clenched, his face an unreadable mask.
Holding onto her hand, Cord protectively pulled her close. “You’re not welcome here, Jeffries,” he said curtly. “I’ll tell you this only one time; get the hell out of here.”
In the tense silence that followed, Kayla gripped her husband’s hand tighter. She realized then that not only had the music stopped, but that every one of the guests was staring at them, and she prayed that Dalton Jeffries would simply do as Cord had asked and leave.
But Dalton made no move to leave. Instead, he gave Cord a sardonic smirk. “Come on, Holderness; why not share some of your good fortune with the rest of us?”
Dalton Jeffries words were casual enough, but as he spoke, he lazily looked Kayla up and down, leaving no room for doubt as to what he was referring to, and Cord snapped.
With a sound deep in his throat, Cord lunged for Dalton. Crying out in dismay, Kayla desperately gripped her husband’s arm as she tried to hold him back.
“Cord, don’t…” she begged.
Intent on making Dalton pay for his snide comment, Cord ignored her, going for the other man anyway, and Kayla was grateful when Lucas, who had been nearby, stepped in to restrain his boss with a hand on Cord’s shoulder. Cord tried to shake him off, which was when another one of the hands took his other shoulder.
“He’s not worth it, Cord,” Lucas advised, trying to maintain his grip on Cord’s shoulder.