Winter's Proposal

by Sherryl Woods

  As if she knew that newborns were fragile, Sharon Lynn reached over and gently touched a finger to her brother’s cheek. “I hold,” she announced.

  “Not yet,” Melissa told her just as there was a soft knock on the door.

  Cody reached for the handle, but his gaze was on her. “You ready for more visitors?”

  “Who else is out there?”

  “Your parents,” he said.

  “Luke and Jessie,” Sharon Lynn chimed in, clearly proud that she’d learned two new names. “And Jordie and Kelly.”

  Melissa chuckled as she imagined straight-laced Jordan if he ever heard himself referred to as “Jordie.” She gave her husband a warm smile, silently congratulating him for ending the feud that never should have happened.

  “Let them in,” she instructed Cody. “If I’d known you were inviting half the town, I’d have insisted on that private VIP suite they have upstairs.”

  As the family crowded in, a nurse came along, wheeling in a three-tiered wedding cake. Melissa stared at it in amazement. “When did you have time to order that?”

  “Right after you said ‘I do’ and delivered our son,” he said. “I told the bakery it was an emergency.”

  Kelly leaned down to kiss her cheek. “You should have seen the look on their faces when I stopped to pick it up. Obviously, they’d never heard of an emergency wedding before.”

  Melissa swung her legs over the side of the bed and prepared to go over for a closer look.

  “Stay right where you are,” Cody ordered, looking panicked.

  “I’m not an invalid,” she informed him.

  “It’s not that,” he admitted, casting a worried look at the cake. “Actually, it was a little late to come up with an emergency cake. Fortunately, they had a cancellation.”

  Melissa stared at him, torn between laughing and crying. “That is someone else’s cake?”

  “They got the other names off,” Kelly reassured her. “Almost, anyway.”

  Sure enough, when Melissa managed to get near enough for a closer look, she could spot the traces of blue food dye across the white icing on the top layer. Love Always had been left in place, but below it were the shadowy letters unmistakably spelling out Tom And Cecily.

  Melissa grinned. “Get on over here, Tom,” she said pointedly. “Give old Cecily a kiss.”

  Cody didn’t hesitate. He gathered her close and slanted his lips across hers in a kiss that spoke of love and commitment and all the joy that was to come.

  “Okay, that’s enough, baby brother,” Luke said. “Give the rest of us a chance to kiss the bride.”

  Cody relinquished his hold on her with obvious reluctance. He stood patiently by as she was kissed and congratulated by all the others. Harlan grabbed a paper cup and filled it with lukewarm water from the tap.

  “A toast, everyone,” he announced.

  When they all had their own cups of water, he lifted his cup. “To Cody and Melissa. This marriage was a long time coming. There were times I despaired of the two of you ever realizing that you belong together. Now that you have, we wish you every happiness for all the years to come.”

  “Hear, hear,” Jordan and Luke echoed. “Much happiness, baby brother.”

  “Now it’s my turn to kiss the bride,” Harlan declared, giving her a resounding smack on the cheek.

  Cody stole between them. “Get your own bride, old man. This one is mine.”

  “Maybe I will,” Harlan said, startling them all.

  Cody, Jordan and Luke stared at him in openmouthed astonishment while their wives all chuckled with delight.

  “Do it,” Melissa whispered in his ear, standing on tiptoe to give him a kiss. “Find a bride and live happily ever after. No one deserves it more. Mary would want that for you.”

  She had a feeling that when Harlan Adams set his mind to finding a woman to share his life, he was going to set all of Texas on its ear. And his sons were going to have the time of their lives getting even for all the grief he’d given them over their own love lives. Melissa was thrilled that she was going to be right in the thick of it all, where she’d always dreamed of being.

  Her mother and father came over to her then. “You happy, ladybug?” her father asked.

  She clung tightly to Cody’s hand and never took her gaze from his as she whispered, “Happier than I thought possible.”

  “About time,” her mother huffed.

  Cody leaned down and kissed her soundly. “Stop fussing, Velma.” He grinned unrepentantly at her mother’s expression of shock. “One of these days you’re going to admit it,” he taunted.

  “Admit what?”

  “That you’re crazy about me.”

  Her mother scowled. “You’re too sure of yourself, Cody Adams. Somebody’s got to keep you in line.”

  He turned his gaze on Melissa then. “And I know just the woman to do it,” he said softly.

  “What if I don’t want to keep you in line?” Melissa asked. “I kind of like your roguish ways.”

  “Told you she didn’t have a lick of sense where that boy was concerned,” Velma announced loudly.

  Melissa glanced at her mother just then and winked. After a startled instant, her mother chuckled despite herself and winked right back. She tucked her arm through her husband’s and added, “Married one just like him myself.”

  “Then I guess Cody and I are going to be okay, aren’t we, Mother?”

  Her mother glanced pointedly at Sharon Lynn and the new baby. “Looks to me like you’ve got quite a head start on it.”

  Cody brushed a kiss across her cheek. “Indeed, we do.”

  Everyone began leaving after that. Finally Melissa was alone with her husband. “I love you,” she told him.

  “I love you,” he echoed. His expression turned serious. “Do you really think Daddy’s going to start courting?”

  “Sounded to me as if he meant what he said. How would you feel about that?”

  Cody hesitated for a minute, then grinned. “Seems like a damned fine opportunity to get even with him, if you ask me.”

  “That’s what I love about you Adams men,” Melissa taunted. “You are so supportive of each other.”

  “You don’t think he deserves to be taken on a merry chase?”

  “By some woman,” she admonished. “Not by you, Luke and Jordan.”

  He sighed and folded his arms around her middle from behind. His breath fanned across her cheek. “I suppose standing on the sidelines and watching him fall will have its moments,” he agreed. “He sure seemed to get a kick out of watching that happen to the rest of us.”

  “Then I suggest you prepare yourself for the ride,” she told him. “Knowing Harlan, it’s going to be a bumpy one.”

  “As for you and me,” Cody proclaimed, “from here on out it’s going to be smooth sailing.”

  * * *

  The Rancher and

  His Unexpected

  Daughter

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Epilogue

  1

  Harlan Adams walked out of Rosa’s Mexican Café after eating his fill of her spicy brand of Tex-Mex food just in time to see his pickup barrel down the center of Main Street at fifty miles an hour. In the sleepy Texas town of Los Piños, both the theft and the speed were uncommon occurrences.

  “Ain’t that your truck?” Mule Masters asked, staring after the vehicle that was zigzagging all ove
r the road, endangering parked cars and pedestrians alike.

  “Sure as hell is,” Harlan said, indignation making his insides churn worse than Rosa’s hot sauce.

  “That’s what you get for leaving your keys in plain sight. I’ve been telling you for months now that times have changed. The world’s full of thieves and murderers,” Mule said ominously. “They were bound to get to Los Piños sooner or later.”

  Given the time it was wasting, Harlan found the familiar lecture extremely irritating. “Where’s your car?” he snapped.

  Mule blinked at the sharp tone. “Across the street, right where it always is.”

  Harlan was already striding across the two-lane road before the words were completely out of his friend’s mouth. “Come on, old man.”

  Mule appeared vaguely startled by the command. “Come on where?”

  “To catch the damned thing, that’s where,” he replied with a certain amount of eagerness. The thought of a good ruckus held an amazing appeal.

  “Sheriff’s close by,” Mule objected without picking up speed.

  Harlan lost patience with the procrastinating that had earned Mule his nickname. “Just give me your keys,” he instructed. He didn’t take any chances on Mule’s compliance. He reached out and snatched them from his friend’s hand.

  Before the old man could even start grumbling, Harlan was across the street and starting the engine of a battered old sedan. That car had seen a hundred thousand hard miles or more back and forth across the state of Texas, thanks to Mule’s knack for tinkering with an engine.

  Harlan pulled out onto Main Street, gunned the engine a couple of times, then shifted gears with pure pleasure. The smooth glide from standing stock-still to sixty in the blink of an eye was enough to make a man weep.

  In less than a minute his truck was in sight again on the outskirts of town and he was gaining on it. He was tempted to whoop with joy at the sheer exhilaration of the impromptu race, but he had to keep every bit of his energy focused on his pursuit of that runaway truck.

  The chase lasted just long enough to stir his ire, but not nearly long enough to be downright interesting. Not a mile out of town, where the two-lane road curved like a well-rounded lady’s hips, he caught up with the truck just in time to see it miss the turn and swerve straight toward a big, old, cottonwood tree. His heart climbed straight into his throat and stayed there as he watched the drama unfold.

  He veered from the highway onto the shoulder and slammed on his own brakes just as the truck collided with the tree. It hit with a resounding thwack that crumpled the front fender on the passenger side, sent his blood pressure soaring, and elicited a string of profanity from inside the truck that blistered his ears.

  “What the devil?” he muttered as he scrambled from the borrowed car and ran toward the truck. Obviously the thief couldn’t be badly injured if he had that much energy left for cursing.

  To his astonishment, when he flung open the driver’s door, a slender young girl practically tumbled out into his arms. He righted her, keeping a firm clamp on her wrist in case the little thief decided to flee.

  She couldn’t be a day over thirteen, he decided, gazing into scared brown eyes. Admittedly, though, she had a vocabulary that a much older dock worker would envy. She also had a belligerent tilt to her cute little chin and a sullen expression that dared him to yell at her.

  Taken aback by her apparent age, Harlan bit back the shouted lecture he’d planned and settled for a less confrontative approach. He could hardly wait to hear why this child had stolen his pickup.

  “You okay?” he inquired quietly. Other than a bump on her forehead, he couldn’t see any other signs of injury.

  She wriggled in a game effort to free herself from his grip. He grinned at the wasted attempt. He’d wrestled cows ten times her weight or more. This little slip of a thing didn’t stand a chance of getting away until he was good and ready to let her go. He didn’t plan on that happening anytime soon. Not until he had the answers he wanted, anyway.

  “Must be just fine, if you can struggle like that,” he concluded out loud. “Any particular reason you decided to steal my truck?”

  “I was tired of walking,” she shot back.

  “Did you ever consider a bike?”

  “Not fast enough,” she muttered, her gaze defiantly clashing with his.

  “You had someplace to get to in a hurry?”

  She shrugged.

  Harlan had to fight to hide a grin. He’d always been a big admirer of audacity, though he preferred it to be a little better directed. “What’s your name?”

  She frowned and for the first time began to look faintly uneasy. “Who wants to know?”

  “I’m Harlan Adams. I own White Pines. That’s a ranch just outside of town.” If she was local, that would be plenty of explanation to intimidate her. If she wasn’t, he could elaborate until he had her quivering with fear in her dusty sneakers for pulling a stunt like the one that had ended with his pickup wrapped around a tree.

  “Big deal,” she retorted, then let loose a string of expletives.

  She either wasn’t local or it was going to take a lot more to impress her with the stupidity of what she’d done. “You have a foul mouth, you know that?” he observed.

  “So?”

  “I’ll just bet you don’t talk that way around your mama.”

  The mention of her mother stirred an expression of pure alarm on her delicate features. Harlan sensed that he’d hit the nail on the head. This ragamuffin kid with the sleek black hair cut as short as a boy’s, with the high cheekbones and tanned complexion, might not be afraid of him, but she was scared to death of her mother. He considered it a hopeful sign. He was very big on respect for parental authority, not that he’d noticed his grown-up sons paying the concept much mind lately.

  “You’re not going to tell her, are you?” she asked, clearly trying to keep the worry out of her voice and failing miserably. For the first time since she’d climbed out of his truck, she sounded her age.

  “Now why would I want to keep quiet about the fact that you stole my truck and slammed it into a tree?”

  A resurgence of belligerence glinted in her eyes. “Because she’ll sue you for pain and suffering. I’m almost positive I’ve got a whiplash injury,” she said, rubbing at her neck convincingly. “Probably back problems that’ll last the rest of my life, too.”

  Harlan chuckled. “Imagine that. All those problems and you expect to blame them on the man whose truck you stole and smashed up. You and your mother have a little scam going? You wreck cars and she sues for damages?”

  At the criticism of her mother’s ethics, her defiance wavered just a little. “My mom’s a lawyer,” she admitted eventually. “She sues lots of people.” Her eyes glittered with triumphant sparks as she added, “She wins, too.”

  An image suddenly came to him, an image of the new lawyer he’d read about just last week in the local paper. The article had been accompanied by a picture of an incredibly lovely woman, her long black hair flowing down her back, her features and her name strongly suggesting her Comanche heritage. Janet Something-or-other. Runningbear, maybe. Yep, that was it. Janet Runningbear.

  He surveyed the girl standing in front of him and thought he detected a resemblance. There was no mistaking the Native American genes in her proud bearing, her features or her coloring, though he had a hunch they’d been mellowed by a couple of generations of interracial marriage.

  “Your mom’s the new lawyer in town, then,” he said. “Janet Runningbear.”

  She seemed startled that he’d guessed, but she hid it quickly behind another of those belligerent looks she’d obviously worked hard to perfect. “So?”

  “So, I think you and I need to go have a little chat with your mama,” he said, putting a hand on the middle of her back and giving her a gentle but unrelenting little push in t
he direction of Mule’s car. Her chin rose another notch, but her shoulders slumped and she didn’t resist. In fact, there was an air of weary resignation about her that tugged at his heart.

  As he drove back into town he couldn’t help wondering just how much trouble Janet Runningbear’s daughter managed to get herself into on a regular basis and why she felt the need to do it. After raising four sons of his own, he knew a whole lot about teenage rebellion and the testing of parental authority. He’d always thought—mistakenly apparently—that girls might have been easier. Not that he would have traded a single one of his boys to find out firsthand. He’d planned on keeping an eye on his female grandbabies to test his theory.

  He glanced over at the slight figure next to him and caught the downward turn of her mouth and the protective clasping of her arms across her chest. Stubbornness radiated from every pore. The prospect of meeting the woman who had raised such a little hellion intrigued him.

  It was the first time since a riding accident had taken his beloved Mary away from him the year before that he’d found much of anything fascinating. He realized as the blood zinged through his veins for the first time in months just how boring and predictable he’d allowed his life to become.

  He’d left the running of the ranch mostly in Cody’s hands, just as his youngest son had been itching for him to do for some time. Harlan spent his days riding over his land or stopping off in town to have lunch and play a few hands of poker with Mule or some other friend. His evenings dragged out endlessly unless one or the other of his sons stopped by for a visit and brought his grandbabies along.

  For a rancher who’d crammed each day to its limits all his life, he’d been telling himself that the tedium was a welcome relief. He’d been convinced of it, too, until the instant when he’d seen his truck barreling down Main Street.

  Something about the quick, hot surge of blood in his veins told him those soothing, dull days were over. Glancing down at the ruffian by his side, he could already anticipate the upcoming encounter with any woman bold and brash enough to keep her in hand. He suddenly sensed that he was just about to start living again.