The Missing Heir (Special Edition)

by Jane Toombs

  Why couldn’t she simply ride over there, walk up to him and tell him she no longer blamed him for what he’d done? No, that didn’t sound right. Tell him that she forgave him? Mari grimaced, not liking that approach, either. What she said to him had to be exactly right.

  How about “I love you?” Her heart turned over as she realized the truth in those words. She did love Russ. More than she could ever love any other man. But how on earth could she walk up to him and blurt that out? Especially since she had no idea how he felt. She knew he wanted her, but that wasn’t love. Maybe she’d just embarrass him.

  In the days that followed she kept agonizing over how to approach Russ, and failing to solve the dilemma. Her consolation was seeing the gazebo take shape before her eyes. When it was finished and painted sparkling white, with lilac bushes planted around it, she could hardly wait for the paint to dry.

  “I’ll have to wait till next spring for the lilacs to flower,” she told Willa as they stood admiring the octagonal building.

  “I told Stan to pick up some lilac blooms from the florist,” Willa said. “If we’re going to have company tonight, we need flowers.”

  “Company? Who’s coming?”

  “Stan invited Russ for dinner. He’s going to cook some of his famous ribs on the outside grill.”

  “He invited Russ?” Mari echoed.

  “Why not?”

  “Well, I—because I—”

  “You never got around to inviting him. That’s why Stan went ahead and did.”

  Hurrying into the house, Mari flung open her closet and stared at what it contained. Almost all of what she thought of as her New York clothes were back at Grandpa Joe’s place. Which was okay, since she didn’t want to wear anything dressy. Casual, but not jeans, she decided. Finally she found the white skirt she’d bought in Mackinac. It might be mid-September, but it was warm, and besides, Nevada didn’t follow the no white after Labor Day rule. She pulled out a lilac, short-sleeved silk shirt she hadn’t worn in a long time. Perfect.

  Now if only she could come up with what to say to Russ she’d be all set.

  As evening approached, Mari decided she’d never felt so nervous in her life. It was going to be all she could do to keep her cool and make semi-intelligent conversation, much less make any kind of confession to him.

  As Russ waited for Stan in the café they’d agreed on, he tried once more to figure out just what the old rancher had in mind. Why this secrecy, when in a couple hours he’d be at their place for dinner?

  He greeted Stan’s arrival with relief, asking, “What’s the deal?”

  “You a gambling man?” Stan asked.

  Russ started to shake his head, then said, “Stocks.”

  “Yeah, guess you might call the stock market a gamble. So that means you’ll be up for this.”

  Russ raised his eyebrows.

  “I figure maybe that builder of yours let you in on the fact that one of his men was throwing up a gazebo for Mari. She’s always wanted one.”

  “I know.”

  “Willa claims you told Mari some kind of Indian tale about a guy coming down from the evening star to rescue a maiden. Sounded kind of peculiar to me, but it gave Willa this harebrained notion you can take or leave….”

  After Stan left him, Russ drove back to his property smiling. Whether or not Willa and Stan’s plan worked, it should be an interesting evening.

  When he arrived at the Crowley Ranch that evening for dinner, Russ thought Mari seemed as stiff as he’d ever seen her. Not that she was anything but courteous. Something, he knew, was seriously troubling her. Stan’s barbecued ribs were delicious and so were Willa’s additions to the meal. By the time they finished and the table was cleared, twilight had set in. It would soon be dark.

  “I got something I want to show you in the barn,” Stan said to Russ.

  “Let’s go sit in the gazebo while they’re fooling around with whatever ’tis,” he heard Willa urge Mari as he left with Stan.

  He noticed the padded seats inside the gazebo and the bushes around it as he passed by on the way to the barn. “Those look like lilacs,” he remarked to Stan.

  “Yeah, Willa’ll be putting out those lilac blooms I got from the florist. Only way we can get the smell of lilacs in the gazebo this time of the year.” He stopped and pointed. “There’s what I rigged up. Lucky that Mari was so busy getting dolled up she didn’t even notice.”

  Since he was about to risk his neck on it, Russ studied the contraption carefully. A thick cable ran from the barn roof to the top of the gazebo. Attached to it was a sort of chairlike apparatus on a pulley.

  “Borrowed it from the casino people. They use it in their theater sometimes. Never killed an actor yet, they told me.” Stan grinned.

  How about a lawyer turned horse breeder? Russ wondered. He shifted his gaze to the sky above the barn roof, where Venus was just coming into view, bright and shining. The goddess of love. He took a deep breath. To tell the truth, what scared him was what Mari’s reaction might be, not sliding down the cable.

  After a few minutes in the gazebo, Willa got up and said to Mari, “I’m going in to brew us some tea. Enough for the men if they want any. Stan’s got to liking it lately. You stay here. I’ll only be a couple minutes.”

  Mari nodded, rising and leaning back against one of the gazebo posts. For some reason Willa had insisted on bringing the lilacs that had been the table centerpiece out to the gazebo with them, and now the scent surrounded her, reminding her of what she ought to forget. Russ had been pleasant enough at dinner, but distant, at least where she was concerned. Did he care for her at all?

  Well, of course he did physically, but otherwise?

  She sighed, glancing up at the sky, where she looked every night since Willa had told her Venus was the evening star. There it was, brilliant in the darkening sky. She frowned. What was that wire stretching from the barn roof?

  Before she could move to the opposite side to get a better look, she gasped. A dark mass was sliding down the wire—what in heaven’s name?

  She gaped in astonishment as the object stopped at the rail and Russ extracted himself, boosting himself over the rail into the gazebo.

  He spread his arms and intoned, “Fair maiden, I come from the evening star. Will you be mine?”

  Totally taken aback, she managed to pull herself together enough to whisper, “Yes.”

  A second later she was in his arms, being thoroughly kissed.

  After a time, he whispered in her ear. “I have a feeling we might have interested observers.”

  Then she realized he must have had assistance in setting all this up. Stan’s. And probably Willa’s, too. After all, hadn’t Willa told her to get the gazebo built before she did anything else? But Russ was the one who’d come down to her from the evening star. Russ, the incurable romantic. Her Russ.

  “I love you,” she murmured.

  “I should hope so, if you’re going to be my wife.”

  She pulled away to gaze into his face, only a blur in the gathering darkness. “Wife?”

  “Didn’t you say yes?”

  She had, in fact, but when he’d asked if she’d be his, she hadn’t realized it was a proposal. “Do you love me?” she blurted.

  “Egads and gadzooks, fair maiden, do you think I’d have risked coming down that thing otherwise?”

  “You haven’t said it outright.”

  “Can’t honestly say I loved you at first sight. I think it crept up on me somewhere between the cupola and the foggy boat ride.” He gathered her to him again and whispered in her ear, “I love you, fair maiden, and if I didn’t feel sure we have an audience, I’d show you just how much.”

  “Too bad we’re not in your tree house,” she murmured.

  Releasing her, he said, “That’s easily enough remedied.” He grasped her hand and pulled her down the steps of the gazebo to the 4X4 he’d parked in the yard.

  Mari hugged her happiness to herself during the ride to Russ’s ranc
h, where he swerved onto a barely discernible track leading to the creek. In the dark they climbed the ladder into the tree house. When he lit a lantern, its dim glow lent a romantic ambiance to the interior.

  “I’ve been sleeping here,” he said, indicating a mat where a neatly folded blanket lay. “Something I’ve always wanted to do.” He put his arms around her, holding her slightly away from him. “I never dreamed I’d be making love to the most desirable woman in the world in my tree house, though.”

  Cupola, boat cabin in the fog, now a tree house, she thought. I’m going to marry a true romantic, who just happens to be the man I love.

  Then he kissed her and her mind went on hold while her body took over, signaling what it needed, answered by his.

  Both were too keyed up with escalating passion to wait. Clothes scattered this way and that until they lay flesh to flesh on the mat, his caresses driving her wild. When they joined together, their journey to the summit was so indescribably wonderful that tears filled Mari’s eyes.

  Holding her afterward, Russ said, “You’re crying. What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” she said huskily. “The tears are because I’m so happy what’s between us has turned out to be love.”

  He leaned over and brushed his lips over hers. “Surprised the hell out of me to be ambushed by love.”

  “I should never have doubted you.”

  “Why not? I doubted myself. What changed your mind?”

  “Willa showed me the right way to look at it. If I was the reason you and your father reconciled, then I’m glad you did what he asked of you.”

  “You can’t imagine how I hated being a spy.”

  “But look what happened because of it.”

  “Yeah. I got you, babe. And if you think I ever mean to let you go, you’re badly mistaken. I never thought I’d trust another woman after Denise, but you’re nothing like her. I regret suspecting you might be an impostor. All along, though, something kept telling me you were anything but. I love you, Mari—how could I help it?”

  “So you’ll never let me go?” she teased.

  “Not in a million years.”

  He pulled her closer, his lips claimed hers, and she felt his arousal even as heat rose in her again. “You couldn’t lose me if you tried,” she told him while she could still think well enough to form words.

  Then there was nothing but Russ.

  Chapter Fifteen

  When Mari flew back to New York, Russ was with her, since they’d decided to deliver their news in person.

  “I know Grandpa Joe likes you, but are you sure your father won’t mind having me as a daughter-in-law?” she asked as they settled into the limo waiting for them at Kennedy Airport. “I once thought of him as the enemy, because I felt he was.”

  “Not anymore, he isn’t. In fact I’ll bet he’ll wind up taking all the credit for us getting together.”

  She smiled at Russ. “I don’t care. We know better. Oh, I’ll admit your father set up the situation, but we could have detested each other on sight. Besides, that leaves Uncle Stan out of the equation. He was the instigator.”

  “My hunch is your grandfather will take over the moment we make the announcement. The odds are we won’t have much say in the wedding plans. Do you mind?”

  Actually, she did. She didn’t answer right away, trying to decide how strongly she felt about having a say in her own wedding. Was this where she should take a stand, as Willa had advised?

  “It’ll be elaborate, you can count on that,” Russ said. “No little chapel and a few guests. I’ll go along with whatever you want—as long as your first requirement is as soon as possible.”

  Yes, she wanted it soon. That was one thing she’d fight for.

  “How about you?” she asked. “You once told me how you disliked all the frills when you married Denise.”

  “I’ve since wondered how much was the frills and how much a feeling I might be making a mistake. While I do prefer simplicity, I wouldn’t dream of throwing cold water on Joe’s plans.”

  She nodded. “He missed his daughter’s wedding. We owe him one, I guess.”

  Since Russ had called his dad and asked him to be at Joe’s apartment when they arrived, both men were waiting when the housekeeper let Russ and Mari in the door.

  “Come to ask my permission, have you?” Joe asked Russ after greeting them both. Mari saw Russ blink, and realized that hadn’t crossed his mind. But he recovered fast. “Yes, sir. Since your granddaughter has given me the honor of agreeing to be my wife, I trust you’ll give us your blessing.” Joe glanced at his old friend. “Think I should, Lou?”

  Mari found herself holding her breath as Lou Simon’s gaze rested on her.

  “I’m not wrong often,” Lou began.

  Joe gave a disbelieving snort, stopping him momentarily.

  “I’ll admit I was not only wrong this time,” Lou continued, “but before, with my son, as well.” Still focused on Mari, he said, “I hope you’ll overlook my meddling. As with most good intentions, mine went down the wrong road.” He clapped Russ on the shoulder. “You were right all the time. Think about it, though, you two. My blunder did result in you getting acquainted.”

  Mari couldn’t help glancing at Russ, who winked at her.

  “I take it that speech was lawyerese for me to go ahead,” Joe commented with a grin. “Would’ve anyway. Couldn’t have picked a better man for you, my dear. See to it, Russ, that you make my girl happy.”

  Mari gave her grandfather a hug as Russ said, “I intend to try my best.”

  “I’m glad you like horses,” Lou told her, straight-faced, but she saw the teasing in his green eyes, so like his son’s.

  “Well, now, we have a wedding to plan,” Joe said, rubbing his hands together. “Not New York, no. Mackinac Island, that’s the ticket.”

  Nevada hadn’t even crossed his mind, Mari realized. Thinking it over, she decided Stan and Willa would really enjoy coming to the island, and so would her other friends. She wouldn’t argue about that.

  “We want it to be soon, Grandfather,” she said.

  “Have to be. October’s the end of the season there. I’ll get my secretary cracking on the details first thing in the morning.”

  “Getting late, Son,” Lou reminded Russ. “Time to call it a day.”

  After Russ and his dad left, Joe said to Mari, “You must be tired. I’ll let you go to bed. Tell me first, though, are you sure he’s the man you want above all others?”

  Remembering how Isabel had wound up running off with her choice, Mari picked her words carefully. “I’m so glad you approve of Russ, because I couldn’t possibly think of marrying anyone else.”

  Her grandfather smiled at her. “The boy’s got guts, standing up to that rock-ribbed old man of his. Like to see that in a kid. Made it on his own. You chose well. I only wish Isabel…” His words trailed off and he sighed.

  Mari waited a moment before saying, “My mother was still a teenager. I remember being that age and how little sense I had then.”

  Nodding, Joe said, “I didn’t have the patience I needed to deal with my daughter. Not that she was right about Morrison, but I should have found a way for the two of us to trust one another long before she met him.” He looked at Mari. “Do you trust me, my dear?”

  It was late, he must be tired and she knew she was. Though he’d offered an opening for her to discuss how she felt about living her own life, she didn’t think this was the right time.

  “You’ve given me no reason to mistrust you,” she said, “so of course I trust you.” Rising from her chair, she crossed to kiss him on the cheek and added, “I feel you’re my friend as well as my grandfather.”

  On that high note, they both retired for the evening.

  A week later, Mari reflected ruefully that Russ had been right. All the wedding preparations had been taken out of her hands. Natalie, Grandpa Joe’s secretary, informed her that she’d be responsible only for making out the bride’s guest li
st and, of course, choosing her own wedding gown.

  Neither task took much time but, unfortunately, the gown fittings kept her in the city, preventing her from joining Russ. The end of the tourist season on Mackinac was rapidly coming to a close, so he was busy supervising the transportation of many of his Blues off the island back to his Lower Michigan farm. He called often to say he missed her and that their wedding day couldn’t come soon enough to suit him. But hearing his voice on the phone wasn’t the same as being with him.

  Grandpa Joe took her to lunch in Manhattan a week before they were due to leave for the island. Apparently he sensed how she felt because, over their salads, he asked, “Everything all right—other than the missing Russ?”

  “I do miss him terribly,” Mari admitted. She hesitated, then added, “I have to tell you I’m beginning to feel totally useless. I may be the bride, but I’m no more than a figurehead.”

  “I want you to have all the trimmings, an occasion you’ll remember all your life. I got cheated out of my daughter’s wedding, but you’ve given me a second chance, and I intend to make use of it. This’ll be a Haskell wedding, my dear.”

  A Haskell wedding, meaning an elaborate show. She supposed maybe that was what was expected of Joe Haskell, and he didn’t intend to disappoint anyone. Besides, she was a Haskell, after all. He looked forward to this so eagerly she wouldn’t dream of letting him down by telling him she’d be satisfied with less. A lot less. All she really wanted was Russ.

  Trying not to count the days until they’d be together again, Mari concentrated on getting to know her grandfather better. By the time they were ready to leave for the island, she truly felt they’d become friends. Still, when they landed on Mackinac, she still hadn’t found the right way to express how increasingly stifled she felt.

  The October day was flawless, the sky so achingly blue it hurt to look at it. “Indian summer,” Joe said as they settled into the carriage to be driven to the cottage. “Best time of the year.”