The Cowboy Steals a Lady

by Anne McAllister

  "You know ol' Hard-Ass?"

  She nodded, still smiling. "He's my father."

  * * *

  Four

  « ^ »

  Her father had that effect on people.

  Not the least, Poppy reflected as she lay between the cold sheets, herself.

  The Honorable George Winthrop Hamilton was indeed a force to be reckoned with. Poppy ought to know. She'd been reckoning with him her whole life.

  Not that he wasn't a good father. He was. He was thoughtful, intelligent, earnest, hardworking, determined and he had all the finesse of a steamroller when he made up his mind about what he wanted.

  Or what he thought was good for her.

  Born late in her parents' marriage—the child they'd always longed for and finally against all odds had—Poppy had forever been the focus of all her father's hopes and dreams.

  For the first twenty years of her life, she had also been blessed with a mother who threw up roadblocks to prevent the judge from flattening everything in sight to make those dreams come true.

  But after her mother's death, Poppy had been on her own.

  She hadn't always done the best job. Oh, some things she'd done well enough. Like instead of going to Yale, her father's alma mater, she'd insisted on going to MSU when her mother had become ill. And she'd stuck to her botany major in the face of his opposition.

  "How on earth will you get into law school with a degree in plants?" he'd demanded.

  Of course, he hadn't known then that she wasn't planning to go to law school. But when, after graduation, she'd bought the flower shop, he'd got the idea. And been furious.

  And wrong.

  At least she'd been right about that. There were other areas of her life where she hadn't been quite so smart.

  She hadn't, for example, been right about Chad.

  It was, she thought, because of her initial success with her flower shop that she'd got involved with Chad Boston in the first place. She'd been heady with her accomplishments, giddy with the belief that making adult decisions really wasn't so hard after all.

  And so she'd overlooked her first impression of Chad Boston—that he was just a little too forward, a little too confident, a little too … interested in her.

  She should have known, she told herself afterward.

  Men weren't generally falling all over themselves to go out with her. They thought she was pleasant and good company and some of them even flirted—like Shane—until they found out who her father was.

  And then they vanished.

  There was something about being the daughter of Montana's twentieth century answer to "the hanging judge" that sent men heading for the hills.

  Except Chad.

  When Chad had learned whose daughter she was, he'd seemed pleased.

  "A judge's daughter?" he'd said, and his smile had widened.

  It almost seemed to make him seek her out. In retrospect she realized that was the truth. But at first she'd thought it was her own scintillating personality that had drawn him to her. And she'd been aglow with the idea that she had a real boyfriend at last.

  A successful boyfriend, too. A real estate wheeler dealer. A man on the move.

  An out-of-stater, to be sure. But Poppy didn't scorn recent arrivals the way some Montanans did. Although it turned out she should have scorned Chad Boston.

  Her father had warned her. Generally not one to criticize her friends, he did wonder aloud at some of Chad's land deals.

  "That young man know what he's doing? He can't divide that property, you know," he said to Poppy once.

  But Poppy was confident that Chad knew what he was doing. And she was right—just not right about what it was she thought he was up to.

  In fact, she didn't really have time to give it much thought. She had her own business to run. And when she wasn't busy in the shop, Chad was distracting her—wining and dining her, more or less sweeping her off her feet. It was a heady experience for a woman who'd never had a steady boyfriend.

  She thought he was everything she'd ever wanted. And when he asked her to marry him, she said yes.

  Fortunately before they got to the altar, the law got to Chad. Even then, when the trouble began, she thought it was just that he didn't understand the covenants and that when he did, things would be all right. She didn't completely understand them herself. She suggested he talk to her father and get things straightened out.

  "Don't need to," he'd said, dropping a kiss on her nose. "It'll all blow over. When people find out I'm the judge's son-in-law, they'll come around. Having a judge in the family is great for credibility." He'd grinned at her.

  "But if it's illegal…" Poppy had protested.

  "Nobody has to know that."

  He'd been so smug. So sure of himself. Of her. And her father.

  Bad judgment on his part.

  Poppy knew her father even if Chad didn't. In Judge Hamilton's eyes, illegal was illegal—no matter who did it. And a man had to accept responsibility for his actions.

  When Chad was arrested, he expected the judge would go to bat for him. He was sadly disappointed. So was Poppy. But not in her father. She was disappointed in her own judgment—and in the man she'd hoped to marry.

  Chad plea-bargained and left the state.

  A month later he wrote and asked if she would mind returning the ring he'd given her.

  She didn't mind in the least.

  She minded being a fool, though. She minded having made such a disastrous choice. It had been two-and-a-half years, and she hadn't dared make another one. She'd shut herself off from men since then, afraid she might do it again.

  "You won't," her father assured her. "He was the bad apple in the bunch."

  But Poppy didn't trust herself anymore.

  "Fine," her father said, "I'll find a man for you."

  She'd thought he was kidding until he started turning up with eligible men. It was embarrassing beyond belief.

  She was polite to them, of course. But she found something wrong with each of them. This one was too tall. That one was too short. This one was too moody. That one had a boring job. She expected that before long he would stop looking.

  And then last summer he'd had a mild heart attack. Poppy thought that might make him quit. And when the too tall, too short, too this, too that men stopped appearing, Poppy breathed a sigh of relief.

  But she was wrong. He'd just become more serious. He was seventy years old and suddenly aware that he might not live to see Poppy settled and giving him grandchildren. He wasn't wasting time on 'probables' anymore. He was going for her perfect man.

  Last Monday he'd appeared in her shop, beaming and rubbing his hands together, sporting the look reserved for when he'd put a criminal away for life. "Got him," he said.

  Poppy, used to glee in judicial matters, had barely looked up from concentrating on the daffodils she was arranging. "Got whom?"

  "Your perfect husband."

  Poppy almost decapitated a daffodil. "What?"

  "You heard me. And this one really is. He's not like all the others. He's exactly right." He looked at her for congratulations.

  Poppy managed a wan smile, all the while strangling the scissors in her hands. She wished it was her father, or even better, her perfect husband, for she was reasonably certain that her father's notion of perfect husband material was not her own.

  "J.R. Phillips," her father had said. "He's a lawyer. Went to Harvard. But he's Montana born and bred. His daddy owns a big spread up near Great Falls. J.R. used to cowboy for him. He's educated and a man of the land, both. Dark hair. Green eyes. Six feet tall. Fine-lookin' fella. You'll love him."

  As if, Poppy thought, those were all the qualifications it took.

  As far as her father was concerned they were. "He's coming Friday. You can come out to the house and fix dinner for him."

  How like her father to think she would jump at the chance to show off her housewifely skills. "Sorry. I can't."

  His brows snapped toget
her. "Why not?"

  "Milly's rehearsal is Friday."

  Her father heaved a sigh, then said, "Fine. Don't cook him dinner. Come by and meet him after the rehearsal."

  "I can't. We're doing the flowers together, Milly and I. She works for me now, did I tell you? Anyway, after the dinner we're taking the dried arrangements over to the church and setting things up."

  "If she's working for you, delegate. Let Milly do it."

  "It's her wedding, Daddy. She's got other things on her mind. Besides, she doesn't have the experience."

  "You're not going to get out of this, Poppy," her father said sternly. "If you won't come to the mountain, the mountain will come to you. I'll bring him to the wedding. I have an invitation for Judge Hamilton and guest," he said, forestalling her objection. "We'll be there. You can't miss the wedding."

  And she wouldn't have—if Shane Nichols hadn't appeared out of a snowstorm and kidnapped her.

  Bless his dear misguided heart.

  Shane didn't know what a huge favor he had done her.

  Poor guy, she thought now, tucking the blanket under her chin. He hadn't had a world-class day. He'd been more than a little disconcerted by her revelation that she wasn't Milly. But he seemed even more discomfited by the discovery that he had kidnapped "Hard-Ass" Hamilton's daughter.

  Poppy smothered a giggle now as she recalled the look of horror on his face. And the deep red flush that followed.

  She'd been charmed. She'd never met a man who blushed before.

  Chad certainly hadn't.

  Of course Chad had no shame. And maybe blushing wasn't all that commendable among men in general. But when it came to kidnappers, Poppy decided it was a positive character trait.

  He had a few other positive traits as well. Like the most beautiful dark blue eyes she'd ever seen. And a lean, hard, handsome face. Chad's features had been almost classically beautiful, but Shane's had character, which she found even more attractive. He had an easy, confident masculine grace, too, telling her that women probably fell over like bowling pins if he so much as winked.

  She wasn't surprised.

  She wouldn't be averse—if she were that kind of girl.

  Not that there was any chance of him going to bed with her now!

  Once she'd said, "He's my father," about Judge "Hard-Ass" Hamilton, Shane had practically shoved her into the bedroom and slammed the door.

  It was an extreme version of a reaction she was used to. The exact opposite of Chad's response. She found that she trusted it. Liked it.

  Liked him.

  She could well imagine a guy like Shane, one who seemed to leap before he looked and would do anything—even kidnap a bride, for a friend—would run afoul of the authorities now and again. She wondered what sort of "school spirit" had brought him before her father. Some sort of petty vandalism, no doubt. Lots of students, caught up in the fervor of school spirit, spray painted their school's name in public places.

  She wondered if her father had made him scrub it off. She knew he'd done that. Her father believed in the punishment suiting the crime.

  What would her father do if he knew Shane had kidnapped her?

  The very thought made her smile.

  Was that what Shane was worried about?

  She would have to assure him that she would not mention it.

  Tomorrow.

  She didn't think she ought to venture back out into the front room again tonight.

  Not because she thought he was likely to jump her bones. She thought the revelation of her parentage had pretty much put the lid on that temptation.

  It was her own temptation she was concerned about. There was a very large part of her that wished she'd kept her mouth shut and let him get on with his seduction.

  The notion shocked her. Poppy Hamilton was not the sort of girl who entertained lightly the notion of going to bed with a man. The fact of the matter was, she'd never gone to bed with a man. Not even Chad.

  He "respected" her too much, he'd told her at the time.

  Her cheeks still burned at how gullible she'd been, believing a thing like that.

  Still, Chad aside, it was true: she'd never been one for casual sex.

  Until now.

  She pressed her hands to her cheeks, felt them burn even hotter and knew it had nothing to do with Chad's perfidy. It had everything to do with the idea that she was actually entertaining the notion of making love with Shane Nichols.

  "Now who's blushing?" she chided herself.

  She wasn't serious about making love with him, was she?

  Of course she wasn't.

  But he was, hands down, the most tempting man she'd ever met in her life.

  Not just the blue eyes and handsome face. It was more than that. More than his narrow-hipped jeans-clad butt, too, even though that had caught her eye right off, the night she'd seen him at The Barrel. She was something of a connoisseur when it came to an appreciation of a Wrangler-wrapped rear end. But usually her admiration stopped there because the rest of the man was not worth writing home about.

  In this case Poppy had let her gaze wander north, expecting to be disappointed, only to find herself catching her breath.

  It wasn't just the ubiquitous cowboy hat set atop short midnight-dark hair that caused her throat to constrict and her heart to trip. Nor the sharp nose, high cheekbones and generous mouth. It was all of the above and more. The more being the grin on that mouth, the grooves in his cheeks, and most especially the dancing light in those bright blue eyes.

  This man was alive.

  She'd found it hard to look at anyone else.

  All evening long she had watched him. More than once their eyes had met and, embarrassed at her blatant interest in a stranger, Poppy had looked away.

  It was a pity, she remembered thinking, that she couldn't find a man like him to take home to her father. But she didn't know him. And she never would.

  She never expected to see him again.

  But she had.

  Once or twice the next day she'd glimpsed him—or thought she had—out of the corner of her eye. Of course Livingston wasn't exactly a metropolis. It was possible to see the same people several times in one day, so she dismissed it. But then tonight at the rehearsal dinner, she'd seen him at the bar.

  Once more their gazes had met. This time they'd lingered. Connected.

  The charge was almost electric.

  It had taken a moment for Poppy to recollect herself and hurry on. She was relieved—but a little disappointed—that when she came back, he was no longer there.

  Still, his presence hadn't seemed quite so coincidental, and she wondered if he was as intrigued by her as she was by him.

  But she thought it was just wishful thinking when they came out after dinner and she thought she saw him sitting in a truck in the parking lot. It was snowing so hard by then she couldn't be sure.

  Forget it, she'd told herself. And she had—until she'd come out of the church and found him waiting for her.

  It had seemed right.

  Inevitable.

  And then he'd approached her, and she'd been shocked, and then dismayed, to discover he thought she was Milly!

  She was irritated that he'd wanted to talk about Cash. As far as she was concerned, Cash was responsible for his own life—and problems. If Cash didn't care enough about Milly to stop her from marrying Mike, well, then Milly was better off without him.

  Poppy had wanted the dark-haired cowboy to talk to her for herself—because he wanted to talk to her.

  When he scooped her up and tossed her in his truck, she was amazed. And a little giddy. And scared. Not to mention furious.

  But that was before she realized he thought she was Milly.

  Then she'd wanted to laugh.

  But she couldn't. Not if she wanted Milly's wedding to come off.

  If she wanted Milly's wedding to come off, she had to play along.

  After all, if he kidnapped the woman he thought was the bride, he wouldn't be able
to kidnap the real one, would he?

  So she played along.

  To help Milly out.

  That was all. Wasn't it?

  Well, not precisely.

  If she got kidnapped, she wouldn't have to meet her father's candidate for the perfect husband. All week long she'd been trying to figure out how to avoid meeting this paragon at the wedding. She'd never considered getting someone to kidnap her.

  But if a gorgeous, well-meaning, slightly mistaken cowboy took it into his head to do so, well, who was she to object?

  And then there was Shane himself.

  She was still amazed at her reaction to him. After Chad she hadn't let herself react to anyone. She'd wondered sometimes if she still could.

  Well, that was one question answered!

  But she really wasn't going to go to bed with him, was she?

  God, it always seemed to keep coming back to that! Why? she asked herself. Because, she answered honestly, she really thought she might.

  After all, how was she going to know if her father's idea of the perfect man was really perfect if she didn't have anything to compare him to? How was she going to be able to make a responsible decision about her future, if she didn't just once behave irresponsibly?

  Not totally irresponsibly. Heaven knew she believed in safe sex.

  But just once to touch, to caress, to hold. To know a man intimately. She wouldn't expect more than was offered. She knew there would be no long term with a man like Shane Nichols. And why should there be? They barely knew each other…

  And as long as she accepted that up front…

  In her twenty-five years Poppy had never, ever had a fling. Not just a sexual fling—any kind of fling. She'd never taken a week, or even a day, off from being responsible, determined, sane-and-sensible Poppy, Judge Hamilton's daughter.

  Either she'd been living up to him or vigilantly fighting to stay independent of him or regretting her foolish mistake with Chad as long as she could remember.

  She could never remember being able to relax.

  And, God, she wanted to relax.

  She wanted to laugh, to smile, to stretch out her arms and breathe deeply and know her father was not standing in the background judging. She wanted to sing and dance and throw snowballs and maybe even roll around in the snow or on this bed with that sexy, blushing cowboy and not think about the right man for the rest of her life.