Mr. Miracle (Harlequin Super Romance)

by McSparren, Carolyn

  “And I’m Maeve.” A small woman, also in riding britches and boots, shoved open a door at the far side of the room with the tea tray in her hands. “Hamish, you great git, take this from me before I drop it.”

  “Fine, Maeve, love,” he said. Then to Vic, “Sit down. You must be half-frozen.”

  Vic felt the laughter bubbling up in her throat.

  “What?” he said suspiciously.

  “You sound exactly like a man who’s been bullying me for most of my life.”

  “Indeed. According to Jamey, the good Lord himself wouldn’t dare bully you.”

  “Where’ve you been the past few days?” Vlado asked as he reached for a biscuit.

  “Getting my act together. I’m looking for Jamey. Is he here?”

  “This isn’t his house,” Maeve said. “He lives up the road another kilometer or so. Behind the big wall. It’s a great old barn of a place with the stables and yard in back of it. This used to be the dower house—where the widows moved when their husbands died. Milk or sugar?”

  “Oh. Milk, please.” She took the proffered cup of dark milky tea. She preferred tea over ice with lots of lemon, but she was among Jamey’s people now.

  “Can I find him there? Can you call him for me?”

  Hamish caught Vlado’s eye and began to rumble with laughter. “Afraid not. We got so fed up with his black mood that we sent him up to the high pasture to live with the yearlings in the caravan until you got here.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “He swore you’d come,” Maeve said easily. “But we knew he was afraid he’d done the wrong thing, walking out that way. And then when the days went by...well, he was simply impossible. So we sent him off. He’s got a cell phone with him, but how good the reception’ll be I don’t know.”

  “How do I get there?”

  “There’s a track of sorts, but that little car of yours won’t make it.”

  “Best way’s on a horse,” Vlado said, then glared at her. “You do ride, don’t you?”

  She smiled at him. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

  “Good. You want a bit of a rest? Some food?” Hamish asked.

  “Don’t be foolish,” Maeve said severely. “She wants her man, don’t you, lass?”

  Boy, these people don’t mince words. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I want my man very much. Don’t call him. I’d like to surprise him if you think that’s a good idea.”

  “A capital idea!” Hamish shouted. “You got riding things with you or do you need some of ours?”

  “I brought my britches and boots.”

  “Vlado and I’ll ride up with you, show you where you’re going. It’s not more than a couple of kilometers. Once you’re past the gate, you won’t get lost.”

  For some reason that seemed to strike Hamish as uproariously funny. A moment later the other two began laughing, as well. Vic realized there was some joke she wasn’t party to.

  She knew why when they let her and the fat chestnut hunter they’d lent her through the gate to the yearling pasture. At the bottom of the pasture under a stand of small trees and beside a stream stood a wildly painted Gypsy wagon straight out of an old Hungarian light opera. Smoke rose from the stack in the roof. At least twenty young horses raised their heads when they heard the three riders approach, but no sign of Jamey.

  “Probably still asleep,” Vlado said. Then he laid a hand on her arm and grinned. “Here. Better take this with you. I’m not certain Jamey has one that works.”

  She looked down at the object in her hand and blushed. It was a folding metal bootjack, needed to pull long riding boots off.

  She glanced up at Vlado.

  “Thought you might like to get your boots off—to rest your feet of course.”

  Hamish laughed.

  In tandem the two men wheeled their horses around and cantered down the dirt track away from her.

  For a moment she and the mare stood quietly. Her heart pounded in her chest, her pulse throbbed, her skin felt hot—but not from panic. From anticipation. What was she getting herself into? Alone out here on what might have been the great plains of Wyoming with not another human being in sight. Could she trust Hamish and Vlado? Maybe they were trying to get rid of her for good.

  She turned the mare, who began to trot down the hill, then broke into an easy canter.

  When she was still a hundred feet from the caravan, the small door at the back opened, and Jamey came down the stairs. His hair was wild. He’d obviously not shaved for several days. He was barefoot, shirtless and busily pulling a pair of disreputable jeans up his naked hips.

  She stopped the mare ten feet away, leaned both hands on the saddle and stared at him. “Aren’t you a pretty sight.”

  He glowered back. “Well, what kept you? I’ve been whistling and humming my fool head off until I can’t whistle or sing another note.”

  “I heard.”

  “Get off that horse before I pull you off.”

  “Where can I tie her up?”

  “Toss the reins on the ground. She’ll stand.”

  Slowly, she slid off the mare and dropped the reins, but made no move toward him.

  “Can’t you come the rest of the way? My feet are cold.”

  “Uncle Vlado sent us a bootjack.” She held it up.

  He whooped and dove at her. The horse skittered out of the way.

  He grabbed her around the waist and swung her high. The moment he stopped she bent her head to kiss him gently. He held her tightly against him. “I’ve never been so frightened in my life,” he whispered. “Not even in the hospital when I thought I was going to die.”

  “You were right to leave when you did.” She frowned at him. “At the time I was ready to kill you.”

  “Why didn’t you follow me at once?”

  “I had a dressage test to ride, remember? If I didn’t ride it alone, without you standing at the rail whistling and crooning, I knew I’d never be any good to you.”

  “You’d be good to me if you never went near a horse the rest of our lives.”

  “Maybe. But I’m better this way. I’ve flown in airplanes and driven cars on the wrong side of the road and met strange uncles and ridden strange horses across strange country. I deserve a treat”

  He took her hand and led her into the caravan, then set her on the narrow bed and took the bootjack from her hand. The grin on his face was evil.

  A minute later her boots were off. He tossed the jack into the corner and reached for the zipper at the waist of her britches. “I have missed my games of tic-tac-toe.” He pulled her heavy sweater over her head.

  They might have been apart for years, so overwhelming was the hunger. They made love fiercely, wordlessly, as though they could absorb each other’s bones.

  Afterward Vic lay in his arms and stroked his smooth chest. He wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled the top of her head. “Ah, love, it’s been an eternity without you.”

  “What if I hadn’t come to Scotland?”

  He chortled. “You couldn’t stay away. I cast a spell on you.”

  She snuggled closer. “You are incredibly arrogant, you know that?” She raised her head. “And no great beauty at the moment, either. You smell like a horse.”

  “You’ve beauty enough for us both.”

  “Seriously, what if I hadn’t come?”

  “The truth?” He kissed the top of her head. “I intended to give you one more week, then I planned to fly back to Tennessee to kidnap you.”

  “Kidnap me?”

  “Absolutely. It’s a fine old Rom tradition to kidnap brides, not to mention the Scots have been doing it for centuries.”

  “Pretty sure of yourself, huh?”

  “No. Sure of you. Sure you loved me. But sometimes in the long nights I worried that loving me wasn’t enough. That you’d opt for your responsibilities rather than your love.”

  “I tried, but I couldn’t live without you. Oh, Jamey, what are we going to do? We’re not an island unto ourselves, thou
gh God knows I wish we were.”

  “I’ve spent the past few days up here worrying the problem like a terrier with a rat.”

  She smiled. “Lovely picture.”

  “As long as you marry me, I don’t give a damn what comes after. If I have to turn this place over to Vlado and Hamish, I will.”

  “Oh, no, you won’t.” Vic sat up. “You think I want that on my conscience? This is a huge operation. I could tell that just from the ride up here and the number of horses in your yard. And the number of people. No. If anybody walks away, I’ll be the one to do it. I can turn over my share of ValleyCrest to Liz. She can hire a good trainer to replace me.”

  “With a new baby? A baby you want to see come into this world? Maybe we should both sell up and start another operation altogether.”

  “In America or Scotland? That way, we both lose.” She threw herself back into his arms. “Romeo and Juliet had it easier. When things got tough they just killed themselves.”

  “Ah, love, don’t they always say the devil is in the details?” He leaned back and crossed his hands behind his head. “There’s got to be a compromise. I don’t want you to lose by marrying me. I want you to gain.”

  “Does it have to be marriage?”

  “Yes, love, it does, and you know it. Unless we stand up and be joined for a lifetime before God and man, we’ll be prey to every problem that tries to tear us apart. This way, whatever we face, we face together.”

  “Oh, Jamey, I wish we could just stay here forever and never have to face anything.”

  He kissed her and stroked her breasts. She shivered and arched up against his hand. “If I thought we could escape, I’d hitch this caravan up and take to the road like my forebears. You’ve never given me your answer. Say the words, Victoria Jamerson.”

  “Yes,” she gasped. “Yes, you are my love and I will marry you and to hell with the rest of the world.”

  “That’s my lass!” He covered her with his body. Her hands cupped his bottom and pulled him against her.

  Afterward they dozed spoon-fashion. Finally Jamey awoke, and after a few minutes of watching Vic sleep, he kissed the lobe of her ear. She stirred and opened her eyes.

  “They tell me,” he whispered in her ear, “your Southern summers are miserable.”

  She stretched lazily and yawned. “Miserable doesn’t half describe our summers.”

  “Scottish winters can be incredibly dreary—little sunshine and a great deal of damp and cold.”

  “What fun to look forward to.” She rolled onto her back and wrapped her fingers in his tangled hair.

  “Well, I suggest we work it out with our respective operations so that we spend six months of the year in Scotland—late spring, summer and early fall—and the rest of the year in Tennessee.”

  She came fully awake. “You’d miss Christmas at home.”

  “Home is wherever you are, love. Besides, Christmas is not nearly the important holiday here as it is where you come from. And you’ll have a new baby to play with, remember?”

  She pulled herself up and leaned her back against the head of the narrow bed. “Can you do it? Leave for that long, I mean.”

  “Difficult, but possible. You’d miss most of show season in America.”

  “I wouldn’t miss the heat and the mess and the travel. How about four months in the States and eight months here? You have to support me, you know.”

  He sat beside her, his shoulder touching hers. “Could work.”

  “And we don’t have to be slavish about it,” she said with enthusiasm. “If it doesn’t work out that way, we can always change.”

  “You’ve never lived away from home before. Can you bear it?”

  “Home, as you said, dear heart, is where you are.”

  EPILOGUE

  “YOU’RE MARRYING the ugly duckling of the family.” Liz sprawled on the foot of the ornate Victorian bed in Jamey’s guest room where Vic was dressing. “I never saw such gorgeous guys in my entire life. Tony the vet? To die for. And have you seen Horvath? If I were not a happily pregnant married woman...”

  “But you are,” Vic said.

  “I’m worried to death about Pat. Jamey’s boy cousins have all adopted her, and they make Leonardo di Caprio look like Frankenstein’s monster. She’s not even quite a teenager.”

  “She will be this summer when she comes back to Scotland to visit,” Vic said.

  “What?” Liz sat up.

  “It’s all arranged. When Albert and Linette come over after school is out, they’re going to leave the barn to you and Angie, and bring Pat along with them for a couple of weeks. Didn’t they mention it?”

  “You devil. I’ll be seven months pregnant by then and the size of a house.”

  “Albert says don’t worry about it. He’ll have plenty of help for you. Since he couldn’t come to the wedding because Linette is in school, it seemed fair.”

  “You and Jamey will be with me when the baby’s born, won’t you?”

  Vic turned to her with a smile. “I wouldn’t miss it. And I’m dying to see Angie’s Christina. The pictures are adorable.”

  “Kevin is besotted with that child. They’ve already put in for another one. And Angie’s hunting for a small pony for Christina. I mean, the child is only three months old. Is she crazy or what?”

  “Just wait until yours is born and say that. Have you got your house finished?”

  “No. Well, almost. Enough to sleep in, at any rate. The kitchen’s still a mess, but what do I care? And all your stuff is unpacked in the cottage. I figure if you and Jamey plan to spend three or four months a year there, you ought to have a decent place to live without packing cases, am I right?”

  “Thanks, Liz.”

  “Don’t mention it. Payback for being such a jackass over Jamey.”

  “Don’t you mention that.”

  “I’d like to think I wasn’t being totally selfish, that I really did think you’d be better off without him, that I wasn’t just afraid to lose the only mother I’ve ever really had.”

  “Let’s face it, darling, he wasn’t exactly open and forthright. I’m not surprised you thought he was a fortune hunter.”

  “Yeah.” Liz looked around the elaborate bedroom. “With six bedrooms, seven baths and his own chapel. And so many horses in training I’ve lost count.”

  “When will Mr. Miracle arrive in quarantine?” Vic asked as she put diamond studs into her ears.

  “By the end of the week.”

  Vic turned around on the bench. “Mike shouldn’t have given him to us as a wedding present. That’s entirely too much money. We’ll pay him back, but we’re cash poor at the moment.”

  “You know Mike. He doesn’t do anything without an angle. He’s very interested in investing in the Scottish sport horse registry thing. With you campaigning for Mr. Miracle all over Europe next year, he’ll get a reputation pretty quickly, I should think. And Mike’s keeping two stallion shares—that’s two free breedings a year in perpetuity. It’s just good business. And Angie’s thrilled to death.”

  “The stallion definitely got Boop in foal, then?”

  “And was a perfect gentleman the whole time. He’s a real sweetheart, even if he is the size of a bull moose.” She glanced down at her watch. “You about ready?”

  “Yes. No. Oh, Liz, am I doing the right thing?”

  “You ask me that ten minutes before you’re supposed to get married?”

  “Yes. I am doing the right thing. I love Scotland, I’ll still have ValleyCrest, and most of all I’ll have Jamey.”

  “And your career back, don’t forget”

  “At my age I’ll be happy just to putter.”

  Liz snorted. “Sure you will. Just like I’ll sit back and putter after the baby’s born. Get real. I come by my competitive genes naturally. Up, Victoria. Destiny calls.”

  The small chapel at the McLachlan house had been decorated with ivy and masses of jonquils. The groom’s side was so packed with people that they spi
lled over onto the bride’s side. There were several distinct groups. First were the big bluff county types and their wives. Vic spotted Marshall Dunn’s bullet head among them.

  Several groups of horse-show people ranged from sleek to scruffy. No way to tell from looking at them whether they were multimillionaires or destitute.

  Then Jock’s family—Hamish’s two boys with their wives—looking very much like ninth-century Vikings in modern dress.

  Finally, Jamey’s mother’s people. Dark, fine-boned, with bright black eyes and brilliant smiles. The psychic aunts in their large hats and even larger jewels, Horvath, who belonged in a Bronzino painting, Tony, with his dark curls—and so many others that Vic, who had been passed from hand to hand at the rehearsal dinner, gave up hope of identifying them within her first fifty years of marriage to Jamey.

  On the bride’s front row Mike sat with Pat, in her first pair of high heels, looking very grown-up and making cow eyes at some of Jamey’s younger cousins.

  Vic wished with all her heart that Albert could be here, and Angie and Kevin. But school schedules and a new baby girl made that impossible.

  Only a few of her horse-show friends had made the trek from the States to Scotland in early March, but she suspected she and Jamey would be inundated with visitors once summer arrived.

  She expected to see Jamey with his two best men, Hamish and Vlado, appear in a dinner jacket. Instead, he stunned her. When the lone piper began to pipe, he stepped in front of the altar in full dress McLachlan kilt, with Hamish dressed the same behind him. She felt her throat constrict. Wherever he was, Jock must be looking down on his foundling with joy. At last Jamey was every inch the Scottish gentleman farmer, sure of his place and his value, his honor restored and his duty fulfilled.

  His vow to Jock was complete, although the stallion’s first foal would be born in Tennessee and not Scotland.

  Liz was Vic’s only attendant. Her pregnancy did not show except in a certain lush ripeness that she’d never possessed before. Her dress was a soft sky-blue silk.

  Vic had agonized over her dress. White was out of the question. This was her second marriage, and besides, white made her look as though she’d been embalmed a week ago. Maeve had finally turned her over to the psychic aunts in Glasgow. She had been looking for a simple pastel dress that didn’t make her look like her grandmother.