Small Town Romance Collection: Four Complete Romances & A New Novella

by Brown, Carolyn

  "Fine with me." Ted grabbed Cassie's hand and pulled her into the backseat of the cruiser with him. "Sure is nice of you to help us out, Sheriff."

  Cassie could've strangled him with one hand tied behind her back. He was digging the hole that they were tumbling into deeper and deeper. How was she ever going to get out of this? She noted the landmarks of the little town they were driving through in case she had to run away again.

  Bud Tucker stopped the black and white at the emergency room entrance of the hospital. He unbuckled his seat belt and opened the door. "Well, let's go in and get the blood test over with. You don't faint at the sight of blood, do you, gal?" Bud studied Cassie, who was almost trembling.

  "No, sir," she said.

  "Good," he nodded. "I know the doctor and all the nurses here. I'll get them to rush you through and we'll be back at Sam's place in a few minutes. You be sure and tell old Bob Wellman that I helped you a lot," he said to Ted.

  "Yes, sir. I sure will," Ted agreed.

  True to his word, Bud Tucker's influence got them the blood tests and the marriage license in record time. The sheriff stood right beside the nurse when she drew blood, and then he peered over the kids' shoulders when they produced driver's licenses to prove that they were indeed Ted Wellman and Cassie O'Malley. He had a sneaking suspicion that the girl's name was really Cassandra Stewart, but then she flipped open her billfold to show her license. It clearly said Cassandra O'Malley. Had Ted said her name was Cassie when he'd introduced the girl to them? Sheriff Bud Tucker sighed. His hearing must be getting as bad as his wife kept telling him. He was almost positive Ted had called her Sassy.

  "Tell Sam I said not to charge you a dime," the sheriff said when he pulled the cruiser into the Justice's driveway again. "Me and Buzz will rent you a room at the Yucca Inn while you're getting married."

  Cassie's brain went numb for the second time in only an hour. What could Ted be thinking of? He could turn around at any second and tell the law officers he didn't know who she was, and walk away from it all. What would she do if they really did say the wedding vows and then he expected her to be really married to him in every sense of the word?

  Samuel Tucker was a short, fat man with bulldog jowls that hung down on either side of his mushy lips. His slick, round head was as bald as a pumpkin, and it didn't look like it had ever sprouted a hair through the years. It was easy to see that he and Bud were brothers. They both sported guts resembling over-inflated tractor tires hanging out over their big, silver belt buckles.

  "Wedding license looks all right. But I gotta see some other ID," Samuel said. "That's the law."

  Ted dug in his pocket for his wallet again.

  "Theodore Ashton Wellman, age 21," Samuel said aloud as he looked at the driver's license.

  "How 'bout you, miss?" Samuel asked Cassie.

  She pulled out her billfold and showed him her driver's license.

  "Cassandra Elizabeth Rose O'Malley. Whew!" Sam chuckled. "That's a long name for such a short girl. Let's see now, your age. Says here on the license you're eighteen. Guess they goofed, didn't they?"

  Without a word, Ted took a fifty-dollar bill from his wallet and laid it on top of the marriage license form. Just get this farce over with, he thought. Uncle Ash can undo it tomorrow, even if he isn't the world's greatest lawyer. Then this piece of redhaired trouble from hell's back door can be on her merry way. Good Lord, all I wanted to do was have some pie and coffe and go home and here I am about to get married to a total stranger.

  "Tryin' to bribe me, son?" Sam picked up the bill with alacrity and put it in his shirt pocket. "Folks at the courthouse didn't notice that she's only seventeen, did they? Well, I guess I didn't see it either. Now . . . where was I?"

  The full impact of what he was about to do slammed into Ted. His chest ached, his mouth felt like it was filled with cotton, and there was an army of butterflies going crazy in his stomach. Ladies had jitters like this, not full-grown, twenty-one-year-old men.

  But it wasn' t as if it was the end of the world, he reminded himself. Or even a real marriage. Uncle Ash would wave a magic law book and take care of it all as soon as he got home.

  Sam commenced the ceremony, speaking rapidly.

  "Do you, Theodore Ashton Wellman, Take Cassandra Elizabeth Rose O'Malley to be your lawful wedded wife, for better or for worse, in sickness or health . . ." Sam droned on and on. No one was really listening. Even the witness, who'd shuffled in from the park bench outside to earn the five dollars that Samuel usually slipped him for these occasions, seemed to be on the verge of slumber.

  "Well, do you?" Sam asked loudly.

  Ted snapped to.

  "I do," he said, crossing his fingers behind his back. It was a childish gesture, he knew, but he did it anyway.

  "Do you, Cassandra . . ." Sam wondered for a second if he'd get a reply out of this girl. He'd performed hundreds of weddings through the years and he'd seen dozens of girls with nervous jitters, but he'd never seen a bride as scared and this one. She looked like she might bolt and run like a jackrabbit.

  Cassie wanted to cry.

  She had always imagined her wedding day, envisioned herself in a church, standing beside a man who'd swept her off her feet, who had promised to give her the sun, the moon, and all the stars. She was supposed to be wearing a white satin gown and a veil of sheerest illusion, not a faded red sweatshirt, ancient sneakers and bleached-out jeans. One tiny tear finally found its way up from the bottom of her soul, hung on her thick eyelashes, and spilled down her cheek. She wiped it away with the back of her hand.

  "Do you?" Sam asked again. She hadn't heard the rest of the vow.

  "I do," she whispered.

  "Well, well, well." The sheriff and the deputy opened the side door to the J.P.'s office. "Looks like we got here just in time for the ceremony. You can kiss the bride," he said joshingly. "You're married now."

  Ted looked down into Cassie's green eyes. He drew her close to him, tipped her chin back with his hand, and hoped for the best. He put his lips on hers and kissed her hard enough to convince that fool sheriff. Wonder of wonders, Cassie kissed him back.

  He felt an indescribable electricity course through him, and he wished he knew why. This girl meant nothing to him . . .

  "Okay. She can consider herself kissed," Sheriff Tucker said hastily. "Buzz, let's get these newlyweds over to the Yucca Inn and have my sister show them their honeymoon suite. Your room's right next to the ice machine so it's real convenient if you want to chill some of them wine coolers to celebrate."

  Cassie wondered if the sheriff had yet another relative who owned the local liquor store, but decided not to ask.

  * * *

  She was speechless with anger, mostly at herself. She crossed her arms, huffed, and stomped the floor of the pickup as Ted drove behind the all-too-familiar cruiser. Tears made rivers down her cheeks, and she felt like she'd just swallowed a stick of dynamite with a short fuse.

  Ted grinned when he thought about their kiss. It had been the high point of this crazy day, that was for sure. He stole a glance at Cassie just in time to see the tears break over their long-lashed dams and spill down her fair cheeks. She put her hands over her eyes and sobbed.

  "Hey." Ted patted her arm. "Don't cry. Come on now. Hush. My uncle is a lawyer and he'll undo this as soon as we get to Maysville. He can file an annulment or an uncontested divorce for us. Please don't cry. Besides, what will Bud and Buzz say if you're in tears when we get to our little love nest?"

  "You shut up!" Cassie pointed an accusing finger at him. "Don't you dare tease me. I'm sorry I ever saw you. Or talked you into this lunatic scheme." She sobbed even harder.

  "I seem to remember that I talked you into it," Ted replied calmly.

  "Oh, you did—but you said you didn't want to—I'm underage—" Cassie's emotional state made her altogether incoherent. She struggled for self-control as Ted handed her a clean bandanna handkerchief.

  "Blow your nose. Calm down," he said pa
tiently. He pulled up in front of the Yucca Inn. "Listen to me, Cassie. It really would be best if you weren't throwing a hissy fit when we get out of this pickup. You don't want good ole Bud and Buzz to start asking a million questions, now do you? Then we'll both be in trouble, as well as married." He grabbed a suitcase from behind the seat and helped Cassie out of the truck. She made a determined effort to smile at the waiting officers, but it came out more like a grimace.

  Buzz and Bud led the way. "Here it is. Lover's paradise," Buzz said proudly. He swung the door open with a flourish, and tossed the key on the bed. He elbowed the sheriff, who was smiling like a possum eating grapes through a barbed wire fence. "Paid for, too. Don't forget to tell your dad that him and the sheriff is squared up, now."

  Ted had spent Tuesday and Wednesday at the De-Luxe Motel on the other side of town. The comparison between that place and this was like the difference between sunshine and absolute darkness. He set his suitcase down with a heavy thud, and locked the door behind the two officers when they left.

  He surveyed the bed, which looked as if it had been dragged by a team of wild oxen over the Texas rangeland during the days of Daniel Boone and the Alamo. There was no doubt that Methuselah's mother had rocked him to sleep in the splintery rocking chair sitting in the corner. The carpet had to be a reject from someone's old outhouse, and if there weren't fleas under the sheets Ted would eat his Stetson, and have his worn-out Roper boots for dessert. "What a dump. Sorry, Cassie. Listen, I can sleep in the rocker, and you can have the bed," he offered. "Or maybe we can just sneak out when Bud and Buzz go home for the night."

  "Oh, shut up!" Cassie glared at him again, just as she had in the pickup. "Who cares?" She threw herself down on the bed and curled up in a ball.

  "Now what did I do?" he asked in exasperation. "I said we could get this marriage undone tomorrow. I kept those two characters from sending you back to wherever it is you're running from. What reason do you have to be mad at me?"

  She sat up and wiped away still more tears with the bottom of her sweatshirt. "Ted, I am an O'Malley," she said, expecting him to understand. He didn't. She had said her name as if all the confusion would disappear if only he would understand how important it was that she was an O'Malley and she'd just remembered it. So what? Ted thought angrily. He didn't give a royal damn if she was related to the Queen of England by this point.

  "You were an O'Malley. So? Now you're legally a Wellman and tomorrow you can be an O'Malley again. So what?" He threw the suitcase on the arms of the rocking chair and opened it.

  "Bud and Buzz were looking for Cassandra Stewart," she tried to explain. "My mother's maiden name was Stewart and when she died I went to live with my Granny Stewart, so everyone just called me Cassie Stewart. I even went to school under that name. Don't you see? If I had been able to think straight, I could've just shown them my driver's license which says I'm an O'Malley."

  "Cassie, you had that driver's license out in the hospital—" Ted stopped and fumed. It was too late now to scold her.

  "I was scared stiff," she pleaded. "The sheriff was looking over my shoulder when I pulled out the license and I didn't even look at it. I didn't know what I was doing, anymore than you did. But I'm sorry. If I had half a brain, I wouldn't be married to you and I'd be on that bus to Oklahoma City."

  She pounded the threadbare pillow with her fist, and a small tornado of feathers burst upward. Cassie choked, and brushed them off her face and clothes.

  Ted took a clean T-shirt out of his suitcase.

  "Look, why don't you take a nice, warm shower, if this dump has hot water, and put this on. Once I get home, Uncle Ash will start annulment proceedings and I'll get you to Oklahoma City somehow. Relax, will you?"

  "Oh, sure. This has to be the most relaxing situation I have ever been in."

  She snatched the T-shirt out of his hand, started toward the bathroom, and suddenly dropped into a heap on the floor. Ted gathered her up in his arms, afraid for a second that she'd died, but he was reassured to feel her heartbeat against his chest. "Cassie, wake up. Open your eyes, girl. What do I do now?"

  "I feel so dizzy . . ." she mumbled. "I'm—hungry."

  Ted laid her gently down on the bed and looked at her carefully. She was on the thin side, and she did look pale. "How long has it been since you've eaten?"

  "Can't remember," she said weakly. She didn't open her eyes. "Is this Thursday? Didn't get to eat yesterday because Cecil was mad. Tuesday, maybe Monday. I had some milk Tuesday, I think."

  "Listen to me." He bent over her. "I'm going to buy food and bring it back. Don't try to stand up. Promise? You might get dizzy and faint again."

  She nodded but her eyes stayed closed.

  Questions plagued Ted as he drove to a fried chicken place only a block away. She hadn't eaten for two or three days because Cecil was mad. Who was Cecil anyway? Was she running from an abusive husband? Maybe that's why she'd been so dead set against marrying him, even as a ruse to evade the sheriff.

  Unfortunately, that very same sheriff and the deputy were sitting in the first booth, with Sam, when Ted walked into the fried chicken place.

  "You kids worked up an appetite already?" Buzz winked and laughed. "Must be great to be young."

  "Yeah." Ted winked back at them and quickly gave the girl at the register his order. He wanted to get out of there and back to Cassie, fast.

  "Don't forget to remember us to your daddy," Sam hollered as Ted left with a red-and-white cardboard box of chicken and biscuits.

  "Sure will. Thanks for all you did for me and my—uh—wife." Ted almost tripped over the word.

  Cassie lay rolled up in a ball, fast asleep. But the savory smell of chicken drifted through her subconscious. Deep in her dream, she'd thrown her schoolbooks on the rumpsprung sofa just inside the front door, and her granny was dishing up supper in the kitchen. "Let's eat. You can study later," her granny told her as she poured gravy into the cracked bowl with the blue cornflowers on the side . . .

  The dream began to fade and Cassie couldn't will it to remain. But when she opened her eyes, the chicken smell was still very real. It came from the cheery red-and-white box that Ted was holding. He took out a biscuit.

  "Nibble on this," Ted said gently. "You might get sick if you eat too fast."

  She ignored his advice and wolfed the biscuit, and a piece of white meat. "I'd be embarrassed to eat like this if I wasn't half-starved," she said between ravenous bites. "Ted, I'm really sorry about this. Are you sure your uncle can undo what we've done tomorrow? Lord, I don't want to be married." She rambled on as she kept eating, but Ted couldn't quite make out everything she was saying. Probably better to let her eat her fill, and then she'd be able to think straight.

  "I've got to go make a phone call," Ted said. "You just keep eating 'til you're full. There's a piece of apple pie somewhere in the bottom of the box."

  "Lock the door and take the key with you. I'll have a shower when I get finished because I'm going to need one. If you don't mind, I will borrow that T-shirt you offered." She smiled at him for the first time, and he smiled back.

  Ted found a pay phone in front of the office and dialed 0 and a familiar number, and told the operator to make the call collect. He waited, keeping an eye on room number thirteen. From now on, that would be his unlucky number. But then, he wouldn't be there ever again. In a few weeks, it wouldn't matter what room he'd spent the first hours of married life in. In a few years, this would be just a funny story to tell his children, when he had some.

  "Uncle Ash, this is Ted," he said, when he heard the voice at the other end of the line accept the call.

  "You're late for supper," Ash said. "Did you have trouble with that old truck? I've told you not to depend on that rattletrap, especially when you go out of state."

  "The truck is fine," Ted said. "Listen, I had planned on leaving right after lunch when the parts Dad sent me for came in. But something came up." He paused and scratched his head, trying to figure out just how in he
ll he was going to explain what had come up. "I'm in a jam. Maybe you and I can talk about it over breakfast tomorrow morning. I'm staying here tonight but I'll be home early."

  "I'll save you a couple of strips of bacon then," Ash joked. "So what kind of a jam are you in?"

  Ted took a deep breath.

  "I got married. And I need you to unmarry me, pronto," he said.

  Ash let out a husky chuckle, which became a laugh, and finally a full-fledged roar.

  "See you at breakfast, nephew. I'll be there. I wouldn't miss the fireworks for all the tea in China and half the dirt in Texas!"

  Chapter Two

  After devouring enough fried chicken to feed a harvest crew and following Ted's advice to relax with a warm shower, Cassie put on his T-shirt. It fell to her knees. She crawled into bed, determined not to shut her eyes until Ted was back from making his phone call and fast asleep on the floor, or in the rocking chair, or wherever. He seemed like a decent sort, but she wasn't about to put her trust in him or any other man. Her experiences with the loathsome Cecil had taught her everything she didn't want to know about men.

  But Cassie was curled up in a ball and asleep again, when Ted returned. He sat down in the rocker, and thought about the day while he took off his boots. It just didn't seem real.

  However, the redheaded girl sleeping under the ratty bedspread certainly was. He suddenly remembered the arousing kiss she'd bestowed on him in the Justice of the Peace's office.

  He studied her lovely face, troubled even in her sleep, and shook his head. She seemed so vulnerable—and so innocent—that his heart went out to her. He told himself silently not to look at her anymore.

  Ted didn't even realize he'd fallen asleep sitting up in the rocker until Cassie shook him awake just about four o'clock. "Let's get going before the sheriff and Deputy Dawg wake up," she whispered.