The Runaway Bride

by Patricia McLinn

  He hadn’t budged. How tired would a man have to be to sleep in such an uncomfortable position? Should she wake him up so he could go to bed?

  Abruptly, she became aware of what she wore—and didn’t wear. She’d pulled the beach coverup over her nightie, but neither reached beyond the middle of her thighs, and she had nothing else on.

  She could imagine what he would say about her clothes if he woke up and saw her in this outfit. A flush of heat pulsed through her.

  Embarrassment at that vision. Had to be.

  She would not wake him. Letting sleeping dogs lie and all that.

  Pulling the hem of the coverup down on the side facing Thomas, she reached into the cabinet with her other hand, stealthily withdrawing a cartoon-decorated plastic cup. She eased the door closed and took the deep breath she hadn’t wanted to risk with the lower edge of her outfit elevated by her stretch.

  Thomas stirred, his head bumping against the wall.

  She was out of the room and halfway up the stairs with no concern about their creaking and groaning before she drew another breath. Under the covers, with the light out, and her filled glass on the nightstand, her heart banged away. Had she made a clean escape?

  One thing for certain, Thomas would let her know if he’d spotted this outfit.

  Chapter Three

  Judi woke around seven, feeling nearly as bright as the dazzling blue sky visible whenever the breeze pushed aside the flowered curtains.

  She washed up quickly and pulled on linen shorts, a T-shirt and the lone sweater she’d packed—an airy cotton knit cardigan—ignoring the gooseflesh popping up on her arms and legs.

  Some of her good mood, she realized, was the feeling she’d had ever since Saturday. Like the weight of the world had lifted off her shoulders. A sensation that had coincided with reversing her course down the aisle. Clearly, when Sterling had asked “Will you marry me?” via the Chicago Bulls scoreboard seven weeks ago, she’d picked the wrong answer.

  The stairs announced her descent again, but this time there was no one in the kitchen to hear. Crumbs on the counter and a streak that might have been strawberry jelly haphazardly wiped up attested to breakfasts having been consumed.

  She heard voices down the hall—too low to make out words but still identifiable as a duet of Thomas and Gran. She headed that way.

  Her first day of work, and she better learn what needed to be done. Thomas wouldn’t waste any time throwing her out on her ear—or any other body part that happened to connect with the ground—if she didn’t earn her keep.

  Strange that he’d been so wonderful to her right after the accident, but had been cool, if not hostile, ever since. It was going to be a long six weeks if he was only cordial when he thought she might be seriously injured.

  The first thing that came into sight in Gran’s room was a foam wedge on the side chair by the door. It was the right shape to have made the lump in Gran’s bedcovers she’d noticed yesterday. Another step revealed Gran lying flat on her back and wearing sweatpants with the left leg slit to accommodate a bulky bandage.

  Thomas hooked the looped end of a long elasticized band under Gran’s foot, then handed her the opposite end. Holding the band taut, Gran swung her leg over the side of the bed, while Thomas appeared to almost scoop her upper body up and set her on her feet.

  They both remained still for a moment, and Judi could hear Gran breathing harder from the exertion. Or was it from pain?

  “Okay?” Thomas murmured in a tone Judi had heard only in the moments after her accident.

  “Right as rain,” Gran replied with what sounded to Judi like forced cheer.

  Without releasing his hold around Gran’s waist, Thomas grabbed the walker with his free hand to position it in front of her. She turned, and caught sight of Judi.

  “Good morning, dear. How’s your head?”

  “Much better, thank you.”

  “We’ll take a look at that after I get settled. I’ll be back in a moment.” She hobbled to the bathroom using the walker, closing the door behind her.

  “She’ll be okay in there alone?”

  “Yeah.”

  Clearly morning didn’t stir Thomas’s sociability any more than late afternoon or evening had the day before.

  He started making up the king-size bed, reaching across the expanse to try to snag the covers. Judi automatically moved so she could flip the covers toward him, and straightened the ones on her side.

  “Why make the bed? She’ll be getting right back in, won’t she?”

  “No.”

  “Why don’t you let the poor woman stay in bed?”

  “Because staying in bed all day could give the poor woman blood clots. It’s a major concern after hip replacement surgery. As you would know if you’d ever had any medical training.”

  “If I remembered my medical training,” she shot back, smoothing the covers over the pillows.

  He tossed a folder to her side of the bed. “You better read up, and remember what you read, because you’re going to give Gran the best care possible.”

  That smacked of ultimatum rather than confidence.

  Since his opinion of her skills obviously couldn’t go lower, she figured it didn’t hurt to show ignorance. “What were you doing with the band thingy you put under her foot?”

  “It helps her swing her leg without bending her hip. She can’t bend her hip—ever. That’s one of the things you better remember.”

  “What else?”

  “She shouldn’t put weight on that foot. If her ankle gets more swollen than it is now, call the doctor—the number’s by the phone in the kitchen. She’s running a fever, that’s normal, and she can have aspirin, but if it spikes, call the doctor. Don’t let her sit for more than forty-five minutes at a time. If her leg gets really sore and rock hard, that’s a sign of a blood clot—call the doctor immediately. And if any of this stuff happens, call me on the cell phone. No excuses.”

  “Yes, sir!” She added a mock salute that coincided with Gran opening the bathroom door.

  “Ah, I see Helga’s caught on to your managerial style, Thomas.”

  He glowered. “If you think you’ll be okay, now, Gran, I’ll go. Or I can stay if—”

  “What, and have Thundercloud Thomas around ruining an otherwise sunny day? Not a chance. Helga will take good care of me. You get back to your work.”

  Judi bit her lip to keep from grinning at Thundercloud Thomas.

  After a moment of hesitation, he left. The sound of his boot heels on the hall floor brought a vision of his confident stride in those nicely fitting jeans. Judi shook her head to try to clear it.

  “Everything all right, dear?”

  “Wh— Oh. Yes. Fine. Now, how about if you tell me what I can do to help you.”

  The older woman needed help getting out of some of her nightclothes. She maneuvered over the shower stall’s small threshold, and said she’d be fine with the handheld showerhead. Despite those assurances, Judi wasn’t about to leave her alone in the bathroom, so she kept her back to the shower while she straightened, cleaned the sink and gathered towels for the laundry. She noticed a riser attachment on the toilet seat that would help the occupant stand without bending a hip.

  Drying off and dressing were further exercises in instant intimacy. Then Gran talked Judi through pulling on the anti-embolism stockings she had to wear all day. The thigh-highs had strong elastic and a tight fit to fight blood clots, which made working them over her foot, heel and calf akin to pulling up a wet swimsuit three sizes too small over wet skin.

  By the time she’d finished, Judi was panting, both with the physical exertion and the strain of making sure she didn’t hurt Gran.

  “I’m not made of spun glass,” the older woman said with a snap.

  “Hey, it’s not you I’m thinking about. I’m worried about what Thomas would do to me if I put the slightest dent in you.”

  They both chuckled, and Gran headed for the kitchen using her walker, with Judi trail
ing worriedly behind.

  The older woman took a seat in the same uncomfortable-looking straight-backed chair she’d used yesterday evening. Following her directions, Judi positioned a fat, firm cushion about eight inches thick to elevate Gran’s foot.

  “We’ll have a quiet day today. You shouldn’t be doing too much with that knot on your head.”

  Judi wasn’t going to argue. She felt as if she’d put in a full day’s labor, and it was barely eight o’clock. Gran also appeared worn out.

  Judi made them toast, poured coffee and settled down with the folder of instructions to see what she’d gotten herself into.

  Gran said she was satisfied. So that had to be good enough.

  He’d stuck close to the house yesterday to stop by a half-dozen times. Everything seemed to be going okay. Actually, Gran’s exact words had been, “Helga’s doing great. Quit worrying.”

  Right.

  She’d said one more thing. “Give the girl a chance.”

  A chance to what? That’s what worried him.

  A couple times when he’d gone in she’d been talking with Gran. Another time she’d had everything out of the refrigerator’s freezer and was reorganizing. Later, he’d found her scrubbing with white paste stuff where the aging coffeemaker sat.

  But what got him today was finding her sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of a cabinet rearranging storage containers under Gran’s supervision. Gran viewed her storage containers the way some women viewed diamonds. Letting Helga handle them was a clear signal she’d awarded the stranger the Iris Swift stamp of approval.

  He’d been pushing it when he’d told Helga she had to cook. The agreement actually said light housework only in the patient’s room. So why was she doing this?

  As he hooked up Klute to drag a tree trunk that had obstructed the east fork of Six-Mile Creek, he mentally listed three possibilities.

  She was Helga Helgerson and she had amnesia.

  No damn way.

  She was Helga Helgerson and she’d decided to do extra work from the goodness of her heart.

  That ranked as only slightly less unlikely.

  She was an unknown quantity pretending to be Helga Helgerson for unknown reasons and she thought cleaning the Diamond V ranch kitchen was going to gain her something somehow.

  Bingo.

  He had to figure out what she thought it could gain her, her reason for the masquerade and who she really was. That way she couldn’t blindside him.

  Thomas couldn’t see any reasons yet, but they had to be there. She was not a stupid woman. Not by a long shot. And that made her all the more dangerous.

  As long as he kept his mind on that, he wouldn’t keep having dreams of long, bare legs speeding in front of his bleary eyes fast enough to stir a breeze that brought the scent of clean female.

  The truck slowly towed the twisted corpse of Judi’s car to a mechanical cemetery between the big barn and a slope-roofed shed.

  Would that make it easier or harder to do what she needed to do? She wouldn’t have as far to go to the car, but anyone could stand at this window and see her as clearly as she saw Thomas get out of the passenger door and stride to a gap between a truck skeleton and the unidentifiable bones of other vehicles that had passed on.

  He surveyed the open area, then talked to Gandy, who was driving. Against the faded blue of his shirt a darker stripe showed down the center of his back.

  He gestured with his arms wide, and that pulled the pale blue material tight across his shoulders. Another twitch, and it looked like the material might rip, and hang in tatters down his back like on a B-movie hero who’d been wandering the desert. Shreds of material that showed off the actor’s physique even better than no shirt at all.

  “You should get out and see more of the ranch, instead of spending all day inside.” Gran’s voice came from the other side of the large room.

  Judi realized she’d gone up on her toes to better see out the window. She rocked back to flat feet as Thomas directed Gandy to back in the towed car.

  “I’d love to see the ranch.” As if the ranch had been what she’d been looking at. Her hormones better get over this honeymoon mood pretty quick. “But I don’t think it’s a good time. I’m still learning—relearning—so I have to go full-tilt all day to have a hope of keeping up.”

  “It’s a great help to have you here.”

  Tell that to Thomas. Dealing with him was like watching thunderclouds boiling up on the horizon and wondering if they might crash over her. Come to think of it, the atmosphere changed whenever he was around.

  Everything would be calm and sunny when she and Gran were alone, with maybe a freshening breeze and a few clouds dotted around when Becky joined them. Then Thomas would come in, and it was like a front coming through. The trees tossed uneasily in the wind, the clouds churned up

  Growing up in the Chicago area, she’d learned about changeable weather. And she knew to pay attention to the signs. The way the birds chirped, the behavior of dogs, the bending of trees and her own body’s warning signs. Not her joints—not yet, thank heavens—but headaches and an odd restlessness. She’d felt it as a kid when she had been sailing with her brother Paul and his friend Grady on Lake Michigan. Paul and Grady had tried to josh her out of her feeling, but she’d insisted they get to shore, saying she didn’t feel right. They’d grumbled, but they’d brought the boat in at the Monroes’ house, intending to drop her off and go back out. Mom had been waiting for them. Funnel clouds had been spotted. They’d all spent an hour in the Monroes’ basement.

  When they emerged, there’d been storm damage all around. And a report that a boat that had been sailing near where they’d been had disappeared with two on board. It was never found.

  “You should get out, though. Get some air, and sun. After lunch, you could—”

  “Thanks, but we can finish organizing those containers if I stay inside today.”

  Where she wouldn’t get swept into a funnel cloud.

  The following day, the beckoning sun was too strong to resist.

  Gran was taking a nap, Becky had left with Steve and Keith on horseback after breakfast and the kitchen was passably clean. When she heard voices by the barn, she didn’t hesitate to wander out and see what was going on.

  She might have reconsidered if she’d known Thomas was at the center of it.

  He was inside the pen beside the barn, along with Gandy. Dickens was also there, and the young horse did not appear eager to be caught and put to work. He trotted easily away from the men. They split, walking to either side of Dickens. The horse kept his attention on the younger man.

  Judi realized why when she got close enough to hear Thomas’s low voice talking calmly to the horse.

  “Okay, Gandy,” Thomas said in the same even voice. “This time.”

  Thomas moved in almost close enough to reach the horse’s head. His outstretched arms showed the rib of muscles at work holding his arms steady, making no move that would give the horse an excuse to spook.

  At the last second Dickens started to wheel away from him. Just as he did, Gandy shouted while staying out of Dickens’ line of sight. The noise was enough to make Dickens decide that direction wasn’t a good idea. He reversed course and turned—right into Thomas’s hands.

  Thomas’s voice deepened and warmed. Judi couldn’t hear the words, but the tone was such pure praise that she half expected the young horse to purr. Or maybe that was her reaction. Dickens stayed tense for a long moment then seemed to give a sigh, while Thomas kept talking, stroking him and putting on the halter.

  He led Dickens around the pen, still talking. When they passed by her, the horse’s eyes and ears flicked toward her, but the man’s attention never wavered.

  Their circuit complete, Thomas removed the halter, let the horse trot free for a few minutes, then repeated the process two more times. The third time, Dickens still started to wheel away when Thomas neared his head, but when the shout sounded from his off side, he turned back to
Thomas with what almost looked like relief, and he relaxed much more quickly.

  Judi didn’t hear any words exchanged, but Gandy unobtrusively left the pen, easing out of the gate when Thomas had Dickens’s back turned.

  “Afternoon, Missy. Think we made real progress with that devilish horse today, yes I do.” He chuckled at his play on the horse’s name as he leaned his crossed arms on the rail beside her.

  “It looked that way. But it’s a slow process, isn’t it?”

  “Slow and steady, that’s what works with a horse, Missy. Specially one as deep in bad habits as that critter. Takes a real patient man to work out the kinks of another man’s mistakes. Best get to work now.”

  Patience was not a virtue Judi would have identified with Thomas Vance. But the evidence was before her eyes.

  He tied Dickens to the rail near where a saddle blanket and a saddle were laid out atop the fence.

  With deliberate motions, he saddled up the horse. At one point Dickens started to step into him. But Thomas was obviously on the alert for the game some horses played of trying to step on a saddler’s foot, enjoying the comical sight of a human hopping up and down on one foot and swearing. He pushed back at the horse, saving his foot, and informing Dickens in a no-nonsense voice and with a few four-letter words that his behavior was unacceptable. When the horse stood still and quiet, Thomas’s voice immediately returned to smooth and low.

  Once mounted, he controlled Dickens’s edginess with the same ease she’d noted the first night.

  On their second circuit, Thomas made eye contact with her for the first time. She interpreted that as permission to speak. “If you were half as patient with Becky as you are with this guy, you’d be getting a lot farther.”

  “He’s only half as irritating.”

  “That isn’t what it sounded like a minute ago.”

  “I didn’t know I had an audience. I usually keep those thoughts to myself—about Becky and about Dickens.”

  “I’d say you usually keep all your thoughts to yourself.” Except about distrusting and disbelieving her, of course. Oh, no, those thoughts he was happy to share with the class. She’d also caught his concern for his grandmother, and his frustration with his sister, and his worry about something else…though she hadn’t pinned that down yet. But it had only been a few days. Feeling cheered, she added, “At least you try.”