The Runaway Bride

by Patricia McLinn

  He pulled out of her, but not away. She felt his weight on her like a blessing, and the deep, fast pulse of his breathing like her own heartbeat. They kept her from being alone now that they were no longer together.

  Then he moved. Rolling off the bed in a fluid motion, and disappearing into the bathroom.

  She should cover up. Pretend she was sleeping. Get dressed. Walk out.

  She hadn’t moved a muscle when he returned. He pulled more packets from his duffle, dropped them on the nightstand and came back to the bed.

  It had to be her imagination, but it seemed he found precisely the position he’d left, sprawled mostly over her. He pushed her blouse from her shoulder and kissed the skin over the bone.

  “Guess we were in kind of a hurry.” He pushed the blouse more, and she shifted to help him ease it off.

  She gave a chuckle. “When haven’t we been?”

  She thought she felt a faint tremor in his touch as he slid the other sleeve off. She rolled on her side so she faced him.

  “Hey, I’ve shown a lot of restraint.”

  He was pretending the indignation. Using it to ease the moment. If that’s what he wanted, needed, she wouldn’t deny him.

  “Right. Lots of restraint.”

  He pulled her bra free and dropped it over the side of the bed, then he slid his fingertip across the tip of her breast. A pulse of renewed heat and need clutched her.

  “If I’d known a knot and a few buttons were all that held that long skirt with the slit and that top on you, I would’ve had you out of them a hell of a lot faster.”

  “Oh, I think we did just fine that night in the truck.”

  “I don’t mean that night.” He slid his hand down her side over her hip, then around to the top of the backs of her thighs. “I mean weeks before that. And that skirt, the one with the blue flowers…that about drove me nuts.”

  She leaned back enough to see his face more clearly. “It did?”

  “Oh, yeah. I kept wondering if you were wearing anything under it, and kept hoping you weren’t.”

  “Nothing under that skirt? That would be—”

  “Sure would be.”

  And he showed her just how it would be. Slow and drawn out, until she wanted to scream…until she had to scream, and he swallowed it into himself and held it, just as she held him inside.

  He couldn’t stop his hands from moving over her, stroking her arms and back. She stirred, murmuring his name. He touched his lips to her forehead. “Go back to sleep, Judi.”

  Judi…

  Funny how it had taken him no time to get used to calling her that. Helga had never felt right.

  Right. None of it should have felt right. It was built on lies, and his making a fool of himself.

  You think I’m your dose of middle-aged crazy, like your Dad got about Maureen.

  When that slick ass had said he was her fiancé, and she hadn’t denied it, he couldn’t say his first reaction had been seeing the similarities to Maureen—that came later. First, had been a gut-deep pain that the other man—any other man—had a claim on her. Too deep a pain to listen when she’d tried to tell him the situation was something more than a spat between bride and groom.

  For that failure he deserved this period in purgatory—being with her while knowing every minute together brought them closer to being apart for good.

  He would see her through this, make sure she didn’t get caught in Carroll’s underhanded dealings, wipe out the bitter taste from the day she’d left the Diamond V.

  A finish he could remember in peace. That’s all he could ask for.

  Chapter Eleven

  The next morning they met up with Katherine—the undercover woman finally had a name—in another motel room twenty minutes from the rendezvous with Sterling.

  “We’ll have people stationed around. Here’s the east parking lot.” Katherine pointed to a diagram propped against the headboard. At the desk, a man soldered the heart charm closed with the key inside. “We’ll have people here, using the archways under the stadium for cover. And in this equipment building—it looks like a garage—and here on the street to the south. But stay on your toes, Judi.”

  “I’m going with her.”

  “Thomas, you heard Katherine—people will be all over—”

  “Not close enough to stop you from getting hit.”

  “Sterling won’t hit—”

  “Right.”

  “I know he would have slapped me if you hadn’t stopped him, but—”

  “Not slap. Slug. He had his hand in a fist.”

  “Oh. But…” Her eyes widened then slitted in anger. “You’re right. He’s more of a jerk than I thought. He was going to punch me!”

  He almost smiled at her indignation. Almost.

  “But even so, he won’t hit me this time, because he thinks he’s getting his way. He’ll be all charm and smiles.”

  The way he must have been when he’d courted her. Probably bought her expensive jewelry instead of jeans four sizes too big. Fed her fancy meals instead of making her cook. Took her to nightclubs with loud music and neon lights instead of a starlit field with the sounds—and smells—of cattle.

  “Charm and smiles,” she repeated. She grimaced, and something eased in him.

  “Maybe so, but I’m going to be there anyhow.”

  Judi turned to Katherine as if to say, You’re the professional, you do something.

  “You’ll need a cover story.”

  Judi huffed in exasperation, turning her back on both of them.

  “I figure we’ll tell him we’re getting married—Judi and me.” She spun around and stared at him, but he kept his eyes aimed at Katherine. His peripheral vision wasn’t as easy to command. “I’m the jealous type, and don’t want her to have anything of her former fiancé’s. I’m there to make sure she gives all the presents back, and there’re no ties left between them.”

  “He should buy that—especially since you’ve already decked him once.”

  They’d started this meeting with an account of Carroll’s visit to the Diamond V, and Katherine had admitted she’d longed a few times to deck Sterling—and Geoff.

  “He hasn’t told anyone about this snafu with the key,” she said. “If the big guys have figured out he’s a screwup they’ll protect their investment by making damned sure he can get the money out of the safe deposit box. You don’t want to mess with those guys. So if somebody else is with him, get the hell out of there.”

  Sterling’s car was already there, and he was the only person visible.

  “Wait until he gets out.”

  Judi understood the unspoken message. As long as Sterling stayed in his car they couldn’t know if he was armed or if he might try to use the car as a weapon. After a few seconds, though, Sterling climbed out and started forward.

  Thomas circled behind the truck and opened her door. “Let him come most of the way.”

  Sterling had stopped midway between their vehicles. Thomas halted her progress a couple yards beyond the truck. After a momentary standoff, Sterling grumbled a foul oath and started toward them again.

  Ignoring her, he demanded of Thomas, “So she got you to lie for her and say she was gone, to send me on a wild-goose chase. But what the hell are you doing here? Are you really that desperate to get laid?”

  “I’m here making sure you don’t try to treat Judi the way no real man treats a woman.”

  He’d put a touch of emphasis on try and real in case Sterling missed the point.

  “Yeah?” Sterling brought out his best sneer. “Looks like you’re thinking it’s not just a woman but your woman. I suppose that explains how she got you to lie. Caught you by the short hairs. Feeding you all that crap about not screwing without marriage and how you’re so important to her.”

  Judi opened her mouth to point out those had been his lines, but the pressure of Thomas’s left hand on her back advised silence. Just as well. If she’d gotten wound up, she might have said too much. And it wo
uldn’t do Sterling’s mood any good.

  “I’m here to make sure you get all your trinkets back and to make sure you know there’s no reason for either of us to ever see your face again.”

  “Fine by me.”

  But when Sterling turned to her, Judi knew that wasn’t entirely true. He might have wooed her and planned to wed her to use her name as an insurance policy against any legal fallout from his smuggling, but his pride had been stung by her flight from the church.

  Suddenly, all the precautions seemed wise and necessary.

  Her hand trembled as she handed over a pair of earrings, two thin gold necklaces and the bracelet. She’d bundled them together so it wouldn’t look as if she gave the bracelet any special significance. “I’m sorry, Sterling.”

  “I bet you are. You know, cowboy, at the rate she’s going, first with me and then with you, she’ll fall in bed with the next guy in another fifteen minutes. Better enjoy your fifteen minutes, cowboy.”

  Without taking a step, Thomas shifted his weight forward. Sterling backed up a step.

  “You got your things. Turn around and leave, Carroll.”

  For six painful beats of her heart, Judi thought Thomas had pushed Sterling too hard.

  Then his fine-cut lips spread in a smirk, and his posture relaxed.

  “You’re right. I got what counts. And it’s sure not some Lake Forest bitch. Have a great time down on the farm, Judi.” And then he laughed.

  As soon as he turned away, Thomas’s hand at her back held her still.

  “Don’t turn your back on him.”

  Sterling had pulled out before they returned to the truck.

  She directed Thomas to Green Bay Road, then they drove in silence to the rendezvous. In an underground garage, Katherine got out of a sedan. Behind that was another, larger car with dark-tinted windows.

  “All set?” Katherine asked, looking closely at Judi.

  “All set.”

  She nodded, then looked to Thomas. “We’ll put your truck somewhere where nobody will see it. You’ll get it back when we’ve got Carroll and the others secured. In the meantime, you’ll be staying at the Monroes like I promised. I filled your family in this morning and they’re waiting for you. And you’ll stay there until I come and tell you otherwise—inside. Understood?”

  “Is that necessary? If Thomas and I were really a couple, it would be natural for us to be at my parents’. Sterling would expect it.”

  “Maybe. But we’re not going to take any risks with Carroll getting a case of the jealous ex-fiancé and messing this operation up now.”

  The car with the tinted-glass windows swept past the impressive front lawn, bypassed the circular part of the drive that would have deposited them at the massive front door and pulled all the way to the back of the Monroe’s driveway, where the house, landscaping and distance hid it from view of any passersby on the street. Also “just in case,” Katherine unobtrusively hustled Judi into the back door, with Thomas right behind them.

  Once inside, no one could get much beyond the entryway, because the kitchen was clogged with greeters.

  Judi’s mother folded her into a hug before she was all the way into the room. She returned the embrace full measure, saying, “I’m okay, Mom. I’m okay.”

  Nancy Monroe loosened her hold enough to look over her daughter, checking the accuracy of her statement, Judi knew.

  That allowed Judi to see her father reach out a hand to Thomas.

  “You must be Thomas Vance. I’m Judi’s father. Katherine here has told us a little of what’s happened and where Judi’s been. Her mother and I—all of us—thank you for taking such good care of our girl.”

  Thomas met the handshake, but said, “She took care of us. That’s the way it really was.”

  He looked toward her, and their eyes met. In that instant it was like she’d heard happened to someone drowning. This was not entire lives passing before their eyes, but the past six weeks, from that first instant of meeting Thomas’s eyes before she wrecked the car to now.

  Each moment with Thomas flashed between them, because they both knew it was over now. He’d paid his debt. He would go back to the ranch, where she no longer had a place because he didn’t believe enough in her to see past the lie she’d told to the truth beneath it.

  The surge of introductions and greetings and talk broke the connection.

  Tears welled in Judi’s eyes. Everyone watching her would take them as tears of relief and joy at being home.

  Katherine extricated herself, ducking thanks aimed at her and promising that she would deliver the all-clear as soon as possible.

  Thomas looked up at the portrait of the distinguished gentleman who seemed to be staring at him, then around the dining room.

  There’d been no shortage of food. Mrs. Monroe had served a beef roast, baked potatoes, salad, fresh rolls and peas, with apple pie for dessert. While the adults ate in the formal dining room, the kids had the same menu in the breakfast room, with college-aged April Gareaux volunteering to look after the Dickinsons’ twin toddlers. “There’re just too many of us to fit around one table,” Mrs. Monroe had said with regret.

  “That’s okay, Aunt Nancy,” Tris Donlin Dickinson had said, “the kids love being out from under our thumbs.”

  There’d also been no shortage of conversation as everyone around the table contributed, though Judi, sitting across from him, had talked in fits and starts at best. The only time she’d become animated was when she talked about Gran, Becky and the Diamond V.

  From the others, he’d learned that the Diamond V had not been Judi’s first exposure to Wyoming—she’d spent a summer waitressing at Yellowstone Park. “And all she could talk about was how much she loved Wyoming,” her mother said. “And hated waitressing,” her brother Paul added, drawing laughter all around.

  He’d learned she had a degree from Northwestern University, had quit a good job at a medical supply company before she was supposed to get married, and had an apartment in Chicago. Her family obviously adored her. She spent a lot of time with them, including her nieces and nephews, biological or otherwise.

  She had a full life here in Illinois. A happy life, now that Carroll was out of it.

  She’d had good reason for showing up at the Diamond V, even for lying. But understanding that didn’t change the fact that she didn’t belong at the Diamond V.

  A woman raised in a house like this—twice as big as his barn, sitting on the shores of Lake Michigan, and with most of what was in it either new and valuable, or old and even more valuable—wasn’t equipped for life on a ranch, not permanently. In every material way, she was better off here.

  The best thing the Diamond V could offer her had nothing to do with the material, because it was the warmth and laughter and caring of the people. But she had warmth and laughter and caring here, too. Along with everything else.

  His eyes returned to the portrait. The distinguished gentleman’s stare had turned to disapproval. Probably never expected a small-time rancher to slip his boots under this table.

  “His name is Walter Mulholland,” Bette Monroe said quietly from beside him. She tipped her head toward the portrait. “He’s Nancy Monroe’s father, Paul and Judi’s grandfather. Not the jolly type from everything I’ve heard. He built this house.”

  “It’s a hell of a house.” The setting alone, with the big lawn in front, and the even bigger lawn in back leading to Lake Michigan, was a jaw-dropper. Then add in the house with God-knew how many rooms.

  “Yes, it is. But it wasn’t until Mom and Dad Monroe moved in that it became a home. Just remember to look at the people, not the house. And don’t fall for Walter’s bull.”

  “What?”

  But Bette had already turned to Michael Dickinson on her other side.

  In another minute, everyone was rising to clear their dishes, and clean up in the kitchen. Everyone helped, he noticed. Even in such a large kitchen, the crowd would have been overwhelming if everyone hadn’t known the r
outine. But they moved with the ease of people who knew each other well, who belonged together.

  For once in his life, Thomas wished he smoked.

  It would have been a good excuse to get out of the house, now that it was dark. But he didn’t smoke. So he simply stepped out the French doors between the kitchen and the breakfast room without telling anybody.

  He crossed dew-covered grass toward the lake, spotting a wooden deck jutting out over the water. In the distance to his right, light spread up into the sky and out across the water—must be from Chicago. Straight ahead, the dark lake met the dark sky in an invisible horizon.

  He heard the gentle lapping against the deck’s piers, as inexorable as sunrise and sunset.

  Voices came to him, then shut off. He saw by the lights from inside the house that two men had come out the French doors from what he guessed was a den, followed after a moment by a third, who caught up with the first two before they reached him.

  “Nice night, isn’t it?” Michael said while he and Paul and Grady were still several strides away. He was the one Judi had said was so nice to her. Also the one she’d said let her flirt with him. Thomas was holding off judgment.

  “Yeah. Nice night.”

  “We haven’t heard much about this ranch of yours, why don’t you tell us about it,” Paul said.

  Some invitation, Thomas thought. Like the judges at the Salem Witch Trials saying, “Tell us about your last chat with Satan.”

  “We run a cow-calf operation, along with raising horses for ranch work. I train horses on the side. Mostly working cow ponies, a few rodeo horses.”

  “I know folks with a place in Wyoming,” Grady said. “The Herbertsons.”

  “Right. A place in Wyoming, another couple in Montana, and Colorado. I don’t exactly move in the same circles.” Thomas turned to Michael. “What about you? What do you want to know?”

  He raised his hands in mock surrender. “Hey, I’m the voice of reason here. Tris sent me after these two to even up the odds a little.”