by Mindy Neff
Love, Eden.
‘‘Not in the mood to deal with me?’’ Stony clamped his jaw and tugged the brim of his hat. ‘‘Guess we’ll see about that.’’
EDEN MANAGED to get the truck stopped in front of the Malones’ without taking out the porch. She was so upset she was actually shaking.
She lifted Nikki out of the truck, knocked on the back door, then walked on in. Distracted, she frowned when she saw her mother cooing over Hannah’s baby and her father at the sink peeling potatoes.
‘‘What are you two doing here?’’ she asked.
‘‘We were invited, remember?’’ her mother said. ‘‘Dinner, then we’re all going to town for the tree lighting.’’
No, she hadn’t remembered. She looked around, trying to clear her mind, recall what was on the menu. Ah, the standing rib roast.
She glanced at Hannah, then Wyatt. ‘‘Do y’all need a cook? I’m hiring myself out. And if you don’t mind, Nikki and I’d like to stay a spell.’’ Without waiting for an answer, and with her parents, the Callahans, the Malones, the old fellas and their wives staring at her oddly, she took off her gloves, hat and coat and went directly to the sink. Nobody in the room thought to challenge her.
‘‘Daddy, sit down. I need to do this.’’ She kissed his cheek, and he immediately relinquished his hold on the potato peeler and sat down. A smart man, he’d lived enough years in a houseful of women to know when to concede.
‘‘I can’t believe him,’’ Eden ranted to no one in particular. ‘‘I told the damn man I loved him. A baby never even crossed my mind when he got injured.’’ Violently, she set peeler to vegetable, taking half the potato with the peel.
‘‘Darling,’’ Sam objected. The judge laid a hand on her husband’s shoulder, shook her head. With a sigh he sat back and tried not to cringe. ‘‘Well, really that’s unnecessary.’’
The judge nodded, patted his hand. ‘‘I know, dear.’’
‘‘Can you even imagine how he could even think that?’’ Eden asked. ‘‘Does he think I’m that horrible, that I’d be selfishly considering myself when he’s hurt?’’
‘‘Um,’’ Ethan ventured. ‘‘What injury would that be, Tex?’’
She came out of her peeling frenzy, looked around the room. ‘‘I didn’t tell you? Some stinkin’ horse—devil horse is what Demone called it—kicked him right where it counts, if you know what I mean.’’ The men crossed their legs. Eden ignored them. ‘‘I swear I wanted to hit him, regardless of the pain he was already in.’’ She rinsed the potato and started massacring another. ‘‘And I know, Mama, that it’s not ladylike or right to settle differences physically, but I was sorely tempted.’’
‘‘Well,’’ the judge said, ‘‘I suppose there are mitigating circumstances in any case.’’ She lowered her voice, looked at the other occupants of the room. ‘‘Although, I’m just a bit lost at the moment. Happens a lot on the bench. I imagine we’ll get it all sorted out sooner or later.’’
‘‘Do you know what he suggested?’’ Eden pointed a knife she’d just picked up, slinging water on the floor. Sam lifted a hand, decided it would be fruitless to interrupt, and his wife quietly told him he was a wise man.
‘‘He told me to go out and find somebody else to get me pregnant.’’
Now Beverley wanted to object. After all, there was a decent-size crowd in the kitchen, mixed company, and such a delicate subject. Sam patted her hand. He could be the calm one, since Eden had put down the knife. The carrots were in grave danger, but what was a carrot or two when their daughter was having a crisis. And such an interesting one at that.
‘‘Like how?’’ Eden ranted. ‘‘Hang a sign around my neck and walk the highway? I am so mad I could just spit. That horse kicked him in the privates, but I think it affected his head—’’ Her tirade halted in midsentence at the sound of a very familiar masculine voice…swearing.
Uh-oh. Standing in the doorway was six feet five inches of bad attitude.
Utter silence engulfed the kitchen. Not a soul moved for several endless seconds.
Then Eden remembered she was just as mad—madder. ‘‘Cryin’ out loud.’’
Stony advanced a step, stopped, fists clenched.
‘‘Uh, sorry to hear about your…you know,’’ Wyatt said.
‘‘Nasty business,’’ Ethan added, grinning.
Stony ignored them both. He was embarrassed that Eden had told the whole roomful of people the nature of his injury, but a haze of annoyance, worry and agony blocked out everything except the maddening woman standing across from him glaring back.
‘‘What the hell possessed you to go tearing off like a maniac—on icy roads?’’
‘‘I did not tear off like a maniac.’’ She drew her Southern dignity around her like a cloak.
‘‘Of course not. My four-by-four just fishtailed all over the driveway for the hell of it. Woman, the way you constantly end up with one of the bumpers pointing in the wrong direction, you shouldn’t even be allowed on the road.’’
She slammed the knife down on the counter. ‘‘ I shouldn’t be allowed on the road? You shouldn’t be allowed out of bed. I think that horse scrambled your brains instead of your…’’ Her hand fluttered in the direction of his belt buckle. ‘‘And you told me to go.’’
He clenched his jaw so hard it was a wonder his back teeth didn’t shatter. ‘‘I didn’t mean that very minute.’’ With a roomful of people looking on, he tried to explain himself once more, even though it was ripping him apart.
‘‘Eden, it took a lot of courage and fierce want for you to ask a total stranger to get you pregnant and then marry him. I’ve seen the way you look at the babies, and it breaks my heart. And I’ve seen you nearly bleed to death before my eyes, seen the determination it takes to keep yourself on your feet, to fight your way through another month. That’s why I told you to go.’’ He dragged in a breath that literally hurt, tried to keep his voice even, quiet.
‘‘Look, baby, we’ve tried for six months, and I’ve failed you. I don’t expect you to stay. You’ll be leaving, anyway, to go back to your business. I’m just urging you to go sooner. There’s still time.’’
Eden wiped her hands on her apron. She wanted to whack him. He’d called her ‘‘baby’’ in that tone that turned her to mush, but regardless the man was an idiot. Before she even realized her intentions, she’d grabbed a sugar cookie off a plate and hurled it at him, beaning him square on the jaw.
He didn’t react, didn’t so much as blink.
Eden was appalled at what she’d actually done, and she held her breath, as did everyone else in the room.
She ought to apologize. Instead she said, ‘‘It’s just what you deserve. You’re talking nonsense and—’’
‘‘I love you, damn it! And because of that I’m willing to sacrifice,’’ he shouted. ‘‘I can let you go so you can get your baby. Why the hell are you being so stubborn!’’
Eden was so stunned by Stony’s outburst she nearly sat down. When her Mustang had slid backward into the barn, he’d been livid, but he hadn’t shouted. He wasn’t a man to raise his voice. That’s what made him such a good horse trainer. His even temper, his gentleness and deep voice.
Well, up jumped the devil, she thought, and noticed that hers wasn’t the only jaw hanging open.
He shut his eyes. ‘‘Eden…’’
That single word, just the one, was filled with so much agony and so much love, Eden felt as though she’d been handed the moon and the stars, as well.
She stepped up to him, placed her hand over his heart, rubbed. ‘‘Why am I being so stubborn?’’ she repeated softly. ‘‘Because I love you more. More than having a baby. More than a house in Texas, more than Garden of Eden—I sold it, by the way.’’
‘‘You…?’’
She nodded, noticed his hand had covered hers, didn’t imagine he even realized it. ‘‘I don’t need to get pregnant, Stony. If it doesn’t happen, it just doesn’t. But I do need you and
Nikki. I have all the family I could ever want right here.’’ She deliberately placed her hand over his scar, stroked, leaned into him and pressed her lips to the side of his eye. ‘‘I love being your wife,’’ she whispered. ‘‘I love your strength, the way you make me feel. I love exactly who you are. I don’t want six months, I want a lifetime.’’
His Adam’s apple bobbed several times as he swallowed. He searched her face, his gaze like a caress. Then he took her face between his big palms, tipped up her chin and lightly, reverently pressed his lips to hers.
‘‘I’m rescinding my sacrificial offer. I love you, Eden. You are my heart,’’ he rasped. ‘‘I won’t ever let you go now.’’
‘‘Well, I hope to shout.’’
His lips curved, slowly, fully, and his eyes went hot. Eden’s heart pounded. Lord have mercy, she knew that look.
Holding her gaze, he took her wrists, locked them around his neck, then slid his palms down the sides of her arms, all the way down her waist. He bent his knees, pulled her tight against him and stood. Eden knew she was going to spend a good portion of the rest of her life with her feet off the floor. When she felt his arousal pressed against her, her eyes widened. She’d forgotten…
‘‘Stony, your—’’
‘‘Hurts like a son of a gun, but obviously works just fine.’’
‘‘Still, maybe we shouldn’t—’’
‘‘I’m going to kiss you now, wild thing. You might want to pay attention.’’
‘‘There are people—oh!’’ Holding her with one arm, he slid his hand to the back of her neck, angled her head and kissed the living daylights out of her. Oh, yes, she was definitely paying attention. His lips were gentle, yet aggressive, assertive….
He eased up, never broke contact, said against her lips. ‘‘I love you, baby. I’ll try to be all that you need.’’ Before she could tell him he was all that she needed, he drew her right back into the kiss, seducing her, turning her mindless, boneless and so in love she thought she’d burst. He kissed her long after it was polite or proper, without apology, without a care for the dozen or so people looking on.
When he finally lifted his head, Eden couldn’t even remember what day it was, didn’t think she could speak or breathe. ‘‘Cryin’ out loud.’’
Stony’s laughter boomed out, and he twirled her around. ‘‘I am so crazy about you.’’
Everyone in the room who knew Stony—knew that he rarely laughed so unrestrained—gaped for an astonished second, then smiled, mouths stretched wide, hearts rejoicing.
The judge broke the spell when she leaned forward and crooked a finger at Nikki. ‘‘Here, doll, come let Grandma see what you’ve got.’’
Nikki looked so hopeful, Eden felt tears sting.
‘‘Well, your daddy’s married to my little girl, that makes me your grandmother.’’ Beverley’s alto voice was even toned and completely unruffled—the voice of a judge. She accepted the tiny sticks Nikki and Ian had been playing with.
‘‘We was just havin’ a sword fight. I winned and Rosie says the winner gets to keep both swords.’’
‘‘Rosie is quite the smart dog.’’ Even though she was several miles away on an entirely different ranch. ‘‘Let’s see what we have here.’’ She held up one stick. ‘‘A single pink line.’’ She lifted the other. ‘‘Two pink lines. I’d hazard a guess that these wonderful children have introduced into evidence the results of a pregnancy test—one negative, the other positive.’’
Beverley’s gaze rested softly on Eden, then back down to Nikki. ‘‘And they make fine swords, doll, but tell us all how you came by them.’’
‘‘I took ’em out of the trash. I showed Ian at Thanksgiving, but Dora fell out—that means fainting case you didn’t know—and we couldn’t play. And then Rosie wanted the glass and it breaked all over the floor. I had to get the snoopy bandage and I liked that one in the trash ’cuz it had two pink lines like my candy cane.’’
‘‘And you switched them,’’ Beverley coached.
‘‘Yep. But Rosie wanted to play, too, and she told me to go get the other one, ’cuz it was in the trash anyway and nobody wanted it.’’
Beverley lifted Nikki into her lap and hugged her. ‘‘And Grandma’s very proud that you’re such a wonderful friend to share with Rosie and Ian this way.’’ She looked up, the picture of calm, as though she’d sifted through all the evidence and was at last able to render her judgment.
Holding up the two sticks, she asked, ‘‘Eden, darlin’ do you recognize these items as yours?’’
Eden nodded. Her lips were numb.
‘‘And could you enlighten us as to which one says there’s a baby?’’
Eden, standing on her feet now, had to grab Stony’s arm for balance. Blood shot to her head, and her heart pounded. ‘‘Two lines,’’ she whispered.
Nikki’s eyes widened, and she craned her neck to have another look at the strips. ‘‘Where’s the baby?’’ she demanded, as though someone had hidden it. Then she looked at Eden. ‘‘Is the baby in your tummy?’’
Eden looked up at Stony. ‘‘I think so.’’
‘‘Okay. I want a sister. But Daddy shouldn’t yell anymore ’cuz it scared me half to death.’’ Everyone laughed because Nikki was always so secure and matter-of-fact. ‘‘And can you really and truly be my mommy now? ’Cuz Daddy loves you to bits, and he loves me to bits, too, and Rosie said the baby wants me to call you Mommy ’cuz you are, ’cuz you give me kisses and Snoopy bandages and call me sugar and make cookies with the M&M faces and let Rosie help lick the beaters.’’
Eden was really afraid she was going to start bawling and embarrass herself. Her heart was so full she didn’t know what to do with all the emotion. ‘‘I think Rosie is very smart, and I want to be your mommy more than anything.’’
‘‘Okay.’’ Nikki hopped down off Beverley’s lap, raced over to Eden and handed her the pregnancy sticks. ‘‘Here’s the baby. Let’s go play, Ian.’’
Stony cupped Eden’s hand, raised it, looked at the two strips, then leaned down and touched her lips with his. She thought she’d experienced every facet of Stony Stratton’s tenderness. In that single, heartfelt brush of his lips, she learned that her husband was and always would be full of wonderful surprises.
And she was the lucky woman who got to be his wife.
AND WHILE EDEN AND STONY melted every single heart in the room, Ozzie Peyton unashamedly wiped a white handkerchief over his vivid-blue eyes. Lloyd, Vern and Henry all slapped him on the back, each of them taking credit for the happy ending.
‘‘Yes, sir, the next baby of Shotgun Ridge’ll be born late next summer. Gonna have us a regular baby boom, you bet.’’
All because of their matchmaking skills, Ozzie thought, raising his eyes heavenward. He’d like to think that his Vanessa was watching and smiling down on them.
Stony and Eden would make a fine family together, you bet. And it was all because of him and the boys.
They were getting pretty darn good at laying the path and getting these recalcitrant cowboys to walk on down it. Ought to make a business out of it, you bet. A nudging service…
ISBN: 978-1-4603-6753-7
THE HORSEMAN’S CONVENIENT WIFE
Copyright © 2000 by Melinda Neff.
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~Tall, Dark & Irresistible
*Bachelors of Shotgun Ridge
