“It looks like fun.” Rachel smiled up at Wade.
He ducked his head and whispered in her ear. “Here comes trouble. Don’t let her fluster you.”
Sue Ann Swenson was striding across the yard toward them. She wore white jeans that fit like paint and a red silk shirt, opened low to reveal her cleavage. Her gaze flitted over Rachel and rested on Wade with a hungry look.
“I was wondering when you’d show up,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
“We had a little horse trouble this afternoon,” Wade said evenly. “Sorry we’re late.”
Ignoring Rachel, Sue Ann fanned her eyelashes at Wade. “You’re a sight worth waiting for.”
“You remember Rachel?”
Rachel forced herself to smile as she met Sue Ann’s hostile stare. The woman, after all, was her hostess. “Looks like a wonderful party.”
Sue Ann’s dark eyes raked her from head to foot. “What a quaint outfit.”
Wade pulled Rachel closer to his side. Reassured by his presence, she didn’t let her smile waver. “I’m glad you like it.”
“I didn’t say I liked it,” Sue Ann purred liked a predatory feline. “I’ve never gone in much for Beverly Hillbillies fashion.”
Rachel fixed her eyes on Sue Ann’s ample cleavage and grinned. “I prefer it to Frederick’s of Hollywood.”
Wade coughed, as if swallowing a laugh.
Sue Ann’s eyes blazed. Evidently unable to think of a snappy comeback, she shifted her attention back to Wade. Tracing her bloodred nails down the sharp angle of his face, she crooned, “You’ll save some dances for me, won’t you?”
Rachel watched Wade stiffen beneath Sue Ann’s touch. Couldn’t the woman tell she wasn’t wanted?
“You know I’m not a dancing man, Sue Ann.”
Sue Ann leaned closer, her voluptuous lips inches from Wade’s ear, and whispered seductively, but loudly enough for Rachel to hear. “You don’t have to dance. We’ll just hold each other while the music plays.”
Wade took a step back, drawing Rachel with him. “You have other guests, Sue Ann. Rachel and I shouldn’t monopolize the hostess.”
His tone was friendly, but Rachel recognized the tension beneath his words. Sue Ann had to be deaf not to notice, but she seemed undeterred. “I’ll be back,” she promised, “for that dance.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” Wade muttered, and wheeled Rachel toward the buffet table.
“The woman obviously upsets you,” Rachel said. “Why don’t you tell her to back off?”
“Sue Ann?” Wade shook his head. “Kicking doesn’t get you anywhere with that woman unless you’re a mule.”
Rachel frowned. “Huh?”
“When Sue Ann sets her mind to something, can’t anybody change it, so talking to her would be as effective as shouting at a post. The best I can do is avoid her.”
Ursula joined them at the table and handed each an empty plate. “How’d it go with Sue Ann?”
“Coulda been worse,” Wade said, “but Rachel held her own like a champion. First time I’ve ever seen Sue Ann struck speechless.”
“I was watching,” Ursula said. “Sue Ann’s after you, son. It’s as plain as red paint. And she won’t take kindly to Rachel standing in her way.”
“That kind of talk’ll spoil a man’s appetite.” Wade motioned Rachel into the buffet line. “Let’s eat before the Spider Woman returns.”
The conspiratorial look he shot Rachel warmed her to her toes and washed away the bad taste Sue Ann had left in her mouth. Suddenly she was starving, especially with the aromas of grilled steak and hot bread wafting on the breeze.
While she filled her plate, Wade introduced her to his other neighbors. Several commented on how good it was to see him, making Rachel wonder how long it had been since Wade had attended a social function.
“Pleased to meetcha, Ms. O’Riley,” Ken Johannson, a plump, red-faced man in his fifties, said. “I own the spread north of the Longhorn.” He pointed to a large Blue Willow bowl on the buffet table. “Be sure to try Irma’s hot potato salad. She’s famous for it.”
Wade wandered farther down the table, and Rachel dished a dollop of Iris’s specialty onto her plate.
“How’re you liking Montana?” Ken asked.
“It’s beautiful, breathtaking.” Rachel was warming to Wade’s congenial neighbor. “And the people are certainly friendly.”
“Plan to stay awhile?”
“I don’t know,” Rachel said. “Depends on how things work out.”
Ken bent toward her and whispered, “Don’t let Sue Ann Swenson run you off, you hear? Wade needs a good woman like you.”
With a friendly wink, Ken moved down the line.
Rachel looked up to see Wade had returned, and she wondered if he’d heard Ken Johannson’s advice. Wade’s detached expression gave her no clue to what he was thinking, however.
She finished filling her plate and joined Jordan, Ursula, and Leo. Wade lifted a hay bale and moved it closer so they could all sit together.
Ursula tapped her foot in time with the music drifting from the barn. “Eat up, Leo. You’ll need your strength for the Texas two-step.”
The old foreman groaned. “After the day I’ve had, my feet feel as if they’ve wintered on a hard pasture. You’ll have to find a younger man for a partner.”
Ursula gaped at him in surprise. “Never known you to miss a dance, even if your feet were on fire. You ain’t coming down with something?”
“Yup.” Leo grinned back at her. “Old age.”
As she dug into her steak, Rachel enjoyed the good-natured banter between the couple, but a glance across the barnyard spoiled her appetite.
Sue Ann was mingling with her guests, but her gaze often settled on Wade. When she caught Rachel’s eye, she glared pure poison.
“Wow,” Jordan said beside her. “If looks could kill, you’d be deader’n a fence post, Rachel.”
If looks could kill.
Ray’s mother was staring at her across the patio. Ray’s dad was cooking chicken on the barbecue.
She handed Ray a glass of iced tea and whispered, “Why is your mother looking at me like that?”
“Don’t take it personally, Jen. You know how much she wants grandchildren. She’s tired of waiting for us to start our family.”
Sinking into an Adirondack chair beside his, she folded her legs beneath her. “And you? What do you think?”
He grinned, flashing the smile that at one time had made her heart stutter and her knees weak. “We’ll have a family when I’m ready. Not before.”
“Don’t I have any say in the matter?”
Ray patted her knee as if she were a child. “We’ve been over this a hundred times, Jen. The husband is the head of the family, so I make all the important decisions.”
She wriggled uncomfortably in her chair. “Since children will be primarily my responsibility, seems like I should have some input in the arrangement.”
Ray’s smile disappeared, and his jaw hardened. “What kind of a wife are you? No wonder Mother disapproves.”
For once her anger overcame her fear. “And you disapprove of me, too?”
He smiled again, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Not as long as you do as I say.”
Fighting back tears, she rose from her chair, skirted the patio without glancing at her in-laws, and entered the house.
Once her refuge, her home now felt like a prison. She had to escape, but she had nowhere to go….
“Rachel? You okay?”
Jordan’s voice jerked her back to the present.
His face was taut with worry. “Don’t let ole Sue Ann spook you. Dad won’t let her hurt you.”
“What?” Rachel struggled to regain her bearings.
She hadn’t been sleeping, so what she’d just experienced couldn’t have been a dream.
It had to have been a memory.
She was married.
Unhappily married.
Was tha
t why she’d agreed to accept Wade’s crazy proposal? To get away from Ray, her insensitive, overbearing husband?
“Rachel?” Jordan slipped his hand into hers.
She squeezed the boy’s fingers and forced a smile. “I’m fine, really. Just woolgathering.”
She lifted her head. Wade, sitting on the hay bale opposite her, laid down his knife and fork and studied her with a puzzled expression.
“You seemed a thousand miles away,” he said.
She took a deep breath and sidestepped the truth. “This is my first social event since the accident. Takes some getting used to.”
“I thought maybe you were remembering something,” Wade stated with a probing look.
Avoiding his eyes, Rachel set her plate aside. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to visit the ladies’ room.”
“Inside the ranch house,” Ursula said. “First door on the right.”
To escape their questioning glances, Rachel hurried away from the crowd in the yard, a thousand questions of her own battering her.
What kind of woman was she?
Divorced?
Runaway wife?
Why hadn’t she told Wade the truth in her letters?
How could she accept his proposal without knowing the answers? And how could she uncover the truth without alerting Wade to her deception?
She scurried up the steps of the house to the darkness of the porch, shaded from the light by climbing vines. Collapsing in a rush-seated rocker, she pressed her hands together to stop their trembling.
For the first time since regaining consciousness after her accident, she had lost her sense of self. Not that she’d remembered any of her previous life, but she’d at least always known her values, her instinct for right and wrong. She’d been comfortable with who she was.
Now she wasn’t so sure.
How could she be? She didn’t know herself any longer. Not if her memories were accurate.
She recalled Dr. Sinclair at the hospital. Tomorrow she could ride into Libby and visit her. The doctor might be able to tell her if her mind was playing tricks on her as a result of her accident.
Her entire body trembled. Dear God, what would she do if her memories were real?
Murmuring voices signaled people approaching, and Rachel drew deeper into the shadows of the porch.
“Looks like you’ve lost out where Wade Garrett is concerned,” an unfamiliar female voice said with a note of triumph. “He seemed very preoccupied with the pretty woman he brought to the dance tonight.”
“Don’t count me out yet.” Rachel recognized Sue Ann’s aggressive tone. “As long as he hasn’t married the little tramp, I’m still in the running.”
“Tramp?” the other woman said with a note of interest. “Do you know something about this Rachel O’Riley you’re not telling us?”
“Oh, please,” another woman begged, “give us all the gossip, Sue Ann. Especially the juicy stuff.”
“I haven’t found anything yet,” Sue Ann said, “but I have a private investigator looking into Miss O’Riley’s past even as we speak.”
“Just because he’s looking doesn’t mean he’ll find anything,” the first woman said, sounding disappointed. “She looks ordinary enough to me.”
“I’m not worried,” Sue Ann said. “Everyone has dirt in their past if you dig deep enough. And believe me, for what I’m paying this guy, he’ll dig all the way to China if he has to.”
“Lordy, Sue Ann,” the second woman said with a nervous laugh, “I’m glad you’re not after my boyfriend.”
“What makes you so sure she isn’t?” the first woman asked.
Giggling like schoolgirls, the women climbed the porch steps and entered the house without spotting Rachel in the shadows.
Rachel found herself shaking harder than ever. She had to find out about her past before Sue Ann did. And once she knew the facts, she’d have to tell Wade.
Her heart sank like a stone in a pond. If she was married and had lied to him in her letters, he’d have to withdraw his proposal. Not that she’d blame him. She’d do the same in his place.
“Rachel, you all right?”
As if her thoughts had conjured him up, Wade stood beside her in the darkness.
“I’m…fine.”
“You’re sure? You disappeared so fast, I was afraid you might be ill.”
She pushed out of her chair, crossed to the railing and gazed back toward the barn. “I’m fine. Just a little overwhelmed by all the excitement.”
With the shadows etching his face, he looked even more attractive than she remembered.
Handsome, strong, dependable.
She wanted more than anything to throw herself in his arms and tell him everything. Except she didn’t know the details of what might be a very sordid story.
“You’re shivering.” Wade stepped behind her and wrapped his arms around her. “Where’s that sweater you had earlier?”
The warmth of his arms, the solidness of his body, the tenderness in his voice made her want to weep.
“I must have left it in the truck,” she managed to answer between chattering teeth.
He threw his arm around her bare shoulders and pulled her toward the stairs. “Then we’ll have to go get it. I—”
“Well, well, what have we here?” Sue Ann stepped out of the house. “You two been necking on my front porch like a couple of horny teenagers?”
“For Pete’s sake, Sue Ann,” Wade said in exasperation, “watch your mouth.”
The woman’s eyes glowed cold beneath the porch light. “Looks like you’re the one should be watching your mouth and where you put it. Never know what you might catch from strange women.”
Rachel felt Wade’s muscles tighten.
“Dammit, Sue Ann,” he said between gritted teeth, “that’s enough. If you weren’t a woman, I’d—”
“Oh, but I am a woman,” Sue Ann purred. “Glad you finally noticed.”
“See?” Throwing his hands wide in frustration, he turned to Rachel. “Talking to her is like talking to a post. She doesn’t hear a word I say. Let’s find your sweater before I forget she’s a woman and pop her jaw.”
Taking Rachel by the elbow, he led her toward the lane where he’d parked the pickup. She had to take three steps to his one to keep up with him.
“Maybe we should leave,” Rachel said.
Wade halted and stared down at her. “I can be stubborn, too. I came to dance, and I won’t let Sue Ann’s bad manners drive me away.”
“You said you weren’t a dancing man.”
The moonlight illuminated his grin. “I told Sue Ann I wasn’t a dancing man. But with you, Rachel, I intend to dance all night. Now let’s get that sweater and hurry back to the barn.”
Rachel hung back. For a few minutes, she’d forgotten her memories of Ray and her in-laws. Now the reality of her fuzzy past crashed in on her again.
“What’s wrong?” Wade asked. “You’re not going to let a mean-spirited bitch like Sue Ann spoil your fun, are you?”
Taking a deep breath, she threw him a brave smile. “No. I’ve never been fond of bullies.”
And Ray had been the biggest bully of them all. She thrust away the unwanted thought.
“Atta girl.”
Wade reached into the truck for her sweater and settled it around her. His hands lingered on her shoulders, and she fought the urge to turn into the comforting circle of his arms. She didn’t deserve Wade. She’d violated his trust by her omissions of her past, and she couldn’t even begin to set things right until she either remembered everything or dug up the facts for herself.
With his arm still draped around her, Wade nudged her gently toward the barn, and she fell into step beside him.
“Look,” he said, “you’ve had a rough time the last few weeks. How about tonight you forget about the future and making decisions and just enjoy yourself?”
“I’ll try.” But she didn’t sound convincing.
Heaven knew, she wanted to forge
t the past, the future, everything but the present, but focusing on the here and now wasn’t as easy as Wade made it sound. Especially when she was enjoying the weight of his arm around her shoulders, the warmth of his body pressed against hers, and the caring in his voice. All that would end all too soon.
They reached the open double doors of the barn, and the easy strains of a slow tune filled the night air.
Wade smiled down at her with a leisurely, amiable look that made her grin back in spite of herself.
“Miss O’Riley,” he said, opening his arms. “May I have this dance?”
Without having to think, she stepped into his embrace as easily as breathing.
JORDAN WATCHED HIS DAD lead Rachel onto the dance floor. The sight of them together gave him a warm, snuggly feeling deep inside. Rachel had fit into life at the ranch as easy as falling off a log, and she had made Jordan a whole lot happier and a lot less lonely.
He hoped Rachel was going to be his new mom. Nobody ever told him anything, but from the way his dad was looking at her, Jordan would bet next week’s allowance that his dad liked her a lot.
Then he caught sight of Rachel’s face. She looked as if her favorite dog had just died. When she saw Jordan watching her, she smiled and waved, but he could tell her heart wasn’t in it.
He waved back and turned away, clenching his teeth with anger. If anybody had made Rachel unhappy, he’d guess it was Sue Ann Swenson. He’d seen the dirty looks his hostess had shot Rachel during supper. He glanced around the room in search of Sue Ann, and he wished he wasn’t just a kid.
He didn’t spot Sue Ann, but he caught the eye of Cindy Lou Sutton, a red-haired, freckled-faced girl from his class at school. Her face lit up like a moonstruck cow, and she started working her way across the dance floor toward him.
“Looks like you’ve found yourself a dancing partner,” Ursula commented beside him.
“Not me. I’m not dancing with no girl.”
Jordan rushed out of the barn and headed straight for the dessert table. He’d been so full right after supper, he hadn’t had room for Ursula’s five-layer chocolate cake, but he was hungry again now. He eyed the last wedge, placed it on a paper plate and scouted the area for a spot to enjoy the cake in peace. So far, Cindy Lou hadn’t followed him out of the barn, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still on his trail.
Montana Mail-Order Wife Page 13
