THE TROUBLEMAKER BRIDE

by Leanne Banks

  When Joshua slid between the covers of his big bed that night, he didn't expect any dreams. He listened to the silence in his house. It was a good silence, he told himself. Especially after the noise of the day.

  He thought about the schedule he'd set for bringing in mares and getting them settled. He thought about his teenage son and how each day seemed to bring a little more distance between them. It disturbed him, but Joshua knew Patrick was growing up, and growing up meant pulling apart from his dad.

  His mind eased back to the picture of Maddie with her newborn son, prompting a memory of the day Patrick was born. He and his wife had been far too young for the responsibility of raising a child, but they'd accepted that responsibility, anyway.

  They'd both been full of hope and full of dreams. That had been before Gail got sick. Before she faded away before his eyes and died. Patrick had only been four years old.

  Sometime after that Joshua stopped dreaming. It was okay, he told himself. He had work to do, and he had to fumble his way through being a single parent. Life was serious business. For Joshua there was no time for dreams.

  * * *

  Two

  « ^ »

  Early evening at the Blackwell's ranch home, and it was quiet. Joshua thumbed through the newspaper. The only noises were restless noises, the rustling of his paper, his son's foot tapping against the kitchen chair as he did his homework, and his German shepherd, Major, prowling around the front door.

  He was accustomed to the absence of noise. If he allowed himself to think about it, Joshua could nail the emotion the quiet provoked—emptiness. But Joshua was a busy man with the responsibilities of managing a successful horse farm and raising his teenage son by himself. There wasn't time to dwell on what was missing.

  He glanced over his newspaper at Patrick. He suspected Patrick viewed him as a stern, humorless and cold man. A sliver of doubt cut through, and Joshua wondered if indeed he had become that kind of man.

  Dismissing the unproductive thought, he glanced back at his paper and ignored the distance between his son and him. But the quiet, the endless, empty quiet, remained.

  Major growled.

  "Lay down," Joshua commanded.

  Major obeyed for a quarter minute, then rose again and started barking. Patrick glanced up from his homework. "What's his problem?"

  Joshua shrugged, getting up to let the dog out. As soon as he opened the door, he heard the distinctive sound of a muffler in need of repair. The muffler was attached to a car making its way down the dirt road to his house. Major was barking his fool head off as Joshua squinted his eyes against the evening darkness. He flicked on the outside lights. The car was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't quite remember…

  The green convertible pulled to a jerky stop right in front of his house. A moment later the driver's car door opened, and the sound of a screaming baby joined Major's chorus.

  Patrick joined Joshua. "What…"

  The two Blackwell males watched in amazement as Maddie Palmer put her baby in a pouch she wore on the front of her, grabbed two large baskets and stomped past Major up the steps.

  "Hi," she said cheerily, her brown eyes glinting with the same good humor as her uptilted mouth. "Remember me? You gave me a ride to the hospital six weeks ago and helped deliver my baby. I promised a meal a week for the next year, and I try to keep my promises. So, here's your first one."

  "Excuse me?" Joshua said, staring at her in disbelief. She didn't actually think he could have forgotten her. He sure as hell had never driven any other pregnant women to the hospital on the back of his motorcycle.

  "Food," Patrick said, his voice nearly trembling with joy. "She brought food, Dad."

  "This isn't nec—"

  She lifted her shoulders in a half shrug. "Already done."

  As the baby started to fuss, Joshua and Patrick took the baskets. "This really isn't—" Joshua began again.

  "There's a pie!" Patrick shouted as if he hadn't seen one in years.

  "Come in," Joshua said as the baby got louder.

  "I underestimated how long it would take me to find you," she told him as she followed him toward the sofa. "Plus I got lost and had to ask one of your neighbors for directions. Mr. Crockett. He's a crabby one, isn't he?"

  "You stopped at Otis Crockett's house?" Patrick asked, his attention veering momentarily from the food to Maddie. "Did he pull a gun on you?"

  "He didn't exactly point it at me," Maddie said, freeing her fussing son from the pouch. "But he had it over his shoulder and he wasn't helpful. I told him he needed to work on his language. It could strip wallpaper."

  "Oh, God," Joshua muttered under his breath, feeling a thud of uneasiness in his gut. Maddie looked so helpless and Otis enjoyed firing guns. "Don't stop at Otis Crockett's house. He's been to court for his temper before."

  "He needs a personality makeover," she said over the baby's wail.

  "Don't stop at—" For emphasis, Joshua started to repeat himself, but broke off when he saw Maddie pull her shirt from her waistband.

  His expression must have stopped her. She paused and lifted her shoulder. "Studmuffin, here, is way overdue for his feeding. I'm sure it's nothing you've never seen before, but—"

  "In the kitchen, Patrick," Joshua said, immediately turning around and walking away. He rubbed the back of his neck and shook his head. Stifling an oath, he motioned for his son to sit facing away from Maddie as she nursed her baby.

  "Dad, it's not that big of a deal. It's natural."

  "Tell someone else, Patrick. I was sixteen once." He began to understand why most hurricanes were named after women. In less than two minutes, Maddie had walked into his quiet peaceful home and turned it upside down.

  He pulled the dishes from the baskets and served the food, noting the baby's silence. That meant Studmuffin was being fed, and Maddie's breasts were bare. Nothing to get worked up about, Joshua told himself. As Patrick had said, it was natural. But it had been a long time since a woman had sat in his den, longer still since a woman with bare breasts had sat there.

  Joshua deliberately cleared the image from his head and focused on the food. It was much better than the scrambled eggs he'd planned.

  "This is great," Patrick said as he reached for another piece of fried chicken.

  "Enjoy it," Joshua told him dryly. "It'll be your last great meal for a while."

  "Not that long," Maddie said from behind him.

  He jerked his head to look up at her, taking note of her rearranged clothing and then her smile. Her smile was slightly crooked, but generous and appealing enough to hold his attention. He lifted his eyebrows. "Not that long?"

  "That's right," she said, as she gently patted the baby on the back. "I promised you one meal a week for a year."

  He immediately rejected the idea. "That's not necessary. It was nice of you to bring this tonight, but let's call it even with this one," he said, ignoring Patrick's protest. "It's not practical or reasonable for you to bring a home-cooked meal all the way out here every week."

  Maddie's smile grew wider. "It wasn't really practical or reasonable for you to drive a pregnant woman to the hospital on the back of your motorcycle, then stay with her during the delivery of her baby, either, was it?"

  "I—"

  "That's an excellent point," Patrick said.

  Joshua clamped his mouth shut. Between his son, the bottomless teenage pit, and Hurricane Maddie, he could see he was going to have to be firm. "It's not—"

  "I should leave," she said, gathering her basket and a few of the empty dishes. "Maui's a little temperamental, and since I don't know my way around your neighborhood in the daylight, let alone the dark, I'd hate to get stranded."

  Thoroughly confused, Joshua stood. "Maui?"

  "Oh, that's what I named my car. A couple of years ago I had to choose between taking a trip to Maui and buying a new car. I chose Maui and decided to call my car that as a reminder every time it broke down." Glancing down at her sleeping baby, she shook her h
ead. "Didn't you hear what I told you last night?" she whispered. "You're supposed to wait for me before you go to sleep."

  The baby didn't stir.

  Maddie tossed Joshua and Patrick a wry glance. "Men."

  Patrick laughed. "Did you, uh, really name him Studmuffin?"

  Her eyes widened. "Oh, no. His name is David. A good solid name to make up for having an eccentric mother. Single mother," she added under her breath, and the light in her eyes dimmed just a little as if she knew the responsibility of raising a child would be a lonely venture at times.

  She gave the appearance of being a damn-the-torpedoes kind of woman, carefree, full of husky laughter that made Joshua think of early mornings in bed. With her casually tossed red hair and mischievous brown eyes, a man might conclude she was a little wild. In his quiet, orderly world, she was noisy and disruptive. She was friendly, but she gave the impression she was at ease with her own sexuality. It was in the way she moved, the way she talked, the way she met his gaze. She made him uncomfortable.

  "Like I said, I should go. Anything you don't like besides liver?" she asked as she headed for the door. "I aim to please."

  Joshua felt a tug in his stomach and blinked. "Please," he echoed, his pulse kicking as his mind registered a swift, inappropriate, but scorching image.

  She nodded. "Dinner next week. Thanks, Patrick," she said, walking onto the front porch.

  "Thank you, Miss—"

  "Maddie," she told him. "Just Maddie."

  Joshua desperately needed to get control of the situation. "Let me take that," he said, and carried the basket to the car. A light drizzle fell. He opened the car door, and she fastened her baby in the car seat.

  "Maddie," he began when she stood. "It was nice of you to bring the meal—"

  "You're welcome."

  Unaccustomed to being interrupted by a distractingly attractive woman, he paused a half beat before he got the conversation back on track. "It's not necessary for you to bring a meal every week. Not necessary, not practical, not reasonable."

  She gave that husky chuckle again, and it shimmied down his nerve endings to flick across his masculinity. "Not practical, not reasonable. Thank goodness there are lots of things that aren't reasonable and practical. And I would argue about whether it's necessary or not."

  She shook her head and leaned closer. She didn't intend it as an invitation. It was merely her natural body language, he knew, yet his fingers curled at the urge to just touch her. "I'm not used to being rescued by solid, dependable, conservative ranchers. I'm not used to being rescued at all. I need to say thank you. Do me a favor and just enjoy the meals. Okay?"

  Speechless, he expelled a breath of frustration.

  "I'll take that as a yes." She walked to the driver's side of the car and smiled just before she got in. "G'night, Joshua Blackwell."

  "G'night," he muttered after she closed her door. Her engine coughed to life, with the muffler buzzing loudly. He could barely hear himself think over the noise of her car, but he noticed Major started barking again, another animal howled in the distance, and the birds fussed at the interruption. Even the insects screamed as if they were on edge. Hell, the woman was an assault against nature.

  In the evening mist, he watched her drive halfway down the lane. Her car rolled unevenly to a stop. It started to rain harder and Joshua sighed. The night wasn't over yet.

  * * *

  Maddie knew all too well why her car was listing to one side. She had a flat tire. "It's not all bad. This time I have a spare. And the baby is sleeping," she told herself, recalling that the last time she'd had a flat tire she'd held up a funeral procession and David had been fully, noisily, unhappily awake.

  She pushed open her car door and stepped into a mud puddle. "This is just another one of life's adventures. It will make me a better person," she chanted under her breath. She'd been chanting the same verse the past ten years of her life and she was still looking forward to the day when she might actually believe it.

  Rounding the corner of her car, she plowed into an immovable object. She blinked, then recognized Joshua. "Oh, bet you thought I was gone," she said with a sheepish smile. "You know what they say about bad pennies. Just can't get rid of them. You can go back to your house. I'm an old hand at changing tires."

  She opened the trunk, and he grabbed the spare and jack before she did. Motherhood was making her slow, she thought irritably. "Listen, it's raining. I don't expect you to—"

  "Why don't you sit in the car so you won't get wet? It won't take me but a minute," Joshua said, already kneeling beside the deflated tire.

  Unaccustomed to having anyone do much of anything for her, Maddie felt uncomfortable. "This is really nice of you, but I can do it. You don't need to. You can—"

  He looked up at her. "You sound like I did a few minutes ago."

  Even in the dark the intensity of his gray eyes cut through her. Shutting her mouth, Maddie felt her discomfort grow. She'd never favored quiet men, especially those who refused to hold up their end of the conversation. She'd always preferred to spend her time with verbally expressive males, because she wasn't left wondering what they were thinking.

  Joshua made her wonder. He was one of those salt-of-the-earth types who probably disapproved of her, but was either too reticent or polite to show it. And she would bet a year's supply of lottery tickets that he was a stick-in-the-mud.

  A nice stick-in-the-mud, she amended because the man was changing her tire for her, but still a stick-in-the-mud. He looked like he needed somebody to loosen him up. She wondered if he had a sex life, if for that matter, he'd been kissed lately. The man looked like he needed a kiss.

  Maddie felt a nudge of excitement at the same time she heard a warning bell. She was well familiar with the results of following that nudge of excitement. She'd gotten herself into trouble too many times to count, because she'd followed it. Well she wouldn't be fulfilling any kissing assignments for Joshua Blackwell, she told herself as she glanced in the car. She checked on David, who was still sleeping peacefully, then returned to Joshua's side.

  She wished she had an umbrella handy to hold over him. Damp from the rain, his cotton shirt faithfully followed the contours of his broad shoulders, back and biceps. She would have to be blind not to appreciate the strength of his body. But the appeal was more than physical. For Maddie there was something insidiously seductive about a man who had clearly made it through some tough times.

  Dependability. She swallowed her chuckle. Who would have ever thought Maddie Palmer would find dependability sexy? Her hormones must still be messed up from the pregnancy.

  "Your son seems like a good kid. I bet you're proud of him," she said to break the quiet and interrupt her train of thought.

  "Yeah," Joshua murmured as he continued working with the tire.

  "Is he girl crazy yet?"

  Joshua paused, glancing up at her. "If he is, he's keeping it a secret."

  His voice was low and deep, wholly masculine, making her want to hear it more. How interesting, she thought, that a straight-and-narrow man could have such an appealing voice. "Academic type, huh?"

  "Yeah."

  She rolled her eyes. Stingy, stingy, stingy. "Plays his hand close to the vest?"

  He nodded.

  "Like his dad?"

  He paused again and looked at her. "I guess so. I hadn't thought about it before."

  That didn't surprise her. He didn't strike her as the kind to sit around and ruminate over his similarities with his son.

  "You should have waited in the car," he told her as he lowered the jack. "You got wet."

  Maddie glanced at her damp shirt. At the same time she knew her hair was probably sticking out in ten different directions from the moisture. She shrugged. "So did you."

  He put the spare and jack in the trunk. "I thought women didn't like to get wet."

  "Depends on the reason," she said. "Getting wet in the swimming pool or shower isn't bad. Getting wet because you're standing in line
to get tickets for a concert isn't too bad."

  He turned to her, and she could have sworn she saw his lips twitch. "What about getting wet because of a flat tire?"

  His hair was damp, too, and for a fleeting second, Maddie couldn't help but imagine what Joshua would look like coming out of a morning shower. His body was clearly well-toned and muscular. The image dragged at her stomach, and she blinked to clear it from her mind. "Getting wet because of a flat tire? Depends on how much of an adventure it turns out to be."

  His mouth tilted slightly, and he regarded her curiously. "Adventure in a dirt driveway?"

  "Sometimes you have to make your own adventures," she told him, and sighed. "Now, how am I going to thank you for this? More meals?"

  His eyes widened in dismay and she laughed. "Are you afraid of a bad penny? Do you want to put the flat tire back on?"

  "No," he said immediately, without conviction.

  "But you thought about it," she said, and laughed.

  "How about a simple thank-you?" Joshua suggested.

  The man looked like he needed to be kissed. The impertinent thought nudged at her again, stronger this time. Well, darn, she thought, it wouldn't require anything monumental of her. But he'd said a simple thank-you would be fine. And some people actually preferred to lead calm, boring lives.

  She nodded. "Thank you very much." The man looked like he needed to be shaken and stirred. Resigned to the inevitable, she stood up on tiptoe, touched his stubborn chin with her fingertips and kissed Joshua Blackwell on his hard mouth.

  She heard his swift intake of breath and the surprise rippling through him. It reminded her of a kid taking cough medicine. Just a little longer for the medicine to work, she thought, and felt his lips test hers. His hand wrapped around the back of her waist. Maddie wasn't sure if he was urging her closer to him or holding her steady. Either way, she melted a little.

  She was surprised at his response. Even more surprised at her own.

  Her heart hammering against her rib cage, she pulled back and took a deep breath. Slowly, she backed into the open door of her car. "Adventure in a dirt driveway," she murmured. "I've never been good at doing anything the simple way, but thank you. G'night," she managed to say, then tumbled into her seat.