Montana Mavericks Christmas

by Susan Mallery

  “I would like.”

  She stared at him. “We can’t put a wedding together in a day.”

  “Why not? I’d like for us to get married in this house so that we can begin making memories here. I thought maybe Nancy and Jerry would be witnesses. Unless you want something different.”

  “No. That sounds perfect. I would like to marry you as soon as possible.”

  He lowered his head to hers and kissed her. With her in his arms, he felt a rightness that had been missing most of his life. With Angela, he belonged.

  He reached down to cup her hip. As he prepared to enter her, the phone rang.

  Shane swore under his breath, then reached for the receiver. “I’m sorry,” he said before picking it up. “It might be work.”

  “I know,” she said. “It’s fine.”

  “McBride,” he said into the receiver, then listened.

  “Shane, I wanted to let you know that Sara Mitchell escaped from her kidnappers,” Matt Anders, one of the deputies Shane worked with, said. “She got away this afternoon. She seems okay, considering what she went through. Chances are those creeps are pretty steamed up about losing her and their million bucks, so the boss wanted me to tell you to make sure to not let Angela Sheppard out of your sight. He wants you two to lay low for a while. Maybe a week, until this is wrapped up.”

  Shane glanced down at the lovely young woman in his arms. “I think I can manage that,” he said. “We might even leave town for a few days.”

  “Great idea. Just let the boss know.”

  “I will. Thanks.” He hung up the phone.

  “What was that all about?” Angela asked.

  “The little girl who was kidnapped the day you were attacked managed to escape. She’s fine,” he added quickly when he saw the concern in her eyes. “But those men are going to be angry at having lost their chance at the ransom money. I’m under orders not to let you out of my sight for the next few days.”

  “Really? So that’s why you mentioned leaving town.”

  “Exactly.” He wrapped his arms around her and pressed himself against her. “I’m going to have to stay very, very close.”

  She gasped as he entered her. “Sort of a one-on-one kind of protection?”

  “Absolutely. Only the best for the woman I love.”

  She started to respond, but even as her mouth formed words, he felt the pulsing of her first release. He was going to tease her about her quick response, but his own body lost itself in the pleasure of what they were doing. He couldn’t think, he couldn’t talk, he could only feel and be thankful that he’d been lucky enough to find her.

  As weddings went, it wasn’t a very big one, Angela thought as she adjusted the peach roses in her hair. There was no church, no live music, no guests except for Nancy and Jerry’s two children. She wasn’t even wearing a wedding gown. But Angela couldn’t remember being happier or having an event in her life that felt so very right.

  “You’re beautiful,” Nancy said, and gave Angela a hug. “And so very much in love.”

  “Thanks for all your help,” Angela told her. “I couldn’t have managed it without you.”

  “Hey, that’s what friends are for, right? Besides, I loved the challenge of throwing a wedding together in a single day.”

  Nancy had indeed worked a miracle, Angela thought. When Shane had phoned her to invite her and Jerry to be their witnesses, Nancy had insisted that she help Angela make the arrangements. Fifteen minutes later she’d been at Shane’s door with a notebook in one hand and a list of phone numbers in the other.

  By ten they’d arranged for Angela’s bouquet, flowers for the cake and a basket of rose petals for Belinda, who was going to be the flower girl. Nancy had called in a favor from a local bakery and had gotten them to agree to deliver a simple two layer wedding cake by four that afternoon. The next stop had been to take Shane’s best suit to the dry cleaner’s, with a promise that it would be ready by three, then they’d hit the dress shop.

  There, on the sale rack, had been a pretty long-sleeved lace dress in Angela’s exact size. The princess style emphasized her bust while skimming lightly over her slight tummy. Nancy had thought of disposable cameras so the event could be recorded and a romantic catered dinner for two by a local firm. Their last stop, after buying two simple gold bands, had been to Nancy’s church where the secretary and part-time organist had played “The Wedding March” so that Nancy could record it and then play it back when Angela walked down the center of Shane’s living room.

  “You thought of everything,” Angela said as she stared at herself in the dresser mirror. “You even did my hair.”

  Nancy shrugged. “I think in my last life I was a general or something. I’m great at getting it all together very quickly. Of course, the downside of that is I alphabetize my spices, which makes everyone crazy.”

  “I think it’s charming.”

  Nancy smiled at her. “I hope so. I’m very glad you’re marrying Shane. I know it’s been quick, but something about it feels so incredibly right.”

  “I agree,” Angela said, trying not to notice how amazing Nancy looked in a simple navy sheath dress. The woman could have made her fortune modeling.

  “I told Belinda you’re going to be living next to us,” Nancy said, “and that you’re having a little girl and she’s very excited. She knows a baby will be a lot more fun than her dolls.”

  Angela felt tears spring to her eyes. This is what she’d always wanted—a home, friends, connections. She wanted her children to play in the neighborhood and forge relationships that would last a lifetime.

  “Thank you for everything,” Angela said, and hugged her.

  Then Jerry knocked on the guest room door and said that it was time to get started.

  Nancy went out first. Angela waited until she heard the opening of “The Wedding March” before entering the hall and heading for the living room. She’d thought she would be nervous, but she’d never been more certain in her life.

  As she walked down the hall, she saw soft flickering light ahead. While she’d been dressing, Shane and Jerry had filled the living room with dozens of tiny candles. They added a soft glow to the lamplight and made Angela feel that she was in a holy place.

  The minister, arranged on short notice as everything else, smiled when he caught her eye. He winked once, then nodded for her to come forward. Shane was waiting there, as well. Tall and solid, a man she knew would be at her side for the rest of their lives.

  His gaze met hers. The rest of the room faded away, and in the blurriness she thought she saw images of laughing children, although there were four smiling faces in addition to hers and Shane’s. She saw a big dog and several cats, heard echoes of joyous Christmas mornings to come. She saw the house—added on to and filled with a happy family. She saw her children graduate from college, then marry, except for the youngest who would always be a rebel. She saw Shane as he was now, then as he would be in his eighties, and she was at his side for the entire journey. She saw them standing together on a beach, watching the sun set, holding hands as they had every day for the past fifty years.

  She came to a stop next to her husband-to-be. When she gave Nancy her flowers, he took both her hands in his. “Are you sure?” he asked.

  She looked past him to the still moving promises of what was to be. “I’ve never been more sure in my life,” she told him. “You are where I’ve always wanted to be.”

  “You might as well kiss her now,” the minister said with a grin. “I can tell that’s what you’re thinking of doing anyway, and if I don’t let you, you’ll be distracted through the entire ceremony. I like my couples paying attention.”

  Everyone laughed, then Shane leaned forward and touched her lips with his. The rightness of the moment grounded her. Then they turned and faced the man of God to pledge their love to each other for as long as they should live.

  * * * * *

  BORN IN WHITEHORN

  Karen Rose Smith

 
To Leanna, Edie, Mary Anne and Lee. For your “new” mother expertise and your ongoing support and friendship.

  Thank you.

  KAREN ROSE SMITH

  enjoys writing about men and women who want to commit their lives to each other, share dreams and grow old together. She believes romance lives in everyday life and thinks there is a hero inside of every man—he just needs the right woman to bring out his best qualities. Wide open spaces call to her, yet she also likes the bustle and convenience of city life. Experience has taught her that true love can be found anywhere.

  One

  “Why can’t Sara talk?”

  Leah Nighthawk glanced at the five-year-old seated beside her as she drove to the Hip Hop Café in White horn, Montana. The sound of the girl’s voice startled Leah for a moment. Jenny McCallum had been unusually quiet during the thirty-mile drive from the Laughing Horse Reservation where she’d stayed with Leah for safety’s sake during the past two weeks. Anyone looking at little Jennifer would never know the child was an heiress and had almost been the victim of a recent kidnapping plot that had gone wrong.

  Leah pushed her long, black hair over her shoulder as she carefully chose the right words to answer her small friend’s question. “The men who took Sara didn’t hurt her, but they must have scared her before she ran away from them. Your mom and dad think she’s still scared and that’s why she’s not talking. Maybe when she has her family and friends around her again, she’ll feel safe enough to tell everyone what happened.”

  Leah hoped her words had alleviated Jenny’s concern. Sara Mitchell and Jenny McCallum were best friends and even looked somewhat alike with their blond hair and blue eyes. Because Sara had been wearing Jenny’s coat in the schoolyard two weeks ago, the kidnappers had mistakenly taken her instead of Jenny. The McCallums had worried that the two men, who had worn ski masks during the attempt, would realize they’d kidnapped the wrong child and come after Jenny again. Leah had offered to keep the little girl with her on the reservation, knowing no one would look there, and Jenny’s parents had agreed to the plan.

  Leah’s very round tummy brushed against the steering wheel as she turned her blue van into the parking lot of the Hip Hop Café. Snow flurries that had begun shortly after she’d left her small house on the “res” danced across the windshield. A welcome-home celebration for Sara had been hastily planned by the McCallums. Leah knew she was tempting fate by bringing Jenny to the party. Dr. Jeremy Winters could very well stop in. Last night he was the one who’d found Sara wandering along the road after she’d escaped from her kidnappers.

  Just thinking about Jeremy made Leah’s heart ache. Unbidden, memories of their night together filled her mind with vivid images, and her eyes pricked with tears. When she’d awakened in his arms almost nine months ago, she’d told him she couldn’t see him again…that she was leaving Montana. But when she’d discovered she was pregnant, she’d postponed leaving and had stayed secluded on the res, working at the trading post, saving money so that when the babies were born she could leave Montana as her mother had always wanted her to do. Over and over again she’d had to remind herself that Jeremy was essentially a stranger, that she refused to be a burden to him, that one night of passion wasn’t enough for her to ungratefully turn her back on the dreams her mother had nurtured for her all her life.

  Jeremy was most likely making rounds at Whitehorn Memorial Hospital right now. She could slip into the Hip Hop, deliver Jenny to her parents, make sure Sara truly was unharmed, then leave before he arrived. As Leah pulled into a parking place, she anxiously checked the cars already parked there. Thankfully she didn’t see Jeremy’s forest-green Jeep.

  Taking a deep breath, she switched off the ignition.

  After she unfastened her seat belt, she protectively laid her hand on her belly and turned toward Jenny. “Before we go inside, I just want to tell you how much I enjoyed having you with me.”

  Jenny smiled and unbuckled her seat belt. “It was fun staying with you. I like the trading post, and practicing my Christmas pageant song with you, and you telling me stories, and…” Leaning closer, she laid her hand beside Leah’s as she had quite a few times over the past two weeks. “And I like feeling the babies.”

  “They’ve been quiet today,” Leah said, her overwhelmingly tender feelings toward her unborn children growing stronger by the minute. When she’d found out she was having twins, she’d been scared but also overjoyed. She’d have two babies to love.

  She just wished her mother was here…she just wished…

  Blinking quick tears away, she motioned outside the window. “Be careful when you get out of the van. The blacktop might be slippery.” A fine layer of snow already coated the parking lot, and Leah knew Jenny’s enthusiasm to get inside could make her feet slip right out from under her.

  Leah opened her door and stepped onto the ground. Her hand automatically went to her back, which had been bothering her all day. She’d been feeling particularly tired, too, and just blamed it on standing on her feet at the trading post.

  After her mother had been diagnosed with cancer twenty months ago, Leah had returned to the reservation from Chicago to be with her and to take care of her. She’d been fortunate to find a job as an assistant to the curator of the Native American Museum in Whitehorn. But as her mother had required more care, Leah had scaled back to part-time and finally quit during the last month of her mother’s life. If Jeremy hadn’t stopped in that one evening after her mother died… If she hadn’t let him comfort her… If she hadn’t foolishly made love with him…

  In spite of Leah’s warning to be careful, Jenny ran to the back door of the café, unmindful of the snow. Leah took more care, keeping her ears alert for the sound of any cars arriving. Once inside, she looked around the 1950’s-style diner with its chrome and vinyl. It was decorated for Christmas, which was less than a week away, with pinecone wreaths, gold tinsel garlands, and mistletoe hanging from the ceiling. Two attractive women were talking while they arranged cookies on a platter. They both looked up when Jenny and Leah entered. Jessica McCallum, Jenny’s adoptive mother, beamed a smile at the sight of her daughter. Tall, slender and very pretty, with sable-brown hair she wore pulled back in a bun, Jessica was the head of the social welfare department in Whitehorn. Danielle Mitchell, Sara’s mother, paused in her work to watch as mother and daughter reunited once more. Danielle, an attractive woman with auburn hair that fell to her shoulders, had been raising Sara on her own for the past two years since her husband had disappeared. Leah had become friends with both women when she’d worked at the museum where they volunteered their time on weekends.

  Jenny spotted her mother and took off at a run across the tile floor, past the jukebox that usually blared country-western music. Jessica opened her arms to Jenny, enveloping her in a huge hug. Both Jessica and her husband Sterling had visited Jenny on the reservation and kept in constant phone contact, but it was obvious how glad mother and daughter were to be together again.

  Finally Jessica straightened and came over to Leah. “I don’t know how to thank you for keeping her safe.”

  “No thanks are necessary,” Leah said. “We had fun.” As she watched Jenny eat a cookie from the tray and talk with Sara’s mother, Leah lowered her voice. “Is it really safe for Jenny to go home since the men haven’t been caught?”

  “We’re putting extra security on at the ranch, and we won’t let Jenny out of our sight,” Jessica assured her. “We don’t think they know yet they kidnapped the wrong girl. If they make a move, Sterling will be ready for them.”

  Sterling McCallum, Jessica’s husband, was a special investigator for the sheriff’s office. Leah had no doubt that he’d see that his daughter remained safe.

  “I’m more concerned about Sara,” Jessica said in a low voice. “I think those men said something to frighten her, and that’s why she won’t talk. If we can make her feel safe again and she can tell us something to help identify them—”

  Jessica stopped abrup
tly as Danielle and Jenny joined them.

  “Hi, Leah. Why don’t you take off your coat,” Danielle suggested. “I’m sure we can find a comfortable chair for you.”

  Knowing she had to avoid Jeremy, Leah said, “I can’t stay. I want to get back to the res before the storm really breaks.”

  “At least have a cup of tea,” Jessica insisted.

  Before Leah could refuse, she spotted little Sara coming around the counter from the kitchen. Her long blond hair was tied in pigtails and her pretty purple sweatshirt and slacks matched. When the five-year-old saw Jenny and Leah, she broke into a huge smile. Sara didn’t look any different than she had a few weeks ago. But when her gaze found Leah’s, Leah saw an element of fear there that had never been in her eyes before.

  Going over to Sara, Leah stooped and gave her a hug, holding on to her for a moment. “I’m so glad you’re back home again. I can’t stay right now, but I’ll see you again soon. Okay?” She leaned back, and Sara just nodded.

  When Leah straightened, Danielle put her arm around her shoulders. “I swear you haven’t gained any weight except for the babies.”

  Leah laughed and patted her belly. “Yes, it’s all right here.”

  “You be careful driving home,” Danielle warned.

  “I’ll be very careful,” Leah responded. Then, after a cautious glance around the room, she said, “Please don’t tell anyone I was here. Okay?”

  Danielle and Jessica exchanged glances.

  Danielle asked, “Does this have something to do with the father of the twins?”

  Leah hesitated. She hadn’t told anyone who the father was. She’d decided that was best.

  After an awkward pause, Jessica patted Leah’s arm. “You don’t have to tell us anything.”

  “Thank you,” Leah said gratefully.

  After a round of goodbyes, and a wave to Jenny’s dad who was coming out of the kitchen with a tray of sandwiches, Leah headed for the door, eager to be on her way before she ran into Jeremy. Unlike most doctors who chose to make rounds in the early morning on Saturdays, Jeremy usually made his rounds in the afternoon, spending more time with his patients, listening and talking to them. He was a good doctor and had shown her mother great kindness.