The Wrangler's Bride

“—goin’ to do, son?”

Grant blinked at Walt. “What did you say? I…was thinking.”

Walt clucked at him mockingly. “Been doin’ a lot o’that lately, boy. Too much thinking ain’t good for a man, you know.”

“Right,” Grant muttered, and turned on his heel and strode out of the barn without another word.

He found Mercy in the house, adding a small log to the fire in the stove. She’d apparently gotten into the habit of replacing what they burned every day, something he had always meant to do but had been unable to, with all the demands on his time; the inside stack hadn’t diminished at all since she’d been here.

“You don’t have to do all this, you know.”

When Mercy straightened and gave him a puzzled look, he knew it had came out rather abruptly, not at all how he’d meant to say it.

“Keep the fire going? It’s strictly selfish. I hate it when my teeth chatter indoors.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

She closed the tempered-glass door of the stove, dusted her hands off on her jeans—jeans that hugged her hips and backside delightfully; it didn’t seem right that such a little thing had such luscious curves—and turned to face him straight on. A trait he was coming to expect from her. And to suspect was how she faced most things in life.

Except, perhaps, the death of Nick Corelli.

“What did you mean, then?”

“I told you I don’t expect you to work.”

“And I told you I need to keep busy.”

“Fine. Keep busy. What you’ve been doing is a big help. But you don’t have to lug hay bales or clean out stalls.”

“I know I don’t have to.”

“That’s hard, dirty work. Leave it to the guys whose job it is.”

She gave him a calculating look. “Oh. But I suppose baking bread and sewing is all right?”

He’d known when he started this that somehow he was going to end up in trouble.

“I didn’t mean that. At least not like that.”

“Then just how did you mean it? You think I can’t do that kind of work?”

“That would be pretty silly of me, wouldn’t it, when you’ve already proven you can?” he said, trying to be reasonable.

“Then why are you telling me to stop?”

He let out a compressed breath. “I’m not. But you’re supposed to be here to rest, not work yourself to death.”

“Did you ever stop to think,” she said, her voice tight, “that maybe that’s the only way I can rest?”

“Yes,” he said honestly. “Because I’ve been there. But I’m used to this kind of work. You’re not. And even though you’re a heck of a lot tougher than you look, you could still get hurt.”

She seemed taken aback at his first words, but by the time he finished, that rebellious look was back in her eyes.

“All this macho protective stuff might have been appealing when I was twelve and thought the sun rose and set on you,” she snapped, “but I’m not a child anymore, Grant. I don’t need protecting.”

Grant drew back slightly, both startled and amused by her vehemence. No, it wasn’t a child who was standing toe-to-toe with him, facing him down. It was a woman, and a fierce, passionate one, at that.

Unfortunate choice of words, he thought as his body surged in response to thoughts brought on just by thinking the word passionate in conjunction with Mercy. Would this ardent intensity carry over into other aspects in her personality? Did she exhibit the same fire and passion in other places, other ways?

If so, he thought wryly as he tried to quell the heat that was suddenly billowing through him, Nick Corelli had been a very lucky man.

And realizing he’d just called a man who had been shot to death on a dirty city street lucky was just the absurdity he needed to rein in his own unexpected and unwanted reaction to this woman he’d spent so much time trying not to think about lately.

“Okay,” he said, keeping his voice light with an effort. “I’m just afraid Kristina’s going to have my head if she finds out I’ve been working you so hard.”

She accepted the change gracefully. “So that’s it—you’re afraid of your little sister.”

“Any man in his right mind would be afraid of Kristina.”

“You’re right.” Mercy smiled, then sighed. “I always wanted to be like her.”

Grant’s brows furrowed. “What?”

“You know, glamorous, charming, bubbly. All the things I’m not.”

“You’ll do just fine as you are,” he said gruffly. “The last thing the world needs is another pampered charmer like Kristina. You’re solid, steady, and not a bit spoiled.”

“Oh, thank you,” Mercy said, her mouth twisting wryly. “Just what a girl wants to hear.”

She left him standing there gaping after her as she turned and trotted up the stairs.

Women, Grant thought, wondering what the hell he’d said wrong now.

He should, he mused rather sourly, leave the females to Joker.

Four

Mercy stretched, then retreated into the warmth of her curled-up shape when her toes found nothing but cold sheets. She opened her eyes to dim gray light, and sleepily wondered what time it was. A few minutes passed before she decided she cared enough to look at the bedside clock; she hadn’t been sleeping well for a long time, and was hesitant to end last night’s relatively peaceful rest.

When she saw the clock read past 8:00 a.m., she came awake in a rush; she hadn’t slept this late in months. She sat up, rubbing her arms against the room’s chill, realizing now that the fire had probably died down to embers, if Grant had been up and out before dawn, as usual. She’d have to hurry downstairs and stoke it before it died out altogether.

She yawned as she scrambled into her jeans and a heavy dark green sweater, then pulled on the sheepskin boots that were the only thing she’d ever found that kept her feet warm no matter what. And yawned again. No wonder the man fell asleep in his chair, she thought. She hadn’t been at all surprised when she found him there that night.

What had surprised her was the book she found resting across his broad chest. Somehow she hadn’t expected the rugged cowboy who ramrodded this big ranch to be prone to reading Shakespeare. But there was no doubt he’d been doing just that—the collected tragedies, to be exact. She’d glanced at the shelves behind the sleeping man, and seen more Shakespeare, Molière and a few more classics tucked in among a selection of much more recent technothrillers, reminding her that Grant had been torn between majoring in literature and studying engineering, despite his never-wavering determination to return to the ranch.

Then she realized she shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d known perfectly well that Grant had graduated college with honors; Kristina had told her so, proud of her big brother’s success. She remembered when he’d left for college that last summer when she was fourteen. She’d wept, certain her white knight was leaving forever and she’d never see him again. And then she’d started high school herself, and by the following summer she’d been far too sophisticated to spend her time mooning over a childhood crush.

But that hadn’t stopped her that night from simply standing beside the worn leather chair, watching Grant McClure sleep. The mouth that was so mobile, as quick to smile as it was to frown or quirk in wry amusement, had looked warm and relaxed, and the sandy brown semicircles of his lashes had looked thick and soft against his tanned cheeks. Free for the moment of the responsibility of keeping this ranch going, he had looked much as he had when she last saw him, eighteen and off to conquer the world.

And her world hadn’t ended, as she’d feared it would. No, she’d left her childhood passion far behind. No longer was her singular goal in life to snag Grant McClure’s attention. And the fact that when he joked that he might appreciate her attention now her heart had taken a sudden leap, and a burst of heat had shot through her, was something she would just as soon ignore. It reminded her far too much of the infatuated child she’d been.

She yawned again, and stretched as she went down the stairs. Still sleepy-eyed, she stirred the coals in the stove until they were glowing brightly, then added three small, dry pieces of kindling. They caught quickly, and she added two larger pieces of wood. When they were burning, too, she shut the stove door. She stood there for a few minutes, until the heat began to radiate again, warming her hands at the rekindled fire.

Somewhat absently, still pondering the near miracle of her almost restful night’s sleep, she wandered over to the front window and lifted the curtain she’d mended last week. And blinked.

Snow. Everything was covered with it. As if all color had been wiped from the earth’s palette, revealing a spotless canvas.

She’d always welcomed the first snow back in the city. The pristine white cloak seemed to mask, even if only for a while, the ugliness she too often encountered in her work. She knew it was only a facade, that all the ugliness was still there, but it lightened the load just a little to pretend for a short time that the world was as clean and bright as it looked after that first snow. But here the landscape itself had its own clean, stark beauty, and the coating of snow softened it all to a gentle loveliness.

She went for her heavy shearling coat and pulled it on, then trotted to the door. The moment she stepped outside, she took in a long, deep breath of crisp air that seemed so clean she could almost taste the purity of it. She found herself smiling, and her smile widened as she stepped off the porch into the pure white and heard it crunch under her feet.

She grinned widely to herself.

And then she stopped dead, marveling. She’d been doubtful when Kristina suggested this; going to a quiet place with nothing to do but think hadn’t seemed to her a wise thing to do. Even though she’d thought seeing Grant after all these years, and seeing how her childhood hero had turned out, might be an interesting distraction, she hadn’t thought it would be enough to get her mind off Nick. And the fact that more than anything, she knew, she should be back home, hunting down the men who had killed him.

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