In the Rancher's Arms

She had hoped that one day she might meet someone who would truly love her unconditionally, but it didn’t look as though that would happen now. In her desperation to leave Charlotte, she’d agreed to the businesslike terms of marrying Eli—a quick solution to her dilemma. And although it wasn’t the fairy-tale beginning that she would have preferred for their relationship, she had every intention of trying to make their marriage work. She had given her word and that was something she tried never to break.

Sighing, she stared out the passenger window. Most people who were unlucky in love could take consolation in the love they received from their parents as a measure of their self-worth and importance. All she had to look back on was a barely tolerated existence by her father.

She gazed at the surrounding mountains as she swallowed around the huge lump clogging her throat. Her birth had taken her mother’s life, and John Bardwell had never been able to forgive her. Now that he was gone, there was no chance of him ever forgiving her. Not that she thought that would have ever happened. She hadn’t. But with his death, even the slightest possibility of that eventuality had been buried along with him.

Of course, she’d had her nanny—a woman her father paid to raise her. Nanny Marie had cared deeply for her. Victoria had no doubt about that. But it wasn’t the same as a mother’s love. To Marie Gentry, Victoria had represented a job and a way to escape the poverty she had grown up in.

“Is something wrong?” Eli asked as he got back into the truck.

Lost in thought, she hadn’t noticed his return. “I’m just a little tired,” she lied, shaking her head. “I think the time difference must be catching up with me.”

“Why don’t you put your head back and take a nap?” he suggested. “There’s plenty of time. We have a two-hour drive to get to the Rusty Spur.”

“I doubt I could sleep.” She pointed to the mountains in front of them. “I don’t want to miss this view. It’s breathtaking.”

He gave her an odd look. “You really mean that, don’t you?”

“Of course.” Nodding, she released a bit of the tension she had felt since her arrival. “I think it’s beautiful here. I find the mountains absolutely fascinating and everything around me looks like it could be on a Christmas card.”

“You don’t think you’ll mind all this snow?” His tone was conversational, but she could tell he had more than a little interest in her answer.

“Not at all.” Smiling, she continued to gaze at the snow-covered landscape. “We rarely get snow in Charlotte and when we do, there isn’t very much and it doesn’t last more than a day or so.”

“If you’ll remember, I told you the Rusty Spur is in a pretty remote valley,” he warned. “There are times in the winter that we get snowed in for a week or two at a time. You don’t think you’ll mind that?”

“Not as long as I can get out and build a snowman occasionally.” Her smile faded. One of the things he had warned her about during their first phone conversation had been how isolated the ranch was and how much snow the area got during the winter months. “But we discussed this the first time you called to interview me. Didn’t you believe me when I told you I wouldn’t mind it?”

To her surprise, he reached over to cover her hand with his. “It’s one thing to talk about what it would be like to be snowed in. You might feel differently about it when you’re actually in that situation, Tori.”

Her hand tingled from the contact and she could have sworn her heart skipped a beat. Deciding to ignore the excitement coursing through her from his touch, she focused on his shortening of her name. “No one has ever called me anything but Victoria,” she said, thoughtfully.

“Do you mind me calling you Tori?” he asked. His smile increased the warmth spreading through her.

It seemed only fitting that she have a new name for her new life, even if it was just a variation of her given name. “I don’t mind at all. In fact, I like it,” she said decisively. “It’s less formal.”

His hand continuing to engulf hers and the feel of his calloused palm against her much smoother skin caused an interesting little flutter to begin deep in the pit of her stomach. She tried to ignore it, but it suddenly felt as if the spacious cab of the truck got quite a bit smaller.

“I know I won’t mind the weather, but don’t you think it’s a bit late for you to be second-guessing me?” she asked.

He seemed to consider her question a moment before he finally nodded. “I just want to be sure you know what you’ve signed on for.”

She didn’t want to tell him that no matter what she had gotten herself into, she hadn’t had any other options. Nor did she feel ready to discuss her father and the disgrace the Bardwell name had suffered because of his poor decisions. She had even been forced to have her surname legally changed to Anderson—her mother’s maiden name—when she started getting death threats.

If they were going to stay together, at some point she would have to tell Eli everything. But she had a month to find the right way to do that. And if they decided to go their separate ways, he would never need to know that for months she had been followed night and day by investigative reporters. He’d never need to understand the desperation that had driven her to marry a stranger or the guilt she would harbor for the rest of her life.

She took a deep breath. Watching your father cause the financial downfall of hundreds of his clients and lose his financial-consulting firm because of it wasn’t something she was comfortable discussing with someone she barely knew. She had told him that her father died of a heart attack, but he didn’t need to know that stress was the cause.

“Don’t worry about me. If I wasn’t certain of what I’m doing, I wouldn’t be here.” She covered a yawn with her hand. “Maybe I will try to sleep a little. Please wake me when we get close to the ranch. The way you described it when we spoke over the phone, I’d love for my first glimpse of the valley to be from the top of the ridge.”

“I will,” he said, giving her a smile that curled her toes inside her new fur-lined snow boots.

She wasn’t entirely certain she was comfortable with feeling so attracted to her new husband so soon. It could be a plus if their marriage worked. It could spell heartache for her if it didn’t.

When Tori closed her eyes and tried to relax, she decided it would be in her best interest not to dwell on that right now. She had other, more important concerns.

If and when she did tell Eli about her father and her part in the scandal, how would he react to learning that he had married the pariah of Charlotte society? Would he understand that in her desperation to get as far away from the shame and humiliation that she had been driven to search online for an area of the country where the Bardwell name wasn’t as well-known?

Even though she held a master’s degree in financial planning and had been cleared of any involvement in the illegal transactions conducted at the now-defunct Bardwell Investments Agency, no one in the financial industry would hire her. She just hoped that Eli could overlook the fact that she hadn’t exactly been honest with him. And that he had married the daughter of the man who had helped to create the nation’s biggest financial fiasco in recent history.

Two

When he stopped his truck at the top of the ridge overlooking his ranch, Eli glanced over at his new wife. Tori had fallen asleep almost as soon as she’d closed her eyes, but it hadn’t been a restful nap. Several times during the past hour and a half, she had whimpered and murmured something. He hadn’t been able to understand what she said, but whatever it was it must have been extremely upsetting. He had even considered waking her when a tear escaped the corner of her eye to run down her smooth cheek. But she had seemed to rest peacefully after that, so he had let her be.

As he continued to watch her sleep, he couldn’t help but marvel at how alluring she was. He hadn’t anticipated that, or the protectiveness that seemed to accompany the pronouncement by the good reverend that she was his wife. Both were feelings he had hoped to avoid.

He had thought by advertising for a bride, listing his specific requirements and making his choice from the qualified applicants, he would remove the possibility of any kind of romantic entanglement. He had learned the hard way that when an emotional attachment was involved, it clouded a man’s judgment.

And truth to tell, after talking to her the first time, he had decided that she wasn’t suitable, and moved on to interview other, more qualified women. But each time he ended a conversation with one of them, his thoughts kept straying back to his phone call to Tori. There had been something about her soft, Southern voice as she told him about her time on the family farm that compelled him to choose her, instead of using his head to select one of the more obvious candidates to be his bride.

Now he had a beautiful wife who he would bet everything he owned had no experience at all with livestock. What she did have were the softest lips he’d ever had the privilege to kiss, as well as a voice that set his pulse to racing each time he heard it.

“So much for keeping a romantic attraction out of the equation, genius,” he muttered to himself.

Not at all comfortable with the direction his thoughts were taking, he decided to analyze his reaction to his new wife a bit later. He lightly touched her shoulder. “Tori, we’re home.”

Her long dark lashes fluttered once, then opened to reveal her extraordinary violet eyes. His lower body tightened as she gazed up at him. She looked soft, feminine and so damned desirable that he barely resisted the urge to release her seat belt and pull her into his arms.

“We’re here already?” She sat up in the bucket seat. “How long was I asleep?”

“About an hour and a half.” He forced a smile. “You wanted me to wake you when we got to the ridge above the ranch.”

He heard her soft intake of breath and knew the moment she caught sight of the Rusty Spur Ranch in the valley below. He forgot all about his lapse of judgment as a sense of satisfaction filled him at the expression of awe on her pretty face. She was clearly impressed by the size of the operation.

“How big is your ranch?” she asked, her voice filled with amazement.

“You’re looking at the ranch headquarters. There’s about ten thousand acres here and another twenty thousand of pastureland outside of the valley. I also lease another fifteen thousand acres from the Bureau of Land Management.” He pointed to the big log home his great-great-grandfather had built. “That’s where we’ll live, along with Buck. He tends to the house and cooks now that he’s retired from ranch work.”

“It’s gorgeous and so big,” she said, unbuckling the shoulder harness to sit forward for a better look out of the windshield. “I can’t tell from this distance. What are all those buildings behind the house?”

Her almost childlike enthusiasm and questions caused his chest to swell with pride. The Laughlins had settled in the valley over a hundred and twenty five years ago and each generation had made the ranch bigger and better than the last.

He pointed toward the buildings directly behind the house. “Those are the barns. There’s one for the work horses, one for storing grain and hay, another one for ranch trucks, tractors and other equipment. That one we use for treating sick and injured livestock and that big one is where we keep the tractor trailers we use for transporting cattle to market and to some of the farthest pastures.” Pointing to the far side of the valley, he added, “That smaller house over there is where the foreman and his wife live and the bigger one next to it is the bunkhouse where the single men stay.”

“There’ll be a woman I can talk to from time to time?” Tori asked, brightening even more.

“When she has time, you can. Sally Ann is usually pretty busy cooking for the men and she sometimes helps Buck take care of the ranch house when his arthritis is acting up.” He grinned. “She and her husband, Jack, have lived on the ranch for as long as I can remember. I’m sure she’ll enjoy having another woman around after having to deal with men all these years.”

“So she’s a bit older?”

“I don’t know exactly how old she is and I’m for damned sure not going to make the mistake of asking her,” he said, laughing. “But if I had to venture a guess, I’d say she’s somewhere in her early to mid-fifties.”

Tori seemed to digest that a moment before she pointed to the corral and holding pens. “Are those…” She stopped, and he could tell she was searching for the right word. “…corrals?”

“There are a couple of corrals for the horses when we let them out of their stalls for some fresh air and exercise, a round pen for breaking them to ride and about eight holding pens for the cattle,” he explained. “We use those when we bring the heifers in from the pastures at calving time and to separate the stock during roundup.”

As he watched Tori take in the vastness of his ranch, Eli couldn’t help but marvel at the difference between her reaction and the first woman that he’d brought home to see the ranch. That had been ten years ago when he brought his college girlfriend home for Thanksgiving and it had turned out to be the beginning of the end of their relationship.

The woman had taken one look at the remote location and the amount of snow that was already on the ground and hadn’t been able to get back to Los Angeles fast enough. She hadn’t liked the stark beauty of the mountains, didn’t like the smell of the pines surrounding the valley and couldn’t believe anyone would want to live in something as primitive as a log home. Never mind that the house had all the latest conveniences, as well as satellite hookup to television and the internet. She hadn’t even appreciated that at night the stars looked brighter and seemed almost close enough to touch. Or that there were so many they couldn’t be counted. All she could do was complain about how dark it was at night and question why his father didn’t consider selling off the land to a developer. He’d tried to give her the benefit of the doubt, but that was before he found out about her lies and the scheme that would have eventually parted him from a good chunk of the Laughlin fortune.

“How many people live on the Rusty Spur?” Tori asked, bringing him back to the present.

Eli started the truck and began to navigate the snow-packed road leading over the ridge to the valley floor below. “Counting me, you and Buck, there are ten of us that live on the ranch year-round. But during the summer months, I usually hire another five to ten men to help out with cutting and storing hay and mending fences, as well as working during fall roundup.”

“I would have thought you’d need more than that from the size of this place,” she said, her soft voice still filled with amazement.

“Contrary to popular belief we don’t do everything on horseback or we would need more hired hands.”

“Really?”

She sounded almost disappointed and confirmed his suspicion that she had little, if any, knowledge of how a modern ranch or farm operated. But he wasn’t going to call attention to the fact. For one thing, they were already married—he had taken the plunge and planned to give it a shot. And for another, he wanted to see just how long it was going to take before she admitted that she knew nothing about rural life and what excuse she was going to give him for misrepresenting herself.

Her false claims might have been cause for concern, were it not for the iron-clad prenup they had signed before the wedding ceremony. That was his insurance. It not only protected his assets—the one-month get-acquainted period also gave him the time to figure out why she had answered his ad when she clearly wasn’t qualified, as well as why he couldn’t seem to bring himself to confront her about it.

“We use pickup trucks and four-wheel ATVs for a lot of the things that we used to have to do on horseback,” he explained, noticing that she was paying extremely close attention to what he said. “But we do ride horses to move some of the herds to the summer pastures in the upper elevations. Most of those are areas that can’t be reached on wheels.”

“Herds?” She looked intrigued. “How many cows do you have?”

He laughed out loud. “I have four herds of cattle—two of registered Hereford and two of Black Angus. And since we raise our own working stock, I have a herd of quarter horses, as well.”

“I meant cattle.” Her cheeks colored a pretty pink and he knew she realized she had slipped up.

When he stopped the truck at the side of the house, Eli got out to open the passenger door. Placing his hands at her waist, he lifted her down from the truck. He had no idea why he kept picking her up, other than the fact that he liked the way she felt in his arms.

After he set her on her feet, she continued to hold on to his biceps as she stared up at him. It took monumental effort on his part to keep from drawing her to him for another kiss. “Why don’t you go on inside out of the cold while I get your luggage?” he finally asked.

She stared at him a moment longer before nodding and turning to walk up the steps.

As he watched her cross the back porch to open the door, Eli exhaled, then took in a deep breath of sharp winter air. Why was he so damned turned on by Tori? She had clearly lied to him about her qualifications when she applied to be his wife. But the strangest part was that he didn’t mind. Somehow it didn’t seem nearly as important to him that the woman he chose be able to help around the ranch as it had been when he’d posted the ad online.

Reaching into the bed of the truck, he pulled out the two suitcases he had placed there when he’d picked her up at the airport, and started toward the house. There was something about Tori—a vulnerability, and quite possibly even a desperation—that had him overlooking her deception and making him want to shelter her from whatever she was running from. And he had no doubt there was something that compelled her to dive headfirst into the uncertainty of being an email-order bride.

Why else would a beautiful woman, who was obviously born and bred to a more genteel life—a woman who could easily have just about any man she set her sights on—answer an online ad to marry a stranger and live on a remote ranch in the mountains of Wyoming?

He had a basic background check run on all of the applicants before starting the interview process and nothing had turned up in Tori’s that had raised a red flag. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t something there and luckily he knew exactly whom to contact if he decided he needed to know more. Blake’s older brother, Sean, had been an FBI agent for years before retiring to open his own private-investigation agency. One phone call was all it would take and within a week or so, he would know all about Tori.

Then, with whatever information Sean Hartwell was able to gather on her, he could decide if he wanted to try to make the marriage work or have it annulled and resume his search for a suitable wife.

As Tori walked toward the house, she chastised herself for her slipups. Since the FBI had confiscated her laptop, she’d had to make a special trip to the library to do extensive research on the Western way of life and the terminology used on a ranch. Calling a herd of cattle “cows” was the kind of mistake she couldn’t afford to make again. Otherwise, Eli would realize she was a fraud and send her back to Charlotte faster than she could blink.

Glancing up at the Welcome to Our Home sign beside the back door, she sighed. It reminded her that she no longer had a home to go back to. Her father was dead, his business no longer existed and her so-called friends had abandoned her at the first sign of the scandal. If that hadn’t been enough to convince her to change her name and relocate, the death threats from some of her father’s former clients had. Even though she hadn’t been involved in any of his illegal practices, her last name alone had been enough to incite hatred in people who didn’t know her.

Then there was the matter of supporting herself. Her name was a huge strike against her, of course. But the fact that she had worked at her father’s agency kept anyone in the banking-and-investments industry from considering her for a job, even though she had actually been instrumental in bringing down his house of cards.

With exactly four hundred and seventy-two dollars between herself and living in a cardboard box beneath a bridge, not to mention the chilling threats to her life, she’d had no other choice. She hadn’t wanted to tell Eli so many fibs, but when she stumbled across his online ad while searching for an area of the country that might be safe, she had not only been intrigued, she had been desperate. Even her condo and car, which had been owned by the Bardwell Investments Agency, were about to be confiscated by the authorities to be sold in order to help with the reimbursement of her father’s clients. Within a few weeks, she would have been homeless and with no means of transportation to go elsewhere.

Opening the door, she walked into a small mudroom and looked around. A built-in log bench had been constructed along one wall with cubbyholes beneath for boots and shoes. When she glanced at the opposite wall, she had to smile at the use of horseshoes turned sideways and attached to the wall to create hooks for coats and jackets. It was unlike anything she had seen in Charlotte and was perfect for a rustic Western ranch house.

Slipping off her coat, she hung it on one of the horseshoe hooks and opened the door leading into the kitchen. It amazed her how vastly different decorating preferences were in different areas of the country. Having been raised in a world of elegant antebellum mansions, elaborate cotillions and formal garden parties, she was fascinated by the rustic, down-to-earth preferences of residents of the western states. Nothing seemed to go to waste and, considering how frugal she’d had to become in the past few months, that appealed to her.

“You must be Eli’s new bride.”

Lost in thought, the sound of the man’s voice caused her to jump. She looked over to find an older gentleman standing at the stove, stirring a huge pot of something that smelled absolutely wonderful. “Yes, I’m Tori, and you must be Buck.”

“Guilty as charged,” he said, nodding. “Eli gettin’ your things?”

“Yes.” She smiled. “Is there anything I can do to help you finish up dinner?”

“Around here we call it supper,” Buck corrected. “But if you’re of a mind to, you could set the table.”

“I’d be happy to do that.” When he pointed to the cabinet where the plates were kept, she asked, “How many places should I set? Three?”

Buck nodded. “Sally Ann feeds the hired hands down at the bunkhouse.”

While Tori set the table, she admired the rustic beauty of the kitchen. The wagon-wheel chandelier hanging over the big round oak table and the plank floor worn smooth over the years made her feel as if she had been transported back to the Old West. As she continued to look around, she marveled at how the river-rock wall behind the stainless-steel stove and the gray-marble countertops complemented the oak cabinets and natural log walls. She wouldn’t have thought the use of nature’s elements would create such a warm and cozy atmosphere, but that was the only way she could think to describe the welcome feeling of the spacious room.

“I’ll take these upstairs and put them with the rest of your things,” Eli said when he brought her luggage in from the truck.

“I meant to ask if my other things had arrived,” she said, smiling. “But the day has been such a blur of activity, I didn’t even think of it.”

He nodded. “I picked up the boxes at the freight company last week when I went down to Eagle Fork to talk to the attorney about our agreement and make arrangements for your arrival.”

A couple of weeks ago, she had shipped most of her clothes and the few mementos the authorities allowed her to keep when her father’s mansion and possessions were auctioned off. It was disheartening to think that her entire life could be reduced to a few shipping crates and a couple of suitcases. But that was the sad truth of the matter.