His Perfect Bride: Hired by the Cowboy / Wedding Bells at Wandering Creek / Coming Home to the Cattleman

When the strain evaporated from her face like magic, he knew he’d done the right thing.

“I think that is a very sensible approach,” she responded. Her eyes cleared of worry and she treated him to another one of her genuine smiles.

“I certainly don’t want to chain you to the place if you’re going to be miserable for the next…how many months? I thought this might be a way to test the waters.”

“Four months,” she replied thinly. Chained to the place? The place wasn’t worrying her half as much as being chained to him. And it would likely be more than four months. Once the baby came she’d need some time to recover; to figure out what to do next.

Suddenly her eyes narrowed. “How long a trial period?” She knew he was operating on a timeline, and a short one, and she didn’t want to feel pressed to make this decision in the first forty-eight hours, or some silly thing.

“I don’t know. No longer than a week.”

Her breath came out in a rush, but her words came out cautiously. “OK. A week I can do.”

“In that case, let’s get going.”

She lifted her backpack as he spoke, surprised when his hands took the weight from her. Her shoulder tingled where his fingers touched.

She’d forgotten his penchant for chivalry, which was surprising, since he was constantly polite. It was hard to get used to that in a man. Simply not what she’d been used to.

“Thank you.”

“Where’s the rest?”

She looked at her toes. “That is the rest.”

“This is all you’ve got?” He halted by the door of the truck, his fingers on the handle. “No suitcase?”

“This is it,” she said firmly. She would not, could not, get into a discussion of why her life was packed into a solitary bag. Someday she’d settle, find something permanent. Then she’d make the home for herself that she longed for.

Wordlessly he opened the door, helped her in, and put the pack behind her seat. Nerves bubbled up in her stomach. What on earth was she doing? This was crazy. Insane. She knew next to nothing about him.

He got up into the cab beside her and started the engine as she fastened her seatbelt. At least she’d had the foresight to do a bit of checking on him of her own. Saturday she’d hit the library and the computers there, looking up information on the man and his ranch.

Surprisingly, there’d been several hits to her query, and she had read with fascination articles regarding Connor and, more interestingly, his family. His father had been prominent in the beef industry, and under his hand the farm had flourished. The Madsen ranch had been around for over a hundred years. Now she understood why Connor was determined to make it through this crisis.

One hit had turned up a recent “spotlight” on Connor—he had done an interview on innovative breeding. His picture had come up beside the print, and she’d stared at it. He sure didn’t look like some creep, despite the oddness of his proposal. He was twenty-nine, sexy as the day was long, and apparently smart and well respected. Her eyes darted to the imposing figure beside her, concentrating on the road.

She wished she’d found something more personal—a vital statistics sort of thing. Where was his family now? He’d only mentioned his grandmother. What were his interests, his quirks?

The only way she could find out that information was to talk to the man himself. She wasn’t at all sure she could marry him, even if it were only a legality. She’d be stuck with him for the next several months. There was her baby to consider. She had to do what was right by her child.

Her hand drifted to her tummy as a current country hit came on the radio and Connor exited on to the highway. It was too early for her to feel the baby’s movement, but already her shape was changing and her waist was thickening. It was her child in there. She hadn’t planned on having children for years yet, and certainly not alone. But she was attached to this life growing inside her, knew that no matter what she wanted to be a good mother. How could she do that if she couldn’t even afford a place for them to live?

Alex stared out the window at the city passing by in a blur. A trial run was her best option right now. At least it left her a way to get out.

The lane was long and straight, unpaved, leading to an ordinary two-story house in white siding with blue shutters.

Alex stared at it, not sure what to think. She looked out both windows…there weren’t even any neighbors. No, wait. There. On that distant knoll to the southeast there was a speck that might have been a house. The land surrounding them was green and brown, spattered sparsely with trees. Basically empty. Isolated.

Beyond the house were outbuildings of various sizes. Alex, city girl, had no idea what they were used for beyond the basic “looking after cattle” umbrella. Another pickup sat in front of a white barn. To the side were tractors. Not the small, hayride sort of tractor she had been used to growing up in southern Ontario. But gargantuan monsters painted green and yellow. The kind she’d need a stepladder to get into.

Connor pulled up in front of the house and shut off the engine. “Here we are,” he said into the breach of silence.

“It’s huge,” she answered, opening the door and hopping down. “The sky…it seems endless.”

“Until you look over there.” He grinned at her, came to stand beside her and pointed west. Her eyes followed his finger and she gasped.

She had focused so hard on the house that she’d completely missed the view. It spread before her now, long and gray, a jagged expanse of Rocky Mountains that took her breath away. They were a long way away, yet close enough that she saw the varied shades, dark in the dips and bowls, lighter at the peaks, tipped with snow even in early June.

“That’s stunning.” Stunning didn’t cover it. Something in the mountains simply called to her, touched her deeply. Made her feel alive and strong.

“They keep me from feeling lonely,” Connor murmured, and she realized how close he was to her ear. There was something in his tone that touched her. All this space…and he lived here alone. Something about him in that moment made her realize that he had a gap in his life, an emptiness he wanted to fill.

She wondered what had put it there, but was in no position to ask. And she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know the answer either. She sure didn’t want him to delve into her past, so she said nothing.

“Why don’t you show me the inside?” She changed the subject, pulling her eyes from the scenery and adopting a more practical air.

He grabbed her bag from the truck and led the way inside. She took off her sneakers, placing them beside his boots on the mat in the entry, and followed him past a living room and a stairway to a large, homey kitchen.

“You hungry? We should have some lunch.” He put her bag on an old wooden rocker and turned to face her. His jaw seemed taut with tension, and she realized that he was finding this as odd and uncomfortable as she was. Now, here, in his house, it became ever more clear that they were practically strangers.

“I could use a sandwich or something.”

He took meat and cheese out of the fridge, condiments, and grabbed a loaf of bread from a wooden breadbox on the countertop. “I don’t know what you like,” he offered apologetically. “So we can fix our own, I guess.” Silence fell, and to break it Connor began stacking meat and slices of cheese on his bread. He reached for a bottle of mustard, looked up, and saw an odd expression on Alex’s face.

“Are you OK?” His hand halted, poised above his sandwich.

“It’s the mustard. I’ll be fine.” She swallowed visibly.

He stared at her, his mouth gaping open with some sort of fresh horror, and a drop of bright yellow landed on his corned beef. He looked down, his expression horrified at the offending blot, wondering if it was enough to make her ill. God, he hoped not!

Connor heard her snort and looked up, confused. Her hand was over her mouth and she was trying futilely not to laugh. Before he knew it, he was laughing too.

“Oh, the look on your face,” she gasped. “Pregnancy does make cowards out of men!”

Putting the mustard bottle down on the cupboard, he chuckled while she caught her breath. “Do you feel as awkward as I do?” he asked.

“Incredibly.”

The laugh had done much to dissolve the polite tension that had risen between them. “I don’t want you to feel out of place here. I want you to feel at home.”

“I want that too.”

“You’ll find I’m easy to please, Alex.” He smiled easily as he said it, but her cheeks colored. When he realized she’d taken what he’d said a little too literally, his smile faltered as they stared into each other’s eyes. He became aware of the way her breasts rose and fell beneath her T-shirt. She was still breathless from laughing.

“I don’t need much,” she murmured. “A place to sleep and some good food. I want to try to help out in any way I can. I’m not used to being idle.”

“Farm work isn’t for you.”

Her mouth thinned. “I’m not going to break, Connor. Women have been having babies for thousands of years.”

“I realize that.” His eyes didn’t relent. “But you’re not doing heavy farm work. There’s a garden behind the house if you like the outdoors. I don’t want you to be bored, Alex, but I don’t expect you to be some indentured servant either. Honestly, if I didn’t have to cook at the end of the day it would be a gift from heaven.”

Choices. Time that was her own, to do as she wished—making dinner or tending the tiny plants of the garden in the fresh air and sunshine. The freedom to clean, do laundry, on her own time.

Perhaps that sounded mundane and tedious, but to Alex it seemed wonderful. Growing up, she’d always envied her school chums whose moms had baked cookies for class parties, or who had invited her over for home-cooked meals. Not to be unfair, her parents had been great, but their lifestyle hadn’t exactly been traditional. It would be almost perfect. If only…

If only it weren’t such a sham.

Still, if he were willing to go through with it, the least she could do was carry her own weight.

“I’ll be honest, I haven’t had much experience in the whole domestic arena…” she waved a hand “…but I’m a fast learner.” She went to the counter and began making her own sandwich of turkey and cheese. She took one look at the tomatoes and passed on to the nice, friendly lettuce, eschewed mayo and went for the pepper.

“All right, then. I’m going to take this with me.” He gestured with the thick sandwich in his hand. “I wish I could stay and help you get settled. But I’ve got a couple of calves that need tending, and if the hands didn’t have any luck this morning I’m going to have to call the vet. Will you be OK?”

He looked so apologetic that she couldn’t be mad. After all, the whole reason she was here was because this place meant everything to him. She couldn’t expect him to forget that and play host for the afternoon.

“I’ll be fine. I can explore on my own. Go.” She smiled and shooed him with a hand. “If you stayed in you’d just worry about it, wouldn’t you?”

He looked relieved that she’d let him off the hook. “Yes, I would. I’m glad you understand. I want you to know…” His feet shifted a little as he admitted, “I’m happy you decided to try this out. I’m going to make sure you don’t regret it, Alex.”

She got the sinking feeling that she was going to regret it, deeply. Because when he was kind, when he was considerate, she knew she couldn’t stay immune.

She followed him back to the door, watched as he shoved his feet in his boots, pulling up the heel with one hand.

“Your room is at the top of the stairs. Turn right and it’s the first door. There’s a white spread on the bed.”

“I’m a big girl. I’ll manage.”

“I’ll be back in around six.”

At this point she started to laugh. “Connor. Seriously. Go do what you have to do.”

He offered her a grateful parting smile, but then he was gone and the house was empty and quiet without him.

Alex went back to the kitchen and finished her sandwich, washing it down with a glass of milk. The morning sickness was starting to pass now and, still hungry, she snooped through the pantry and found a bag of oatmeal cookies. She grabbed two, then put her backpack over her shoulder and went to explore.

At the top of the stairs she turned right, but she was immediately faced with two doors. Did he mean the first one at the end or the first one right in front of her? She chose the latter and, turning the knob, stepped into what had to be Connor’s room.

The spread wasn’t white, it was brown with geometric shapes dashed across it in tan and sienna. He’d made it that morning, but there was a spot on the edge, just about in the middle, that looked like perhaps he’d sat there while getting dressed. The air held a slight odor of leather and men’s toiletries, mingled with the fresh scent of fabric softener. She put down her bag and went over to the chest of drawers. On the top was a bowl, containing some errant screws and pins and what looked like a screwdriver bit, probably removed from his pants before they went in the laundry. Beside the dish was a framed picture. In it she saw Connor, much younger, perhaps twenty or so, standing beside a boy with the same dark hair and mischievous eyes. They each had a hand on a shorter woman standing in front of them. The woman was slight, with black hair, and she was laughing. In her hands she held a gold trophy. Off to the right stood their father, tall and strong, his hand on the halter of a large black cow.

So he did have a family. A brother and two parents. And from the smiles they appeared happy. But where were they now?

She’d trespassed long enough. If Connor had wanted her to know about his family he would have told her. And he might tell her yet—once they knew each other better. But she wouldn’t pry. It was his business, his secret to reveal or to keep. She respected that—after all she had skeletons of her own. She backed away from the dresser and picked up her bag on the way out the door.

The next room was undoubtedly the one he’d meant. It was large, with a double dresser and mirror and a sturdy pine bed. The coverlet was white and lacy, lady’s bedding, and Alex wondered if it was a spare room or if it had belonged to his parents. She put her bag on a chair beside the nightstand. After the floors she’d slept on, the dingy rooms with nothing pretty to redeem them, this was too much. Too pretty, too feminine. Too perfect. She didn’t want to mar that pristine white duvet with whatever might be on the bottom of her bag. She took her clothes out and put them in the dresser. All she had only filled two drawers. A plastic bag held toiletries—soap, shampoo, toothbrush, deodorant. Those she took to the bathroom at the end of the hall and placed them on a wire rack that had one empty shelf. Other than that her bag only contained a journal and a pen and a picture. The picture she left in the bag, stowing the pack in the otherwise empty closet. The journal she tucked into the nightstand drawer, out of sight.

Going back downstairs, she decided then and there that if she were going to pull her weight at all she’d better get cracking. After all, it wasn’t fair if for the next six months her only contribution to this arrangement was signing on the dotted line and leaving Connor to do all the work. He was willing to support her, not only now but after the baby was born, if only she’d marry him first. It definitely made her feel guilty, knowing she got the easy part of the deal. The least she could do was make sure he had a good hot meal at the end of the day and a clean house to come home to. If he wouldn’t let her do any of the manual labor, she could at least look after things in the house.

Except she’d never done anything like it in her life. And now the fate of herself and her baby depended on her success.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE top of the fridge held nothing but extra bread and some frozen vegetables. He’s got to have meat around here somewhere, she thought, and searched high and low until she came across a huge Deepfreeze in the basement.

She took out a package that said “cross rib steak” and remembered going to her grandmother’s house when she had been a small child. Her grandmother had made this dish…Swiss steak…and it had been fork-tender, surrounded by onions and gravy, all layered on mashed potatoes. Surely there was a recipe book somewhere that would tell her how to make it?

She searched the kitchen for such a book, and came up with a small binder. The cover had a crudely drawn picture of an apple on it and the words Mom’s Recipes in black marker. Inside were pages of handwritten recipes, in no particular order. Maple Chicken was next to Dad’s Chocolate Cake. Bread and Butter Pickles next to Come and Get ‘Em Cookies. She sighed as the microwave dinged out a message that the meat was thawed. This was going to take forever.

She finally found a recipe that said “Smothered Meat” and thought it sounded about right. Retrieving a roasting pan from a low cupboard, she put in the meat and then added water, onions and bay leaves that she found above the stove in a motley assortment of spices. She turned on the oven and slid the roaster in…step one complete.

She could do this. She could. Just because she’d never learned to cook, it didn’t mean she couldn’t, she told herself. All you had to do was follow instructions. It couldn’t be that hard.

Potatoes didn’t take that long, so maybe she’d really live on the edge and attempt something for dessert. Jazzed up with motivation, she grabbed the red binder again and flipped through the pages, looking for one that sounded good. These were his mom’s recipes, probably the ones she made most often. She stopped at a page that looked like it had been handled often. Caramel Pudding. She read the recipe. Easy enough. Flour, egg, butter, milk, leavening, salt…brown sugar, boiling water. How hard could it be?

An hour later she slid the pan into the oven beside the meat and sighed. The instructions had sounded deceptively simple. However, they didn’t seem to translate into her hands. She looked at the countertops. They were strewn with flour and sticky batter and dirty dishes. The first order of business had to be cleaning up this disaster zone before she went any further.

She was halfway through the dishes when she remembered the meat needed tending, the sauce thickening.

The mess doubled. Again.

The next time she looked at the clock it said four-fifty-five. She was exhausted, and with a whole new appreciation of women who willingly did this every blessed day of their lives. She was certain now that she’d had the easy job—waitressing, instead of being in the kitchen!

It took her twenty minutes and two Bandaids to peel the potatoes, and she grumbled that she was really going to have to caution Connor on having his knives too sharp.

She found a glass casserole and emptied a bag of frozen corn into it, put it in the microwave and let her rip just as Connor was coming in the door.

“Hey,” he called from the front door. “How was your afternoon?”

I’d rather have been chased by the hounds of hell, she thought grumpily, but pasted on a smile and said, “Fine.”

He came into the kitchen and sniffed. “Do I smell caramel pudding?”

She smiled for real, the curve of her lips fading as she saw how weary and defeated he looked. “I found your mom’s old recipes.”

He came over to the stove, lifted the lid on the potatoes bubbling away. “It’s good to come in and not have to worry about supper. Thank you, Alex.”

Don’t thank me yet, she thought, none too sure of success. The pudding seemed oddly flat, and she hadn’t checked the steak yet. At least the potatoes seemed to be holding their own.

“Your afternoon didn’t go well?” she surmised quietly.

When he sank into a chair and ran his hand through his hair, she knew she’d guessed right.

“We lost one. The other’s touch and go.”

“I’m sorry,” she offered, her stomach suddenly churning with nervousness. He was expecting a great home-cooked meal after a rotten afternoon. He couldn’t know she’d never made anything that wasn’t out of a can or ready with one touch of a microwave button. She took the roaster out of the oven, and as the corn finished she drained the potatoes.

“Don’t be sorry. It happens. But you know, no matter how much you think you get used to it, you never do.”

She filled his plate with potatoes and a generous scoop of corn, then a large slice of steak from the roaster. The gravy was thinner than she’d expected, and seemed suspiciously lumpy, but she hoped for the best and ladled it over the top of his potatoes.

She fixed her own plate and sat down across from him. “I hope the other one makes it,” she offered as he picked up his fork. Only to pause with it still stuck between his lips.

“Is something wrong?”

Connor looked up at her hopeful eyes and made himself swallow. The corn was still cold in the middle. “No, no,” he reassured her, cutting into the steak. She looked so vulnerable, so eager to please, that he didn’t have the heart to tell her.

The meat was cooked and tender, but the gravy…something was off. It was too pale and runny. He bravely took a scoop of potatoes and gravy and found a ball of flour rolling on his tongue. He smiled up at her, but he could tell she knew by the crestfallen way her lips turned down and her cheeks fell.

“It’s horrible. Disgusting. You can’t eat this.”

“Sure I can. It’s definitely edible.”

Alex tried a bite with the gravy and made a face. “Eeeew. What did I do wrong?” She took a mouthful of corn and hurriedly spit it into her napkin. “And the corn is still frozen! Oh, I can’t do anything right!” she cried. “You put in a horrible afternoon and then come in to this!”

“You can do things right,” Connor said gently. He got up from his chair and took her plate. He put it in the microwave and heated it up more. “It’s not your fault that I had a tough day. And you worked hard to try to make me a nice dinner. That was a sweet thing to do, Alex.”

“Don’t patronize me. I don’t want to be sweet. I want to be helpful!” she burst out in frustration. “I’ve been on my own for five years and I’ve been outdone by a bag of frozen vegetables!”

He gave her back her plate, then heated his own. “The corn just needed more time.”

“But I followed the directions on the bag!” She stared morosely at the offending kernels, now piping hot. Cooking was the only thing he’d asked of her, and the meal was a disaster. It wasn’t a good way to start a trial period for marriage.

Connor couldn’t help but laugh. “It takes a bit longer when you cook a whole bag at a time.” The casserole was filled with enough of the vegetable for at least three more meals.

“And the gravy is revolting. But I followed the directions to the letter!”

“Where’s the gravy browning?”

“Browning?”

He had to turn his face away to hide a smile. That was why it was pale. She hadn’t used any browning. If he knew Mom’s recipe, it probably said to thicken the juices with flour and water. And the lumps…If she didn’t know how to make gravy, she wouldn’t know how to make it without clumps of flour in it either.

“Connor?”

“I’ll show you how to make gravy. It takes practice.”

Alex pushed her plate away. Other than the corn, the tasteless, flour-pitted gravy had ruined everything. How on earth could she carry her own weight when he had to teach her how to cook? Never had she felt so defeated.

She scooped the odd-looking pudding into two bowls. “Do you put ice cream on it?”

“I’m out, but milk’s just as good. Sit down. I’ll get it.”

He poured a little milk on the pudding and served it. He took a bite, sucked in his cheeks, and pushed the bowl away.

“I’m sorry, Alex.”

Tears sprang into her eyes. She had never felt such a complete failure. Well, if this wasn’t a whole new discovery. Alex, who always seemed to manage, to find a way, was completely hopeless in the kitchen. The one thing she could contribute in this whole arrangement and she was a culinary idiot.