His Holiday Bride

“I intend to.” For a change. First it had been calving and foaling season, then it had been harvest and hay. “The last time I had a free night in town it was February.”

“The life of a rancher. Why exactly did you want to do this for a living?”

“No idea. Must have been out of my mind.” She found her truck keys in a drawer, wished Rori a good night and flew out the door.

“Whoa there, little lady.” Her dad, Frank Granger, caught her before she charged into him. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

“It’s my night off, remember?”

“I didn’t know you were allowed one of those.” He chuckled. That was her dad, Mr. Humor.

“Ha, ha. I won’t be out too late, but don’t wait up.” She danced around him, skipping down the porch steps, two at a time.

“You’ve got a four-thirty wake-up call, girl.”

“I know!” As if she could forget. She’d been waking up that early as long as she could remember. Really. Dad must think he was hilarious. She could be a comedian, too. “Hey, guess who I’m giving a riding lesson to on Saturday?”

“Uh, are you still doing that?” Frank swept off his Stetson. Something passed across his rugged face that looked a lot like interest.

Yeah, that’s just what she’d thought. She kept going, running backwards. “Cady Winslow. The nice lady new to town who bought one of my horses? You remember her, right?”

“I suppose.” He cast his gaze down, as if looking at some trouble with one of the porch boards.

Good way to hide his interest, but she wasn’t fooled. She tripped along the concrete path. “You could drop by the arena tomorrow if you want. Hang around. Offer some advice.”

“I’m sure you’ve got it covered.” A faint blush crept high on his face. “Have a good time tonight, darlin’.”

“Sure.” That was the problem with men in this family. They didn’t give much away. They acted as if real feelings were something to be wrestled down and extinguished.

“Autumn, you know we’ve got an early morning tomorrow.” Her older brother Justin called out as he slipped between the fence boards. “Don’t be too late.”

“Late is the story of my life.” The dinner bell on the back porch clanged, signaling the time as she hauled open the garage door. Six o’clock. Late, late, late. Her friends were used to it. She’d been leaving them to order for her for years.

She jammed the key into the ignition, turned over the engine and took the driveway as fast as she dared. Gravel crunched beneath the tires and dust rose up in her back trail, blocking all views of the pretty two-story ranch house tucked between the orchard and a copse of aspen.

The second she hit the county road, images of the new sheriff dogged her. His wide-shouldered stance. The dimples bracketing his grin. Confidence beaming from him like the sun from above. Gorgeous. She was a total softy when it came to a man with dimples and big baby blues. A sign she couldn’t give this man an inch. She gave the truck a little more juice, ignored the posted speed limit by a few miles per hour and kept an eye out for wildlife and livestock.

The trick was to keep the to-die-for new sheriff out of her mind. She glanced at the dashboard clock—eight minutes after six. Yikes. A hawk swooped low in the road in front of the truck. She hit the brakes to miss it. The creature sailed away, and in that unguarded moment her thoughts returned to Ford Sherman. She would never forget the look on his face when he realized the cows were destroying his Jeep. That’s something you don’t get in a Western movie, she thought.

If only she could have witnessed the look on his face when he saw his remodeled barn. That would have been priceless. No doubt he was mighty relieved to discover he had indoor plumbing and not a single barnyard animal sharing his living quarters.

The radio blared, and Christian country songs accompanied her all the way to town. She skidded into a spot in front of the diner, leaped out of her truck and hit the ground running. After she popped through the front door and glanced at the clock behind the till, she wanted to pump her fist in the air. She’d shaved two minutes off her drive time.

“There she is.” Merritt waved from a booth halfway down the long stretch of front window. “I can’t believe my eyes. She’s here almost on time.”

“Before we had to order for her.” Caroline twisted around to wave, too. “Glad you could make it. We figured you got held up on the ranch.”

“Broken fence line, escaped cattle, met the new sheriff. I didn’t think I would make it, but Scotty offered to take care of Aggie for me.” Bless their best hired man. She dropped into the booth beside Caroline. “Otherwise, I’d still be in the stables. How have you been?”

“Let’s go back to the part about you meeting the new sheriff.” Merritt flipped a lock of brown hair over her shoulder and leaned one elbow on the table. “So, spill. Is he young or old?”

“Cute or ugly?” Caroline took a sip of soda.

“He’s somewhere in this thirties.” She grabbed the laminated menu and flipped it open. “Not too ugly, I guess.”

“Well, he at least sounds promising—” Merritt fell silent, her sentence unfinished. Her eyes rounded.

A battered roll of duct tape landed on the edge of the table, held in place by a sun-browned hand. The hand was attached to a muscled arm, and she didn’t have to look farther to know who belonged to that arm. Ford Sherman.

“Not too ugly?” His baritone warmed with amusement.

Okay, not the most comfortable situation she’d ever been in. Good going, Autumn. She squirmed on the vinyl bench seat, wishing she could disappear beneath the table, spontaneously combust, anything to escape the embarrassment. She’d wanted to hide her interest in him, that was all. What she needed was a snappy comeback. “What do you think, girls? We have certainly seen worse in these parts.”

Not a snappy comeback, but the best she could do under the circumstances.

“Worse?” Ford’s gaze latched onto hers, an intense, uncomfortable probing that only made his dimples deepen. “You think because I’m from the city I can’t measure up?”

“No, I was talking solely about your appearance.”

“Good to know.” Judging by the twinkle in the sheriff’s knowing eyes, he wasn’t offended.

“Did the tape help? Or is your side mirror still dangling in the wind?”

“It is fixed for now.” He released his hold on the roll and stepped back, giving her the once-over. He’d thought her magnificent on her horse with the sun at her back, framed by a perfect blue sky. But without her Stetson, her strawberry-blond hair tumbled around her face and shoulders in a soft cascade. Her features were scrubbed clean, her complexion perfect. She was girl-next-door wholesome in an ivory sweater and jeans. He liked this side of her, too. “You clean up nice, Miss Granger. Very nice. I almost didn’t recognize you without your .45.”

“I only wear it when I’m working. Usually there’s no need to scare off varmints in the diner.”

“I hope you’re not hinting that I’m a varmint.”

“Who, me?”

He liked her sense of humor, too. Out of the corner of his vision, he spied the waitress setting his burger and fries on the corner table in the back. “I’m keeping my eye on you, Miss Granger. Something tells me you are trouble waiting to happen.”

“Me, trouble?”

The young women at the table began to laugh. “It’s true,” the black-haired woman said. “Disaster finds you, Autumn.”

“Trouble has always been her middle name,” the brown-haired one agreed merrily.

“I’m not that bad.” Autumn had a cute gleam in her eye.

He lifted his hand in farewell, reluctant to turn around and walk away, but he didn’t want to keep blocking the aisle. He couldn’t explain the spark of interest in her or the weighing disappointment as he turned on his heel and left her behind.

“He’s not ugly,” Merritt whispered over ice cream sundaes. “I’ve thought about it all through the meal, and I can’t see it. You don’t think he’s gorgeous?”

This was not what she wanted to discuss, thanks. Autumn took a big bite of syrup-covered ice cream, knowing full well the sting of brain pain was coming. But did she care?

No. Bring on the agony. It was better than having to admit the truth to her friends.

“He’s a hunk.” Caroline licked the syrup off her spoon.

“A hunky hunk.”

“Fine. So he’s gorgeous.” She rubbed her forehead—ow—and kept her voice low. No way was she going to take the risk that their conversation might carry across the noisy Friday night crowd to Ford Sherman’s no doubt supersensitive ears. Everything about him looked superior, why not his hearing?

“Then he’s all yours.” Caroline plunged her spoon into her butterscotch sundae. “I think he likes you.”

“Why do you say that?” He couldn’t like her. He didn’t know her.

“Because he keeps stealing glances this way, and he’s not looking at me.” Caroline stirred her sundae around. “That’s it, I’m stuffed.”

“Me, too.” Merritt gave up on her dessert with a sigh.

Autumn scraped the bottom of the glass bowl with her spoon and licked the last drop of fudge. After divvying up the check, leaving a pile of bills and change on the table, they filed out of the booth and down the aisle. It took all her willpower not to glance over her shoulder. She didn’t have to look to know Ford was watching her. The force of his gaze settled on her back like a dead weight. Best to ignore it.

The crisp evening air greeted her as she ambled along the sidewalk. A motorcycle rumbled down the road, the only traffic on the street. A dog barked somewhere on the residential blocks behind the diner. The nape of her neck tingled. Was the sheriff tracking her as she passed in front of the window?

“Something’s wrong with your truck.” Caroline noticed it as she set her purse on the hood of her car. “Your tire is flat.”

“All of them are.” Merritt squinted at the damage.

“What?” She’d been so busy wondering about Ford that she hadn’t noticed her truck. Deflated rounds of rubber sagged tiredly against the pavement, all the air gone. She’d never seen such flat tires. Had she run over something in the road? She knelt to get a good look, and her heart slammed to a stop. A neat cut sliced the upper curve of the front tire.

A slice, not a nail or a screw or anything like that. Someone had done this on purpose. Judging by the size of the gash, whoever had done this must have used a bowie knife.

“It’s the same back here.” Merritt had spotted the slit in the back tire. “Who would do something like this? We were close by the whole time.”

“I should have seen it from my seat.” Should have, yes. Why hadn’t she? Because she spent the whole meal fixated on the new sheriff and trying not to be, there had been little attention left over to notice anything other than her friends. What had happened to her decision not to think about him?

“We are currently sheriff-less, right?” Caroline shrugged, glancing down the road to the closed up sheriff’s office. “The old guy is gone, and the hunky one isn’t officially at work yet. So do we bother him? Who do we call?”

“No idea. I need Loren and his wrecker.” Shock pulsed through her in little beats. Lord, I know You’re in charge but who would have done such a thing? And why? She swallowed, pulling her thoughts together. She needed a working truck. Loren had the only tow truck in thirty-five miles. “Here’s hoping he has the right tires in stock.”

“I can give you a lift home,” Merritt spoke up.

“Thanks.” She couldn’t stop staring at the knife slit. Wild Horse was a small town and a friendly one. There wasn’t a whole lot of crime. Few people in these parts would disable a ranch truck. She couldn’t think of a single person who would.

“Is there a problem, ladies?” Ford ambled out of the diner.

“A small one.” Of course, it would have to be him.

“Let me take a look.” He eased down next to her, squinting hard at the knife slash. “Looks like you’ve got trouble here. Is there anything you want to tell me about?”

“Like what?”

“Crazy ex-boyfriend, a long-standing feud, someone who has a grudge against you?”

“Not for a long time, no, and not that I know of.” She swiped a lock of red-gold hair out of her eyes. “This is deliberate. No one else’s tires are slashed.”

“I noticed.” Considering every car on the street was clustered around the diner, it was obvious. He knelt down to take a closer look at the angry gash in the rubber. Someone sure didn’t like Autumn. “Anything unusual happen lately?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary, except for meeting you.”

Was that a hint of a grin on her lips? He wasn’t prepared for the sight of Autumn smiling. He was a professional, even if he wasn’t on the clock yet. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to have unprofessional thoughts about her centering on conversation with candlelight and a nice steak. She’d turned him down once, but she hadn’t sounded one hundred percent final. There had been a glimmer in her eyes.

“I didn’t do this, as you know. I also have an alibi.” He slipped the paperback he carried into his rear pocket. “I was in the thick of Larry McMurtry. But I’ll find out who did.”

“If someone saw something, they would have said so. This isn’t a big city. People don’t look the other way here.” Her gaze met his, and the force of it was like the sun and moon colliding. Hard to think straight when such a pretty woman was waiting for an intelligent remark. It was even harder to pretend he was stone-cold granite, professional and unaffected.

“Hey, you! What’s going on over there?” someone called out. A shadow fell across him. Ford looked up to see an elderly man with his wife at his side hurrying along the sidewalk. Fearless, the gray-haired stranger shook his finger angrily. “What are you doing to that truck? Get away—oh, howdy, Autumn. I didn’t see you there.”

“Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Plum.” Autumn’s smile of welcome was one of greeting for old friends. She rose, the tires forgotten. “This is our new sheriff. He’s your neighbor, too.”

“Howdy.” Ford climbed to his feet.

“Oh. Mighty fine to meet you, sir.” The older man had a powerful stance, a direct gaze and a firm handshake. “Velma and I thought we saw someone at Miller’s rental place, but we didn’t look too close. It could have been the Realtor.”

“Martha’s been in and out now and again showing the place. Didn’t know it was let.” Velma Plum patted his hand in a motherly welcome. “If I’d known, I would have had an apple crisp ready for you. I’d best get crackin’. Hal, remind me when we get home. You know how I am—”

“Always stopping to chat with everyone. Always talking away and losing track of everything else.” Hal winked, as if he didn’t mind at all. When he gazed at his wife, it was with great, accepting love. “Look, there’s Betty. See what I mean?”

“I see.” Ford watched a woman in her fifties greet Velma with a hug. Both of the women fell to talking.

“Need a hand there, young fella?” Hal asked.

“What I need is information. You wouldn’t have noticed anyone slinking around this truck, would you?”

“Besides you?” Hal quipped.

Autumn’s amusement hit him like a wind gust. He could feel her holding back laughter. More folks came out of the diner to congregate on the sidewalk, already discussing the slashed tires.

Looked like she was right. Apparently, little went unnoticed in a small town.

Chapter Three

“Autumn!”

Somewhere far away in the dark she heard her name, but it wasn’t powerful enough to yank her out of her dream. Her bed was warm and her electric blanket cozy, and in her mind she was at the diner running her spoon through the hot fudge and trying not to feel a pull in Ford’s direction.

Keep your attention on the ice cream, she told herself. Ice cream is better for you, calories and all, than he is. Dudes are nothing but heartache.

“Autumn!” A full-fisted pounding rattled her bedroom door. “Wake up!”

“Dad?” The dream evaporated and she sat up. Her pillow tumbled to the floor, she kicked off her covers and rubbed her eyes. Cool air enveloped her. The numbers on the clock shone blurrily in the ink-dark room. She squinted, bringing them into focus. Two-forty-three. What was going on?

Then she heard it: a faint, rhythmic, rapid-fire sputtering. A helicopter.

“We got trouble,” Dad shouted, moving on down the hall to pound on Cheyenne’s door. “Up and at ’em!”

Rustlers. Her feet hit the floor and she grabbed her clothes from last night, pulling them on as she went. By the time she threw open her door, she was only missing shoes. She’d grab her boots on her way through the mudroom.

In the hall up ahead, Dad hammered on the last door—Addison’s—before racing downstairs. She jammed her bare feet into her riding boots and grabbed her cell from her purse.

“Here.” Frank handed her a rifle and a box of cartridges. His phone rang and he answered it, grabbing a second rifle. “I just put a call in to the sheriff and the county. They said they’d be here in ten to twenty. They’ve got the only chopper aound, and it will take a while to get in the air.”

Rifle in hand, she flew out the door and into the night. Surrounded by darkness and shadows, she ignored the nearby cow mooing plaintively, wondering what was going on, and hit the ground running. She ate up distance, whistling for Aggie. The whop-whop grew louder. She could see the faint flash of a helicopter’s safety lights above the far hillside’s crest before the vehicle nosed down to make another pass. No doubt it was rounding up their animals and scaring them into a hard run. She prayed the Lord was watching over the livestock.

Aggie nickered, hooves pounding the dirt as she skidded to a stop. No time to bridle up. Autumn ripped open the gate, caught Aggie by a handful of mane and leaped. She landed on her mare’s back as the horse broke into a hard gallop. They rode in sync, bulleting up the gravel road that stretched from the house to the long row of barns, stables and outbuildings.

Dad was behind her, calling for Rogue. His cutting horse answered with an anxious whinny. In the shadows, she caught sight of her sisters dashing full speed from the house. She searched the darkness ahead. Where was Justin? Best guess, he was headed for the rustlers.

She wheeled Aggie toward the hillside, leaning low and urging the mare into a hard canter. She heard an engine flare to life, and a headlight pierced the darkness. Justin. Halfway up the hill, her dad on Rogue passed her. No time to say anything, but she knew her father’s plan. She gripped the gun tightly in her right hand and prayed she wouldn’t have to use it.

The helicopter wheeled around to make another pass, and gunfire flashed from the loading door. Bullets zinged through the air, biting into rock and earth and kicking up dust all around them. Aggie didn’t startle but put her head down with determination, her hooves eating up ground.

Up ahead, both Dad on horseback and Justin on the ATV ground to a halt. Her dad was fast, sighting and firing first. Must have been a hit, because the rustler’s semiautomatic fired in a fast burst, bullets licking haphazardly along the hillside away from them before falling silent. The helicopter went nose up and ate distance.

“They’re not done with us yet,” Frank shouted. “You girls split up. Addison and Cheyenne, go with Justin along the section line.”

“I’m with you, Dad.” She signaled Aggie around to the field gate and unlatched it, backing the horse to swing it wide. “You didn’t take a bullet this time, did you?”

“No. Don’t you worry about me, missy.” He flashed a grin as he raced past her. “You stay behind me, you hear?”

That was her dad, always taking the lead, fearless, although years ago he’d taken two bullets to the chest chasing off rustlers. If the county’s helicopter hadn’t been on site and flown him straight to the hospital at Jackson, they would have lost him.

Please keep protecting him, she prayed, clinging to Aggie as the horse lunged up the dark, treacherous slope. Rocks rolled, earth shifted and Aggie lost her footing. For one terrible second Autumn felt them tumbling backwards. She leaned forward, resisting the instinct to dismount, and stuck with her horse.

Aggie pawed her way back onto the trail and surged forward until they were on solid ground again. Grateful, Autumn wiped grit from her face, ignored the adrenaline spiking through her system and focused on following her dad along the ridge. The helicopter, farther away now, made one low sweep. Another shot rang out in their direction. Before she could hit the safety and lift her rifle, bullets whizzed by and dirt and rock flew. Something hit her in the leg—a slight sting. A rock sliver. Her dad got off another shot before the helicopter wheeled low and began to smoke.

“Got ’em.” He sounded grim. “Trouble is, I think they got me, too.”

It was strange to be woken out of a sound sleep by the dispatch operator and to hear the words, “Cattle rustlers.” Ford felt like he was sleepwalking through an old cowboy movie as he jumped into clothes and his Jeep. Lights flashing, he barreled through the sleeping town and along the rolling countryside, startling owls and coyotes as he broke speed barriers following directions to a ranch off Mustang Lane.

Good thing he knew where Mustang Lane was. That brought up images of the pretty red-haired cowgirl he’d taken a shine to—now he was thinking like an old Western. Made it seem even more like a dream until he spotted the address he was looking for on a big black mailbox and the last name spelled out in silver reflective letters. Granger.

Autumn’s ranch. Fear gripped his gut as he gunned it, taking the gravel drive at a fast clip. It wove between a shadowed copse of trees and up a rise. Up ahead a two-story house perched, windows glowing like a beacon in the night. He followed the driveway to the side of the house and a detached garage with six doors. He hit the brakes, launched out of his seat and followed the porch light to the back of the house.

The door flew open before he reached the porch and a younger version of Autumn with serious blue eyes and red-brown hair stepped out to greet him. The college-aged girl had a streak of blood on her pajama top.

“Autumn?” He choked out, unable to ask the question. The fear in his gut cinched tight.

“You’re the sheriff? You made good time from town.” The girl spun on her heels, gestured to him and led the way toward the brightly lit back door. “Justin and my sister are out there, and they haven’t come back.”

His knees felt half-jelly as he forced his feet to carry him up the walk. Usually he was invincible, but the thought of Autumn out there facing armed thieves made him weak. He glanced around. Nothing but miles of rangeland and cattle. The paramedics were volunteers from town who were at least twenty minutes away. And a hospital? He had no idea where the closest trauma center would be.

This was a sign. He cared more about Autumn than he’d realized. He stumbled up the steps, across the porch and into the bright lights of a spacious kitchen.

“You must be Ford Sherman.” A brawny man in his early fifties sat at a round oak table with his chair pushed back, T-shirt sleeve rolled up and fresh sutures exposed. He stood and extended his good hand. “Glad to meet you. I’m Frank Granger.”

“Looks like you’ve been better.” They shook. He’d seen a wound like that before. “You took a bullet.”

“Flesh wound, mostly.” Granger didn’t look troubled by it.

“Dad, sit down.” Another red-haired young woman pointed to the chair and scowled at him. “You’ve been shot.”

“Yeah, but it’s not bad.”

“I don’t care. You’re going to sit down and stay down.” This daughter, who looked to be somewhere in her mid-twenties, dabbed a swab along tidy stitches, her stern tone at odds with the affection on her face. “You could have been killed.”

“Nothing vital got hit.”

“You still could have slipped off your horse, rolled down the ridge and died, so you will stay in this chair or I’ll rope you into it.” She dropped the swab into a wastebasket and reached for a sealed package of gauze. “I’m almost as good as Autumn when it comes to calf roping, so don’t tempt me.”