In the Rancher's Arms

One



“Do you, Victoria Anderson, take Eli Laughlin to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health?”

Reverend Watkins droned on, but Victoria couldn’t have said whether the man recited the sacred words of the wedding vows or if he were trying to auction off a pile of manure. She was far too nervous to concentrate on anything but the ruggedly handsome, dark-haired stranger standing next to her—the very one whom she would pledge herself to within the next few seconds.

When the rotund little minister cleared his throat and gave her an expectant look, she swallowed the panic threatening to choke her. “I do,” she murmured, her voice surprisingly steady, considering the state of her nerves.

The good reverend turned to her almost-husband and repeated his question, but Victoria heard none of the words. Two short hours ago, Eli Laughlin had been nothing more than a few long-distance phone calls and a half dozen or so email messages. In fact, during the course of their brief acquaintance, they hadn’t even bothered to exchange pictures.

Not that it would have made a difference in her decision to marry him—it wouldn’t have. There just weren’t a lot of options for a down-on-her-luck heiress with less than five hundred dollars to her name and several death threats hanging over her head.

But she fervently wished they had at least discussed physical characteristics. It might have lessened her shock when Eli met her at the airport in Cheyenne. She wasn’t sure how she had expected him to look, but she knew beyond a shadow of doubt, nothing could have prepared her for the reality of the man she had traveled over eighteen hundred miles to marry.

Of course, if she hadn’t been so distracted by the hurried preparations and the urgent need to leave Charlotte, she might have taken a hint from the sound of his voice. She had always heard of someone having bedroom eyes, but Eli Laughlin had a bedroom voice. Smooth and deep, his voice could—as her nanny used to say—charm the bloomers off an old maid. The first time he had called to interview her, just the sound of it had caused goose bumps to shimmer up and down her arms and her pulse to flutter erratically. It stood to reason nature wouldn’t have bestowed that kind of voice on a scrawny little wimp.

Victoria glanced up at him from beneath her lashes—way up. When they had discussed their arrangement, she hadn’t given his size a second thought, hadn’t considered it would matter. She had been more concerned with convincing him that she met his list of qualifications, and listening to him outline his reasons for treating the marriage like a business agreement. But now?

The man was well over six feet tall, had the broadest shoulders she had ever seen and every time he moved, the most fascinating bulges pulled at the fabric of his chambray shirt. From her vantage point, he looked like a giant and a well muscled one at that.

Her gaze traveled to his face. Weren’t men who spent the majority of their time outdoors supposed to have skin like leather? The only wrinkles Eli had were the faint creases fanning the corners of his dark brown eyes and the laugh lines bracketing his mouth.

“I do.” The sound of him responding to the minister jolted her back to reality.

“By the power vested in me by the state of Wyoming, I pronounce you husband and wife,” Reverend Watkins said cheerfully. “Son, you may kiss your bride now.”

Surely Eli wasn’t going to kiss her, she thought as she stared up at her new husband. They had met in person only a few hours ago when he’d picked her up at the airport in Cheyenne. Her pulse sped up when he put his arms around her and started to lower his head.

A moment of panic seized her. What on earth had she gotten herself into?

But remembering the prenuptial agreement, especially the part outlining a one-month “get acquainted” phase, she began to relax a bit. The marriage would remain in name only unless both parties agreed to waive the clause and consummate the union before the end of the specified four weeks.

“Congratulations to both of you,” Blake Hartwell said, brushing Eli aside to hug her.

On the hour’s drive from the airport to his attorney’s office in Eagle Fork to sign the prenuptial agreement, Eli had explained that the wedding ceremony would take place at Blake’s grandmother’s house as soon as the document was signed. Eli and Blake had been best friends since they met in grade school. He and his grandmother, Jean Hartwell, would be their witnesses to the marriage.

As Blake wrapped her in a bear hug, she realized he was every bit as tall and muscular as her new husband. She briefly wondered if all the men in Wyoming were as large and intimidating as the two she had met thus far.

“Thank you,” Victoria murmured as he turned her loose to shake Eli’s hand.

Everything was happening so fast she felt overwhelmed by it all. Her first trip to Wyoming, the wedding and the fact that with a few quietly spoken words she had once again changed her surname were almost more than she could take in. It was surreal to think that in a little less than four months she had gone from being Victoria Bardwell to being Victoria Anderson and now Victoria Laughlin.

“Thanks for your help,” Eli said as she abandoned her disturbing thoughts in favor of watching the exchange between him and his friend. “I appreciate you and Grandma Jean standing up with us on such short notice.”

“Glad to do it,” Blake said, grinning.

“I wouldn’t have missed this for anything. It’s not every day one of my boys gets hitched,” Jean Hartwell said. Shouldering her grandson out of the way, she hugged Eli. “You treat this little girl right, you hear?” Turning to Victoria, she grinned. “You got a real good boy here. But if he does give you any trouble, just let me know. I’ll straighten him out in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.”

“I’ll remember that, Mrs. Hartwell,” Victoria said, smiling. She wondered what the Hartwells thought of her and Eli’s unorthodox marriage, but if they had any objections they kept their opinions to themselves. They had shown her nothing but kindness and made her feel as if their wedding was like any other marriage ceremony witnessed by close friends.

“You’re married to one of my boys now,” the woman said, kissing Victoria’s cheek. “Call me Grandma Jean.” Turning to the minister, she asked, “Would you like to join us for some refreshments, Preacher?”

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to stay, Jean,” the man said, smiling as he walked toward the front door. “I have to drive down to the hospital in Cheyenne to see a member of the congregation who came down with pneumonia.”

After seeing Reverend Watkins out, Blake’s grandmother motioned for them to follow her. “I’ve got a wedding cake and some of my best elderberry wine waiting for you two in the dining room. I know you’ll want to get on the road before too long, so we’d better get to celebrating.”

* * *

Eli watched his new wife follow Grandma Jean out of the room and wondered what the hell he had been thinking when he chose Victoria Anderson to be his wife. She wasn’t anything like the woman he had been looking for when he placed his advertisement on the Hitching Post website. He had been looking for a woman who could help out with ranch work and eventually bear him a son to carry on the legacy of the Rusty Spur Ranch. But he would bet his next breath that his new wife had never worked a day in her life, much less on a ranch.

“You’re the only son of a gun I know who could fall in a pile of manure and come out smelling like a rose.” Blake’s tone was low and quiet and Eli assumed his friend didn’t want the women to hear him.

“What do you mean?” he asked, frowning.

“When you posted your ad on that rancher’s dating website, you made it sound more like you were looking for a female hired hand instead of a wife,” Blake said, laughing. “I wouldn’t have given you a plugged nickel for your chances of finding any woman to take you up on an offer that sounded about as romantic as a trip to the dentist. But I’ll be damned if you didn’t end up with the prom queen!”

As his friend slapped him on the back and followed the women into the dining room, Eli had to admit that in the looks department, he had hit a home run when he chose Victoria. Her long, golden-brown hair complemented her lightly tanned complexion, and she had the most expressive violet eyes he had ever seen.

Unfortunately, beauty hadn’t been one of his criteria for a suitable wife. He had wanted a woman who understood the daily operation of a ranch the size of the Rusty Spur and could pitch in to help if the need arose. And she had assured him she had the experience he had been looking for. But one look at his new wife’s designer clothes and her delicate, perfectly manicured hands signing the marriage license, and he had known for certain that her claim to be knowledgeable of any kind of farm or ranch work was a total myth.

He had suspected as much the first time he called to interview her, but he chose her anyway over several other, more qualified respondents for one simple reason. Her soft Southern drawl caused his pulse to race. In hindsight, he probably should have been thinking with his head and not his hormones. But at the time, he had reasoned that if they were eventually going to have a child together it probably wouldn’t hurt to find his wife desirable. What he hadn’t anticipated was his reaction when he saw her for the first time.

He had always thought that having a woman rob a man of breath was just a line in a song or a novel. But that was the only way to describe what had happened to him when she stepped off the plane in Cheyenne. At first sight, he’d sucked in a sharp breath and he wasn’t sure he had released it even yet.

“Eli Laughlin, stop standing there like a moon-eyed calf and get in here to help your bride cut the wedding cake,” Grandma Jean said from the doorway of the dining room.

Grateful for a diversion from his disturbing thoughts, Eli smiled at the woman who was grandmother to all of her grandson’s friends. “Yes, ma’am. On my way.”

When he entered the room, Victoria was standing behind a three-tiered cake sitting on one end of the dining table. She looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.

Walking over to stand beside her, he tried to give her a reassuring smile. “Are you doing all right?”

She nodded. “It was very sweet of Mrs. Hartwell to go to all this trouble. I didn’t expect a cake....” Pausing, she looked directly at him and laughed. “To tell you the truth, I really don’t know what I expected.”

Her nervous laughter and the vulnerability she couldn’t quite hide caused an unexpected emotion to spread throughout his chest. For reasons he couldn’t even begin to understand, Victoria Anderson-Laughlin brought out a protectiveness in him that Eli hadn’t even known he possessed.

He told himself that it was because she was pretty, petite and delicately feminine—the type of woman who made a man feel like a man. But the fact was she was his wife and she carried his name now. For some reason that upped the ante. It was his job to protect her and it came as no small surprise how quickly the feeling had settled over him.

Eli took a deep breath. He must be losing it. Hell, they hadn’t been married more than ten minutes and he was already thinking like a husband?

Emotions like that were something he had tried to avoid and approaching their marriage as a business deal, he thought he had done that. Apparently, he had underestimated the sense of responsibility that came along with having a wife.

“Okay, you two. Give me a big smile,” Blake said, holding up a digital camera. He motioned toward Victoria. “Put your arms around your wife, dude. This is your official wedding photo.”

If Eli could have reached over the cake to choke his best friend, he would have. Blake knew that he and Victoria were little more than strangers. But being thrown in jail on his wedding day for throttling the best man probably wasn’t a good idea, Eli decided as he put his arms around her. He would just have to settle the score with Blake later.

When he pulled her to him, Victoria placed her hand on his chest and the warmth of her palm through his shirt felt damned good. Maybe too good. The prenuptial agreement they signed had a clause that stated they would refrain from having sex for a period of four weeks in order to get to know each other and find out if they were compatible. He took a deep breath. If the magnetic pull between them was as strong as he was beginning to suspect, he was in for a miserable month of bone-chilling showers and a hell of a lot of frustration.

The camera flashed and just as Eli was about to release her, Blake grinned. “Now give your bride a kiss. I missed getting a picture of it during the ceremony.”

Eli wasn’t entirely certain all the pictures were a good idea. What if, after their month of getting to know each other, they decided they weren’t a good match and the marriage was annulled?

“Oh, yes, you’ll want a picture of your wedding kiss,” Grandma Jean chimed in.

Gazing down at the woman in his arms, Eli could read every emotion in the crystalline depths of her violet eyes. Victoria was as surprised this time as she had been when the minister told him he could kiss her after pronouncing them husband and wife. She hadn’t expected him to observe the ritual then, and truth to tell, he hadn’t intended to. But something about the way she had looked at him throughout the brief ceremony had compelled him to stick to tradition. The way she was gazing up at him now was having the same effect.

Without giving it a second thought, Eli lowered his head to cover her mouth with his. He told himself he was kissing Victoria because refusing would have created an awkward situation. Deep down, he knew better. He wanted to kiss her again, needed to see if his first impression had been correct.

The moment their lips met, he knew for certain that his assessment of the brief kiss they’d shared following their vows had been right on the money. Victoria had the softest, sweetest lips he’d ever had the privilege to kiss. The thought of what they’d do if things worked out between them sent his temperature soaring.

When his body began to tighten, Eli quickly broke the contact and took a step back. To his satisfaction, his bride looked as dazed by this kiss as she had the first one. Unless he missed his guess, she was feeling the same chemistry between them that he was.

“Perfect,” Blake said, grinning like the damned Cheshire cat. “One more of you two cutting the cake and I’ll be done for now.”

“What do you mean, ‘for now’?” Eli asked, scowling. Blake had been his best friend for as long as he could remember, but the man was pushing the limits of his patience.

Blake’s grin widened as he rocked back on his heels. “I’ll have to get at least one picture of Grandma throwing rice at the two of you and then another of you and your beautiful bride driving away to start your new life together on the Rusty Spur.”

Eli ground his back teeth. Blake was having way too much fun at his expense.

After they cut the white cake with little pink flowers on it, fed each other a bite and toasted with a glass of Grandma Jean’s homemade wine, Eli checked his watch. “Thanks for everything, but I think it’s time we get on the road. We have a two-hour drive to get to the ranch, and Buck will pitch a fit if he has to reheat supper.”

“You tell that old goat the next time he comes into town I have a bone to pick with him about refusing to be here for this,” Grandma Jean said as she put on her coat and walked out the door. Her disapproval was evident in her stern expression. “He should have been here to see you tie the knot, and I’m going to tell him so.” She turned suddenly and held up her hand. “Wait until Blake gets ready with the camera before you start down the porch steps. And be careful. He shoveled most of the snow off the walk, but there’s still a couple of slick spots.”

“Thanks for the warning.” When Grandma Jean walked out of the house, Eli helped Victoria into her coat, then shrugged into his. “I had Blake go out a little earlier to start my truck and turn on the heater. It should be warm inside the cab now.”

“That was thoughtful of you.” Her smile sent a wave of heat spreading through his chest that he did his best to ignore. “And thank you for introducing me to your friends. I’ve really enjoyed meeting them. They’re very nice.”

“Well, Grandma Jean is, anyway,” Eli said, jamming his wide-brimmed Resistol onto his head.

“How often do you get to see them?” she asked.

“I make it down here several times in the spring and summer, but after it starts snowing in late fall, I usually don’t see them until the next spring,” he said as they walked out onto the front porch. “My dad and Blake’s dad were best friends and when I was young. I used to stay with them during the winter months so I could go to school.” When he caught sight of his truck, he stopped short. “Son of a...”

Blake had apparently decided to do a little decorating when he went out to start the engine. Just Married had been scrawled across the back glass with white shoe polish, and a big white paper bell had been attached to the tailgate.

“I see you’ve been busy,” Eli said. He cupped Victoria’s elbow with his hand and they descended the steps.

“I take the job of being best man very seriously,” Blake said, laughing. He clicked off several pictures as his grandmother threw handfuls of rice at them. “Part of that job is to decorate the groom’s wheels.”

“I’ll get you for doing all of this,” Eli said under his breath as Grandma Jean stopped throwing rice to hug Victoria.

Blake laughed like a damned hyena. “I never doubted for a minute that you wouldn’t, dude.”

When they reached the truck, Eli opened the passenger door for his new wife, but instead of helping her step up onto the running board to climb into the cab, he swung her up into his arms. She brought her arms up automatically to encircle his neck and he found himself surrounded by the light scent of her enticing perfume.

“Wh-why did you do that?” she asked, wide-eyed and sounding a little breathless.

“There’s a patch of ice where you were about to step and I didn’t want you to fall,” he said as he set her down on the front seat.

She frowned. “I don’t remember it being there when we arrived.”

He shook his head. “It wasn’t.” Shutting the door, he turned and narrowed his eyes on Blake. “You thought of putting some water on the running board when you decorated my truck?”

Blake’s unrepentant grin had Eli questioning his choice of best friends. “Yup. I had to figure out some way to get a picture of you picking up your bride, since I won’t be there to get a shot of you carrying her across the threshold.”

“What if I hadn’t seen the ice and Victoria fell?” Eli asked through clenched teeth.

“Hey, dude, I know you better than you know yourself.” Blake shrugged. “Living out there in no-man’s-land, you have to be overly cautious. I knew you’d see the ice before you helped her into the truck.”

“You had better hope I forget about all this before you find some little gal naive enough to marry your worthless hide,” Eli warned. “Just remember, payback can be a real kick in the ass when you’re on the receiving end.”

“Since I have no intention of getting married, you’re preaching to the choir, dude,” Blake said, laughing. “You’re going to have a long time to wait for your revenge.”

“I’m a patient man,” Eli said, waving as he walked around the truck. “See you in the spring.”

* * *

When they stopped by the feed store at the edge of Eagle Fork for Eli to buy some supplies to feed a couple of “bucket babies,” whatever they were, Victoria waited in the truck. So much had happened in the span of a few hours. From the time she stepped off the plane she’d been caught up in a whirlwind of activity. Now that things seemed to have quieted down and she had time to reflect, she wasn’t sure she wanted to.

Staring down at her left hand, the simple gold band Eli had slid onto her finger during their wedding ceremony solidified her transition from life in the lap of luxury to her new role of being the wife of a hardworking rancher. But that didn’t bother her. As far as she was concerned, money or the lack thereof was a minor wrinkle in the grand scheme of things. In fact, if she never rubbed elbows with the wealthy again, it would be all too soon. She had learned the hard way that when her bank account dwindled down to nothing, so did her friends.

But none of that mattered. What bothered her more than anything else was knowing she’d traded one loveless existence for another. Of course, legally they had a month to decide whether or not to stay married. But there was no guarantee, even if they chose to stay together, that they would fall in love.

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.