Montana Hearts (16 page)

Growing up, he never thought any of his kids could do anything right. The ranch work always had to be done
his
way. Then after he'd driven both Bree and Luke away with his perfectionism and gruff dictator-­like manner, he'd said
she
would have to stay at the ranch because she couldn't make it out in the world on her own.

She left for college in San Diego to prove him wrong. Then when her grades slipped, she feared he was right and that she'd have to come home. Until she met Steve, who offered marriage as a convenient solution. But when Steve filed for divorce, her father said that was her fault, too, because she
“didn't have what it takes
”
to keep him. Just like Gavin McKinley had threatened that she
“didn't have what it takes”
to keep Jace. Coming home and having to rely on her family again, and admit that
yes, she'd failed
, had been one of the most humiliating moments of her life.

And she would not let her father or the rest of her family think she could not pull her share of the responsibility around here.

“Jace
is
going to endorse our ranch,” Delaney told them.

“When?” her father demanded. “His two weeks are almost up and so far the only thing you've managed to get out of him was a kiss.”

“I promised you that I would get that endorsement,” she said, standing up on her tippy toes and looking her father straight in the eye. “And I will. Right
now
.”

She gave him one last infuriated look, then turned on her heel and marched down the path to Jace's cabin, and pounded on the door.

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the door of his cabin, wondering if Natalie had forgotten something and returned. She'd only left fifteen minutes before, long enough for him to remove the splinter he'd received while trying to free the deer and put on some of Ruth Collins's homemade mineral lotion to help his finger heal.

His mystery guest pounded on the door again. This time with more strength.

“Coming,” he called. Then unlatching the lock, he swung the door out and there she was, the one he'd been waiting for, standing on his front porch. Taking her hand, he drew her inside, and relocked the door behind them.

“I'm sorry for the interruption earlier,” he said, stepping toward her. “We seem to have had a lot of them over the past few days.”

“You are absolutely right,” Delaney agreed, her voice firm. “That's why I can't wait a minute longer.”

He grinned. “Neither can I.”

“So should we just get right to it?” she asked, her expression as innocent as ever.

He did a double take. “Geez, I didn't expect you to be so straightforward.”

“Jace,” she pleaded. “I need that endorsement.”

“Endorsement?”
he asked, fighting to hide a smile and choking on his response at the same time.

“Of course,” she said with a frown. “What did you think we were talking about?”

He placed his hands on either side of her waist and pulled her closer. “For a minute there, I thought you couldn't wait to kiss me again.”

Color rose into her cheeks and she smiled as her gaze drifted toward his mouth. “Why did you kiss me, Jace? What is it you see in me or am I just another pretty face?”

He brushed back her hair with his hands and then cupped her cheeks. “I see that you are the most compassionate, honest, persevering, cleverly resourceful woman that I have ever met.”

“Resourceful?” she asked, as if puzzled.

“Your attempts to keep me from hunting,” he said, and a surge of warmth spread over him as he recalled the memories. “Let me see, like trying to keep my hands on a camera instead of a gun, grabbing my arm and pretending to sneeze so I'll miss a six-­point buck with my bow, or emptying your dirty laundry basket out in the woods to chase off any animal within a half mile radius?”

“That's called being desperate,” she said, and laughed.

“Delaney,” he said, drawing his head closer. “If you didn't want me to hunt, you should have just said so.”

“Would you have listened?” she asked.

“I did,” Jace assured her. “I heard the message through your actions loud and clear.”

All of the sudden she jumped in place. “My father was pretty loud and clear today when he said I needed to get that endorsement. You
will
write us one, won't you, Jace?”

“I promised you that I would.”

“Right now?”

Jace closed the distance between them and brushed a kiss over her lips, then drew back and sighed. “If that's what you really want.”

Delaney hesitated, then shook her head. “The endorsement can wait.”

“Are you sure?” he teased, his mouth hovering just inches above hers.

She smiled, and wrapping her arms around his neck, she whispered, “Kiss me.”

“Maybe I should add
‘demanding'
to your list of attributes.”

“Kiss me,” she repeated. “Please?”

“If you insist,” he said, gazing down at her, but keeping his mouth just a hairsbreadth out of reach. Her breath was sweet upon his lips, fresh and enticing and—­

“Jace Aldridge,” she sputtered, her voice sharp. “Stop teasing me and kiss me already!”

He chuckled, enjoying the intense look of yearning in her eyes. “Geez, Del. You're a little spitfire beneath that innocent, quiet, shy demeanor, aren't you?”

“Only when it matters,” she countered.

“And this does?” he asked, skimming his mouth across her lower lip.

“Definitely.”

Jace captured her mouth with his, and wrapping his arms around her shoulders, he pulled her in against him. Delaney tightened her grip around him, too, and as time lapsed and the world around them fell away, he realized he didn't want to leave this week, he didn't want to go back to the rodeo circuit, and he certainly didn't want to go back to Arizona.

He wanted to stay right where he was, like this, with Delaney by his side.

Forever, if she'd have him.

 

Chapter Ten

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in the front of the house with Ma, Grandma, and Party Marty, her grandma's ever-­present miniature companion. Meghan had her arms around the pony and was giving him a hug when she joined them.

“We've been keeping our eye on the protestors,” Grandma said, pointing at the crowd circling along the road near their driveway.

“I'm sorry your father was so hard on you,” Ma said, her face taking on a worried expression. “He's afraid of losing this ranch as much as the rest of us and holding on to it sometimes seems like an uphill battle.”

“A battle we will continue to fight,” Grandma proclaimed, giving Delaney's ma a stern look.

“Thank you for watching Meghan so much for me lately,” Delaney said, bending down to scoop her little girl into her arms. “I feel guilty every time I leave her side.”

“What you're doing is important,” Ma said, and raised her brows. “Any news?”

Delaney smiled.
“Yes.”

Ma let out a sigh of relief. “That will make your father happy.”

Meghan tangled one of her hands into Delaney's hair, playing with the ends, and asked, “What news? Where were you?”

“I was with Cowboy Jace,” she told her.

Meghan's eyes grew wide. “Without
me
? He was my friend first.”

“Can't he be a friend to both of us?” Delaney asked.

“Did he give you anything?” Meghan asked suspiciously.

She thought of their kiss, but she wasn't about to divulge that particular detail to her two-­year-­old; instead, she could mention the other gift he'd given her. “Cowboy Jace gave me a paper.”

“He gave
me
a horse,” Meghan said, proudly taking a tiny two-­inch plastic figurine from her jacket pocket. “This is Rio.”

“It
does
look like Rio, doesn't it?” Delaney asked, and marveled once again how kind Jace was to her little girl. He'd make a wonderful father someday. So different from Meghan's real father, who didn't want anything to do with her, a man who never even wanted her to be born.

Putting Meghan back down to walk on her own two feet, she said, “Let's go see Aunt Bree. I need to give her something very important.”

Delaney wasn't sure if she should enter the ranch office or not. She overheard several women arguing before she even got to the door. Deciding Bree might need either moral support or a distraction, she slipped in quietly with Meghan behind the three women standing before the office desk. Sammy Jo sat beside her sister and noticed her as soon as she came in.

“This is the brave woman who helped get the deer out of your cabin,” Sammy Jo said, motioning for the other women to turn around. “You should be thanking her instead of making threats to sue.”

Delaney gasped. “You plan to sue us?”

One of the women scrunched her nose and informed her, “All of our personal belongings are trampled. My new designer suitcase has a
hoofprint
on it.”

“My clothes were destroyed,” announced another. “Even my underwear.”

“The beast broke my laptop,” said the third woman. “I had it on the coffee table in the living room and found it smashed in pieces all over the floor. Then there's all the blood! There's no way we can sleep there tonight.”

Delaney looked at Bree. “Did you offer them another cabin? We have lots of empty cabins.”

“You'll have a lot more after I file a lawsuit,” the first woman threatened.

They couldn't survive a lawsuit. They had enough bad publicity from the protestors. From the look on Bree's face, she knew it, too.

“We'll refund the money for your cabin rental,” Bree offered. “And reimburse you
twice
the replacement cost of your damaged items.”

“Twice?” the three women chorused, and looked at one another.

Then each of them broke out in a smile and the woman who had threatened the lawsuit exclaimed, “Let's go shopping!”

After the three left, check in hand, Delaney winced. “Bree, how can we afford that?”

Her sister shook her head. “How could we afford not to? We don't have the money to hire a lawyer and get involved in court fees. We're already spending enough on the PI we hired to track down Susan and Wade Randall so we can try to get some of our embezzled money back.”

“I'm going to need a private detective of my own,” Sammy Jo complained. “Every morning this week, Luke has gone MIA. I've wanted to talk to him about wedding plans but he keeps disappearing. You don't think he's getting cold feet, do you?”

Bree laughed. “Absolutely not. He's head over heels in love with you. Which reminds me . . . Del, can you take our engagement photos?”

Sammy Jo nodded. “Yes. We figured it would be easier if we could do Luke and me at the same time as Ryan and Bree.”

“Of course,” Delaney agreed. She was to be a bridesmaid and Meghan was to be a flower girl in both their weddings. Ryan had proposed to Bree first and planned a spring ceremony, but Luke and Sammy Jo couldn't wait and decided they'd marry this Christmas.

Bree gave her a wistful look. “What about Jace?”

“Cowboy Jace is my friend,” Meghan told them.

Delaney smiled at her daughter and handed Bree the piece of paper Jace had given her with his endorsement for their ranch. “I think right now he's everyone's friend.”

Bree and Sammy Jo talked back and forth excitedly as they read the kind words Jace had written about their ranch, but Delaney's thoughts were on the words he had
really
wanted to write. The ones only she knew about.

After Jace had kissed her at least a dozen times, he'd pulled back with a grin and said, “We better get that endorsement written before your father comes looking for us.”

She wasn't thinking of her father at that moment. All she wanted to do was keep kissing Jace. But he had a point. They'd been kissing for over an hour and if she didn't return soon they'd send out a search party.

Retrieving a pad of paper and a pen out of a drawer in the kitchen, Jace leaned over the counter and asked, “What do you think I should write? That Collins Country Cabins has the most beautiful women, the finest flirters, and the best kissers?”

Delaney had smiled, then she placed a kiss on his forehead, another on the tip of his nose, and a third on his chin. “I told you that I don't know how to flirt.”

“Oh, but you do, Del,” he said, giving her another quick kiss on the lips. “You most certainly do.”

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a ­couple flashes from a camera go off from someone in the crowd who stood watching the scene with the deer unfold. But he'd thought it was a natural gesture from a guest who was excited by what was happening and wanted a shot to show their friends. Today, he realized one of the “guests” must have been a reporter looking for a juicy story to sell newspapers. But it wasn't the story of how he helped save the deer that covered the front page. Instead, they'd featured a picture of him kissing the guest ranch owner's youngest daughter.

Delaney hadn't known they'd had a reporter within their midst either. When the twins first showed her the newspapers, she'd dropped her plate of scrambled eggs and toast all over the floor, her face had gone stark white, and he'd pulled out a chair for her to sit down so she wouldn't faint.

“Oh, Miss Delaney!” Nora squealed, bending down to help her sister, Nora, clean up the mess.

“We didn't mean to startle you, Miss Del,” Nadine added. “I'd give anything to have my photo on the front page.”

“And,” Nora said, and giggled, “it's so romantic!”

“I never wanted to be in the spotlight,” Delaney said, meeting his gaze. “The focus should be on the deer.”

“Welcome to my world,” Jace said, and set all the newspapers into one pile so she wouldn't have to look at them again. “The media is biased. They say what they want, label you how they want, tell the whole world you're an avid hunter if they want.”

“In the text beneath the photo it explains how the ranch managers embezzled our money earlier this summer and how I had to come home to work the ranch,” Delaney said, and grimaced. “Then they call me a modern-­day Cinderella who has been swept off her feet and caught kissing famous rodeo star Jace Aldridge.”

“I always wished I could be like Cinderella,” Nora said dreamily as she stood up holding the dustpan she'd used to clean the food off the floor. “So that I could—­”

“Meet a handsome prince!” Nadine exclaimed. “And live—­”

“Happily ever after!” both twins chorused in unison.

Some of the color returned to Del's face and she appeared to relax. “You two have been watching too many of Meghan's fairy-­tale movies on TV.”

“Don't you believe in fairy tales?” Jace teased. “Sometimes dreams really do come true.”

She smiled and gave him one of those adorable, longing looks. “I
want
to believe.”

So did he, which is why he planned to do everything in his power to make her happy and feel secure. First, he'd have to find out who put the deer in the cabin and see if the same poachers who were messing with her family were the ones threatening his mom.

“Aren't you two supposed to be in school?” he asked the twins.

Nora suddenly coughed, an obvious
fake
cough, and Nadine pretended to sneeze, although her acting was ten times worse than Delaney's.

“We're sick,” Nora told him. “But it's not contagious or anything.”

“You don't
look
sick,” Delaney said, giving them each a frown.

“Oh, Miss Delaney,” Nora squealed. “We just couldn't go to school today.”

“Not when we saw who arrived at the ranch last night,” Nadine added. “A father and his two sons who are—­”

“Absolutely
gorgeous
!” Nora finished, and pointed into the side of her cupped hand to indicate their location.

Jace glanced over at the middle-­aged man and the two younger guys who accompanied him. The boys looked to be only a year or two older than Nora and Nadine. But they weren't his sons. The older man with them glanced up and caught Jace looking at him. Then smiled.

“Excuse me,” Jace said, rising from his chair and giving Delaney an apologetic look. “There's someone I want speak with.”

Then moving into a seat at the table with Bucky's father and the other young men, he said, “Welcome to Collins Country Cabins
.
”

Eli Knowles let out a chuckle. “I was wondering when you'd notice us. Jace, let me introduce you to Clint and Clay Maier, undercover agents in training.”

“Like me?”

Eli gave the boys a nod. “They're friends of a friend.”

After they shook hands, Eli said, “With all the reports that have been coming in, we figured we needed to get closer to the action. These poachers may have a hidden agenda other than killing for sport or making a profit.”

Jace frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Have you considered what might have happened if you had shot the deer, three days before gun season?”

“You'd arrest me for poaching?” he teased.

“No,” Eli warned, “
think
, Jace.”

“The media twists stories around to say whatever they want,” he said, clenching his fist. “They might not portray it as a mercy killing. The rival outfitters could have framed the Collinses for poaching and put them out of business.”

“Or,” Eli offered, “they could have framed
you
, the son of a candidate running for governor. This could have ruined your mother's campaign.”

He thought about the second note they'd sent his mother
. Drop from the race, or we'll hurt Jace.
The poachers could have set him up to ruin his reputation to keep his mother from taking office. “You think this is all political?”

Eli shrugged. “We have to look at it from every angle.”

Bucky's dad was right. There was more than one possibility. He'd have to keep his eyes and ears open and not make any swift assumptions.

When he returned to his own table, each of the twins, one on either side of him, grabbed his arm. “Jace, you didn't tell them we
like
them, did you?” Nora exclaimed, her face almost as white as Delaney's had been when she'd seen the newspapers.

“No,” he assured them. “Your secret is safe with me.”

The twins released his arms and let out identical sighs of relief.

“By the way,” he said, amused by all their dramatics. “Their names are Clint and Clay.”

“Clint and Clay,” Nora repeated. “The names kind of roll off your tongue when you say them, don't they? Just like Nora and Nadine.”

“Oh, Jace,” Nadine said, giving him a big smile. “You were helping us get information, weren't you? How can we ever thank you?”

Jace glanced at Delaney's bemused expression, and then looked back at the twins and asked, “Give us some privacy?”

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special powdered formula her wildlife rescue group used for orphaned wild animals with the correct dosage of water. Then she fed the bobcat cubs one at time, holding them in the crook of her arm like a baby. They certainly were adorable. The cub she held wrapped its little paws around the bottle as it drank and looked up at her with those round blue eyes. The cub's eyes were as blue as Meghan's and her own. And how could anyone resist that cute little pink nose, and the black tiger-­like stripes on its face?