Duncan's Bride (7 page)

“So, when do I get to meet him?”

“The day of the wedding, probably. No matter what you have scheduled, I expect you to drop everything and fly out when I call you.”

“Wouldn't miss it.”

Christine was even less encouraging. “What do you know about ranch life?” she asked ominously. “Nothing. There are no movies, no neighbors, not even any television reception to speak of. No plays, no operas or concerts.”

“No pollution, no having to put six different locks on my door when I go out, no getting mugged when I go shopping.”

“You've never been mugged.”

“But there's always the possibility. I know people who've been mugged several times.”

“There's the
possibility
of a lot of things. It's
possible
I may even get married some day, but I'm not holding my breath waiting. That isn't the point. You really have no idea what life on a ranch is like. At least I have
some
idea. It's a hard, lonely way to live, and you're not the isolated type.”

“
Au contraire,
dear friend. I'm just as content by myself as I am surrounded by people. If I had to live in Outer Mongolia to be with him, I'd do it.”

Christine looked amazed. “Ye gods,” she blurted. “You're in love!”

Madelyn nodded. “Of course. Why else would I marry him?”

“Well, that explains the sudden madness. Does he feel the same way?”

“Not yet. I'm going to do my best to convince him, though.”

“Would it be wasting my breath to point out that that usually comes
before
the part where you say ‘I do'? That courtship usually covers this phase?”

Pursing her lips, Madelyn considered it, then said, “No, I think it would come more under ‘falling on deaf ears' than ‘wasting your breath.' I'm getting married. I'd like you to be there.”

“Of course I'll be there! Nothing could keep me away. I have to see this paragon of manly virtues.”

“I never said he was virtuous.”

In complete understanding, they looked at each other and smiled.

T
HEY WERE MARRIED
in Billings twelve days later. Madelyn was exhausted by the time of the wedding, which was performed in the judge's chambers. She had gotten only a few hours of sleep each night since Reese's phone call, because it had taken so much time to pack up a lifetime of belongings, sorting through and discarding what she wasn't taking, and packing what she couldn't bear to do without. She had also gotten the required physical and expressed the results to Reese, and hadn't been surprised when she had received his results by express mail the same day.

She had shipped numerous boxes containing books, albums, tapes, CDs, stereo equipment and winter clothes to the ranch, wondering what Reese would have to say about having his home taken over by the paraphernalia of a stranger. But when she'd spoken to him during two brief telephone calls he hadn't mentioned it. Before she knew it she was flying to Billings again, but this time she wasn't coming back.

Reese didn't kiss her when he met her at the airport, and she was glad. She was tired and on edge, and the first self-doubts were creeping in. From the look on his face, when he started kissing her again he didn't intend to stop, and she wasn't ready for that. But her heart leaped at the sight of him, reassuring her that she was doing the right thing.

She planned to stay at a motel in Billings for the five days until their marriage; Reese scowled at her when she told him her plan.

“There's no point in paying for a motel when you can stay at the ranch.”

“Yes, there is. For one thing, most of my New York clothes are useless and will just stay packed up. I have to have Montana clothing—jeans, boots and the like. There's no point in making an extra trip later on to buy it when I'm here already. Moreover, I'm not staying alone with you right now, and you know why.”

He put his hands on her waist and pulled her up against him. His narrowed eyes were dark green. “Because I'd have you under me as soon as we got in the house.”

She swallowed, her slender hands resting on his chest. She could feel the heavy beat of his heart under her palms, a powerful pumping that revealed the sexual tension he was holding under control. “Yes. I'm not ready to start that part of our relationship. I'm tired, and nervous, and we really don't know each other that well—”

“We're getting married in five days. We won't know each other much better by then, baby, but I don't plan on spending my wedding night alone.”

“You won't,” she whispered.

“So one of the conditions for getting you in bed is to put a ring on your finger first?” His voice was getting harsher.

He was angry, and she didn't want him to be; she just wanted him to understand. She said steadily, “That isn't it at all. If the wedding were two months away, or even just a month, I'm certain we'd…we'd make love
before the ceremony, but it isn't. I'm just asking you for a little time to rest and recuperate first.”

He studied her upturned face, seeing the translucent shadows under her eyes and the slight pale cast to her skin. She was resting against him, letting his body support hers, and despite his surging lust he realized that she really was tired. She had uprooted her entire life in just one week, and the emotional strain had to be as exhausting as the physical work.

“Then sleep,” he said in a slow, deep voice. “Get a lot of sleep, baby, and rest up. You'll need it. I can wait five days—just barely.”

She did get some sleep, but the emotional strain was still telling on her. She was getting married; it was natural to be nervous, she told herself.

The day they signed the prenuptial agreement at the lawyer's office was another day of stress. Reese was in a bad mood when he picked her up at the motel, growling and snapping at everything she said, so she lapsed into silence. She didn't think it was a very good omen for their marriage.

The prenuptial agreement was brief and easily understood. In case of divorce, they both kept the property and assets they had possessed prior to their marriage, and Madelyn gave up all rights to alimony in any form. She balked, however, at the condition that he retain custody of any children that should result from their union.

“No,” she said flatly. “I'm not giving up my children.”

Reese leaned back in the chair and gave her a look that would have seared metal. “You're not taking my children away from me.”

“Calm down,” the lawyer soothed. “This is all hypothetical. Both of you are talking as if a divorce is inevi
table, and if that's the case, I would suggest that you
not
get married. Statistics say that half of new marriages end in divorce, but that means that half don't. You may well be married to each other for the rest of your lives, and there may not be any children anyway.”

Madelyn ignored him. She looked only at Reese. “I don't intend to take our children away from you, but neither do I intend to give them up. I think we should share custody, because children need both parents. Don't try to make me pay for what April did,” she warned.

“But you'd want them to live with you.”

“Yes, I would, just as you'd want them to live with you. We aren't going to change that by negotation. If we did divorce, I'd never try to turn our children against you, nor would I take them out of the area, but that's something you'll just have to take on trust, because I'm not signing any paper that says I'll give up my children.”

There were times, he noted, when those sleepy gray eyes could become sharp and clear. She was all but baring her teeth at him. It seemed there were some things that mattered enough to rouse her from her habitual lazy amusement, and it was oddly reassuring that the subject of their children, hypothetical though they were, was one of them. If he and April had had a child, she would have wanted custody of it only as a way to get back at him, not because she really wanted the child itself. April hadn't wanted to have children at all, a fact for which he was now deeply grateful. Madelyn not only appeared to want children, she was ready to fight for them even before they existed.

“All right,” he finally said, and nodded to the law
yer. “Strike that clause from the agreement. If there's ever a divorce, we'll hash that out then.”

Madelyn felt drained when they left the lawyer's office. Until then, she hadn't realized the depth of Reese's bitterness. He was so determined not to let another woman get the upper hand on him that it might not be possible for her to reach him at all. The realization that she could be fighting a losing battle settled on her shoulders like a heavy weight.

“When do your stepbrother and best friend get here?” he asked curtly. He hadn't liked the idea of Robert and Christine being at their wedding, and now Madelyn knew why. Having friends and relatives there made it seem more like a real wedding than just a business agreement, and a business agreement, with bed privileges, was all Reese wanted, all he could accept.

“The day before the wedding. They won't be able to stay afterward, so we're going out to a restaurant the night before. You can be here, can't you?”

“No. There's no one at the ranch to put the animals up for the night and do the chores for me. Even if I left immediately afterward, it's almost a three-hour drive, so there's no point in it.”

She flushed. She should have thought of the long drive and how hard he had to work. It was a sign of how much she had to learn about ranching. “I'm sorry, I should have thought. I'll call Robert—”

He interrupted her. “There's no reason why you should cancel just because I can't be here. Go out with them and enjoy it. We won't have much chance to eat out after we're married.”

If he'd expected her to react with horror at that news, he was disappointed. She'd already figured that out on her own, and she didn't care. She intended to be his
partner in rebuilding the ranch; maybe when it was prosperous again he could let go of some of his bitterness. She would gladly forgo restaurant meals to accomplish that.

“If you're certain…”

“I said so, didn't I?” he snapped.

She stopped and put her hands on her hips. “I'd like to know just what your problem is! I've seen men with prostate problems and women with terminal PMS who aren't as ill-tempered as you. Have you been eating gunpowder or something?”

“I'll tell you what's wrong!” he roared. “I'm trying to quit smoking!” Then he strode angrily to the truck, leaving her standing there.

She blinked her eyes, and slowly a smile stretched her lips. She strolled to the truck and got in. “So, are you homicidal or merely as irritable as a wounded water buffalo?”

“About halfway in between,” he said through clenched teeth.

“Anything I can do to help?”

His eyes were narrow and intense. “It isn't just the cigarettes. Take off your panties and lock your legs around me, and I'll show you.”

She didn't want to refuse him. She loved him, and he needed her, even if it was only in a sexual way. But she didn't want their first time to be a hasty coupling in a motel room, especially when she was still jittery from stress and he was irritable from lack of nicotine. She didn't know if it would be any better by their wedding day, but she hoped she would be calmer.

He saw the answer in her eyes and cursed as he ran his hand around the back of his neck. “It's just two damn days.”

“For both of us.” She looked out the window. “I admit, I'm trying to put it off. I'm nervous about it.”

“Why? I don't abuse women. If I don't have the control I need the first time, I will the second. I won't hurt you, Maddie, and I'll make certain you enjoy it.”

“I know,” she said softly. “It's just that you're still basically a stranger.”

“A lot of women crawl into bed with men they've just met in a bar.”

“
I
don't.”

“Evidently you don't crawl into bed with the man you're going to marry, either.”

She rounded on him. “That's unfair and you know it, because we aren't getting married under the usual circumstances. If you're not going to do anything but snap at me and try to pressure me into bed, maybe we shouldn't see each other until the wedding.”

His teeth came together with a snap. “That sounds like a damn fine idea to me.”

So she spent the last two days before her wedding alone, at least until Robert and Christine arrived the afternoon before. She hadn't expected Reese to drive to Billings every day, and in fact he hadn't, except to meet her at the airport and to go to the lawyer's office, but it disturbed her that they had already quarreled. If their marriage survived, it looked like it would be a tempestuous one.

When she met Christine and Robert at the airport, Christine looked around impatiently. “Well, where is he?”

“At the ranch, working. He doesn't have anyone to look after the animals, so he isn't coming in tonight.”

Christine frowned, but to Madelyn's surprise Robert took it in stride. It only took a moment's thought to
realize that if there was anything Robert understood, it was work coming before everything else.

She hooked her arms through theirs and hugged both of them. “I'm so glad you're here. How was the flight?”

“Exciting,” Christine said. “I've never traveled with the boss before. He gets red-carpet treatment, did you know?”

“Exasperating,” Robert answered smoothly. “She makes smartmouth comments, just like you do. I kept hearing those sotto voce remarks in my ear every time a flight attendant came by.”

“They didn't just come by,” Christine explained. “They stopped, they lingered, they swooned.”

Madelyn nodded. “Typical.” She was pleased that Christine wasn't intimidated by Robert, as so many people were. Christine would never have been so familiar in the office, and in fact Madelyn doubted that the two had ever met before, but in this situation he was merely the bride's brother and she was the bride's best friend, and she had treated him as such. It also said something about Robert's urbanity that Christine did feel at ease with him; when he chose, her stepbrother could turn people to stone with his icy manner.

Now if only her two favorite people in the world would like the man she loved. She hoped he'd recovered from his nicotine fit by the morning, or it could be an interesting occasion.

They took a cab to the motel where she was staying, and Robert got a room, but Madelyn insisted that Christine stay in the room with her. On this last night as a single woman, her nerves were frayed, and she wanted someone to talk to, someone she could keep up all night if she couldn't sleep herself. After all, she reasoned, what were friends for if not to share misery?

They shared a pleasant meal and enjoyed themselves, though Madelyn wished Reese could have been there. By ten o'clock Christine was yawning openly and pointed out that it was midnight in New York. Robert signaled for the check; he looked as fresh as he had that morning, but he was used to working long hours and usually only slept four hours a night anyway.

“Will you sleep tonight?” he asked Madelyn when they got back to the motel, having noticed her shadowed eyes.

“Probably not, but I don't think a bride is supposed to sleep the night before she gets married.”

“Honey, it's the night she gets married that she isn't supposed to sleep.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “Then either. I'm tired, but I'm too nervous and excited to sleep. It's been that way since he called.”

“You aren't having second thoughts?”

“Second, third and fourth thoughts, but it always comes back to the fact that I can't let this chance pass.”

“You could always postpone it.”

She thought of how impatient Reese was and wryly shook her head. “No, I couldn't, not one more day.”