“I don’t want a fucking cow,” he hissed, spittle flying. “I want money or something to sell for money.”
“All right,” I replied. What else could I say? He’d killed Tennessee’s father to punish her for her lies. What was keeping him from lifting the gun to my head and pulling the trigger? “I’ll… bring you something to sell.”
He released his hold, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand with the gun.
“You have a week.” He turned and pointed at Tennessee, who was now crying in earnest. “One week and then I kill her.”
I nodded numbly, my heart beating frantically. I was going home anyway now with graduation behind us. I wasn’t sure how I would be able to return, but I’d worry about that later.
“If you don’t come back, my men will find you.” He waved the gun in front of my face, and my eyes followed the lethal weapon.
I retreated a step. He didn’t do anything, so I took another tentative one, then another, afraid to turn my back on him. Tennessee was still crying.
“Don’t leave me here!” she cried, holding her hand out to me to take.
It hurt to leave her behind, but if I was going to save her, I had to go. I heard the door open, and it was only then when I turned. The henchman held the door for me and escorted me out into the street, my friend’s sobs following. I had to help my friend. I had to return home and find something I could bring back to appease Mr. Grimsby. Something James wouldn’t miss. Otherwise, she would die. And if I didn’t do it in the week, he’d send someone after my brother. I’d saved him as a little girl. I couldn’t let him die now.
CHAPTER ONE
Abigail
I should have been watching the bride and groom as they stood before the minister, reciting their vows. Theresa was lovely in her white dress, her face radiant with a happiness which seemed to come from within. She loved Emmett, I had no doubt. The feelings were reciprocated if the hitch in the big rancher’s voice as he said “I do” was any indication.
I should have watched as they shared their first kiss as a married couple, but my eyes were on the handsome duo, Gabe and Tucker Landry. The brothers sat together across the center aisle and two rows ahead of me with a few of the others from Bridgewater. I could see nothing lower than their broad shoulders, but their hair was neatly combed, shirts crisp and freshly washed.
This opportunity to look at them for such a long duration wasn’t afforded to me very often and I sighed, taking in their chiseled profiles; Tucker’s clean-shaven and Gabe’s with his trim beard.
I’d been in Butte two years and hadn’t seen them in all that time, at least until the picnic the day before. My interest in them wasn’t something I could share. I’d met them when I was fourteen, and to say I had an instant crush was a gross understatement. But they were at least a decade older, and while solicitous, they’d barely glanced my way. And so I’d dreamed of them, watched them from afar with a young girl’s eager eye. I’d told no one of my feelings about them. With so many nosy neighbors in this small town, I couldn’t have had them discovering the truth. A fourteen-year-old girl with a crush. It would have been mortifying.
But I was a girl no longer, and my interest in them had not waned in all those years. I hadn’t seen them all that often, but every man I met was measured against them. There had yet to be a worthy comparison. And now, at nineteen, I thought of them in new ways. Carnal ways. Naughty ways. Unfortunately, I could do nothing about this… attraction I had for them. I was not a woman to be forward, like Tennessee, and I’d certainly learned from her what happened if she behaved so. I had to think of my return as temporary because I had to worry more about saving her life than how just looking at those two men made my heart flutter and my nipples harden.
But with them sitting in front of me, I took this rare chance. I didn’t just look. I stared, ogled even, and dreamed. Dreamed I would someday stand with them and recite wedding vows like Theresa and Emmett.
One Landry was fair, the other dark. One broad, the other slim. One mild, the other brooding. I shouldn’t want two such different men, but I did. My heart wanted what my heart wanted, and that was the crux of my problem. It had been instant, the interest in them when I was younger. Every time I saw them since, it was like my heart skipped a beat. But with not having seen them for so long, the desire for them was immediate. Intense. I’d never felt anything like it before. I could admire them, as they were no hardship on the eyes. They were more than handsome. They made my body heat all over whenever they glanced my way at the picnic the day before. Surely every woman in town felt the same way.
I wanted to feel how soft Gabe’s beard was beneath my fingers. I wanted to know how hard Tucker’s sinewy shoulders were. I wanted to hear Gabe’s deep voice whisper in my ear how he would claim me. I wanted Tucker’s broad body pinning me beneath him. I shifted on the hard pew, for my body was achy with need, a need I had never had fulfilled. And yet I was willing to slake it with the Landry brothers.
Late that night, I thought of them unbidden. Just the night before, I’d lifted up the hem of my nightdress, parted my thighs, and touched myself. I thought of their large hands and imagined it was their fingers slipping inside me, sliding over my wet folds. I’d climaxed, my body tense and awash in pleasure as I whispered their names into the darkness. No, this was no girlhood fancy. Not any longer.
As if they felt my heated gaze on them, they turned their heads and stared at me. Me! Gabe’s dark eyes pinned me in place as Tucker’s dropped to my mouth. It was blatant, and my heart skipped a beat. Could they see what I’d been thinking as if it were written on my face? Did they know I wanted them almost desperately? Could they sense I used them for my most illicit fantasies? When Tucker winked, I gasped. Hoping the sound wasn't too loud, my fingers flew to cover my lips, just in case.
James, who sat beside me, glanced my way. I offered my brother a reassuring smile as everyone clapped for the newlyweds walking down the aisle.
“That might be you, soon enough,” James said over the noise, patting the back of my hand.
For a second, I thought he was referring to the Landrys, but then I remembered the truth. No, the lie. The lie I’d started at the picnic. I’d only returned from Butte the day before. James hadn’t allowed me to travel alone, so I’d waited after graduation for the Smith family, a local family in town to offer me escort. I realized if instead of waiting, I’d gone by myself as I’d wanted, I would have been away from Butte and avoided the entire mess with Tennessee. I wouldn’t have had to lie, wouldn’t have to fear for my friend or even James. Now, I had to return to Butte. With money. Somehow.
Besides Christmas, it was my first time back in the two years since James sent me away to school. At seventeen, I’d been a little less ladylike than he wished, considering I’d been raised on a ranch with him serving the role of parent. He’d wanted me to attract a husband, but I knew my scar would deter all men from courting me. Instead, the school had kept me hidden away from any prospect. Because of this, I frowned at James for his comment then remembered.
The lie.
At the picnic, the ladies my age had gathered around the baked goods table and spoken of their new husbands or beaux. Unlike them, I’d lived a sheltered existence at school—at James’ insistence—and no man, except the piano teacher, had stepped inside the building, let alone courted me. I could not speak about a man of my own.
But I needed a reason to go back to Butte so swiftly after coming home. A beau would keep my connection to the town, give me a reason to eagerly return and to then save Tennessee. When the crisis was resolved, I could just state I had ended the arrangement. No one would be the wiser, and I would never have to go back to the town again.
With the ladies twittering on incessantly about how happy they were, I’d told the lie, a man in Butte. They looked at me first with surprise then happiness. I was the plain one, the one with no mother, no sisters. A plain face with an unattractive scar. I wore my hair in a simple braid, wore simple clothes. I was shy. The school had taught me how to play a lovely concerto and to plan a meal for fifteen, but men? I had no idea what I was doing.
I’d been on the periphery of the group until that moment, but they’d pulled me into the fold eagerly asking after the man I’d snared. I’d assumed they would offer a passing response of “That’s nice,” then be done. I hadn’t expected them to be so pleased for me, so curious about him. It was amazing how the little fib took on a life of its own. It had worked its way across the picnic and, by the time the sun set, everyone in town, including my brother, believed I had a beau named Aaron Wakefield. My excuse to return to Butte was well established.