A Match Made In Texas

To escape a scandal in England, Violet Brookfield is sent to her brother’s ranch in Texas. Soon she discovers that the vibrant new world and rugged trail boss Raleigh Masterson are perfect material for the Western she’s writing. And when her time is up, she’ll return to the nobleman she left behind.

Violet is the most elegant female ever to set foot in Simpson Creek, and Raleigh is sure she’ll never stay. He has no business falling for the beautiful aristocrat. But soon Violet makes a place for herself in the Hill Country—and in his heart. Now if only he can convince her that she belongs there forever….

“I’ve never met a writer before.” He let his admiration show in his voice.

Violet turned back to him, surprised. “You’re

the first person who’s ever called me a writer, Raleigh Masterson. Even Gerald doesn’t—” She stopped suddenly, as if she’d said too much.

“Who’s Gerald?” he asked.

“Gerald is the man I’m in love with. He’s the Earl of Lullington.” She spoke so softly that he had to strain to hear, but when he made sense of her words, his heart sank. Of course she’d found someone to love, someone who was titled and wealthy, as she was. He’d been a fool to think otherwise.

“I’m surprised you could leave him for so long,” he said.

“I didn’t have a choice. My brother thinks if he separates us for a time, I’ll forget about Gerald. But I won’t, of course.”

There was an uncertain look in her eyes, as if she couldn’t speak with confidence about her beau’s feelings for her.

“I’m sure no man in his right mind could forget about you, Miss Violet.”

LAURIE KINGERY

makes her home in central Ohio, where she is a “Texan-in-exile.” Formerly writing as Laurie Grant for the Harlequin Historical line and other publishers, she is the author of eighteen previous books and the 1994 winner of a Readers’ Choice Award in the Short Historical category. She has also been nominated for Best First Medieval and Career Achievement in Western Historical Romance by RT Book Reviews. When not writing her historicals, she loves to travel, read, participate on Facebook and Shoutlife and write her blog on

www.lauriekingery.com.

Hill Country Cattleman

Laurie Kingery

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which

so easily doth beset us, And let us run with patience the race that is set before us.

—Hebrews 12:1

To my “adopted sisters”

Carole Tyson and “Tudie” Metzer.

Thanks for being part of my family!

And as always, to Tom.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Dear Reader

Questions for Discussion

Chapter One

Simpson Creek, Texas—July 7, 1868

“Simpson Creek!” the driver called out as the coach rolled onto the bridge over the creek that had given the town its name.

“Thank goodness,” grumbled Violet’s brother Edward, Viscount Greyshaw, rubbing his back and glancing resentfully at the top of the coach after the driver hit yet another rut. He grabbed for the overhead strap to steady himself. “He does that on purpose,” he muttered, then added, for the hundredth time, “I don’t know why Nick chose to live so far from the coast. Barbaric place, Texas. Too big by half.”

Normally, her elder brother was the kindest of men, but the two of them had been on the road for several days now, first on the stage line that ran from Indianola, on the Gulf coast, to Austin. They’d had to cool their heels in the Texas capital for several days until Friday, when the stage to Lampasas ran again. Once in Lampasas, however, they had learned there was no regular stage that ran the final thirty miles to Simpson Creek. It had taken a sizable bribe at the stagecoach station to convince an off-duty driver to take them the rest of the way. They had not gone a mile when Edward had voiced his suspicion that the coach had been retired due to its lack of springs and threadbare cushions.

Violet ignored his complaining as she stared raptly out of the window on her side of the coach. “I think it’s a darling little town—so quaint and picturesque. So very Old West.” She could already imagine penning a letter in which she described it to Gerald—assuming there was a place to post a letter to her beau back in England. And she could use Simpson Creek as the basis for the fictional town in the novel she was writing. “Oh, look—is that the church where Nick and Milly were married?”

“The very one,” her brother murmured, his tone softening somewhat. “It’s the only church in town, so everyone attends it.”

They rolled past a row of storefronts on either side and finally pulled up in front of a hotel.

“Driver, will there be time for us to have luncheon before we go on to the Brookfield ranch while you obtain a fresh team?” Edward inquired as he descended the coach.

“I’ll be changin’ teams, all right,” the driver said, beginning to lift down the trunks that had ridden on top of the coach during their journey, “but I cain’t take you out to no ranch, Mr. Greyshaw. I got t’ git back t’ take the Lampasas-to-Austin run at six in th’ mornin’. I’m gonna be plumb tuckered out as it is.”

“That’s Lord Greyshaw,” Edward told him curtly. “And how in blazes are we to get to my brother’s ranch with all this luggage—walk?”

“Like as not y’ could hire a wagon at th’ livery, sir,” their driver said cheerfully, unfazed by her brother’s anger. “Follow me, if yore of a mind t’ take care of that now. That’s where I’m goin’ to change horses.”

“Out of the question,” Edward said, and turned to Violet. “I suppose we shall have to hire someone to drive us to Nick’s ranch. I certainly hope we can find a better-sprung carriage than that poor excuse for a coach.”

Really. One would think Edward had never been to Texas before, and experienced the reality of traveling here, Violet thought with amusement. Before she could say something to soothe her brother’s ruffled feathers, though, she caught sight of a handsome blue roan trotting toward them.

If there was anything Violet appreciated more than books, writing and the Earl of Lullington, it was superior horseflesh. The approaching roan was the finest example of equine excellence she’d seen since she regretfully bade goodbye to the chestnut hunter Gerald had offered to loan her for the hunting season. He’d hinted he was going to give it to her later as a wedding present.

More powerfully muscled than the thoroughbred hunter, the roan had fire and spirit—and savvy. She had gleaned that word from one of the many books she’d read about the American West. It was from the Spanish word saber, meaning he knows. And this horse looked like he knew plenty—the perfect horse for a cowboy.

The hunting set decreed a proper horse should be bay, chestnut, black or gray, and would have decried the roan’s unusual color as flashy. But Violet thought the hue ethereally beautiful. Then, as the horse nosed in to a hitching rail at the store next door to the hotel, her eyes rose to its rider, and she forgot all about the roan.

Tall and rangy, he wore dusty denims and a vest over a shirt of faded blue. His sleeves were rolled up to the elbow, showing forearms bronzed by the unrelenting western sun. A wide-brimmed hat left his upper face in shadow, but she could see an angular jaw shadowed with several days’ growth of beard, a long nose and black hair covering the back of his bandanna. He dismounted with a grace that made Violet release an appreciative sigh. There he was, the epitome of the Texas cowboy, tying his horse’s reins to the hitching post and totally unaware of his perfection—or her scrutiny.

“Violet, what are you staring at?” Edward demanded. “I said, we’d better go into the hotel and see if there’s someone who can direct us to a trustworthy driver.”

“I wasn’t staring, Edward,” she protested, even though she knew very well she was, “but I think perhaps that man over there might be able to help us.”

Licking her dry lips to moisten them, she strode forward, ignoring Edward’s hasty “Violet, stop right there! You can’t just go up to any stranger you see!” The cowboy looked as if he was about to go into the store. If he did, she might well lose her chance.

Even if he couldn’t help them get to Nick’s ranch, he might know someone who could. And she didn’t want to deny herself the experience of having that deliciously dangerous-looking fellow focus on her for a few delightful seconds. All fodder for my novel, she told herself.

“Oh, sir!” she called. “Please wait! We—I’m in need of your help.”

He’d just set one booted foot on the boardwalk, but at the sound of her voice, he stopped, turned around and whipped his hat off his head.

“Ma’am?”

The single syllable was uttered by a voice that was hoarse and husky, as if he’d been riding a long way without water. It was drawn out in that entrancing drawl that delighted her English ears. She hoped she could reproduce it somehow on the pages of her manuscript.

Even more gratifying was the way his dark eyes widened as he studied her, the color rising in his high, sun-bronzed cheekbones.

* * *

Raleigh Masterson had never expected to see such a golden-haired, blue-eyed example of absolute female beauty in the dusty streets of Simpson Creek, Texas, much less that she would speak to him. He suffered a moment of agonizing regret that he had decided to go to the mercantile for a new shirt before his long-awaited visit to the combination barbershop and bathhouse down the street. But once he was clean, he’d want to wear a new shirt, not the same one that he’d worn over miles of trail back between Abilene, Kansas, and Simpson Creek.

If he had gone to the bathhouse first, though, he’d probably have missed seeing this vision of female flawlessness. She wore a traveling suit of dark burgundy trimmed with white, its narrow waist flaring out behind in a dainty bustle that swayed as she glided toward him. She wore a hat of matching burgundy cocked forward on her head. It was little more than a confection of stiffened fabric, ribbon and silk flowers, and sure wouldn’t provide any shade like a bonnet would, but he thought it was mighty pretty all the same.

She possessed a milk-and-roses complexion he’d never seen on any woman used to the Texas sun, and lips that put him in mind of a rosebud. The eyes she focused on him were large and the bluest blue he’d ever beheld. Her expression betrayed none of the disgust so exquisite a lady should have shown from looking at such a trail-scruffy character as himself, but surely she was just being polite.

“I...I said, I’m in need of your help, sir,” she said, looking a little uncertain now, the color rising in those lovely cheeks.

He realized he’d been staring at her for several seconds. He started to tip his hat, then realized he was already holding it by the brim in his hand.

“Y-yes, m-ma’am,” he said, realizing he was stammering. Idiot. Not only do you smell like a sweaty old longhorn and look like a saddle bum or worse, but you’re stuttering like you spent the past hour drinking rotgut whiskey. He cleared his throat, and added, “How can I help you?”

She smiled then, and Raleigh was sure he’d died and gone to heaven. Any moment now, he’d be hearing harp music.

“We—that is, my brother and I—” she said, with a nod over her head at Edward “—are on the way to a ranch, but the stagecoach driver was unable to take us the rest of the way. So we were hoping you might be able to direct us to where we might obtain a driver and a carriage to transport ourselves and our baggage....”

Then his brain caught up with his ears, and he realized that the foreign pronunciation of her words was an English accent.

“You folks kin of Mr. Brookfield?” he asked. Nick Brookfield was the only Englishman he knew, and he’d become well acquainted with him on the trail the past couple of months.

Now her face became as radiant as the sun on a spring morning. “Why, yes. You know him?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “We just trailed two thousand head a’ cattle clear to Abilene together.”

Her eyes widened. “All by yourselves?”

He laughed. “No, ma’am. There were ten of us, countin’ the chuckwagon cook.” Modesty prevented him from saying he’d been the trail boss of the outfit.

The man she’d identified as her brother approached now, a pale fellow dressed like a fancy Eastern gent, wearing a bowler and a black frock coat with a brocade vest. He looked suspiciously at Raleigh before addressing his sister.

“Violet, is this man able to help us reach Nicholas’s ranch?”

Violet, that was her name. She looked more like a Rose to him, but he wasn’t about to quibble. Her name was none of his concern, anyway.

“Yes, sir,” he said. He thought about offering his hand, but he was hot and sweaty from a morning of chores, and he didn’t want to dirty the fancy gent’s gloves. “I’m Raleigh Masterson, foreman of the ranch right next to the Brookfields’, Colliers’ Roost. I’d be happy to help you get there. Reckon I could rent a rig at the livery.” Paying for the rental was no problem—he was flush with cash from his profit from the trail drive, and he knew Nick Brookfield would reimburse him if his visiting brother neglected to. Regretfully, he bade goodbye to the idea of a new shirt, bath and shave. At least for now.

“This is my brother, Lord Greyshaw,” Miss Violet said. “And I’m Miss Violet Brookfield, of course.”

He didn’t know why her brother had one last name, and she another, but he figured he could puzzle that out later.

Greyshaw gave him a lordly nod. “Very good of you. We’re much obliged.”

Miss Violet cast a wistful eye back at the hotel. “I was hoping for a bite to eat and a cup of tea while we were in town, Edward. The food at the stagecoach station was abysmal, wasn’t it?”

Raleigh saw her brother shudder in agreement.

“Perhaps you’re right, Violet. It’s still quite a distance to the ranch. If you wouldn’t mind the delay, Mr. Masterson?”

Raleigh saw a way to kill two birds with one stone. “Not at all, sir. And please, call me Raleigh. It’ll take a while for me to get a rig hitched up and load your luggage,” he said, nodding toward the stack of brass-bound trunks sitting in the dust where the driver had left them. “By that time you can have a nice, cozy dinner at the hotel. Meanwhile, no one will bother your trunks here.”

“Won’t you join us, Mr. Masterson?” Miss Violet asked. “I’d love to hear about the trail drive. I’ve never spoken with a real Texas cowboy before.”

There was nothing he’d like better, but her innocent invitation had left Violet’s brother looking like he’d swallowed a horned toad whole. And besides, with them eating a leisurely dinner at the hotel, he’d have time to run over to the livery and tell Calhoun what he needed to rent, knowing the liveryman would hitch up a team for him. While that was happening, he could buy a shirt at the mercantile, have a quick bath and a shave and be back by the time the pretty lady and her brother were done with their meal.

“That’s right kind of you, ma’am, but I’ve eaten,” he said. It wasn’t really a lie—he’d eaten Cookie’s biscuits and gravy at sunup. “I’ll just go arrange a rig while you have some vittles. Take your time, and I’ll have it waiting outside the hotel when y’all are finished.”

There wouldn’t be time to soak in hot soapy water till his fingers got pruney as he’d planned, but that was all right. He’d like to correct the unkempt impression he must have made, even though he knew an aristocratic lady like Miss Violet and he lived on separate planes entirely.

* * *

Violet watched the cowboy walk away, appreciating his easy, long-limbed stride and the way his spurs jingled over his boot heels with every step. Unconsciously, she let out another sigh of feminine appreciation.

“Violet Rose Alicia Brookfield,” sputtered Edward behind her. “Whatever were you thinking to invite the man to dine with us? You mustn’t be so familiar with a man you’ve just met, a mere cowboy. And don’t think I didn’t see the way you looked at him, young lady. I haven’t brought you across an ocean to protect your good name only to see you ruin it within your first few days in Texas. You must think of your position, your—”

“Edward, don’t be pompous,” she said, interrupting his tirade and taking his arm to steer him toward the hotel. She figured he was cranky from hunger. “This is America, after all, and you told me things are much more informal here. Besides, the man just offered to do us a service. I wish he had agreed to dine with us. You know I want to write novels about the West—interviewing a cowboy over a meal would certainly furnish me with ideas.”

“That’s just what I’m afraid of,” Edward muttered.

It wasn’t as if she’d fallen in love at first sight, she told herself, even if the interested look in the depths of Masterson’s dark eyes had sped up her pulse. No, she loved Gerald, and he adored her, as he told her so often. When her time in Texas was over, she’d return to England and they’d be married, just as Gerald had promised.

“You know how I feel about this notion of your being an authoress. You are a lady, Violet, the daughter and sister of a viscount. The nobility does not engage in trade, and selling a manuscript for money certainly constitutes that. I should think you’d understand by now that having your nose in a book all the time has left you naive....”

It had been an oft-repeated refrain on this journey, and one she was too tired and hungry to listen to at the moment. She wanted to think about the cowboy she’d just met, and how she’d describe her book’s hero so that he resembled Raleigh Masterson.

It was hard, being so far away from the man she loved, but she was determined to look on her time in Texas as an adventure. She would be richer in experience when she returned to Gerald, and then they could live happily ever after, she was sure of it.

Chapter Two

They were given the table in front of the bay window at the far end of the restaurant, but Violet knew she was the center of attention in the dining room of the Simpson Creek Hotel.

“Why are they all staring at you?” Edward fumed over his roast beef. “You’d think they’d never seen a lady before.”

“’Tis my modish dress, Edward,” Violet said softly, hoping those at nearby tables hadn’t heard his fussing. “It’s only natural London would be rather ahead of Texas in fashion.” She hadn’t brought any of her Worth gowns, of course, but a glance around at the simple ginghams and calicos she’d seen worn by the women coming out of the businesses and in this establishment told her she might need to obtain some clothing more in line with what she’d seen. Edward, too, was dressed far more formally than the ranchers and travelers who made up most of the diners, but he wouldn’t be staying long enough for it to matter.

“Will you folks have anything else?” their waitress asked then, something sharp in her tone telling Violet she’d overheard her remark about Texas clothing being behind the times.

Oh, dear. She hadn’t meant to say anything derogatory, merely a statement of fact. There was no way to apologize, but at least she probably wouldn’t come in contact with the woman again.

“I’d like a piece of that delicious-looking peach pie,” she said, indicating the dessert a nearby diner was enjoying. She gave the waitress what she hoped was a winning smile, but it did nothing to soften the other woman’s expression. “Why don’t you have some, too, Edward?”

“Really, Violet, I don’t want to dillydally any further in getting out to Nicholas’s ranch,” Edward complained.

“There’s no use being in a hurry, Edward—you can see from here that Mr. Masterson hasn’t returned with the carriage yet,” she said, pointing out the window by their table.

Her brother craned his neck to look both ways out the window. “Bother,” he muttered. “The fellow probably found something more interesting to do and we’ll never see him again. Very well, miss, two pieces of peach pie.”

After the waitress had left, Violet leaned over toward her brother. “Really, Edward, do stop being so critical. It probably takes some time to arrange for the rental of a carriage and hitch up a team of horses. I’m sure Mr. Masterson is hard at work at it this very minute.”

* * *

The cowboy who sat atop the buckboard wagon had undergone a metamorphosis since she’d last seen him. Gone was the beard that had hidden the fine planes of his cheekbones and made him look like an outlaw. The shirt he wore was no longer ripped, stained and dusty, but immaculate. He’d been interesting in appearance before, but merely grist for her writing mill. Now he was handsome.

“Mr. Masterson, you...you’ve transformed yourself,” she said before she thought, and felt the heat of the blush that she knew was pinking her cheeks.

He grinned. Sweeping his hat off with a flourish, he bowed, revealing hair that was still damp, but shiny clean and trimmed. “Why, thank you, Lady Violet,” he said. “I figured it was more’n time to spruce up a little and wash away all that trail dust.”

She smiled back. “You’re welcome, but I’m not ‘Lady’ Violet. Our father was a viscount, one of the ‘lesser’ nobility, you see. I’m merely ‘the Honorable’ Miss Violet Brookfield—but ‘the honorable’ is only in writing. Miss Violet is fine.”

“And ‘Miss Brookfield’ would be even better,” Edward added in a caustic tone. “What is that monstrosity?” he demanded, shifting the direction of his ire and jabbing a lordly finger at the roughhewn wagon Raleigh sat atop. “I assumed you’d arrange for a carriage, Masterson, not some rude freight wagon like this.”

Raleigh blinked at the scorn in Edward’s voice, and Violet could practically see him gathering his reserves of tact.

“I’m sorry, Lord Brookfield—I mean Lord Greyshaw—but Calhoun’s doesn’t have any carriages to rent right now, only a buggy. If I took you in a buggy, there ain’t—isn’t—a way to transport your trunks,” he said, pointing at the luggage that was stacked in the back. “I’m sorry. I know you must be used to much nicer than this buckboard, sir.”

“But where is my sister to sit?” Edward retorted. “Or did you imagine she would sit on one of those trunks? There’s hardly room for all three of us on that seat.”

Violet rather thought it would be delightfully cozy if she could sit next to Raleigh Masterson, and her brother ride out atop one of those hard, brass-bound trunks, but she knew that wouldn’t happen. Nor would she be allowed to ride the roan, which had apparently been left at the livery until his master returned. She wasn’t dressed for riding, anyway, she consoled herself.

“Don’t worry, I’ve made your sister a nice soft place to sit, sir,” Raleigh said, pointing to a pile of furs behind the passenger’s side of the driver’s bench. “Calhoun lent us a buffalo robe.”

“You expect my sister to ride for miles on the hide of a buffalo?” Edward was practically purple with indignation now.

“I shall be fine, Edward,” she said, raising a hand to quell his wrath. “It looks quite soft. How very Western! I’ll enjoy writing home about that. Mr. Masterson, if you would assist me?” she said, extending a hand to him.

He reached out to her, and before Edward could protest further, she had put her booted foot where he indicated and climbed aboard with what she thought was a very creditable grace.

Edward could do nothing but clamber his way onto the other side of the bench seat, grumbling under his breath about the benighted country in which they found themselves.

Violet enjoyed the ride from Simpson Creek southward over the gently rolling land with its blue hills in the distance.

“It’s a beautiful place, your Texas,” she told Raleigh. “I hope I shall get some time to ride out among those hills while I’m here.”

He looked back at her with interest. “You ride, Miss Vi—that is, Miss Brookfield?” he corrected himself hastily, after intercepting another glare from Edward.

“Oh, yes. I love it. In fact, I rode to hounds at home,” she told him.

He looked confused.

“That is, I foxhunted with a pack of hounds back in England. There’s a lot of jumping of hedges and walls and fences as we pursue the fox. It’s great fun.”

He looked startled. “You must be quite a horsewoman,” he said, respect lacing his voice.

She shrugged. “I’ve been riding since my brother Nick first took me up in the saddle, before I was big enough for the pony my brothers had learned to ride on,” she said. “I was just about to get a hunter of my own—that is, as a loan for the season.” She shut her mouth, aware that Edward’s back had gone rigid on the seat ahead of her. He wouldn’t want her to speak about anything related to Gerald.

Perhaps Raleigh sensed that it was an awkward subject, for he was tactful enough not to pursue it. “Yes, it’s pretty country to ride, Miss Brookfield. You should see it in the spring. The bluebonnets are out in mid-March and April, the fields are carpeted in them. It’s just like heaven.”

He loves Texas, she thought, and her heart warmed to him even more. “Those red and gold flowers are glorious,” she said, pointing to a field just ahead.

“Indian blanket and Mexican hat,” he said. “And the pale yellow flowers are primroses. They don’t open till afternoon—”

“Oh! And what is that funny-looking bird there—see it?” A gray-brown bird about the size of a rooster dashed out from a clump of mesquite, spotted them with his pale yellow eyes, then sped ahead in a blur of motion before disappearing into a patch of cactus. She laughed in delight. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid I interrupted you,” she said.

“No problem, ma’am. That was a roadrunner, or some call him a chapparal bird,” Raleigh said. “They’re so quick, they can even kill rattlesnakes and eat them.”

She shuddered. “Oh, dear. I hate snakes. It’s not likely I’ll see any, is it?”

“You might, but they want to avoid you as much as you do them. Out here we make it a point to watch where we walk, though.”

Violet made a mental note to always do exactly that.

He asked Edward questions about their sea voyage then—perhaps out of politeness since he’d been talking to her for so long. Afraid she would forget the names for the flowers and bird Raleigh had just taught her, she reached into her reticule and pulled out her notebook and pencil and began to write them down. She might well need them for her novel.

* * *

It took about an hour to reach Brookfield ranch, and in that hour under the Texas sun, Violet decided her stylish hat was definitely impractical. She could feel her nose and cheeks reddening under the rays as the horses trotted along, and she understood now why the men all wore wide-brimmed hats and the women, bonnets. She had hats with wider brims in one of her trunks, but she hoped her sister-in-law would be able to loan her a bonnet for everyday use, or she’d go back to England brown as an Indian.

And then Raleigh pointed out the wrought-iron arch over the ranch entrance in the distance. They turned off the road onto a long lane that led to a low ranch house built of fieldstone with a roof of shiny tin. Masterson pulled up in a yard between the ranch house and the barn.

A pretty, dark-haired woman came flying out. “Oh, dear heavens, can that be you, Edward? We just read your letter two days ago and learned you were coming!” She caught Edward in an enthusiastic embrace, kissed him on one cheek, then turned back to Violet. “And you must be Violet! I’m Milly, of course—welcome to Brookfield ranch! We’re so happy you’ve come to visit!” she said as she gave Violet the same kind of exuberant hug she’d bestowed on her brother.

Violet smiled back at her sister-in-law, dazed at the warmth of her welcome. We’re so glad you’ve come to visit. There was no guardedness, no tinge of reproach, no hint that Violet’s coming was anything more than a pleasure trip. She was sure her brother had written of the disgrace and scandal that threatened to shadow her name, yet Milly’s blue eyes held nothing but joy at meeting her and seeing Edward once again.

Milly drew back for a moment and called, “Raleigh, thanks so much for bringing them out here! Won’t you come in and have some lemonade?”

Violet hoped he’d agree, for she didn’t know when she’d ever see him again, but he just touched the brim of his hat respectfully and said, “Thanks, but I’d best be moving along. I’ve got to return Calhoun’s wagon and horse. I’ll just bring the trunks inside before I go.”

“Well, at least take a jar of lemonade to wet your whistle on the way. Go on in, y’all, before you faint from the heat—I know you’re not used to it,” she said. “I’m just going to ring the bell so Nick will know you’re here.” Stepping over to a big iron bell hanging from the porch, she pulled on a rope and set up a clanging that made Violet jump and the horses that had pulled the buckboard lurch against the traces. Inside, Violet heard a small child calling.

“Goodness, I’ve woke little Nick up,” Milly said with a chuckle, following behind them. “I reckon he’ll be excited to meet his aunt and uncle.”

The back door led into a spacious kitchen with an iron stove, a long rectangular table and chairs. It was lit only by the sun that filtered through the curtains and relatively cool compared to the outside.

Violet remained at the door to hold it open for Nick while Milly disappeared down a hall to retrieve her child. She returned, carrying a brown-haired toddler who hid his face against his mother’s shoulder at the sight of strangers.

Raleigh brought the first trunk inside.

“Would you take that to the guest room down the hall to the right, please?” Milly asked Raleigh. “Put them all there, and we can sort out whose is whose later.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“This is Richard Nicholas, but we call him Nicky,” Milly told them proudly. “Nicky, this is your Aunt Violet and Uncle Edward. He’ll lose his shyness in a minute or so,” she added when he buried his face once more. “And I can see his father riding in from the north pasture,” she added, shading her eyes with her free hand as she peered out the window in front of the table.

Violet turned, eager to see the brother she hadn’t laid eyes on in five years. He’d come home on leave from India when their father died, but hadn’t returned to England after he’d been drummed out of the Bombay Light Cavalry in a scandal that was none of his own making. Disgraced, he’d gone directly to Texas to serve at the embassy branch in Austin.

Nick had never taken up that post, of course, for he’d ridden up to the hill country first on a lark to meet Milly, the lady who’d placed an advertisement for bachelors to come to Simpson Creek, and had ended up marrying her.

Violet now followed Milly’s pointing finger. First she saw a cloud of dust, then picked out the figure of a man leaning low over the back of a galloping bay. What was it about Texas that made it possible for men to ride as if they were one with the horse like that? The hunt set used a French phrase for it—“ventre à terre.” Would she be able to ride like that by the time she returned to England? Perhaps, once Edward went home, she’d even ride astride.

The daring thought made her smile as she held the door open for Raleigh again. He smiled, too, and looked as if he wanted to say something, but at that moment Nick’s horse reached the yard and slid to a dust-raising halt. Nick shouted her name, and she forgot everything else and ran to embrace the brother she hadn’t seen for so long.

He was older, of course—there were lines crinkling the corners of his eyes, and his hair had gone from pale to tawny gold, with hints of gray at the temples. Even older and weathered by the suns of India and Texas, though, he was still the best-looking of the Brookfield brothers.

“Violet, I’m so happy you’re here!” he said against her hair, hugging her tightly. “I only just found out you were coming when I got back from the trail drive two days ago, and we had no idea when exactly to expect you. Milly’s been in a flurry of making curtains, cleaning and airing out the guest rooms....”

“I’m glad to be here,” she murmured against his chest. “And so pleased to see you again, and meet your lovely wife and your darling son.”

He held her at arm’s length and studied her. “When I left you were still in the schoolroom, and now look at you. You’re all grown-up.” It was half accusation, half loving observation.

She glanced over her shoulder to see if Edward was coming out, but he wasn’t. Thankful her eldest brother was giving her a moment for a private reunion with Nick, she turned back to him. “Yes, and now I’ve taken your position as the black sheep of the family, dear brother,” she said ruefully. “I’m sure Edward told you all about it in the letter—how he had to spirit me out of England to restore the good name of the family, just ahead of the scandal that was brewing.” She spoke lightly, but even she could hear the bitterness tingeing her tone. She hugged Nick again. “Edward doesn’t believe an older man could love me honorably, but Gerald—the Earl of Lullington, that is—does, I know he does. You must believe me, Nick!” she cried, looking pleadingly up into his yes.

“We’ll sort it all out, Vi,” he promised, using the nickname he’d given her when she was a baby. “As one black sheep to another, I promise you, it’s going to turn out all right.”

Tears sprang to her eyes as she returned his gaze, and she remembered why, of all her brothers, she had always loved this one best. When Nick promised, he always came through. He’d rescued her from innumerable scrapes when they were growing up, and now she believed he would do so again.

“Edward was so angry when we sailed,” she told Nick. “Amelia said if it had been a generation ago, he would have challenged Gerald to a duel. Even Richard told me he was disappointed in me,” she added, referring to their other brother, who was vicar of Westfield. “But, Nick, Gerald never did anything improper—on my honor, he didn’t! We only just kissed....” She felt herself blushing, remembering how close she’d come to ruin after Edward had stopped them from eloping to France. They’d get married in a little chapel in Paris, Gerald had promised, and it would be so romantic. Once they crossed the channel, her brother could do nothing to keep them apart, for she would be his wife. A widower, he’d had many love affairs before her, but Gerald insisted she was the love of his life.

“We’ll have plenty of time to talk about that, little sister,” Nick told her. “For now, let me thank Raleigh.”

She released him and watched as Nick strode over to Masterson and shook his hand.

“Much obliged to you for bringing them here, Raleigh,” she heard him say. “How’d you manage that? We weren’t sure when they’d arrive.”

“Happy to do it, Nick,” Raleigh assured him. He shrugged. “It just so happened I got to town right after that rascally stagecoach driver from Lampasas refused to take them to the ranch. Well, I’d better get going—I’ve got chores waiting.”

She marveled at their informality. Nick was a ranch owner, and Raleigh merely an employee at the neighboring ranch, but there was no standing on ceremony in Texas, no order of precedence to worry about. No “my lord,” and “my lady.” Yes, she was going to like it here.

“Goodbye, Miss Brookfield,” Raleigh said, fingering the brim of his hat again. “Reckon I’ll see you around, too, bein’ as we’re neighbors and all. Maybe you’ll be at church come Sunday?”

She blinked in surprise. This handsome cowboy attended church? Her own churchgoing consisted of listening to the local vicar droning on and on from the raised pulpit in the centuries-old Norman chapel at home. Gerald boasted of never attending divine service, preferring to sleep late after nights at card parties and balls during the Season. She could not imagine Raleigh in a fancy frock coat and hat such as gentlemen wore in England when attending church.

“Perhaps,” she murmured, wondering if Milly and Nick rode all that way from the ranch to the small church she’d seen in Simpson Creek every Sunday.

“And you’ll have to meet the ladies of the Spinsters’ Club. They’re nice, and they’ll enjoy making your acquaintance, too.”

It would be nice to make some friends while she was here, Violet thought. “I look forward to meeting them,” she told Raleigh. And seeing you again. If Raleigh was half as good-looking in a frock coat as he was in everyday cowboy clothing, he would provide quite an inspirational figure for her novel.

That wasn’t being disloyal to Gerald, was it?

Chapter Three

Raleigh was thoughtful as he drove the wagon back into town and retrieved Blue from the livery. The Honorable Miss Violet Brookfield—he grinned at the fanciful title—was certainly the most beautiful lady he’d ever clapped eyes on, from the tip of her dainty laced-up boots to the fetching hat atop her golden hair.

He wondered how long she’d be visiting the Brookfields, and whether her dragon of a brother was staying as long as she was. The oh-so-proper Englishman sure hadn’t liked his sister talking to the likes of him. Not that he blamed the fellow. If he had a sister as beautiful as Miss Violet, he reckoned he’d watch her like a hawk, too. He knew there were plenty of men who’d be so tempted by her that they’d do anything to possess her, even for a little while.

On the trail to Abilene and back, Nick Brookfield had never mentioned his privileged background or put on airs, but it had been obvious from the viscount and his sister’s clothing and speech that the English Brookfields were as wealthy as they were aristocratic. But Miss Violet had that same lack of pretentiousness that Nick had, Raleigh thought. Just look at how she had come right up to him in town, smiling at him as if he was some knight in shining armor when he’d agreed to help them.

He glanced down at his clothing and chuckled. Even considering his new shirt, his clothing was about as far from shining armor as it could get.

With her wealth and beauty, Violet Brookfield would be a prize for some lucky gent back home in England. She’d probably left a string of beaux there, if not one special suitor. Yet she was no flirt. Raleigh sensed an innocence about her that was very appealing to him.

It didn’t matter, though, because they were of completely different worlds. He was just a cowboy, even if he had risen to trail boss and foreman of Colliers’ Roost. He got a little more pay than the rest of the Colliers’ Roost cowhands, but he slept in the bunkhouse same as they did.

A lot of cowboys never married, and the only women they were comfortable around were the ones in saloons and worse. But Raleigh had decided those women weren’t an option for him—not after that stampede just before they reached Abilene. The Lord had been trying to get Raleigh’s attention for quite a while—during the turmoil and danger of the war, in which he’d fought for the Confederacy, and in that incident when he’d nearly been hanged for something he didn’t do in Blanco. But He’d finally succeeded in the midst of the stampede that had changed Raleigh’s life forever.

Violet Brookfield would return to England one day. In the meantime, he’d have to be content to see her at church, or on the rare occasions that the Brookfields visited their neighbors, the Colliers. It would have to be enough.

And yet he longed to have a wife and children and a piece of land to call his own. His brushes with death had given him a hunger for something more permanent than the life he’d been living.

Maybe someday he could find a Texas version of the Englishwoman. But in the meantime, he thought about what Miss Violet had said about her love of riding.

She’d need a horse for the time she was here, and from what he knew of the Brookfield horses, none would suit her. It was a well-known fact that Milly’s Ruby wouldn’t let anyone on her back but Milly. But he thought he might just have the solution to her need—and it would be the perfect excuse to see her again.

* * *

“Edward, your letter troubled me, of course,” Nick said that night after Violet and Milly had gone to bed, and the two men were alone in the comfortable parlor. “I wanted to sail to England and beat the fellow into a bloody pulp. He’d already begun this sort of behavior when I was on furlough from India, as I recall.”

“Yes...but these are modern times, and one can’t merely get out the dueling pistols, select a second and show up on some patch of green at dawn to blow a hole in the cad,” Edward said.

“Pity,” Nick agreed, knowing his eldest brother’s dry wit was a shield for the protective fury he felt because the scoundrel had come close to ruining their innocent younger sister.

Nick began, “You don’t think—”

“That the blasted roué had already seduced her?” Edward finished for him. “No, I don’t, though it was a close thing. Violet’s incensed at me, of course, for making her give back the hunter and separating the two of them by an ocean.

“I’m sure she thinks I’m worrying over nothing,” Edward went on, “as she firmly believes Gerald Lullington’s blather, even though I could give her chapter and verse on Lullington’s amours.”

“You don’t believe Lullington would dare come to Texas in pursuit of Violet, do you?”

Edward gave a bark of mirthless laughter. “It’s far more likely that upon my return home I’ll hear that he’s already hot on the trail of another impressionable, gullible young miss with a sufficient fortune to repair his tumbledown wreck of a castle and pay off his debts at the gaming establishments in London. He still needs an heir, you know—that sickly lad of his isn’t likely to make old bones. Still, in the unlikely event he did show up here, I know I may count on you to take care of the matter.”

“Indeed. He’d never even get close,” Nick promised, looking Edward in the eye.

“Good man.” Edward steepled his fingers and looked thoughtful. “I don’t think she’ll do anything foolish while she’s here, Nick. She’s expressed excitement about being in Texas—fancies herself an authoress, you know. Wants to write novels about the Old West. Who knows if she’ll succeed, but I’d vastly prefer her having the reputation of being a bluestocking to her being one of the blasted earl’s many ruined conquests. I think this time in Texas will be good for her, and she’ll return to England having realized what a big mistake she nearly made.”

* * *

My love for Gerald is not a mistake, Violet thought, frozen in the hallway only a few feet away. She clapped a hand over her own mouth to smother the impulse to storm in and inform Edward just how wrong he was about Gerald. She’d been padding down the hallway in her bare feet on the way to the kitchen for a glass of water and approached the parlor just in time to overhear Edward and Nick talking about her.

It wouldn’t do any good to argue with Edward again, she thought miserably. She knew her brother loved her and wanted only her good, but he was completely mistaken about Gerald. Edward didn’t believe a man such as Gerald could be changed by love, but Gerald had changed. She was sure of it. Why would he have given her a ring, if he hadn’t meant to love her only and forever? She felt for it now on its golden chain beneath her nightgown and wrapper, and was reassured by the solid feel of it. It wasn’t the big Lullington signet ring with its cabochon ruby, but a smaller copy he’d had as a boy that would fit her smaller finger. Of course she hadn’t dared to wear it openly, and Edward didn’t suspect she had it.

She heard Nick ask Edward if he thought it possible Gerald would come after her.

How romantic, if Gerald followed her across the Atlantic and stole her away! It would be like some medieval knight storming his enemy’s castle walls to rescue his chosen bride.

In her heart, though, she knew Gerald wouldn’t do so. He couldn’t, poor dear. Her brothers thought she didn’t know her love’s financial condition, but she did. He couldn’t afford to leave England right now while his business affairs were so time-consuming. He’d had some setbacks, true, but he’d given up gambling for her sake and was well on the way to restoring his fortune. He’d told her he would use the time they were parted to solidify his holdings and do some redecorating of Lullington Castle so it would be a fitting residence for her when she arrived there as his bride.

She’d be happy to give him control of her money when they were married. They’d use it to make his string of racehorses the pride of England. They’d win the Epsom Derby and every other race, and perhaps even come to America to compete. The Lullington stud would be world-famous for breeding champion racehorses and hunters.

She’d give Nick and Milly no cause for worry while she was here, Violet resolved. She and Gerald would bide their time, and when she returned to England, their reunion would be gloriously romantic. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, doesn’t it? They’d write beautiful, romantic letters, and their love would blossom on the pages they exchanged.

She only hoped Nick wouldn’t make it difficult for her to mail them. She’d manage, after Edward departed, even if she had to use all her ingenuity. After all, she had enough money for postage, if not to book passage back home. She’d spotted the post office when they’d driven through Simpson Creek.

Violet was about to tiptoe back to her room so her eavesdropping wouldn’t be discovered, but then she heard Nick ask, “So, how long can you stay with us? The longer, the better, for Milly adores you, of course, and loves having company, but I know Amelia will be missing you.”

Edward sighed. “Only until Saturday, I’m afraid. I trust you won’t mind conveying me back to Lampasas Saturday afternoon for the stagecoach? It leaves at the awful hour of six Sunday morning back to Austin. I’ve some business to conduct in New York before I sail home, and I’m to present a bill in the House of Lords.... By the by, Amelia and I wish you could come home for a visit one day, you know.”

“I’d like that, too, someday. Money’s still a bit tight, though we made a handsome profit on the cattle in Abilene, thanks to Raleigh Masterson, the fellow who brought you out here. He was in charge of the trail drive—the ‘trail boss,’ as the others called him.”

“He mentioned something about that,” Edward remarked.

“He knows longhorns,” Nick said, respect in his voice. “They’re the wiliest, most unpredictable and contrary beasts alive, but he knew how to handle them.”

“I believe he found our sister quite captivating,” Edward said then, an edge to his voice. “He looked at her as if she was Venus reborn.”

He had? Violet found herself grinning in the darkness. She’d thought she’d seen admiration in Raleigh Masterson’s eyes, but to hear her brother put it the way he had was even more thrilling. Not that she wanted any man but Gerald, of course, but any girl would be flattered to know a man like Raleigh appreciated her.

“He’d have to be blind not to,” Nick said. “Violet was all eyes and legs, like a spindly filly, when I was last home, but she’s grown quite beautiful. Puts me in mind of that portrait of Mother that hangs on the landing at Greyshaw Hall.”

“She does favor Mother, doesn’t she? But you’re saying I needn’t worry about Masterson pressing...shall we say ‘inappropriate attentions’ on Violet once I leave?” Edward asked.

Again, she heard that edge in his voice.

“Raleigh? Of course not.”

Edward gave an inelegant snort. “He’s not a saint, is he? Any man could be tempted by a lovely female, lady or not, and Violet can be impulsive, you know. She walked directly up to him in the street.”

Again, Violet had to suppress the urge to dash into the parlor and read Edward the riot act, but she checked herself. It was true that an eavesdropper never hears any good about oneself. And she wanted to hear how Nick would respond.

“I might have agreed with you before we went on the cattle drive, Edward,” Nick said. “Drovers are known to be rather a wild lot, especially when they get to town after a long cattle drive. But something happened to Raleigh on the trail...something that’s changed him. For the better.”

“Oh? What’s that?”

“Why don’t you ask him yourself, if you see him again before you leave?”

“Perhaps I shall, if the opportunity presents itself. But for now, I think I’ll seek my bed. Between the stagecoach and that buckboard wagon, I feel jolted into powder.”

Nick chuckled. “I imagine you do. But then you are getting along in years, brother....”

“You always were an impertinent pup.” It was affectionately said.

Violet barely had time to scramble silently back to her room and close the door as quietly as she could before she heard the two men enter the hallway she’d just left. She had to stifle a giggle. How embarrassing it would have been if they’d caught her listening to them talking about her.

She waited till later, after the house had grown quiet again, to go get the glass of water she’d wanted. In the meantime, she entertained herself by wondering what had happened on the trail drive to change Raleigh Masterson “for the better,” as Nick had said. Perhaps she’d ask him about that, if they got a chance to talk again.

Whatever it was, it hadn’t affected Masterson’s ability to know a pretty woman when he saw one, she thought, smiling in the dark.

Later, her thirst quenched, she mentally planned a letter to Gerald. She’d tell him all about their journey, and the exotic flora and fauna she’d seen, and the beautiful blue roan stallion the cowboy had ridden. She’d write nothing at all about the cowboy himself, of course. There was no point in making Gerald fear he had a rival for her affections, after all. Raleigh Masterson would merely be the model for her book’s hero, and what a hero he would make! He would fairly light up the pages of her manuscript.

It wasn’t Gerald who appeared in her dreams that night, though. It was Raleigh Masterson.

* * *

Violet first felt a tentative touch on her cheek, so light a moth’s wing might have made it. She started to brush it away, thinking a moth might well have landed on her in the night, but before she could, she felt a more insistent poke, like that made by a small child’s finger. A sticky finger, at that. She caught the scent of strawberries.

“Mornin’, An’ Vi’let,” a childish voice said by her ear.

Violet opened a tentative eye to see little Nick staring at her, his face only inches from hers. She’d fallen asleep with her arm hanging over the edge of the bed, and now her nephew stood right by her, watching her curiously.

Sunlight streamed through the east-facing window, little hindered by the sheer muslin curtains, illuminating the jam smeared on both of the child’s cheeks. His brown hair was tousled.

“Good morning, little Nick,” she said, amused by the sight of him. “Already had breakfast, have you?”

He scowled. “Not lil’. Big boy,” he informed her.

Just then Milly bustled into the room. “So that’s where you’ve gotten, Nicky! I’m so sorry, Violet. I told Nicky he had to be quiet out in the kitchen because his aunt was sleeping, and when I went to get a cloth to wipe his face, he took that as a hint he was to come wake you.”

“It’s all right,” Violet assured her. “I normally don’t sleep past dawn.”

“You must have been tired after your journey,” Milly said, then chuckled. “The last time I went somewhere in a stagecoach, I thought my brains would rattle right out of my head.”

“An’ Vi’let ’wake!” crowed little Nick.

“Yes, she is, thanks to you,” agreed his mother. “Now come with me and let me wipe off your face and hands, Nicky. I declare, you have more jam on your face than you swallowed. Violet, come out to the kitchen for breakfast when you’re ready. No need to hurry.”

Violet smiled as she watched them go. She quite liked Milly, she’d decided. Her brother had chosen well. Such a romantic story, his coming to this part of Texas to meet the woman who had placed a newspaper advertisement for eligible bachelors, and losing his heart to her. To think she’d been running the ranch with only her sister and a few cowboys before that! She must have had considerable spirit to have coped with it all. The very day Nick had arrived in Simpson Creek, Edward told her, the ranch had suffered a savage Indian attack. It was just as exciting as the novel she planned to write.

Little Nick was appealing, too, she decided. He had his father’s smile and adventurousness, but his dark eyes were shaped just like Milly’s. Hearing him call her “An’ Vi’let” had quite won her heart.

Hearing her brothers’ voices in the kitchen, she decided to get dressed rather than appear in her nightgown and wrapper. She picked the simplest dress she’d brought, a flower-sprigged cotton more suited to the heat of Texas than her traveling ensemble yesterday had been. She twisted her long blond hair into a knot at her nape.

“Good morning,” she wished them all when she entered the kitchen and seated herself at the long, rough-hewn table.

Nick looked up from the newspaper he’d been showing Edward. “Good morning, Violet. I hope you found your room comfortable?”

“Perfectly,” she replied. It was certainly different from her tower room at home with its flocked wallpaper and Aubusson carpet and the ancient, canopied bed. But she rather liked the guest room’s simple whitewashed walls, the bed with its brass-railed headboard, blue-ticking mattress and muslin sheets. By the bed, there was a braided-rag rug she suspected Milly had made herself. There were pegs on the wall for some of her dresses, a chiffonier for her other clothing. By the bed stood a small table with a lamp, a basin and ewer, and Milly had brought in a vase full of the same pretty Indian paintbrush flowers she had seen on the ride out from town.

“Thank you, Milly,” she murmured now as her sister-in-law placed a plateful of scrambled eggs, bacon and toast in front of her. “I trust you slept well, Edward? You and Nick didn’t stay up talking too late?” she inquired innocently.

“I slept very well,” he said.

Was there suspicion in his eyes? Had he heard that floorboard creak just before she’d reached her room?

She ate her breakfast in silence, listening to the two men talk about politics in England, but just as Edward finished verbally dissecting Disraeli, Violet heard the sound of hoofbeats approaching the house from the direction of the road. She lifted an edge of the curtains back just in time to see Raleigh Masterson dismounting from his blue roan. Violet felt her pulse quicken at the sight of the good-looking cowboy.

He held a rope attached to the halter of another horse, too, a striking black-and-white piebald perhaps a hand shorter than his mount. As she watched, he tied the rope to the hitching post by the house.

Milly glanced out the window, too. “Well, well...if it isn’t your driver from yesterday,” she murmured, eyeing Violet, who strove mightily to look as if the arrival of Masterson held not the least importance.

“Mornin’, everyone,” Raleigh said as he came through the door, but his eyes went directly to Violet.

“Good morning, Mr. Masterson,” she said. “I thought you’d be hard at work already, busting broncos,” she said lightly. “Isn’t that what they call horse breaking here in Texas?”

He grinned. “So you’ve been picking up the Western lingo,” he said. “No, at the moment we’ve no broncs to bust. But you’ll want a horse to ride, and after asking your brother ’bout an hour ago if it was all right—” he nodded at Nick “—I decided to bring over a horse from my own string I thought might be perfect for you while you’re here. Why don’t you come see her and tell me what you think?”

He’d brought the piebald mare for her.

Violet scrambled out of her seat with unladylike haste and fairly flew to the door and threw it open. Then she whirled and looked back at the smiling cowboy.

“You’re not joking with me, are you? Oh, Raleigh, she’s lovely!” Violet cried, forgetting she shouldn’t address him by his first name in front of Edward. She started to run outside, but realized she must not frighten a strange horse by dashing at it and squealing.

The mare looked up from the grass she had been nibbling, faced Violet with calm, kind eyes and nickered, her ears pricked toward her.

Violet approached slowly. “Oh, yes, you are lovely, aren’t you?” she crooned, reaching up a hand to stroke the horse’s velvety nose. The horse snuffled softly, seeming to savor her touch, then stamped her hoof.

“She likes sweets,” Raleigh said, following her outside. The others had come, too, but remained under the sheltered porch. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, then unfolded it to reveal a couple of lumps of sugar.

Violet took them from him and offered them to the mare on her flattened palm. She smiled as the horse lipped the lumps delicately from her hand. “Oh, you like that, don’t you?” she said. She loved the horse’s bold coloring. The mare’s head was all black but for a narrow blaze, and her body was black, too, but with big white irregularly shaped patches scattered over her shoulders and flanks.

She stroked her neck, and the mare responded by arching it proudly.

“Are we friends now? Oh, Raleigh, I like her! What is she called? Where does she come from?”

“Lady. She was one of my string of horses on the trail drive, so I know she’s well-trained and reliable. I’d be right proud for you to borrow her while you’re here, Miss Violet.”

“Lady,” Violet repeated, and the horse bobbed her head as if to agree. “You know your name, don’t you? She looks like an Indian pony,” she said. “I’ve heard they favor piebald horses.”

“Yes, but we Texans use the Spanish term pinto, or paint, not piebald. You can use that saddle, there,” Nick said, pointing to a lady-size stock saddle that straddled the porch railing farther down.

Violet darted a look at Edward. His eyes were narrowed and his mouth a thin tight line.

“Ladies do not ride astride,” he proclaimed indignantly. “It’s not decent. She needs a sidesaddle.”

But Milly had come out behind him, and held out a divided skirt. “Violet can be perfectly respectable in this. It’s mine, but you can use it until I can make you one of your own, Violet.”

“You’re too kind,” Violet said, amazed at her sister-in-law’s generosity. “But I’m afraid I’d be keeping you from riding. That’s your saddle, isn’t it?”

Milly smiled. “I don’t get much chance to ride these days, what with Nicky, here,” she said, nodding at the boy, who was holding on to her skirt. “And keeping house and all. But if I do, I’m just as apt to hop on Ruby, out yonder—” she pointed at a red roan mare in the corral by the barn “—bareback.” She grinned at Edward. “Sorry if I’ve scandalized you, dear brother-in-law. Nick was a little surprised, too, until he saw how much fun it was to ride double, bareback.” She winked at Violet.

Violet couldn’t help grinning back. She saw that Nick was smiling as if at a fond memory, and she became newly aware of how much in love these two still were. It was the kind of love she yearned to experience herself. She and Gerald would have that kind of love someday, she promised herself.

Edward just shook his head and shrugged. “I suppose that would be all right, but don’t plan on bringing these hoydenish Texas ways home with you, Violet.” His lips curved upward, though, as he nodded toward Milly, which softened his words.

“I can’t wait to try her. Might I do that this morning, Raleigh? If I’m not keeping you from things you need to attend to, that is?”

He nodded. “The boss gave me the morning off. There’s nothing that can’t wait. I’ll just take her out to the barn and tack her up while you change your clothes.”

“Oh, no, I want to saddle her,” Violet said. “I don’t wish to cause you more work, and a proper horsewoman prepares her own mount. I merely need you to show me where everything is kept in the stable and make sure I do it correctly the first time, since it’s a new type of saddle to me.” She’d done her own saddling and bridling at Greyshaw once she persuaded the stable boys her brother would never know. She realized that by saying so, she revealed the fact that she had taken over the stableboy’s job at home, but it was too late to retract her statement now. And seeing the approval in Raleigh’s eyes, she didn’t even want to.

“I’ll just be a moment,” she said, taking the skirt from Milly.

Half an hour later, wearing the divided skirt and a floppy-brimmed straw hat Milly had loaned her to protect her complexion, Violet had bridled and saddled Lady herself under Raleigh’s tutelage. She’d found the Western saddle a lot heavier than its English counterpart, and harder to lift gently onto the mare’s back, but Lady stood calmly as she did so. She patiently swished her tail as Raleigh taught Violet how to tighten and secure the girth, then she dropped her head and accepted the bridle with grave dignity.

“Oh, you are a lady, aren’t you? I can see how you got your name,” Violet cooed at her, and Lady again favored her with a friendly look from her deep, dark eyes. Violet was already halfway in love with this horse, and if the mare’s manners when ridden matched her behavior when merely being petted, she’d be a fabulous mount indeed.

“This mare has a soft mouth, Miss Violet,” Raleigh said. “You’ll never need a whip or spurs with this horse, just your knees and heels, and not much of the latter. Western horses usually neck rein, rather than bit rein,” he added, making gestures to show her that she’d hold the reins in one hand instead of two, with the pressure against the neck of the horse, rather than pulling the rein in the direction one wished to go. “That’s because cowboys often have to use the other hand to throw a rope, or shoot a gun,” he added matter-of-factly.

Violet nodded, absorbing all this. No doubt these details would come in handy for her manuscript.

Lady was not as tall as a thoroughbred, so Violet didn’t need a mounting block. Just as well, for she didn’t see one anywhere.

“You can put her through her paces in that open stretch just beyond the corral,” Raleigh suggested, and settled himself on the top rail to watch.

She found everything the cowboy had said about the mare was true. She was a “sweet goer,” as the hunting set would have said, responding to the lightest of neck and knee pressure to change direction as Violet directed her. She walked and backed and did figures-of-eight with the merest of cues. Her trot was smooth—which was fortunate, since Raleigh told her cowboys “sat the trot,” rather than posting. Her canter had an easy, rocking-horse quality to it.

When she and Lady came near the house again, Violet saw that Raleigh was still perched on the corral fence, watching her ride, and he’d been joined by Milly and her brothers, though Edward stood rather than sit on the top rail. She felt suddenly self-conscious, and checked to make sure her heels were down, her posture correct.

But she saw nothing but admiration in his eyes.

“Well, what did you think of her?” Raleigh asked after she’d ridden Lady over to the corral and dismounted.

“She’s perfect! So smooth and well-mannered. I’ll love riding her while I’m here.”

“Be careful, Raleigh, or she’ll try and talk you out of that horse by the end of her visit,” advised Nick wryly.

Violet grinned, finding the idea of showing off the piebald—pinto, she corrected herself—mare in England even more appealing than the blue roan had been. The hunt would be scandalized at the horse’s gaudy color, and she’d be a sensation. She’d start a fashion for paint ponies.

“Perhaps we could work out a trade,” Nick said with a wink. “Greyshaw’s best thoroughbred for one Indian pony.”

Edward snorted. “Highly unlikely. Where’d you learn horse trading, brother?”

“Well, I suppose I’d better get started on the noon meal,” Milly said. “I left beans simmering, but the rest of it sure won’t cook itself. Raleigh, don’t be a stranger,” she said, waving at the cowboy and turning to go back to the kitchen.

“I won’t—oh, hey, Miss Milly, I nearly forgot. Miss Caroline wanted me to ask y’all to come over to have supper with them tonight. I’d told them about the arrival of Nick’s English family, and they were eager to meet them, if y’all hadn’t any other plans, that is.”

“Why, that would be purely delightful!” Milly exclaimed. “Violet, you’ll love the Colliers. Raleigh, tell Miss Caroline we’ll start over about five, all right?”

Violet released the breath she’d been holding until Milly gave her answer, but hid the delight surging through her. She’d get another chance to see Raleigh—twice in the same day! She firmly squelched the voice within her that said it shouldn’t matter.

“Yes, ma’am.” He fingered the brim of his hat to Milly.

Now it was safe, and even appropriate, to smile up at him. “Raleigh, thank you so much for the loan of your horse,” she said. “I promise I’ll take good care of Lady.”

“You’re a right fine rider, Miss Violet,” he said, touching the brim of his cap to her.

His compliment warmed her, for she sensed this man didn’t give them lightly.

“Thank you,” she said. She wanted to add, “I’ll see you later, Raleigh,” but Edward was still present, and besides, she had no way of knowing if the foreman of the Colliers’ ranch took his meals with his employer and his wife, or not.

But one could hope so, she thought as she watched Raleigh mount and canter away. Oh, yes, she certainly hoped so.

Chapter Four

She should go help Milly prepare the meal, Violet thought after Raleigh and his roan had disappeared down the road. But a proper horsewoman always saw to her mount’s unsaddling, unbridling and rubbing-down before anything else.

“I’ll take care of her for you, Miss Violet,” a voice said from behind her, and she turned to see a towheaded, lanky young cowboy coming from the direction of the bunkhouse. He blushed as she focused on him, but continued gamely, “I’m Bobby Gibson, one of the cowhands. I’m sure you’ll meet the rest later, but they’re all out in the fields, tendin’ th’ stock, ’ceptin’ my uncle Josh, and he’s cookin’ beans and biscuits in the bunkhouse.”

“Nice to meet you, Bobby,” she said. “And I’ll take advantage of your kind offer, this once, since today I should like to help Milly with the cooking.”

After giving Lady a last pat, she washed her hands at the outside pump. How could water in such a hot sunny climate be so cold? It must be a very deep well indeed.

At Greyshaw, she would have nothing more to do than plan her ensemble and daydream about the coming evening until the bell for luncheon rang, Violet thought while she changed her clothes. But perhaps if she kept herself busy, the hours until she could see the handsome cowboy would not be so endless. Besides, she didn’t want to look like Nick’s spoiled, lazy sister while his wife worked so hard.

Finding her sister-in-law in the kitchen, she said, “Please, may I help you? I’d quite like to.” Would Milly allow it? At home, Cook ruled the roost in the Greyshaw kitchens and no “outsiders”—even the family who paid her salary—were welcome in her little bailiwick.

Milly looked surprised, but she smiled. “You don’t have to, but I’d welcome the company. Go tie on that spare apron over yonder,” she said, pointing to that item hanging from a hook on the wall.

“I must confess I’m totally out of my element here,” she admitted to Milly. “Cook’s quite the dictator belowstairs at home. But I would love to learn to cook, especially Texas specialties.”

“Well, Texas cooking is pretty uncomplicated compared to what you’re probably used to,” Milly said, “but we also eat a lot of dishes the first settlers picked up from the Mexicans. Today we’re having one of those—enchiladas. And the beans I started earlier, too.”

In no time, Violet learned to brown the meat, roll it up in the soft tortillas and lay them next to one another in a pair of rectangular baking pans, then mix the spicy sauce and pour it over the rolled-up tortillas. Milly sprinkled on some cheese and stuck the dishes into the oven to bake.

“Does Bobby’s uncle Josh do all the cooking for the cowboys?” Violet asked while they set the table. What they had prepared was clearly only enough for the family.

“Most of it, though I took him some of the beans earlier, and when I bake bread I share the loaves with them. He’s been the foreman here since I was a little girl, but now that he’s getting along in years, the other men do most of the work and he just supervises and handles the cooking. He cooks a lot of chili and ‘son-of-’—that is, um...I suppose we should call it ‘cowboy stew.’ The actual title is most unsuitable for a lady’s ears. I guess I’ve developed some careless habits of speech out here with all these rough men.”

Violet grinned. She loved Milly’s genuineness and lack of airs.

They drank cold tea while they waited for the enchiladas to cook. It didn’t take long for the appetizing aroma to pervade the kitchen. Edward wandered back in from a stroll around the ranch and sat down with them.

“Mmm,” Violet breathed. “If that dish tastes as good as it smells, I believe I’ll take the recipe home and teach Cook a thing or two.

“It wouldn’t hurt the old tyrant to add to her cooking repertoire,” Edward agreed. “I had them when I was here before and found the dish quite tasty.”

* * *

On the way home from the Brookfields’ ranch, Raleigh decided not to join the others at the Colliers’ table tonight, but to keep to his normal practice of taking his meals with the rest of the men in the bunkhouse. He’d never felt he was superior to those over whom he’d been made foreman—he’d been one of them until his boss had promoted him. Cookie’s grub suited him fine, as a rule.

Of course, he had a standing invitation to meals with Jack and his wife whenever he wanted to join them, and he did so when he had ranch business to discuss with his boss. He figured if he’d been sparking one of the Simpson Creek girls, Miss Caroline would be more than happy to promote the romance by inviting them both to supper.

But Miss Violet—Lady Violet, as he liked to think of her—was no local girl. And while he could invite himself for a meal with the Colliers anytime he liked, sitting down at supper where Miss Violet and her brother were the guests of honor would be a whole different matter. The Englishwoman’s proper, stuffy brother would glare at him like he was a skunk at a picnic. And he wasn’t sure Nick Brookfield would be pleased to know Raleigh was attracted to his sister, either. He’d taken to Texas like a duck to water, but he probably had higher ambitions for Violet—like marriage to a duke, if not a prince.

So he’d make himself scarce when the Brookfields came calling at Colliers’ Roost at suppertime. Perhaps he’d get to see Lady Violet out riding his mare one day. And for now he could remember how she had blushed with pleasure when he had complimented her riding.

What he wouldn’t give to be the one to make her blush like that on a regular basis. Dream on, cowboy.

* * *

Violet couldn’t remember when she’d enjoyed an evening more. Caroline Wallace Collier was a natural hostess, and soon even Edward was smiling and praising her cooking. And when Caroline, who’d been the town schoolteacher until she’d married Jack Collier, discovered Violet was an avid reader, she’d begun talking about books a mile a minute, asking Violet what she’d read, offering to loan volumes from her library and asking if Violet had brought any reading with her.

“Only one, I’m afraid, Wilkie Collins’s new novel, The Moonstone, and I read it on the voyage,” Violet said, remembering how Edward had bustled her aboard the ship with but a few days to pack. There hadn’t been time to order new books from her favorite store in London. “You’re welcome to borrow it, of course.”

“How wonderful! I’ve read his other novel, The Woman in White. In return I will loan you part one of a marvelous book, Little Women, by an American author, Louisa May Alcott, also published this year. I like her writing, even if she is a Yankee,” she added with a laugh.

“You’re very kind,” Violet murmured, charmed by the other woman’s enthusiasm.

“Not at all,” Caroline said. “It’s too rare that I have a chance to get my hands on a new book—or a new friend.”

“Mama’s always reading,” piped up one of the Colliers’ pretty blue-eyed, black-haired twin girls. Violet wasn’t sure if it was Abigail or Amelia.

The other girl chimed in. “Yeah, and if we’re very good, Mama reads to us at bedtime.”

“You know, in England you two ladies would be called ‘bluestockings,’” Edward commented wryly. “I’m sure Violet won’t mind if I tell you she’s an aspiring novelist, as well.”

Caroline’s eyes widened. “Is that right, Violet? How fascinating! What do you write about?”

“The American West, actually.”

“You don’t say! Tell me about your story,” Caroline invited.

“I—I haven’t got very far as yet, because I felt I didn’t know enough about the area,” Violet had to admit. “Other than that there will be a romance in it. I plan to gather details while I’m here—scenery, clothing, that sort of thing. Your Mr. Masterson was kind enough to tell me the names of some of the wildflowers yesterday, and that the bird we saw was a roadrunner,” she said, trying to sound casual as she mentioned his name.

She missed the quick look Edward darted at Nick.

“Oh, yes, our Raleigh knows the country,” Caroline said. “Most of these fellows could live off the land if they needed to, so they know their surroundings. Well, be sure and let me know if I can answer any questions....”

Where is Raleigh? would have been her first question, if she dared. The addition of the handsome Texan at the table was the only thing that would have made the evening more complete. Violet hadn’t realized how much she had been counting on seeing him until she didn’t catch even a glimpse of the rugged cowboy at Colliers’ Roost. When they arrived in the buckboard, it had been another cowhand who’d emerged from the barn to see to their horse.

Where could he be keeping himself?

* * *

“See? I told you you’d enjoy meeting the Colliers,” Milly remarked as they waved goodbye to their hosts and the wagon carried them away from the house.

“Yes, Caroline was very kind,” Violet agreed, clutching the volume of Little Women that their hostess had lent her as the wagon lurched over a dip in the road. “And her husband is so handsome—just what one pictures when one thinks of a Western rancher.”

“Yes...how those two fell in love is quite a story,” Milly responded with a smile. “Caroline was engaged to marry his brother Pete, you see, but he died during the influenza epidemic a couple years ago. Then, after Caroline became the schoolmarm, Jack turned up with his twin girls, not knowing his brother had passed away. Jack was a widower, and had been planning on driving his cattle to Montana, and wanted his brother and Caroline to keep the girls till he could send for them. He ended up wintering here. He and Caroline fell in love and he forgot all about Montana.”

“That is romantic,” Violet agreed with a sigh. “Why, I thought they’d been married a long time and that Caroline was the twins’ mother.” What would that be like, she wondered, to raise children to whom one hadn’t given birth? Gerald had a son off at Eton whom she had never met, so it was unlikely she would ever become as close as Caroline Collier was to the twins.

She would begin that letter to Gerald before retiring, she decided. In addition to the things she’d thought about writing to him while she lay awake last night, she’d tell him about Simpson Creek, her brother’s ranch, the pinto mare and about the people she’d met since her arrival—though not Raleigh Masterson, she thought again. Gerald wouldn’t think to mention some neighboring land agent who’d done him a couple of trifling services, would he?

* * *

Violet would have been interested to know that Raleigh had watched both her arrival and her departure from the safety of the bunkhouse.

“She’s a purty thing, right enough, that sister of Nick Brookfield and his fancy lord of a brother,” Cookie noted now, next to him.

Raleigh hoped the old chuckwagon cook hadn’t seen him jump. He’d been so intent on watching the Brookfields’ buckboard roll away with Violet in it that he hadn’t heard Cookie come up behind him.

Cookie’s comment didn’t carry far enough to reach the ears of the other cowboys, who had settled down to a game of poker as soon as the visitors’ horses had been hitched back up to their wagon. “Guess ya learned yore lesson about women down in Blanco, after ya almost got yerself hung for a murder ya didn’t commit, didn’t ya?”

“Yeah, don’t worry, Cookie. A fellow can’t get in trouble just looking,” Raleigh responded, but he let the calico curtain fall back into place, denying himself a last glimpse of the English beauty. He shuddered, remembering how being in the wrong place at the wrong time had nearly cost him his life when a girl lured him into the saloon she worked in after it had closed for the night. He’d found the saloon owner dead and been accused of his murder. He’d almost been the guest of honor at a lynching before the real guilty party was discovered.

“Yeah, that’s what Adam said when he first spied that there apple in the Garden of Eden, ain’t it?” Cookie retorted. “Where ya goin’ now?”

“I’m going off on nighthawk duty early, since you’re in a naggin’ mood,” Raleigh replied. “You tell Wes to be sure and relieve me midway through the night, hear?” he added, jerking his head toward the stocky cowboy who currently held what looked to be the winning hand.

They hadn’t stopped riding herd at night after they’d returned from Abilene, even though what they guarded were just the remaining heifers and young bulls that had been too young to go on the drive, plus the horses. There hadn’t been any episodes of rustling for quite a while, and no Comanche raids since earlier in the spring, but it didn’t do to grow careless.

* * *

“It’s such a nice day,” Violet commented the next morning over breakfast. “Would you mind terribly if I take Lady out and explore your land a bit, Nick? I thought I might find a shady spot and do some writing. That is,” she said, eyeing little Nick, who was at present throwing bits of scrambled egg down to the tiger cat who was allowed in the house, “if you wouldn’t like me to watch my nephew awhile and give Milly a break?”

“No, Nicky, the kitty’s had enough,” Milly admonished her son, then redirected his attention with a bit of bacon before turning back to Violet. “I’ll take you up on it another time,” she said with a wry lift of her brow. “Take one of my bonnets and Nick’s spare canteen—it’s going to get very hot very quickly. You can find more water if you need it where the creek widens right at the border between our ranch and the Colliers’.”

Milly’s mention of the Colliers’ ranch reminded Violet of their foreman. Perhaps if luck was with her, she might catch an inspiring glimpse of that intriguing cowboy at work. It was all grist for the literary mill, wasn’t it?

“Stay out of the north pasture. That’s where the cattle are grazing. I don’t think they’d bother you, but they’re not used to you,” Nick added from across the table. “Oh, and Raleigh told me Lady’s been trained to ground-tie—that is, you can just drop the reins on the ground. She’ll graze and not wander too far.”

“How convenient,” Violet said, thinking of how their high-spirited mounts at home would bolt for the barn, given such an opportunity.

“Merely a well-trained Texas cowpony,” Nick responded with a smile.

“Be sure and mind where you walk,” Edward added. “Remember what that Masterson fellow told you about snakes.”

Violet swallowed hard at the thought as she left the room to change into her riding clothes. It was good to be reminded that not everything in Texas was as civilized as England.

* * *

“You don’t think you should go with her, or send one of the hands along?” Edward softly asked his brother after he heard the door shut to Violet’s bedroom. “What about Indians? Or outlaws? Will she be safe, riding alone?”

Nick was glad he hadn’t mentioned the Indian raid to the east a few months ago, or their kidnapping of Faith Bennett, one of the townswomen whom the preacher rescued and then married.

“She’ll be plenty safe enough on the ranch. The boys are out there riding fence and checking on the stock,” Nick said in his imperturbable way.

“Besides, the heat she’s not used to will bring her back in before long,” Milly put in from where she was tugging a fresh shirt over Nicky’s head.

“I suppose it might not be a bad idea to give her some lessons with a pistol and have her carry one when she’s out riding,” Nick added.

Edward shuddered at the thought, but knew he could hardly object when he’d raised concerns about her safety.

Nick leaned forward. “Edward, the quickest way to send her running back into the arms of Gerald Lullington would be for us to monitor her every movement and make her feel like she’s little more than a prisoner while she’s here. She’ll be imagining she’s Juliet and he’s Romeo—without the quick tragic consequences, of course. And the result will be a slower tragedy for her. I think we have to show her she’s worthy of trust.”

Edward sighed. “I hope you’re right.”

* * *

The first thing Violet, on Lady, did was to climb the sloping hill near the ranch house, upon which Nick and the hands had erected a small stone lookout fortress. From here she enjoyed the bird’s-eye view of the mesquite and cactus-dotted fields and the blue hills in the distance. Then, after they descended the hill, she enjoyed the feel of the horse’s powerful muscles moving beneath her in a smooth canter. More than once a jackrabbit sprang up just ahead of Lady’s hooves, and although the mare snorted, ears pricked forward, her steady lope never altered. Violet saw the cattle in the north pasture from a distance, a quiet mass of multicolored beasts with elongated horns, some with calves, all grazing or lying placidly in the shade of a grove of live oaks. It was hard to believe they could be as dangerous as she’d been told.

The sun beat down upon Violet as predicted, making her glad of the bonnet that shaded her head from the worst of its glare. She felt a trickle of perspiration snake down her back. The pinto’s withers were damp, though she had slowed the mare to a walk after a quarter of an hour. It was time to find the creek, and then some shade where she could do some writing.

Heading east, she came to the place where the creek widened just before flowing over the boundary between Brookfield and Collier land. The fence had terminal posts on both sides of the creek so the cattle of either ranch had full access to the widest part of the creek. The north side of the creek was rimmed by a wide rocky ledge.

On the south side of the creek lay a shady grove of cottonwoods and live oaks—the perfect place to write, Violet thought. It would give her a sheltered vantage point overlooking Collier land while she did so.

She let Lady go forward and drink from the stream as long as she wanted to before reining her into the shady grove and dismounting. As soon as Violet dropped her reins, the pinto lowered her head to graze. Milly had sent along an old quilt, and now Violet took that down from where it had been rolled up behind the saddle and spread it out under one of the cottonwoods, settling herself against its rough bark. Pulling the ruled copybook she had brought to write her story in along with a sharpened pencil from the deep pocket of the divided skirt, she set them upon her lap and opened the notebook to the first page.

When they’d boarded the steamer for America, she’d thought she might be able to write an entire rough draft of her novel during the voyage, and merely polish the manuscript while she was in Texas by adding authentic details—verisimilitude, she’d learned it was called—that she would learn during her stay. She’d imagined filling page after page with her story, the hours passing by like minutes, and stopping only when writer’s cramp forced her to. She’d brought a stack of copybooks in her trunk, sure that her novel would be long and her prose lyrical.

When it came down to actually writing, however, she found it difficult to concentrate. Not only was she acutely missing Gerald, of course, but Edward was rarely long absent from her side except when they went to their respective staterooms at night. It was as if he feared one of their assorted fellow travelers, or even one of the deckhands, might tempt her to folly if she was alone. When other passengers stopped to chat, her brother’s manner seemed excessively jovial, as if he was desperate to convince everyone they were on a pleasure trip, and he was not escorting his notorious sister away from England just ahead of scandal.

Now Violet stared at the lines she had penned during the voyage. It was utter and complete tripe, all of it. She had had no idea how to begin a novel about the American West, never having seen the land she was writing about. She had only the most amorphous idea of her hero, and how he should accomplish winning the heroine’s love.

She’d started out describing Gerald as the hero, but she couldn’t imagine Gerald as anything but what he was—an English aristocrat in tweeds rather than cowboy garb. And Edward’s constant presence by her side made Violet too self-conscious to write. It didn’t take long before she put the copybook back in her trunk and only read the book she’d brought with her.

Now, however, she had the perfect opportunity and solitude to make a brilliant new start. Ruthlessly ripping out the four pages she’d written on the ship, she crumpled them into a ball and threw them to the other end of the quilt.

Violet supposed she should start by setting the scene, and so she wrote several lines about the landscape, the cactus, the mesquite, the brightly colored wildflowers...but no, that was dull. Perhaps she should describe her hero, using Raleigh as the model as she had decided the day she arrived in Simpson Creek. But what to call him? She dared not use the same name, for her brothers would think she had developed an inappropriate, schoolgirllike infatuation for the Colliers’ foreman.

Riley? That was close to Raleigh, but perhaps too close.... She should get away from “R” names. Charlie? Marcus? Monty? Yes, Monty, that was just right.

She would start in the middle of the action.

Monty, his pistols still smoking from the shots he had fired, reined in his magnificent blue roan stallion and gazed at the heroine, who looked up at him with undisguised adoration. A tear trickled down her lovely alabaster cheek.

“You have saved me from a Fate Worse Than Death, sir, yet I don’t even know your name,” she said. “How you happened along just in the nick of time, I’ll never know, but I’ll be eternally grateful....”

He dismounted and took hold of her lily-white hand. “Why, I’m Monty—”

Here Violet stopped, chewing on the end of the pencil. What should his last name be? Brewster? Montgomery? No, something simpler—Simpson, for Simpson Creek. When the book was published and she became the darling of the literary world, her hero’s surname would be her tribute to where she’d written the manuscript.

Violet continued writing.

“I’m Monty Simpson. And what might your name be, my fair one?”

Violet giggled. Would a cowboy speak that way? Probably not. She crossed out the last three words and wrote instead, “pretty lady.”

“I’m Lily Lawrence.”

Goodness, it was hot. Milly hadn’t been exaggerating. Heat waves shimmered beyond the shade of the live oak. Violet fanned herself with the copybook, then loosened the top two buttons of her blouse. She probably ought to return to the ranch house soon, but she wanted to write a little more before she left. Besides, she hadn’t so much as caught a glimpse of any cowboys, let alone Raleigh.

The heat was making her drowsy—that, and the early hour she had awakened, thanks to her nephew’s penchant for running through the house exercising his lungs. Violet took a drink from the canteen and thought about splashing some of the water on her face. Perhaps that would make her more alert....

In the distance, a cow bawled.

Surely it wouldn’t hurt to just close her eyes for a moment, and ponder the next lines of dialogue between her hero and the heroine....

Chapter Five

Raleigh had been out riding fence when he’d spotted Lady, saddled and bridled, grazing just beyond a grove of trees near the creek.

He looked around, but didn’t see Violet. Alarm struck him like an arrow of ice. Had she fallen off her mount? Was she lying nearby, unconscious and bleeding?

He galloped his roan through the gap in the fence at the creek, staring wildly around in all directions. Despite Lady’s calm demeanor, Raleigh expected to see the Englishwoman’s crumpled form somewhere in the midst of the grass or, worse yet, lying against one of the clumps of rocks.

Then he caught sight of her white shirt in the grove of trees, and breathed a heartfelt prayer of thanks.

“Miss Violet?” he called, not wanting to startle her, but not understanding why she hadn’t arisen at his approach. Surely anyone would have heard the pounding of his horse’s hooves. Unless she was injured, after all, and had only managed to crawl into the shade before fainting. Heart pounding, he approached, seeing that Violet’s eyes were closed.

She looked utterly peaceful, her clothing neither ripped nor sullied. He could see no blood, and her golden hair curled loosely about her shoulders. A floppy-brimmed hat lay nearby on the grass. Two buttons on the high-necked blouse were undone, giving him a charming view of her graceful neck. Her chest rose and fell in a regular rhythm, her breath softly escaping through parted lips. He saw some sort of notebook lying open in her lap, the pages filled with a looping script, and a pencil lying on it.

Should he wake her? He didn’t want to frighten her—he knew with the sunlight behind him, all she might see when she opened her eyes would be a hulking form looming over her. Yet he knew she wasn’t used to the heat, and if she slept much longer, she might wake up with a headache at the least.

He didn’t want to embarrass her, either. Raleigh backed up carefully, intending to approach again more noisily, calling her name. But when he turned to go, his boot snapped a twig.

She woke up with a start, eyes wide, arms flailing. “Wha—who?”

“Miss Violet, it’s me, Raleigh Masterson,” he said quickly, and watched as her eyes blinked and focused on him and the panic ebbed. “I...I didn’t want to startle you, but I thought you might have had a fall from your horse.”

She jumped to her feet, pushing a loose tendril of hair from her forehead and brushing off her riding skirt. She smiled sheepishly up at him. “No, I didn’t fall... I... It seems I fell asleep,” she said. “The heat made me drowsy.”

She didn’t seem to notice the notebook and pencil, which had fallen to the ground, and now he bent, picked them up and handed them to her. “I’m glad,” he said. “That you weren’t hurt, that is. Were you...writing a letter?” he added, nodding toward the notebook. He was curious, but mainly wanted to give them something to talk about so she could stop feeling self-conscious at being caught napping.

“No, I was actually working on my novel,” she said with a shy pride.

“You’re writing a book, Miss Violet?” He’d never met anyone who’d even thought about doing that, much less actually started one. Most of the men he worked with were almost illiterate. “Can I ask what it’s about? If you don’t mind telling me, of course,” he hastened to add, aware that his question sounded downright nosy.

“Certainly you may,” she said in a way that dispelled any notion that she was perturbed by his curiosity. “It’s a story set in Texas, as a matter of fact. That’s why I was so interested when you were telling me about the flowers and the bird the other day, you see.”

“Why’d you want to write about Texas?”

“Because the American West is so romantic and untamed,” she told him, her face glowing with enthusiasm. “Not at all like proper, civilized England.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “What about all those old castles and knights in armor, that kind of thing? That sounds pretty exciting to us Americans.”

“‘In days of old when knights were bold’?” she quoted in a singsong voice. “From what I’ve seen, those drafty old castles were a lot less romantic in reality than in the imagination.”

“You’d know best about that,” he said, thinking how heading off stampedes or fighting Indians was the very opposite of romantic to him. But he didn’t want to dim the enthusiasm that made her even more beautiful, if that was possible. “Tell me more about your story.”

She put a finger on her chin. “Well, there’s a hero, of course, and a heroine, whom he rescues in the opening scene,” Violet told him. “I thought it was best to begin in the thick of things, with the hero saving the heroine from danger....”

“May I read it?”

He knew he’d gone too far when she colored and looked away, clutching the notebook to her as if she feared he might snatch it away from her. “Oh, I don’t think it’s ready for others’ eyes yet,” she said. “I’ve only just written a few pages. Perhaps after I’ve polished it a little, it’ll be good enough....”

“‘Good enough?’ I’m just a cowboy, Miss Violet. I went to school only long enough to learn to read, write and cipher before my pa pulled me out to work on the farm. I wouldn’t know good from bad. I’ve never met a writer before.” He let his admiration show in his voice.

Violet turned back to him, surprised. “You’re the first person who’s ever called me a writer, Raleigh Masterson,” she said wonderingly. “Not a ‘would-be writer’ or an ‘authoress,’ as Edward calls it, both of which sound rather condescending, don’t you think? Even Gerald doesn’t understand why I want to try to write—” She stopped suddenly, as if she’d said too much.

“Who’s Gerald? Another of your brothers?” he asked, though her rising color betrayed the answer before she spoke.

She shook her head. “No, my other brother is Richard, the vicar. Gerald is...well, he’s the man I’m in love with, back in England. He’s the Earl of Lullington,” she said, looking down at her riding boots. She spoke so softly that he had to strain to hear, but when he made sense of her words, his heart sank.

She was in love with a nobleman, and apparently, he with her. Of course she’d found someone to love, someone who was titled and wealthy, as she was. He’d been a fool to think otherwise.

“You must miss him a lot, this man. I’m surprised you could leave him for so long,” he said.

Again, she looked surprised, and maybe even a little taken aback by his frankness.

“I’m sorry, it’s none of my business,” Raleigh said. “I don’t know what came over me to say such a meddlesome thing.”

She shrugged. “It’s all right. I’m the one who mentioned Gerald. And I didn’t have a choice about coming here, if you want to know the truth.”

Now it was his turn to feel surprise. “But you seemed so happy to be in Texas,” he said.

She shrugged. “I figured I might as well make the most of it,” she said. “I do love the West, and seeing Nick and meeting his wife and son, of course. But Edward thinks Gerald isn’t a suitable match.”

“I see.” He wanted to ask why, but he’d been too nosy once already.

“He thinks if he separates us for a time, I’ll forget about Gerald. But I won’t, of course.”

He noticed she didn’t say “we’ll forget about each other.” And there was an uncertain look in her eyes, as if she couldn’t speak with confidence about her beau’s feelings for her.

“I’m sure no man in his right mind could forget about you, Miss Violet.”

She smiled wanly up at him. “You’re a very nice man, Raleigh. But I mustn’t take up any more of your time. I’d better be going, or my brothers will worry. Thank you for checking to see that I wasn’t hurt.”

He wanted her to stay and talk to him, but her flushed face told him she’d probably been out long enough. “I’ll bring your horse,” he said. He held a hand on the mare’s bridle as she mounted.

“I imagine I’ll see you Sunday?” he asked as she gathered the reins and settled herself in the saddle.

“Sunday?” she said blankly, as if her mind was still on their conversation—or the day held no special significance to her.

“At church?”

“Oh. Oh, yes, I imagine so. Thanks again for checking on me, Raleigh.”

He watched as she cantered away. So Miss Violet had a beau back home. He couldn’t help wondering why her elder brother disapproved of the man, since he was of the same social class. Was this “Gerald” fellow somehow objectionable, or did Edward Brookfield merely think Violet was too young as yet to settle down? None of your business, he reminded himself.

But perhaps knowing Violet’s heart was already taken would remind him to protect his own.

* * *

“Violet, I’m going into town today to buy supplies at the mercantile. Would you like to come with me?” Milly asked. “I’m going to stop at my sister Sarah’s before the mercantile—she’s usually willing to watch little Nick for me while I shop. Then we could have a visit with her. If we time it right, I’m sure she’d feed us,” she added with a wink. “And I’m going to invite her and her husband, Nolan, to come to supper tomorrow night, so they can see Edward before he leaves Saturday afternoon.”

Edward would be gone in two days. Violet knew she would miss her eldest brother. However much they disagreed about Gerald, she knew Edward loved her. Would she feel freer once he’d departed? Or would Nick suddenly become superprotective in Edward’s absence?

“Yes, that sounds lovely. I’d quite enjoy coming along,” Violet said. The outing fit right into what she’d been planning to ask Milly. “Perhaps I could buy some fabric while we are there? I’ve been wondering if you’d teach me how to sew. I’ve seen that you’re quite the seamstress, and I’ve become aware much of the clothing I’ve brought is...well, rather too elaborate for Texas, since it’s so warm here,” she said. She was trying to be tactful so as not to offend her sister-in-law as she accidentally had the waitress in the hotel.

Milly looked surprised, then pleased. “I’d like nothing better,” she said eagerly, then looked thoughtful. “I saw just the cloth at the mercantile the last time I was there—a light blue cotton with tiny white flowers that would be perfect with the color of your eyes, if Mrs. Patterson still has it. If not, I’m sure we can find something else just as good,” she said confidently. “I’m not sure we’ll get it done before church on Sunday, but we can at least get a good start. Nick will be taking Edward to Lampasas Saturday afternoon, and he’ll probably stay through supper with him, so we should have some time.”

“Don’t feel you must rush,” Violet said. “It takes my modiste weeks to make me a dress. And she doesn’t have a young son to mind and meals to prepare....” She was already in awe of how much her sister-in-law accomplished in a day. She couldn’t help thinking how nice it would be, though, to have a new dress to wear so she would fit into her surroundings. And in case she encountered a certain cowboy at church....

“We’ll see how it goes,” Milly said. “I’d offer to lend you a dress or two of mine meanwhile, but you’re taller—and a mite more slender than I’ve been since Nicky was born,” she added with amusement.

* * *

“Mrs. Patterson, I’d like you to meet my sister-in-law, Miss Violet Brookfield, who’s visiting us from England,” Milly said as they entered the Simpson Creek Mercantile.

A woman with salt-and-pepper hair in a no-nonsense bun and alert dark eyes smoothed her hands on an apron before extending it to Violet. “Heard yore English relatives were visitin’,” she said. “How d’ya do, Miss Violet? This here’s my niece Kate, who’s come to live with me and help out in the store,” she said, nodding at a brown-haired girl who stood behind her, holding an open box of glassware packed in crumpled newspaper.

“Mrs. Patterson, it’s a pleasure to meet you,” Violet said. “And you, too, Miss Kate.”

Kate Patterson blinked in obvious surprise at Violet’s accent, a reaction Violet was becoming all too accustomed to since arriving in Texas. Probably she, too, had goggled the first time she had heard a Texas drawl, she thought.

Violet smiled, wanting to put the girl at ease. Kate reminded Violet of a fawn poised for flight.

“I ain’t never heard—I mean, I’ve never heard a real English person talk before,” Kate said wonderingly. “Well, except for your brother, of course. You sound a bit like him, I reckon.”

“Mrs. Patterson, we’re here to buy some dress lengths, both for me and for Violet,” Milly said. “Do you still have that light blue cotton—oh, I see you do,” she said, spotting it on the shelf behind the woman and pointing to it. “What do you think, Violet?” she asked as the shopkeeper lifted it down and placed it on the counter between them.

Violet studied it, then took it to a nearby window to take advantage of the light. Milly has a good eye, she thought. The china-blue echoed the color of her eyes, and the fact that the cloth was sprigged with white flowers instead of the usual white background sprigged with colored flowers added interest.

“It’s eye-catching—I love it,” she praised. “I’m thinking white piping and buttons, perhaps a white sash with a bow at the bustle?”

“Exactly,” Milly said, and the two of them exchanged a grin of perfect understanding.

Mrs. Patterson glowed with satisfaction. “I got the latest Godey’s Lady’s Books—well, as ‘latest’ as there is in Simpson Creek, anyways—if y’all want to look at styles,” she said, bringing several magazines from under the counter. “And this ribbon is just what you’re talkin’ about, I think, and I got buttons that’ll look right fine....”

They spent an enjoyable hour perusing styles and discussing the merits of each, and each of them picked out an additional dress length and the accompanying notions.

“Oh, this will be such fun, learning to sew!” Violet enthused. Mrs. Patterson folded the cloth and wrapped up the selections in brown paper, and Milly counted out her coins. They’d already agreed that Violet was to pay Milly back for her cloth when they got back to the ranch. “I hope I’m good at it.”

“You ain’t—I mean, you never made any dresses before?” Kate Patterson asked. “I thought all women had to make their own clothes—and their menfolks’, too. Aunt Mary just recently started stocking some ready-made shirts and denim trousers, but those are mostly for cowboys passin’ through, folks like that who don’t have a woman to sew for ’em.”

“No, never,” Violet admitted. “I think it will be an adventure, starting from scratch like this, getting to choose one’s own style and trim.” She knew the ladies in her social circle back home would die before they’d ever turn their hands to such a task, but while she was here, she could be a different person.

“You’re so lucky Miss Milly’s your kin,” Kate said. “She’s the best seamstress in these parts. She even makes wedding dresses,” she said with awe. “She’ll teach you good, I’d wager.”

“Miss Milly’s one of my best customers,” Mrs. Patterson said in confirmation.

“Miss...that is, Violet, would you come in and show us the dress when it’s all made?”

“Of course,” Violet said.

At the sound of the bell tinkling over the door, Mrs. Patterson looked over Violet’s shoulder and called out, “Hello, Ella, what’s your cook out of now?”

Violet turned to see the black-haired girl who had waited on them at the hotel just a few days ago. As she had been then, she was dressed in the gray dress with a white apron.

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