Stories of family and romance beneath the Big Sky!

“I like hearing your laughter. It opens up a whole new world.”

Startled, Hope stared at him, the amusement dying as she gazed into his eyes. Flames licked over her nerves at his intense perusal. Awareness flickered between them, as insistent as heat lightning in a summer storm.

With effort, she looked away.

“It isn’t going to disappear,” Collin said, his voice rich with nuances that hinted at future bliss…and reckless, impossible complications.

She thought of pretending not to know what he meant, but discarded the notion. “Nothing is going to come of it,” she said instead.

“Nothing?”

“No. The Baxters and Kincaids will always be on opposite sides.”

A wry smile curved his expressive lips.

“You’re wrong. And soon I’ll prove it.”

Outlaw Marriage
Laurie Paige

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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LAURIE PAIGE

“One of the nicest things about writing romances is researching locales, careers and ideas. In the interest of authenticity, most writers will try anything…once.” Along with her writing adventures, Laurie has been a NASA engineer, a past president of the Romance Writers of America, a mother and a grandmother. She was twice a Romance Writers of America RITA® Award finalist for Best Traditional Romance and has won awards from RT Book Reviews for Best Silhouette Special Edition and Best Silhouette Book in addition to appearing on the USA TODAY bestseller list.

Settled in Northern California, Laurie is looking forward to whatever experiences her next novel will bring.

To Sonja and her runaway groom

Best Wishes

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

One

H ope Baxter exhaled a pensive sigh, her gaze on the mountains to the west of Whitehorn. Today the lofty peaks didn’t comfort her troubled spirit. Neither did they gain her any perspective on the problems confronting her.

Not that the problems were personal, she hastened to assure herself.

The elaborately hand-carved sign on the lawn that proclaimed the building to be the new headquarters of the Baxter Development Corporation reminded her of her duties. She squared her shoulders and glanced toward the neatly arranged papers on her desk.

As the chief attorney on the case of Baxter versus Kincaid et al, she had to be cool, decisive and firm in the meeting with Collin Kincaid. She wondered where he was. Punctual in their prior meetings, he was ten minutes late for this one and he was the one who had requested it.

A movement caught her eye. She paused, her attention on the street in front of the building, and watched as a tall, agile rancher climbed out of a battered pickup, the standard mode of transportation for about ninety percent of the rural residents of Montana. He walked up the sidewalk toward the entrance of the building.

Collin Kincaid. Handsome, as all the Kincaid men were. Eyes like blue sapphires. Dark, almost-black, hair. Half a foot taller than her own five-seven stature, giving him the height advantage even when she wore high heels. He was also muscular. His palm had been calloused when they had shaken hands at their first meeting. He was a working rancher, not an armchair cowboy.

Collin was also the only legitimate grandson of Garrett Kincaid. Garrett was trying to buy the old Kincaid spread from the trustees who managed the ranch for seven-year-old Jenny McCallum, the heir to the throne, so to speak. The grandfather wanted to provide a legacy for the other six grandsons—a seventh hadn’t been found yet but was thought to exist—all of whom were the bastard offspring of Garrett’s deceased son, Larry Kincaid.

Oh, what tangled webs we weave…

Not just Larry with his profligate womanizing, she mused, but all humans. She gave a snort of amusement. My, but she was waxing philosophical today.

Because Collin Kincaid made her nervous? Because she’d felt the unmistakable pull of male-female interest between them the first time they’d met? Because they were enemies?

Impatient with her thoughts, she resumed her seat in the executive chair and pulled herself closer to the desk. It was an effective shield, she’d found, for dealing with those who didn’t take her seriously as an attorney.

The secretary—another indication, along with the sign and new building, of the corporation’s affluent image, one her father wanted to project these days—buzzed her on the intercom and announced Kincaid’s arrival.

“Send him in,” she requested. She didn’t stand when the door opened. Keeping her seat kept her in the position of authority. In this office, she was the one in charge.

His eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled upon seeing her. Their startling blue depths held laughter as he advanced across the Oriental carpet, as if he knew more than he was telling. And saw more than she was willing to reveal.

He was dressed in a gray summer suit with a touch of blue in the weave. His shirt was white and immaculate, his tie a tasteful blend of blue and gray with a touch of red.

Understated. Nothing too obvious, yet he had an aura of power that could have been intimidating had a person less confidence in his or her own abilities.

She returned his smile with cool professionalism.

He had a way of acting older and more experienced in the ways of the world than she, but that was ridiculous. He was only thirty-one to her almost twenty-eight. She’d gone to college at one of the prestigious Ivy League schools back east while he’d attended a Montana university. She’d been raised in New York until her father had decided to move back to Whitehorn a few years ago. Collin had lived most of his life on a ranch. Except for a few years with his mom and stepfather in San Diego after his parents divorced.

She wondered if that had been a lonely time for him. He’d returned to his grandfather’s ranch over in Elk Springs when he was fourteen or thereabouts, so the town gossips had reported. He’d been a rebel at the time, but hard work and a firm hand from his grandfather had soon put him to rights, the local story went.

Not that Hope cared in the least about Collin’s past, but knowledge of one’s enemy was a good thing. She cleared her throat and nodded firmly.

“Good morning. Please be seated,” she invited briskly, gesturing to the guest chair at the opposite side of the desk. Her tone was crisp, decisive.

He casually pulled the chair to the side of the desk, angling it toward her, then sat and stretched out his long legs so that his black dress boots were within two feet of her chair.

This action encroached on her space and forced her to angle her chair sideways to face him in a full frontal position, which she favored as one of greater power. It also put her feet within touching range of his, which further decreased the autonomy of her position.

“So,” he said in his deep, pleasant baritone, “we meet again.”

There was a world of innuendo in the statement. As if they’d been lovers or something in the not-too-distant past.

“Yes,” she said coolly, and picked up the Kincaid file. She flipped it open and studied the first page without really seeing it. Realizing she was using the folder as a shield, she tossed it back onto the desk, disgusted with her cowardice. “I don’t see that we have anything more to discuss,” she said, deftly reminding him that he had been the one to request the meeting.

“Don’t you?” he inquired with lazy humor.

He laid his creamy white Stetson hat, which he’d been holding, on her credenza. She was chagrined with herself for not telling him to hang it on the antique lowboy beside her door. Now he was further ensconced in her space.

In fact, she was beginning to feel surrounded by his confident masculinity. His eyes, as blue as the Montana sky, studied her. There was nothing lazy or humorous in that probing perusal. Her heart beat faster as she shifted uneasily in the executive chair.

Annoyed, she told him, “Past meetings between our parties have not been productive.”

“Well,” he drawled in that maddening Western accent, “your dad and my grandfather tend to get a mite heated on the subject. I thought you and I could discuss a possible settlement more fully without them being present.”

His eyes raked over her navy-blue coat dress that fastened all the way down the front with red-and-white enameled buttons. He lingered at the last button, which was located four inches above the hemline. Her knee was visible in the slit thus created.

Hope pulled her chair close to the desk so that her legs were hidden and twisted sideways from the waist so she could face him. “Does this mean you’re accepting our terms for settling the case?”

He had the nerve to laugh. The crinkles appeared beside his eyes again and twin lines indented his lean cheeks. His teeth were very white in contrast to his tanned face. His lips curved alluringly at the corners. She stared at his mouth and wondered about his kiss, how it would feel, if his lips would be hard or tender as he touched hers—

Appalled, she broke the thought and brought her wayward mind back to what he was saying.

“Hardly. My grandfather would have apoplexy. He’s determined to provide a legacy for his other grandsons and has decided the Kincaid ranch here in Whitehorn is the perfect place. The way I see it, we can haggle over this for years in the courts and not do anyone any good, or we can iron out an agreement.”

“What is your idea of an agreement?”

“That Jordan buy what’s left of the old Baxter ranch from the trustees at the price they offered it to us and let the rest go.”

Hope knew her father would never agree to anything less than the total original Baxter land. “Your grandfather has agreed to this?” she asked, probing for information.

“Well, not exactly. He’s as stubborn as your father. The Baxter place was folded into the Kincaid spread years ago. Granddad wants to keep the ranch intact as it now stands.”

“The sale of those two parcels was illegal since the original acquisition of the Baxter land was accomplished through fraudulent means,” she reminded him.

He heaved a sigh. “Looks like we’re going to talk in circles.”

She stood. “Then there’s no need to continue this meeting, is there?”

He rose, too, a frown marring his good looks. “My idea was that if we each took the same proposition to your dad and my grandfather, maybe we could get them to agree. A year of haggling over this is more than enough.”

His nearness bothered her. Standing no more than two feet away, she could feel the blanket of warmth from his body and the aura of confidence that came from the supreme ego that all the Kincaid men seemed to possess. She could smell soap and sandal-wood talc and aftershave.

She became dizzy, the air suddenly close, hot and still. Stepping back, she bumped into her chair, causing her knees to buckle. “Oh!”

With the quickness of a cat, his arms were there to steady her. She was engulfed by his heat, his scent, the protective cage of his arms and body.

“Easy,” he murmured, his breath soft against the hair at her temple, his voice deep and gentle.

Laying her hands against his chest, she made the mistake of looking up at him. Instead of pushing away as she’d intended, she was trapped within the depths of his eyes. Blue was supposed to be a cool color, but that wasn’t true of him. His gaze was blue…and hot. It burned down to some point in her that was suddenly agitated.

She felt the quick lift of his chest in a sharply in-drawn breath, then the way he went very still, not releasing her, yet not taking advantage of their forced closeness.

His lips, the bottom one slightly fuller than the top, parted. His head bent toward hers.

A quick, sharp need rose from that disturbed place inside her and made her tingle where they touched. She moistened her lips, then realizing what she was doing, clamped them tightly shut. Directing a glare his way, she tried to step back but was trapped between him and the chair.

Panic, strange and harsh and lightning-fast, swept over her. Her breath caught. “Let me go,” she ordered.

A second, an eternity, went by.

She was aware of a struggle in him, one as elemental as the hunger in herself that shocked and angered her sense of rightness. He was the enemy. She had to remember that.

He stepped back, sliding his hands from her back to her elbows to make sure she had her balance. “There now,” he murmured as if soothing a nervous filly.

Shoving the chair aside, she retreated a full three feet away. “I will present your offer to my father,” she told him stiffly. She sounded breathless, which she didn’t like. It might be interpreted as weakness on her part.

“We haven’t really discussed an offer yet. We’d better consider every facet and nail the details down before we jump in.” He picked up his hat. “It’s nearly noon. Let’s review it over lunch.”

“I really don’t have time—”

“It’s been a long spell since breakfast. I can’t talk on an empty stomach. The Hip Hop okay with you?”

She hesitated, not sure she wasn’t being rushed into something she would regret. However, her father wanted progress on the case and the courts liked to see a show of cooperation, so maybe she’d better go along with this arrogant Kincaid who seemed to think he could persuade her to his view. Besides, it was noon and her breakfast of toast with peanut butter was long gone, too.

“Yes, that will be fine.” She was pleased that she spoke in a firm tone. She sounded in charge once more, her panic of a moment ago subdued.

His ready smile lit his face. “Great.”

His hat in one hand, he placed the other under her elbow to escort her out. She gracefully eased away and retrieved her purse from the bottom desk drawer. She settled the strap over her shoulder and slipped the file folder into a soft-sided briefcase. Thus armed, she nodded that she was ready.

He stepped back and allowed her to precede him out of the office. She told her secretary where they would be and reiterated it to Kurt Peters, another full-time attorney with Baxter Development, when they encountered him in the quiet, cool hallway of the executive floor. With Collin observing every detail of the place, she was suddenly pleased with the show of Baxter wealth. While it didn’t match that of the Kincaids, it wasn’t something to be ignored, either.

“Shall I join you?” Kurt asked, his light blue eyes expressionless as he glanced at Collin.

Hope knew Kurt had absorbed her father’s dislike of the Kincaids, which bordered on the obsessive.

A flicker of guilt shot through her at the disloyal thought. At eighteen, her father had been cheated of his birthright as the promised heir to the Baxter ranch, which was owned by his uncle, Cameron Baxter, at that time.

Jeremiah Kincaid, former owner of the Kincaid ranch and a cousin to the present Kincaids who were trying to buy the place from Jenny’s trustees, had pulled strings to get the bank notes on the Baxter land called, thus forcing Cameron to sell or go into bankruptcy. Jeremiah had then bought the place for a song.

“This is a private conversation,” Collin said to Kurt before she could reply, taking her arm again and leading her past the other lawyer.

“I’ll talk to you later,” she called over her shoulder to Kurt. “Don’t push me around,” she said when she and Collin were out of hearing.

“I wouldn’t think of it,” he returned smoothly and, opening the door, ushered her out into the August heat.

At his truck, Collin considered helping Hope inside with the simple expedient of putting his hands on her waist and lifting her, but thought better of it.

Admiration hit him as she solved the problem of the high step by reaching down and unfastening the bottom button of her dress. Then she grabbed the handhold inside the door, stepped up with her left foot and swung neatly inside, her shapely behind plopping gracefully onto the leather seat.

His libido stampeded all over his self-control.

He closed the door and went around to the driver’s side. The heat was suffocating. He cranked up the engine and flipped the air conditioner on high. They were silent on the short drive to the main street of town. He pulled over to the curb on a side street beside the town park. She climbed out before he could get around to help her.

At the Hip Hop Café, they were directed to a table for two by the window where they could look out on the busy street or beyond to the hilly terrain east of town. Ranchers called out greetings as they wound their way through the busy diner. He noted their quick speculative glances at Hope and their equally quick nods.

Outsiders were viewed with suspicion in these parts. Her father had been buying up land in the county for years, even before he moved back here, which caused resentment among the old-timers. Collin noted the lift of her chin and the way she smiled at one and all. He mentally grinned. This woman had spirit. She wouldn’t be intimidated by a bunch of clannish ranchers.

A new waitress had replaced Emma Stover, nee Baxter, who was now his sister-in-law by virtue of marrying Brandon Harper, one of his newly discovered half-brothers. The lives of the Kincaid brothers were getting complicated.

The Baxters seemed to be at the heart of the complications, largely because of the controversy over the ranch and the lawsuit, which threatened to drag on forever. And of course, there was the matter of the new wives and babies being added to the Kincaid family at an awesome rate.

He felt a hitch in the vicinity of his heart. His granddad had made it plain that he expected Collin to marry and populate their ranch in Elk Springs, Montana, with a new generation of Kincaids. The sooner, the better. Seeing the domestic bliss of his half brothers brought the same thought to his mind. Now all he needed was a willing woman.

His gaze was drawn to his companion who was studying the menu with the grave seriousness she apparently brought to everything she did.

He frowned and peered at the menu he held. Getting mixed up with a woman whose father was a sworn enemy of the family would be stupid beyond belief. But, he had to admit, something about her fascinated him, this beautiful enemy who was as aware of him as he was of her.

“Are you ready to order?” the pretty young waitress inquired, her pad and pencil ready.

“Hmm, it’s Tuesday,” he recalled. “The blue plate special is elk hash, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir.” She read the day’s special, which was written on a chalkboard near the cash register, as if he couldn’t read or maybe couldn’t see that far.

He frowned. The young woman evidently thought he was ancient. Catching the brief curving of Hope’s mouth before she sternly disciplined the mirth at his expense, he grinned and winked at her before ordering the special and a glass of raspberry iced tea.

“I’ll have the same,” she said, handing the menu to the teenage waitress and settling back in the chair, her eyes on the traffic moving slowly along the street. “Superior court is in session,” she noted.

“Mmm-hmm. I see Judge Kate Randall Walker in a booth with the local psychic. Wonder where Lily Mae Wheeler is. She’s usually holding court here in the Hip Hop at noon everyday.”

This time Hope did smile. She even laughed, a tiny gurgle of sound that enchanted him. She was a mystery, this woman, one he would like very much to unravel. He backed off from the thought. She had pretty much made it clear that she, like her father, wouldn’t give a Kincaid the time of day if she could avoid it.

“I’m glad Emma was cleared of that murder charge,” Hope murmured. “It’s so odd to find a new relative, to learn my father and Emma’s mother are first cousins, after all these years of thinking there was no one else.”

“The notorious Lexine Baxter,” Collin said, referring to Emma’s mother, who evidently killed anyone who stood in the way of her ambitions, including a former partner, a husband, and finally Jeremiah Kincaid, her father-in-law. The woman was now in prison for her crimes.

A blush highlighted the porcelain skin of his dining companion as if she was embarrassed at the mention of her infamous relative. Collin couldn’t look away.

Hope Baxter was a natural blonde. Her eyes were large and of a soft blue-gray with a hint of vulnerability buried deep in them that was at odds with her cool, professional manner. Sometimes he thought he detected a hint of sadness in her. It made him wonder about her life.

With divorced parents and a profligate father he could never depend on, Collin knew how a person’s family could cause wounds that were hard to heal, if they ever did. His grandfather, Garrett Kincaid, had taken him in hand when he was fourteen and probably saved him from a senseless life of dissipation similar to his father’s.

“Sorry,” he murmured. “I didn’t mean to pull your family skeletons out of the closet.”

“I never knew Lexine. My father never mentioned her. So she doesn’t really seem like family.” She paused and looked troubled. “I would like to know Emma, though. I always wanted a sister. It’s lonely, growing up with no relatives. My father was always so busy—”

She stopped abruptly, looking surprised and irritated with herself, as if she’d given away family secrets. She was very protective of her father. Collin had seen that in the brief meetings with the older men present, meetings that more than once had ended in anger and a shouting match between her father and his granddad.

Collin mentally shook his head. He didn’t have much hope of doing any better than his grandfather, but he had promised he would try. If only he could find a way to breach the barriers he sensed in her….

“Your father doesn’t have a chance of winning this case,” he said, switching back to the subject of their meeting. “His claim is too old. He should have pursued it at the time of the sale to Jeremiah.”

“He didn’t have the means then.” She directed a hard look his way. “Nor the evidence we have now. Jeremiah made sure of that.”

“We both have interesting characters in our respective families,” he said with grim humor. Jeremiah Kincaid had been a womanizer just as his own father had been. However, unlike Larry with his six, maybe seven, illegitimate kids, Jeremiah had only two that they knew of.

She ignored his attempt to put them on common ground. Her face stern, she reminded him, “There is no statute of limitations on fraud.”

“Yeah, I remember that from business law.”

He had studied business management from a ranching viewpoint. Business law had focused on land ownership and legal decisions involving ranches and cattle disputes, or the inheritance of those.

“Then you must admit we have a very strong case,” Hope said. “It would be in your family’s interests to settle it now.”

He couldn’t help the sardonic tinge in his voice. “Well, now, if it were up to me, I would, but with the sale of those two parcels—one of which was to the Laughing Horse Reservation—others are involved. Jackson Hawk says the res won’t give up the land. They’re too far along with plans for a resort on it.”

Her eyes turned frosty. “That land belongs to my father. The trustees had no right to sell it. Surely with the famous Kincaid influence and charm, your grandfather can persuade the tribal elders to give up their claim. I’m sure the Kincaids can afford to return their money.”

“With interest,” he agreed, his own tone hardening.

The waitress arrived with their food, forestalling the argument. Damn, but he was tired of this whole thing. They had been at a stalemate for months. What made his granddad think he could break through the impasse? Baxter’s daughter was as tough and stubborn as her old man.

Silence engulfed them when they were alone again. He began eating the meal, one of his favorites, without tasting it. When the door of the café opened, he watched the new arrivals with a jaundiced eye. He recognized the woman as a local florist and wedding planner. She carried her son in her arms.

The kid, who looked about two years old, glanced his way and shouted, “Ope. Ope.”

Collin felt decidedly uncomfortable, as if the boy had named him the absent and unknown father of the florist’s son. Heat suffused his ears.

The woman laughed and came toward him. Hell, what was going on?

“Hope,” she said to her son. “Hope.”

“Ope. Ope,” the boy said.

Hope laughed, startling him. It was a truly joyous sound, a welcoming sound rather than an amused gurgle. He was instantly fascinated. She held out her arms.

For a second Collin thought heaven had opened its gates and was inviting him inside. He was totally fascinated by the change in her. Whereas a moment ago she’d been all frosty professionalism, there was now tenderness and laughter in her eyes. But she wasn’t looking at him. He swallowed hard and watched the woman with the kid stop at the table.

“Here, he’s yours.” The mother dumped the child into Hope’s willing embrace. “Gabe can say ‘Ope,’ but can’t seem to get the H on the front of Hope,” she explained to Collin.

“Hey, big boy,” Hope murmured.

“Shug,” the child said in an insistent voice.

“You have some sugar for me?” she asked in make-believe surprise, her eyes going wide.

The kid nodded and grinned happily.

To Collin’s further amazement, the cool, serious attorney planted loud, smacking kisses on the toddler’s neck and ear until he giggled with delight. The kid caught chubby fists in her smooth hair and left it in tangles when she settled him on her lap.

Seeing his gaze on them, the blush hit her cheeks again. “This is Meg Reilly and her son, Gabe. Have you two met?” Hope asked, reverting to the polite persona he suddenly disliked.

“No, we haven’t. Glad to meet you,” he said.

“You’re Collin, right?” Meg asked. “It’s hard to keep all the Kincaid brothers straight. Oh, I’m sorry. That was extremely rude of me.”

With green eyes and wavy brown hair, she was a pretty woman a few years older than he. He liked her rueful smile and straightforward manner when she apologized.

“No problem,” he assured her. “I had trouble keeping the names straight myself when it was discovered I had six half brothers.”

Her frank gaze was discerning. “That must have been a startling revelation.”

“To put it mildly.”

“From all evidence, you’ve handled it well.” She turned to her son who was playing some kind of clapping game with Hope. “Okay, young man, I know you hate to leave the love of your young life, but Mommy needs to eat. It’s been a hectic morning with a bridal shower and two funerals,” she explained to the adults.

“Who’s dead?” Collin asked.

Sorrow rippled over her face. “A baby that was stillborn, and the son of a rancher who lives at the far northern reaches of the county. The son was from New York. He was in advertising and dropped dead of a heart attack in a meeting with a client. His father brought him back here to be buried in the family cemetery.”

“It must be terrible to lose a child,” Hope said, handing the boy to Meg. Her eyes were as soft as velvet.

“Yes,” Meg agreed after a beat of silence. “See you later. Don’t forget you’re coming to supper Thursday night.”

“I won’t.”

Watching Hope with her friend, Collin had an idea. He considered it from every angle, looking for flaws and planning an argument to win her to the plan, which, in his estimation, was a sound one.

When Meg and Gabe left them to sit at the counter, he ate the tasty hash and studied Hope for a moment before speaking what was on his mind.

“I think you should come out to the ranch and look the land over before presenting our offer to your father. That way you’ll know exactly what we’re talking about. I can show you the two parcels in dispute.”

He liked the way her eyes opened wide as surprise darted through them. He waited impatiently for her answer.

Two

“N o,” Hope said, sounding as horrified as she felt.

She had done some stupid things in her life, such as getting mixed up with a fortune hunter in law school, but becoming involved with Collin Kincaid wasn’t going to be added to the list. She knew all about his father and the women the man had seduced—there were six known bastard sons to verify that. She wasn’t going to allow herself to be seduced by the current Kincaid heir. Going to the ranch with Collin would be the first step on that slippery slope.

“It would be logical,” he insisted, leaning forward over the table, his expression serious.

“’Logical’?” she questioned. That was the last word she would have expected him to use.

“Sure. You can view the two parcels that were sold, then you’ll know exactly what you’re talking about when you approach your father with our offer. Or don’t you care to see the land you’re fighting so hard over?”

The sardonic undertone hit a nerve. She had, of course, been out to the old Baxter spread. From what she could see, it was mostly hills and sharp peaks, but in truth she had only gone a short distance. The original ranch road had been too overgrown with shrubs and pine seedlings to navigate and the old mining road had been too rough for her car. A four-wheel-drive vehicle was the only practical way to get around in this country if one intended to really explore it in detail.

“And when I’ve seen it?” she inquired.

“Then, as a fully informed attorney, you can truly advise your father as to its value and if it’s worth another year of wrangling over.”

His tone as much as his words challenged her legal expertise. She stiffened in resentment.

But her next thought was that she wanted to see the ranch, not so much because of the case but because it was part of her history. The Baxter roots in Montana went back as far as the Kincaid roots did. Somehow her family had lost its heritage.

Somehow? She knew the “how” of that loss. Jeremiah Kincaid and his lying, cheating ways.

“What time shall I pick you up on Friday?” Collin asked, smoothly diverting her thoughts from the past.

“Pick me up?” she asked, puzzled. Had she lost track of the conversation?

“The old Baxter spread is a substantial piece of land. We’ll need a couple of days to see it all. The weekend would be a good time for me. You can stay over at the ranch house. We have plenty of room.”

He leaned back in the chair, as if sure that she would fall in with his plan, which would put her right in the middle of the Kincaid compound and the multiple relatives who now lived there as if it were already theirs.

“What arrogance,” she said, keeping her voice soft, amused. “My father doesn’t jump to your bidding. Neither do I. This lawsuit isn’t going to be disposed of at the whim of the current Kincaid family. We’re willing to pay top dollar for the Baxter place, which rightfully belongs to my family. Will the court believe the trustees are acting in Jennifer McCallum’s best interest to sell for less?”

“If Jordan can pull that much money together. It seems to me he’s spread pretty thin, what with all the developing he’s doing south of town, plus, the fancy new headquarters building.”

Collin’s manner was coolly sardonic now, but edged with the Kincaid fury that was as well known as their legendary charm. She was angry, too. She didn’t appreciate his trying to manipulate her into doing as he wanted, nor his casting doubts on her father’s business acumen.

“My father has more than enough resources to handle the ranch sale, which has nothing to do with Baxter Development Corporation.”

Unable to finish the meal, she laid her fork down and stood. Collin, polite as usual, immediately got to his feet, tall and intimidating.

“You Kincaids stick together like flies on honey, but you won’t win this case,” she informed him heatedly.

“Don’t take that to the bank quite yet,” he advised with an amused glance at the gaping faces around them.

A couple of ranchers chuckled openly while several of the local residents grinned behind their hands. Hope was the outsider, and she was acutely aware of that fact.

“I wouldn’t think of it. I’ll see you in court,” she said, flashing him a breezy smile and answering the challenge in his eyes with a confident lift of her chin.

She walked out of the quaint café, aware of multiple stares as she did, and especially that of Collin Kincaid’s.

Collin remained at the table, his face impassive as he observed her departure.

Outside, she spotted another employee of the corporation and got a ride to her office. There, she closed her door and paced restlessly to and fro, aware of a trembling deep inside her. She felt she’d braved the lion in his den and had gotten out alive—but not unscathed.

Sighing, she calmed herself and admitted she’d blown the meeting, walking out in a huff that way. As if emotion ever solved anything. She was more angry with herself than with Collin. It was his job to persuade her to see things his way just as it was hers to see that things were settled in her father’s favor.

Oh, what tangled webs…

Sitting at the desk, she pressed her forehand against her hands and wished this whole thing was over. She was so tired of the Baxter ranch and her father’s obsession—

Biting back the rest of the disloyal thought, she rubbed her temples where a headache pinged insistently. She removed the folder from her briefcase and again studied the facts in minute detail. Yes, they definitely had a case.

She wondered if she could get the venue changed to Great Falls or Billings. She would have to show a higher court that the local judge could be prejudiced in favor of the Kincaids. If she lost, though, the case would go that much harder for her side.

Before she could think this through, the door opened. Only her father would dare intrude without an announcement. She looked up and met his eyes.

“Good afternoon, Father.”

“What’s this I hear about you having lunch with the Kincaid grandson?”

Her father refused to recognize any of the bastard grandsons, so for him there was only one—Collin, the legal heir to Garrett Kincaid’s holdings.

“I thought I told you I had a meeting with Collin today.” She knew she had. She was also pretty sure she knew who had mentioned the luncheon to her dad. Kurt Peters curried her father’s favor in every way he could.

“What did he say?”

She considered how much to tell him, not just the facts, but the nuances of the meeting. “They’re tired of wrangling over the land. They’ll ask the trustees to sell us the remainder of the Baxter land for the price they offered it to Garrett Kincaid.”

Her father’s face darkened dangerously. “They’ll sell all the Baxter land to me.”

“Jackson Hawk is representing the reservation. Collin said their plans are too far along to stop. I’ve spoken with Hawk prior to this. The tribal elders refuse to give up the land and will press their own suit if need be.”

“Have they started building?” he demanded.

“I don’t know. Legally, it doesn’t matter to our case. By buying land without a clear title, they aren’t entitled to any special consideration. However, their suit will complicate things for us.”

Her father sat on the corner of her desk, another perk only he was allowed. “Those blasted Indians. We need to check on what they’re doing. I have to fly to New York tomorrow on that bank merger since I’m on the board of directors. You’ll have to go out there.”

Surprised at this announcement, she said, “Collin invited me to spend the weekend at the Kincaid place. He thought I should look the Baxter land over. That sounds like a case of ‘Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly,’ doesn’t it?” She smiled in ironic amusement.

Instead of seeing the humor in the idea of her being at the Kincaid compound, surrounded by their opponents and those loyal to them, her father slapped his hand on his thigh and chortled.

“Good,” he said. “Perfect. When do you go?”

Her jaw nearly sagged at his elation. “I turned him down. Why would I fall in with his plans?”

“Why? To see what’s going on. You can check on the reservation doings at the same time since the land adjoins the Kincaid place.” He gave her a derisive glare. “Where’s your head, girl? You might be able to come up with something we’ve overlooked or know nothing about. We need to know any weakness in their case or if they have any surprises up their sleeves.”

“We’ve already gone into disclosure,” she reminded him.

“I’m not talking about legal stuff,” he interrupted, silencing her in his usual impatient manner. “We need to look for chinks in the family armor. Or among the ranch hands. Not everyone out there thinks the Kincaids are God’s gift to Montana. Someone working on the ranch might have information we can use.”

She remained silent, every instinct within her advising that this was the wrong thing to do.

“Call the grandson and tell him you accept.”

She stood. Her manner cool and at odds with the way she felt inside, she said, “I’ll consider it.”

His eyebrows shot up. She’d never used that particular tone with him. She didn’t know why she felt so defensive.

For once he seemed at a loss for words. “Well, then, good.” He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got to go to a meeting on the new mall in five minutes. Blasted construction boss is a crook, if you ask me. I’ll see you Monday when I get back from New York. No, Tuesday here at the office.”

“All right.”

She remained standing behind her desk after he’d gone. She doubted he heard her agreement. It would never occur to him that she wouldn’t be there or that she might have other things to do. For the briefest second, resentment stormed through her, causing a lump to form in her throat.

The telephone rang, diverting her from the strange tempest of emotion. She cleared her throat and answered. For the rest of the afternoon, she was too busy to think. At six, she went to her apartment in one of the elite Baxter Development complexes. A common-interest development or C.I.D., as it was called in the industry, it was inhabited by professional couples or those wealthy enough to afford a second home.

The mountains around Whitehorn were scenic and the fact that the town was close to Yellowstone was an added attraction for those with children. The county was becoming increasingly popular with families from metropolitan areas.

Her father had seen the opportunities long ago. The fact that the local people hadn’t certainly wasn’t his fault. Pulling on her bathing suit, she wondered why she sometimes felt a twinge of guilt as the company bought up mismanaged ranches and turned them into thriving strip malls, condos, golf courses and nature trails for the aging baby boomers. The mismanagement wasn’t her father’s fault.

Swimming one hundred laps of the Olympic-size indoor pool, she dreaded the thought of calling Collin and accepting his offer. It felt like a concession on her part, which could be interpreted as a sign of weakness from their side. Neither did she like the idea of being a spy sent into the enemy camp by her father.

She sighed shakily. She felt she no longer knew the man she’d adored as a child. They were becoming more and more estranged. It bothered her.

From what she had seen of Collin and his grandfather, they were very close-knit. For a second, something like envy washed through her. She discarded the notion and put her efforts into propelling herself through the water that was almost as warm as a bathtub.

At the end of an hour, feeling neither refreshed nor any happier, she returned to her place. The silence seemed to mock her as she showered and dressed in silk pajamas, then ate a salad for dinner.

She wondered how many of the grandsons and their various families were at the Kincaid spread and imagined them crowded around a long table, laughing while Collin told them about the meeting.

Collin returned to the dining room and the lunch he’d left to answer a summons to the phone. “Will wonders never cease?” he said to his grandfather, the seventy-three-year-old patriarch of the Elk Springs branch of the Kincaids. “Yesterday Hope Baxter refused to accept an invitation to come out and look the ranch over. Today she calls and says she will.”

Garrett beamed. “I knew the Kincaid charm wouldn’t fail,” he said cheerfully.

Collin had his doubts about that. It wasn’t charm that had changed Hope’s mind about coming out for the weekend. Whatever it was, he figured he could find out before the weekend was over. He would make a point of it.

“What’s happening?” Trent, one of Larry Kincaid’s other illegitimate sons, wanted to know.

“Collin talked Baxter’s daughter into coming out to the ranch. She’ll be here for the weekend,” Garrett told him.

Trent glanced first at his wife Gina and then back at Collin with interest. “She’s the attorney on the case, isn’t she?”

Collin nodded and didn’t add anything more.

“It’s strange how the Kincaid family seems to be so totally enmeshed with the Baxters, isn’t it?” Trent continued. “Lexine, Emma’s birth mother, was married to Dugin Kincaid, Jeremiah’s younger son. Now Emma is married to Brandon, a Kincaid from the illegitimate branch of the family.”

“And has a twin, although Emma’s mother isn’t admitting to having another child,” Gina, the private investigator instrumental in locating Garrett’s grandsons, reminded them.

The DNA tests that had nearly convicted Emma in the death of the mayor’s daughter, Christina Montgomery, had proven she was one of a set of identical twins. Only the fact that Emma’d been inoculated against rubella and her mysterious twin hadn’t, had saved her.

Collin thought of Hope and her embarrassment at the mention of her relative, the notorious Lexine Baxter.

The unknown twin, who had apparently been with Christine Montgomery shortly before her death, wasn’t making herself accessible to the local authorities as requested through the news media. From what he’d seen of Brandon’s wife, Emma wasn’t anything like her mother. Was the twin?

Gina laughed ruefully. “So. Does this mean there’s going to be one more for dinner this weekend?”

“I’ll help with the cooking,” Trent volunteered.

Hattie, their previous housekeeper, had recently quit. The ranch had trouble keeping help because of the supposed curse on the Kincaid land. Gina had assumed most of the planning and served as executor of household chores. Everyone had been assigned a task that contributed to the running of the homestead.

There were moans all around and graphic reminders of charred hamburgers resembling charcoal briquettes at Trent’s last attempt at supper. He was unrepentant. “Practice makes perfect.”

“Only if you do it right,” Collin told him. “You have to keep an eye on the grill and squirt water on the flames before they incinerate the burgers.”

“Hey, I can do it,” Trent assured everyone.

“Uh-oh,” Gina said, “the impatient one awakes.” She hurried from the table to answer her son’s summons.

Collin’s grandfather chuckled. “I believe women could hear the cry of their own baby if they were at a ball game with fifty-thousand cheering fans and the child was in a nursery a mile away.” He turned his gaze on Collin. “It’s about time you were thinking of starting your family. You aren’t getting any younger.”

“I’m only thirty-one,” Collin protested good-naturedly. He’d been hearing about marriage and children from the old man since he could remember. “Besides, I’m too busy rushing back and forth between here and Elk Springs to think about finding a bride.”

Across the table, his half brother watched with the assured grin of one who had done his part and won their grandfather’s approbation by acquiring a wife and providing a son to carry on the Kincaid tradition in Whitehorn.

Assuming they ever got title to the ranch.

Collin frowned as he recalled his brief telephone conversation with Hope. He wanted to know what had happened to change her mind between their meeting yesterday, which hadn’t gone well in his opinion, and this morning.

She had been positively horrified at the idea when he had mentioned it yesterday at lunch at the Hip Hop Café. Today she’d admitted he was probably right—she needed to see the land to know exactly what parcels had been sold off the original Baxter holdings. She was a mystery, this woman who’d had the nerve to walk out on him in the busy diner one day, then call him the next, pretty as you please, to admit she’d possibly been wrong.

A thrum of anticipation vibrated through him. It had nothing to do with settling the case and everything to do with being alone with her as they explored the range.

Alarms went off in his head, but he knew he wasn’t going to heed them. Ruefully he wondered what had happened to his instinct for survival.

“So what’s the plan?” Trent wanted to know.

Collin shook his head. “No particular plan. I thought she should come out and explore the place while we try to hammer down the details of an offer that her father, we hope, can’t refuse.”

Trent’s face darkened. “Revenge. The man is obsessed with it. That’s the only reason for this whole lawsuit.”

“It’s hard to let go of a dream,” Garrett said sadly. “He was promised the place as a teenager. He poured his heart into it, then it was lost to him through no fault of his own. That’s a deep hurt.”

Collin studied his grandfather. The old man had a temper, which had exploded in the last meeting with Jordan Baxter and his sharp-minded daughter, but he also understood the underlying emotion of his enemy. Collin hoped when he was his grandfather’s age he had half the understanding of human nature that Garrett had. And the compassion.

Collin had at first been resentful of the brood of bastard brothers, but that was before he’d realized he’d had life a lot easier than any of them. He’d known his roots. And he’d had Garrett’s unwavering love to help him on the right path. That had been the greatest influence in his life.

Realizing his advantages and that the Elk Springs ranch would still be his—and his sister’s, of course—he’d pitched in to help the new brothers gain their own part of the Kincaid inheritance. He’d even learned to like them for the most part, especially Trent, who was becoming a close friend.

Both Trent and Gina liked staying at the ranch and did so often. Cade and Leanne had built a fine house in a wooded meadow nearby. Brandon and Emma were thinking of doing the same. Emma and Hope, newly discovered cousins, could get to know each other…

Shocked at the direction of his thoughts, Collin broke off the odd musing. Rising, he told his grandfather, “I have work to do. I need to talk to Cade on the Appaloosa breeding program. I saw a stallion on the res the other day that he might be interested in.”

Garrett nodded, his smile serene.

Although the lawsuit wasn’t over, Collin knew his grandfather thought things were progressing smoothly and according to plan—which was to have all his grandsons married and settled within the year.

That left him as the last Kincaid bachelor. Plus the unknown seventh bastard son of Larry Kincaid.

Gina had traced his philandering father’s whereabouts at the time and was sure the last son had been conceived and still existed in Whitehorn. It was only a matter of time before she found the woman who’d been involved, Gina’d said. She was checking birth records in Whitehorn, plus Blue River County and all connecting counties.

The seventh son would still be a child, though. Garrett would have to wait a number of years before he could be married off.

Smiling, Collin headed across the compound to the horse arena where Cade was sure to be working with his prize Appaloosas. He wondered if his weekend guest liked to ride. That was how he intended to show her around the place.

At the thought of being alone with Hope for hours out on the trail, his body stirred hungrily. She was a beautiful woman. A man would have to be deaf, dumb and blind to not respond to her.

She was also an enigma. There was something soft and alluring, totally feminine, about her that came across in spite of her cool professionalism.

The picture of Hope holding the toddler in her lap came to him. In spite of her lawyerly ways, she couldn’t hide the other facets to her personality. With the child, she’d been warm and exuberant and open, not minding at all if her hair was mussed or her dress wrinkled. There was no doubt in his mind that she would make an excellent mother.

Together they would produce beautiful children—

Again he was dumbfounded at the direction his mind had taken. He scoffed at his own wild imagination. There was no way in hell Hope Baxter would ever have anything to do with a Kincaid other than in court, fighting over some rocks and valleys that weren’t much good for anything anyway.

He wasn’t going to fall for her, either. No way.

But the attraction was there.

Yeah, sex. So what? An attraction didn’t mean lasting commitment or anything serious. He’d made his share of mistakes in his life, but he certainly wasn’t going to do anything as stupid as fall in love with her.

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