The Bridal Promise

“As you know,” John continued, “our parents and grandparents tried a couple of decades ago to position Spirit Valley for the future. But they made their efforts based upon Spirit as a continuing center of commerce.” He paused briefly. “Nobody dreamed it would ever get like this. So nobody planned for the worst.” John sighed. “They complacently expected things to continue as they had always been.”

Perri finally spoke. “I think accusing them of complacency is a little harsh, John. Nobody could have predicted drought, the oil bust and the railroad’s demise,” she pointed out.

“Thank you, Miss Oklahoma Girl Stater,” Matt interjected dryly, “but we’re getting off the subject here.” Didn’t she realize her calm appeal for reason was killing him?

Perri remained unruffled and coolly crossed her legs. He realized he was staring. He realized she knew it. How she could remain that placid was just beyond him. He made a mental note to set about breaking down that composed demeanor at the first opportunity.

Matt grimly turned his attention back to the man he was beginning to think of as “that lawyer.” “I want to know what Gannie said,” Matt demanded. “Why did she want me to many Stone here? And, Johnnie, don’t you give me that attorney/client confidentiality crap.”

John Deepwater looked his best friend in the eye. “She said it was time you did something you should have done over ten years ago.”

Perri inhaled sharply. John continued. “She said it was time that the Stone-Ransom animosity was put to rest for the good of all concerned. Now that you’re both older. Now that . . . you’re both single, Gannie felt it was high time you two got married.” He didn’t have to add, “now that Leila Ransom is dead.” The words John left unspoken were a silent outcry heard by everyone in the room.

“But why?” Perri spoke so low she might have been alone. “Why barter me and buy him? I have no interest in holding Matt to anything he said twelve years ago. As a matter of fact,” she continued, “I’m grateful to him for ending it. I was way too young to get married. Please tell me why she would do this, Johnnie.”

Matt was saved from responding to that bit about her being “grateful” when he saw Deepwater’s face gentle into a faint smile. As always, it softened the fierceness of his features to a surprising degree.

“Gannie said she promised your grandmother Anne to always look out for you and your mother.” Matt and Perri both displayed a momentary lack of composure at the mention of Peni’s grandmother, Anne. “She said it was time for the Stone/Marlowe women to stop running—mat you, in particular, needed to come home. That even later,” he added, “and divorced from Matt, you’d be accepted as a member of the community and not as an outsider. She said: ‘Perri needs to have her home restored. The Ransoms took it from her and they can damn well give it back.”

Matt sat silently, his mind racing around all the angles as John continued. “So folks, here’s the bottom line. Number one, you two have ninety days to accept or decline the terms of the will. If you marry, you stay married for at least six months before entertaining the possibility of a divorce—all the while, you must live together in the Gledhill place.”

Matt stirred indignantly at that. “I don’t have the time to be driving back and forth to the farm,” he said. “I’ve got horses to see to. I’ve—”

“Oh, please. It’s down the road, not even a mile,” Perri interjected. “I live 2,000-something miles away and you have the nerve to whine about how—”

“Number two,” Deepwater’s rich, courtroom voice filled the little office. “You come up with a plan to use the land she’s donated to Spirit in a way that will benefit the area. From the way she described it to me, what she wanted from y’all . . .”

John’s eyes were drawn to a photograph on the wall behind his clients’ chairs. His voice trailed off. Matt could almost feel him looking back to a time before the sound of the starting gun for the Run of ’89. The day the town of Spirit Valley sprung up overnight.

“Well,” John continued, “it was as if she wanted you two to homestead and make the improvements necessary to maintain a claim. I think that’s how she saw it, as a claim. I think it was important to her that the two of you were the ones to find some way to bring people and commerce into the area.” John looked from Perri to Matt, letting his words sink in.

“But I don’t want to bring people into the area,” Matt pointed out politely. “I want them to stay out.”

“Well, then you’re going to have them in your lap, Matt,” his friend replied just as politely as you please. “The house and the land will be sold to the developers and you’ll have a condominium resting up by your east pasture.” The thought of that left all three of them breathless.

“Gary Kell is the attorney for the developers and he is just about beside himself, he wants that deal so bad,” John stated grimly. “So unless you put your back into this project, not only will you lose the inheritance of that land, you’re going to have people just about up your nose.

“Perri.” John continued, “I’ve seen the plans. They are trying to be sensitive and tasteful about it, but the condo will surround the old graveyard. Some of your family is buried there.”

Perri looked away.

“Of course, maybe that’s your preference,” he added with studied carelessness.

Well, that brought her head back around to stare him down. The tears in her eyes had dried in an instant and the green glints flashed with a renewed show of spirit.

Good, Matt thought. Whatever else had happened, the woman had acquired some grit along the way.

“Take the money,” John continued in the same indifferent vein, “and let us become even more of a bedroom community for Oklahoma City than we already are.”

“So, is that all?” The simmer and sizzle of Ransom’s slow burn could probably be detected all the way to Oklahoma City.

“No.” Deepwater replied soberly. “No.”

“Well?” Matt was in no mood to be strung along. And he still wasn’t fooled John had been looking forward to this. “What else did she say?”

Deepwater’s gaze fell upon Perri. “She said “Tell Perri I said it was time she stopped running and came home.’” Perri looked deeply into John’s eyes, as if she were trying to see Gannie’s face emerge from their onyxlike surface. “Tell her I said for her to just trust me.’”

“Don’t make me drag it out of you, John. What else?” Matt demanded.

A surprisingly boyish grin lit Deepwater’s face as he looked at Ransom. “She said: ‘And Johnnie, when Matthew starts to squawk, you just tell him he should have paid more attention. Back when I was trying to teach him how to play chess.’”

Just trust me.

Out in the parking lot, Perri fumbled with the car keys and the copies of Gannie’s will. She had excused herself and gotten out quick. From the look of the sky, Spirit was caught between two opposing weather patterns, one to the norh, the other to the east. The light had turned that clear, lovely shade of pale, apple green that Perri associated with soon-to-follow destructive weather.

The weather had been as good an excuse as any to make a graceful exit The ex-Mrs. Gary Kell, the lovely Lida, had been lying in wait in the outer office when the three of them had emerged. She had immediately draped herself all over Matt like a cheap suit, the better to pump him for details. It took a stronger stomach than Perri had possessed at the moment to witness that.

Strong wind blew her hair into her eyes as she tried to get it straight which key on the unfamiliar ring fit the car door. A large, bronzed hand took the ring from her, inserting the proper key and holding open the door. “Thank you, Matt,” she said formally.

He was wearing a suit, his hair just curling around the collar of his shirt. And cologne. She could sort of halfway deal with him when he was in boots and jeans, but not in a suit. Perri fought the urge to hang her head and not look at the man. He looked too good, too solid, his presence too comforting.

“I’ve asked John to dig out whatever boilerplate he’s got on hand for prenuptial agreements,” Matt said. “You have an appointment tomorrow morning at 9 a.m., right after mine,” he added rapidly upon her glare, “for a medical checkup.”

Jolted out of the notion of a “comforting” Matt Ransom, Perri stared at him. “What?” she cried.

“Doc Berkka is leaving for Tenkiller,” Matt said as if that settled it.

It did. “Of course. Silly me,” she said dryly. “Whatever was I thinking?”

Trips to the lake were sacred to the Berkkas. Back when the current Dr. Berkka’s grandfather was in practice, every cesarean birth in June had been scheduled to accommodate the fish.

“So, do we sign a prenup?” Matt demanded. “Book the church? Get a jump on the next thing that lawyer is going to tell us to do?”

She had to ask. “Just when did Johnnie Deepwater become ‘that lawyer’?”

“When he told me I had to marry you, that’s when,” Matt roared.

Perri’s face tilted up toward his as they squared off. “Thank you so very much for announcing that at the top of your lungs,” she answered. “We can finish the job if you go on over to Blue’s Tavern. I’ll head for Marjorie’s Beauty Shop and then the whole damn county will be up to date on our personal affairs by sundown.”

“Now who’s shouting?”

“Go to hell, Ransom,” she said sweetly.

For a moment he simply looked at her as the wind brutally lashed at them both. “Hell is where I’ve lived for the last twelve years.”

Perri marched back through Gannie’s front door, past her cousin LaDonna Marlowe, and headed right for the wine.

“The storm’s moved on to Apache, now that you’ve got your stuff out of my place during the worst of it. I brought beer,” Donnie called absently from the couch as she removed the cotton separating each newly painted pink toenail.

“I knew better than to bring food, what with all the casseroles. Want one? A beer, I mean,” she clarified, looking up from her toes. “No, I guess you don’t.” Donnie watched with cautious fascination as Perri dumped her purse, slapped her copies of the will down on the sideboard, filled a goblet with wine and threw back a big swallow. Huge, blue eyes got even bigger. “What?” she demanded. “Tell me.”

“I have ninety days to decide to marry Matt Ransom and keep this place intact,” Perri announced. “Or, I can decline marriage to that particular prince of darkness and see Gledhill sold out from under me for condominiums.”

The silence lengthened as Donnie took in her cousin’s words. “Oh, I am nowhere near drunk enough for you to be telling me this.” Donnie replied. “I just started on this beer. Now slowly, and from the top.”

Perri repeated the full exchange in Deepwater’s office. “Eek,” Donnie said weakly.

“Maybe I won’t have to make this decision,” Perri continued. “Maybe Matt will refuse and I won’t have to make any kind of a choice about the land.”

Her voice trailed off at the sound of a vehicle moving hard up the drive. On a sigh, they both braced themselves and, taking a sip, set goblet and beer bottle aside. There was no choice when it came to Matt or to the land. It didn’t need saying.

“Donnie,” Matt nodded at the little brunette upon entering the living room. He paused to consider her screaming pink toenails. “Does the county sheriff’s office know what its ‘star’ deputy is wearing underneath her uniform?” he demanded.

“Matt.” Donnie gave him a luminous smile that said: ‘I ain’t movin.’

He looks dangerous; ready to blow, Perri thought as she glanced toward the woman she loved like a sister. The tension in the room made it difficult to maintain the appearance of nonchalance. Donnie would manage it somehow, Perri was certain. This was too good not to watch them play it out.

A train whistled softly past the crossing and into the distance as Perri’s stance widened to mirror Matt’s own. Both of them had their weight transferred to the balls of their feet. They were poised like two gunslingers facing off.

The only sounds were the ever-present wind, and the ticking of the clock on the mantel. Tread lightly, Matt, Perri silently cautioned. No matter what, he was going to have to work a bit harder to wear her down than he’d done twelve years ago.

“We didn’t finish our conversation before you ran off,” he said. “Again.”

“On the contrary,” she answered, “there’s nothing more to say for the moment, Matt.”

“You still haven’t said yes or no, Stone,” he challenged.

“No, I haven’t,” she shot back, “and I don’t intend to. Yet. I have ninety days before the decision is due.”

Did he have to look that great? Why couldn’t he be an out-of-shape, doughy accountant, for heaven’s sake? And why had those adorable dimples of his sharpened into such a dangerous face? It really wasn’t fair, damn him.

“Ninety days?” Matt echoed as he slowly covered the distance between them. “If you plan to string me along for three months, think again.”

“I don’t plan to ‘string you along’ at all,” she countered. “But I won’t be pressured into a snap decision either.” She stood her ground and took a deep breath. “I want to at least sleep on it, Matt. So should you.” Perri tilted her head to look up with steady eyes as he reached the end of his walk. He didn’t have to know how much it cost her. “Am I to conclude from this unexpected visit that you want us to get married?” she asked dryly.

Matt looked again at Donnie as if she’d missed her cue. “Forget it,” she said flatly.

“Donnie.” Perri smiled, never taking her eyes off Matt.

“Oh, all right.” Donnie stood up carefully, like a woman unconvinced that her polish was completely dry. “But if you hurt her, Matt, I’ll have to shoot you,” she muttered, turning toward the hall. “I’ll be in the kitchen,” she stated unnecessarily and did the only sane thing a woman could do under the circumstances. She walked out on her heels.

“Okay, bottom line,” Matt declared as they heard Donnie slap through the kitchen’s swinging doors. “Gannie must have felt strongly about it if she wanted us to get married this badly. And she was right. The Ransoms, or at least this Ransom, should make the effort to restore your place in the community. And to restore your home.”

Well, that answered that. Perri knew she might regret it, but she let him take her hand. His callused fingers rasped gently against the center of her palm. She couldn’t help being drawn to him. It was all too well-known.

“Perri, I’m asking you to marry me.” His smile was so sad and awkward, it affected her like a blow.

“I know this is a different marriage proposal than the last one you got from me.” Restless, he turned away and moved to the mantel. His fingers automatically searched out the arrowhead he’d found one day, a lifetime ago. “It certainly will be a different marriage then the one I wanted with you,” he acknowledged. “But I’m serious about it.” His gaze remained on her face as he gripped the thin, lethal piece of tapered stone. “So if there is another man in your life, tell me now,” he demanded.

There was a long pause while she tried to get her breath. “But, we don’t know each other anymore. I’m not sure I even like you,” Perri continued with a calm totally at odds with how she felt. “And more to the point—is there a woman here in Spirit with certain expectations regarding her relationship with you?” she asked.

He gave her a blank look. She tried again. “Is there someone who would be hurt by our getting married, Matt?” Besides myself, she wondered.

Matt studied her, his eyes searching her face and body like he’d never seen her before. Suddenly he relaxed as if he’d reached a decision. Obviously, he wasn’t listening to a word she’d said. And here she was, knocking herself out to be calm, reasonable and mature.

“I’m not involved with anyone myself, at the moment, but that is not the issue.” She was going to maintain her dignity if it killed her. “If we go through with this—”

“No, there’s no one,” he said absently as he strolled back toward her. “And you’re wrong about one thing. Who you’re ‘involved’ with is most decidedly my business, as of now.”

“But you’ve made it clear that you don’t think much of me,” she looked at him in bewilderment and quickly stifled another nervous urge to yawn. Could he be any more annoying? she wondered. Knowing him, she was soon to find out.

“That’s not exactly true,” he muttered gracelessly.

Where was this leading? It was best to keep it just business if she wanted to live through it. “All right. Let’s just leave it,” she said briskly, getting a grip on her heart. She shook off the hopes and dreams of a past that was bygone.

“If this is your idea of down-home charm, it’s not working.” She paused and coolly looked him over. “And I can’t help but wonder if you knew about the conditions of the will in advance. You didn’t seem all that shocked over the idea of a marriage. Were you just getting a charge out of toying with me earlier today?” she demanded.

The skin around those cheekbones seemed to tighten at her words. “You used to be such a sweet little girl,” he said in furious tones.

“But that doesn’t mean I was stupid.” She couldn’t quite keep the smile out of her voice. Apparently Mr. Ransom was not best pleased by the question.

“I may have been a little girl, but I was at least smart enough to be in love with a decent young man. One, I might add, who was honorable enough to propose marriage and mean it.” Perri stared out the window at the nearby tree as a breeze played lightly through the leaves. Just as it had always done. It helped her get hold of herself.

“Yeah, I suppose I was a sweet little girl,” she sighed, the threat of tears receding. How could he make her want to cry and then smile in the spin of a dime? How could he make her want something that no longer existed with such reckless intensity? A recklessness that fully acknowledged how much it would hurt six months down the road. “I will think about the idea of marrying you and see if I can live with it,” she said formally. “I’ll get back to you in a day or two.”

He chucked as if he was actually beginning to enjoy that snippy tone. “Come here,” he said softly, holding out his arms. She hesitated before walking into his light embrace. “I’m sorry I worked so hard to get your goat earlier. And no, I didn’t know she had marriage in mind for us. I would have promised, at least to look out for you,” he admitted grudgingly, “if she’d asked. Truce?” His lips lightly played along her temple.

Perri relaxed slightly and smiled. “Truce,” she said.

“Good,” Matt murmured as he smoothed her hair from her shoulders. Without warning he skillfully covered her mouth with his. There was a moment when she all but tasted his frustration. Then she felt him let it go as he deepened the kiss. The tender quality changed everything.

He overwhelmed her common sense and left her totally unprepared for the sudden transfer into sweetness. His kiss became a gentle appeal rather than an angry demand and the effect was shattering. She gave more of herself than ever before.

Never had she wanted a man the way she wanted Matt at this moment. The tenderness contained such a quality of honesty between them, it almost brought tears to her eyes. She clung to his jacket and found a depth of feeling she could never have envisioned with him. Even young Matt hadn’t stirred her so acutely.

The kiss intensified and changed. His hands began to move over her, molding her to him, keeping her close. They roamed down to her hips, his thumbs playing over her protruding hipbones before he tilted her pelvis into him. She rose up to cradle his aroused flesh.

His hand traveled up to her breast. She arched into him as his thumb found her nipple already erect. “I’m going to have you, Perri,” he said softly as he lay openmouthed kisses against her throat and jaw. “We’re going to have each other and at least some kind of a marriage,” he vowed, “unless you can look me in the eye and tell me ‘no’ like you mean it.”

He kissed her deeply, as if they had all the time in the would Perri’s bones were melting as she clung to him. The mood shifted again and became more demanding. She felt herself straining toward Matt when he abruptly pulled back from the kiss.

“Now that we’ve got a truce,” he said, breathing hard, “let me state my plans.” His grip moved from her shoulders to her nape, his thumbs supporting her jaw, as he kissed her hard and fast. “You may not have heard, darlin’,” he said, “but I’ve been slap out of tact for some time, so I’ll be direct.

“We’ve got ninety days,” he reminded her. “I plan to see to it that each one is an exercise in sheer torment until you say ‘Yes, Matt, I’ll be pleased to be your wife.’ We are going to honor Gannie’s wishes, Per,” he went on. “Even though the word ‘honor’ just about sticks in my throat...”

That did it Fury lashed apart the sexy haze he’d led her toward. Perri was well and truly riled. His words and the fact that he had kissed her right out of all reason and into a stupor were too much. She started to haul off and hit him, but he had always been too quick.

Matt grabbed her and pulled her up off her feet, so that they were eye-to-eye. “I asked you nicely first.” he reminded her. His tone hardened. “Now, I’m telling you. Get ready for a wetding, ‘cause you are getting married. I’m not going to let anything or anybody build a damn condo on this property,” he vowed. “And if, by some screwup, you are responsible for such a thing ever rising out of Gledhill, I will personally take some long and very painful strips right out of your pretty hide.

“And understand this,” he added with grim determination. “I plan to see to it, Ms. Stone, that you’re my wife in every sense of the word.” He set her down sharply.

“You can say ‘yes’ now or spend the next three months looking over your shoulder,” Matt called loudly after her as she pushed past him and headed for the kitchen. “It’s up to you.”

“Miss Marlowe,” he called out with a little too much glee. The look on Perri’s face as she stalked into the kitchen had Donnie moving through the swinging doors looking for a fight. “Try to explain to your cousin from New York that it’s a done deal.

“And,” he added as he walked to the door, “please tell Ms. Stone, I’ll see her in church.” He graciously closed the front door behind him on a grim little smile.

Donnie returned to the kitchen to find her cousin leaning up against the counter. Navy blue eyes narrowed, wincing as Perri gently banged her forehead, just once, against the kitchen cabinet.

“Well, nobody can accuse that man of a lack of intensity,” Donnie announced.

“Nobody can accuse him of having a soul either,” Perri muttered. She slowly pushed back from the counter and tried to get a rein on her temper.

Only now did she notice she was holding the arrowhead in a viselike grip, with no notion of when he had put it into her hand. She looked down at her palm. Perri had squeezed the implement of war hard enough for the sharp edges to leave marks.

Donnie stood patiently for a time, waiting for the storm to pass. “Shall I heat up one of the casseroles the church ladies landed on us, while you get out of that suit?”

Perri sighed and turned to the little brunette. “Why stop at one?” she asked.

Matt passed his own place and kept going. He needed a minute or two to calm down. The lake, he thought as he tore at his tie. I’ll just stop off for a minute at the lake. It wasn’t far and the sight of all that water never failed to soothe him.

He veered off the road to the main picnic area and away from the skiers, making for a secluded section where he had a better chance for a moment of peace, It was a mistake.

He had taken Perri here. He had told her he loved her and wanted to marry her right about where he was now parked. He slammed out of the car and looked around rather wildly at where be had just driven himself, in his own vehicle, by his own hand. “Just shoot me,” he muttered.

She had tasted lightly of wine, he thought. It had only served to enhance the well-remembered taste of her. Matt wanted her. After all this time, and to the point of violence. The feelings of tenderness, laced with shots of fury had him off balance. If she had been appealing to him before, she was devastating now. His hands fisted as he could almost feel her hair brush through his fingers. Matt swore to himself.