The Bridal Promise

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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.

How could he explain to Perri that she was no longer the true source of his anger, but instead a painful reminder of his own dreadful mistakes? Pride made it all but impossible to acknowledge the need he now felt for the woman Perri had become without him. A woman he just knew was going to leave.

Ransoms didn’t leave. They stayed. They remained anchored to the land; ever since 1891, when a spinster schoolteacher had taken in a half-breed foundling and raised him for her own.

Miss Vienna Whitaker, obviously Southern and a lady to her fingertips, had named the baby Matthew Lawrence, after her beloved father. But for reasons unknown. Miss Vienna had given the child the last name of Ransom.

The citizens of Spirit Valley could only speculate as to why she had chosen the name. Some thought it a good name. With no one in Indian Territory named Ransom, no one could be blamed for having fathered a half-Indian baby.

Those citizens with a dictionary alongside the family Bible, had puzzled over what the ransom was for. If raising the child was the price of atonement, then what was the sin? And whose, exactly? Miss Vienna hadn’t seen fit to share her reasoning. She had quietly raised a fine son, who later became a much-respected member of the community.

Like his father, Sam, Matt didn’t give much thought to the source of their need to take care of what his great-greatgrandfather had been given. Nor did he give any thought to his automatic mistrust for those who moved on. Its origins were as deeply engrained as the desire to maintain a well-respected position in the community. His folks had always stayed, spit in the dust and stuck it out.

No, Ransoms didn’t leave, they were too busy. None had shirked the responsibility of family and land. None, that is, except for one. Matt’s grandfather, Lawrence Ransom, had done just that when he had run off with Anne Marlowe, the grandmother of Pern Stone.

Since that time everything had changed. It certainly had stained Matt’s love for Perri. As soon as Matt had declared his intention to make Perri his wife, everything he had subsequently put his heart into had turned to dust. Even later on when his brother had drifted off, the unspoken assumption had been that somehow the wounds of the past had caused Whit to leave town as soon as he was able. But the violence and scandal their grandparents had launched was not Perri’s fault. It shamed him to think he couldn’t rise above that one fact. Matt noticed that it evoked interest to realize that he still could feel a sense of shame about anything.

He wished he could muster up some feelings for the way he had treated Perri twelve years ago. But they were locked in ice. Matt had wanted to destroy her that night. He speculated now on just how close he had come to achieving his goaL

Once Sam had stormed out of the house that night, Leila had laid it on thick about the old scandal. Then as if his grandparents hadn’t been reason enough, she had told him his father was keeping Janie Stone—Perri’s mother—as his mistress. Matt’s attempts to reason with her had only served to make his mother more lethal.

Today, his own youthful arrogance and naiveté astounded him. He had foolishly assumed his parents’ objections would be due to Perri’s age; and he had been preparing his argument for some time along that line. He knew now that he had underestimated his mother as a fighter. But then, he had never gone up against anyone like her.

The force of her rage had been terrifying. And underneath the emotions, what she had said had made some sense. His mother had made it plain that Perri Stone couldn’t possibly love a Ransom. After all, since Perri was aware of Sam’s involvement with Janie, then her eagerness to marry Matt had to be founded on a desire to exact some small degree of revenge on the Ransoms. If Perri had truly loved him, Leila had made it clear that Marlowe honor would have demanded Perri let Matt go.

Looking back on it, his actions later that night had been due as much to the way Leila had aroused his emotions as to what she had actually said to him. He had left a sobbing Leila and gone for a much-needed drive to cool off. He hadn’t wanted to go directly to Gledhill and have it out with a seventeen-year-old girl who loved him. But by the time Matt did show up, he hadn’t been able to calm his fury over his mother’s accusations.

He could still see Perri in the darkened living room, looking paralyzed with shame and fear. It only now occurred to him that he had never asked her what that was about. He’d never taken a moment to find out if something was wrong. He had just started in and said some appalling things to her.

When she had denied his mother’s accusations about his dad and Janie, he had nearly lost it. He quite simply hadn’t believed her. After all, she had seemed to expect his indictment.

“He hasn’t been seeing my mother,” Perri had all but screamed. “She’s not seeing anybody.”

“Of course,” Matt had whispered, gently touching her cheek. She had such smooth skin. He had scared her with that gentle stroke. But still Perri had hung on to her lies. Just as his mother had predicted she would. “You’ve got good reason to think I’m stupid enough to believe you. Don’t you, baby?” he had asked softly. “You’ve gone all the way to convince me, haven’t you?”

Matt winced when he thought of how he had roped the chain of the gold locket around one hand and grabbed her shoulder with the other. His fingers had dug in as he had pulled her to him. Perri’s eyes had dilated in shock at his savage behavior.

He had given her the necklace as a symbol of their secret engagement, until the time was right for a ring and a formal announcement. That night, he had struggled not to rip it from her throat. The heavy snake chain had held, but he knew the contempt in his eyes had destroyed her where she stood. Still, Perri had said nothing. She hadn’t tried to defend herself, only her mother.

“I’m real impressed,” he’d said. “You’re good, I’ll give you that.” He had roughly pushed her away and headed out the door. Matt’s last memory of Perri was a glimpse of her through the window, trying to rub away the red marks already forming on her throat.

From that night on, his pride had focused on his role in maintaining a respected position in the community. He had set himself apart from his father and younger brother to see that scandal didn’t touch another generation of Ransoms.

And it was more than his relationship with Perri that hadn’t survived that night. To this day, his relationship with his father was forever altered as well. They worked together and lived on the same property, but boundary lines had been drawn by Matt’s resulting sense of betrayal.

Matt idly watched a very fat blue jay repeatedly dive-bomb a squirrel. That brought him back to the present. It dawned on him, as he looked around, that he’d never brought Cadie out here during their brief marriage. He’d never brought his wife to a place he considered so important, so much his. Never shared it with her. He couldn’t. This spot was forever associated with memories of Perri.

He felt the fury drain away as he accepted that he wanted her. He wanted Perri with a single-mindedness of purpose that sooner or later would leave his heart on the line. He’d just have to find a way around the fact that Perri Stone was settling back into his blood and soul with an ease he wouldn’t have thought possible.

Matt couldn’t trust himself to take the best road for either of them. Hurting her again would most likely hurt him down to the ground. But for the life of him he couldn’t stop himself from behavior that was bound to cause them both sorrow.

How many more times was he going to hurt Perri Stone? The same woman he had once wanted to protect for a lifetime? How many times now had he attempted deliverance, some sort of atonement? Hadn’t that been the real reason he had married Cadie?

After Perri left, he had married a sweet, fragile girl who had needed him to take care of her. Matt laughed ruefully. Leila had secretly despised Cadie as much as she had Perri, maybe more. It had really killed Leila not to be able to call upon Cadie’s honor as a tool for manipulation. Cadie hadn’t understood honor. All she had understood was competing.

What he hadn’t understood at the time was that he had been the prize. His own willful pride hadn’t let him see that simple fact. He had been so sure life was never going to break Matt Ransom. So convinced that life would have to bend, not himself. He got back in his car and started for home.

All Cadie had wanted was to get married to someone “better” than either of her sisters and have a baby. She had had no plan, no thought about what would happen after that. She had not been prepared for a reality beyond the point where she would reach her goal. So when she had miscarried the second time, to her it was as if she’d lost everything.

Cadie had gotten in the car one day, shortly after being released from the hospital, and headed west. She hadn’t given herself time to heaL If Matt could have done something for her, she hadn’t let him know what it was.

Funny about that. She had zeroed in early and locked onto his need to take care of his family, to have children to carry on for the land. Well, he had failed at all of mat and now he’d had a bellyful of women who needed someone to take care of them.

Near Tucumcari, New Mexico, she had been killed by a drunk driver during a sudden, violent storm. Cadie had pulled over, seeking the protection of an overpass and had been plowed right into the concrete wall. Bad luck. Sorry for your loss, Ransom.

It had left him wild, mean with grief. But Ganme had turned Matt around. She had never been afraid of his rage. Gannie was someone who could love him and would stay during the hard times. He hadn’t managed to drive her away. God, he missed her more than he did his dead wife and his mother combined. He steered the car away from the lake.

Good thing for Perri that she bugged out when she did, he thought. No, it hadn’t been Perri’s fault. Bad luck. Sorry for your loss, you sorry fool.

And so he had grieved, finally. Thanks to Gannie, he hadn’t had to do it alone. Matt reckoned that maybe being the one left behind at home to deal with broken dreams hadn’t changed him too much for the worse.

If not, it was thanks to Gannie. He grinned in spite of everything. Matt didn’t think Gannie would be too proud of his behavior today. He knew he wasn’t. I’m not much impressed with your attitude, Matthew. He could just hear her now.

He’d gone out of his way today to needle Perri. He had meant to keep it up until he had gotten a response from her other than that cool-handed, white-gloved crap. He had had to make her lose her composure, just to prove to himself she was not as immune to him as she had seemed.

And he had been so sure he could bully her into bending to his will; into doing what had to be done. He hadn’t even thought through how she might stand and take it instead. And how that might hurt her. His reasoning had centered on how she had faded away without a fight twelve years before. Well, obviously, that was twelve years gone.

He shouldn’t have taken it as far as he had today. He had to work with the woman. He had to cooperate with her in order to get a job done and it wasn’t going to be easy now that he had kissed her.

She had every right to be furious with him, and hurt. He had been out of line to call her honor into question like that. Gledhill meant as much to Perri as it did to him and he knew it. And on top of that, Matt’s own fury, fueled by an ever-present despair, had caused him to screw up even that, what had been the first moment of real tenderness he had felt in a long, lonely time.

He turned into the drive toward his home. As he drove under the wrought-iron arch, announcing to anyone passing by that this was Ransom Horse Farm, a Cadillac and a Lincoln pulled in behind him. Matt steeled himself to be cordial to the arriving owners and mentally rehearsed what he had to say about their horses.