Blaylock's Bride

Patty was Logan Blaylock’s ten-year-old daughter, and Else, the Blaylock’s eldest sister, had painted a big cup and saucer in an intricate design, duplicating a high priced Italian manufacturer’s. Kallista replaced the plate on the shelf and began checking the names on the bottom of the fired and painted ceramics. The Blaylocks, a close family, liked coming to paint their designs, though the male Blaylocks were conspicuously absent. The huge Blaylock family wouldn’t like her shaking Roman’s tight-fisted grasp over Boone’s estate.

An experienced troubleshooter who knew she was in for a fight, Kallista began making mental lists. First, she would check on the care and feeding of Boone’s beloved pigeons, his goats and sheep and the rest. She skipped her usual cool logic and hurled herself into the passionate dislike of Boone’s executor. Somehow, she would rip the estate away from Roman; she would expose his greed and—she glanced at Boone’s house, overlooking Jasmine, the lights glowing in the April night. Kallista stooped to jerk her small birdwatching binoculars from her leather flight bag and aimed them at Roman Blaylock’s house, which sat on the other hill. The house was dark, proof that Roman still lived in Boone’s home. From Hannah, married to Dan Blaylock, Kallista had learned that Roman had moved into Boone’s house when the old man became too ill to care for himself... and Blaylock hadn’t moved out when Boone died a year ago.

“Squatter.” Kallista muttered the Western term for those who would settle and claim another’s property. Enraged, she hurried out of the shop into the sweet-scented night.

The flashy little sports car soared up the Llewlyn ranch road, gleaming in the moonlight Roman appreciated the skill with which the driver changed gears, easing over the bars of the cattle crossing at the massive iron Llewlyn ranch gate. Then the sports car geared up again, hurling around the moonlit curves, that led upward to Boone’s big, two-story house. Roman flinched when a cow and calf wandered onto the road and the car’s tires squealed to a stop. The car slowly eased off the road, around the cow and calf and began more cautiously toward the house. Whoever was driving the car was mad enough to ignore a few fresh cowpatties. The car skidded to another stop beside Roman’s big dented pickup and Kallista Bellamy hurled her body out of the door.

Roman eased into the shadows, the exercise sweat on his body cooling in the night air. He watched her free stride toward the house, waist-long hair floating out in a black wave behind her. She glanced at the pigpens, the pigeon house and the cattle. She stopped in front of the steps, braced her hands on her hips and studied the house as if looking for one missing board, one untended potted fern.

She moved gracefully, her taut body eloquent and rippling with passion, impatience and fury. She looked the same as that day she’d slapped him, all fiery hot and full of life, and an unfamiliar restless hunger moved inside Roman. He shoved it away and studied Kallista’s long, curved athletic body, her pale heart-shaped face. In a classic style, straight back from her forehead and tamed by large silver combs on either side of her face, Kallista’s hair swung around her restless body like a curtain of sleek heavy silk.

In the framed picture beside Boone’s big carved four-poster bed her face wore a soft, tender look, her eyes luminous and green. Her smile at the photographer—probably Boone—was warm and loving.

Now, Kallista’s frown was cold and furious. Beneath her black shiny jacket, she wore a body-hugging black sweater and black jeans that fitted like a second skin. Roman’s body tensed as he noted the lush curve of her hips and endless legs. Her black combat boots added to the dangerous female-warrior look.

She hesitated, studying the old flower bed, heavy gold daffodils bent beneath the weight of raindrops. For just a heartbeat, her frown softened. Then, she flew up the steps in the easy movements of an athletic woman on a mission, and punched the doorbell furiously. Before Roman could move from the shadows, she had banged her fist on the door. In the next second, she had begun muttering and had extracted a small black kit from the huge leather bag slung over her shoulder.

When she crouched to pick the lock, Roman found his mouth drying at the curve of her hips. The instant desire to place his hands on her startled him, and he spoke too roughly, “The door isn’t locked. You’re a strong woman and I don’t want the stained-glass window broken. It was Boone’s mother’s treasure,” Roman murmured, moving out into the moonlit square on the porch.

“I know what that stained glass meant to him.” Kallista took a step backward, her narrowed almond-shaped eyes ripping down his body, pausing on his bare chest and then jerking back up to his face. At six foot three, Roman stood a head higher than her and Kallista’s frown said she resented looking up to him. She jammed the worn lockpicking kit into her bag. The firm edge to her jaw and the thrust of her chin reminded him of Boone. “I want you out of here. Now. You don’t belong here, not in Boone’s house.”

Roman took his time in answering, stunned by the exotic scent curling from her—part anger, part cinnamon and silk, and all woman. Sleek, tough, sophisticated and...wounded. From Boone’s file, Roman knew the shadowy corners of Kallista’s life. “He wanted me here.”

She glanced again at his bare chest, hesitated for a heartbeat, and then jerked her gaze back up to his face. “You took advantage of a dying man. You moved in and took over. You’re probably bleeding his estate dry.”

In the fraction of a heartbeat when she’d glanced at his chest, wildfire heat shot through Roman’s body, stunning him. She’d tensed just enough to prove that she’d been aware of him. At thirty-nine, Roman considered his sensual years behind him—if he’d had any—and settling gently into middle age without the complications of a woman, Roman wasn’t prepared for the sensual jolt slamming into his midsection. “I see your opinion of me hasn’t changed. You should have called. I tried to contact you for a solid year after Boone’s death.”

He noted the trembling of her fingers before she gripped the porch railing, gleaming with the rain that had passed. “I didn’t want contact with you. I don’t know what Boone saw in you.”

In the moonlight, Roman saw her resemblance to Boone, that sweep of feminine jaw clenched in rigid, righteous anger reserved for bullies and those who would hurt others. “Boone wanted me here...to take care of things.”

“I’ll just bet,” she snapped back, locking her arms around herself. “I want to see everything. Now. I want to see what you’ve sold off, what you’ve destroyed, and oh, yes, the books. I want to see just how much you’ve siphoned off into your own accounts.”

“No one has ever accused me of being dishonest,” Roman stated tightly, and wondered why this woman could set him off so easily.

“Afraid that I’ll see something I shouldn’t?” she taunted in a silky purr that raised the hair on Roman’s nape. “Something that might be missing? Something expensive?”

“It’s ten o’clock at night. Why don’t you come back in the morning, after you’ve had some sleep and cooled down?” Roman managed after taking a long, deep breath. Kallista knew just how to insult his pride. She’d launched her contempt without shielding it But then from his file on Kallista, Roman knew that she wasn’t sweet—she was a fighter.

She folded her arms across her chest, slanting a suspicious look up at him. “And give you time to fix what you’ve done? No.”

Roman locked his jaw before he said too much. “Let’s try this another way. I’m the legal executor of Boone’s estate. What makes you think that you have the right to examine anything?”

She shimmered in anger, as though she wanted to launch herself at him, and tear him from Boone’s property. Then, for just an instant her bottom lip trembled and Roman prayed she wouldn’t cry. He fought a shudder; he knew his limits. One tear and he’d go down like the proverbial ton of bricks.

“He was my friend. I loved that man,” she said finally and the raw pain in her tone tore at Roman’s heart, matching his own love for Boone.

“He left you something.” Roman reached past Kallista and opened the door. He noted the distinctive recoil of her body from him—die “wife beater.” “After you.”

She arced an eyebrow and nodded curtly. “You first.”

Roman smiled tightly and remembered his mother rapping him on the head when he forgot “ladies first.” Kallista didn’t trust him. Spitting mad, she looked like a weary, fragile kitten backed into a corner she didn’t understand. The tension in her expression was for Boone, a man who had kept her safe. Roman wanted to fold her into his arms, to keep her safe, just as Boone had wanted. Instead he curled his hand around her nape, tugged slightly and she leaped back, her indrawn breath a hiss of warning, as she gave him room to pass.

“Wipe those boots.” Roman Blaylock’s broad, tanned back rippled in front of her, gleaming with sweat and rain, and the primitive impulse to draw her nails slowly down the smooth dark surface, stunned her. When he turned, a mocking lilt to one corner of his hard mouth, Kallista forced her eyes to stay locked with his, keeping them from drifting lower—to that wide, fascinating expanse of his chest, tanned and lightly flecked with damp curling hair. The man was physically potent, enough to send women swooning, especially with his dark warlord scowl and shaggy, poorly cut hair. A physical man, she repeated, catching the scent of rain on his skin, sweat and a dark stormy presence. Roman moved like a mountain lion, smooth, rippling—a predator aware of his surroundings, his power. In Kallista’s experience, men who looked like Roman knew how to use their looks and she wasn’t interested. She focused on her mission—to see that Boone’s beloved house hadn’t been sacked.

A sweep of Roman’s hand invited her to look—the house was just as she remembered, big and cluttered, filled with pictures of people she didn’t recognize, other children latched to Big Boone’s safe body. The old upright piano, which had been Boone’s mother’s, loomed in the shadows. The furniture was old, overstuffed, and stripped of the doilies she’d remembered. Against the wall, covered by an oversized shawl, was the huge steamer trunk that he’d always kept locked. The hulking china cabinet was packed with old china and glassware, which Boone had said came from his mother and grandmother—me fascinating, elegant collection of ruby glass circled by gold had been Kallista’s favorite. Amid other framed childish drawings on the wall was her watercolor of Boone, a huge stick man, holding a little stick girl’s hand. Boone And Me And My Boots a young Kallista had printed in block letters, referencing her favorite red boots.

Emotion tightened Kallista’s throat and dampened her eyes. She never cried, and couldn’t afford the luxury now, because she had a job to do for Boone. She forced herseh to scan the house, because if anything was missing...

Kallista moved past the living room into another smaller less formal room. The chair was simple, solid lines of oal- big enough to accommodate Roman’s tall body. She scanned the room quickly—a television set, magazines books, and a dinner tray placed on a coffee table that matched the chair. Off to one side, the door to Boone’s study was open and Kallista entered the room in which he had held her on his lap. He’d cuddled a sobbing lonely child, deserted by her mother. He’d told her that he loved her, that love was the most important thing in the world and that she would always be his girl, that she could cal- The Llewlyn her home.

Boone... Tears burned her eyes and she slashed at them impatiently, shielding her weakness from Roman Blaylock “You still have his pigeons and pigs and goats and sheep and cows, don’t you?”

“They’re fine. You can check on them in the morning My brother Dan and his wife Hannah have the buffalo herd Big Al, Dan’s bull buffalo, wouldn’t stop tearing down fences until the herd was together. The stock is marked and can be separated.”

“Uh-huh, and we both know how the marking is done right? More for Blaylock, less for Llewlyn? What about his stamp collections and all the rest? The orchid house? I suppose you let that go to ruin.”

“You won’t find anything wrong with how the calves are marked. Dusty and Titus do that, and I wouldn’t like you questioning their honesty.” For the first time Kallista caught Roman’s low tone, like a wolf’s warning growl, and it lifted the hair on her nape. He hadn’t defended himself against her jabs, but his tone said he would not tolerate a slur on the elderly cowboys. He picked up an issue of Orchid Facts magazine and showed it to her, before tossing it aside. “I’m learning.”

The thought of Boone’s delicate orchids lying within Roman’s hard scarred palm caused Kallista to shiver. “I can’t imagine a man like you taking care of Boone’s orchids. What about his collections? The stamps and coins and—” Then Kallista remembered that Roman had just mentioned something more important than valuable items. “Dusty and Titus? Boone’s old ranch hands? You can’t fire them—they are old men now, and without homes... You know they can’t take hard physical work—”

“Did I work them to death? You’ve really got a high opinion of me, don’t you? They’re sleeping in the same bunkhouse where they have for fifty years. When their times come, Boone said to bury them in his cemetery up on the hill. Don’t worry, they’re healthy and they’ve got plenty to do looking after Boone’s pigeons, pigs, goats, and sheep without doing hard ranch work.” Roman studied her. “You can stay here, if you want. Boone wanted you back.”

“With you? No, thanks.” She pushed into the study, grand with books and a massive desk. The new computer sprang to life at her touch. The cursor blinked at her—Password? “Cute,” she snapped, glancing at Roman who leaned against the door frame and studied her. “That’s where you keep his accounts, isn’t it?”

She quickly circled the room, then stood in front of Boone’s massive antique desk. She ran her hand over the solid oak wood, and tugged at the brass handle of the rolltop. The lock held. She stared at Roman. “Figures. I won’t ask you for the key. I wouldn’t ask you for anything.”

Then she circled the room again, lifting gilt-framed antique pictures away from the wall until she found the safe. It was new, high tech and the instant she touched it, a deafening alarm sounded and outside, Boone’s registered beagles began howling. Roman sighed wearily and reached for the ringing telephone. “Mike? I know the alarm activated. Kallista Bellamy is here and prowling through the house. Right. I know a sheriff has better things to do patching things up with his ex-wife than to answer useless midnight calls. Mike...stop ranting. It’s only past ten.”

Roman answered the second call from a wall intercom and his expression softened momentarily. “Kallista is back, Dusty...go back to sleep. She’ll be here for a few days.... Yes, I’ll tell her you’d like to see her.... I’ll tell her that we redid the plumbing and there’s plenty of hot water now for her baths.”

He smiled briefly. “I know. Females like to take long baths. Yes, I’ll tell her that we have a dishwasher and a new washer and dryer. Yes, I’ll tell her that you and Titus missed her.”

Kallista turned on him when he replaced the telephone to the cradle. “I’ll see them tomorrow when I check out the ranch. I want a good look at what you’ve done to Boone’s land. I should have known. I’d forgotten how convenient it would be for you to come in here and take over. Mike is your cousin and you’re related to almost everyone in town. The Blaylocks had seven children and your family would come to your defense, wouldn’t they?”

“They’ll do what’s right,” he said slowly with the confidence of a man who had grown up loved and cherished.

She hadn’t been loved; she’d been a piece of luggage her mother hauled from marriage to marriage. She didn’t want him to see her pain, how much she loved Boone, and Roman’s black eyes were seeing too much. Spanish eyes, the locals had called the Blaylock eyes, a mark of their heritage on their father’s side—a sturdy mix of Scots and English and French on their mother’s.

Kallista hurried into the kitchen, away from him, from the memories of how wonderful life with Boone had been, how safe. Nothing had changed in the kitchen, not the big scarred farm table with its plain glass salt and pepper shakers, nor the mug stuffed with spoons. The old pottery bowls were stacked on the counter and every dish was still in the glass cupboards. The big gas cookstove had several ovens and burners and a shelf spanning the top. Boone had said it was his mother’s...that he’d dreamed of his wife using it, but she never had. Boone had little to say about his wife, or his children, but sometimes the faraway look in his eyes told of his pain.

The old blackened camp coffeepot that Boone said brewed the best, sat on the back of the stove.

She sucked in air. Or was it pain? Boone had sat her on his lap, poured himself a large, hefty mug of coffee and her small china cup half full, adding fresh cow’s milk to complete the measure. From the past, his voice curled around her. “This is how my mother did, little girl. Sat me on her lap, and told me how it should be for me, holding my own child on my lap and passing the time of day. But it didn’t come to be until now, and now I’ve got you. That’s her cup and now it’s yours. That’s real gold on the rim, and those are real English roses painted on real china—see? It’s so thin, you can see your fingers through it. We’re going to chat about things every day, sitting just like this, big stuff, like why flowers grow, and how people should keep each other in their hearts.”

The cup seemed huge, or was it because she was small and only five? Kallista slashed the hot tears from her eyes and knew nothing could take away the pain in her heart. She glanced at a woman’s handwritten note, posted to the old refrigerator by a magnet. “Come over tonight. Your favorite for dinner. There’s garlic bread in the foil, just place in the oven with the rest to heat. We need salad dressing and olive oil. I changed the sheets.”

A fresh wave of anger slammed into Kallista, and she jerked open the refrigerator door to find a large pan of lasagna. She slammed the door, rocking the huge pottery tureen on top. Roman Blaylock had not only taken over Boone’s house, he had installed a woman in his bed. “I’ll look upstairs,” she managed, brushing past him.

When she’d first seen the house, hiding behind her mother and peering out at this frightening savage land, she’d thought it was a castle and Boone was a fearsome giant who might eat her. Then she’d grown to treasure and to love him and now he was gone.

The hallway was just as wide, a table placed beneath a mirror and fresh herbs stuffed into a vase scented the air. Nothing had changed. Boone’s bedroom looked just the same: gleaming wood floor covered by a braided rug, her picture with those of other children by his oversized bed—a man’s Western boots placed neatly in a corner, gloves and a denim jacket discarded into an overstuffed chair. Roman Blaylock slept here; his masculine scent filled the room and a picture of the extensive Blaylock family sat on Boone’s mahogany chest of drawers.

She hurried to Mrs. Llewlyn’s room, soft with ruffles and floral patterns, the scent of lavender and roses hovering in the still air. Boone had said that she lived long enough for his return, then she had passed away. “Mrs. Llewlyn’s walnut wardrobe is missing. It’s huge and has drawers—like an armoire.”

“It needed repair and refinishing. It’s in the barn.”

“You just put it back.”

Her room was just the same, a single Jenny Lind bed, ruffles and flower prints and a brass vanity table and chair. Other girls had used this same room, layered with unfamiliar dolls and tea sets, and the other bedroom reserved for boys with model airplanes and trucks. The attic was stuffed with doll carriages and framed tintype pictures and memories. Kallista leaned against the door as layers of memories pressed painfully upon her. He’d tucked her in, placed a brand-new Raggedy Ann doll in her arms and told her that she was his. She’d never felt so safe—a horrible empty chill swept through her. “Oh, Boone...”

Downstairs, Roman waited for her, a well-loved, worn rag doll in his hand. “He wanted you to have this. When you calm down, there were other things he wanted you to have.”

“You’re not fit to sleep in Boone’s bed.” Kallista snatched the doll from Roman, holding it against her racing heart. One glance at the fringed Spanish shawl covering the huge steamer trunk and she knew where the doll had been stored. There would be other things in that trunk and she knew how to pick locks. She looked up at Roman’s impassive expression, and knew that she was going to destroy him. If Boone had stored her doll in the trunk, there had to be other things, perhaps something belonging to a relative who deserved Llewlyn House and the ranch. “You know, I think I’ll take you up on staying here—for the night.”

When Roman nodded solemnly, she added, “Don’t try anything. I can protect myself.”

An icy chill whipped through Kallista. She’d already proven that with one of her mother’s lovers—

Beneath his glossy black lashes, Roman’s eyes turned warm and amused, drifting slowly over her taut body and his deep drawl curled around her. “Now that’s quite an assumption, princess—that I’d want you. What would give you that idea?”

Two

After hours of denying that his body tensed every time Kallista’s very soft and athletic one tossed on the bed in the other room, Roman gave up on sleep. When he heard her creep from her room he reached beneath his bedside table to disconnect the alarms. With Mike’s romantic reconciliation underway, he wouldn’t want a second awakening at three o’clock in the morning. Roman stared up at the shadowy leaf patterns on the ceiling and listened to Kallista’s boots prowl through the house, built by Boone’s parents before the turn of the century. The rippling electronic sound downstairs said she’d turned on his computer, and after a solid fifteen minutes, another sound said she’d turned it off. A small beam of light lasered through the shadows beneath his door, and Kallista’s footsteps moved past Roman’s bedroom and up into the attic. He listened to the rhythmic creak of a rocker, too small for Boone’s size.

Roman placed his arms behind his head and waited, stretched out on the top of the bed, dressed only in his jeans, the waist snap unbuttoned. Kallista was the first of Boone’s “Innocents” on the list and if she was any measure of the rest... Roman shook his head; all he needed with his ranch chores and keeping up Boone’s silent business was a prying, nosy, bitter and sexy woman. He tossed in passionate, colorful and vibrant.

He backtracked to the “sexy,” and that long-ago kiss stung his lips. She’d been surprised, her sassy, full lips parted and the collision of their mouths wasn’t sweet, but rather all fire and storms and unleashed hunger, and for a moment she’d matched him. Kallista’s footsteps eased down the attic stairs and pushed into his room, stalking to his bedside.

Roman’s body leaped into heat, shaken by the passion in her slightly slanted eyes. Hands on her hips, she glared down at him. The rag doll peered at Roman from Kallista’s big leather shoulder bag. “Good. You’re awake. I want you to see me coming and know that I’m going to take Big Boone’s estate away from you, piece by piece.”

Kallista jerked a fat file from under her arm and slapped it on his chest. “Yes. I did pick the desk lock. You’ve been tracking me. Everything’s in there from my immunization shots that Boone started to every address where I’ve lived. It’s always wise to keep up with someone who might be a threat, isn’t it? You bet I’m a threat, Mr. Blaylock. You’re not the kind of man who should be taking care of Boone’s property.”

“Boone wanted to keep up with you. That’s his file. He’d want you to have it. It’s yours.” He was just getting worked up to tell her that he didn’t appreciate the invasion into his bedroom when the tears glittering on her lashes distracted him; inside Roman, a part of him slid into helpless mush. Then she reached out her hand and Roman reacted, grabbing her wrist and jerking her toward him. With a soft cry, she fell heavily upon him, and in that instant, in the soft whoosh of her curved body against his, Roman knew that he wanted Kallista. He whipped away the crushed file between them, urgent for her soft body against his. The next instant, he realized he was easy prey for her and the thought nettled; the old bed creaked as Roman flipped over, pinning her beneath him, his hands circling her wrists.