Lynnette Kent: Married In Montana

Thea Maxwell stared at her father without understanding. “Who…you mean Rafe?”

Her dad nodded. “He’s the law.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“He’ll be investigating Bobby’s accident.” Robert Maxwell closed his eyes for a moment. “If one of those boys dies, it’s going to be all we can do to keep your brother from being tried for murder. This deputy you’re so set on getting friendly with will be the one making the arrest, gathering the evidence. And he’ll be the one pushing to convict.”

He looked straight at Thea, his face haggard, his eyes as cold as stone.

“Are you willing to let your boyfriend send your brother to prison?”

Dear Reader,

In the midst of writing Married in Montana, I made a major change in my life: I bought a horse. After taking riding lessons for a few months, my daughter fell in love with a spotted saddle horse named T-Bone, a sweet guy with whom she could learn the ropes of riding and showing horses. I was horse crazy when I was a teenager, so I’ve enjoyed encouraging her equine adventures.

I suppose my early romance with horses explains, in part, why I love to write about the people who make ranching their life. The vacation I would choose is a couple of weeks spent on a working cattle ranch—in Montana, of course—riding out with the crew every morning, coming in tired and dirty and hungry in the evening…and then getting up the next morning to do it all over again!

I get to live a bit of that cowboy life when we go to the barn to ride—and when I write books like this one. My heroine, Thea Maxwell, is living my idea of the perfect life. All she needs is the perfect man with whom to share it. Deputy Sheriff Rafe Rafferty fits the bill…except for the fact that he’s on one side of the law and she, thanks to family complications, is on the other. Working out Thea’s and Rafe’s problems, against the magnificent backdrop of the Montana Rockies, gave me a great deal of pleasure. I hope their story does the same for you.

All the best,

Lynnette Kent

P.S. I should mention that once I finished Married in Montana, I took the horse experience a step further…I bought one for me!

Married in Montana

Lynnette Kent

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For Roxanne and Ellen, who mined the Maxwells and their story with me. Thanks for all the hard work. We make a great team!

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

EPILOGUE

SETTING HIS JAW, Rafe Rafferty stepped out of his truck into the driving rain. He turned immediately to open the rear passenger door. “Okay, son, you’re home. Get out.”

Sprawled across the back seat, a nineteen-year-old troublemaker rolled his handsome head from side to side. “Don’ wanna be home.” Each word puffed out a rich aroma of beer.

“Doesn’t matter what you do or don’t want.” Rafe reached in and caught the boy by one wrist. “You’re not spending the night in there.” He gave the connected arm a jerk. His passenger flowed into a sitting position, held it for a second, then slid to the floorboard like a rag doll.

Rafe glanced at the water running an inch deep around the soles of his boots. “This is gonna hurt you a hell of a lot more than it hurts me.” He braced a foot on the running board of the truck, grabbed the boy’s ankles, one in each hand, and thrust backward with all the force his legs would generate.

A second later, Bobby Maxwell, heir apparent to the Walking Stones Ranch near Paradise Corners, Montana, landed on his butt on the driveway in the rain.

Rafe ignored the boy’s cussing. “I’ll wake them up inside,” he told Bobby. “And then I’m leaving. You want to sleep out in this weather, that’s your business. Getting you home before you killed yourself or somebody else was mine.”

His heels struck loudly on the floorboards of the wide porch as he crossed to the ranch house’s front door. The brass knocker had been fashioned as a bull’s head—an Angus, no doubt, the specialty of Walking Stones Ranch—with a twelve-inch horn spread and a ring through its nose. Rafe grabbed that ring and slammed brass against brass five times, good and loud. Then he backed up a step, propped his thumbs in the pockets of his uniform slacks and waited.

Soon enough, the porch lamps flashed on, the dead bolt turned and the big double doors swung backward. Just over the threshold, a woman stood silhouetted against the glow of interior lights. According to what he’d heard, there was no Mrs. Maxwell. So this would be Bobby’s older sister, Thea Maxwell, the one who, so rumor had it, could give most cowboys in the area a run for their money when it came to ranch work.

“Hello?” Her voice was deep, husky, questioning. And totally feminine. Hearing it, everything inside Rafe—his pulse, his breath, his thoughts—stopped for a second in surprise.

“Is something wrong?” Worry edged the words as she stared at him, waiting.

He pulled himself together, freed a thumb and tipped his hat. “Good evening, ma’am. I’m Deputy Sheriff Rafferty. I brought Mr. Bobby Maxwell home.”

She raked a hand through her short hair. “Let me guess—you caught him tipping Fred Byron’s cows again.” Now her voice held a smile, inviting him to smile, too.

This was business, though, so he didn’t. “No, ma’am. I broke up a fight at the Lone Wolf Bar up in Paradise Corners and found him in the middle.”

She stiffened. “Is he hurt?”

“He’s beat up a little. But mostly he’s too drunk to run around loose.”

“Dammit, Bobby!”

“Don’ yell at me, Tee.”

The Maxwell boy stumbled up the three steps onto the porch, swayed and wrapped an arm around a stacked stone column to keep from falling over. His clothes were soaking wet, plastered to his skin. “Don’ yell, okay? No harm done.”

“This time.” Brushing past Rafe, Thea Maxwell crossed the porch to pry her brother from his prop. The drape of her blue pajamas hinted at some very nice curves underneath. Rafe liked women with curves. And voices like hers.

At the moment, though, this woman wasn’t thinking about impressing him one way or another. She was fussing over her brother. “You’d better get into some dry clothes before you get sick. How’d you get so wet?” She pulled his arm over her shoulder, turning him toward the front door.

As they passed Rafe, Bobby gave him a wink and a good-natured grin. “Can’t ’member.”

“Do you remember promising you’d stay out of trouble?” Still holding him up with an arm around his waist, she propelled Bobby down the length of the palatial great room. Rafe could hear her scolding as they disappeared through an arched doorway. “When are you going to grow up?”

Bobby laughed, but his mumbled reply was lost in the distance. Duty discharged, Rafe turned away from the warmth of the house to start the long drive back to town.

“What the devil is going on here?”

He pivoted back to face the growling question. Now a man confronted him from the doorway, tall and broad-shouldered, still dressed in the working clothes of a hands-on rancher. This would be Boss Maxwell himself. Robert Maxwell Senior.

Another respectful tip of the hat. “Sorry to bother you, Mr. Maxwell. I brought your son back from town—he was too drunk to drive. He can pick up his truck in the parking lot where he left it.”