B.J. Daniels - Shotgun Bride

Jud and Dalton quit wrestling to look at Russell. “Straws?” they asked in unison.

“Why not beans?” Shane suggested, thinking of the Texas Rangers who were caught in Mexico back in the 1800s. “A white bean, you’re spared. A black bean, you’re not.”

“Drawing straws is the only fair way,” Russell insisted, ignoring Shane’s sarcasm. “We leave it up to chance.”

“Or destiny,” Jud added.

“ Destiny? You’ve been hanging out with those Hollywood types too long,” Lantry said. He grabbed a beer from behind the well-stocked bar and pulled up a chair in front of the window next to Shane.

“What do you say?” Lantry asked him.

Shane was disgusted with the whole mess. He poured himself a glass of bourbon and downed it before he finally spoke. “This is emotional blackmail, and I don’t want any part of it.”

His brothers all looked at him in surprise.

“It was our mother’s dying wish,” Russell said.

“Yeah, and bad karma if we ignore it,” Jud said.

“Destiny? Karma?” Shane scoffed.

“It isn’t just about Mom,” Russell said quietly. “Can’t you see what this is really about? Dad wants us here in Montana with him. He’s not always going to be around.”

“Well, I think he was a fool to leave Texas,” Shane said.

Russell shook his head. “He did it for Kate. He loves her and would do anything for her. Look how happy Dad is. All those years of being lonely without Mom. I’m glad he found Kate.”

“Kate found him,” Shane corrected. “Just to keep the record straight.”

This marriage and the move to Montana had been all her doing. Anyone could see that. She’d gone to Texas to find their father, playing on the one thing they had in common—Grayson’s deceased wife. Kate and Rebecca had grown up together on this ranch.

No one was fool enough to think that buying the Trails West Ranch in Montana hadn’t been Kate’s idea. The ranch had been in her family for decades, until her father died and it was lost.

“Kate isn’t the only one with history here,” Russell argued. “Let’s not forget that our mother was born and raised here.” Rebecca Wade’s father had been the foreman of the ranch. She and Kate had been like sisters. “This place means a lot to both Dad and Kate and should to all of us, as well.”

“We’re doing this for Dad,” Russell continued. “And Mom. It’s what she wanted.”

Shane shook his head as he watched Russell step over to the bar, pick up the knife their father had used to slice up limes for margaritas, and proceed to cut five straws into five different lengths.

Taking another drink, Shane swore under his breath as a hush fell over the room. He couldn’t believe they were really going to do this.

Russell mixed up the pieces in his hand, leveling off the cut straws at the top, hiding their lengths in his massive fist.

“This is crazy,” Lantry said, looking to Shane for help. Shane knew that he was considered the sensible brother. After all, he was the Texas Ranger. Or at least had been.

Russell held out the cut straws. “Who wants to go first?”

“Not me,” Jud said quickly. “I’m leaving mine up to destiny. I’ll take the last straw.”

“Hell, I’ll go first,” Dalton said, and drew one, palming it until the others had drawn.

Lantry went next, although he didn’t seem any happier about it than Shane. Part con artist and charmer—if there was a way out of this, Lantry, the lawyer would find it.

“Shane?” Russell held his closed fist out to him.

“I don’t want any part of this,” Shane said with a curse.

“If you get the longest straw, you have five years before you have to do anything,” Russell said, always the pragmatist. “By then Dad may be gone, too. You can ignore both of their dying wishes and do whatever the hell you please. In the meantime, take a damned straw.”

Shane snatched one of the cut straws from his brother’s hand, tossed it on the table without looking at it and poured himself another drink.

“You lucky bastard,” Dalton said. “Shane got the longest one.”

Russell turned to the youngest of the brothers. “Well, Jud, you still sure you want to go last?”

Jud stared down at the tops of the two remaining straws. “Yeah.”

Russell drew one, and Jud took the only remaining straw.

“Okay, let’s get this over with,” Lantry said. He held out his straw to compare it to the others.

Shane was the only one who didn’t join in. As he took a drink, he heard Jud swear and smiled to himself. The youngest of them had drawn the shortest straw. Maybe there was something to this karma business after all.

“Can’t argue with destiny, Jud,” he said. His brother collapsed into a chair beside him to brood or, more than likely, try to figure out an angle to get out of this. The brothers all had that in common—they all looked for a way out of whatever situation they found themselves in.

Shane had gotten the longest straw. Not that it mattered. This whole thing was ludicrous, and he wasn’t going to be blackmailed into anything—especially marriage.

“Okay,” Russell said. “Jud, you have one year in which to find a suitable wife. Lantry is next, then Dalton, me and Shane.”

“I say we do it over. Best two out of three,” Jud suggested. All four brothers turned on him. “Okay, okay. I suppose it’s time I started thinking about settling down.”

They all laughed. Of the five of them, Jud was the wildest when it came to horses—and women. The Hollywood stuntman settle down with one woman anytime soon? Not likely. On every film he was involved in, he usually had a couple of girlfriends.

“I told you this wasn’t going to work,” Shane said. “It’s not the way to find a woman to spend the rest of your life with.”

“Come on, none of us would marry unless forced to,” Lantry said with a laugh. “Look at Dad. After Mom’s death, he had all kinds of chances to marry, and he didn’t.”

“Not till Kate,” Jud said.

“Maybe Kate reminds him of our mother,” Dalton said.

Russell shook his head. “Kate is nothing like our mother.” As the oldest at thirty-two, Russell had the best memory of their mother. “Anyway, Dad always said there was no one like Mom.”

Shane said nothing. He’d only been around Kate at the wedding, but there was something about her that had made him suspicious, even before she talked their father into selling his place in Texas and moving to this isolated part of Montana to buy back her family’s home ranch.

Kate was a woman with secrets. Shane had been a lawman for too long not to recognize it. Kate was hiding something. Something big. And Shane feared that when the truth came out, Grayson Corbett would be devastated.

“I’ll have you know that I’ve already found the perfect woman,” Jud announced. “Her name is Maddie Cavanaugh. She’s exactly what mother said she wanted for us—a Montana girl.”

The rest of them laughed, but Shane watched his little brother, thinking he might actually be telling the truth. Jud did attract women the way magnets attracted tacks. And Jud had been in town for over a week now.

“Dad and Kate are going to love Maddie,” Jud said with a grin. “I predict wedding bells in the very near future.”

Shane got to his feet. He couldn’t take any more of this. “Have you all lost your minds? Who gives a damn what’s in some stupid letter? Our mother didn’t live long enough to know any of us well enough to determine what kind of woman we should marry. Why should we let her tell us how to live our lives from the grave?” He shook his head.

JERILYN DROVE as far as she could. She’d been running on fear and large doses of caffeine. Now after fifteen hours at the wheel her nerves were fried and she had the jitters so bad she was forced to stop for what was left of the night.