Susan Mallery - Unexpectedly Expecting!

She pressed her lips together but didn’t respond. There was no point in talking about this any further. However, Stephen didn’t share her opinion.

“So what’s the big deal?” he asked. “How come you don’t go out much?”

“Miss Nora hates men,” a voice announced cheerfully.

Nora held in a groan. Her wish for Trixie to appear had been granted, but she was sure the timing couldn’t be worse.

Stephen turned his attention to the pretty forty-something waitress with big hair the color of fire. Trixie gave him a flirtatious wink.

“Nora here is our Himalayan mountain range. You can look all you want and on a clear day she seems real approachable, but if you try to conquer her, you’re gonna freeze to death.”

“Thank you for sharing, Trixie,” Nora said dryly.

“Just trying to help,” the waitress offered with a big smile. “The meat loaf is great tonight, as always. So’s the fried chicken. I’d pass on the fish. It sat out a bit while the tornado ripped through town.”

Stephen touched his menu. “Why don’t you give us a minute. In the meantime, Nora, what would you like to drink?”

“Coffee,” she said, wishing there was a way to walk out of the diner and never be heard from again. She could feel the heat flaring on her cheeks. It was like being sixteen again and confessing to a girlfriend that she had a crush on Bobby Jones. Unfortunately his little sister had been lurking around the corner and had run off to blab the news to the entire school. Nora had endured an entire week of singsong chants of “Nora loves Bobby.” The fact that the object of her desire had asked her to go to homecoming with him had only taken away part of the sting.

It’s not that she was interested in Stephen Remington, but she didn’t appreciate being compared to a mountain range that could freeze a man to death.

“I’ll have coffee, too,” he said.

When Trixie left there was a moment of silence between them. Nora searched frantically for a neutral topic. Anything that didn’t involve her romantic past. Unfortunately her mind was blank.

“I heard that there was some damage on several of the nearby ranches,” Stephen said casually. “You mentioned you’d spoken with your family. They’re fine, right?”

She was so grateful, she almost decided she liked him. Almost. “Yes. My mom said that except for my brother’s house being totaled, the damage was minor.” She thought about Jack’s small two-bedroom structure. “He’ll be able to rebuild fairly easily. The hands were all accounted for. She told me there was more damage at the neighboring Fitzgerald place. The fence line was knocked down, but the great patriarch Aaron won’t let anyone help repair it, which is typical.”

Stephen leaned forward. A lock of his sandy brown hair fell across his forehead, giving him an oddly appealing look. Innocently devious, like a little boy about to pull a prank.

“That’s right. You’re a Darby, aren’t you? One part of the infamous Darby-Fitzgerald feud.”

Trixie appeared with the coffee. Nora quickly ordered meat loaf while Stephen picked the fried chicken. When the waitress left, he shrugged. “I know food like that is bad for me, but it’s a weakness. I allow myself to have it a couple of times a month. I figured I’d earned it today.”

She thought about the lives he’d saved, how he’d stayed so calm, despite all the injuries. While she’d been busy barfing her guts out, he’d been fixing the problem.

He took the coffee mug in his strong-looking hands. “So tell me about the feud. Why did it start, and when? And why are the fences Aaron’s responsibility? They’re shared between the two families, aren’t they?”

She raised her eyebrows. “You want me to squeeze a hundred and forty years of history into a five-minute recap?”

“Something like that.”

She sipped her coffee, feeling the jolt of heat as it hit her stomach. Suddenly she was starving. “Explaining about the fence is a whole lot easier. The Darbys and Fitzgeralds have nearly twenty miles of shared fence. About sixty or seventy years ago the families were in court about one thing or another. They did that a lot back then. Anyway, the judge was so tired of always seeing them in his court that he broke the fence up into five-mile sections. Each family is responsible for ten miles. If they don’t keep it repaired, they’re fined ten percent of the previous years’ income.”

Stephen had been drinking his coffee and nearly choked when he heard the amount of the fine. “Ten percent?”

She grinned. “We have a long history of not getting along. During the 1920s there were several fights about water rights. Things got so bad that a couple of cowboys were killed. The Texas legislature enacted a law saying that if either a Fitzgerald or a Darby interfered with water rights again, both families would lose their ranches.” She made an X over her heart. “I swear it’s true. You can look it up.”

“I believe you. I just didn’t realize there was so much bad blood between the two families. How did it start?”

“About a hundred and forty years ago two friends came to Texas and settled in Lone Star Canyon. Joshua Fitzgerald and Michael Darby were young, fearless and interested in making their fortune. They had neighboring cattle ranches, sharing everything from winter feed to bulls.”

Nora paused. She knew the history of the two families because she’d heard stories about them all her life. What would it have been like to live back then? she wondered.

“Joshua Fitzgerald decided it was time for him to settle down so he sent back east for a wife. A mail-order bride.”

Stephen raised his eyebrows. “A woman, huh? I can see where this is going. I’ll bet she made trouble.”

Nora leaned forward. “Don’t even think about going there, Dr. Remington. This feud wasn’t started by the women of the family, but by the men.”

Trixie arrived with their food and set the large plates in front of them. “You two seem to be getting along real nice,” she said speculatively. “Any chance you’re reconsidering your opinion on men, Miss Nora?”

“Not really, Trixie, but thanks for asking.” She smiled at the waitress, wished she were anywhere but here, then cut into her meat loaf. When she took a mouthful and started chewing, she noticed that Stephen was looking at her. Instantly, heat flared on her cheeks. No doubt he was learning a whole lot more about her than he’d wanted.

“You could eat,” she said after she’d swallowed. She pointed at his plate. “Your chicken is getting cold.”

He picked up his knife and fork. “Please continue with your story. I’m all ears.”

Unfortunately he was more than that. He was good-looking, in a nerdy way, and kind. He didn’t seem frightened of her, which was something she hadn’t experienced in a while. Most men she knew thought of her as a fire-breathing, man-hating dragon.

“Joshua’s mail-order bride wasn’t impressed with her groom. Unfortunately Joshua fell for her hard and fast. He tried everything he could to win her heart, but after a year she left him. They were divorced shortly after that.”

“Let me guess,” he said. “She married Michael Darby.”

“About three days after her divorce was finalized. It seems that she and Michael had fallen in love at first sight and the feelings had never faded. Joshua didn’t take kindly to being cuckolded by his best friend. From that time forward, the Darbys and the Fitzgeralds became bitter enemies.”

Stephen nodded when she was finished. “I can see how something like that would upset former friends, but not enough for a feud to last over a hundred years.”

“This is Texas,” she reminded him. “We don’t do things by halves out here.”