Carol Ericson - The McClintock Proposal

Rod took her arm and grinned down at her. That grin didn’t contain an ounce of hesitation or concern. Why should it? They had a deal. She’d promised to set him free once she met the conditions of her grandfather’s will.

“Do you, Roderick McClintock, take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

“I do.” Rod’s voice sounded close to her ear, and she closed her eyes. The low timbre of his voice reverberated in her chest, unlocking dreams and desires she didn’t realize she had.

McClintock. They didn’t even know each other’s last names. Callie McClintock. Mrs. McClintock. Mrs. Roderick McClintock. Callie and Rod. Yeah, she’d promised to set him free…but she didn’t want to.

“Do you, Callie…”

Her knees buckled as her world went black.

Callie sagged against him before crumpling into a heap at his feet. His mouth dry, he crouched beside her and called her name.

The clergyman joined him on the floor, fanning Callie’s face with the marriage license. “Is she okay?”

Her golden lashes fluttered against her cheeks, and Rod blew out a breath. “Callie, are you all right?”

She struggled to sit up, and he wrapped an arm around her waist to help her, propping her against his thigh. “Rod, I…we…”

“Shh. It’s okay. We’re going through with this.” As he smoothed her hair back, he glanced at the clergyman. “She’s nervous and hungry. We didn’t stop for breakfast this morning, after a long drive. Can you finish the ceremony now?”

“O-on the floor?”

“Finish it.”

The clergyman shot a worried look at Callie. “Miss?”

She nodded. “Let’s get this done.”

The clergyman shrugged. “I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride.”

Rod planted his lips against Callie’s forehead. He could save the real wedding kiss for later. He swept her up in his arms, dug in his pocket to tip the clergyman, and strode out of the chapel with his bride.

“Let’s get breakfast.”

“You can put me down now.” She kicked her legs, with those strappy sandals on her feet.

“What happened in there?” He set her down but kept his arm around her, in case she decided to take another tumble. “Did you have second thoughts?”

Her blue eyes clouded over. “I didn’t want to trap you into a situation you’d regret later. I realized how selfish I’d been.”

“I agreed to help you.” He gripped her shoulders, hooking his thumbs beneath the straps of her dress. “Once I commit to something, I see it through. And right now, I’m committed to finding breakfast.”

THEY FOLLOWED THE HOTEL SIGNS to the buffet and parted company at their table.

Rod piled food onto a couple of plates, shook out his napkin, and ordered coffee from the waitress. He sipped the hot, mellow brew while he waited for Callie.

For a minute in the chapel, he thought she’d changed her mind and took a dive to opt out of the deal. Would he have cared? He would’ve dropped her off at the bus depot in Vegas and paid for a one-way ticket to L.A. Out of sight, out of mind.

Yeah, right.

He could no sooner put Callie…McClintock out of his mind than he could walk into that casino and drop a twenty at the blackjack table. Hell, he didn’t even know her maiden name, but that didn’t matter.

She was a McClintock now.

Callie returned to the table balancing two plates of food, one heaped with bacon, eggs and hash browns and one overflowing with a huge waffle topped with strawberries and whipped cream.

“Weddings give you an appetite?”

“Well, I did almost faint at the…er…altar.”

They both dug into their food in silence, and Rod downed three cups of coffee to combat the weariness that kept tugging at his eyelids. He figured they had another long drive ahead of them, to reach Callie’s ranch in Wyoming.

Pushing back from the table, Rod tossed several dollars on the table. Callie scooped them up and counted out the eight dollars.

“Not enough?” Rod reached for his wallet.

“No. Very generous, considering we got our own food. I’m trying to keep track of how much I owe you, once I get my hands on some money.”

“Don’t worry about it. We’re husband and wife, remember?”

She sucked in her lower lip and sighed. “I’m going to have to hit you up once more. I want to get out of this dress. Not taking a shower or brushing my teeth for twenty-four hours is bad enough.”

He plucked some bills out of his wallet. “Buy yourself some clothes, a couple of toothbrushes and some toothpaste, and I’ll roam the hotel hallways and filch some soap from a maid’s cart. We’ll clean up in one of the bathrooms before we take off.”

A half-hour later—armed with two bars of soap and two towels tucked under his arm—Rod met Callie outside the shop where she’d bought her shoes. She handed him a toothbrush after squeezing some toothpaste onto the bristles, and he headed for the men’s room. After he brushed his teeth and washed his face and neck, he hung the hotel towel over one of the stalls in the bathroom.

He caught his breath when Callie emerged from the ladies’ room, her blond hair pulled back into a silky mane. The blue, flowered skirt brushed her slim calves, and the blue top matched the color of her eyes.

She looked pretty in the wedding dress, but it belonged to another time, another life.

The valet delivered his truck, and Rod pulled forward, idling at the end of the hotel driveway. “Okay, where to? Do you need to go straight to the ranch?”

“No.” She tossed the wedding dress into the backseat. “I need to see my grandfather’s attorney first.”

“It’s still Sunday. His office won’t be open.” Rod pulled out the GPS and secured it to the windshield. “And by the time we roll into Wyoming, it’ll be close to ten o’clock at night.”

She tilted her head, her ponytail slipping over her shoulder. “My grandfather’s attorney isn’t in Wyoming.”

“I figured his attorney would be near the ranch.” His fingers hovered over the GPS screen.

“It is, but the ranch isn’t in Wyoming.”

“You said he built a house on his ranch in Wyoming.”

“Oh that. In all the excitement and prewedding jitters, I forgot to mention that he sold that original ranch and bought another one…in Colorado.”

A prickling sensation attacked the back of his neck, and Rod rubbed it. “Colorado?”

“The ranch is in Colorado, and my grandfather’s attorney is in Durango. So you see, we don’t have that far to go. But you’re right, his office will be closed on Sunday. So I guess it’s to the ranch first. Un-unless you want to go to your home.”

“Where is your ranch in Colorado?”

“It’s outside of Durango in a former mining town, Silverhill.”

Swallowing, Rod gripped the steering wheel with both hands, a low roar building in his ears. “Does the ranch have a name?”

“Yeah, the irony of it hit me on the road. You know how we were in Truth or Consequences?”

Rod nodded, his throat too tight to speak.

“Grandfather Ennis named his ranch Price Is Right. Isn’t that a coincidence? Another game show? Maybe it was a sign.”

“Price?”

“My last name.” She snorted. “I know we didn’t formally introduce ourselves but I’m, or rather I was, Callie Price.”

The roar in his ears cascaded in a thunderous roll. Callie Price. Ennis Price, the eccentric old man who owned Price Is Right. The ranch right next to his own.

The ranch he just acquired by marrying old man Price’s granddaughter.

The knuckles on the strong hands grasping the steering wheel bleached white, matching the line etched around her new husband’s mouth. By revealing the name of the ranch, did she convince him that her relatives consisted of a bunch of howl-at-the-moon crazies?