Ally had counted on the cowboy coming to her rescue.
What she hadn’t counted on was being imprisoned between a pair of muscular, jean-clad legs. She looked up to see the cowboy staring down at her with the most charming smile. He was casually straddling the bar stool, one hand resting on his knee, the other still grasping her upper arm with a strength that caught her by surprise.
“Sorry, Red.” His voice was low. “Didn’t mean to startle you. But I wasn’t sure you’d like to find yourself wearing all those drinks.”
“Thanks.” She reached out a hand to steady herself and came in contact with a chest of solid muscle. Something else she hadn’t planned. Even after she moved her hand away and lowered it to her side, she could feel her fingers tingling from the touch of him. Aware of the intimacy, not to mention the awkwardness, of their positions, she took a step back and looked up.
He hadn’t been expecting those eyes. Green, with little flecks of gold. Or the reaction he’d felt from that simple touch. Like icy needles down his spine, and then a sudden surge of heat through his veins…
Dear Reader,
Once again, Silhouette Intimate Moments has rounded up six top-notch romances for your reading pleasure, starting with the finale of Ruth Langan’s fabulous new trilogy. The Wildes of Wyoming— Ace takes the last of the Wilde men and matches him with a pool-playing spitfire who turns out to be just the right woman to fill his bed—and his heart.
Linda Turner, a perennial reader favorite, continues THOSE MARRYING MCBRIDES! with The Best Man, the story of sister Merry McBride’s discovery that love is not always found where you expect it. Award-winning Ruth Wind’s Beautiful Stranger features a heroine who was once an ugly duckling but is now the swan who wins the heart of a rugged “prince.” Readers have been enjoying Sally Tyler Hayes’ suspenseful tales of the men and women of DIVISION ONE, and Her Secret Guardian will not disappoint in its complex plot and emotional power. Christine Michels takes readers Undercover with the Enemy, and Vickie Taylor presents The Lawman’s Last Stand, to round out this month’s wonderful reading choices.
And don’t miss a single Intimate Moments novel for the next three months, when the line takes center stage as part of the Silhouette 20th Anniversary celebration. Sharon Sala leads off A YEAR OF LOVING DANGEROUSLY, a new in-line continuity, in July; August brings the long-awaited reappearance of Linda Howard—and hero Chance Mackenzie—in A Game of Chance; and in September we reprise 36 HOURS, our successful freestanding continuity, in the Intimate Moments line. And that’s only a small taste of what lies ahead, so be here this month and every month, when Silhouette Intimate Moments proves that love and excitement go best when they’re hand in hand.
Leslie J. Wainger
Executive Senior Editor
THE WILDES OF WYOMING—ACE
RUTH LANGAN
For my own wild bunch.
Mike (the baby) this one’s for you. With love.
And, of course, for Tom. Who gambled and won.
Books by Ruth Langan
Silhouette Intimate Moments
§The Wildes of Wyoming— Chance #985
§The Wildes of Wyoming— Hazard #997
§The Wildes of Wyoming— Ace #1009
Silhouette Romance
Just Like Yesterday #121
Hidden Isle #224
No Gentle Love #303
Eden of Temptation #317
This Time Forever #371
Family Secrets #407
Mysteries of the Heart #458
The Proper Miss Porter #492
Silhouette Special Edition
Beloved Gambler #119
To Love a Dreamer #218
Star-Crossed #266
Whims of Fate #354
The Fortunes of Texas
Snowbound Cinderella
Harlequin Historicals
Mistress of the Seas #10
†Texas Heart #31
*Highland Barbarian #41
*Highland Heather #65
*Highland Fire #91
*Highland Heart #111
†Texas Healer #131
Christmas Miracle #147
†Texas Hero #180
Deception #196
*The Highlander #228
Angel #245
*Highland Heaven #269
‡Diamond #305
Dulcie’s Gift #324
‡Pearl #329
‡Jade #352
‡Ruby #384
‡Malachite #407
The Courtship of Izzy McCree #425
Blackthorne #435
Rory #457
Conor #468
Briana #480
One Christmas Night #487
Harlequin Books
Outlaw Brides
“Maverick Hearts”
Harlequin Historicals
Christmas Stories 1990
“Christmas at Bitter Creek”
RUTH LANGAN
Award-winning and bestselling author Ruth Langan creates characters that Affaire de Coeur magazine has called “so incredibly human the reader will expect them to come over for tea.” Four of Ruth’s books have been finalists for the Romance Writers of America’s RITA Award. Over the years, she has given dozens of print, radio and TV interviews, including Good Morning America and CNN News, and has been quoted in such diverse publications as The Wall Street Journal, Cosmopolitan and The Detroit Free Press. Married to her childhood sweetheart, she has raised five children and lives in Michigan, the state where she was born and raised.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Epilogue
Prologue
The month of July had been a scorcher. Folks around Prosperous, Wyoming, were saying they couldn’t recall a spell of hotter, drier weather. It parched the land, withered the crops, and sent tempers flaring.
At the Double W, it was cause for extra concern. Without the range grass to sustain their cattle, the Wilde brothers had been forced to dip into their cash reserve to buy grain.
It was nearly three in the morning. In his room, Chance Wilde, at twenty-two, the oldest of the three brothers, tossed and turned and tried to escape his worries in sleep.
Twenty-year-old Hazard was hunched over the kitchen table, trying to figure out what he could sell off in order to keep the ranch going. Beside him lay the letter from the county, warning that unless the back taxes were paid within the month, their land would be confiscated.
He and his brothers had been up since before dawn the day before, handling the hundreds of chores around their ranch. The cattle were only a small part of it. There was the well that was threatening to go dry. The ten-year-old truck that demanded constant repairs in order to keep running. The barn roof that had been patched so many times, it resembled, from a distance, a quilt. And the small plane he and his brothers had bought, in order to keep track of their hundred fifty thousand acres of wilderness, that was now crash-landed in a field. They still had two more years to make payments on a pile of twisted metal.
As the figures started to blur Hazard closed his eyes and rested his forehead on his folded hands. As if he didn’t have enough to worry about, his younger brother, seventeen-year-old Ace, who had walked away from the crash-landing with nothing more than some scratches, had taken off as soon as his chores were finished and headed into town.
There wasn’t much nightlife to brag about in the little town of Prosperous. There was the E
.Z. Diner, where the chili was as hot as the weather. For those who wanted to impress a girl from among the churchgoing families, there was Alice’s Ice Cream Parlor. Next door was a small movie theater running films that were already showing on cable. The majority of cowboys headed to Clancy’s, to drink beer and shoot pool.
It was on nights like this that Hazard found himself wishing desperately for his father’s advice. There was no telling how much trouble Ace would get himself into. Hazard’s only consolation was the fact that Clancy had already banned Ace from his saloon until he was old enough to drink. In his freshman year Ace had been tossed out for hustling cowboys at the pool tables and relieving them of their paychecks.
Without the lure of Clancy’s there wouldn’t seem to be much room for trouble. Except, in Ace’s case, trouble always seemed to find him.
Hazard was vaguely aware of the sound of gravel churning as the old truck engine coughed and circled the house before coming to an abrupt halt at the back door. Relieved that the source of his worries was finally home, he started to drift back to sleep when he heard the sound of the horn honking. A continuous, annoying sound that had his head coming up sharply, at the same time that Chance stomped into the room, barefoot and shirtless, snapping his jeans as he did.
“What’s that?” Chance demanded.
“Don’t know. Ace, I guess.” Still half-asleep, Hazard shoved away from the table and followed his brother across the room.
Outside the horn was still blasting, as though someone was leaning on it.
“Shut up.” Chance was out the door and sprinting toward the truck, hoping to slap some sense into his little brother. He snatched open the door, then froze.
Hazard bumped into him, then stepped to one side to see what had stopped Chance in his tracks.
“What the…?” It was the sight of Ace slumped over the wheel that brought him up short. That, and all that blood.
For a moment he felt his heart stop. Then he saw the slight movement that told him Ace wasn’t dead. Yet. He reached up and dragged him from the truck, ready to throttle him within an inch of his life. “Give me a hand.”
Hazard caught him under one arm, while Chance took the other. They managed to haul their younger brother up the steps and into the kitchen, where they lay him on the floor.
“Get some blankets,” Hazard shouted as he knelt beside the still form.
His preliminary training in veterinary medicine hadn’t prepared him for this. There was blood everywhere. Streaming from Ace’s arm, soaking his shirt and jeans. More blood poured from a gash in his head. His face was a mess. His eyes blackened. His mouth swollen to twice its normal size.
Hazard grabbed some kitchen towels and a pan of hot water and began to mop at the blood. When Chance returned with some blankets, he was already at work with a first-aid kit, disinfecting the wounds.
Chance knelt beside him. “Think that wound will close without stitches?”
“I hope so.” Hazard drew the two sides of the gaping cut together and firmly applied a bandage. “He’s going to have a lovely scar, but his hair will hide it.”
“Look at this.” As Chance tore away the sleeve of Ace’s shirt, his eyes narrowed. He pointed to the gash that was several inches long and gushing blood. “Looks like a knife wound.”
“Yeah.” Hazard poured a liberal amount of disinfectant, hoping the blade had been clean.
At Ace’s hiss of pain he added a few more drops for good measure. “So. You’re alive.”
“Am I?” Ace opened his eyes and squinted against the glare of the kitchen light.
“Looks that way.” Hazard began dressing the wound. “Who did this?”
“The cowboys…” Ace found it hard to speak around his swollen, bloody lips. “…From the Circle T.”
“Why?” Chance’s heart was starting to beat again, now that he realized his little brother was going to live. “They…” Ace wiped a mouthful of blood on his torn sleeve. “…Wanted their money.”
“Their money?” Chance’s eyes narrowed. “Have you been at Clancy’s?”
“You know I’m barred.” Seeing that Hazard was finished with him, Ace sat up weakly. For a moment his head swam, before his vision gradually cleared.
“Then where’d you get their money?”
Ace caught the edge of the table and pulled himself to his feet where he stood very still for a moment until he got his bearings. He knew, from the pain, that there were a couple of broken ribs. “Started a crap game behind the bar.”
“A crap game.” Chance caught him by the front of his shirt. “What the hell’s wrong with you? Isn’t there enough excitement in your life? Did you think it might be fun to see just how far you could push these guys before they’d push back?”
“Hey.” He shoved his brother backward. It was all he could manage at the moment. “I’m still standing.”
“Barely.” It was Hazard’s turn to grab him by the shirtfront. What he really wanted was to knock some sense into him, and maybe bloody his nose again. But he’d just taken all that time and effort, not to mention the toll on his nerves, to patch his brother up. It wouldn’t do to have any more bloodshed. “And only because we were here to pick up the pieces. How the hell did you even drive yourself home?”
“Sheer willpower,” Ace said with a grin.
“Bullheaded, you mean.” Hazard gave him a shove backward and watched with satisfaction as Ace had to steady himself against the table. “You’re just too stupid to realize that those cowboys could have killed you. And all because you had to feed your need to gamble.”
“Yeah.” Ace was beginning to fade. He could feel it. But there was no way he’d show any weakness in front of his two brothers. Not when they still thought of him as the kid. The youngest. The baby.
It rankled. Always had. Almost from the moment of his birth he’d been fighting for his place in this family. Here he was, a senior in high school, the tough guy on campus, and he still had to take orders from these two.
Chance was fighting a battle against anger and relief. Anger that his precious sleep had been shattered by Ace’s foolishness, and relief that his wounds hadn’t been more serious. For a moment there…
He fisted his hands on his hips, determined not to let himself think about what might have happened. “The next time you want to go to town, big shot, you can walk.”
Ace’s eyes widened. “What?”
“You heard me. I’m through worrying about what kind of mess you’ll get yourself into. From now on, the truck’s off-limits.”
“Fine.” Ace knew he didn’t have much time left. There was a buzzing in his ears, and the faces of his brothers kept swimming in and out of his line of vision. His body felt like one giant toothache.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a fistful of bills. With as much dignity as he could muster he set them on the table, before staggering like a drunk.
“What’s that?” Hazard eyed the money.
“The last I counted, it was fourteen thousand dollars.”
“Fourteen…” Hazard turned to Chance, then back to Ace, too stunned to finish his sentence.
Ace managed what he hoped was a negligent shrug of his shoulders. “I really wanted to stay home tonight and finish my geometry.” He even managed that famous grin, though it cost him. “But I figured this was more important. I was the one who ruined the plane. And I didn’t want you to lose any more sleep over those back taxes. I figure this ought to keep us going for a little while longer.”
He walked stiffly away, until he hit the hallway. Then, bent almost double, he limped off to his bed. Leaving his brothers staring at each other in absolute astonishment.
It would seem that their foolish, hotheaded little brother had just saved their hides. As usual, without regard to his own.
Chapter 1
“Cass.” Restless, Ace Wilde moved around the cabin of the private jet, holding the cell phone to his ear as he spoke to his assistant. His briefcase, tossed carelessly in a seat, wa
s bulging with documents. He wore his success as casually as his custom-tailored suit, which he couldn’t wait to exchange for jeans and a plaid shirt as soon as he got home. “I’m running later than I’d planned. I’m not going to get back to the office in time to look over those contracts. Why don’t you fax them to me. And you may as well give me my phone messages. I can return some of them. The rest will have to wait until tomorrow.”
His longtime assistant, Cassidy Kellerman, reeled off a list of names and numbers, while Ace scribbled in a notepad. “Remember. You have a nine o’clock appointment tomorrow with a Phillip Curtis from the government.”
“Right. Curtis. Thanks, Cass. Send me that fax now.”
“Wait. I think you’ve forgotten something.”
When he didn’t respond she gave a sigh of resignation. “It’s the little matter of my replacement.”
“Oh. That. How’s she working out?”
“Fantastic. She’s smart. Efficient. Fun. But I can’t keep her dangling forever, Ace. She needs to know whether or not she has the job.”
“Look. I don’t have time for this.” He huffed out an impatient breath. “As long as you’re satisfied with her qualifications, that’s all that matters.”
“Ace, I’m flattered to know that you trust me on this.” He could hear the smile in her voice. Because she and Ace had gone through school together, and had worked side by side for a decade, she was comfortable saying exactly what was on her mind. “But you’re the one who’ll be working with her. You need time to observe her job skills, and decide whether or not the two of you are compatible. It was your decision not to hire Marla Craine.”
Ace frowned, thinking about the girl who had worked in the outer office of WildeMining for the past three years. She and Cass were best friends. But when Cass had recommended her as a replacement, he’d had to refuse. He knew it had come as a shock to Marla as well as Cass. But her job skills weren’t even close to those of his longtime assistant.
“Ace.” Cass’s voice came over the phone line. “The final decision has to be yours.”