Courtship, Montana Style. Charlotte Maclay

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      Chapter Two

      Looking down at his shirtfront, Walker winced. “I trust I shouldn’t take Susie-Q’s comments personally.”

      “I’m really sorry, Mr. Oakes.” Lizzie offered him a cloth diaper in exchange for the baby. “I’m afraid she’s having some trouble digesting the formula.”

      “You might want to consider changing brands.”

      “I’m sure she’ll adjust soon.”

      Not soon enough for the sake of his shirt, Walker thought as he wiped away the spit up. Despite the mess, he noticed the kid’s smile carried a wallop. Just before she hurled her lunch on him, he’d had the fleeting thought that having a baby around the house wouldn’t be all that bad. Having a good-looking housekeeper around wouldn’t be awful, either.

      Susie-Q’s milky projectile had brought him back to reality. He hadn’t advertised for a housekeeper. Hiring one who had a baby to care for didn’t make any sense, even if it didn’t cost him a dime. Given that the would-be housekeeper was the sexiest woman he’d seen in a long while would only complicate matters further.

      With the boys outside arguing about who would put up the playpen and Speed upstairs doing whatever he was doing, Walker found himself alone with Lizzie. Not a good situation when she was fussing with the baby, looking maternal and feminine. The sounds she made and the gentle way she rocked Susie-Q made him think of lullabies and loving mothers. Not that he’d had much experience with any maternal females except his heifers and their calves.

      His own mother hadn’t thought enough of Walker to keep him around after she found a new husband.

      “Miss Thomas—”

      “Why don’t you call me Lizzie? It would be so much easier, don’t you think?”

      No matter what name he called her, it wasn’t going to be easy to throw her out, not when his boys were already stuck on her.

      “It seems to me—” he began.

      “I’m sorry. Is there somewhere I could change Suzanne? She’s soaked through.”

      Now that was a really good reason to be nervous about having a baby around the house. They did stuff he didn’t know anything about—and didn’t want to.

      He shrugged helplessly. “Sure. Wherever you want.”

      Holding the baby on her shoulder, she glanced around the room for a spot that suited her. By now she had a streak of milky stain on her cotton blouse, which had been neatly tucked in at her waist and had tugged free. Her hair was beginning to come loose from its twist. Still there was something glamorous about her, a dose of sophistication Walker wasn’t used to. A certain grace that couldn’t be learned mucking out stalls.

      Walker would lay down a sizable bet in any Nevada gambling casino Lizzie Thomas could name that she was not a housekeeper by trade.

      But who the hell was she?

      With a flick of her free hand, she tugged a light blanket from the diaper bag the boys had left in the living room and spread it out on the rug. With the ease of a dancer, she settled next to it and lay the baby down.

      “There you are, sweetie,” she crooned. “I know those old wet diapers are yucky so we’ll get you some nice dry ones. How would you like that, huh?”

      Susie-Q pumped her chubby little legs, gurgled and blew out a bubble.

      In spite of himself, Walker felt his lips tilt into a smile. “Speed’s right. She is cute.”

      As Lizzie lifted her head to bestow one of her smiles on Walker, he felt a punch in the gut that erased everything else in the room except this woman and her baby. He had the eerie sensation she belonged there.

      But that wasn’t possible.

      Oliver Oakes had drilled into his head to keep away from fancy women and city slickers. They couldn’t make it on a Montana ranch. The winters were too tough; they found the isolation oppressive. They didn’t have what it took to be a rancher’s wife. Oliver knew. He’d married one. Within five years he’d lost her and the sons she’d borne him.

      In all the years he’d lived with Oliver—since he’d arrived at the Double O as a rebellious fourteen-year-old foster kid—Walker had found the foster father who had eventually adopted him was dead right about most everything he said.

      Blinking and shaking his head, Walker knew whatever he’d imagined as he looked down at Lizzie had been caused by months of celibacy and the same isolation that drove women away.

      He really needed to get into town more often.

      Squatting down on his haunches next to her, he said, “You want to tell me what’s going on here?”

      “I’m changing Suzanne’s diaper.”

      “I know what you’re doing with Susie-Q, what I want to know is—”

      “Do you give everyone a nickname?”

      He frowned. “I suppose.”

      “What’s yours?”

      She was the most distracting woman. Or at least her perfume was. Nothing like the scents he smelled all day, barn smells and prairie sage. Better than both. A scent he could go on inhaling every day and still look forward to taking his first breath the next morning.

      He swallowed hard. “Speed and the boys call me boss.”

      “The boys don’t call you Dad?”

      “Most of the youngsters who come here have issues about their fathers. No sense to push their buttons. And giving them a nickname gives them a chance to be someone else, someone whose old man hasn’t beaten the tar out of them or whose mother didn’t abandon him. Someone who can start over without any strikes against them.”

      She bent over the baby again, snapping her overalls back together. When she lifted her head, Walker could have sworn there were tears in her eyes, but maybe it was just the light that made the blue glisten like a high-mountain lake on a bright summer day.

      “I think that’s a wonderful concept,” she said, her voice huskier than usual. “And so does Susie-Q, don’t you, sweetie?”

      She hugged the baby, and something in her eyes brought a lump to Walker’s throat. He’d seen that same haunted look in the eyes of the boys who’d come to him over the years. Wary desperation. A need for sanctuary. Fear that he’d turn them out just as their families had.

      He didn’t doubt for a minute that same look had been in his eyes the day he showed up at the Double O.

      Damn it all! How could he send this woman and the baby away? Whatever her real story was, he didn’t have the heart to do that.

      Not as long as she didn’t pose a threat to the Double O Ranch.

      “Come СКАЧАТЬ