Free Adrienne deWolfe - [Wild Texas Nights 03] by Texas Wildcat Page A

have the handsome young Scot, Patrick McShane, when he'd arrived by clipper ship in Boston. Their one fateful night together—or, rather, their unfortunate night together, as Lucinda had always described it—resulted in Bailey's conception and the couple's hasty marriage.
    Lucinda never let her daughter forget she was to blame for Lucinda's miserable sheepherding life in Texas. The fact that Lucinda was able to conceive only two more stillborn daughters, never a son, confirmed in her mind that the marriage was cursed.
    At least that was the excuse she had used when she'd run back home to Beacon Street on Bailey's tenth birthday. Patrick, believing in the sanctity of their wedding vows, had sailed north after his wife, but he came home bitter and disillusioned, divorce papers in his pocket. Lucinda, it seemed, had wasted little time planning her nuptials to an elderly railroad tycoon.
    Bailey cleared her throat. The silence lengthened unbearably. Through the smoke of his pipe, Mac was staring at her with some chagrin, as if he had guessed her thoughts. He said nothing about them, though. As was his way, he gave her hand a gentle squeeze and went back to hammering the misshapen wagon wheel.
    She sighed. It was at times like these when she wished she could love Mac passionately, not like the second father he'd always been to her. She knew she could do a hell of a lot worse than Iain McTavish as her mate, even if he was more than twenty years her senior.
    "Mac, do you think I'm wrong to compete in the rodeo?"
    He never missed a beat with his hammer. "Do ye want to compete, lass?"
    "Yes."
    "Then what difference does it make what I think?"
    She squirmed on the inside. That wasn't exactly the answer she'd wanted to hear.
    "But do you think I can beat Zack Rawlins? Really?"
    She watched the corners of his eyes crinkle beside his jaw-long sideburns. "When you set your mind to something, lass, I've always seen ye rise above the odds. So I've no doubt ye'll come out a winner, as long as ye keep yer head... and yer heart."
    She blushed at that. Iain McTavish knew all her secrets. Season after season, he'd listened to her prattling stream of confessions while she'd worked beside him pitching hay, harnessing horses, dipping sheep, and bottle-feeding lambs. Of course, he also knew her only interest in Zack Rawlins these days was business. She'd been sure to tell him that.
    "Well," she said briskly, "I figure I can up the odds in my favor if I practice. You know, find some hogs for Pris to herd. Zack'll be in Fort Worth next week, lobbying the railroaders to build a feeder line in Bandera, so that won't leave him much time to get many pig roundups in before the contest." She grinned smugly at her advantage. "So with me winning pig herding, and the Eldridge-Cole team winning fence stringing—"
    Mac raised his bushy eyebrows at her.
    "I'm not leaping to conclusions," she said defensively, "I'm looking at the facts. Bandera cattlemen have experience cutting barbed wire. They hardly ever string it."
    Mac's expression turned wry as he shook his head. Setting aside his hammer, he reached for a bucket of grease. She handed him a brush.
    "And then there's Octavio Ramirez—you know, Billy Chilton's new foreman," she continued excitedly. "I heard he won a gold buckle last year busting broncs in Mexico City. That means we sheepherders might actually have a contender who can beat Nick."
    Mac snorted. "Ye wouldna be dealing with gossips, gunnysackers, or rodeos if ye would have let me handle that upstart as I'd wanted to."
    She flinched at his tone. She should have known better than to speak Nick's name. Now she was in for a McTavish lecture, the kind that had made even her daddy squirm.
    "That lad needs a couple of good swift kicks in the pants," Mac growled, jabbing his pipe stem in the air for emphasis, "preferably from a man who knows how to wear his. There oughta be a law in this land against what he did to ye. Why, back in Scotland—"
    "Now,