Free Bushedwhacked Groom by Eugenia Riley

po tion. And if he’d had any hope of awakening back where he’d come from—awakening to sanity —it was dashed now. He was still stuck in the same wacky limbo in which he’d fallen asleep.
    With a pained grunt, he crept out of bed and put on the strange clothes he’d been given yesterday—the odd jeans with the button fly, the long-sleeved, green-checked shirt that looked homemade. He slipped on his own well-worn brown cowboy boots and made his way out the door, across the porch and to the necessary.
    He emerged in the morning briskness to the sight of a glorious Colorado dawn, with mule deer grazing in the valley beyond and hawks soaring overhead, against a rugged Rocky Mountain backdrop. He could hear the calls of horned larks and mourning doves.
    What he didn’t hear were any sounds of civiliza tion—at least not the civilization he remembered. Not a truck engine revving up or a tractor groaning its way across a field. Not the distant blare of a stereo or the hum of an AC unit. This place truly seemed sus pended in time. Though Lucky wasn’t a technology buff, he actually found himself missing the comforting drone of CNN in the background and the binging of the microwave.
    Where in hell was he? Nothing about the terrain or the house looked familiar. Even more critical, how would he find his way home? If what these people said was true, he was not only miles distant from home but nearly a century away.
    This last he refused to believe. These fruitcakes must be lying to him. Even this Jessica person, though she had her motherly appeal, was ultimately too far fetched to be believed. He needed to get the hell away from these crazies, find some folks who had their heads on straight and could direct him back to the Fly ing T . . .
    He was hobbling around toward the front of the house to get a better look at the farmstead when the sound of “Chee, chee, chee!” interrupted his musings. Out in the barnyard he spotted his lovely nemesis feeding the chickens. Again she looked too pretty for words in a low-cut, pink muslin gown that did nothing to hide the lush contours of her breasts and the trim lines of her waist. She was throwing seed to an attentive flock of chattering hens.
    Lucky was about to duck around toward the front porch when she spotted him. Dimpling charmingly, she called out, “Morning, Handsome.”
    “Morning,” he grumbled back, about ready to give up on trying to rid her of her obnoxious habit of call ing him “Handsome.” He strode closer and found even the strong barnyard odor could not dampen the effect on his senses of seeing this vision of femininity— damn her little hide!
    “How you feeling?” she asked.
    “Better, no thanks to you.”
    She glowered. “Hey, I’m the one who rescued you yesterday—”
    “And half killed me on the ride back here.”
    “Well, you couldn’t have been too messed up, since you’re already up and rambling about.” She regarded him slyly. “Were you hoping to give me the slip?”
    Lucky ground his teeth; that notion had certainly crossed his mind numerous times. “You think I’m gonna steal one of your daddy’s horses?”
    “He’d shoot you if you did.”
    “How hospitable of him.”
    She gave a shrug. “You up to getting hitched today?”
    Lucky’s glare was eloquent.
    She rolled her eyes. “I see you’re just as ornery as before .”
    “Yeah, that pretty much happens every time I get shanghaied by a crew of psychopaths . . . and it takes some time to pass.” He rubbed his unshaven jaw. “What’s got you up so early, anyhow?”
    “ This is a farm—or have you already forgot? Someone has to scatter feed to the chickens.”
    “ If anything’s scattered, lady, it’s your brains.”
    “You think I don’t have chores around here?” she demanded.
    He laughed. “All gussied up in pink muslin? Tell the truth, now. You got up early and got yourself dolled up just hoping you could entice me so I’d go along with your crazy