Mail Order Cowboy (Harlequin American Romance) (19 page)

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Authors: Pamela BAUER

BOOK: Mail Order Cowboy (Harlequin American Romance)
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“I am.” Her eyes flashed passionately.
“He’s dead, Hannah!”
“It doesn’t matter. If I marry, he wins.”
He threw up his hands in frustration. “You are one stubborn lady.”
“I think it’s a ridiculous idea—marrying someone in order to collect an inheritance.” She scooped up the remains of their lunch and tossed them into the picnic basket. When he tried to fold the blanket for her, she snatched it out of his hands. “I can do this myself.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And quit calling me ma’am.”
He stilled her busy hands and looked in the eyes. “What part of respect is it that you dislike?”
She looked suitably chastised. “Most men I know don’t treat women the way you do.”
“They should.”
She pulled her hands away from his. “I think we’re straying from the topic of conversation.”
He sighed. “On the subject of marriage, here’s the way I see it. You can marry me, collect your inheritance, and nothing has to change. You have my word that I won’t make any claims on you financially.”
She thrust a hand to her hip. “Are you saying you’d sign a prenuptial agreement?”
“A what?”
“A contract saying that what you bring into the marriage is what you take out,” she explained.
“I’m not looking for money from you, Hannah.”
“What are you looking for?”
“A place to stay. That’s the second reason why I think we should reconsider the marriage idea. You can use an extra man to help you, and I need a roof over my head.”
“For how long?”
He shrugged. “Until you want me to leave or until I figure out a way to find my sister. It would essentially be the same setup we have now, except you would be able to eliminate a great deal of your debt.”
She bristled at his statement. “And what would you know about my debt?” She shook her head. “I should have known. Gabby.”
“I do have eyes and ears,” he reminded her with a wry grain.
“You talk as if marriage isn’t a serious legal contract. Most couples know each other for years before they marry. I know so little about you, yet you expect me to trust you enough to enter a marriage.”
Wood knew that she had a valid point. Ever since he had arrived at the farm he had been keeping things from Hannah. For a good reason, but he had still been deceptive.
“Forgive me if I haven’t been completely truthful with you, Hannah,” he said sincerely.
“I’d like you to be direct with me right now, Wood. If you expect me to even consider a legal arrangement like the one you’re suggesting, I need some honest answers from you.”
He sat back against his heels and spread his arms. “All right. I’ll do my best.”
“What is your background? And don’t tell me farming. I know what your references say, but you are no farmer.”
Wood knew that the time had come for him to reveal his past. If he was going to put her in a situation where she could one day have her husband drop out of sight, she needed to know why.
He shoved his hands out in front of her, palms upward. “Most of the work these hands have done has been with numbers.”
“You’re an accountant?”
“No, a banker. At least I was at one time.”
“A banker.” Hannah gazed at him in amazement. “No wonder you didn’t have a clue about the soybeans. You faked your references?”
He took a deep breath and said, “No. I’m sure Alfred Dumler is a fine farmer. It’s just that I’m not Alfred Dumler.”
Hannah could only stare at him in disbelief. “If you’re not Alfred, just who are you?”
“My name is James Woodson Harris. Wood.” He took a deep breath, trying to figure out how to tell her how he came to be lying in her cornfield. “I didn’t lie when I said I didn’t remember how I got here. It’s just as I told Gabby. One day I was looking for my sister, the next I was flat on my back in your cornfield.”
Skepticism caused her eyebrows to lift. “You’re saying you can’t remember how you got here?”
He shrugged helplessly. “Like I told you before, I woke up one morning and part of my life had disappeared.”
He searched her eyes for one glimmer of understanding, but all he saw was apprehension. He wondered how he would ever be able to convince her that the newspaper article that had branded him a murderer was erroneous. She’d remember those bruises on his neck and wrists and any hope of earning her trust would be forever gone.
“If you have amnesia, you should have seen a doctor.” Again there was uncertainty in her tone.
“And how would a doctor help me?”
“He could give you a physical exam for one thing—see if you’ve had any head injuries that might have caused you to lose part of your memory.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think a doctor’s going to be able to tell me anything that will help me.”
She sat quietly for several moments. “I wish you had told us who you were right from the beginning.”
“It was easier to let you assume I was Alfred Dumler. I needed a place to stay and, like you, I thought Gabby had answered an ad for a hired hand. Considering my circumstances, it was the only option I thought I had,” he explained.
“The truth didn’t merit any consideration?”
He sighed in exasperation. “I was homeless, without money and not feeling well. Even when you thought I was Alfred Dumler you wanted to have me hauled to the nearest insane asylum. How do you suppose you would have reacted had I told you the truth?”
Hannah knew he had a point. “But to take another man’s identity...”
“I only took his name, Hannah. The man you know is me, Wood Harris, not Alfred Dumler. I’m the one who has worked with you till the wee hours of the morning. I’m the one who helps Jeremy with his homework and plays cards with Gabby. And I’m the one who wants to see that you get what’s rightfully. yours—your inheritance.”
To his surprise she didn’t give him an outright rejection. “I need to think about all of this,” she told him, gazing past him to the corn stalks, waving in the breeze.
“I understand.”
She folded up the blanket and gathered up the picnic basket.
“You take the combine. I’ll drive the truck,” she told Wood.
He saw it as a positive sign. For weeks she had been training him to run the combine. Now he was finally getting his chance. She finally trusted him with the most expensive piece of machinery she had. Now the only question was would she trust him with her heart.
 
JUST WHEN HANNAH THOUGHT they’d finish the harvest in record time, the rains came. Steady, cold rain that made it impossible to work in the fields. All Hannah could do was sit on the porch swing and stare dismally out at the gray skies and hope that tomorrow would be dry. If it wasn’t bad enough that corn prices had dropped, now the weather threatened to keep her from getting her crop in at all.
Ever since she had been a small child Hannah had liked to sit on the porch and listen to the rain. She thought the sound of the drops hitting the roof were like mood music. Today those drops sounded relentless, a perfect background for her own emotions.
Two days had passed since Wood had proposed to her, yet she was no closer to making a decision. She wished she could forget about the stupid deadline of the will, but it hung over her head, pounding on her subconscious just like the rain pounded on the roof.
Although Hannah had thought of little else during those two days, she hadn’t arrived at any conclusions. Her pride demanded that she ignore her grandfather’s wishes and fight to keep the farm without his help. But then her intellect reminded her that it was difficult enough making ends meet without the added pressures of more debt.
And there was Wood himself. Every instinct she had tempted her to trust him, despite the fact that she knew so little about him. Marrying a stranger should have appalled her. Yet it didn’t. It actually intrigued her.
He had made it sound like a business arrangement, which should have suited Hannah just fine. Intellectually Hannah knew it was exactly what she should have wanted to hear, but emotionally it felt like a rejection. She caught herself wondering what it would be like to have a man who would fuss over her and make her feel as if she were the most important woman in the world. Someone who would bring her coffee in bed and kiss her awake, someone she could talk to late at night and fall asleep in his arms.
The men in her life had never proved to be very reliable. Her own father had left when she was only seven, discontented with life on the farm. After her relationship with Jeremy’s father, she had dated few men. None had proved they were any different. Just like the hired hands that came and went, so did the loves in her life.
Experience had taught her not to trust her heart to the care of a man. Now here she was contemplating marriage. Of course it wouldn’t be a real marriage. It was a business arrangement. It would have a prenuptial agreement, a legal contract and, after a certain amount of time, a dissolution.
“Why don’t you come inside and have a cup of hot chocolate with me?” Gabby called out through the screen door, interrupting her musings.
The chain on the swing creaked as Hannah slowly rocked back and forth. “Are there any of those fudge brownies left?”
“I just made another batch. And this time I frosted them.”
It was a temptation Hannah couldn’t refuse. She scrambled inside, shrugged out of her rain gear and hung it in the entry.
“You just got over the flu and now you’ve gone and got your hair wet.” Gabby scolded her, setting a steaming mug of hot chocolate in front of her niece.
Ever since Hannah’s own mother had died when she was only twelve, Gabby, despite being single and never having been a parent, had assumed a maternal role in Hannah’s life. The problem was that Gabby was more of a mother hen than her own mother had been. Even though Hannah was an adult woman with a child of her own, Gabby often treated her as if she were still a twelve-year-old. At times it irritated Hannah. But not today. Today with the cold rain and her emotional uncertainty, she found Gabby’s concern comforting.
“It’s a good thing you made me something hot to drink.” Hannah wrapped cold hands around the warm cup and inhaled appreciatively.
“We’re running out of time.” Gabby set a plate with six brownies on the table.
“I think we’ll get all the corn in,” Hannah said, blowing on the steaming chocolate before taking a sip.
“I’m not talking about the harvest. I’m talking about getting your inheritance.”
Hannah sighed. “Oh, that.”
“Yes, that.”
“I still have time.”
“Then you haven’t ruled out marriage?” Gabby asked eagerly, taking the chair opposite Hannah.
Hannah was a bit surprised that Wood hadn’t told Gabby about his marriage proposal. The fact that he hadn’t was another point in his favor. He had left it up to Hannah to spread the news—if there was any news to spread.
“Wood and I have discussed the possibility of getting married.” She scooped up a tiny marshmallow with her fingers and plopped it in her mouth.
Gabby’s face brightened. “Then you’re not angry with me for bringing him here?”
Hannah was about to tell Gabby that she wasn’t responsible for bringing Wood to the farm, but thought it would be better not to say anything. “No, I’m not angry.”
Gabby exhaled a long sigh. “Good. We need to pull together if we’re going to save the farm. When will the wedding be?”
“I haven’t said there’s going to be a wedding. I said I’m considering it.”
“You’d better hurry.”
“It’s still seven days until the deadline.”
“Yes, but have you forgotten there’s a five-day waiting period for a marriage license in Minnesota?”
Hannah had forgotten. “That means I only have two days to make up my mind.” She smoothed fingers across her brow.
“Not if you want to drive across the border into South Dakota. There’s no waiting there.”
Hannah shook her head. “I can’t take a day off now—not during harvest.” She groaned. “I just wish I had more time to think this through.”
“Your grandmother used to say that it didn’t do much good to dwell on a decision. She would tell me to make up my mind and not worry. Nothing was irrevocable.”
That may have been fine for her grandmother, but Hannah always planned things out methodically. “I don’t know. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so quick to discourage Red,” she said thoughtfully over her mug of chocolate. “At least I’ve known him most of my life and he’s—”
“Boring,” Gabby finished for her. “Wood is a hunk. I’ve heard the gals in town talk about him.”
Hannah agreed. He was a hunk, which was what was so frightening.
“Hannah, your great-great-grandfather had a mail-order bride. He knew her less than a week when they became husband and wife, and their marriage lasted over forty years.”

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