The Wedding Ransom (40 page)

But Rafe wasn’t beside her. She sat up and looked around. He wasn’t in the room at all. She sniffed huffily. Maggie didn’t appreciate waking up alone following a night like the past one.

The perfume of roses surrounded her as she rose from the mattress, restoring her good humor. He probably wanted to get back before the papas started stirring and had decided not to wake her since she’d gotten so little sleep the night before. “I’ll forgive him,” she murmured, grinning at the idea. “This time.” After all, she wouldn’t want to have to tell their children they’d been married with the barrel of a shotgun—five shotguns—at their backs.

She pulled on her nightgown and looked around, hoping he’d thought to leave her a change of clothing when he decorated his decadent pirate lair/harem. That’s when she noticed the note on the floor beside the door. Curious, she bent and picked it up. She recognized his bold handwriting right away.

My dearest Mary. Thank you for the most wondrous night of my life. You ‘II find some fruit and cheese in the basket atop the quilt. Make yourself at home. Someone will be by for you later. All my love, Rafe.

PS. The door is locked. You’ve been abducted. You’ll be released once your ransom has been paid.

“Abducted!” she screeched. “Ransom!”

Tossing down the letter, she ran first to the door. Locked. “That eel. That moray eel.” She ran to the window and leaned outside. It was a good fifteen to twenty-foot drop to the pile of debris—sharp-edged rock and brick—below. If it were grass she might have attempted the jump, but the brick made it too risky to attempt safely. She settled with leaning out and shouting, knowing she was too far away for anyone to hear. “Malone! Swash your buckle right back here. You are in trouble now!”

~~~~~~~~~~

“You’ve done what!” Ben Scovall exclaimed.

Andrew Montgomery shouted, “I’ll kill you, boy!”

Snake went running for his cutlass and Lucky took a swing at him and knocked a lamp off a table. Gus simply folded his arms and smirked. Luella Best glanced worriedly at Luke, who gave her a sly wink, then stared hard at the toes of his boots.

Rafe, once again wearing his pirate attire, stood in the parlor at Hotel Bliss, his legs spread wide and his arms crossed over his chest. “I’ve kidnaped Maggie.”

“Well, what the sea turtle did you go and do that for?” Lucky demanded.

“Because I want the pirates’ treasure.”

The room fell silent, the buccaneers’ eyes going round. One by one, the pirates looked to their leader, to Captain Ben Scovall, who scrutinized Rafe with eyes that burned like blue flames. “What game are you playing, Malone?”

“It’s no game, Captain. It’s my life.”

“What are your demands?”

Rafe turned to Montgomery. “From what I understand, you took much more from the cenote than one pouch full of jewels. Correct?”

Montgomery nodded stiffly.

“Very good. Then my first demand is that you agree to split the spoils five ways. And I mean five equal ways. Now, as a show of appreciation I want you to subtract the value of the jewels we gave Hill from one of the shares.”

“Well, that won’t be nothing,” Snake snapped. “Those gems were full of flaws.”

Rafe arched a brow and stared at Montgomery, who shrugged and said, “I expected my former partners to come for the treasure at some point. I’ll admit I forgot Snake’s expertise in judging jewels.”

“As soon as I got a good look at ‘em, I knew it was a bag of culls. They did the trick, though. Hill, the buzzard, signed the property over to us fair and square.”

Unable to help himself, Rafe started to laugh. From the sounds of it, Barlow Hill got his due after all. “Smart, gentlemen. Very smart.”

“Get to the point, Malone,” Ben said, a muscle twitching in his jaw. “What do we have to do to get Mary Margaret back immediately?”

Rafe nodded, returning his attention to the matter at hand. “Will you agree to my first demand, Mr. Montgomery?”

“I will.”

“And just where can we find the loot?”

“It’s here,” he groused.

Ben, Gus, Snake, and Lucky shouted in unison. “What!”

“I buried it beneath that pecan tree out behind the hotel.”

Snake sputtered. “Wh-wh-why in the kelp did you do that?”

Montgomery turned a glare on him. “I liked the idea of you looking all over the world for it and having it buried beneath your nose all the time.”

Gus looked at Rafe and observed, “Drew always was an ornery one. Now you see where she gets it. Like they say, a pearl doesn’t swim far from the oyster.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard that particular saying,” Rafe replied, his voice strangling on a laugh.

Montgomery whirled on Rafe. “Get on with it, man. What else do you want?”

Rafe rubbed his hand across his jaw in a considering manner. “Well, I’m a man of pride, you know, and that means I must provide for my own.” Crossing the room, he lifted Luke’s saddlebags from the table where his partner had left them at his request. He untied the leather lace and flipped first one pouch, and then the other open. Reaching inside, he withdrew a stack of bills from one bag and a heavy leather pouch from the other. He gave the bag a shake. The familiar clink of coins sounded like gunshots in the room. “My second demand is that you sell me half of Lake Bliss.”

Lucky’s legs seemed to go right out from under him as he slumped into a chair. “Half the hotel?”

“Not the hotel. The lake. I want to buy the house that sand lizard was building and half the land you now own.” He tossed the coins to Ben and the bills to Gus. “Luke brought me the proceeds from the auction of my old-age stash. I’ve decided to invest it in bliss.”

“Wait a minute,” Ben said, scowling. “Let me understand this. You’ve abducted Maggie, and before you’ll give her back you want us to give you our treasure. But at the same time, you’re using your own money to buy our land. It makes no sense!”

Shaking her head, Luella stepped into the middle of the circle of men. “Pepper, dear, you’re too angry, and you’re not thinking straight. Rafe doesn’t—”

“Luella,” Rafe warned. “I do. I will. You can count on it. And I want their agreement before we go any further.”

“Now, Rafe.”

“I mean it, Luella. This is very, very important to me.”

She sniffed. “Well, all right. But only because the cause is one I champion myself.”

“You champion his cause?” Ben Scovall exploded. “Why, Luella Best, I thought I knew you! I gather I have misplaced my trust!”

“You’ve misplaced your sense, old man,” she fussed, bracing her hands on her hips. “I won’t have a beau talk to me in that tone of voice. You may address me again with an apology, Captain, and not another word prior to it.” She turned to Luke. “I’ve preparations to make. Come with me, son. I’ll need some help carrying things.” Luella marched from the room, her head held high. At the doorway, she paused and gave a haughty sniff.

Smiling, Luke spoke to Rafe. “I reckon you’d better get this thing done before somebody gets hurt and your brother is forced to act in an official capacity. Where is Callahan, by the way?”

“I expect him anytime now. He rode into town on a personal errand on my behalf.”

“Ah, I see.”

Rafe thought he probably did. Luke was sharp as Gus’s cutlass and most likely right when he said Rafe should see to the conclusion of matters. Reaching into his jacket pocket, Rafe withdrew a stack of papers. “I don’t know if you are aware of this, but in my previous life I read law. Calling upon those old skills, I have drawn up contracts for you to sign agreeing to what we’ve discussed here today.”

He spread the sheets out on the nearby desk, lifted the pen from its tray, and dipped it into the inkwell. Holding it out first to Montgomery, he said, “Sir, if you’d please go first?”

Montgomery stomped over to the table and scratched his name across the documents where Rafe indicated. When he was done, Lucky, Snake, Gus, and Ben followed in turn, the latter being the only man taking time to read the contracts. “Wait a minute, Malone. You have Montgomery splitting the treasure with the four of us. I thought you wanted it.”

Gus snapped his fingers. “Of course. I don’t know why it took me this long to see it. Luella was right. We let our anger interfere with our thinking. Malone does want our treasure, men. Our most valuable treasure.”

Rafe snatched the signed contracts from Ben’s hands, folded them, and tucked them into his pocket as slowly, one by one, the light came on in the pirates’ eyes. Montgomery swallowed hard.

“He wants our treasure,” Snake breathed, laying a hand over his heart.

“Our greatest prize.” Lucky buried his head in his hands.

“Our most precious gem.” Gus nodded, a bittersweet smile upon his face.

A tear dripped from Ben Scovall’s eyes. “He wants our Mary Margaret.”

“That I do, gentlemen. No need to get your barnacles in a bend, however. I want Maggie for my own, but I’m willing to share. After all, my children will need their great-grandpapas around to teach them about the sea, now won’t they?”

“Great-grandpapas?” the pirates spoke in unison.

“You’ve given me everything I’ve asked for as payoff for her, but I’m afraid it isn’t enough. It could never be enough. You see, Maggie has stolen something from me, and there is no ransoming it back. The little thief has stolen my heart. I love her, gentlemen.”

Ben cleared his throat. “And what of her feelings? Does she return your love?”

“She does. She told me so. Hotel Bliss will host a wedding today, after all. Our wedding. I’ll allow nothing to interfere with it. But you are her papas, and honoring you as such, I’m asking for your blessing, gentlemen.”

Gus was first to shake his hand. “You’ve got a halibut way of going about it. You take care of her, Malone.”

“You treat her right,” Lucky said.

Montgomery dipped his chin in a bow. “I like you, Mr. Malone. You’ve got nerve. I’m sure that’ll come in handy dealing with my daughter, considering how she was reared by these reprobates.”

Ben shook his head as he shook Rafe’s hand. “You scrambled my thinking, Malone. Now I shall be forced to make it up to Mrs. Best. I think I will find a way to make you pay for that.”

“But not today,” Rafe said.

“No, not today.”

Rafe turned to Snake, who sat scowling out toward the lake.

“Seems like just yesterday she was a little thing scrambling around on the ship’s rigging or ringing the watch bell. Now she’s a woman grown. It’s difficult. It gets an old man right here.” He hit his chest over his heart with his fist.

“I love her, Snake. I’ll protect her with my life, just like you’ve done all these years. And I’ll need you there to watch my back. Will you do it?”

He raked his fingers through snow white hair. “On one condition. Give us a baby, a great-granddaughter. I’ll be a better teacher this time around. I’ll teach her not to get hooked up with a man the likes of you, Malone.” He held out his hand.

Accepting it, Rafe said, “That’s a deal, Snake. That’s a deal.”

Rafe crossed to a nearby table and the tray he’d placed there earlier. Tugging a cork from a bottle, he poured three fingers of Bliss water into six different glasses. He passed out drinks to each of the pirates, keeping one for himself, and lifted it in toast. “To Maggie.”

The papas’ voices echoed, “To Maggie.”

~~~~~~~~~~

Maggie yelled out the window. “Rafe Malone, when I get my hands on you I’m gonna snatch you baldheaded!”

She yelled so hard and so long, she almost didn’t hear the knock on the door. “Maggie, honey?” Luella called. “Maggie, don’t throw anything. It’s just me coming in.”

“Luella! Thank God! Do you know what he’s done? Do you know what that son of an oyster has dared to do?”

“Yes. He got Andrew Montgomery to split the treasure equally with your papas. He also used his old-age fund to buy this house and half the Lake Bliss land from them. Then, as his final bit of magic, he managed to convince your papas to bless your upcoming nuptials. They are waiting downstairs to escort you to your groom.”

Shocked, Maggie stumbled back against the wall. “My what?”

“Your groom. Rafe is waiting at the hotel with Luke and Mr. Nick and some preacher the ranger fetched from town. And then there’s been the nicest surprise. Apparently my Honor up and decided she needed to witness the Lake Bliss treatment on Luke’s leg, so she loaded up the children and headed after him. They arrived not half an hour ago. We just think it’s wonderful that all the Prescotts will be here to share this special day with you and Rafe.”

“Special day,” Maggie repeated.

“Yes, special day. Everything is all set for you to marry. All you have to do is change into this pretty yellow dress I brought over with me. Honor found it in your wardrobe, and she says to tell you it’s a good—luck color for a wedding dress. Probably you’ll want to brush your hair, too. It’s looking a little mussed, Maggie dear.” Luella held the dress up to Maggie and sighed. “You’ll be a beautiful bride. Simply beautiful.”

“I’m going to kill him. I can’t believe he did this.”

“Isn’t he romantic! Why, I swear, if I could find a man who would go to the lengths Rafe has gone to in order to make this such a special day for you, why, I’d marry the man in a heartbeat. He met your grandfathers on their own terms, Maggie. Gentleman thief to pirate. I was so proud of him. Even if he hadn’t done it before, he earned their respect then. That will make it so much nicer for you, you realize. Of course, not that we won’t miss him over at the Winning Ticket.

But he says he’s keeping the Lone Star, and it’s not so terribly far from Lake Bliss.” She batted her eyelashes and added, “Besides, I wouldn’t be surprised if Pepper discovered a desire to invest some of his new wealth in the horse-breeding business. We’ll see plenty of you, I’m certain of it.”

Though Luella had been the one talking, Maggie was the one having trouble catching her breath.
A wedding. Today. Mrs. Rafe Malone. Mary Malone.
“What are we waiting for, Luella? Let’s get moving!”

~~~~~~~~~~

An hour later Honor Prescott’s eldest son played a march on the parlor piano as Maggie, a vision in yellow calico, entered the hotel escorted by her papas. All five of them.