The Rancher’s Fugitive Bride (Preview)

Chapter One: Rosie

Albany, New York

Spring 1882

“Wyatt, you can’t mean that!”

Wyatt strode across the room and crossed his arms, leaning against the mantle of the fireplace as he stared at her. “I do, Rosie, and you’re going to do as you’re told. It’s already been arranged. We’ll leave for Montana Territory by the end of the week.”

Her mind raced as she tried to latch onto one feeling at a time, but they ranged between horrified realization and rampant ideas of how she might avoid all of this. “But Wyatt—”

He pointed a finger at her. “I don’t want any arguments from you. It’s well past time that you got married. So start packing your trunks.” He paused. “Make that one trunk. You won’t need so many clothes out there on the frontier. Charlie already knows we’re coming. I’ll stay for a couple of days until you’re wed, then I’ll return home.” He scowled. “It’s going to take us at least a week, maybe a little more, to get there and I can’t be away from my job any longer than that.”

Rosie stared at her older brother, shaking her head, panic growing. “But I don’t know him, Wyatt!” She straightened her back and lifted her chin, anger and confusion rising behind the fear. “Why would you do something like this to me?”

“I’ve known Charlie Westerly since we met at the university in New York City. He’s a good fellow and will make a good husband. You should be thanking me instead of complaining. You’re almost an old maid as it is.”

“I’m nineteen years old! Hardly on the shelf—”

“No arguments this time, Rosie, and I mean it!”

“He’s just three years older than you are! He’s thirty-three years old! Why would you do this? Why would you promise to marry me to a man so much older, not to mention one who lives on the other side of the country and has an eleven-year-old son?” Her heart pounded. Her skin felt clammy. Her stomach churned with horror at the thought.

He heaved a put-upon sigh. “You act as if I’m trying to punish you, and I’m not. All my female acquaintances are already married and have a family. Even Mellie, your own age, already has a two-year-old child!” He flung out a hand. “And it’s more than obvious that none of my other, unattached acquaintances are interested in marrying someone as stubborn and willful as you.”

She frowned. “Why do you care if I marry?” she demanded. She knew the truth but didn’t want to admit it at the moment. “And I’m not stubborn,” she argued. “I just don’t share your opinion about marriage, that’s all.” She could have pointed out that he wasn’t married yet, but then he would probably blame that on her as well, stating no one wanted to marry a man with a troublesome sister like her. He always came up with excuses, and most of them faulted her.

He scowled and continued despite her protests. “Like I said, I’ll only stay with you and Charlie for a couple of days to visit with him and give you two a chance to get to know one another a little. But then I have to get back here and take care of my clients.”

She almost suggested that someone could easily take over his tasks while he was gone. Wyatt worked as a loan officer for a large bank in downtown Albany. He didn’t have clients, not really. He just supervised paperwork regarding sales and acquisitions and filed it. He’d left home when she was little. He’d gone to school in New York City with aspirations of becoming a successful lawyer with a thriving law practice. A tragic incident had curtailed his plans. First, the death of their parents. The second tragedy, Rosie supposed, was the fact that he had been obligated to come back home from the city to the rural outskirts of Albany to care for her. He never let her forget it.

“And of course, you’re going to travel with me to make sure the deed is done?” While she didn’t necessarily want to make the journey on her own, having her brother hovering over her every mile made her cringe.

Wyatt frowned and ignored that comment. “You’re the one who’s always telling me you’re grown up and want to start living your life, aren’t you?” He shook his head. “Ungrateful snip! I try to help you, try to guide you into adulthood, and this is how you thank me?”

She narrowed her eyes, about to say something sarcastic, then decided she’d better not make things worse. “But Montana Territory? It’s so far away!” 

“Enough of this! I don’t have time to deal with your poor attitude and temper,” he glowered. “Just do as you’re told for a change without any arguments, all right?”

Rosie found herself staring at her older brother’s back as he strode from the parlor, across the small foyer and out of the house, closing the door none too softly behind him. She glanced out the window behind her and watched him walking stiffly down the sidewalk until he turned the corner. She turned around when she heard footsteps cautiously approaching the parlor from the kitchen. The housekeeper’s daughter stood in the doorway, staring wide-eyed at her.

“He can’t mean it, can he?” Agatha asked softly, emerging from behind the kitchen door.

“Oh, he means it, Agatha,” Rosie Beaumont sighed.  

Agatha glanced once behind her shoulder toward the kitchen, where her mother was in the midst of preparing supper. She entered the parlor, reached for Rosie’s arm, and pulled her from the room, quickly up the carpeted stairs nearby, then to Rosie’s bedroom at the far end of the hall. She closed the door softly behind her, and only then did they both heave a sigh of relief.

“What are you going to do?” Agatha asked, eyebrows drawn upward and eyes wide with concern.

Rosie shook her head, still in shock. “I don’t know.” 

She and Agatha had been friend,  and sometimes conspirators for the past ten years, ever since Rosie’s parents had died. Wyatt, eleven years older than Rosie, had arrived back in Albany for their parent’s funeral and stayed to take on – resentfully – the role as her sole and overbearing guardian. So many thoughts raced through her mind that she couldn’t settle on one.

“But Montana? I know he’s been trying to marry you off for a while, but why so far away?”

Rosie smirked. “Supposedly, he’s failed to make a match for me here in Albany, and evidently our neighboring counties as well, but I think he just wants to be rid of me once and for all.” She sighed. “After all, the money in the trust fund my parents set up before they died insisted on it. He can’t get his hands on the bulk of it until I’m married.”

Her brother had been aggrieved of his obligations as her guardian after their parents died just days apart from a mysterious illness that had swept through much of the Hudson River Valley one winter long ago. Over the years, he’d seem to have grown more annoyed with his duties as her guardian. Why, just last year, Wyatt had accused her of ruining his chances of marrying Millicent Abernathy, the daughter of one of Albany’s richest families, because of his familial obligations to her.

“But I don’t want you to leave, Rosie,” Agatha murmured. “You’re the only friend I have.”

Rosie glanced at Agatha and smiled. “And you’re my only friend also.”

It was true. Wyatt had never allowed Rosie to attend school. Instead, he had hired a tutor who came four days a week to guide her education. As a result, she hadn’t had much opportunity to socialize with girls her own age except Agatha. 

“Then we have to do something,” Agatha said, her voice resolute.

Rosie paced her room, her gaze passing over the two portraits that hung on the wall over her dresser. She missed her mother and father more than words could ever convey. Her only memories of them were here, in this house. Sometimes, just before she slipped into slumber, she could still remember the sound of her mother humming as she went about her tasks. Other times, sitting in the parlor with the fireplace blazing warm on a cold winter’s night, she remembered the sound of her father’s booming laugh. 

At the time of their death, her parents, though comfortable financially, were not rich. Her father had insisted that Wyatt earn his own way through life, which would only make his success more rewarding. It didn’t happen. Though Wyatt had always planned to open his own attorney’s office in New York City, he’d been obligated to remain in Albany and take up guardianship of the nine-year-old sister he barely knew – and seemed to resent her from that moment on. 

“Rosie?”

Rosie pulled her gaze from the portraits of her parents and glanced at Agatha. “What can I do?”

“You can leave home and find your own place in New York City, or maybe Schenectady or Syracuse,” her friend suggested. “But I think New York City would be the best of those choices. I know some places where you might be able to stay. You’d have to share a room, maybe a bed, but your brother would never think to look for you there. You could even get a job at one of the factories. There’s so many that I don’t think you’d have trouble finding work.”

Rosie knew she could disappear into the poorer parts of the city and work in a factory. It wasn’t the thought of hard work that bothered her. She might not have any particular skills, but she would be a hard worker. It wasn’t the abysmal wages that factory workers got paid, not really.  Of course she wanted to live comfortably. Yet she also wanted something even more important, something she’d lost when her parent’s died; a place that felt like home. A family. A husband who loved her and she loved him back. Until then, she had always pictured herself living on her own, in a small cottage in a rural area, surrounded by beautiful landscapes and blue skies. She knew that was idealistic, but it was her dream.

Of her few visits to New York City, she recalled the layer of sooty coal dust floating in the air from the multitude of factory stacks,  the smoke rising into the air in great plumes before dispersing and settling back down onto windows and sidewalks. During the season that she had been there with her brother, a dull and hazy sky had been more prevalent than the few days of sunshine. It was noisy and crowded, even late into the night. No, she didn’t want to live there.

“I can’t do that, Agatha.” Though she certainly didn’t want to marry a stranger, and one so much older than herself, she didn’t want to bring dishonor to her brother nor her memory of her parents. Her parents had raised her to be a good Christian girl, obedient and humble. She couldn’t refuse to marry this friend of Wyatt’s, even though he was only being selfish. If she refused, Wyatt would follow up on his threat to hire her out somewhere to earn her keep. In a way, she sometimes felt sorry for Wyatt, having been forced to give up his own dreams to take care of her, even though his resentment against her seemed to grow by leaps and bounds every year.

“Can’t you come up with an excuse? Maybe you could tell him that you met someone …” Agatha sighed. “No, I don’t suppose he’d believe that.”

“No, he wouldn’t,” Rosie agreed. “Besides, even if I didn’t marry the man, my brother would only find someone else. He doesn’t want to be responsible for me anymore.”

She also knew that the moment she left this house, she would be cut off financially, not that she had access to any of the money that Wyatt controlled, not even an allowance. She didn’t really care about a stipend. She’d had a roof over her head, and she ate well, and her armoire was filled with clothes. Despite the constrictions her brother placed on her, he had kept her safe from harm all these years. 

“But marrying a man so much older than you, one who already has a half-grown child? What if he’s mean? What if the boy resents you? What did your brother tell you about him?”

“Not much,” Rosie admitted. “His name’s Charlie Westerly. They met while at the university. I guess they write occasionally. I think Mister Westerly moved west into Montana Territory a few years ago or so, but his wife died of consumption last year, and Wyatt told me that he needs someone to care for his son.”

“So your brother is going to send you away to marry and live with a complete stranger so that you can raise the man’s child?” She shook her head. “I don’t understand why he wants to get rid of you. He’s hardly here at all anymore. He can’t claim you’ve been a burden to him.”

Rosie shrugged. “He’s still trying to get a law practice going, and he’s suggested more than once that it’s my fault that he’s not succeeded, that I add too much stress to his life that he can’t focus on his work as well as he should.”

“That’s not true!” Agatha exclaimed. “How can he blame you because he’s only a bank loan officer?” She lowered her voice. “I think he supposed all he had to do when he got his law degree was to open an office and people would come for his services. He knows nothing…” She paused and took a deep breath and let it out. “You barely see him in the morning at breakfast, and only for a little while at supper, then he disappears into that claustrophobic study of his. He’s been so unfair to you!” 

Agatha stomped her foot on the floor, but thankfully the thick carpet beneath her feet muffled the sound. Even so, both of them froze a moment before relaxing. Agatha’s mother, Vella, didn’t much care for the relationship between her daughter and Rosie. She said it was improper for a maid’s daughter to be so close to her employer’s sister. Nevertheless, the two had long managed to get away with that friendship 

Agatha glanced down at the floor, her shoulder sagging. “I guess there’s nothing either one of us can do about things.. I’m being sent to the Barkwell’s home in the next couple of weeks.”

Rosie nodded, her mood turning even more somber. 

Agatha shook her head. Tears shone in her eyes. “I don’t know why your brother just doesn’t move back to New York City and leave you in charge of the house here in Albany. Then I could still work here. But I know that he doesn’t want me here either.”

That was her brother’s doing too, Rosie believed. Anything that made her happy seemed to annoy her older brother. She didn’t understand why. 

The two friends stood facing one another, both miserable but without options. With no money at her disposal and with no skills such as a teaching certificate or work experience to rely on, Rosie didn’t see any way out of this nightmare.

A sharp knock on the door startled them. Agatha’s eyes widened. For a second, Rosie thought about trying to hide her friend, but changed her mind. They weren’t ten years old anymore. Heart in her throat, thinking it was Wyatt, she took a deep breath and opened it. The air left her lungs when she realized it wasn’t her brother, but Vella, Agatha’s mother. The woman briefly frowned at Rosie and then peered over her shoulder at her daughter.

“I need you in the kitchen, Agatha,” she said briskly. She cast a quick glance at Rosie. “Unless you require her services for something?”

“No, Vella. We were just talking.”

The older woman said nothing but simply tilted her head. With an apologetic glance, Agatha lowered her eyes and left the room, quietly following her mother down the hallway. Leaving the door open, Rosie turned toward her bed and sank down on it, the springs squeaking softly as she did so.

She lowered her head and closed her eyes, her voice soft in the quiet of the room. “Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence. He shall cover you with His feathers and under His wings you shall take refuge—”

The front door downstairs opened, then slammed shut. She winced and waited for Wyatt to come upstairs and finish their mostly one-sided discussion. First though, she heard his voice in the kitchen, then his shoes striding down the hardwood hallway, followed by the creak of a couple of risers on the staircase as he made his way to the second floor. With every thud of his boots as he traversed the hallway to her room, her heart beat dismally in her chest.

When his figure appeared in the doorway, she finally looked up, taking in his ruffled black hair, his dark brown eyes, and the slight frown tugging at the corners of his lips. She said nothing.

“I’ve sent a telegram to Charlie, told him that we would be getting on the train within a week’s time. We’ll be able to take the train most of the way, then a stagecoach. I’ll rent a buggy in Copper Flats to take us to his home.” With that, he turned abruptly and left the room. 

Rosie sat on her bed, shoulders hunched and chin lowered. She had always tried to be a good and obedient Christian. She tried to obey her brother, but he never seemed happy with her efforts. Something was always wrong with her. Yet he was wrong in this. To order her to marry a man so much older, one who only wanted her because he needed someone to take care of his own son? It would be a horrible and oppressive marriage, she just knew it. She would be no better off than poor Agatha, working as a servant for the rest of her life. 

Blinking back warm tears, she lifted her gaze and resolutely eyed the open doorway. What lay beyond in Montana Territory she didn’t know, but she was determined to meet the challenge that faced her with as much strength and faith as she could muster.

Chapter Two: Jesse

McAllister Ranch 

Outside Willow Bend, Montana 

Jesse McAllister sat comfortably in the saddle on his chestnut mare, eyeing his slowly growing herd of cattle. He should be more than happy. At twenty-four years of age, he was on his way to becoming one of the most successful ranch owners in the county. Good thing, too, considering he also took care of his Aunt Lydia, his mother’s elderly sister, and his younger brother, Luke, who’d just turned twenty, going on sixteen by the way he acted.

“Two more calves were born yesterday, Jesse.”

“Have you seen Luke today?”

“No, I haven’t. But did you hear what I just said?”

Jesse glanced at his long-time friend, Alex Black, and nodded. Alex owned the ranch just to the east of his. “And yours?”

“Three.” Alex peered at the grazing herd, a grin curving his lips. “By mid-summer, we can pull our herds together and drive them down to Cheyenne or Denver. If the weather holds out through spring, we can fatten our herds up nice and plump, and we’ll get a good price for each head.”

Jesse nodded and held back a sigh. He should be happier, more patient and content, but the past few months had been hard. His mother, who had moved back to Chicago following the death of his father five years ago had sent him a telegram just before Christmas asking for his help in caring for her sick older brother and his wife. Of course, Jesse had answered the summons.  He’d been gone two months. Two long, heartbreaking months that saw first his uncle passing away, then his aunt, then his mother. He alone had been spared. Upon his return home to his ranch outside of Willow Bend, he’d been struck another blow when Molly had broken off their engagement. 

“… you hear what I just said?”

Jesse turned again toward Alex. At twenty-three, his best friend was just a year younger than himself. Alex pulled his hat off his head and swept his fingers through dark blonde and slightly curly hair, wafting in the seemingly constant yet gentle breeze that blew in this part of the country. Hazel eyes somberly regarded him, the crow’s feet at their edges wrinkled from years of laughter and squinting against Montana’s summer sun or winter’s snowy glare.

“Sorry, I was distracted,” Jesse muttered.

“I can imagine by what… or who.” He shook his head. “Forget about her, Jesse.”

“Not so easy,” Jesse murmured. “She told me she’d been pushed into the engagement by her parents, that she was fond of me but didn’t love me! I’m supposed to pretend it didn’t happen?”

“’Course not,” Alex replied. “But you gotta quit isolating yourself. You’ve even stopped going to church and when you go into town, you don’t even talk with anyone like you used to.”

Feeling betrayed and lacking hope for a good marriage in the future, he’d focused all his attention on his ranch. “I’m doing the best I can, for now,” he grumbled.

Alex didn’t say anything for several moments. “Okay then, I’ll drop it.” He turned toward the cattle again. “But I said that if we we’re lucky, we might be able to get sixty dollars a head, maybe more.”

“Sounds good to me,” he murmured. 

Since his return to the ranch, he’d made it a point to rise well before dawn and not return to the house until darkness settled over the land, hoping that this would be the day he would be so exhausted he couldn’t focus on anything but sleep. He always hoped he would be so tired that he would fall into bed and not think, not dream, but his strategy always failed. He couldn’t help thinking about Molly, about how she had misled him during their nearly year-long courtship, destroying his dreams of love, home, and family. 

He heaved a sigh. “I’m heading into Willow Bend with the wagon for some roofing shingles and nails. Aunt Lydia also needs a few things from the mercantile.” He turned toward Alex. “You need anything from town while I’m there?”

“Nope,” Alex shook his head. “But why not send Luke into town? Don’t you have enough to do?”

He glanced at Alex. “I would if I could find him.”

Alex shook his head. “I have no idea how he got along when you were gone. If your Aunt Lydia hadn’t moved up from the boarding house in Cheyenne to help out—”

“You mean to keep him in check?”

Alex nodded. “To keep him in line and get some of the much-needed work that needs done after such a brutal winter, you would’ve likely come back to a disaster.”

Jesse turned to him with a grin. “You didn’t let that happen.” He paused, more serious now. “Thanks for keeping an eye on him also, Alex. I’ll talk to him.”

“I don’t think another talk is going to do any good. Luke needs to grow up. He has his job on the ranch, but if it wasn’t for that where would he be?”

Jesse knew Luke needed to grow up and mature. Four years younger than Jesse, Luke shared the same green eyes and brown hair. He was also exceedingly cheerful and playful, often more interested in horsing and admiring eligible ladies than taking life more seriously. He still couldn’t understand it. He and Luke were as different as night and day. 

“He’s a lot like you were when you were younger,” Alex commented.

Jesse turned to his friend. “What, when I was twelve?”

Alex laughed. “No doubt that kid needs to face his responsibilities around here rather than letting it all land on your shoulders.”

Jesse shrugged. “I’ve got broad shoulders.”

“Not the point.”

Jesse felt Alex’s eyes on him and turn to him with a frown. “What?”

“You gotta move on,” Alex sighed. “I know it’s hard, and it’s only been a month, but you can’t keep dwelling on it. It’s not doing you any good. You’re so distracted—”

“I know I have to move on, Alex. And I am.”

“No, you’re avoiding everyone,” Alex said bluntly. “If it weren’t for your aunt and your little brother living with you, you’d—”

“I’d what?” Jesse winced. “What are you talking about?” 

“I can guess,” Alex replied with a sigh. “But you’re not the first to lose a woman.”

Jesse felt guilty for his self-pity. He and Alex had been friends for years, since they were fourteen or fifteen years old. At eighteen, Alex had fallen in love with a girl named Matilda. He’d been working up the courage to ask her to marry him, until the day they’d gone on a buggy ride. A snake in the trail startled the horse, who took off at a run. The tongue of the buggy snapped, sending it careening. Alex survived with only scrapes and bruises while Matilda had been badly injured and died in Alex’s arms. 

Alex looked off into the distance. “I’ll never forget Matilda, but I know she’s in heaven now, entertaining the angels with her singing and her laughter. So I guess it’s not quite the same thing.” He shook his head. “I know you feel betrayed, Jesse, but don’t you think it’s better that you learned the truth before it was too late?”

Jesse tamped down a surge of anger. “She lied to me. The whole time, she was lying to me.” 

He looked out over the landscape. The air smelled of pine and juniper and sage. His three-thousand-acre ranchland was nestled along the foothills that rose to thickly forested mountainsides towering thousands of feet upward into the brilliant blue sky. The green of pine trees carpeted their slopes. Clusters of quaking aspens, their light green spring leaves contrasting with the dark green of the pines. In the fall, those aspen leaves would turn brilliant yellow and gold. 

His ranchland spread out southeastward from the foothills, encompassing a vast acreage of prime cattle grazing country. They aimed their horses down the gentle slope, where the trees thinned out and patches of early spring grass grew, little more than ankle high now. That grass would grow up to knee or hip length by the end of summer, offering plentiful grazing for his herd. Soon the landscape would be dotted with colorful flowers of pink or gold or red, sometimes blue, the shrubs rich with berries.

The landscape never failed to instigate within him a sense of awe, the mountains towering to the west, marveling that God had made such a beautiful place filled with everything a man could want to survive. The forests and plains beyond were rife with animals, from the chipmunks who always managed to make him smile, to deer, elk, and antelope. A myriad of birds called the treetops and the never-ending blue skies their home. 

He felt guilty for sulking, for not appreciating what was right in front of him. Without another word, he nudged his horse forward, leaving Alex behind. He headed toward the watering hole beside which perhaps a dozen of his cattle had gathered. He’d already cleared the scrub brush from the edges of the east side of the small pool of water. He eyed the creek that fed into it, trying to distract himself, to push thoughts of Molly to the back of his mind. 

While he had told Alex the truth about working through his feelings, he was still trying to find a way to forgive Molly. He admitted to himself that more often of late he felt more resentment and anger toward her now than the pain of betrayal. He frowned and glanced up at the sky. Why did You allow that to happen, Lord? What was the purpose of it? To humble me? Was I getting too big for my own britches? He didn’t think so, but maybe God had a different perspective. I loved her. Why wasn’t that good enough for her?

He knew he wasn’t going to get an answer. He’d been angry at everything and nearly everybody, and at God too, since that moment Molly confessed her truth. He knew that he should forgive her, as the Bible told him to. When the disciple Peter had asked Jesus how often he should forgive someone who did him wrong, he asked if seven times was enough. I do not say to you up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven, Jesus answered.

He realized that he wasn’t just angered by the betrayal. His pride had taken a blow. She had made an embarrassment of him, had mocked him… no, she hadn’t mocked. She had appeared genuinely sorry, and he tried to remember that. Still. He looked over his land, his cattle, and knew that he still had a purpose. He just didn’t know what it was. Someday maybe God would bless him with a wife who loved him for who he was and not for what he had. He had always been a bit of a loner, and he liked it that way, but sometimes…

“Come on, Jesse, let’s check on the rest of the herd before you’ve wasted the entire afternoon brooding.”

He glanced at his friend, sitting easily on his horse. Despite his devastating loss, Alex was rarely morose, preferring to look forward to possibilities in the future rather than the disappointments and griefs of the past, which he said only ate at a person’s soul bit by bit. He could take a good lesson from him. 

“I’m not brooding,” he muttered. “But you’re right. I’m wasting time. We still have the other parts of the herd to check on. “I’ll head over to your ranch tomorrow to bring that mare back to the house. Luke will be pleased.”

He knew he had to look forward as well, to focus on one day at a time, not years into the future. Perhaps God would see fit to bless him with a woman who would walk beside him and have as much enthusiasm for the growing ranch as he did. As if Alex could read his mind, as he often seemed to, he spoke as they turned their horses from the watering hole.

 “Patience, Jesse.” Alex said, smiling. “Good things come to those who wait.”

Jesse heaved a sigh and nodded in agreement. He had enough to deal with, striving to make his ranch successful in addition to providing for his aunt and younger brother. That should be enough for now. Even so, patience was a hard thing to grab hold of. And the Good Lord seemed to be taking His sweet time in granting Jesse what he hungered for most. Someone to love with his whole heart, and someone to love him like that in return.