Practically Married Read online

  “Tess, I...”

  Letter to Reader

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Books by Christine Rimmer

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Teaser chapter

  Copyright

  “Tess, I...”

  Zach began. His courage seemed to fail him.

  Tess sat up straighter. “Yes?”

  At last he made the words come. “I suppose you have a pretty good idea what this is about. It’s a practical offer from a practical man. I need someone to keep the house and to keep me and the hands fed. Someone who knows the loneliness and plain day-to-day drudgery of life on a ranch.” A ghost of a grin came and went on Zach’s face. “And someone just crazy enough to want that kind of life for herself.”

  Zach looked up to her eyes. “Do you know what I’m getting at here, Tess?”

  Her heart set up a terrible clatter. It sounded like thunder in her ears. She’d never imagined that she would be such a bundle of nerves about this. “I...I think so.”

  “Tess, I’m asking you to marry me.”

  Dear Reader,

  With Mother’s Day right around the comer, Special Edition commemorates the warm bonds of family. This month, parenthood brings some unlikely couples together in the most woadrous ways!

  This May, Sherryl Woods continues her popular AND BABY MAKES THREE: THE NEXT GENERATION series. THAT SPECIAL WOMAN! Jenny Adams becomes an Unexpected Mommy when revenge-seeking single father Chance Adams storms into town and sweeps Jenny off her feet with his seductive charm!

  Myrna Temte delivers book three of the MONTANA MAVERICKS: RETURN TO WHITEHORN series. In A Father’s Vow, a hardheaded Native American hero must confront his true feelings for the vivacious schoolteacher who is about to give birth to his child. And look for reader favorite Lindsay McKenna’s next installment in her mesmerizing COWBOYS OF THE SOUTHWEST series when a vulnerable heroine simply seeks solace on the home front, but finds her soul mate in a sexy Stallion Tamer!

  Listen for wedding bells in Practically Married by Christine Rimmer. This final book in the CONVENIENTLY YOURS series is an irresistibly romantic tale about an arranged marriage between a cynical rancher and a soft-spoken single mom. Next, Andrea Edwards launches her DOUBLE WEDDING duet with The Paternity Question. This series features twin brothers who switch places and find love—and lots of trouble!

  Finally, Diana Whitney caps off the month with Baby in His Cradle. In the concluding story of the STORK EXPRESS series, a very pregnant heroine desperately seeks shelter from the storm and winds up on the doorstep of a brooding recluse’s mountain retreat.

  I hope you treasure this book, and each and every story to come!

  Sincerely,

  Tara Gavin

  Senior Editor & Editorial Coordinator

  Please address questions and book requests to:

  Silhouette Reader Service

  U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

  Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, OnL L2A 5X3

  CHRISTINE RIMMER

  PRACTICALLY MARRIED

  To Arlene Evans, fellow writer from my Sacramento

  RWA chapter and former school nurse, for seeing my

  characters through any number of gunshot wounds,

  sprains, contusions and broken bones. You’re the

  greatest, Arlene.

  Books by Christine Rimmer

  Silhouette Special Edition

  Double Dare #646

  Slow Larkin’s Revenge #698

  Earth Angel #719

  *Wagered Woman #794

  Born Innocent #833

  *Man of the Mountain #886

  *Sweetbriar Summit #896

  *A Home for the Hunter #908

  For the Baby’s Sake #925

  *Sunshine and the Shadowmaster #979

  *The Man, The Moon and The Marriage Vow #1010

  *No Less Than a Lifetime #1040

  *Honeymoon Hotline #1063

  †The Nine-Month Marriage #1148

  †Marriage by Necessity #1161

  †Practically Married #1174

  Silhouette Desire

  No Turning Back #418

  Call It Fate #458

  Temporary Temptress #602

  Hard Luck Lady #640

  Midsummer Madness #729

  Counterfeit Bride #812

  Cat’s Cradle #940

  The Midnight Rider

  Takes a Bride #1101

  Silhouette Books

  Fortune’s Children

  Wife Wanted

  *The Jones Gang

  †Conveniently Yours

  CHRISTINE RIMMER came to her profession the long way around. Before settling down to write about the magic of romance, she’d been an actress, a sales clerk, a janitor, a model, a phone sales representative, a teacher, a waitress, a playwright and an office manager. Now that she’s finally found work that suits her perfectly, she insists she never had a problem keeping a job—she was merely gaining “life experience” for her future as a novelist. Those who know her best withhold comment when she makes such claims; they are grateful that she’s at last found steady work. Christine is grateful, too—not only for the joy she finds in writing, but for what waits when the day’s work is through: a man she loves who loves her right back, and the privilege of watching their children grow and change day to day. She lives with her family in Oklahoma.

  Chapter One

  It was one-thirty in the afternoon on the last Sunday in April when Zach Bravo turned to Tess DeMarley and asked, “Will you go for a drive with me, Tess?”

  Tess met his steady gray-blue eyes and knew immediately what would happen on that drive.

  Ignoring the sudden acceleration of her heartbeat, she sat a little straighter and gave him a bright, direct smile. “Yes. I would enjoy a ride, Zach.”

  Edna Heller, with whom Tess lived, sat on the sofa a few feet away. Tess turned to the older woman. “Edna, would you mind if we left you on your own for a while?”

  “Not at all. You two go on.”

  Tess thought of her daughter, Jobeth. After lunch, Jobeth had gone out to play with some neighbor kids. “Jobeth is off down the street at the Collerbys’. Do you think you could look after her while I’m gone?”

  “Of course I will. Don’t you worry about Jobeth. You two have yourselves a nice little ride.”

  Zach and Tess stopped in the small entry hall at the foot of the stairs to put on their coats. Then they went out together into the cold and windy afternoon.

  When Zach opened the pickup door for her, Tess couldn’t help noticing that he’d brought the best one, the newest one of the three he used out at the Rising Sun Ranch. It was a Chevy, a deep blue in color. And there wasn’t a speck of mud or manure on it, inside or out. He must have washed it before he came to call.

  That touched her, made silly tears push at the back of her throat. She swallowed them. She was not a woman who indulged in tears.

  And there was no reason for tears anyway. Tess and Zach had spent a long, careful time with each other, slowly getting acquainted, each learning the other’s ways and wants. And now Zach would make her an offer. It
was nothing to cry over. It was a good and logical thing for all concerned.

  As the pickup sped down the road, the wind whistled outside, blowing hard enough to make the cab shake. Tess stared through the windshield at the rolling prairie, the wide pale sky and the Big Horn Mountains in the distance, so tall and proud, silvery snow still thick on the tops of them and white clouds snagged on the crests. She had lived in Northeastern Wyoming for almost two years now. It was grand, harsh country; rich and green in early summer, cold and unforgiving in winter. More and more, she had begun to allow herself to think of it as home.

  As they rode, Tess and Zach talked a little, about the newest addition to the Bravo family, Jason James, who’d been born just yesterday to Zach’s cousin Nate and Nate’s wife, Meggie. Zach had driven in to Buffalo, to the hospital there, to see the baby early that morning.

  “Nate looked so proud,” Zach said. “And I’ve never seen Meggie so happy. I think things between them have worked out, after all.”

  There had been some trouble between Nate and his wife. Tess was glad to hear the trouble was over. “That’s good.”

  Zach chuckled. “Already that baby’s got a set of lungs on him. You should hear him holler.”

  “I can’t wait to get my hands on him.” Tess thought of when Jobeth was a baby, of her tiny, perfect hands, her fat pink cheeks. Of the smell of her, that lovely, milky, baby-powder scent.

  Zach took his gaze from the road long enough to turn his smile her way. He had a wonderful smile. All the Bravo men did.

  A funny, weak feeling swept through Tess. Right then, for the first time, it became real to her that she might have more babies. With this man. It seemed an awfully intimate subject to consider—for a woman who would soon be made a strictly sensible offer.

  Zach was looking at the road again. If Tess’s face had turned red, he hadn’t noticed—or else his natural tactfulness made him pretend that he hadn’t.

  A moment later, Zach slowed the pickup and turned onto a smaller road. A few minutes more, and the pavement wore out; the road turned to dirt. They bumped along, skirting ruts for a while.

  Then Zach pulled to the shoulder next to a barbwire fence that stretched on in both directions as far as the eye could see.

  Zach turned off the engine. In the quiet, the wind outside seemed to rise up louder and bump itself even harder against the truck. Zach gestured toward the snow-patched sweep of land beyond the fence. “This is Rising Sun land, as far as you can see.”

  The Rising Sun Cattle Company belonged to the Bravos, to Zach and Nate and their third cousin, Cash.

  Cash. Tess thought the name, registered the inevitable ache it caused, and pushed it from her mind.

  She smiled at the man behind the wheel. Of the three Bravo cousins who owned the Rising Sun, Zach was the one who lived there and worked the place full-time. A born rancher, everyone said of him. And from what Tess had seen in the past two years, everyone was right.

  Zach pointed toward a stand of cottonwoods several hundred yards away. “Would you walk out there with me?”

  Tess nodded, feeling formal and stiff—and a little bit scared. “Yes. Certainly.”

  They got out of the pickup. The wind, sharp and chill after the warmth of the cab, tore at Tess’s jacket and tried to whip her hair out from under her wool hat. She hunched down into her jacket and stuck her gloved hands into her pockets.

  Zach held the wires apart, so she could slide through the fence. She gave him a warm nod in thanks and eased through the space he’d made for her, taking care not to snag her clothes on the sharp barbs. Then, together but not touching, they slogged out to the bare cottonwoods, which clustered around a swiftly running stream—Crystal Creek, the stream was called, if Tess remembered right. It twisted and tumbled its way across a good portion of the Rising Sun Ranch.

  “It’s a pretty spot in summer,” Zach said when they reached creekside. He sounded a little bewildered.

  She hastened to let him know she found no fault with the place he had chosen. “It’s just fine, Zach.” But in truth, it looked barren and drab, the ground half-frozen and muddy. The trees, still leafless this time of year, reminded her of weather-bleached bones.

  Zach’s strong shoulders lifted in a shrug. “It’ll have to do.”

  She could hear the nervousness in his tone and knew just how he felt. Even though this was a practical matter, it was still a big step. She assured him once more, “It’ll do just fine.”

  They shared a smile. The wind blew strands of her hair across her mouth. She caught them and eased them back under the edge of her hat.

  He seemed to shake himself. “Here.” Between them crouched a big, round boulder. He bent and brushed it off. “Sit down.”

  “Thank you.” She perched on the boulder. It was an extremely cold seat; it made her bottom ache. But she didn’t get up. It had been so thoughtful of him to offer it to her and to brush it off and all. Tess believed that thoughtfulness should always be appreciated.

  Zach coughed. “Tess, I...” His courage seemed to fail him.

  She sat up straighter, willing him to be able to go on. “Yes?”

  He coughed again, into his gloved fist. Then, at last, he made the words come. “I suppose you have a pretty good idea what this is about. It’s a practical offer from a practical man. I need someone to keep the house and to keep me and the hands fed. Someone who knows the loneliness and plain day-to-day drudgery of life on a ranch.” A ghost of a grin came and went on his face. “And someone just crazy enough to want that kind of life for herself.”

  She stared at him, thinking of the South Dakota ranch that had been her childhood home. Zach was right. It hadn’t been an easy life. But it had been a life she’d loved, a life she’d only left to follow her husband. She had believed at the time that she could always go back.

  Oh, what a foolish girl she had been.

  Zach hitched a booted foot up on the side of the boulder where she sat, looked down at the frozen ground by his other boot—and then up into her eyes. “Do you know what I’m getting at here, Tess?”

  Her heart had set up a terrible clatter. It sounded like thunder in her ears. She’d never imagined that she would be such a bundle of nerves about this. “I...I think so.”

  He took his boot off the boulder, slid his hat off his head and rolled the brim nervously in his two hands. “Tess, I’m asking you to marry me.”

  In spite of the gentle way he said those words, they came at her stronger and sharper than the Wyoming wind. She found she couldn’t sit still, so she shot to her feet, walked in a circle, and then sat back down. “I see.”

  He frowned, fiddled with his hat brim a little more, then stuck the hat back on his head. “I thought you knew. I thought marriage was where we were headed.”

  “Well, yes. I...I did know. And we’ve talked of marriage, of what we both wanted from marriage, haven’t we? Often.”

  “But you seem surprised.”

  She gulped. “No, really. I’m not.”

  “Tess. You should see your face.”

  She blinked, shook her head. “No, I’m not surprised. I mean, I am surprised, but not about you proposing. I mean... Oh, I don’t know....” She made herself stop babbling, took a moment to breathe deeply, to try to find some shred of composure somewhere in her agitated mind and heart.

  Silently, as she breathed carefully in and out, she reminded herself of what mattered: that Zach Bravo offered her the life she longed for. That she liked Zach. And that the two of them sought the same things. They were both honorable people who would work hard to build a good future together. Zach Bravo would make a fine husband. He was a man who would always take care of his own, a man she would be able to count on.

  And to a widowed single mother with minimal wage-earning skills, a man she could count on sounded pretty dam good.

  Still...

  “Tess?”

  She closed her eyes. “Just...give me a minute, okay?”

  “All right.”<
br />
  She rose again from the freezing rock, and turned away from Zach, to look westward toward the rugged peaks of the mountains. Somewhere behind her, from the other side of the creek, faintly, she heard a mournful cry, as of a dove, a sad, cooing sound.

  And she couldn’t stop herself; she saw Cash’s face. She saw him grinning that warm, teasing grin of his.

  Her heart seemed to get small and tight inside her chest. He was so splendid: golden-haired, blue-eyed Cash. Zach’s cousin. And the one who had always come through for her and Jobeth when all hope was gone.

  Cash had been her dead husband’s buddy since high school. And Cash Bravo never deserted a friend.

  Tess could almost feel the touch of his hand now, pressing money she hated to take but couldn’t afford to refuse into her palm. Over and over, though he must have known he was only throwing good money after bad, he had bankrolled her husband’s crazy wildcatting schemes. All it ever took was a phone call—and Cash would come.

  When Josh died. Cash was there to help her through the funeral. And to offer her and Jobeth a new start, in Medicine Creek, living with Edna, who had been ill at the time and needed someone to care for her.

  Cash was her friend and her hero. And she loved him with all of her heart.

  Tess held her face up to the biting wind and closed her eyes again, tightly, as she ticked off the hard facts.

  Cash Bravo was happily married and deeply in love with his wife, Abby—who was Edna’s daughter, and who considered Tess her friend. Cash had no idea of Tess’s feelings for him—and he never would. It was her guilty secret, a secret she would carry to her grave.

  A secret that would never hurt Zach. Because Zach wasn’t asking for her heart. He’d made that clear from the first. Zach wanted a loyal wife and a life’s partner, a suitable mother for any children they might have. Tess could be those things for him. There was no reason he would ever have to know of the hidden, pointless yearnings of her stubborn heart.