Wild Angels
By Amiboshi-chan
Chapter one
The noonday sun beat down on the chapel, and the carriages and wagons surrounded the building. Missy Brooks sighed, longing to be back home at the Circle B ranch house, which despite the heat of the noonday, would be buzzing with life and excitement.
Heaving another sigh, she watched Suboshi run his fingers around the inside of his high, stiffly starched white collar. He swallowed hard, and then gave her a why-am-I-being-tortured-like-this grimace. It was as plain as the nose on his face that he was as uncomfortable in his fancy duds as she was in her maid of honor dress. Still, they had agreed to get all gussied up for this occasion. And when she thought about it, she had to smile. All the fuss and wearing of stiff lace, starched petticoats and pinching corsets was worth it, because Cyril and Ellen were finally getting married.
The doctor and cautioned them to wait until Ellen had fully recovered from her injury last fall. Then Patricia and Donovan O'Bannion, Cyril's parents, had insisted the wedding wait until the winter weather had cleared. They had arrived only a week past, with Cyril's eldest brother Nakago, his cousin Yui and an assortment of relatives in tow. It was hard to believe that after so many obstacles, Ellie and Cyril were finally going to be wed.
The spinster who had played the organ for every wedding in the territory for the last twenty years suddenly changed tempo. The ancient instrument droned and wheezed, announcing that the time was growing short and all should find a seat.
"Are you ready?" A resonant voice rippled over Missy like a warm summer breeze.
When she turned and looked up at Tasuki McCarty, her middle tightened even more. Ranch life had transformed his easy-on-the-eyes appearance into the lean, uncompromising visage of a true cowboy. His rich amber eyes gazed out at her from skin bronzed by more than a year in the territorial sun and wind. He had the determined, never-give-an-inch look of a work- hardened Western man coupled with the elegant, refined manner of an Eastern dude.
'A deadly combination,' Missy thought to herself.
As good looking as he was, she still would have been hard pressed to pick him out of a crowd of ranch hands without a second look, if not for his unique hair, that mixed somewhere between a rich red and the orange of a flame. He fit right into the crowd, had learned to rope and ride with the best of them. When he walked, his body spoke of strength and confidence. He had succeeded in doing what she'd been sure he could not.
At the beginning she'd teased, and needled and picked on him, but as he settled in and learned to handle himself on the ranch, the situation between them had flip-flopped. Instead of becoming accustomed to being around Tasuki over the long months since he'd arrived, she had found herself growing more and more awkward around him.
Tasuki had slowly begun to get the upper hand at their every confrontation. Now he openly teased her with a wicked twinkle in his eye. And every time it happened, she got all tongue-tied and fluttery. Her only defense was her sharp-as-a-buck-knife Brooks tongue, but even that weapon had failed under the heat of that intense gaze.
"Missy?" He asked again. "Are you ready?"
"Ye-yes—I guess so."
"You seem a little jumpy."
"Only like a tom turkey before Thanksgivin'," Missy admitted softly. She tugged at the snug waist of her dress, trying to give herself enough room to take a deep breath. Cyril and Ellen both had said she looked fine in the form-fitting, peacock blue sateen, but with Tasuki's critical gaze skimming over her, Missy now doubted the truth of their words. Damnation. She wished she could've worn chaps and boots. At least then she could be herself and would be able to inhale normally, instead of having to take panting little breaths. Ellen having her as a bridesmaid had been a dunderhead notion. She wasn't a lady, and putting fancy duds on her skinny form wasn't going to change that. It was like putting a candelabra in an outhouse: it didn't change what was on the inside one bit.
A deep, throaty chuckle drew her attention back to Tasuki. He was staring at her, grinning like a fox who had found a way into the henhouse.
"It is customary for the bride to be nervous, not the maid of honor," he advised her in an easy tone. It could have been friendly teasing, or it could have been that he was mocking her. "Interesting though. I didn't think the princess of the Brooks clan ever had a moment of fear about anything! Could it be that you are only human like the rest of us, Missy?" His eyes glittered with the challenge of his words, and he gave her a devilish half smile.
Now there was no doubt. He was poking fun at her- again! And sure as God had made little green apples, he'd keep on doing it until she flew off the handle and said or did something she'd regret. Even so, spouting off at him wasn't a luxury she could allow herself smack-dab in the middle of Ellen's wedding.
'Consarn him, ' she thought sourly. 'I won't ruin this wedding on account of his fool teasing.'
What was it about this Easterner that got under her skin, anyway? She knew enough to walk away from a coiled rattler or a porcupine, so why couldn't she just turn her back on Tasuki? He was prickly as a porcupine, and the way her belly knotted and her pulse was racing, he must be as deadly as any sidewinder—well, deadly to her, anyway! It confounded her how he could just open his mouth and rile her up. It didn't make a lick of sense. All she had to do was use the brains God gave her and ignore the grinning varmint, but somehow it never worked out that way.
"Well, Missy? Are you?" Tasuki leaned a little nearer and gazed at her with his seductive eyes. "Are you -afraid?"
"I'm not afraid of anythin'!" She snapped, then looked around in chagrin, at the heads that turned to stare at them, due to the volume of her reply. "M- my dress is just tight as a narrow cinch, th-that's all." She continued, lowering her voice to a respectable whisper. "And with all these folks squeezed in here, there's barely a breath of air left." She forced herself to ignore the amusement etched in Tasuki's ruggedly handsome face. "So why don't you quit flappin' your jaws so much and usin' up what little air there is left?" She concluded sassily.
He laughed.
Damn him to hell and back. He had the gall to stand there and laugh. And then he raised a long-fingered, roughened hand as if to touch her. The thought sent her belly dropping to her feet like a stone. Mercifully, his fingers stopped just short of touching her cheek.
"Rest easy, little lady." He said smoothly. "If you swoon, I promise to do my best to catch you before you hit the floor in front of all these people."
Her face grew hotter and all the shallow little breaths she was taking seemed to be hanging in the back of her throat. It took all her control to keep from yelling at him, or slapping his face, but she managed to keep her voice low and controlled, and her hands clenched at her sides.
"I appreciate the offer, Tasuki, but you'll never see the day when I can't stand on my own two feet." Her long, unbound hair tickled her back through the silky material of her dress as she emphasized her speech with an emphatic little nod of her head.
This time Tasuki didn't laugh, but she felt his palpable amusement sluice over her in a scalding wave. Her heart beat a tiny bit faster inside the sateen bodice of her dress.
'Damn him! Double damn him!'
He could affect her with just a look, or God forbid, the hint of a casual touch. And then, just as if he had read her tortured thoughts, he reached out and took hold of her elbow with his bare fingertips. A myriad of uncontrollable emotions rippled through her middle when his fingers tightened around her arm. She promised herself that she would not react, but she stiffened in spite of herself.
"Don't make a bigger fuss, Missy. Everyone is watching." His low warning rumbled over her while his gaze slid around the interior of the crowded Catholic mission, the closest house of God they could find.
Missy followed his line of vision. Just as he had said, the tiny building was full to overflowing, and while not everyone was staring at her, more than enough curious eyes were looking her way.
"Come on, Missy, I won't bite you—"he leaned close enough to whisper in her ear, tightening that possessive hold on her arm. "—but I might nibble a bit around the edges." He breath fanned her earlobe. For a moment she was afraid he would nip her flesh.
'Was she afraid that he would—or that he wouldn't?'
"It's time we took our places, Tasuki." She managed to croak. "Stop all this foolishness."
Tasuki grinned widely, then the deftly maneuvered her and the wide ruffles of sateen up through the narrow aisle. Missy marveled that he got them where they needed to be without tripping either one of them.
She shook herself and blinked. Without quite knowing how time was moving so fast and disjointedly, she realized she was now standing opposite Tasuki in front of the slat thin minister with the too-large Adam's apple.
Missy allowed herself one backward glance. Now every person seated in the small chapel was watching her as she stood at the front of the church, twisting her fingers and plucking at the too-tight, unforgiving waist of her dress.
She whirled back around. She felt like a complete moron-- and she blamed Tasuki for it and for making her feel things that confused and befuddled her.
A murmur of restrained voices, like a cooling breeze over dried leaves, moved through the chapel. Missy turned to see what had caused the stir, grateful that something, anything, distracted the group's interest from her. Then she saw Cyril, and all her thoughts were for him alone.
He looked happy, healthy and more handsome than she'd ever imagined. His sandy blonde hair glowed in the flames of the candles on the altar; his face was flushed with excitement.
The organ wheezed and groaned again. Then with a reverberating sound that tickled the bottoms of her feet, the 'Wedding March' began. Missy followed Cyril's gaze to the side door.
Moving with all the grace of an angel fallen to earth, Ellen appeared in her flowing ivory gown, and Missy felt her heart well up with love for her cousin. She shifted the bouquet of wild lavender and oxeye daisies to her empty hand as she smiled at Missy. The gesture made the hot dry lump in Missy's throat grow larger.
"Let us all bow our heads in a moment of prayer . . ." the minister intoned ". . .and ask God's blessing on this young couple as they embark on the road of life."
Tasuki watched Missy's eyes flutter shut. He half listened to the prayer while he continued to observe her from the corner of his eye. Looking at her now, a feminine vision in sateen, it was hard to believe she was the same razor tongued shrew that had pestered him for the last year—except that he had the emotional bruises to prove it. The little vixen had drawn blood, in a manner of speaking, a time or two. She was feisty and headstrong, the exact opposite of the women he'd formerly pursued.
A murmured amen brought Tasuki's head up. He focused on his childhood friend. He doubted he'd ever seen Cyril happier, perhaps aside from the time he'd told Tasuki he was following Ellen westward.
Cyril's leaving and Violet Ashland's fickle heart had been the catalyst for Tasuki to also leave the city and the pointless pursuits he had once thought of as manly.
After Cyril left, Tasuki had surrounded himself with a flock of beautiful ladies, but none had ever held his attention for more than a couple of weeks until he'd met Violet Ashland. The petite blonde had captured his interest the way no other woman had before...
A nervous cough pulled his attention to the russet haired girl standing opposite him. Missy was a wildcat one minute and a siren the next. She could make him madder than any woman he knew, yet in the whole year he'd known her she had never shown any interest in snaring him for his fortune- or any other reason, he thought with a smile.
'Not like Violet.'
He frowned and wondered where that thought had come from. It was probably the magic of the candles and the organ music and the lethargy of the afternoon. A man would have to be made of iron not to be influenced by the romantic promise of the moment. The trappings or matrimony had resurrected memories that had long been buried, reminding him of his own proposal of marriage.
But that had been another man, in another life. Now his days were filled with work and with fending off verbal arrows from Missy Brooks, who could strip the hide off a man with one look. And yet, he thought idly, under all that bluff and bluster, Missy was honest and brave, the kind of woman to cross rivers and climb mountains with.
Tasuki blinked in bemusement at his thoughts, realizing that he was beginning to sound like Chichiri. The idea that he had learned some wisdom from the irascible cowboy was oddly pleasing to him, and he caught himself grinning.
In the same moment he grinned, he and Missy looked at each other by accident. Their gazes caught, and then held. Her dark eyes reflected the candlelight like a deep, shimmering stream in the first rays of morning. Funny that he'd never noticed how wide and luminous her eyes were until now.
"Dearly Beloved . . ." the tall, lanky preacher's baritone voice filled the chapel. "In sight of God and this company . . ."
Tasuki adjusted the shoulders and front of his black coat and tried to focus on the preacher's words. Missy fidgeted once more, and his attention became riveted upon her.
Was she really that nervous?
'Naw.' The answer came quickly into his head. Missy Brooks was a steady a woman as ever walked the earth. But if she wasn't nervous, then why was her softly rounded bosom rising and falling so rapidly inside the sateen bodice?
He frowned at her in speculation. Then as if she felt his attention on her, she looked at him again, with an _expression so poignant, that he experienced an wild impulse to reach out and touch her.
He shook himself and looked back at the preacher, telling himself that he shouldn't give a hoot in hell how she felt. If she was frightened it was poetic justice. She had given him undiluted hell this past year. It would serve her right if she was stewing in her own juices.
No, he didn't care how she felt. He couldn't give a damn about Missy's feelings- or any other woman's, for that matter. Life out here had let him see that a lone wolf survived just as well as one with a mate, and that was what he wanted now- to remain alone. A lone wolf, free, unattached and pleasantly sane. None of this madness called love for him, thank you. He intended to remain a confirmed bachelor, like Chichiri. Chichiri was a man who knew what was what. He had helped Tasuki learn to rope and ride and learn how to laugh at Missy's sharp barbs.
"Cyril Liam O'Bannion . . ."The clergyman's deep voice gained volume. "Do you . . ."
The nearest group of candles flickered. Cyril leaned over and gave Ellen a little peck on the cheek, quite improper when taking his vows, but the kind of thing Tasuki had grown to expect in this half-tamed place. Here men made their own rules to live by. Now that he had become accustomed to it, he liked it.
Missy shifted on her feet and Tasuki glanced at her again. She was smiling. It was an angel's smile, full of love and innocence. Something hot and liquid coursed through his veins while he watched her face.
"Ellen Irene Brooks, do you take . . ."
The image of Violet Ashland flitted unbidden into Tasuki's head, filling his mind with the memories of life with a cold, elegant woman. Then he glanced at Missy. Where Violet had been cold, Missy ran red-hot. "And her hot tongue will sear flesh, as well," he whispered to himself.
He caught himself smiling at the memory of Missy's frequent outbursts and his determination to prove himself. If he was honest with himself, he'd have to admit that he had come to enjoy their verbal sparring. His taste in women had changed, or maybe he had changed in the rowdy environment of the territory. One thing for certain, Tasuki McCarty was not the same man he had been when he'd stepped off the train from New York. Besides, if the time came that he wanted to settle down-- and he wasn't thinking that it would—but if it did, then Missy would be here. He cast a furtive glance at her.
Yep, he could count on Missy Brooks to be constant and unchanging. She would always be Missy and she would always be tied to the Brooks ranch. It was a comforting thought, and one that Tasuki tucked away in the corner of his mind for safekeeping.
"The ring, if you please . . ." The minister's voice snapped Tasuki back to attention. He pulled the ring from the pocket of his brocade vest and gave it to Cyril.
Ellen gave her flowers to Missy and allowed Cyril to claim her hand. Work- roughened fingers held hers within a protective grasp. Tasuki thought of their old lives in New York—the champagne suppers, buggy rides through the park and trips to the athletic club. He glanced back at Cyril's parents, who were more like parents to him than his own family. They sat side by side in the nearest pew.Then he turned back around in time to see Cyril slip the ring on Ellen's finger.
Tasuki grinned. Now that he had withstood the worst that Miss hell-bent- for-leather Brooks could dish out, there wasn't anything or anybody that would force him to return to New York—not ever again.
~~~*~~~
By Amiboshi-chan
Chapter one
The noonday sun beat down on the chapel, and the carriages and wagons surrounded the building. Missy Brooks sighed, longing to be back home at the Circle B ranch house, which despite the heat of the noonday, would be buzzing with life and excitement.
Heaving another sigh, she watched Suboshi run his fingers around the inside of his high, stiffly starched white collar. He swallowed hard, and then gave her a why-am-I-being-tortured-like-this grimace. It was as plain as the nose on his face that he was as uncomfortable in his fancy duds as she was in her maid of honor dress. Still, they had agreed to get all gussied up for this occasion. And when she thought about it, she had to smile. All the fuss and wearing of stiff lace, starched petticoats and pinching corsets was worth it, because Cyril and Ellen were finally getting married.
The doctor and cautioned them to wait until Ellen had fully recovered from her injury last fall. Then Patricia and Donovan O'Bannion, Cyril's parents, had insisted the wedding wait until the winter weather had cleared. They had arrived only a week past, with Cyril's eldest brother Nakago, his cousin Yui and an assortment of relatives in tow. It was hard to believe that after so many obstacles, Ellie and Cyril were finally going to be wed.
The spinster who had played the organ for every wedding in the territory for the last twenty years suddenly changed tempo. The ancient instrument droned and wheezed, announcing that the time was growing short and all should find a seat.
"Are you ready?" A resonant voice rippled over Missy like a warm summer breeze.
When she turned and looked up at Tasuki McCarty, her middle tightened even more. Ranch life had transformed his easy-on-the-eyes appearance into the lean, uncompromising visage of a true cowboy. His rich amber eyes gazed out at her from skin bronzed by more than a year in the territorial sun and wind. He had the determined, never-give-an-inch look of a work- hardened Western man coupled with the elegant, refined manner of an Eastern dude.
'A deadly combination,' Missy thought to herself.
As good looking as he was, she still would have been hard pressed to pick him out of a crowd of ranch hands without a second look, if not for his unique hair, that mixed somewhere between a rich red and the orange of a flame. He fit right into the crowd, had learned to rope and ride with the best of them. When he walked, his body spoke of strength and confidence. He had succeeded in doing what she'd been sure he could not.
At the beginning she'd teased, and needled and picked on him, but as he settled in and learned to handle himself on the ranch, the situation between them had flip-flopped. Instead of becoming accustomed to being around Tasuki over the long months since he'd arrived, she had found herself growing more and more awkward around him.
Tasuki had slowly begun to get the upper hand at their every confrontation. Now he openly teased her with a wicked twinkle in his eye. And every time it happened, she got all tongue-tied and fluttery. Her only defense was her sharp-as-a-buck-knife Brooks tongue, but even that weapon had failed under the heat of that intense gaze.
"Missy?" He asked again. "Are you ready?"
"Ye-yes—I guess so."
"You seem a little jumpy."
"Only like a tom turkey before Thanksgivin'," Missy admitted softly. She tugged at the snug waist of her dress, trying to give herself enough room to take a deep breath. Cyril and Ellen both had said she looked fine in the form-fitting, peacock blue sateen, but with Tasuki's critical gaze skimming over her, Missy now doubted the truth of their words. Damnation. She wished she could've worn chaps and boots. At least then she could be herself and would be able to inhale normally, instead of having to take panting little breaths. Ellen having her as a bridesmaid had been a dunderhead notion. She wasn't a lady, and putting fancy duds on her skinny form wasn't going to change that. It was like putting a candelabra in an outhouse: it didn't change what was on the inside one bit.
A deep, throaty chuckle drew her attention back to Tasuki. He was staring at her, grinning like a fox who had found a way into the henhouse.
"It is customary for the bride to be nervous, not the maid of honor," he advised her in an easy tone. It could have been friendly teasing, or it could have been that he was mocking her. "Interesting though. I didn't think the princess of the Brooks clan ever had a moment of fear about anything! Could it be that you are only human like the rest of us, Missy?" His eyes glittered with the challenge of his words, and he gave her a devilish half smile.
Now there was no doubt. He was poking fun at her- again! And sure as God had made little green apples, he'd keep on doing it until she flew off the handle and said or did something she'd regret. Even so, spouting off at him wasn't a luxury she could allow herself smack-dab in the middle of Ellen's wedding.
'Consarn him, ' she thought sourly. 'I won't ruin this wedding on account of his fool teasing.'
What was it about this Easterner that got under her skin, anyway? She knew enough to walk away from a coiled rattler or a porcupine, so why couldn't she just turn her back on Tasuki? He was prickly as a porcupine, and the way her belly knotted and her pulse was racing, he must be as deadly as any sidewinder—well, deadly to her, anyway! It confounded her how he could just open his mouth and rile her up. It didn't make a lick of sense. All she had to do was use the brains God gave her and ignore the grinning varmint, but somehow it never worked out that way.
"Well, Missy? Are you?" Tasuki leaned a little nearer and gazed at her with his seductive eyes. "Are you -afraid?"
"I'm not afraid of anythin'!" She snapped, then looked around in chagrin, at the heads that turned to stare at them, due to the volume of her reply. "M- my dress is just tight as a narrow cinch, th-that's all." She continued, lowering her voice to a respectable whisper. "And with all these folks squeezed in here, there's barely a breath of air left." She forced herself to ignore the amusement etched in Tasuki's ruggedly handsome face. "So why don't you quit flappin' your jaws so much and usin' up what little air there is left?" She concluded sassily.
He laughed.
Damn him to hell and back. He had the gall to stand there and laugh. And then he raised a long-fingered, roughened hand as if to touch her. The thought sent her belly dropping to her feet like a stone. Mercifully, his fingers stopped just short of touching her cheek.
"Rest easy, little lady." He said smoothly. "If you swoon, I promise to do my best to catch you before you hit the floor in front of all these people."
Her face grew hotter and all the shallow little breaths she was taking seemed to be hanging in the back of her throat. It took all her control to keep from yelling at him, or slapping his face, but she managed to keep her voice low and controlled, and her hands clenched at her sides.
"I appreciate the offer, Tasuki, but you'll never see the day when I can't stand on my own two feet." Her long, unbound hair tickled her back through the silky material of her dress as she emphasized her speech with an emphatic little nod of her head.
This time Tasuki didn't laugh, but she felt his palpable amusement sluice over her in a scalding wave. Her heart beat a tiny bit faster inside the sateen bodice of her dress.
'Damn him! Double damn him!'
He could affect her with just a look, or God forbid, the hint of a casual touch. And then, just as if he had read her tortured thoughts, he reached out and took hold of her elbow with his bare fingertips. A myriad of uncontrollable emotions rippled through her middle when his fingers tightened around her arm. She promised herself that she would not react, but she stiffened in spite of herself.
"Don't make a bigger fuss, Missy. Everyone is watching." His low warning rumbled over her while his gaze slid around the interior of the crowded Catholic mission, the closest house of God they could find.
Missy followed his line of vision. Just as he had said, the tiny building was full to overflowing, and while not everyone was staring at her, more than enough curious eyes were looking her way.
"Come on, Missy, I won't bite you—"he leaned close enough to whisper in her ear, tightening that possessive hold on her arm. "—but I might nibble a bit around the edges." He breath fanned her earlobe. For a moment she was afraid he would nip her flesh.
'Was she afraid that he would—or that he wouldn't?'
"It's time we took our places, Tasuki." She managed to croak. "Stop all this foolishness."
Tasuki grinned widely, then the deftly maneuvered her and the wide ruffles of sateen up through the narrow aisle. Missy marveled that he got them where they needed to be without tripping either one of them.
She shook herself and blinked. Without quite knowing how time was moving so fast and disjointedly, she realized she was now standing opposite Tasuki in front of the slat thin minister with the too-large Adam's apple.
Missy allowed herself one backward glance. Now every person seated in the small chapel was watching her as she stood at the front of the church, twisting her fingers and plucking at the too-tight, unforgiving waist of her dress.
She whirled back around. She felt like a complete moron-- and she blamed Tasuki for it and for making her feel things that confused and befuddled her.
A murmur of restrained voices, like a cooling breeze over dried leaves, moved through the chapel. Missy turned to see what had caused the stir, grateful that something, anything, distracted the group's interest from her. Then she saw Cyril, and all her thoughts were for him alone.
He looked happy, healthy and more handsome than she'd ever imagined. His sandy blonde hair glowed in the flames of the candles on the altar; his face was flushed with excitement.
The organ wheezed and groaned again. Then with a reverberating sound that tickled the bottoms of her feet, the 'Wedding March' began. Missy followed Cyril's gaze to the side door.
Moving with all the grace of an angel fallen to earth, Ellen appeared in her flowing ivory gown, and Missy felt her heart well up with love for her cousin. She shifted the bouquet of wild lavender and oxeye daisies to her empty hand as she smiled at Missy. The gesture made the hot dry lump in Missy's throat grow larger.
"Let us all bow our heads in a moment of prayer . . ." the minister intoned ". . .and ask God's blessing on this young couple as they embark on the road of life."
Tasuki watched Missy's eyes flutter shut. He half listened to the prayer while he continued to observe her from the corner of his eye. Looking at her now, a feminine vision in sateen, it was hard to believe she was the same razor tongued shrew that had pestered him for the last year—except that he had the emotional bruises to prove it. The little vixen had drawn blood, in a manner of speaking, a time or two. She was feisty and headstrong, the exact opposite of the women he'd formerly pursued.
A murmured amen brought Tasuki's head up. He focused on his childhood friend. He doubted he'd ever seen Cyril happier, perhaps aside from the time he'd told Tasuki he was following Ellen westward.
Cyril's leaving and Violet Ashland's fickle heart had been the catalyst for Tasuki to also leave the city and the pointless pursuits he had once thought of as manly.
After Cyril left, Tasuki had surrounded himself with a flock of beautiful ladies, but none had ever held his attention for more than a couple of weeks until he'd met Violet Ashland. The petite blonde had captured his interest the way no other woman had before...
A nervous cough pulled his attention to the russet haired girl standing opposite him. Missy was a wildcat one minute and a siren the next. She could make him madder than any woman he knew, yet in the whole year he'd known her she had never shown any interest in snaring him for his fortune- or any other reason, he thought with a smile.
'Not like Violet.'
He frowned and wondered where that thought had come from. It was probably the magic of the candles and the organ music and the lethargy of the afternoon. A man would have to be made of iron not to be influenced by the romantic promise of the moment. The trappings or matrimony had resurrected memories that had long been buried, reminding him of his own proposal of marriage.
But that had been another man, in another life. Now his days were filled with work and with fending off verbal arrows from Missy Brooks, who could strip the hide off a man with one look. And yet, he thought idly, under all that bluff and bluster, Missy was honest and brave, the kind of woman to cross rivers and climb mountains with.
Tasuki blinked in bemusement at his thoughts, realizing that he was beginning to sound like Chichiri. The idea that he had learned some wisdom from the irascible cowboy was oddly pleasing to him, and he caught himself grinning.
In the same moment he grinned, he and Missy looked at each other by accident. Their gazes caught, and then held. Her dark eyes reflected the candlelight like a deep, shimmering stream in the first rays of morning. Funny that he'd never noticed how wide and luminous her eyes were until now.
"Dearly Beloved . . ." the tall, lanky preacher's baritone voice filled the chapel. "In sight of God and this company . . ."
Tasuki adjusted the shoulders and front of his black coat and tried to focus on the preacher's words. Missy fidgeted once more, and his attention became riveted upon her.
Was she really that nervous?
'Naw.' The answer came quickly into his head. Missy Brooks was a steady a woman as ever walked the earth. But if she wasn't nervous, then why was her softly rounded bosom rising and falling so rapidly inside the sateen bodice?
He frowned at her in speculation. Then as if she felt his attention on her, she looked at him again, with an _expression so poignant, that he experienced an wild impulse to reach out and touch her.
He shook himself and looked back at the preacher, telling himself that he shouldn't give a hoot in hell how she felt. If she was frightened it was poetic justice. She had given him undiluted hell this past year. It would serve her right if she was stewing in her own juices.
No, he didn't care how she felt. He couldn't give a damn about Missy's feelings- or any other woman's, for that matter. Life out here had let him see that a lone wolf survived just as well as one with a mate, and that was what he wanted now- to remain alone. A lone wolf, free, unattached and pleasantly sane. None of this madness called love for him, thank you. He intended to remain a confirmed bachelor, like Chichiri. Chichiri was a man who knew what was what. He had helped Tasuki learn to rope and ride and learn how to laugh at Missy's sharp barbs.
"Cyril Liam O'Bannion . . ."The clergyman's deep voice gained volume. "Do you . . ."
The nearest group of candles flickered. Cyril leaned over and gave Ellen a little peck on the cheek, quite improper when taking his vows, but the kind of thing Tasuki had grown to expect in this half-tamed place. Here men made their own rules to live by. Now that he had become accustomed to it, he liked it.
Missy shifted on her feet and Tasuki glanced at her again. She was smiling. It was an angel's smile, full of love and innocence. Something hot and liquid coursed through his veins while he watched her face.
"Ellen Irene Brooks, do you take . . ."
The image of Violet Ashland flitted unbidden into Tasuki's head, filling his mind with the memories of life with a cold, elegant woman. Then he glanced at Missy. Where Violet had been cold, Missy ran red-hot. "And her hot tongue will sear flesh, as well," he whispered to himself.
He caught himself smiling at the memory of Missy's frequent outbursts and his determination to prove himself. If he was honest with himself, he'd have to admit that he had come to enjoy their verbal sparring. His taste in women had changed, or maybe he had changed in the rowdy environment of the territory. One thing for certain, Tasuki McCarty was not the same man he had been when he'd stepped off the train from New York. Besides, if the time came that he wanted to settle down-- and he wasn't thinking that it would—but if it did, then Missy would be here. He cast a furtive glance at her.
Yep, he could count on Missy Brooks to be constant and unchanging. She would always be Missy and she would always be tied to the Brooks ranch. It was a comforting thought, and one that Tasuki tucked away in the corner of his mind for safekeeping.
"The ring, if you please . . ." The minister's voice snapped Tasuki back to attention. He pulled the ring from the pocket of his brocade vest and gave it to Cyril.
Ellen gave her flowers to Missy and allowed Cyril to claim her hand. Work- roughened fingers held hers within a protective grasp. Tasuki thought of their old lives in New York—the champagne suppers, buggy rides through the park and trips to the athletic club. He glanced back at Cyril's parents, who were more like parents to him than his own family. They sat side by side in the nearest pew.Then he turned back around in time to see Cyril slip the ring on Ellen's finger.
Tasuki grinned. Now that he had withstood the worst that Miss hell-bent- for-leather Brooks could dish out, there wasn't anything or anybody that would force him to return to New York—not ever again.
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