Fortune's June Bride (Mills & Boon Cherish) (The Fortunes of Texas: Cowboy Country, Book 6) (2 page)

Somehow he’d missed the fact that Aurora McElroy even possessed cleavage. That time at the feed store he was certain she’d been wearing a plaid work shirt that had been big enough to fit her daddy.

He dragged his mind away from cleavages. They were fine in their place. He was even a man who enjoyed his fair share of ’em.

But not when their existence seemed to come out of the same left field as Aurora’s “I need you to marry me” had.

“Seems to me missing one show wouldn’t be the end of Cowboy Country,” he said, keeping his eyes well above her neckline.

“We get paid by the show,” Aurora said. “Maybe it
wouldn’t
be the end of Cowboy Country. But it cuts into the performers’ paychecks, believe me.” She gestured at the script. “Did you look through it?”

He grimaced and dutifully opened the script. Fortunately, it was easy to read. Only a few words per line, running down the center of the page. The action took up more space than the dialogue and attested to what he already knew—that the show involved stagecoaches, racing horses, and a lot of melodrama. “I guess I can manage,” he muttered.

Even a hick rancher could read a few lines of dialogue.

He scanned through the pages, easily grasping the gist. He was to escape Frank’s goons who were holding him captive and race to Aurora’s rescue with the deed to her daddy’s ranch in Rusty’s name, narrowly preventing Frank from forcing her to say “I do” in front of the preacher.

Like Aurora had said. It wasn’t Shakespeare.

It was just a ten-minute show that took place in the middle of the whole dang park since someone, in their brilliance, had recently decided the
Wild West Wedding
stage needed to be relocated there.

People could be eating hot dogs in the Main Street Grill, watching a demonstration over in the smithy or buying hand-dipped candles in Gus’s General Store; they’d catch the wedding.

“It’ll be fun,” Aurora promised.

He snorted softly. “Getting my teeth drilled appeals more than making an ass out of myself in front of Cowboy Country’s paying customers.”

“You’re not going to make an ass of yourself,” she assured dismissively. She reached up and adjusted his tie, then stepped back, her hands tucked behind her back. “You actually look perfect for the part.” She smiled, but her eyes didn’t quite meet his. “Better than Joey, even, but don’t tell him I said so.” She smiled a little impishly. “His ego is a tad delicate.”

“Well, it’s probably dented pretty good now he’s fallen off a horse. Where’d it happen? Here at the park?”

“No, thank goodness.” She rolled her eyes. “Can you imagine the publicity we’d get about it after already having a horse stampede during the soft opening? But from what I heard, he might have sprained his ankle. And I can’t see him resuming Rusty’s role if he’s sporting a modern splint. Don’t worry,” she added quickly, seeming to recognize Galen’s alarm, “the casting department will be able to find someone to replace him. Right now, I’m concerned with getting us through today.”

“Hold on.” He closed the script and tossed it on the picnic table. “I remember something about this taking ten minutes of my time.” The authenticity-consultant business was temporary and only took up part of his day. He might not have been a real fan when the park first opened, but even a man like him could recognize that the park’s success meant success for Horseback Hollow as well.

He hated change, but he loved his hometown more. So he was willing to do his part. And the fact that Moore Entertainment was willing to pump some serious money into the town contributed to that willingness.

Nevertheless, he still had his own ranch to run, and even at the best of times, that was a 24/7 job.

“That’s all I agreed to,” he said. “Once I embarrass myself in the noon show, your—” what had she called it? “—
casting
department better be finding someone else in the two hours before the next show.”

“I’m sure they will,” she soothed. She slipped a tube out of some mysterious pocket hidden in the side of her skirt and ran it quickly over her lower lip, leaving it pinker than it ordinarily was and intriguingly shiny. “In the meantime, we’ve got a crowd to entertain. Okay?”

He dragged his eyes away.

What the hell was wrong with him? A corner of the McElroys’ spread had butted up next to his folks’ property his whole life. He wasn’t all that sure that his little brother Jude hadn’t dated Aurora once upon a time. Before Jude fell for Gabriella Mendoza last year, he’d changed girlfriends more often than Galen changed shirts.

“Yo, yo, yo,” Frank hailed, joining them. He dropped a proprietary arm around Aurora’s shoulders and squeezed. With his free hand, he twirled one side of his fake mustache and leered at her. “Ready to become my wifey, my dear?”

Aurora’s smile thinned a little. She unhooked Frank’s arm from her shoulders and stepped away from him. “Save it for the crowd, Frank.” She sent Galen a smile and marched ahead of them to climb into a buckboard that would carry them down the center of Main Street while the guests were safely held back from the action with ropes carried by security guards dressed as old-time railroad workers.

As he watched, she worked a small headset into her riotous curls and he felt a fresh wave of misgivings. That headset was a microphone. She followed up the headset with a lacy veil held onto her head by a band of white roses.

“Rory likes playing hard to get,” Frank was telling Galen in a man-to-man tone that set Galen’s teeth on edge. “Makes the gettin’ all that much more fun.”

Galen eyed Frank, realizing he wore a tiny microphone, as well. “Am I gonna have to wear one of those?”

“Nah. Your important lines are picked up by the stage mics. Just remember they don’t kill the audio until right before you kiss Lila.” He clapped Galen on the shoulder. “Break a leg,” he said before sauntering ahead to climb up beside Aurora. She had her head tilted back, seeming to be looking up at the sky.

Another young man whom Galen didn’t know handed Frank the reins for the horse’s harness, then moved up to the front to lead the horse around toward a wide gate that he swung open.

Over the loudspeaker, a deep-voiced announcer was telling all comers to hold on to their chaps ’cause they were in for a hog-tying good time down on Main Street.

On cue, Aurora looked back at Galen and gave him an encouraging thumbs-up. Then Frank flicked the reins and the buckboard rattled out of the gate just as adventurous music blasted over the loudspeakers. A moment later, Galen could hear Aurora’s and Frank’s voices as the show began in earnest.

“Good grief,” he muttered, feeling a strong urge to sit on the picnic bench and stick his head between his knees. What the hell had he agreed to do?

But there was no time for second thoughts. Over the speakers, he could hear “Lila” proclaiming her faith in her beloved “Rusty.”

“You’re the new Rusty?” A vaguely familiar-looking skinny guy wearing a ten-gallon hat and a bright, shining sheriff’s star on the chest of his blue shirt got his attention.

“Only for this show,” Galen allowed.

“Come on, then. I’m Sal the Sheriff.” He shoved a bedraggled-looking scroll into Galen’s hand. “That’s the deed you need to wave in Frank’s face before you knock him out and kiss Lila. Try not to drop it like Joey keeps doing when we’re riding down Main Street.”

Galen started, but Sal was already hurrying him to another gate farther along than the one the buckboard had gone through. There were ten horses waiting, eight of them already mounted with riders. Some were dressed like Frank. Some like Sal.

He tucked the deed inside his shirt and swung easily up into the saddle.

But his thoughts were nowhere near so calm.

He should have paid more attention to the end of the script. He’d gotten to the punching Frank part. But he’d clean missed seeing that he got to kiss the fair Lila at the end.

Galen had never gone to school to study acting the way Aurora had. As far as he was concerned, kissing Lila would be as good as kissing
her
.

And even though he was rapidly realizing that wasn’t an entirely unappealing notion, it wasn’t something he necessarily wanted to do in front of an audience!

Chapter Two

A
urora didn’t have to work too hard to look dismayed as she fended off Frank’s advances when he pulled her unwillingly toward the wooden stage at the end of Main Street, where a preacher paced back and forth in front of the old west building facade of a bank, a boardinghouse and a feed store. Frank had been making advances toward her for the past two weeks—ever since he’d joined the cast—and didn’t seem to take the hint that she wasn’t interested.

“I don’t
want
to marry you,” she cried out loudly for the crowd who’d been following them along Main Street as her trials and tribulations were extolled. “I love Rusty. He’d
never
desert me like you claim!”

Frank pulled her close, his leer exaggerated for the audience. “He’s gone off to Dodge City, my dear.” He twirled his mustache for added effect. “He’s never going to come back. Your only hope to save your departed daddy’s land from the
railroad
—”

The crowd booed on cue.

“—is to marry me!” He swept her off her feet, carrying her, kicking and struggling, up the steps and onto the stage. “That’s it, Preacher Man,” he boomed and set her on her feet. “Get us wedded and hurry up about it.”

Behind them, the onlookers sent up a cheer as horse hooves pounded audibly down Main Street, accompanied by the triumphant music swelling over the loudspeakers.

Lila tried to pull away from Frank, but he held her arm fast.

“Dearly beloved,” Preacher Man started off in a quaking voice. “We are gathered—”

“Get on to the vows,” Frank demanded, looking nervously over his shoulder.

Preacher Man gulped. “Do you, sir, take this, ah—”

“Lila,” Frank growled loudly. He pulled out his pistol and waved it, and a sharp
crack!
rent the air
.
Down the facade in front of the feed store, a bag of seed exploded. “Hurry it along, Preacher Man, or the next one goes in you.”

Preacher Man’s eyes widened. “Take
Lila
, to be your wife—” His fast words practically fell on top of each other.

“I do,” Frank yelled, “and she does—”

“Not!” Rusty had vaulted from his horse and stormed up onto the stage, sweeping Lila away from Frank. “She’ll never be your wife, Frank. No more than that land’ll ever be yours.” He pulled the deed from inside his shirt and waved it in the air. “They’re both mine, and I’ll never let either one go!”

“Oh,
Rusty
.” Lila nearly swooned as the audience hooted. Aurora caught the faint grin on Galen’s face before he turned to take on the villain of the piece, and felt a little bit swoonish inside for real.

She’d gotten over her schoolgirl crush on him ages ago, but Galen Fortune Jones was still the kind of man that could make a girl’s heart stutter.

She clasped her hands together over her breast, crying out as Frank aimed his pistol at Rusty’s chest.

But Lila’s white-hatted hero fought off the hand holding the gun and swung his fist into Frank’s chin, knocking him comically right off the stage where he fell ignominiously on his butt in a pile of fake horse poop.

Sal the Sheriff and his men stood over Frank and his goons, whom he and Rusty had already dispatched, looking satisfied at the turn of events.

She waited until the cheers died down slightly. “I
knew
you’d save me, Rusty!”

“I’ll always save you, Lila.” Galen’s voice was deep and loud and definitely heroic as he tossed the “deed” to the sheriff, who caught it handily. “Will you finally be my wife?”

She fanned herself, simpering. “You know I will, Rusty.”

They turned to Preacher Man, who stopped gaping comically at Frank and flipped open his oversize Bible again. “Dearly beloved,” he began again.

“I do,” Lila burst out. “And he does, too!”

The audience laughed and Preacher Man held out his hands as if to say, what could he do? “Then I now pronounce you husband and—”

Galen swept off his hat with one hand and grabbed her around the waist with his other. “Wife,” he finished loudly, then bent her deep over his arm, while she buried her face against his chest.

“Am I s’posed to kiss you for real?” Galen whispered in her ear as the crowd cheered and the music crescendoed from the loudspeakers to its triumphant conclusion.

Something inside Aurora’s tummy fluttered. The way Galen held her, nobody beyond the stage would be able to see that Rusty and Lila weren’t actually locking lips. She shook her cheek against his, though she wished he hadn’t asked. That he would have just gone ahead and done it.

It was as close as she’d ever get to actually kissing the man for real, that was for certain.

Sal the Sheriff and his men pulled Frank from the horse manure and clapped him in chains before leading him and his goons off at rubber gunpoint through the audience.

As they did after every show, the onlookers dispersed quickly, anxious to get to the next attraction. The next cotton candy. The next roller coaster.

She didn’t mind the quick loss of attention.

She was just happy to be part of a show again. Playing Lila in
Wild West Wedding
was a far cry from the acting career she’d once dreamed of having, but for a rancher’s daughter who spent day in and day out helping her father, it was more than she’d thought she’d ever have.

And being held in a close embrace against a seriously handsome cowboy wasn’t anything to sneeze at, either.

Feeling breathless inside, Aurora patted Galen’s shoulders. “You can let me go now,” she whispered. It was safe to break character, because the mics were cued to be killed at Rusty’s last word, “wife.”

“Yeah. Right.” Galen straightened, letting her loose. All around them, people were streaming away from the stage, calling out smart remarks and still clapping.

She beamed at them and tucked her arm through Rusty’s, clinging to him as they and Preacher Man left the stage and strolled in the opposite direction from where Frank had been taken by the sheriff to the jail across the street. As long as any of the cast members were in costume out in the public areas of the park, they remained in character.

Over the loudspeaker, the music had softened to a background melody of “Yellow Rose of Texas.”

When they passed through a gate once more to the backstage area, though, she forced herself to let go of Galen’s arm. “You did a good job,” she said, slipping past him. “Didn’t he make a good Rusty, Harlan?”

“Hell,” Galen said, stopping short. He peered at Preacher Man’s face. “I didn’t even notice that was you, Mayor.”

Harlan Osgood grinned, pulling off his bottle-glass round spectacles and the fake gold caps on his front teeth. “Got myself a helper at the barbershop these days,” he said. “Been having some fun doing this a few times a day.”

“Harlan switches off with Buddy Jepps playing Preacher Man,” Aurora provided. She pulled off the veil and microphone, then the hairpiece she wore over her own pinned-up hair, and saw Galen’s look.

She laughed a little awkwardly, holding up the thick fall of ringlets that perfectly matched her own dark red hair. “My hair is straight as a stick. It would take hours to curl like this. And pretty as this is,” she held out one side of her skirt and gave a quick curtsy, “it’s about as comfortable as a straitjacket. So I’m going to change.” She headed toward the costume trailer, leaving the two men still talking.

The corseted wedding dress wasn’t quite as uncomfortable as she’d made out.

But she had no intention of admitting that she was finding it a tad difficult to breathe normally after being clasped up against Galen.

Being held by Frank was a requirement of the role she was playing.

Being held by Galen Fortune Jones was something entirely different...

She left her veil and microphone out so the production crew could reset them in the buckboard for the next show, then stepped behind the changing screen to peel down the hidden zipper in the side of the old-fashioned-looking dress. She hung it on the hanger and tucked it, as well as her boots, away in the corner of the wardrobe trailer she’d purloined for her own use. Then, changed once more into her own knee-length sundress and cowboy boots so she’d be free to move throughout the park until the next show, she left the trailer again.

Galen was still talking to Harlan, and his dark brown eyes crinkled a little as she approached them.

Her gauzy white tiered dress wasn’t at all confining, but she still felt a constriction in her chest when he looked her way.

It was a little annoying, actually. And embarrassing.

Because if Galen had been at all interested in her
ever
, he’d have had ample opportunity to do something about it. It wasn’t as if they lived on opposite ends of the planet, after all. A corner of her daddy’s ranch bordered his daddy’s, and she’d spent nearly all thirty years of her wholly single life living there.

Which was vaguely depressing, when she really thought about it.

Thirty years old.

She wouldn’t say she’d never been kissed, because she had. She’d even been in love until he’d been stolen away from her. But that time with Anthony Tyson had been years and years ago, back during the days when she’d still had dreams in her eyes about a life that held something more than cows, cows, and more cows.

And certainly more than little ol’ Horseback Hollow.

But life, at least Aurora’s, was about more than dreams. It was about loving her family and hard work and trying to replace a brother who was never coming back.

She added some briskness to her pace. “I’m going to head over to casting and see how they’re coming along on replacing Joey,” she said when she reached the two men. All around them, the performers for the next show,
The Great Main Street Bank Heist
, were beginning to arrive and the backstage area was becoming increasingly noisy.

“I should probably get back into my own stuff first,” Galen said, plucking the shirt.

She nodded. “Thanks again for pinch-hitting on such short notice.”

She still could hardly believe that he had. But then, she still had a hard time believing that he was helping out at Cowboy Country at all, considering that—like a good number of Horseback Hollow residents—at first he hadn’t even been a proponent of the theme park opening.

Tall, dark and swoonworthy he might be. But Galen Fortune Jones had ranching in his roots and ranching in his blood. And he’d never made any secret that he liked their little town just fine the way it was. He didn’t want to see outsiders and fat wallets coming in and gentrifying things.

She, however, had been practically champing at the bit to get her name added to the list of supporters. And as soon as she’d discovered that Moore Entertainment wanted to hire as many local performers as it could for the live entertainment at Cowboy Country, she’d hustled her tush right into line.

Yes,
Wild West Wedding
was as campy as it got. But in the two weeks since they’d opened, the guests had been enjoying it, and so was she.

“If you hold up a sec, I’ll walk with you,” Galen offered, surprising the heck out of her.

She realized she was twisting one toe of her prized Castleton boots into the dirt and made herself stop. “Sure.”

He smiled and strode away toward the trailer, all long legs and brawny shoulders.

“How’s your mama and daddy doing, Aurora? Haven’t seen Walt and Pru in months, it seems.”

Glad for the distraction, she smiled back at Harlan. “Real fine, Harlan. They’re going on a cruise, actually. To Alaska. They leave week after next.”

The mayor-slash-barber beamed at her. “That’s good news. I can’t remember a time when your folks ever went off on a real vacation. Not since—” He broke off and his smile turned a little awkward. “Not in a long time,” he amended. He patted her shoulder like a benevolent old uncle. “Be sure and give ’em my best, will you?”

“I will.” If her daddy hadn’t been bald as a cue ball and her mama hadn’t always cut her own hair, they’d have spent a little time in the Cuttery, the barbershop/salon where Harlan usually spent most of his time when he wasn’t acting as mayor, or playacting as Preacher Man.

Harlan headed off and Galen returned, wearing his own shirt and usual hat. On him, the black hat wasn’t the least bit villainous. It was just authentic.

“You even wore a cowboy hat back in high school, didn’t you?” she said aloud.

“Huh?” His fingertips lightly touched her back as they set off for the closest gate.

Her cheeks felt warm, but it was nothing compared to the shiver spiraling down her spine. “Nothing. Just thinking that Cowboy Country did a good job choosing you to make sure all things cowboy around here are actually believable.”

He grimaced, looking self-conscious. “It’s extra money in the bank,” he muttered. They’d reached the gate and he pulled it open for her, waiting for her to walk through first. “Every smart rancher knows it’s good to set some aside for leaner times.”

She watched him from the corner of her eye. “Your spread’s doing okay, though, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” He stopped outside Gus’s General Store where a selection of leather goods was on display. “My mom would like this,” he said, lifting a leather purse. But when he looked at the price tag, his eyebrows shot up. “Holy Chr—” He bit off the rest. “Even with all the Fortune money she refused to take from her newfound brother, that’s a ridiculous price.” Shaking his head, he dropped the purse back in place and continued down the boardwalk fronting the stores, the heels of his boots ringing out.

“I’ve heard a little about that,” Aurora said, skipping a few times to keep up with his long-legged pace. “Mostly that Jeanne Marie found out she’s twin sisters to British royalty?”

“She’s one of triplets,” he corrected. “Lady Josephine Chesterfield and James Marshall Fortune. Separated when they were babies. Josephine grew up in England. James in Atlanta. Mom here. Their birth mother only gave up the girls.”

She made a face. “I’m sure there’s a reason, but that sounds terrible.”

“She’s dead. It was only ’cause James started looking that they know anything about each other at all.”

“What’s it feel like finding out that you have scads of family across the world that you never even knew existed?”