Wyoming Wildfire Read online

  LOVE UNDER THE STARS

  “It’s not often that a man gets to take a girl to watch the sky at night.” Burch was speaking almost to himself. “It makes you look at things differently.”

  “How’s that?” she managed to ask without her voice quavering.

  “I can’t say for sure. Sky is sky and I’ve spent more nights in the open than in a proper bed, but when a man has a woman to watch out for, it’s not the same.”

  Sibyl’s heart was pounding so loudly she could hardly hear his words. “I like being here,” she answered. “I can’t understand why, but I feel like I belong.”

  “It’s because you were never meant to be caught in the web of staid Virginia society. You’re just as wild as those cattle down there, and your spirit needs just as much space as they do.”

  His body was next to hers, making it hard for her to think about space, spirits, or anything else. His hands no longer held hers but were traveling hungrily over her body, exploring and setting her skin on fire. She felt helplessly carried away on a raging, uncontrollable torrent of sensation.

  She tried to resist, at least she thought she did, but the heat coursing through her had changed into a desire that matched his. Burch was beyond the power of words, his aching need blotting out everything but his own overwhelming hunger….

  WYOMING

  Wildfire

  Leigh

  Greenwood

  To Fran, Judy, Lee, Sheri, and the CRW.

  Copyright © 1987, 2011 Leigh Greenwood

  WYOMING

  Wildfire

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Burch Randall, in no hurry to reach his destination, allowed Old Blue to canter on a slack rein. The searing heat of the summer sun was mercifully eased by cooler, drier winds that swept down from the hills, but the season had been without rain and the range more closely resembled a desert than the lush grasslands that had drawn the first cattlemen to Wyoming in the late 1860’s. Yet not even the chance of a thunderstorm could keep his mind off the problem that had bedeviled him for weeks. Everyone at the Elkhorn Ranch knew that the new heir arrived today and that Burch was as mad as a wounded grizzly that he would have to share ownership with a twenty-year-old girl from Virginia.

  Grinding his teeth in helpless frustration, Burch unknowingly pulled back on the reins. Old Blue resented the unwarranted check and sidestepped in protest. Burch smothered a curse, relaxed his grip, and allowed his mount to settle into an easy stride once more.

  Old Blue pricked his ears and slipped into a nervous canter as half a dozen antelope burst from a small canyon just ahead. The fleet animals glided across the plain with effortless grace, but just as the horse and rider reached the mouth of the canyon, a lone buck catapulted across their path almost on top of them. Old Blue shied abruptly at the sound of a rifle shot ricocheting down the canyon.

  “You’re too old to be spooked by antelope,” Burch said, pulling him back on the trail just as a second bullet passed through the sleeve of his shirt, painfully grazing his arm. “Damnation!” he ejaculated furiously. Driving his spurs into his horse’s sides, he galloped into the mouth of the canyon, bent on finding out who was fool enough to fire wildly after a fleeing herd. But when he reached the far end he was forced to pull up in disgust; he hadn’t seen anyone and it was next to impossible to find tracks on the dry, stony ground. “Damned fool’s too much of a coward to show his face,” he cursed and turned Old Blue back toward home. Probably some dude from one of the ranches near Laramie, he thought. They occasionally wandered off the beaten path and became a menace until they could be rounded up again. He’d have to bring it up at the stockmen’s fall meeting. It was time to do something when a man couldn’t ride his own range without being shot at.

  A hot stinging reminded him of his wound. He reached around the back of his arm and his fingers came away bloody. It wasn’t much—no need to bother with it until he reached home—but it ruined a perfectly good shirt.

  Nothing else appeared in the broad expanse of the Laramie River basin to command his attention and his thoughts soon returned to their unprofitable musings. His Uncle Wesley hadn’t felt he could leave the ranch away from his only blood kin, but he had anticipated his niece would sell her half or quietly accept her share of the profits, not move out West. “She’ll probably expect to get milk from a steer,” Burch muttered angrily to the uninterested wind and his equally indifferent horse. He could have paid her a good price, even by Eastern standards. The cattle market was booming, and though his ranch couldn’t match some of the company-owned spreads above Cheyenne or in Montana, the Elkhorn was one of the largest privately owned ranches in Wyoming and certainly the best run.

  Ever since he was ten years old, he had worked as hard as any paid hand to earn the position he now held. “You can’t expect a man to do any job you can’t do yourself” had been his uncle’s favorite maxim. So it was a bitter day when the lawyer told him that not only was his cousin not going to sell, she had decided to come out West to run her ranch. The lawyer had listened patiently while Burch turned the air blue with curses, but when his temper cooled he knew he was helpless to prevent the unwanted arrival. Without lifting a finger, she had as much right to live at the Elkhorn as he had after close to twenty years of unremitting labor.

  Damn the woman, he thought, kicking his horse into an easy gallop. If she looks anything like Uncle Wesley’s brother, she has a face like a mottled cow. Not the kind of girl he wanted to marry. That had been the lawyer’s idea, not his. His uncle had urged him to marry right after Aunt Ada’s death, and for a while he stirred up hopes in the bosoms of several beauties all too ready to share his bed and wealth. Unfortunately, they didn’t share his interest in the ranch and the hard work that weathered his handsome features, hardened his muscled body, or produced his wealth. Maybe it was time to settle down, but twenty-eight was still young.

  “Hell,” he swore with conviction, if anything happened to him now, the ranch would go to his cousin. He’d be damned if he’d see a lifetime’s work turned over to some female itching to play at ranching. Most likely she’d run it into the ground in a few years and have to sell out to the first person to make her an offer. Then she’d go back East and boast for the rest of her life of having lived in the wild West. It had been his uncle’s dream to see Wyoming become a state, and Burch was determined to be the owner of the Elkhorn when that day arrived.

  The double yoke of oxen plodded steadily across the open plain through an enveloping silence that was punctuated only by the squeaks of protest from the overloaded wagon as it bumped over the uneven ground. The two women inside could not discern a path through the buffalo and blue grama grass, but the driver, following careful instructions received at the ranch where they had spent the previous night, was confident they would reach their destination well before sunset. He would be glad of it, too, since in all his years on the range he had seldom had a more difficult job.

  A crippled ex-cowpuncher, it was difficult for Ned Wright to find any kind of work, so when he was offered the chance of a permanent position if he would drive two women and their belongings to a ranch north of Laramie, he didn’t hesitate. He congratulated himself on his luck when he got his first look at the pair of them. Both were handsome women, but there was nothing in the territory that could hold a candle to that younger one.

  Less than twelve hours later he was scratching his head and wondering how any girl could look so pretty and soft on the outside and still be tough as shoe leather on the inside. Pretty girls were supposed to give over to a man, not order him about like a drover on roundup. Still, he was well paid for his trouble, and if he decided not to stay, all he would have to listen to on his way back was the jingle of gold coins in his pocket.

  The younger of the two women put her head through the flaps. Thick golden hair falling below her shoulders framed a complexion of creamy smoothness. That rancher said we had to keep a good pace if we were to reach the Elkhorn before nightfall.”

  It was uttered as a simple statement, but Ned bridled, feeling his competence was being questioned. “This is a good pace, miss. We’ve still got four or five more hours of daylight, and that’ll be more than enough, even if we get lost.”

  “We look lost now,” said Sibyl Cameron, surveying the emptiness around her and shading her deep blue eyes with slim fingers. “Can’t you find some shade? My aunt is suffering dr
eadfully from this heat.”

  “There’s no shade to be had for anything but lizards and jackrabbits.”

  “My aunt is neither,” the girl responded dryly.

  No sense of humor either, he thought. “We’re coming up to a river,” he said aloud. “She can rest while I water the oxen.”

  “She doesn’t need rest, she needs shade.”

  “Don’t bother the poor man on my account, dear. You can’t expect him to produce trees where there aren’t any.” The soft voice belonged to Augusta Hauxhurst, a very attractive woman barely ten years older than her niece, yet the difference in dress and character made them seem decades apart. Augusta wore her ash-blond hair in a tight bun and protected her fair complexion with a broad-brimmed straw hat. She looked very much like her niece, with the same generous mouth and delicately chiseled nose, but her blue-gray eyes and serene countenance lacked the vivacity and intensity that characterized Sibyl.

  “There must be trees somewhere. This whole territory can’t be covered in nothing but rocks and grass.”

  “The lawyer did try to warn you,” her aunt ventured timidly.

  “He said the climate was uncomfortable and the rangelands unending. He never said the place was a virtual desert. I can’t see how a camel can survive here, much less thousands of cows.”

  “I feel sure, dear, that if he says cows live here in great numbers, we shall soon discover that they do.”

  “Aunt Augusta,” Sibyl said with a grunt of disgust, “why must you accept everything a man says without question?”

  “They do know more about these things than we women.”

  “I know as much about farms and cows as any man,” her niece asserted. Her eyes flashed in defiance while the sun reflected the myriad shades of gold in her cascading hair.

  “But you’ve never been here before, and it does seem a rather desolate place.”

  Sibyl dared not admit to her aunt that she had already begun to question the wisdom of leaving Virginia. From the safety of her parlor it seemed like such a good idea, but now that she was actually face to face with the yawning wilderness, she wondered if it might not have been more prudent to accept the money and settle for a conventional existence. A mental image of her second cousin utterly routed that thought. Nothing could possibly be worse than being married to Kendrick.

  Sibyl’s beauty, trim figure, and old family had insured her popularity but no acceptable offers of marriage. A moderate fortune, an educated mind, independent ways, and a sharp tongue had kept all but her thick-skinned cousin at a distance. That had all changed, much to her cynical amusement, as soon as it became known she had inherited a prosperous cattle ranch. The latest aspirant to her hand was Moreton Swan of the Moreton Swan & Son Hardware and Farm Supply Company. She didn’t mind hardware—one had to earn a living somehow—but she did mind Moreton Swan. No white-columned mansion on a hill was worth being mauled by that brute.

  “It can’t all be this bad,” she said to her aunt with forced enthusiasm. “If Uncle Wesley loved it so much, there must be something about it we haven’t seen yet.”

  “What?” asked her aunt, willing to be convinced.

  “I don’t know, but it has several advantages over Lexington: No one has ever heard of Moreton Swan and his wandering hands, or his mother and her beady eyes, or his father and his drooling mouth.”

  “Sibyl, you must not talk like that,” her aunt reproved. “I know you don’t like Moreton and his family, but—”

  “I loathe Moreton and everything connected with him,” she stated flatly.

  She’s a spirited filly all right, Ned thought, chuckling silently to himself, but with those looks it would certainly be worth the trouble to tame her. After staying a bachelor for thirty-seven years he wasn’t thinking of trying himself, but he’d give a year’s wages to see what happened when she met a man who could handle her.

  They reached the river. The drought and blistering sun had reduced it to a tepid, slightly alkaline ribbon. Ned unhitched the oxen and the sensible beasts waded in, took a few swallows, and then waited patiently before drinking again. Sibyl climbed down to stretch her stiff legs. “I hope we get some rain before night,” she remarked to her aunt, pointing to a horizon that was beginning to show red in the west. But Augusta wasn’t interested in talking about the weather or exposing her tender skin to the broiling sun, and Sibyl was left to walk in silence. Meanwhile, Ned tested the river bed for a crossing, but the more he walked through the water, the more uneasy he became.

  “They should have had enough to drink by now,” Sibyl said, impatient to resume their journey. “My aunt can’t stand much more. How much farther do we have to go?”

  “No more than fifteen or twenty miles, as best I can figure. We ought to make it in about three or four hours.”

  “Thank goodness. I can’t wait to be through with this interminable journey. I’ve been thinking of a long hot bath for days.”

  Ned couldn’t help staring. He had never seen a bathtub outside Laramie. Cowboys bathed in creeks or water troughs, but he couldn’t imagine the proper Miss Cameron settling for anything like that. “I don’t think we should cross here,” he said, wading farther out into the river. “The bottom is too sandy.”

  “How can it be too sandy when we’ve seen nothing but rocks for the last hundred miles?”

  “It washes down with the spring runoff,” answered Ned, unsure of just where the sand did come from.

  “It does that everywhere, but there’s always a bed of rock underneath. How far is the next ford?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then how do you propose to find out?” she asked crisply.

  “Follow the river until we come to one.”

  “But that could take hours, and my aunt’s nearly exhausted now.”

  “If we get stuck, you’ll have to unload the whole wagon,” Ned warned.

  “I guess we can wait while you take a few of the smaller trunks across.”

  “I can’t, not with this leg,” he said, pointing to the twisted limb that had ended his days in the saddle.

  “Then we’ll cross here,” she decreed. “I’ve crossed hundreds of streams without the least bit of trouble.”

  “But that was in Virginia, dear,” cautioned her aunt. “Maybe you should listen to Mr. Wright.”

  “Not if it means spending the rest of the day following this river. I want to reach the Elkhorn before midnight. If you don’t want to drive the wagon, then I’ll do it.” Sibyl informed him, climbing into the driver’s seat.

  Ned hitched up the team, his final protest receiving short shrift. As he waded toward midstream, the sluggish water barely up to his knees, his ever alert eyes noticed a rider in the distance. It was possible the man knew of a safe crossing, but even as the rider paused, Ned decided not to signal him. You never knew what kind of man you might meet on the range, and he didn’t want to invite trouble. He waded on across.

  The far bank was low enough for the oxen to pull the wagon out and Ned waved Sibyl in. She gathered up the reins and eased the wagon down the bank and into the water. At least she knows something about driving, he thought.

  Sibyl angled upstream into the current until halfway across, then straightened out again. She kept the oxen at their task, never permitting the wagon to stop or the weight to mire them down. Yet she didn’t hurry them or wear them out unnecessarily. She was beginning to feel rather smug when ten feet from shore she felt the ground give way under her wheels. She cracked the whip sharply, but the efforts of the straining beasts could not keep the wagon moving and she did not abuse them. “We’re stuck,” she acknowledged, thoroughly annoyed and somewhat chagrined. “I hope it’s not quicksand.”