Bushedwhacked Groom (12 page)

“Why, you little shit.”

Molly caught just a hint of the outrage gripping Lucky’s
features, then she was hauled up hard
against his lean frame. His mouth slammed down
on hers and his tongue plunged fully inside her
mouth. To her further horror and fascination, his
strong hands gripped her buttocks, pushing her
against something very stiff and tantalizing.

Molly burned from head to toe, but not from embar
rassment. What Lucky’s scorching looks had done to her could not compare to the storm of excitement she
felt with his masterful mouth ravishing hers, his tongue
probing, retreating, then plunging again, his fingers
digging into her bottom, forcing her into his heat, mak
ing her throb inside. She ached for him all over!

Then, as quickly as the kiss had started, he shoved her away, triumph and a darker emotion gleaming in
his eyes. He spoke hoarsely, raggedly. “There, lady, you
got it, now? I like to do it with
girls.
But you’re the last girl this side of Hades I’d ever want to do it with.”

For a moment they just glared at each other. Molly
felt appalled yet equally fascinated, almost hoping he
would grab her and kiss her again. Then both tensed at
the sounds of gasps. Molly turned to see Ma, Pa,
Grandma, Aunt Dumpling and Uncle Billy, all standing
on the back stoop, regarding them in openmouthed
disbelief.

Molly almost shrieked with joy at her good fortune.
Deliberately bursting into tears again, she ran back to
the stoop and thrust herself into her father’s arms. Con
vulsively she cried, “Pa, Lucky grabbed me and kissed
me and shoved his nasty tongue down my throat!”

“He shoved his
what?”
cried Dumpling.

“Yeah, and he pinched my butt, too.”

Clutching Molly close, Cole had gone white with
anger and was shaking a fist at Lucky. “Young man, you’ve got a lot of explaining to do—”

“But, sir, she provoked me.”

“She’s a lady, and that’s no excuse.”

“
Yeah,” added Billy with a fearsome scowl. “Brother,
should I go fetch your shotgun?”

“
0h, yes,” chortled Dumpling, clapping her hands in
glee. “We’ll be having us a wedding afore sundown.”

At the mention of a wedding, Molly turned tri
umphantly, just in time to see Lucky’s jaw drop almost
to the ground.

Chapter Nine

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“Pa, you just gotta make Lucky marry me! You just
gotta!”

Inside the kitchen, Cole Reklaw frowned and
watched his daughter pace about, her features mur
derously set. For long moments now he’d been trying
to reason with Molly, while out in the back yard, his brother Billy stood guarding the “scoundrel” Lucky at
gunpoint.

Damn, but things were in such a lather. Cole badly
needed time to gather his thoughts regarding the wisdom of his daughter’s demanded shotgun wedding to
this drifter, and unfortunately Molly wasn’t cutting him
much slack. Of course Lucky Lamont had insulted his
daughter terribly and deserved to be horsewhipped for
his sins; but for her doting father, that didn’t necessar
ily mean she should rush headlong into marriage with a stranger—whether Fortune was at play here or not.

She sure had that wild Reklaw blood in her, he
thought with a mingling of pride and exasperation.
When Molly set her sights on something, there was no
stopping her. But she had to be made to understand
that this marriage business was a serious matter, and
nothing to be embarked upon on a whim.

When Cole had established the contest, he’d been
well aware that they lived in a small, close-knit community, where he knew all of the young men who might be
suitable candidates to wed his daughter; it had never
occurred to him that she’d take a shine to a vagabond,
even if it did appear that Lucky was from another time
and there might well be something to this destiny business. Jessie seemed convinced it was so; but to be hon
est, he’d never seen a more contentious pair.

Then he smiled, remembering how he and Jessie
had started out on equally rocky footing—and what a
glorious outcome had followed. Nonetheless, some
caution was definitely in order.

“Well, Pa?” Molly prodded.

Cole fought a grimace at the sight of the outrage and
pride gripping her beautiful face. “Molly, honey, your
ma and I just want what’s best for you. This young man
is a stranger. We hardly know him—”

She folded her arms over her bosom. “We know he
grabbed me like I was some whore and insulted my
womanhood. And it’s your duty as my daddy to make things right. That means you either gotta make him
marry me or you gotta shoot him.”

“Defeated by my own code of honor, am I?” Cole
asked wryly.

She nodded adamantly. “Yes, sir. You got no choice
now.”

He moved closer, reaching out to smooth an errant
auburn curl away from her brow. “Molly, girl, you know
you’re the apple of my eye.”

At last she grinned. “Yeah, I know.”

Oh, the little stinker! Fighting a smile, Cole continued sternly, “But your ma and I don’t want to see you
make a huge mistake.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning you haven’t really thought through all the
implications of marriage—’til death do you part and
all that. You regard Lucky as no more than a means to
an end. This is not what I intended when I established
the contest, honey. I was hoping all of you children might use this as an opportunity to grow up and find
the right spouses, mates you could really get to
know—and love for the rest of your lives. I had no idea
things would take this reckless turn, and frankly, I’m
beginning to regret establishing this competition at all.
I know you too well, honey. You don’t really want this
rambler; you just want to win.”

Ire sparkled in her eyes. “Pa, I want him in the worst way.”

Cole chuckled. “You know, I’m almost feeling sorry
for the poor fella.”

“Sorry for him? After he assaulted my—”

Cole held up a hand. “Your pride? Yes, daughter, I think I’ve got your story straight there.”

She tapped her foot. “It wasn’t just my pride he
riled—”

“I know. It was your desire to win against your brothers at all cost.”

For just an instant, Cole thought he detected a
twinge of guilt flickering across her pretty face; then her chin
came up.
“
So what if it was? Great Jumping
Je
hoshaphat
,
Pa
! Just what do you think my no-account
brothers are gonna do to try to beat me out? Hitch up
with anything with titties, that’s what they’ll do.”

Cole whistled. “Mind your language, daughter.”

Undaunted, she went on, “‘Sides, my friend Janey Struthers went out to
Wyoming
as a mail-order bride
without a never-you-mind, hadn’t even met the man
she wed. At least I know the arrogant, infuriating son-
of-a-bitch I’ll be marrying.”

Cole couldn’t help himself; he shook with silent
laughter. “How can I say no when you speak of him
with such eloquence and affection?”

“Pa, are you giving me my way in this or not?” she de
manded with a scowl.

He gave a long sigh. “You’re sure this is what you re
ally want, daughter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Have you ever heard the old adage ‘Be careful what
you wish for’?”

“Yeah.” She grinned. “I may just get it.”

Cole gave a groan. As usual, Molly had an answer to
his every argument. Before speaking with her, he’d ac
tually feared she might be biting off more than she
could chew with this Lucky character, but as the conversation had progressed, he had felt more and more
sympathy toward the object of his daughter’s designs.

Still, he was not about to ride posthaste for the par
son as Molly was insisting. “Very well, then,” he con
ceded. “Mind you, I’m not making any promises, but I
will have a word with your young man. Go tell your un
cle Billy to bring in the prisoner.”

Cole could only shake his head as Molly whooped with glee and went tearing out the back door.

***

How in hell had he gotten himself into this appalling
predicament?

In the yard, Lucky stood glowering by a Douglas fir
while Billy guarded him at gunpoint and regaled him
with tales of shotgun weddings in these parts. In the
background the two dogs and the pregnant cat lis
tened to the oration in apparent fascination.

“Now Tildy Jessup and Owen Tanner, that was a
funny one,” Billy was saying as he puffed away on a ci
gar, holding the shotgun loosely in his other arm. “You
see, Tildy’s pa caught her out in the springhouse cavortin’ with old Owen. Wilbur blasted the miscreant
out of there in a hurry, let me tell you. After the fire
works, poor Owen stood repeatin’ his vows with his
pants still smolderin’ from the buckshot.”

“Yeah, that’s just hilarious,” Lucky snapped.

“Then there was the time the mayor caught the new
preacher kissing Edwina Ann Morton—the two of
them was rolling around in the church baptistery,
would ya believe? Edwina Ann’s a distant cousin of our’n, did you hear tell? Anyhow, after them two was
corralled up, there was nobody to perform the nup
tials—seein’s how the preacher was the bridegroom,
and all—so me and Cole, we had to ride out to Dil
lyville to fetch in the circuit judge. Ain’t that a hoot?”

“You trying to scare me?” Lucky countered nastily.

Billy fixed a fearsome scowl on the younger man.
“Maybe I’m aimin’ to impress on you how lucky you
are, young
Lucky,
to get to marry my pretty niece—”

“Instead of meeting my maker?” Lucky snarled back.

“There are worse fates for a man in this world,” Billy
rejoined piously.

“Well,
excuuuuse
me if I can’t think of one.”

Billy was about to reply when both men tensed at
the sound of loud female hooting coming from within
the house. Seconds later Molly burst out the kitchen
door, looking flushed and breathless. “Pa’s ready to talk
to old Handsome now!” she yelled at her uncle.

Lucky muttered curses.

Billy regarded his niece with veiled humor. “Should I
come along to guard him? He ain’t acted none too
hospitable toward me so far.”

Molly grinned at her uncle. “Naw, I’m sure Pa can handle a greenhorn like him.”

Billy nudged Lucky with his shotgun. “Get on in the
house now, junior. And no trying to hightail it, neither, you hear? I’ll be keeping watch out here in the yard, so
mind your manners.”

Hurling Billy a nasty look, Lucky trooped off toward
the back steps. He was angrier than he’d ever been in
his entire life, but more at himself than Molly. He still
could not believe he’d let this slip of a girl
maneuver him into what now would surely be a
shotgun wedding. How could he have been so stupid?

He’d gotten in his licks, of course, had mortified and
humiliated her with his brazen kiss—a kiss that had
aroused him far too much. Still, ultimately, he had
only himself to blame for letting her break his control
that way.

Surely her pa would understand that, he thought
with desperate hope. After all, a man could only take
so many insults from a female.

The vixen smirked at him as he passed her on the
stoop. He ground his jaw, silently vowing that he would
find a way to wipe that impudent smile off her face if it killed him.

He barreled into the kitchen to see Cole standing at
the side window, hands shoved in his pockets. “Well,
sir? You wanted a word with me?”

Cole turned, smiling. “Seems my daughter is deter
mined to marry you, young man.”

“No way!” scoffed Lucky.

Cole shrugged. “Well, it’s either that or I’ve gotta
shoot you, she tells me.”

Lucky gulped. “What? You’d really shoot me, sir?”

“You want to wait and find out?”

“Goddammit!”

Cole glowered. “Watch your language, young man,
or my wife and mother’ll be dashing in here to clean
out your mouth with lye soap.”

Lucky had to admit
that
was a daunting possibility. With considerable effort, he calmed himself. “Sir, excuse me, but this is ridiculous. A shotgun wedding, my
ass.”

“Didn’t I just warn you about your—”

“Do you think we’re living back at the turn of the century or something?”

“Well, yes.” Cole appeared perplexed.

Lucky uttered a sound of frustration. “I can’t believe
you’re allowing your daughter to deceive and manipu
late you this way. Whatever you folks saw outside was totally staged on her part. Sir, she forced me into it—”

“Forced you to kiss her, eh?”

Miserably Lucky confessed, “She taunted me, called me a pantywaist, said I must like boys—”

“Boys?” Cole’s eyebrows shot up.

Lucky felt a flush creeping up his face. “You know,
sir, she said—uh—that I must only like to do it with
other guys.”

Cole roared with laughter. “Lord have mercy. I knew
I’d raised a spitfire, but now I see I’ve underestimated
my daughter.”

“No shit!” Watching Cole’s features darken with fury, Lucky quickly held up a hand. “No offense, sir, but with
all due respect, that daughter of yours is dangerous.”

“She’s a determined one, all right.”

“And there’s only so much a man can take, before
he—”

“Shows his woman her place?” Cole provided.

Lucky realized he was quickly painting himself into
a corner. “Well, er, yes, sir, I mean, no, sir. That is, she
ain’t my woman, but she did need some showing—”

“And you hated every second of it, right?” Cole
drawled.

Lucky frowned but didn’t answer. Truth to tell, he
had savored every second of the kiss but would
never
admit it.