Peggy Moreland – Hard Lovin' Man (страница 2)

“Yeah,” she mumbled, and dropped her gaze to hide the unwanted tears that swelled again.

“So am I.”

Lacey’s head shot up. “What did you say?”

Mandy drew in a shuddery breath. “I’m Lucas’s daughter. I have two younger sisters, Merideth and Sam.”

Lucas had daughters? Then that meant Lacey had half sisters. Numbed by the realization, she stared, speechless.

Mandy seemed at a loss for words, too, because she clasped her hands together and squeezed until her knuckles looked like a string of pearls wrapped around her fists, before she lifted her hands in a helpless shrug. “I—I don’t know what to say to you.”

Lacey clamped her lips together in a frown. “You don’t have to say anything. Like I said, I’m sorry.” She turned away again, but Mandy grabbed her arm, stopping her.

“Please don’t go,” she begged. She glanced toward the house, catching her lower lip between her teeth. “We’ve got this wedding,” she began hesitantly, then turned to Lacey again. “But it shouldn’t last too long, and I really would like to talk to you. We all would.”

Lacey eased from the woman’s grasp, regretting that she’d ever stepped foot on the Double-Cross. “Sorry, but I came to talk to Lucas. Since he’s dead, there’s no reason for me to hang around.”

“But Sam and Merideth will want to meet you.”

Lacey snorted a laugh. “I doubt that.”

Mandy scowled, obviously irritated by Lacey’s sarcasm. “Well, I don’t, and I think I would know their preferences better than you.”

Lacey moved her shoulder in a shrug. “Can’t argue that, since I didn’t even know they existed, or you, either, for that matter, until a couple of minutes ago.”

Mandy lifted her chin defensively. “Well, we didn’t know you existed, either, until you showed up on our doorstep.”

Aware that the conversation was going nowhere fast, Lacey tried to think of a way to end it. “Look,” she said, fighting for patience. “Just pretend I was never here, and that this conversation never took place. Okay?”

“No way.” Pursing her lips, Mandy grabbed Lacey’s hand and dragged her toward the house. “You can’t expect to drop a bomb like that and just drive away, leaving us with a thousand unanswered questions.”

Lacey dug in her boot heels, trying to wrench free, but was surprised to discover that, though the woman appeared delicate, her strength equaled Lacey’s own. “Hey! I said I was sorry. Okay? It was a mistake. I should never have come here.”

“Too late,” Mandy muttered.

“But you’re getting ready for a wedding,” Lacey reminded her, grasping at straws, anything to escape.

“Your cousin Alayna’s wedding. You’ll want to meet her, too.”

Lacey jerked to a stop and succeeded in dragging Mandy to a stop, as well. Half sisters and cousins? She’d never thought about Lucas having a family. He’d been just a name to her, not a real person…and she wanted no part of his family. “My horse is in the trailer,” she said on sudden inspiration. “I can’t leave him there in this heat.”

Mandy gave Lacey’s hand another jerk, hauling her up the steps behind her. “Don’t worry. I’ll have my son Jaime take care of him for you.”

She opened the door and all but shoved Lacey inside ahead of her. “Merideth! Sam!” she called. “Come here. I’ve got someone I want you to meet.”

Lacey stood at the back of the cavernous living room, trying her best to melt into the wall. The room was crowded with members of the McCloud family—all of them strangers to her. Half sisters. Brothers-in-law. Cousins. Nieces and nephews. Before the wedding had started, Mandy had insisted on introducing her to every last one.

She drew in a shaky breath. She still wasn’t sure how Mandy had managed to rope her into staying for the ceremony. She didn’t want to be here. She wanted to be on the road, headed for Missouri, and as far away from the Double-Cross Heart Ranch as she could get.

But she wasn’t. And it didn’t look as if she was going to be able to leave any time soon.

The hair on the back of her neck prickled, and she angled her head slightly to find Merideth staring at her, a slight frown curving her lips. Lacey frowned right back. With a haughty lift of her chin, Merideth turned away, centering her attention on the preacher and the bride and groom who stood in front of the massive fireplace.

To heck with you, Lacey fumed silently, forcing her gaze to the ceremony. She wasn’t here to win any friends. Heck, she didn’t even know why she was here!

Well, she did know, she reflected morosely as the preacher’s voice droned on and on as he read a long passage from the Bible. It was all Mandy’s doing. There had only been enough time for quick introductions before the wedding had started, and Mandy had insisted that Lacey stay until after the ceremony when they would have more time to talk. Lacey had finally agreed, just to get the spotlight off her for a while. Being introduced as Lucas’s illegitimate daughter and having all those people staring at her had been a little disconcerting.

She had to give it to them, though, she thought with a sigh. To their credit, not a one of them had questioned her claim as Lucas’s daughter, and all had treated her civilly.

Other than Merideth, of course.

Lacey glanced Merideth’s way again, frowning at the back of her blond head. It wasn’t that Merideth had been rude exactly. She just kept watching Lacey as if she expected to catch her slipping off with the family silver or something.

Lacey pursed her mouth in irritation and turned her gaze back to the front of the room. Discovering one of her half sisters was a movie star had come as a shock, but hadn’t changed Lacey’s feelings toward Meredith. She didn’t care for Meredith any more than Meredith cared for her, movie star or not. And as soon as this hitching was over, she told herself, she was getting out of here, promise or not. She didn’t owe the McClouds any explanations, and as far as she was concerned, they didn’t owe her any, either.

She heard the front door open behind her and glanced over her shoulder to see who was arriving late. She choked back a laugh when she realized the futility in that gesture. She didn’t know the bride and groom, much less any of their wedding guests. With a shake of her head, she turned her attention back to the ceremony, silently praying that the long-winded preacher would speed things up.

She felt a shoulder bump hers and glanced over to find a man had slipped into the room and was standing beside her. When she got a good look at his face, she did a quick double take, snapping her gaze to the front of the room and the groom, then back to the man at her side, sure that she was hallucinating. The two men could be identical twins—only the groom was wearing a suit, and the man beside her was wearing camouflage pants and a black T-shirt. She smothered a laugh. And she’d been concerned about attending the ceremony dressed in boots and jeans.

The eyes that met hers were a deep chocolate brown, and she couldn’t help but stare. His face obviously hadn’t seen a razor in a couple of days, because the stubbled beginnings of a mustache and beard the same shade of brown as the hair that brushed the neck of his black T-shirt covered his jaw and chin. And his eyes. There was a wildness, a desperation in them that was downright scary.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, and shifted away, putting space between them.

Tearing her gaze from his, Lacey quickly turned her attention back to the ceremony just as the minister said, “If anyone present knows of a reason why this man and this woman should not be joined in holy matrimony, may he speak now or forever hold his peace.”

“I do!” the man beside her growled.

Lacey whipped her head around to stare at him, as did everyone else in the room. As Lacey had, to a person, they did a double take when they got their first look at his face.

“Travis!” the groom exclaimed, a smile beginning to spread over his face. “You came!”

The stranger—Travis, the groom had called him—didn’t return the smile. “And just in the nick of time,” Lacey heard him mutter under his breath as he pushed himself away from the wall. He took a step forward, then stopped, squaring shoulders as broad as those of the man he confronted. “Mike, our foreman, sent me a wire relaying your message. I can’t let you go through with this, Jack.”

The smile that had bloomed on the groom’s face quickly dipped into a scowl. He turned back to the preacher. “Ignore him. Go on with the ceremony.”

Travis took another step forward. “Don’t listen to him, preacher. He’s crazy.”

Lacey watched the groom’s shoulders rise then fall in an obvious search for patience before he turned slowly back around. “There’s nothing wrong with me, Travis. I’m okay now.”

Travis closed the distance between them. “No, you’re not.” He nodded his head toward Alayna, who was staring at him, her eyes wide with shock, her face pale beneath the sheer veil that shadowed her face. “Not if you’re about to get married again. You made one mistake. I can’t stand by and watch you make another.”

“Then leave,” the groom snapped. He turned to face the preacher again. “Finish the job,” he growled.

The preacher gulped, glancing nervously from one man to the other.