Millionaire in a Stetson

But the breath eased out of Gabriella’s lungs. Then, just like in the movies, the heart monitor screeched out a solid beep. The line went flat.

Within seconds, two nurses sprinted into the room.

They crowded the bed, firmly elbowing Niki out of the way. She barely remembered to breathe as Gabriella’s hand slipped from hers. Her brain fogged over in a daze.

An eternity seemed to pass, people coming and going, calling instructions to each other. But then, the urgency left their movements. Their voices went calm. Someone gently pulled the sheet over her mother’s face. And a nurse led Niki to a chair in the hallway.

Gabriella was gone. Niki’s beautiful, vivacious, irrepressible, fun-loving mother had died far too soon.

Niki felt a shiver run up her spine, and she had an eerie sensation of being watched. For a split second, Niki believed in ghosts. But then she glanced down the hallway to find a man in a business suit staring hard in her direction. Before she could react, he turned abruptly, banging his way through a set of double doors.

Gabriella’s words flooded back to her. There were secrets in a diary, money in a Swiss bank account and a mysterious them for Niki to worry about.

“Oh, Mom,” she moaned under her breath. “What did you do?”

One

The trouble with living a lie, Niki discovered three months later, wasn’t that you might get caught. It was that, eventually, you wanted it to be true. And that moment came when Sawyer Smith arrived at her half brother’s newly framed ranch house.

Late-afternoon sun rays slanted through the empty window openings, turning the dust flecks to sparkles, and highlighting planes and angles of Sawyer’s striking face. He was neater than most cowboys, clean shaven, hair trimmed short. But his stance was easy, shoulders square, hands wide and capable.

Niki was crouched on the rough plywood floor of the kitchen, power drill in her hand. She was putting holes in the two-by-fours in preparation for running the electrical cables. Her jeans were dirty, the heels of her palms scratched and red. She had sawdust in her hair, and her serviceable, green T-shirt was streaked with sweat.

“I took possession of the Raklin place yesterday.” Sawyer spoke to her half-brother Reed, his deep voice carrying across the open rooms.

Niki watched covertly between the studs of the skeleton walls. Reed was an imposing figure, broad shouldered, heavily muscled, at a height of six-feet four. But Sawyer held his own. He was a little shorter, a little leaner, obviously athletic. And he was cover-model sexy, with the most startling, deep blue eyes she’d ever seen.

“Welcome to Lyndon Valley,” Reed responded, reaching out to shake Sawyer’s hand.

Sawyer’s gaze met Niki’s, and she quickly refocused on her work, embarrassed to be caught checking him out. She revved up the drill and lined up for the next spot that had been marked by the electrician. She eased the bit through the fibrous wood, her arm vibrating all the way to her shoulder.

Up to now, she would have sworn she was only attracted to the urbane, classy type. But, apparently she’d reassessed. At some point, after her life had taken a one-eighty, forcing her to flee Washington, D.C., for the wilds of Colorado cattle country, cowboys must have started to look good.

Not that it mattered. Nobody was going to be remotely interested in her while she looked like this.

When she’d lived in D.C., her hair had been long, wavy blond, always cleanly cut and highlighted to perfection. She’d never left the penthouse without her contacts, perfect makeup, fine jewelry and designer shoes. She preferred cultured entertainment and five-star restaurants. Her mother had taught her that if a man didn’t own a Mercedes or a Jaguar, he might as well ride a bicycle.

But that had been Niki Gerard. Here in Lyndon Valley, she was Nellie Cooper, innocuous half sister of Reed and Caleb Terrell. Her hair was cut short and dyed brown. Her sensible glasses were perched on a sunburned, slightly freckled nose. She hadn’t worn makeup in weeks, and her blue jeans had cost twenty-five dollars down at the Lyndon City Co-op.

Nobody from her old life would ever recognize her. But then that was the point.

“Hey, Nellie,” Reed called from the entry hall, his deep voice booming above the high pitch of her drill.

She released the trigger, and the motor whined to a stop as she glanced up.

“Come meet our new neighbor.”

Niki hauled herself to her feet, conscious of her sweaty, dusty appearance, telling herself that it didn’t matter. She was working on a construction site, not waltzing into the ballroom of the St. Regis. Sawyer seemed to scrutinize her as she approached, and she couldn’t help but wonder what stood out for him. The dirt? The sweat? The glasses? The plain-Jane hair?

“This is my sister,” Reed introduced, motioning her farther forward.

Though they’d met for the first time three months ago, Reed never referred to her as his half sister. Neither did his fraternal twin Caleb. From the moment the DNA tests had come back positive, Niki had been welcomed into the Terrell family with open arms. Her newfound brothers had turned out to be solid, smart, dependable men. And with every day that went by, she regretted her lies to them more and more.

She wiped her hands across the front of her jeans as she stepped her way around a pair of sawhorses and over an air-compressor line. “Hello,” she greeted Sawyer, swallowing the hormonal reaction that grew more intense as she neared.

He gave her a brief nod of acknowledgment. There was some kind of a question lurking deep in his blue eyes, but it quickly disappeared, and his expression smoothed out.

“Sawyer Smith,” he intoned in a pleasantly mellow voice, holding out his hand.

“Nellie Cooper,” she returned, her own voice slightly breathless as his hand closed over hers.

His was warm, strong and commanding, sending pulses of awareness skittering along her nervous system.

“I just bought the Raklin place across the highway,” he told her.

“Welcome,” she managed, wishing the odd sensation would stop, wondering if he could feel it, too.

“You lived here long?” he asked.

“Born and raised,” Reed responded. “From our three times great-grandparents on down.”

Sawyer released Niki’s hand, and she glanced over to Reed in surprise. She knew the ranch had been in the Terrell family for generations, but she hadn’t realized just how long they’d lived in the Lyndon Valley.

“That’s impressive,” Sawyer told him.

“What about you?” Reed asked. “Are you from Colorado?”

“Montana originally.” Sawyer shifted his stance. “Spent a little time in the military after college. I guess I’m coming back to my roots.”

“Good roots to come back to,” said Reed as his cell phone chimed. “Excuse me.” He drew the phone from his pocket and raised it to his ear, listening for a second, a smile growing on his face. “Hey, sweetheart.”

Niki knew it had to be his wife, Katrina.

Though it didn’t seem to happen often, because each of the brothers had other homes out of the state, both Reed and Caleb were on the Lyndon Valley ranch this week.

Reed and his wife, Katrina, spent much of their time in New York City, because Katrina was a professional ballerina. Caleb’s wife, Mandy, had grown up on the neighboring Jacobs spread, but Caleb had spent years in Chicago building Active Equipment, his heavy-equipment manufacturing business. He and Mandy now spent about half their time in Chicago, half in Lyndon Valley.

“Starving,” Reed said into the phone, and he grinned at Niki.

She tried to pretend she didn’t notice Sawyer studying her. She’d attracted her fair share of male attention in D.C., particularly if she was wearing something by Delwanna, and always when she was wearing her black Magnamis heels. But she couldn’t imagine she was anywhere even approaching attractive at the moment. She hoped she didn’t have dirt smeared across her cheek or something equally gauche.

Sawyer’s black jeans were spotless, his boots polished to a shine. He wore a white, Western-cut shirt with black piping and black buttons, and his curved-brim Stetson was worn enough to look natural, but new enough to complement the outfit.

Unable to stop herself, she reached up and casually brushed the back of her hand across each cheek. A breeze rustled through the windows, bringing the scent of wild clover. A diesel engine fell silent outside, and a horse whinnied in the distance, blending with the gurgle of the nearby creek.

Reed pocketed his phone. “Katrina’s on her way with the barbecue fixin’s. My wife,” he explained to Sawyer. “Care to stick around for a burger?”

Sawyer gave an easy nod of acceptance. “Appreciate the offer.” He unbuttoned one of his shirt cuffs. “In the meantime, can I lend a hand?” He rolled up a sleeve, revealing a ropy, muscular forearm.