Fortune Hunter's Hero

Buck didn’t know if he wanted to laugh or curse. If. God, he was learning to hate that word. If the termites hadn’t gotten to the studs in the bathroom wall, just the paneling would have to be replaced. If the sick cow that died that morning in the barn didn’t have mad cow disease, the rest of the herd was probably going to be all right. If the well hadn’t run dry, then the problem might be the pump.

And if the jackass Hilda hired as a foreman had done his damn job and not taken advantage of an old lady instead, Buck thought irritably, then he wouldn’t be bankrupting himself now to put the place back on its feet!

Quit your whining, a voice drawled in his head. It’s not the ranch that’s really bothering you, and you know it. It’s Melissa.

He couldn’t deny it. What a fool he was, he thought bitterly. He’d believed that she loved him enough to follow him to the ends of the earth. Fat chance. She hadn’t loved him—she’d loved a stockbroker who vacationed in Switzerland and Monaco and rubbed shoulders with the rich and powerful in London. She’d wanted nothing to do with the wannabe cowboy in the wilds of Colorado. She’d dropped him like a hot rock.

Forget her, he told himself coldly. She’d shown him who she really was, and he was better off without her. Besides, he had more important things to worry about—like keeping the ranch that had been owned by his family since before the American Civil War.

He couldn’t argue with that. In spite of all the problems he’d run headlong into, he didn’t regret leaving London and moving to the ranch. He loved the place, loved the untamed wildness of the mountains and canyons, the isolation. Not for the first time, he wondered how his great-grandfather had ever found the strength to walk away.

Buck had only been here four short months and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else…except when the pipes rattled and doors stuck and the roof leaked.

How many things could be wrong with one house? he wondered, a reluctant grin tugging at his mouth. After working on it from the moment he’d arrived at the beginning of January, he and David hadn’t made a dent in anything except his bank account. If he was going to restore the ranch to its former glory—and he was determined to do so—he was going to need to win the lottery. Or find the lost gold mine…if it existed.

Grimacing at that word again—if—he sighed. “I’ll check prices on a new generator and see what I can find. You might as well make a parts list for the truck, too.”

“Good,” David grunted. “Brake shoes need to be first on the list. They’re just about shot. Oh, yeah, and fan belts. I don’t think they’ve ever been changed.”

“Make me a list,” Buck said as he turned his attention back to the sink. “I should be finished here in about an hour.”

Taking him at his word, David returned an hour later with a list that turned out to be pages long. Buck spent the rest of the afternoon tracking down parts and prices, and the final results weren’t pretty. And it was only a partial list!

Sitting back in his chair at the massive antique desk that dominated the ranch office, staring at the outrageous sum he’d come up with, Buck found himself once again thinking of the lost gold mine. Maybe finding it really was the only solution. The ranch was turning into a money pit, and he’d hardly even tackled the ranching problems: downed fences, lost cattle, feed to get the animals through dry summers and long winters.

How the hell was he going to do this? he wondered, scowling. What little money Hilda had had at her death had gone for her funeral—the land was all she’d had to leave. He had his own money, of course, but the ranch wasn’t his and his sisters’ yet. Not for a year. He felt sure the four of them would be able to live up to the stipulations of Hilda’s will, but he couldn’t be absolutely certain of that. He’d already invested some of his own money in the place. How much more was he willing to risk?

Lost in thought, his eyes focused inward, he suddenly realized his gaze had fallen on the built-in bookshelves across from his desk that contained a number of books on the history of Colorado and life in the Old West. Several included references to the Broken Arrow and the lost Spanish mine—he knew because every time he got a spare moment, he read everything he could get his hands on about the ranch and its secrets.

Was the mine really out there somewhere, lost in the mountains? he wondered, frowning. Or was it just a rumor, a half truth that, over the centuries, developed into a fantastic story that was too good to be true? He didn’t doubt that there probably was a mine that had been lost in an avalanche—there was too much historical evidence to dispute that—but how much gold had actually been taken from the mine? If it really was as rich as the rumors claimed, surely someone would have found it in the last two hundred years. He’d read reports from the geologists the Wyatts had brought in over the years—they were inconclusive. Was there any supporting evidence to back the rumors? Surely there had to be something….

Pushing to his feet, he strode over to the bookshelves that lined the entire east wall of the office, studying the titles of the books he hadn’t yet read, and pulled out the oldest one. It wasn’t until he dropped into his favorite easy chair to read that he realized that book was actually a journal written by Joshua Wyatt, his great-great-grandfather and the pioneer who first settled the ranch. Seconds later, he was totally lost in one of the most fascinating stories he’d ever read.

Rainey Brewster wasn’t a woman who was prone to nerves. She’d been too many places, seen too many things. As a child, she’d traveled the world with her father, moving with the wind wherever whimsy and fate took them, searching for treasures that had been lost down through the ages. She’d slept in tents and castles, traveled by everything from car to plane to camel, and thanks to the teachings of her father, she recognized a two-legged snake when she saw one.

When her father died six months ago, she’d continued to run the business as he had, and though she missed him terribly, she couldn’t imagine ever doing anything else. There was just something incredibly appealing about looking for buried treasure. Especially when she was hunting for one of those rare finds that the rest of the world had long since given up hope of finding.

The lost Spanish mine on the Broken Arrow Ranch was just that kind of treasure. And she was almost positive she knew where it was.

Approaching the front door of the Wyatt-family homestead, she smiled at that familiar tingling feeling she always got when she was closing in on a treasure. It seemed as if she’d been waiting for this day forever. During the last five years of her father’s life, the two of them had, whenever they were in Spain, spent all their spare time researching the mine, checking state and private libraries all over the country, looking for any references to it, regardless of how small. It wasn’t until three months after her father died that she stumbled across what the two of them had always dreamed of finding: irrefutable proof not only of the mine’s existence, but of its location. Now all she had to do was convince the new owner of the Broken Arrow Ranch that she could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams.

Knocking sharply on the scarred wooden door that appeared to be original to the house, she assured herself that convincing Buck Wyatt to work with her was going to be a piece of cake. After all, he was British, educated, and according to the gossip she’d picked up in town, quickly running out of money. He’d already had a fortune in property fall in his lap. Surely he wouldn’t turn his back on the gold mine sitting in the middle of it.

Determined to make him see reason, she squared her shoulders and once again lifted her hand to knock, but a split second later, the door was jerked open and suddenly, she forgot to breathe.

She’d done exhaustive research on not only the mine, but the Wyatt family, as well, and there was no question that the man who stood before her was a Wyatt. The Willow Bend library had worlds of data on the local ranchers, including pictures of the Wyatt family all the way back to the 1800s, and Buck had the same sharp eyes, the same rugged face and tall, rangy build as every Wyatt man who’d owned the ranch for the last hundred years. He might have been born and raised in England, but he had rancher written all over him.

“Do I have a fly on my nose?”

Jerked out of her musings, she blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“As well you should,” he retorted, amused. “You’re staring at me like I have a bloody fly on my nose.”

Mortified, she could do nothing to stop the hot color that bloomed in her cheeks. “I’m sorry. Really. I don’t know what I was thinking.” Abruptly sticking out her hand, she forced a smile. “You must be Buck Wyatt. I’m Rainey Brewster. I was wondering if we might talk.”

He did not, as she’d expected, take her hand. Instead, he studied her with midnight-blue eyes full of suspicion. “Obviously, you didn’t stumble up my driveway by mistake, and you’re not part of the welcoming committee. They were here four months ago, and you weren’t with them—I would have remembered. So why are you here, Ms. Brewster? What do you want?” His accent had turned clipped and very British, and for the life of her, Rainey didn’t know what she had done to earn his suspicion. “I’m sorry,” she said quickly, dropping her hand. “I should have called first, but what I have to say to you isn’t something you discuss on the phone. If you have the time, I’d like to talk to you about the lost Spanish gold mine on your property.”

“Really?” he retorted dryly. “And what business is that of yours?”

“I’d prefer not to discuss it on the doorstep…if you don’t mind.”

For all of ten seconds, Buck seriously considered shutting the door in her face. He didn’t know who she was or what she wanted, but he had no intention of discussing the mine or anything else that belonged to him with a stranger…even if she was the cutest woman he’d met in a long time. If she thought she could use her looks and that sweet, dimpled smile to talk him around, she was in for a rude awakening. He wasn’t so easily taken in.

“Actually, I do mind,” he retorted. “I don’t invite just anyone into my home. State your business, Ms. Brewster, and be quick about it. I’m busy.”

He was being a hard-ass and wouldn’t have blamed her if she’d called him a jerk and walked away. But the lady was tougher than that. When her chin shot up and her blue eyes glinted with irritation, he found himself impressed. She was a gutsy little thing.

“My business, Mr. Wyatt, is the mine. I’m a treasure hunter and would like the opportunity to discuss the mine’s location with you.”

Disappointed—God, another treasure hunter out to con him!—he groaned, “Not another one! Do you know how many people like you have knocked on my door over the last four months, Ms. Brewster? The family’s been looking for the mine for well over a hundred years. My office is full of yearly reports from geologists and archaeologists and even Indian shamans who swear they know where it is, and there’s no sign of gold anywhere. What could you possibly know about the mine’s location that all of the experts missed?”

“More than you obviously think,” she retorted. “The reason they haven’t been able to locate the mine is because they’re looking in the wrong place!”

Far from impressed, Buck laughed. “You know, for a moment, I actually thought you were serious. Nice try, love. Now that you’ve had your little joke, I suggest you leave. I’ve got work to do.”

“Wait!” she cried when he started to shut the door in her face. “I’m serious!”

“Mmm, hmm,” he said as he continued to shut the door. “You probably know where the Holy Grail is, too.”

“Don’t be an ass,” she retorted. “I’m trying to help you! If you’d just listen—”

“To what? Another half-baked story about where the mine is? I’ve heard them all. Did you have a dream or what? One lady told me an angel appeared to her and told her. Then there was the drifter who claimed he heard it on the wind. Wow. So, tell me…why should I believe you? Oh, wait, I’ll bet I know. You’re psychic! You looked in your crystal ball, and there was the mine, right there in front of your eyes.”

Heat burned her cheeks, but to her credit, she stood her ground. “You’ll apologize to me in the future for that, Mr. Wyatt—”

“I don’t think so, Ms. Brewster. But then again, I’m not psychic.”

“Obviously not,” she said, her blue eyes glinting with triumph, “or you would know that I’m not, either. I discovered the whereabouts of the mine in some private papers in Spain.”

Far from impressed, he just looked at her. “Really? And you expect me to believe that even though people have been looking for the mine for centuries, you found papers that no one else even knew existed?”

Rainey couldn’t blame him for his skepticism. Her claim did sound outrageous. “If you’ll just take a look at what I have, you won’t regret it,” she assured him. “All I need is ten minutes.”

For a moment, she thought she had him. He hesitated, studying her consideringly. Then his jaw tightened. “I don’t know what you found in Spain, Ms. Brewster, or what you paid someone to create false documents, but you wasted your money. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do—”

Lightning quick, she stuck her foot in the door. When he gave her an arch look, she merely held out her card. “When you change your mind, call me. I’ll be in town for another week.”

Making no effort to take her card, he just looked at her. “I have no intention of changing my mind.”