The Wildcatter

The Wildcatter
Peggy Nicholson

Seeking treasure–finding pleasurePenniless wildcatter Miguel Heydt has come seeking his fortune–oil–on Suntop land. But the cranky old owner of the Colorado ranch will tolerate no mineral exploration on his spread, so Miguel hires on with the ranch's haying crew and explores for oil at night.Until a secret contract the rancher proposes is too tempting for Miguel to resist. In exchange for unlimited drilling rights, he's to marry the old man's daughter, Risa, and produce the male heir Ben craves.Miguel woos, wins, beds and then weds Risa–falls in love with her, too. But minutes after the wedding, she finds out what he did and she flees.Eleven years later, Risa and Miguel meet at Suntop once more, and the fire between them is still there.But how can she trust him again? A man who'd marry her for drilling rights…a man who'd trade his own son for an oil well?

“I…”

She made a little moan deep in her throat, but she didn’t pull away. Her lashes shivered; the color swept over her breasts, a dawning of desire.

He fingered one swelling rosebud—leaned to adore it with tongue and mouth, felt her heart thundering against his cradling palm. Ah, marry me, Risa, and we’ll do this every night of our lives! He raised his head to replace his lips with his coaxing fingers. Perhaps it was male instinct that would brook no denial. He would have her surrender. “Say yes!” he demanded, his voice husky with emotion. “Only leap, Risa-Sonrisa, and I will catch you!”

“Truly?” She flattened a hand against his heart. “¿De veras? You really want me?”

More than all the oil in the world. He caught her slender waist and lifted her to kneel astride his lap. “You’re all that I want!”

But that…that was a lie he’d pay for.

Dear Reader,

I still remember the first oil well my geologist father took me out on. It was some place in the Big Thicket country of East Texas.

What a circus of sights and sounds for a six-year-old! The towering rig, the massive machines bellowing and roaring—spinning and rising and falling. The muddy, greasy men performing their dangerous balletic feats up on the drilling platform. The rig lit up at night like a Christmas tree.

The trailer where my dad and others studied the wavering, intricate lines on long scrolls of paper as the drill bit gnawed its way down to black gold—or a dry hole that cost a fortune.

Big, drawling male voices, lots of laughter, the underlying tension and excitement. Back then in my preprinting days I never dreamed that someday I’d want to write about these men. I just knew that, looking up from buckle level, they all seemed like heroes to me.

So here I give you my latest hero, Miguel Heydt, a seeker, a searcher, who comes to Trueheart, Colorado—to Suntop Ranch—looking for treasure.

Thanks for coming along for his ride!

Peggy Nicholson

The Wildcatter

Peggy Nicholson

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

DEDICATION

This book is for the first and last wildcatter

in my life: Erwin Grimes, of Kerrville, Texas—

the man who taught me to dream big; to dare to back my

dreams with action; and to come back smiling…even when

a well comes up dry. Because there’s always the next time,

the next dream, isn’t there? And thanks so much,

Dad, for all your advice and background on this story—

couldn’t have done it without you!

And in memory of Yaffa.

She came; she saw; she conquered. We wept when she left.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN