McFarlane's Perfect Bride / Taming the Montana Millionaire: McFarlane's Perfect Bride

In a wide, rolling pasture dotted with wildflowers, they spread a couple of blankets. Melanie and Tori put out the food. They ate as the hobbled horses cropped the grass nearby.

The kids were finished with lunch in no time. They wandered off to explore, CJ and Jerilyn side by side, Ryan happily trailing along behind.

The grown-ups chatted about casual stuff. Melanie said she and Russ were turning a nice profit with the guest ranch. Russ talked about buying more land. Connor dared to kid him that if he didn’t watch out, he’d become a land baron. Russ laughed and said maybe he would. His easy response pleased Connor. He was making progress healing the early breach with his cowboy brother-in-law.

Tori mentioned some Outward Bound–type program, ROOTS, that a local woman, Haley Anderson, was trying to start up in a storefront in town. Melanie said she was so happy for Haley, to have found the right place for ROOTS at last.

And then Melanie wanted to know if Tori had met Erin Castro, who was new in town and apparently going around asking questions about the Cateses, the Cliftons and the Traubs.

Tori frowned. “No. I haven’t met her.”

Russ said, “Grant told me that woman started in on him at the Hitching Post. She had a thousand and one questions.”

Connor remembered the blonde woman he’d spoken to at the bar at DJ’s. “I met her at the summer kickoff barbecue. She introduced herself.” He described their brief conversation.

Russ grunted. “She’s up to something …”

“But what?” Melanie wondered aloud.

Russ added, “Grant said she has this tattered yellowed newspaper clipping, a picture of some old-time gathering of—”

“Let me guess.” Connor predicted, “The Cateses, the Cliftons and the Traubs.”

“You got it.”

“Maybe she’s writing a tell-all,” Tori suggested lightly. “The secrets of Thunder Canyon, Montana, revealed.”

“She better watch herself,” Russ muttered darkly. “Folks around here don’t like strangers poking in their private business.”

And the conversation moved on.

Connor didn’t say much to Tori. She returned the favor. He didn’t think his sister or her husband even noticed that they kept their distance from each other and avoided eye contact.

He couldn’t help glancing Tori’s way, though, when he thought no one was looking. She was so pretty, strawberry-blond hair shining in the sun, her skin like cream. There was something about her, even beyond her fresh good looks, something that drew him. He couldn’t explain it, and he certainly didn’t understand it. It just was, like the blue sky above, the wide, rolling pasture below.

And it’s going nowhere, so get over it,the voice of wisdom within advised.

The kids wandered in and out of their view, sometimes disappearing into a small stand of pines on a ridge to the northeast, sometimes coming near, but then turning to head off in a different direction before they got too close to the adults. Their laughter and chatter rang out across the rolling field.

Once, when they were all three in sight, near a weathered fence that separated the pasture from the next one over, Melanie got up. “Time to talk a little business.” She set off toward the three by the fence.

“Business?” Tori glanced at Connor—and then apparently caught herself actually looking at him. Her gaze slid away.

Russ, stretched out on his back, with his hat over his eyes, said lazily, “Connor’s decided it’s not a bad idea if CJ does a little honest work this summer.”

Tori sent Connor another swift glance. What? She was surprised that he’d taken her advice.

He gave a curt nod and looked away.

Russ, still with his hat over his eyes, continued, “He and Red agreed that she should make the offer.” According to Melanie, Russ had always called her Red. Even back when she didn’t like it in the least. Now, though, it was his pet name for her.

Melanie had reached the three teenagers. Connor— and Tori, too, he noticed out of the corner of his eye—watched as the scene played out. Melanie spoke.

CJ instantly started shaking his head, backing away. It looked like a no-go.

But then Jerilyn said something. Melanie nodded and offered her hand. The girl took it.

And then CJ spoke up again. Melanie turned to him and said something. He nodded. And Melanie shook his hand.

Ryan shot a fist in the air and they heard him exclaim, “Yes!”

Russ lifted his hat enough to glance toward the scene by the old fence. “Mission accomplished, if you ask me.”

“Looks that way,” Connor agreed. “Your wife is amazing.”

“She certainly is.” Russ spoke with deep satisfaction. Then he put his hat back over his eyes and let his head drop to the blanket again.

Melanie returned to them. Connor thought she looked sort of bemused. “CJ starts tomorrow,” she told him. “Nine to one, Monday through Thursday. I guess we’ll have to take turns driving him out here—Jerilyn, too.”

“Either Gerda or I will do it, no problem.” Connor would slip his housekeeper a little extra for the inconvenience. “So you’ve got two new employees, then?”

“Oh, yes, I do. CJ turned me down flat. But then Jerilyn spoke up and said how she’d love to work at the Hopping H. So I offered her the job.”

Connor could guess the rest. “And then CJ suddenly changed his mind.”

“And it’s great. I can put them both to work, and Ryan will love having them around.” She added, sounding bemused again, “I really do like that girl.”

Connor almost turned to share a glance with Tori, to give her a nod of acknowledgment, since what had just happened was all at her urging. But then he remembered that he and Tori were finished sharing glances.

They were finished, period.

As the day went by, Tori became only more certain that there really was no hope for her and Connor. The picnic at the ranch was just one of those final obligations they both felt duty-bound to fulfill.

By Sunday evening, when Connor pulled the SUV to a stop in front of her house, she was beyond positive. It was done between them, finished. All without ever really getting started.

She tried to remind herself yet again that it was for the best. But somehow it didn’t feel that way in the least.

CJ and Jerilyn jumped out first, but only to load Jerilyn’s bike in the back. They would take it to her house when they dropped her off.

That left Tori and Connor momentarily alone.

She said, each word falsely bright, “Well, thank you. It was a beautiful day.”

“Yeah,” he replied without looking at her. “Great weather.”

“I’ll be seeing you, then.” She leaned on the door.

He turned as the door swung wide and he looked at her. A look that burned her right down to the core. She had the impossible, overwhelming urge to leap across the console and kiss him so hard.