The Rancher's Daughter
Stories of family and romance beneath the Big Sky!
“Once I get my life in order, I’d like to look you up.
“I mean, if you want me to,” Ash added.
The seconds before Maura nodded were torture. “I’d like that, very much.” Ash’s heart pounded in his chest.
Until he heard the masculine shout.
“Maura!”
An alarm went off.
He should have known better. Known that luck was not currency that could be hoarded and stored up until you really, really needed it—or really wanted it.
And, oh, he’d wanted Maura! Ash had wanted her so much, he had drained his luck, just so he might have a chance with this woman. A chance at life. A chance at happiness.
Clearly, that was impossible now.
Not when the man coming toward them was one of the most powerful men in the county.
And not when he was Maura’s father.
Unless…somehow, he could convince this woman that, while he wasn’t yet the man she believed him to be, he intended to become that man. Or die trying.
The Rancher’s Daughter
JODI O’DONNELL
grew up one of fourteen children in small-town Iowa. As a result, she loves to explore in her writing how family relationships influence who and why we love as we do.
A USA TODAY bestselling author, Jodi has also been a finalist for Romance Writers of America’s RITA>® Award and is a past winner of RWA’s Golden Heart Award. She lives in Iowa with her two dogs, Rio and Leia.
For Carol and Cindy, for keeping me laughing
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter One
“It’s a blowup! Run!”
The shout was like a shotgun blast in Maura Kingsley’s ears. She didn’t even hesitate. Without turning to see who’d issued the order—she knew, anyway, that it was Hal Chatsworth, the boss of her crew of firefighters—Maura took off in a sprint across the pine-studded steppe and away from the forest fire that the national media had recently dubbed the worst in Montana’s history.
Her ax-hoe-hybrid Pulaski clutched in her right hand, she dashed through the bone-dry forest duff, dodging ponderosa pines that were as drought-stressed as Maura had ever seen in her three years with the Forest Service. She was aware of her crewmates, as well as others who’d been on the burnout detail, running toward the good black in the riverbed that Hal had designated a safety zone at the beginning of the shift, should the winds change direction.
There was no predicting when a fire might achieve the critical mass it needed to reinforce itself with its own heat and instantly incinerating flames, creating the vicious vortex called a firestorm. The only way to fight that kind of fire was to get out of its way.
The problem was, Maura realized as a crackling branch fell to earth in front of her, the fire was crowning above their heads, leaping from treetop to treetop at a pace faster than the firefighters were running. Embers rained down on her like the sparks of a firecracker as she picked up her pace.
Good heavens, but it was moving fast. Too fast for her to outrun.
She could feel its heat, like the draft from a blast furnace, on her back. Gasping for breath as she ran, she clutched the pouch on her belt as if it were a talisman. It contained the collapsible fiberglass and aluminum fire shelter that would be her only chance of survival should she truly become overcome by the flames licking at the heels of her lug-soled boots. It was a firefighter’s worst nightmare, getting caught in a burnover, where the white-hot heat of a raging wildfire could reach over 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
Not for the first time in her life Maura prayed for a little height and longer legs as she felt herself falling behind the others. Her goggles obscuring her peripheral vision, she turned her head from side to side, trying to get an idea of what her options might be. To her right was only more sparsely treed forest, to her left the craggy limestone face of a rock mountain. Neither left her much to choose from. In fact, she’d be in ten times worse trouble heading for the mountainside if the flames chose to follow her. A fire moved faster up a slope because the uphill fuels became preheated.