In His Eyes: Blemished Brides Book 1 Read online

  In His Eyes

  Blemished Brides Book 1

  Peggy L Henderson

  Contents

  Copyright

  Introduction

  1. Chapter One

  2. Chapter Two

  3. Chapter Three

  4. Chapter Four

  5. Chapter Five

  6. Chapter Six

  7. Chapter Seven

  8. Chapter Eight

  9. Chapter Nine

  10. Chapter Ten

  11. Chapter Eleven

  12. Chapter Twelve

  13. Chapter Thirteen

  14. Chapter Fourteen

  15. Chapter Fifteen

  16. Chapter SIxteen

  17. Chapter Seventeen

  18. Chapter Eighteen

  19. Chapter Nineteen

  20. Chapter Twenty

  21. Epilogue

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author.

  Copyright © 2015 by Peggy Henderson

  All rights reserved

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  Titles Currently Available in the Blemished Brides Series

  In His Eyes

  In His Touch

  In His Arms

  In His Kiss (coming soon)

  Introduction

  Carefree and strong-willed, Katherine Montgomery is the daughter of a successful Montana horse rancher. When a tragic accident claims her father’s life, Katherine is left to deal with an overbearing mother whose agenda does not include a young daughter. Fate deals her another devastating blow, leaving her to face an uncertain future far away from everything and everyone she’s loved.

  Trace Hawley used to push the limits of the law, and no one was going to plan his future for him. The death of the man who always had his back leaves him to finally face responsibility. The promises he made a decade ago have shaped him into the man he is today, and will bring him face to face with the one girl from his past he always tried to avoid.

  After a ten year absence, Katherine returns to the ranch she once loved to discover the shocking reason her mother summoned her home. Surprised to find Trace still at the ranch, her childhood infatuation grows into something far stronger as he challenges her to lead the life she once wanted, but seems to have forgotten. When Katherine is forced to make a choice between saving her father’s dreams or following her own, Trace might be the only one who holds the key to both.

  Chapter One

  Deer Lodge, Montana Territory 1886

  Trace Hawley pulled his hat from his head. He paced the boardwalk in front of the telegraph and post office. Running a hand through his hair, he peered through the window at the clock that hung on the wall behind the counter. He frowned. The stage was late.

  Harley Wilson, the post master, glanced up from behind his thick spectacles. He stood, and walked around the counter, then opened the door and stepped outside.

  The balding man shot Trace an indulgent smile, and pulled a watch from his waistcoat pocket. He flipped it open and nodded. “I’d say another twenty minutes. Stage is never on time.”

  Trace scoffed. He should have figured coming into town would eat up his entire day. Why the hell had he allowed his sister, Sally, to talk him into the trip in the first place? Their boss, Chantal Sinclair, had a personal servant who could have driven into town, but the man had apparently become ill today, according to Sally.

  More like hung over.

  Trace shook his head. That woman could drive any man to drink. Annoyance shot through him and he gnashed his teeth. He should be grateful that the overbearing female hadn’t insisted that she come along.

  Why the hell were his nerves on edge about being here to meet the stage? Neither Chantal Sinclair’s demands, nor Sally’s pestering, had ever bothered him before.

  You wanted to be the one to meet the stage.

  Yeah, he’d wanted to come, out of curiosity. He could have easily told Mrs. Sinclair to send someone else, that he was too busy. As foreman of the Red Cliff Ranch, he could have delegated the job to one of the hired hands.

  Harley cocked his head at Trace. “Must be something mighty important coming in on that stage to make you wear a path clean through these here floor boards. You waitin’ on a letter from them high-falutin’ horse breeders from back east?”

  “I ain’t expecting anything from Kentucky,” Trace said when Harley looked at him with raised brows.

  “You still got plans to go to that fancy horse race they put on out there?” Harley asked, and twirled the curly end of his mustache between his thumb and index finger.

  “If all goes the way I hope, I plan to be there in three years,” Trace said, and a smile passed over his lips. He didn’t conceal the confidence in his voice. He would be in Kentucky with a colt he’d bred, and show those blue bloods that a horse didn’t have to be foaled in the east to run with the best of them.

  “Well, I wish you luck, son.” Harley slapped him on the back. “Wouldn’t that be something, to have a homegrown colt beat them fancy thoroughbreds they’ve got.”

  Trace’s lips widened. “Yeah, Harley, it sure would be something.”

  His smile faded, and he glanced at the dust on his worn boots. John Montgomery would have been proud, and so would his own father. Breeding a Derby winner was one promise he’d made to John that he planned to keep, even if he’d only been a wet-nosed kid at the time and had made that vow out of arrogance.

  Maybe if he made good on that promise, the fine citizens of Deer Lodge would look at him differently, rather than whisper behind his back. As if he didn’t notice. But, as far as that other promise was concerned . . .

  “Stage is comin’,” a young boy shouted excitedly at the top of his lungs. He came running up the dusty street, nearly tripping as he looked over his shoulder. He continued to peer backward, as if to make sure that what he was yelling was actually true.

  Trace glanced toward the swirl of dust in the distance. His heart beat faster all of a sudden and he shook off the strange sensation of anticipation flooding through him. People started to gather along the boardwalks that lined the shops. The arrival of the stagecoach every other week, bringing news from the states, was an eagerly awaited event.

  Trace stepped back, allowing people to gather around him in front of the depot. He didn’t need to be first in line. He’d wait his turn to retrieve what he’d been sent into Deer Lodge to fetch.

  Amidst the jingle and creaking of harness leather, and loud curses from the driver, the Wells Fargo concord coach came to a halt in a cloud of dust. The horses pulling the stage heaved in their traces, lathered and sweaty, their nostrils flaring with each breath. Harley shook his head and removed his spectacles, then wiped at his eyes with a white handkerchief.

  “Always the same with those drivers. Cussin’ and putting on a show. No respect at all for decent folks. Women and children don’t need to be hearing such language.”

  “Deer Lodge, Montana Territory, folks,” the driver shouted, and hopped from the jockey box. He spat tobacco juice on the ground, and opened the door to the coach. Trace raked his fingers through his hair. He gripped the brim of his Stetson, and held his breath.

  An older gentleman in a gray suit emerged first, gave the driver a disapproving look, then slapped at his dusty hat before putting it back on his head. He turned and reached into the rig. A woman accepted his hand and carefully stepped out of the coach. She nodded at the man, who tipped his hat, then stepped to the back of the stage to retrieve one of the leather bags the driver’s assistant had tossed carelessly onto the dusty street.

  The woman wore a dark blue, nearly black, high-collared dress, with laces at the neck and at the ends of her long sleeves. Her hat bobbed precariously on top of her head and looked as if her pins had come loose from her upswept dark hair. She dabbed at her face with a lacy white handkerchief. Trace took a step forward, and he shook his head slightly. This wasn’t her.

  She turned back to the coach, and reached her lace-gloved hand inside, just as the man had done to assist her. Her lips moved, obviously speaking to someone still inside the stage.

  A moment later, the silhouette of another woman emerged from within the darkness of the coach. She had a firm grip on the older woman’s hand and inched her free hand along the door of the rig for assistance.

  Trace stared, moving to the side when someone stepped in front of him and blocked his view. The young woman stumbled slightly, stepping down from the coach, and Trace reflexively lurched forward. It was a ridiculous move. He was too far away to catch her if she fell.

  The older woman gripped her tightly by the arm and guided her fully from the coach. The younger one nodded at her and smiled, then straightened when she stood on firm ground. Soft curls of golden hair framed her face, the rest swept up and under a stylish hat. The skirts of her gray and white-striped traveling gown swished around her legs.

  Trace swallowed past the lump in his throat. Katherine Montgomery. Katie, as her father used to call h
er. It had been, what? Ten years since he’d last seen her? She’d been no more than a little girl then, but Trace would recognize her anywhere. Through the photographs her mother displayed in the study at the ranch house, he’d watched her grow from a pesky freckle-faced girl into a lovely young woman.

  Trace had stolen glances at those photos more often than he cared to admit, and had wondered more than once at the haunted sadness that her brilliant smile couldn’t disguise in those pictures. In every one of the photographs, he’d detected an emptiness in her eyes, which used to sparkle with life and mischief whenever she and his sister tormented him relentlessly all those years ago.

  He studied her as the other woman led her away from the coach. Wisps of her blond hair shone like a sorrel’s coat in the summer sun. The girl he remembered growing up, who had always reminded him of a yearling filly with legs much too long and gangly, had definitely matured into a beautiful woman.

  He wiped a hand across his jaw. Would she still remember him? He chuckled at the memory of their last encounter.

  “Sally and I saw you sparkin’ with Mathilda Comfrey behind the mercantile last week, Trace Hawley. I’m gonna tell your papa on you.”

  “Get home before I let your mama know that you’re running around barefoot in the barns again, Katie. Or tell your pa that you’ve been sneaking into the breeding shed when Goldfinder was put to a mare the other day.”

  “Papa doesn’t care if I watch. He wants me to learn everything I can so that someday I can run the ranch myself.”

  “Trace.”

  Harley nudged him in the side and the memory dissolved. Trace glanced at the postmaster, who held a large leather mailbag in his arms. He nodded with his chin toward the stage.

  “Those women are asking if there’s someone from the Red Cliff Ranch here to meet them. Is that what you came for?”

  Trace shot a hasty look at the women. The older one’s lips were drawn in an annoyed tight line. Katie . . . Katherine, looked in his direction while holding on firmly to the woman’s arm standing next to her. Trace held her gaze. There was no recognition in her eyes, or any other emotion for that matter.

  “Yeah, I’m here to fetch Miss Montgomery home,” he said absently and stepped off the boardwalk toward the women. He ignored the sharp, surprised intake of breath from the postmaster. It would be common knowledge in town and throughout the entire county by day’s end that the late John Montgomery’s daughter, heiress to one of the largest horse breeding and racing establishments in all of Montana Territory, had returned home after a ten-year absence.

  Chapter Two

  “Katherine Montgomery?”

  Trace stopped in front of the women, directing his question at Katie. Not that he needed to ask her who she was. She hadn’t appeared to notice his approach, so his question was merely to get her attention. Her traveling companion shot him a high-browed look, and quickly stepped in front of her charge.

  “I’m Wilma Rodgers,” the woman said, her tight-lipped glance sweeping over him from top to bottom as if she was appraising a horse at auction. “Miss Montgomery’s guardian and chaperone.” Her eyes gleamed, letting Trace know in no uncertain terms that she meant business. It wouldn’t surprise him if she pulled a gun on him. “Are you from the Red Cliff Ranch?”

  The corners of Trace’s lips twitched and he nodded. “Yes, ma’am. I’m here at the request of Chantal Sinclair, Miss Montgomery’s mother. She’s waiting anxiously back at the ranch to welcome her daughter home.”

  Trace questioned the truth of his words. If Chantal were eager to see Katie, why hadn’t she come to town herself? The woman hadn’t traveled east to visit her daughter in more than two years, something he’d always thought was odd. Just as curious was the fact that Katie hadn’t come home since the day she’d left ten years ago to attend some fancy girl’s school in New York. From what little he remembered, the two hadn’t ever shared a close mother-daughter bond.

  Katie had always been her father’s little girl. John Montgomery had doted on her, spoiled her, and indulged her by letting her run through the barns as if she were one of the stable hands. She and her best friend, his sister, Sally, would spend hours in the horse barns, which had annoyed Trace to no end. The more he’d tried to ignore the girls, the more Katie seemed to enjoy finding new ways to taunt and torment him during those years. The few times she’d been dolled up in a dress, no doubt at her mother’s insistence, she’d looked downright uncomfortable.

  Everything had changed when Katie’s father had died suddenly after his horse had stumbled and fallen on top of him. Trace clenched his jaw at the memory. He glanced at Katie. Everyone’s lives had been affected that day. Katie had loved the horses, and loved the ranch, just like her father. After his death, however, she’d stopped coming to the barns, something he’d always suspected had been her mother’s doing.

  Sally had often complained to him that Chantal refused to let her visit with Katie, and the two girls had to resort to meeting secretly. Sally would tell him how sad and withdrawn Katie had become, but Trace hadn’t paid much attention to his sister’s laments. To his way of thinking, at the time, good riddance that she wasn’t underfoot any longer.

  Not six months after John had been laid to rest, Chantal remarried, and soon after that, Katie had been shipped off to school in New York. It had happened so abruptly, that Sally hadn’t even been able to tell her friend goodbye.

  “Our luggage is over there.”

  Wilma Rodgers’ sharp words cut into Trace’s thoughts. She pointed to a stack of trunks and bags the stagecoach driver had piled haphazardly by the boardwalk. “If you could get everything loaded, we’d like to get to the ranch. Miss Montgomery has had a long journey and needs to rest.”

  Trace stared at the woman. He forced his mouth to remain shut and mentally counted to ten, or he might tell Wilma Rodgers what she could do with her luggage. Dealing with Chantal Sinclair over the years had taught him more about self-control than the stern warnings he’d received from his father, whenever he’d gotten into trouble as a kid.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Trace drawled. His eyes narrowed on the woman.

  He stepped to the side, casting a quick glance at Katie. What had happened to the spunky girl he remembered? She just stood there, silently, staring at the ground and looking as if she might wilt at any moment.

  “Welcome home, Katie,” Trace said.

  He touched his fingers to his hat and nodded at her. Her head snapped up and she looked his way for a split second. The sun cast a shadow over the brim of her hat, concealing her eyes. They’d be blue, like the summer sky.

  Trace cursed silently. Now why would he remember such a detail? Katie’s lips parted in surprise before her head turned in the direction of her companion, as if seeking the woman’s guidance on how to react or what to say.

  His gaze roamed down her curvy silhouette. Her bust tapered to a trim, tightly-corseted waist, which widened into a full, draped skirt that was bustled at the back. Trace frowned. What the hell had they done to her in the big city?

  “I suggest you get our belongings packed, Mr. . . .? Wilma Rodgers glared at him, outrage in her eyes at his open perusal of Katherine Montgomery.

  “Pardon me, ma’am.” Trace grinned. He touched the brim of his hat and nodded at the irate woman. “Trace Hawley, at your service.” His eyes were on Katie when he gave his name.

  Her spine visibly stiffened and she glanced up for a fleeting moment. Well, at least she recognized his name, even if she’d apparently gone mute at that fancy finishing school.

  “Well, please lead us to our carriage, Mr. Hawley,” Wilma Rodgers said impatiently. Trace tuned her out.

  “Cat got your tongue?” he said directly to Katie. “Or is your corset strapped on so tight that you can’t speak for yourself?” He took a step closer. Katie looked up, and he caught a glimpse of her blue eyes just before she lowered her head again. “The Katherine Montgomery I remember used to talk my ears off.”

  She squared her shoulders and her chest heaved. Looking directly at him, she said, “It’s been a long time, Mr. Hawley.” She held out her hand.