No Strings Attached. Susan Andersen

Double F Ranch.

      Derek Fontaine reined his horse to a standstill and examined the far-off buildings. At the same time, he grappled with the sound of a hundred noisy voices, all shouting inside his head and demanding his attention. The lies, the accusations…the angry recriminations. He’d been so sure he could hold them under the strictest control—and had done so for years. Suddenly they were back…and for what?

      He scowled at the scene before him as the memories forced themselves upon him: the lies from all the years they’d pretended Richard Fontaine was his uncle; the unfair accusations he would never forget; the names with which they had branded him. Troublemaker, traitor…bastard.

      Betrayals all, and from those he’d trusted most. His own family.

      The anger and loneliness of a childhood spent unwanted and unloved festered up inside him like an old wound that had never quite healed. Derek swallowed, forcing back the memories as he had always done before. He couldn’t afford to open himself up to it all again, reexamining those tired, ancient emotions when he’d come so close to losing himself to it once. Later, when the pain finally went away, or when he regained his strength, he would think about it.

      But not now. Now he had all he could manage just trying to figure out what the hell he was doing here.

      “That it?”

      Derek blinked, turning as he swept a distracted gaze over his companion. Gideon—the only name he’d given, back three hundred miles or so—said nothing more. Willing enough to shoulder his share of the work and more, and evenly divide the few costs they’d incurred along the trail, he had also established himself as a man of few words. He didn’t disclose personal confessions and he didn’t ask questions. That suited Derek just fine.

      He nodded, shifting as imperceptibly as he could. It was sufficient movement to prod a creak from his leather saddle, and he took a moment to appreciate the noise. It sounded familiar, reassuring somehow, and it settled him, reminded him of who he was and where he’d been.

      Turning back to study the terrain, he noticed, then dismissed, a patch of bluebonnets waving brightly in the breeze. More interesting was the view of the sprawling frame ranch house and outbuildings that squatted earnestly in the distance.

      He answered after another moment. “I expect it is.”

      “It doesn’t exactly look deserted.”

      Derek aimed a sharp gaze over the details: a lazy plume of smoke wafting from a chimney, while a cloud of dust billowed from what he suspected was the corral. Definite signs of life.

      He shrugged. “I didn’t know what I’d find.”

      “You still don’t.”

      “True enough.”

      “You expect trouble?”

      Derek urged his horse forward without answering, and Gideon followed a moment later.

      “I always expect trouble,” Derek finally replied. “It’s just a matter of what kind.”

      Gideon nodded again, but said nothing more, leaving Derek free to consider the possibilities of what lay ahead. He knew what he wouldn’t find: Richard Fontaine alive and well and waiting for his arrival. If he had been, there would be no reason for Derek to be there.

      But Richard was dead and Derek wasn’t. He was here in south Texas, looking out across the love of the other man’s life: the land. More than his ancestry, more than family…perhaps more than life itself, Richard had loved this place.

      That doesn’t mean you have to love it the same way, Derek reminded himself. He doubted that he ever would. He didn’t have enough emotion left within him for that. But it was the perfect answer, for now.

      He had more than twenty-five years behind him as Jordan Fontaine’s son. And later, he’d survived four long—agonizingly so at times—years of civil war. In his life, he’d faced enough strife, enough pain…enough everything. He just wanted a little peace and quiet.

      The Double F would give him that. The space and freedom to be alone, to forget…to heal?

      Well, no. He shook his head and urged his horse to move faster. He wouldn’t go that far. He knew better. But maybe, if he had any luck left to him at all, he might get the chance to discover if there was anything left of the man named Derek Fontaine.

      Chapter One

      “Riders comin’.”

      Amber Laughton heard the call but held her response, choosing to concentrate on her work for another moment. Separating the troublesome weeds from the healthy plants in her fledgling dill bed didn’t take that much thought, but the mindless chore gave her a chance to think.

      The Double F Ranch rarely welcomed visitors these days. Invitations were no longer extended or accepted, and she could think of no one interested in seeing that change. No one, perhaps, except Derek Fontaine, arrived at last.

      “Amber-girl, you hear me? Riders comin’.”

      She looked up, shading her eyes with one hand. High, thin clouds gave the day a deceptively overcast appearance, but they didn’t entirely stop moments of fierce brightness. Blinking, she picked out Micah standing at the corner of the house.

      She smiled softly. The little man, as much grandfather as friend to her after so many years, stood as straight and tall as his size and aging body would allow. Alternately he stared out toward the curved front drive, then sent her sharp, pointed looks, intended no doubt to make her take him seriously.

      She did, and he had to know it. “I heard you.”

      “You expectin’ somebody?”

      “And who do you think I’d be expecting?”

      “Them crazy Andrews brothers ain’t been out here in a while. It could be them,” Micah suggested, scowling.

      “That doesn’t mean I’d be expecting them. Clem and Twigg come to see Whitley, and you know it.” Amber dropped the last few weeds into a dilapidated wooden bucket, already half full of wilting green plants, and stood, wiping her hands on her stained apron. For once she had remembered to put on her gardening apron, and she refused to change it now simply to impress uninvited company. Even if it was Derek Fontaine.

      Besides, a dirty apron hardly mattered under the circumstances; she looked every bit the part of the hired housekeeper she was. Her plain brown cotton dress and sturdy work shoes hadn’t been new in years. She’d pulled her hair back into a serviceable, tidy bun early that morning, but tendrils had loosened by now and clung with damp persistence to her forehead and neck. Her hands were red and chapped from the scalding hot, then icy-cold water and strong lye soap of yesterday’s laundry, while her fingertips seemed permanently tinted to a faded black from the rich dirt in her garden.

      “They might say they’re comin’ to see Whitley,” said Micah, disapproval wrinkling his already weathered brow, “but they don’t care nothin’ that he’s their nephew. They just wanna stick around till you invite them to supper.”

      “Well, if it’s them, they’ve run out of luck today.” Amber stepped around the bucket and headed in his direction. “Whitley went to town again, and I don’t have time to entertain them until he gets back.”

      “Nah, I don’t think it’s them, anyway.” Micah narrowed his eyes. “That don’t look like their horses.”

      She rounded the corner of the house and stopped next to him, shading her eyes with one hand as she looked out across the prairie.

      There were two of them.

      Amber swallowed the words, along with a clipped gasp for air—or thought she did, until Micah demanded, “What’s wrong with you, girl? Course there’s two of them. I said riders comin’. We was talkin’ about the Andrews brothers, fer cryin’ out loud. Addin’ them esses at the end of a word usually means