Oklahoma Bride

he muttered as he grabbed her elbow and frog-marched her ashore. “What’s your name, woman?”

She tilted her chin defiantly, clamped her mouth shut and glowered at him as he dragged her alongside him.

“Where did you learn to fight like that?” he asked.

“In places I’m sure you’ve never been, General,” she said impudently.

“Obviously. Where I come from ladies don’t brawl. I have already determined—the hard way—that you’re no lady. Furthermore, I’m not a general. I’m the commandant at Fort Reno. Major Rafe Hunter.”

She twisted to flash him a smirk. “You’re from back East, right? Uppity accent. Imperious demeanor. Wealth and pedigree, no doubt. Don’t you have better things to do than sneak around, assaulting defenseless women?”

“Defenseless?” he hooted. “I can think of a dozen adjectives to describe you, but defenseless isn’t on the list!”

Oklahoma Bride

Carol Finch

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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This book is dedicated to my husband, Ed,

and our children, Jill, Jon, Christie, Jeff, Kurt

and Shawnna. And to our grandchildren, Blake, Livia,

Brooklynn and Kennedy. Hugs and kisses!

A special thank you to my editor, Kim Nadelson.

It is a pleasure to be working with you!

Contents

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

Chapter One

Indian Territory

April, 1889

R afe Hunter lifted his hand to bring his patrol of soldiers to a halt. His roan gelding, Sergeant, shifted impatiently beneath him, anxious to return to Fort Reno and the anticipated bucket of grain in his stall. Rafe panned the rolling plains that stood knee-high in waving grass then glanced toward the tree-lined creek that meandered southeast.

It was hard to imagine that in a couple of weeks this peaceful countryside would be the site of the nation’s first Land Run. He had the unenviable task of guarding the western boundary to the two million acres of free land. It was his responsibility to insure would-be settlers didn’t jump the gun and sneak in to stake their claims prematurely.

In addition, it was his duty to keep a watchful eye on the Cheyenne-Arapaho reservation near the garrison. The extra obligation of gathering up trespassers demanded long days and stretched his company of soldiers to the limits.

When Rafe glanced over his shoulder, his longtime friend—and second in command—lifted a questioning brow. “A problem, Commander?”

“No, just taking time to appreciate the peaceful moment before all hell breaks loose,” Rafe replied.

Micah Whitfield grinned wryly. “By the end of the month, I wonder if any of us will recall what peaceful feels like.”

Rafe stared past Micah to focus on the five prisoners the patrol had flushed from the nearby creeks. The Sooners—as the army referred to the illegal squatters—had set up camp inside the territory, hoping to claim prime property before thousands of anxious settlers could make the Run. After three weeks of relentless patrolling, Rafe and his company of men had a stockade crammed full of Sooners who refused to follow the rules.

To Rafe Hunter a rule was a rule was a rule. Those who broke the rules paid the consequences.

Rafe’s attention shifted southeast when he picked up a familiar scent in the evening breeze. Micah must have recognized the scent, too, for he followed Rafe’s searching gaze.

“There’s more Sooners hunkering down out there,” Micah said quietly.

Rafe scowled. “There’s always more Sooners scuttling around out there. You capture five and there’s another five waiting to take their place. At the rate we’re going we’ll have to build another stockade to house them all.”

“If you want to make another sweep of the area to determine who started the campfire I’ll go with you,” Micah volunteered.

“No, you take the prisoners back to the fort,” Rafe requested. “I’ll reconnoiter the area alone.”

While Micah led the patrol back to the fort Rafe reined his reluctant mount toward the tree-choked creek. Although he was tired and hungry, he was determined to rout out another nest of Sooners. By damned, this unprecedented Land Run was going to be fair for all participants—at least if he had anything to say about it.

Rafe dismounted and left his gelding to graze. Employing the Indian-warfare skills Micah had taught him, Rafe moved silently along the creek, following the faint scent of smoke that had caught his attention earlier. To his surprise he spotted a young boy dressed in homespun clothes. Rafe scanned the shadows, expecting to see a crowd of Sooners migrating toward the small campfire. He frowned curiously, wondering if the boy’s family had sent him into the territory alone to illegally stake a claim.

The smell of brewing coffee and a simmering pot of beans made Rafe’s stomach growl. He had been on patrol all day, wolfing down trail rations for lunch and wearing calluses on his backside. And here was this scrawny kid, tucked discreetly beneath a copse of trees, preparing a tasty meal and lounging by the fire.

It just hit Rafe all wrong. He wasn’t going to wait until daybreak to come swarming down with his army patrol. He was going to arrest this kid and haul him back to the fort tonight. Then he was going to seek out this boy’s parents and chastise them for sending a child out into the wilderness alone.

He wondered if the kid’s family expected a soldier to show leniency and look the other way. It wouldn’t be the first time some scheming adult had tried that tactic. But it wasn’t going to work with Rafe.

This kid was not going to spend the night, nestled up to the heat of the small campfire, Rafe decided. He was going to find himself wedged into the stockade with the other prisoners. That should teach the kid a lesson he wouldn’t soon forget.

Filled with purpose, Rafe circled around the trees to sneak up on the young boy’s blind side. “You’re trespassing, son, and you’re under arrest,” Rafe growled as he emerged from his hiding place.

The kid shrieked in surprise, bounded to his feet and took off through the trees like a cannonball. There was not the usual moment of paralyzed shock, just immediate flight. In addition, the kid was amazingly agile and swift of foot. He zigzagged around the trees like a gazelle.

Scowling at finding himself in a footrace with a kid half his size, Rafe took off at a dead run. “Halt!” he shouted authoritatively.

The boy didn’t break stride, just whizzed through the trees and underbrush and never looked back.

Rafe tackled the kid before he could leap over the narrow creek, scramble up the steep incline and disappear in the thick underbrush. He and the boy landed with a splat, and Rafe hooked his arm around his captive’s waist.

To his amazement the worming bundle of energy smacked him in the nose with an elbow, squirmed sideways and arched his back. Rafe found himself on the losing end of a mud-wrestling contest before he could blink. The kid was so slippery that he very nearly slithered away before Rafe could grab him by the scruff of his tattered jacket and yank him off balance.

With an enraged squawk the boy fell facedown in the creek. Rafe bounded to his feet and hoisted the kid upright before he took on too much water and drowned.

To Rafe’s amazement the waterlogged kid thrust back his leg—and hit Rafe squarely in the crotch. Rafe’s knees buckled beneath him, but he kept a death grip on the squirming kid, determined not to let him escape and have to recapture him again.

“Hold still, damn it!” Rafe growled threateningly, then gave the kid a good shaking. “You—”

Rafe’s voice dried up when the boy’s scruffy cap fell off and dropped into the creek. A waterfall of flaming red hair tumbled to the kid’s shoulders. “You’re a girl!” Rafe croaked in disbelief.

He was still trying to digest that startling discovery when the female in question ducked her head and plowed into his midsection, causing the air in his lungs to rush out in a pained whoosh.

All those lectures—delivered by his grandfather and father—about treating a lady with the utmost respect and consideration flew right out of his head when the woman shoved him back into the creek and tried to use him as a doormat to make her escape.

In all his thirty-three years he had never encountered a female quite like this one. And this one was no lady, Rafe decided as he made a quick grab for her ankle. This was a scrappy, two-legged wildcat who knew how to fight dirty and didn’t mind utilizing every trick in the book to make her getaway.

Scrappy female or not, she was an illegal Sooner and it was his job to evict her from the territory, even at the risk of personal injury—which he had already suffered at her hands. His groin was throbbing like a son of a bitch. His ribs were still tender after she had used her head like a battering ram. Plus, the claw marks she had left on his neck, during their most recent struggle for supremacy, were bleeding onto the collar of his mud-soaked shirt.

“Enough!” he roared as he concentrated all his energy on rolling on top of her and pinning her down in the water.

Rafe’s conscience tried to deliver a scathing lecture when he straddled her bucking hips, clamped his hand over her face and held her head under water until she stopped resisting. But his noble conscience relented when she practically bit a chunk out of his hand.

Muttering, Rafe shifted the heel of his hand to her forehead and held her underwater until all the fight went out of her. When she sagged beneath him, as if she were about to succumb to drowning, he wondered if this was another of the many dirty tricks in her surprising repertoire. And sure enough, she began to struggle again, lashing out with her arms and fists, trying to do enough physical damage to unseat him.

Only when Rafe was reasonably certain that he had held her underwater so long that her lungs were about to burst did he grab a fistful of her hair and pull her into a sitting position beneath him. She exploded to the surface like a spouting whale, cocked her arm and tried to punch him in the nose.

Rafe hurriedly shifted sideways so the intended blow connected with air. He jerked her up beside him while she raked that mop of red hair from her eyes. As she struggled to get her bearings, Rafe fished into the pocket of his soggy jacket for a length of rope to shackle her wrists. Thankfully, he was able to restrain her before she used those deadly claws on him again.

“You are under arrest,” he muttered as he grabbed her elbow and frog-marched her ashore. “What’s your name, woman?”

She tilted her chin defiantly, clamped her mouth shut and glowered at him as he dragged her alongside him to fetch his horse.

Ten minutes later Rafe scooped up the woman and plunked her atop Sergeant. Keeping a firm grip on her leg, he swung up behind her. With her hands secured in the middle of her back, her elbows out so she couldn’t clobber him in the midsection, Rafe wrapped one arm around her waist to insure she didn’t launch herself off the horse during their jaunt to the fort. Given the battle royal he had just encountered with this female, he wouldn’t put another escape attempt past her.

“Where did you learn to fight like that?” he asked five miles later.

“In places I’m sure you have never been, General,” she sassed.

“Obviously not. Where I come from, ladies don’t brawl. I have already determined—the hard way—that you’re no lady. Furthermore, I’m not a general. I’m the commandant at Fort Reno. Major Rafe Hunter.”

She twisted in the saddle to flash him a smirk. “You’re from back East, right? Uppity accent. Imperious demeanor. Wealth and pedigree, no doubt. Don’t you have better things to do than sneak around, assaulting defenseless women?”

“Defenseless?” he hooted. “I can think of a dozen adjectives to describe you, but defenseless isn’t on the list.”

She fell silent as they approached the post, and Rafe made no further attempt to pry information from her. It rankled that she poked fun at the privileged background he had spent years trying to overcome. He had prided himself on becoming his own man rather than flitting by on the laurels accorded to him by the illustrious Hunter family name. Rafe had worked damn hard to prove himself capable and responsible to assume command of this military fort. But in one fell swoop, and in a few choice words, this sassy hellion implied that his personal accomplishments were the result of his family pulling strings to land him this position.

When Rafe halted at the hitching post in front of officers’ quarters, Micah was leaning negligently against the doorjamb. Micah’s astute gaze drifted over the female captive then focused on Rafe’s disheveled appearance. The hint of a smile quirked his lips as he pushed away from the door to assist the captive from the horse.

“Met with trouble, did you?” Micah questioned as he set the woman on her feet then clamped an arm around her elbow.

Rafe watched in amazement as the hellcat—who had tried to claw him to shreds—turned a radiant smile on Micah. “If that question was directed to me, sir, then the answer is yes. I would like to press charges against your commanding officer for molestation and assault.”

Rafe nearly choked when the woman mimicked his Eastern accent and projected an air of ladylike dignity. When Micah’s befuddled gaze bounced back and forth between Rafe and the woman, he had the impulsive urge to spout his denial of her outrageous accusations.

“Well?” the woman prompted haughtily. “Don’t I have the right to protest such ill treatment, just because Rafe Hunter is the commandant of this fort?”

“I…uh…” Micah stammered, his blue-eyed gaze leaping from one mud-covered face to the other.

“Come along, miss,” Rafe muttered as he towed her into the foyer of officers’ quarters. “Captain Micah Whitfield is second in command and he’s a longtime friend of mine. Your ploy won’t work on him.” He hoped.

To Micah he said, “She’s the one who set up the campfire that we detected before you led the patrol back to the fort.”

Micah’s eyes widened as he reassessed the woman in muddy breeches, faded shirt and patched jacket. “You were out there alone?” he asked incredulously.

She turned pleading green eyes on Micah, graced him with that feigned-innocent smile and began her spiel about traveling cross-country to rejoin her family and how she had resorted to wearing men’s clothes to protect herself from lecherous men—like the post commander.

Rafe barked a laugh. He didn’t believe this feisty little con artist for a minute. He had seen her fight like the very devil and then he had watched her turn on the charm for Micah’s benefit.

“That is more than enough,” Rafe interrupted her long-winded explanation. “Don’t waste your breath. Micah isn’t as gullible as he looks.”

Whoever this woman was, it was glaringly apparent that she was adept at living by her wits and she would say anything in an attempt to talk her way out of trouble.

Rafe grabbed the woman’s arm, wheeled toward the door, then halted in his tracks. As much as he would like to stuff this feisty female in the stockade that was bulging with men, he couldn’t. If she antagonized any of them the way she had smarted off to him they would collectively strangle her. Either that or she would find herself molested repeatedly before the guards could reach her. He really had no choice but to lock her in his quarters for the night and bunk with Micah.

“I’ll keep her in my room,” he announced as he reversed direction.

Micah’s dark brows shot up.

The woman refused to budge from the spot. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. Well, good, thought Rafe. It was about time this mouthy hellion showed him some wary respect.

Rafe uprooted the woman and herded her into his tidy quarters. He slammed the door shut then positioned a chair under the doorknob to make sure she didn’t escape while he wasn’t here to stop her. With Micah hot on his heels, Rafe walked back outside to lead his weary mount to the stables.

“You gonna explain what is going on or just leave it to my vivid imagination?” Micah teased as he fell into step beside Rafe.

“That female is a chameleon,” Rafe declared. “She might have been charming to you, but she fought like a cornered Apache when I apprehended her. I’ve encountered less resistance and more respect from the men we’ve taken into custody. I was kicked, bitten and clawed repeatedly.”

“So I see.” Micah chuckled in amusement as he appraised Rafe’s frazzled appearance. “Makes me wish I had insisted on going with you. I’d like to have witnessed that battle.”

“It wasn’t a pretty sight.” Rafe’s stomach growled, reminding him that it was long past supper. “I tried to remind myself that I was brawling with a woman, but it wasn’t easy when she fought like a man.”

“I like a woman with spunk and spirit,” Micah said, blue eyes twinkling.

“You’re welcome to her,” Rafe shot back. “I’m accustomed to a woman who behaves like a lady.”

“Like your fiancée? Ah, yes, the poised and dignified Vanessa Payton. Ask me, that will be a dull marriage indeed.”

“Marriage is part of my obligation to my family,” Rafe reminded him with a casual shrug. “You know perfectly well that I’m devoted to my position here. The army is my life.”

“Which is obviously why you allowed your grandfather, the general, and your father, also a general, to arrange this marriage. As I recall, you’ve only met the lovely Vanessa twice. How can you possibly know if you’ll suit?”

“That’s just the way it’s done in my family,” Rafe replied as he led Sergeant into the stall to remove the saddle.

“Being a half-breed, raised among the Choctaw tribe, I was taught to believe that a man and woman should have a certain affection for each other when they marry. You have heard the word love before, haven’t you, my friend?” Micah taunted.

“Heard of it,” Rafe agreed as he grabbed a brush to tend his prize gelding. “Never associated it with marriage, however. My grandparents’ marriages were arranged, as were my parents, as mine has been. It’s no different than accepting an assignment with the army. You take what you are given and you make the best of it.”

“And my parents, though they hailed from drastically different cultures and contrasting civilizations, defied it all because they loved each other,” Micah maintained then grinned teasingly. “All I can say is that you whites have a strange way of looking at things. And some say Indians are heathens,” he added with a smirk. “Ask me, it’s the other way around.”

“Be that as it may,” Rafe said as he rewarded Sergeant with a bucket of grain, “I agreed to marry Vanessa when the Land Run is over and business in this territory is functioning smoothly.”

He pivoted to shoulder his way past Micah, who was leaning leisurely against the top rail of the stall. “In the meantime, I have to focus my time and efforts on protecting the Unassigned Lands against settler intrusion and attempt to maintain law and order.”

Micah shrugged as he followed Rafe from the stables. “Whatever you say, Major Hunter, but I still contend there is life beyond the military. After I served with the Choctaw light-horsemen to police the territory and guarantee my credentials, I joined the army so I wouldn’t be stuck on the reservation like my mother’s people. I’m not married to the army. When the right woman comes along, I intend to marry for love, not because her name will sound good when it’s linked to mine. That, I assure you, will be my very last consideration.”

Honestly, Rafe sometimes wondered how he and Micah had formed such a strong, lasting friendship when they came from such different walks of life. Maybe the truth was that Rafe envied Micah’s laid-back manner and his philosophies that were steeped in Indian beliefs.

In the early years of their friendship they had relied on each other’s knowledge and backgrounds to broaden their horizons and make them well-rounded soldiers. Now they were as close as brothers and had saved each other’s hide several times during harrowing campaigns against the hostile Plains Indians who had escaped from the reservations in New Mexico.

“Let me know if you need help dealing with your latest prisoner,” Micah commented as he veered toward his quarters.

Rafe snorted at the reminder of the upcoming encounter with the red-haired firebrand who was occupying his room. Now there was a woman he could never love—if there was such a thing as love.

Indeed, Micah was welcome to the smart-mouthed little witch. Rafe preferred to associate with women who allowed him to behave like the gentleman his family had groomed him to be. It didn’t sit well to know that he had tackled a woman, straddled her hips and held her underwater until she practically drowned, just to make her surrender.

Rafe smiled in reluctant admiration when he recalled how that belligerent hellion had refused to accept defeat, despite the odds against her. She had more spunk and spirit than most men he knew.

Exasperated, Karissa Baxter paced Commander Hunter’s living quarters. It irked her that the bedroom and sitting room were neat as pins. Everything was in its proper place—lined up like soldiers on parade.

Most of the men she had encountered in her twenty-six years never bothered to pick up after themselves. Her father certainly hadn’t and neither did her younger brother, Clint. She had taken care of him since he was six years old and she had tried to become the mother they had lost to typhoid. Because she felt sorry for Clint, she had pampered him.

Karissa halted beside the window when the regimental band stuck up a lively tune. There was no way she could escape through the window, not with so many soldiers milling around the place. She had already tried the door and found it had been secured from outside. The commander had taken extra precautions because she had made the mistake of letting him know she wasn’t beneath doing whatever necessary to escape.