Expecting His Brother's Baby

Alex’s child.

Whenever she looked at Brock and felt things she shouldn’t feel, all she had to do was think about her baby. It was hard enough for one man to accept another’s offspring. In Brock’s case, it would be impossible. Whenever he looked at her, he probably thought about his half brother, Alex—the younger son, the one their father had loved.

How could she have such mixed feelings about all of it? How could she be grieving for Alex, but when Brock walked into the room she felt…touched in some way? Touched by an excitement, an electricity, a bond that had begun when she was seventeen and had never ended.

Had she loved Alex? Yes, she had. But she had to admit, Brock had always affected her…had always made her heart skip faster.

Dear Reader,

When I connect with someone either in friendship or in love, those bonds are lasting. My husband and I have been married thirty-five years. At our first meeting, did I know we’d be committed to each other for a lifetime? I feel I did. And he did, too. After a few months of dating, we certainly did. We had the same values, goals and dreams.

The hero and heroine in Expecting His Brother’s Baby met when Kylie was seventeen. Was she too young to fall in love? Although she buried her feelings for Brock, the roots stayed strong. But so many obstacles blocked their connection.

Can love conquer all?

I believe true love can.

All my best,

Karen Rose Smith

Expecting His Brother’s Baby

Karen Rose Smith

www.millsandboon.co.uk

KAREN ROSE SMITH

read Zane Grey when she was in grade school, and she loved his books. She also had a crush on Roy Rogers and especially his palomino, Trigger! Around horses as a child, she found them fascinating and intuitive. Her BABY BONDS series set in Wyoming sprang from childhood wishes and adult dreams. When an acquaintance adopted two of the wild mustangs from the western rangelands and invited Karen to visit them, plotlines weren’t far behind. For more background on the books in the series as well as photos and info about the wild mustangs, stop by Karen’s Web site at www.karenrosesmith.com or write to her at P.O. Box 1545, Hanover, PA 17331.

Thanks to Gale Jacobs, who invited me to visit her

adopted mustangs and learn their stories.

With appreciation to Francee and Dick Shaulles.

Thanks for opening your home and ranch to us.

Your family embodies the meaning of ranch life.

We’ll never forget our visit.

With appreciation to Ken Martin, who knows and

understands the mustangs so well. Grey Face and his

band had to be part of this book.

For information about wild mustangs, visit

www.wildhorsepreservation.com. For adoption

information go to www.wildhorseandburro.blm.gov.

Contents

Prologue

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

Epilogue

Prologue

Wild Horse Junction, Wyoming

Kylie Warner didn’t often compare herself to other women. She’d been a tomboy all her life, more comfortable on a horse than anywhere else. Function, rather than fashion, had always directed her clothing choice. But meeting this pert and sexily dressed waitress from Clementine’s—Wild Horse Junction’s watering hole—Kylie felt as if she’d let herself go. With her straight blond hair drawn back in a ponytail and her parka fitting snugly over her maternity outfit, she wondered what had happened to her sense of womanly pride since Alex died.

“I’m Trish,” the waitress said with a smile that looked more forced than genuine. “We can use the boss’s office. He went home for dinner.”

When Trish had called Kylie, she’d said she wanted to talk about boarding her horse at Saddle Ridge Ranch.

Since her pregnancy, Kylie hadn’t been able to take on training horses…or even giving lessons. After her baby was born, she was hoping to jump in again with both feet. Until she could, boarding horses would help keep Saddle Ridge from sinking deeper into debt.

At seven-and-a-half-months pregnant, she was driving herself hard, concentrating on the life growing inside of her, managing Saddle Ridge as well as working as office manager at Wild Horse’s temporary employment agency. No wonder she hadn’t gotten her hair trimmed in months or applied more than lipstick before she left the ranch every morning.

As she followed the brunette in the short black skirt down the hall to the saloon’s office, the hairs on the nape of Kylie’s neck prickled. Something about Trish Hammond’s demeanor seemed…off. Kylie’s hand protectively went to her tummy. The fingers of her other hand gripped her purse tighter.

This is about boarding a horse, she scolded herself. Relax.

Yet once she stood inside the small cluttered office and Trish Hammond closed the door, her uneasiness grew. Squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin, she looked the waitress in the eye. “You have one horse to board?”

Trish’s red blouse clung to her breasts as she gave an offhanded shrug. “I never exactly told you I had a horse to board. I just said I wanted to talk about it. Really, I had another reason for asking you here. I have something you might want. It belonged to your husband.”

Trish opened her cowhide purse, the same shade of red as her boots, and extracted something shiny.

Kylie felt suddenly queasy as she recognized the belt buckle. Alex had several of them that he’d won at rodeos. Bull riding had always been his passion…and it had killed him.

Her mouth went dry. Her heart raced. Her worst fears, which had gnawed at her over the past couple of years, had also urged her to hide her head in the sand. Yet she knew she had to play this out. She knew she had to finally face the truth.

Taking the buckle from Trish, she turned it over and saw the engraving on the back. Alex had been dead for four months, but he still had the power to hurt her. The date on the belt buckle was April, the month before she’d gotten pregnant.

When she lifted her gaze to Trish’s, she knew this was the woman who’d been calling the ranch and hanging up whenever Alex wasn’t home. This was the woman who had been her competitor and she hadn’t even known it. It had been Trish’s initial on the note on the cocktail napkin Kylie had found when she’d sorted through Alex’s clothes.

Why had Trish called her here? To humiliate her? To see for herself the woman Alex had married, yet betrayed? Kylie could attack. She could sling accusations. She could show how much she was shaken by this proof that Alex had cared for someone else, maybe as much as he’d cared for her, perhaps even more. But she knew anything she did or said could affect her baby. She could gain satisfaction for a minute, but anxiety from words flung in pain would last a lot longer. Her hands trembled and she wouldn’t let Trish Hammond see that.

Whatever Trish’s reasons for needing this confrontation, Kylie wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of a scene. She laid the buckle on the desk. “If Alex gave that to you, then he wanted you to have it.” She turned to leave.

Obviously Trish had wanted to get a much bigger rise out of her because she asked, “Didn’t you mind sharing your husband?”

Fury rocked Kylie. She didn’t think she’d ever been this angry in her whole life. But she also knew her life with her son or daughter was more important than any hurt this woman could inflict.

Still, she couldn’t keep the fierceness from her voice. “I believed in the vows I made. I tried to hold my marriage together, but I couldn’t do it alone.”

As tears burned her eyes, she turned her back on the other woman and left Clementine’s quickly. Outside she blindly made her way to her small blue pickup at the edge of the parking lot. Rooting for her keys, she finally found them as she tried not to think…tried not to feel…tried not to remember.

However, as she climbed into her truck and turned the ignition switch, she did remember—the weeks at a time Alex had gone on the road following the circuit, the nights of loneliness, the days of chores and finally facing the fact that Saddle Ridge was sinking deeper and deeper into debt and her husband wouldn’t listen to her about it.

Backing out of her parking space, she veered toward the lot’s entrance and Wild Horse Way. Once on the road she turned on the heater, knowing she was too cold inside for the warmer air to do any good. Tears began falling then as she relived her decision to leave Alex if he didn’t go to a counselor with her. Before he’d left for his last rodeo in Las Vegas, they’d argued. He’d accused her of getting pregnant on purpose to keep him at home more. She’d insisted their marriage didn’t stand a chance unless they tried couples’ therapy. That had been the main reason for her wanting to take the job at the temp agency. Not only to earn more money to pay for the bills, but to pay for counseling so they could put their marriage back together and maybe start over.

As she avoided a pothole in the road, tears fell harder. She increased her speed outside of town. Her heart hurt so badly she knew it might finally break. Picturing the satisfaction in Trish Hammond’s eyes as she’d handed Kylie the belt buckle, Kylie couldn’t hold in the sobs that broke loose now.

Distracted, she barely registered the upcoming pothole. As she hit it, her truck listed and fell to the right, banging onto the road. She lost control and, in horror, knew she was going to land in the ravine.

One prayer passed her lips. “Lord, keep my baby safe.”

Then the truck lurched sideways and fell sharply, throwing her against the door. When her head hit the steering wheel, a gray fog swept over her. Closing her eyes, she let it engulf her, relieved to escape the pain of a broken heart.

Chapter One

Panic gripped Kylie as Brock Warner entered her room Sunday afternoon. Unfortunately, her enforced stay in the hospital since Friday had given her too much time to remember her confrontation with Trish Hammond. All she’d been able to think about was her husband’s infidelity.

Now here was his half brother! How had he found out about her accident? Was he going to try to convince her to sell Saddle Ridge?

“What are you doing here?” Her emotions were so raw the question had just popped out.

Shoving his black Stetson higher on his forehead, Brock stopped beside the chair where Kylie sat. “Dix called me. He was worried sick about you.”

Her foreman shouldn’t have meddled. “I’m fine.”

“Don’t you just look fine.” Brock’s thick black eyebrows quirked up as he took notice of her sling, then the bruise on her forehead.

Her brother-in-law’s Apache blood was evident in the hue of his skin, the dark somberness of his eyes and the jet blackness of his hair. Brock Warner emanated a sensuality when he walked, when he talked and when he smiled, in a way she’d seen in few men. It had given her a jumbled, off-balance sensation when she was a teenager…and still did now. She remembered the night she graduated from high school, the night she’d kissed him and—

She stood, pride and courage taking over for her and her unborn child. “I’m sorry Dix dragged you here from…wherever you were.”

“Texas,” Brock filled in. “Between consultations.”

“When did you arrive?” she asked warily, her gaze taking in everything about him. She hadn’t seen him since Jack Warner’s funeral five years ago…when Brock’s new wife had accompanied him.

“I got in about an hour ago. Dix looked worn out, so I offered to come get you.”

Concern for Dix took away her annoyance at his interference. He’d been a friend of her father’s and had looked out for her in a quiet way since he’d gotten her a job at Saddle Ridge. They were both worn out. Trying to keep the ranch afloat without any outside help had been wearing on them long before Alex had died.

Brock’s gaze softened a bit as it slid from her loose blond hair to her maternity top. “I’m sorry about what happened to Alex.”

Brock had said that on the phone after he’d missed Alex’s funeral. He’d been doing whatever geologists did somewhere in Central America. Away from civilization, he hadn’t called his home in Texas for messages in over a week. When he finally had, he’d phoned her and learned about the bull-riding accident that had taken his brother’s life. By that time, though, Alex was buried and she hadn’t wanted Brock to learn the condition of Saddle Ridge. It was during that phone call she’d told him she was pregnant but managing perfectly fine.

“I’m sorry for your loss, too,” she said quietly, knowing Brock had cared deeply about Alex.

“The last time I talked to him he was in Utah. I should have kept in touch more often,” Brock said with real regret.

The crack in Kylie’s heart grew a little wider when she thought about the last time she had talked to Alex. After he’d left early for his last rodeo, she was sure their marriage had been over. With what she’d found out from Trish Hammond, it had been over long before that day.

A smiling nurse bustled into the room, cast an admiring look at Brock, then handed Kylie a few papers. “Here are Dr. Marco’s instructions. I understand he went over them with you this morning.”

Kylie studied the checklist. For the most part, she was supposed to rest for the next two weeks.

Brock took them from her hands. “I spoke with your doctor a few minutes ago. I told him I’d make sure you followed his recommendations.”

“What do you mean you’ll make sure? Go back to Texas, I don’t need you here. Dix should never have called you.”

“You should have called me long before this. One look at the place—” He shook his head. “There will be time enough for this discussion. Right now, let’s get you home.”

When Brock took her elbow, Kylie’s knees felt wobbly. She could smell the piney musk of his aftershave, feel the strength in his large hand. She had once dreamed of more than friendship with Brock Warner, but he’d dismissed her as too young for his consideration. He’d come home with a wife and that had told Kylie, more than anything else, that she’d never belong in his life.

Six months after that, she’d married Alex.

She and Alex had gone to school together. He’d teased her in the play yard. They’d shared homework. When her pop died and she’d had to sell their homestead to pay debts, when she’d moved to Saddle Ridge and taken a room above the barn to be a groom to the horses, Alex had still seemed more like a brother than a suitor. Then suddenly, after his dad died, he’d turned the full extent of his cowboy charm on her. Not only that, he’d needed her. He’d poured out his grief to her and she’d shared his loss…because she’d lost her own dad. Never one to sit still long enough to figure out numbers, Alex had asked her to help him with the bookkeeping, and he’d found her suggestions made sense. Yet he’d had his own agenda. Marrying her had only been a part of it.

Now, she didn’t know if he’d ever really loved her. She had loved him, in a loyal, until-death-do-us-part kind of way. She’d wanted to have children with him. She’d wanted to raise a brood—sons and daughters who would always have each other and the legacy of Saddle Ridge to depend upon. But Alex had wanted to postpone having kids and it wasn’t until they’d been married a couple of years that she’d really understood he’d never grown up himself, that he’d intended to ride the rodeo circuit until he was too old to care about conquering the next ornery bull.

When a volunteer came into the room with a wheelchair, Kylie pulled away from Brock’s clasp. “I can walk. I don’t need—”

“Hospital policy,” the nurse announced cheerily.

Brock hefted up the worn, leather duffel bag that had been her pop’s. “I’ll take this to the car and meet you at the front entrance.”

As Brock left the hospital room, Kylie almost felt dizzy with relief. Then she reminded herself the woozy feeling probably had come from the concussion. Concussion or not, she was clearheaded about one important fact—she would never depend on Brock Warner. He was not going to look after her…or interfere in her life.

A short time later, Brock picked her up at the hospital’s entrance in a white SUV. They’d driven in silence for about five minutes when Kylie cut the awkward tension. “Did you rent this?”

“Yes. For now. But after what happened to your truck, I’ll be going to look for something to replace it.”

“Dix said it could be repaired.”

“It had a broken ball joint and it’s fifteen years old. With over one hundred and fifty thousand miles, it’s time to let go of it, Kylie.”

Holding on to the first vehicle she’d ever owned hadn’t been strictly sentimentality. She simply couldn’t afford to replace it. “I’ll check the paper for used trucks.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll take care of it. The ranch could use a new one. What happened to the crew-cab Alex won?”

So Brock had known about that, Kylie realized. Two years ago, a prize at one of the rodeo competitions had been a brand-spanking-new silver truck but it had been a gas guzzler. “I sold it.”

“Why didn’t you keep it and get rid of yours?”

Because she couldn’t have gotten anything for hers. “I did what I thought was best.”

The message she sent was clear—the truck she drove was none of his business.

Brock’s jaw tightened and deep furrows dented his forehead.

Turning away from him, she stared out the side window. If he thought he could come in here and just ride rough-shod over her, he was sadly mistaken.

“Why didn’t you call me and tell me Saddle Ridge was going to hell?” Brock demanded of Dix an hour later.

The pre-Thanksgiving wind held an icy bite as Brock turned from the foreman to scrutinize the outside of the barn, with its peeling paint, the few horses loose in the corral and the acres of land that used to be peppered with at least five hundred head of Angus, but now only boasted about fifty.

Brock shook his head with disbelief.

“Maybe instead of waiting for a call from me, you should have come home to see what was going on.”

Brock stared out over the sections of Warner land. “There was no place for me here. There never was, and you know that.”

“What I know is that you can be as stubborn as your father was.”

His father.

Jack Warner hadn’t been a real parent to him, though he’d fathered him and given him his name. He’d married Brock’s mother to save face. The smart, handsome, rich Jack Warner couldn’t handle the reputation of being a scoundrel, of sleeping with a woman and then turning his back on her when she got pregnant…even if she were Apache. He’d married her and Brock had been born here, but had never felt as if Jack Warner had cared one bit for him. And he’d always known why. His skin was the wrong color. His hair was coal-black, like his mother’s, not blond like his father’s. The bottom line was Jack had never loved Brock’s mother. He hadn’t really wanted her as a wife. He’d never wanted Brock.

Brock glanced over at the house where he’d grown up but never really belonged. The roof was missing a few shingles and the porch steps looked as if they should be replaced. “When did this start happening?”

“After your daddy passed.”

That brought Brock’s gaze to Dix’s again. “Alex let it go like this?”

“You think this happened in the four months since he died? Look again, son. This neglect has taken years. Kylie’s worked harder than any man I know. The two of us have tried to keep up, but we couldn’t. With Alex gone so much—”

“Bull riding?”

“Bull riding. Chasing the next belt buckle or purse. Always expecting to win the Grand Championship and never doin’ it. I do understand why you didn’t come back here since your daddy died. His will was a slap in the face, leaving the place to Alex, and only giving you half of it if he sold it. But why didn’t you come back here after Alex died?”

“I was in a jungle. I never got the message about Alex until after the funeral. I called Kylie then. Didn’t she tell you?”

“No, she didn’t. What did she tell you?”

“She mentioned she was pregnant, but she said everything was fine.”

“And just what else was she supposed to say with you in another country and her here?”

“She could have told me the truth.”

“In Kylie’s mind, she probably was fine,” Dix admitted, blowing out a huge breath. “She has plans to turn this place around after the baby’s born.”

“What kind of plans?”

“Teaching more classes. Boarding more horses. Training more two-year-olds.”

“She’s dreaming.”

“Yes, she is. About her baby’s future. She didn’t tell you what was going on because she didn’t want you to know, is my guess. You proved you didn’t care about Saddle Ridge by staying away. I wouldn’t have called you, except the doc says she’s supposed to take it easy for the next couple of weeks. I knew I couldn’t handle this myself. I hate admitting it, but it’s true.” Dix’s red beard was laced with some gray now. The lines on his weathered face were deep and counted every one of his sixty-two years.

“No hands at all? Not even part-time?”

“We couldn’t afford them! I shouldn’t even be talking to you about this. Kylie should. But she’s still shaken up and I don’t want her worrying so much. It’s not good for her or the baby.”

Brock had been back home in Texas when Dix had called him yesterday to tell him about Kylie’s accident. He didn’t know what to make of any of this.

After his dad had divorced his mom, she’d gone back to live with her family on a reservation in Arizona. He’d been four years old, and he could still remember the tears in her eyes when she’d claimed Saddle Ridge was where his future lay. As he’d grown older, he’d understood what she’d meant. If he stayed at the ranch, he could eventually go to college and become anything he wanted to be. If he went to Arizona and lived on the reservation with her, he wouldn’t be happy. He wouldn’t get the same kind of education. He wouldn’t grow up to be everything a man could be.

He’d visited his mother, mostly in the summers, but his life had been empty without her. Jack Warner had never been warm to Brock. He’d hired a housekeeper, and Brock had had all his needs met. But after Jack remarried and Alex was born, with his blond hair and his blue eyes just like his mom and dad, Brock often thought about leaving and going to live with his mother in Arizona. Yet as each year passed and his mother encouraged him to stay, he’d bonded with his half brother, found satisfaction in school work and tending to the horses, and he’d always felt a kinship with the land.

“With the holidays comin’,” Dix continued, “Kylie’s driving herself harder. She’s on a committee for the First Night celebration in town. She has presents to make, as well as things to ready for the baby.”

“The last thing she needs to be worried about is Christmas presents, decorations and a New Year’s Eve party.”

“Don’t go tellin’ her that, or you’ll get your head handed to you on a platter. You might anyway,” he muttered. “She likes to do everything on her own.”

“Didn’t you call me so I’d get back here and talk some sense into her?”

“Not exactly. I called you because she needs help. I need help. You’ve got a vested interest in this place—”