Mistletoe Bride

Cover Page

Was it love?

Dear Reader

Title Page

Dedication

About the Author

Recipe for A Very Merry Christmas

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Copyright

Was it love?

Ryan had his son, Sawyer, to think about. But Danielle and Sawyer already shared an easy affection that would grow if fed time and patience. In short, loving Danielle might not be such a bad thing for the boy…or for him.

So why did the thought scare Ryan half to death?

Maybe it was because what was between them defied logic, common sense and caution. Near strangers, they had kissed in the dark and tempted fate. And he’d enjoyed it way too much.

Was this a Christmas miracle? A little Yuletide magic? A gift from above that Ryan would be a total idiot to deny?

He didn’t know…but he was going to find out.

Dear Reader,

What better way for Silhouette Romance to celebrate the holiday season than to celebrate the meaning of family….

You’ll love the way a confirmed bachelor becomes a FABULOUS FATHER just in time for the holidays in Susan Meier’s Merry Christmas, Daddy. And in Mistletoe Bride, Linda Varner’s HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS miniseries merrily continues. The ugly duckling who becomes a beautiful swan will touch your heart in Hometown Wedding by Elizabeth Lane. Doreen Roberts’s A Mom for Christmas tells the tale of a little girl’s holiday wish, and in Patti Standard’s Family of the Year, one man, one woman and a bunch of adorable kids form an unexpected family. And finally, Christmas in July by Leanna Wilson is what a sexy cowboy offers the struggling single mom he wants for his own.

Silhouette Romance novels make the perfect stocking stuffers—or special treats just for yourself. So enjoy all six irresistible books, and most of all, have a very happy holiday season and a very happy New Year!

Melissa Senate

Senior Editor

Silhouette Romance

Please address questions and book requests to:

Silhouette Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

Mistletoe Bride

Linda Varner

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Thanks to Ginger Moix for sharing her expertise on

horses, barns and rodeos.

LINDA VARNER confesses she is a hopeless romantic. Nothing is more thrilling, she believes, than the battle of wits between a man and a woman who are meant for each other but just don’t know it yet! Linda enjoys writing romance fiction and considers herself very lucky to have been both a RITA finalist and a third-place winner in the National Readers’Choice Awards in 1993.

A full-time federal employee, Linda lives in Arkansas with her husband and their two children. She loves to hear from readers. Write to her at 813 Oak St., Suite 10A-277, Conway, AR 72032.

Recipe forA Very Merry Christmas

1 cowboy

1 newly found son

1 unexpected mugging

1 independent single gal

1 rescue

1 ranch (big enough for 3…or more)

Toss together cowboy and son, add in Christmas Eve mugging. Stir in single gal and a reluctant rescue. Set mixture on an isolated ranch, right in time for Christmas morning. Simmer until too hot to handle.

Yield: A HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS…and forever!

Prologue

“Okay. You don’t have to go if you promise me that you won’t play with matches, stick anything in your nose or ears, drink poison or open the door to strangers.” Ryan Given, now hesitating on the threshold of the motel room he’d just rented, hated leaving his son, Sawyer, alone for even a second. It was something he hadn’t done since they’d found one another.

“Aw, Dad,” responded the boy, who lay sprawled on his stomach on one of the beds, his nose a couple of feet from the television set. “That kind of stuff is for kids. I’m eight years old.”

“So you are,” Ryan hastily murmured, properly chastised. Though his fingers itched to tousle Sawyer’s dark hair affectionately, he wasn’t that comfortable with the boy yet, so dared not. Instead, he stepped into the freezing cold night and shut the door firmly behind him. Sawyer would surely be okay for the fifteen minutes required to walk to a nearby café, pick up their take-out dinner and walk back to the motel. In fact, he’d probably be okay for longer than that. He was damned mature for his age.

Grinning with fatherly pride—a novel experience—Ryan sidetracked to the narrow metal strongbox hidden behind the seat of his pickup truck, where he’d stashed their traveling cash. He tucked a couple of ten-dollar bills into his wallet, then headed to the café where a long overdue hearty meal awaited. He and Sawyer had been on the road ten hours, with only quick snacks to nourish them. Both wanted the works tonight: salad, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, homemade cloverleaf rolls with lots of real butter, apple pie and ice cream….

Ryan swallowed hard and stepped faster, his face stinging from the brisk winter wind. Wishing for his sheepskinlined jacket, which hung in the motel room, he noted how dark it was for 7:30 p.m.—black as pitch, thanks to heavy snow clouds—then glanced toward his destination, the Clearwater Café. Though a tree-tangled shortcut obscured his view of the building, Ryan could tell that vehicles filled the back parking lot. He couldn’t help but wonder why all these people weren’t at home, spending Christmas Eve with their families.

Ducking to avoid a low-hanging limb, Ryan entered the shadowy no-man’s-land that would save him steps, according to the motel desk clerk. Almost instantly, he stumbled over a rock, invisible under the patchy snow underfoot. Then a frozen tree branch slapped his cowboy hat off his head. Staggering like a wino on a cheap drunk, Ryan reseated his hat, then forged a path through the gnarled branches by pushing them, crackling and popping, away from his face.

So much for saving steps, he thought as his hat left his head again. Cursing his bad luck, Ryan bent to retrieve it. He heard the snap of a frozen twig. He sensed that he was not alone.

“Who’s there?” Ryan blurted out, words that barely left his lips before he saw a blur of motion and felt pain shoot through his head.

Chapter One

Humming “Blue Christmas,” the last song she’d heard inside the Clearwater Café that Thursday night, Danielle Sellica slipped behind the steering wheel of her car and set her one-more-for-the-road cup of coffee in the plastic holder designed for it.

She wrinkled her nose at the smell of old grease and cigarettes that permeated her denim jacket. Although a few minutes of fresh Colorado air would easily kill the scents, Dani didn’t get out of the car. It was already 8:30 p.m., and a one-hour drive home still lay ahead. Not that Dani minded the drive. She really didn’t. There was just so much to do before she could go to bed tonight—not the least of which was put up and decorate her Christmas tree.

A mood as blue as the Christmas of the song settled over her. Refusing to give in to it, Dani turned on the radio and quickly found a station playing something upbeat. She relished the cheerful tune, as well as the beauty of the snowflakes dancing in her headlights, for only a moment before turning the volume way up so she could sing “Holly Jolly Christmas” at the top of her voice.

It was the buzz of the car phone that brought an end to her off-key songfest some forty-five minutes later. Since only one person ever called her on the car telephonebought for emergency purposes only—Dani smiled and turned off the radio, then snatched up the receiver.

“How did you know I was in the car?” she demanded, instead of saying hello.

The familiar laughter of Jonni Lisa Maynard, a dear friend and neighbor, spilled forth. “Lucky guess.”

“Do I hear Jimmy Stewart in the background?”

“Of course. Have I ever made it through December without crying over It’s a Wonderful Life a couple of dozen times? For that matter, have you?”

It was Dani’s turn to laugh. They were both sentimental softies for sure. “No to both. Are you ready for Christmas tomorrow?”

“I’m proud to report that my presents are wrapped, my fruitcake is baked and my tree is up. How about you?”

“I’m not into fruitcakes, but my shopping, such as it is, is done.”

“What about your Christmas tree?” asked Jonni.

“The most beautiful Douglas fir in the world is in my trunk even as we speak. I’ll put it up the minute I get home.”

“And I thought I was running late! Any big plans for the holiday?”

“I’ll probably sew.”

“You mean you still haven’t finished Barbara’s wedding dress?” Jonni asked, referring to a mutual friend who planned a New Year’s Day wedding.

“Another lucky guess,” Dani told her, ruefully adding, “Would you believe she’s changed her mind about the sleeves three times?”

“I’d believe that. What I cannot believe is that you ever agreed to make it in the first place.”

“Temporary insanity?”

“Well, that beats the permanent kind, which is what I’ll be by the time Ricky goes back to school.” Ricky was Jonni’s rambunctious seven-year-old son, out of school for the holidays and already driving his mother nuts. She also had a four-year-old daughter named Pattie and was trying for a third child.

“Which reminds me—”

Thump. Thump.

A sudden sound, loud enough to make Dani abandon what she’d started to say about having presents for the children, seemed to be coming from the rear of the car. A flat? she automatically wondered with a mental sigh of dismay.

“Dani? You still there?”

“I’m here, and I’ve got a flat,” Dani replied even as she braked her car and eased off the asphalt.

“Oh, God,” Jonni exclaimed, clearly concerned. “Will you be okay?”

“Are you kidding? I can change a tire in five minutes with one hand in my pocket.” She didn’t add that she’d never had to do it on a lonely mountain road with the heavens spitting snow….

“Well, be careful. Two guys broke out of prison this morning—”

“Thanks so much for letting me know,” Dani retorted dryly, refusing to think about a prison break at Cañon City, less than fifty miles away.

“Oh, honey, I’m sorry—”

“I was teasing you. I’m not a bit scared. Now, I really have to go.”

“Please call me when you get home. I’ll worry until I hear from you.”

“I’ll call,” Dani promised, wishing her friend a Merry Christmas before hanging up.

With another sigh, this one of resignation, Dani killed the engine. After checking to see that the car was easily visible to approaching traffic, should there be any, she switched on the hazard blinkers. Flashlight in hand, Dani then got out of the car.

With purposeful strides, she walked around her vehicle, inspecting each tire in turn. There was no flat. Had she imagined that awful noise…?

Thump! Thump! Thump Thump Thump! As if on cue, it came again, only louder.

Dani whirled toward the sound, which seemed to be emanating from the trunk. For the first time, she noticed that Kyle Smith, the surly teenager who’d loaded her Douglas fir in the trunk, had not tied down the lid as she’d requested, but had closed it instead.

Wondering if something besides a Christmas tree now lay inside, Dani retrieved her keys from the ignition. Had that bad-mannered young man played some sort of practical joke on her? Dani wouldn’t have been surprised. He’d made it more than plain that carrying a Christmas tree from the service station, where she’d bought it, to her car, parked behind the café next door, was beneath him. Obviously she should have supervised the task instead of heading inside the eatery for her late dinner.

Though admittedly more outraged than afraid—some poor stray dog or cat was probably trapped inside the trunk—Dani did clutch the long-handled flashlight like a club. In truth, she was fully prepared to trounce whatever she found, should it prove dangerous.

Her ring full of keys jangled against the car when she inserted the right one in the lock—

“Thank God!”

Dani squealed and leaped back at the sound of the muffled masculine voice coming from inside her trunk.

“Hey!” Thump! Thump! “I’m dying in here! Let me out!”

She could not move. She could not think. For the first time, fear shimmied up her spine. How could this be? Had Kyle somehow fallen in…?

Or was one of the escaped convicts hiding in her trunk?

“Hel-looo? Anybody there?”

Heart hammering, Dani eased the key out of the lock. Not for anything was she going to open this trunk now.

“I know you’re out there. Open up, dammit.” Thump! Thump! “Open up now!”

With a gasp, Dani spun on her heel and lunged for the driver’s side of the car. In a heartbeat, she was behind the steering wheel. In another, she was speeding back to Clearwater. Destination: the police station. More than once, Dani glanced fearfully in the rearview mirror, half expecting to find a man in a bright orange jumpsuit with a number stenciled on it sitting in the back seat.

But he was in the trunk, not the back seat.

“Omigosh!”

What seemed an eternity later, but was really only forty minutes, Dani turned on two wheels into the parking lot adjacent to the Clearwater police station.

She greeted the officer on duty, Cliff Meeks, by name-they went back a long way—then spilled her story in a rush of words. Without comment, Cliff rose from the crackedvinyl swivel chair and headed straight down the hall to the exit that opened onto the parking lot.

“You don’t even seem surprised,” Dani commented, hurrying after him.

“Nothing could surprise me tonight,” drawled the relocated Texan, an old friend of Dani’s father. She didn’t have time to question the cryptic comment before they reached her car. Silently, Dani handed him the key. Then she took cover behind his considerable girth.

Instead of opening the trunk, Cliff slapped his hand down hard on the lid. “Hey in there! Chief Cliff Meeks, Clearwater Police, speaking. I want your name, and I want it now.”

“Ryan Given. Let me out.”

“Okay, Mr. Given, I will. But you should know that I’m armed, so don’t try anything funny.”

“I swear I won’t,” came the muffled reply. “Just let me outta here.”

His expression unreadable, Cliff pulled his gun, unlocked the trunk and tossed back the lid. Inside lay a man, as expected—a wide-shouldered, broad-chested, long-legged man. Dani took quick note of his clothing—western from head to toe—before dragging her gaze away.

A cowboy. A sweet-talking, good-looking, don’t-worryyore-pretty-li’l-head-about-it cowboy. She’d be safer with an escaped convict.

This cowboy’s groan of agony drew Dani’s gaze back to him. Without sympathy, she watched as the blue-eyed wrangler untangled his feet from a length of rope and unfolded himself from the trunk. It took an assist from Cliff, who for some reason had reholstered his weapon, to get the stranger fully on his feet. Then the man sat right back down on the rim of the open trunk, touching his fingertips to the back of his head. Dani saw blood on them.

“It’s about damn time,” the ungrateful stowaway commented, glancing at his blood-smeared hand. He looked accusingly from Cliff to her and then back to Cliff. “Are we really still in Clearwater after driving around for so long?”

“That’s right,” Cliff said, coolly adding, “ID, please.”

The man, clearly in a temper, shook his head. “Stolen by whoever locked me in here. I’m from Tulsa, Oklahoma, staying at the Garrett Motel. My eight-year-old son is with me…back at the motel, I mean. I told him I’d just be gone a minute—”

“You left an eight-year-old child alone in a motel room?” Dani blurted out in horror. If that wasn’t typical cowboy logic!

Ryan Given never wasted so much as a glance on her. “He’s probably wondering where I—”

“Sawyer is inside the station, Mr. Given. We picked him up two hours ago at the Garrett when the clerk called to report your disappearance.”

Ryan’s jaw dropped. “Two hours ago!” He glanced at the back of his wrist as though he usually wore a watch, which he didn’t now. “What the hell time is it?”

“Ten o’clock.”

“Damn!” Ryan leaped to his feet and immediately stumbled forward as if his legs were asleep. Or was he just dazed from his head wound? Dani wondered as both she and Cliff made a grab for him.

“Whoa, fella. Better take it easy,” Cliff said.

“But Sawyer—”

“Is just finishing two quarter-pound burgers, double fries, a large cola, and a fried pie. That boy can really put it away.”

Dani felt some of the tension leave the cowboy’s body. “You fed him?”

“We fed him.” Cliff grinned. “That’s quite a youngster you’ve got there, Mr. Given. Thanks to his description, I knew that you were who you said you were the minute I saw you,” the policeman continued, words that explained the reason he’d reholstered his gun.

Ryan relaxed so completely that Dani’s shoulders dipped under the weight of his muscled arm, now stretched across them.

“Dani, can you hang around long enough to give me your version of what happened tonight?” Cliff asked.

“I guess so,” she replied somewhat grudgingly. In truth, she wanted nothing more than to hightail it back to the sanctuary of her ranch. Dani, who worked hard to make her life an endless cycle of identical days, didn’t want or appreciate the excitement fate offered her this Christmas Eve.

At that reply, Ryan Given disengaged himself from both her and Cliff. When Dani automatically put distance between them, the cowboy gave her a once-over so thorough her entire body glowed with embarrassment. His expression said that what he saw did not impress him. Dani, who shouldn’t have cared less, nonetheless bristled.

“I guess I should thank you for bringing me back to Clearwater,” Ryan said. He put his fingers to the back of his head again and winced. His comment did nothing to soothe her ruffled feathers. His discomfort evoked no compassion.

“Don’t bother. I only did it because I thought you were one of the convicts who escaped this morning.” She turned to Cliff. “Have they been caught yet?”

“No, but it’s just a matter of time. We put out an APB right after the motel clerk saw them steal Mr. Given’s truck—”

“They stole my truck?”

Cliff nodded, his own expression full of the empathy Dani lacked. “We thought they’d taken you, too, as a hostage…speaking of which, your son is anxious for your safety. Why don’t we go on inside? I’ll tell you everything I know there, and we may even be able to rustle up another hamburger or two.”

Looking a little dazed, Ryan nodded. The two men then followed Dani into the station.

A good twenty minutes passed before Cliff, Ryan and Dani finally sat down in the break room to reconstruct the night’s events. She paid for her earlier lack of pity for Ryan by now blinking back tears that resulted from the emotional, if oddly restrained, reunion she witnessed between the cowboy and the young son who obviously adored him.

Admittedly interested in Ryan’s brief tale of attack, blow to the head and subsequent awakening—bound and gagged—in the trunk of her sedan, she nonetheless gave him only half of her attention. Sawyer Given, now watching an old black-and-white television in a corner of the room, owned the other half.

For an eight-year-old, he displayed remarkable maturity, she thought, recalling how solicitous he’d been of his father. Dani was not surprised by what appeared to be a role reversal. She was quite familiar with the phenomenon, having once cared for an irresponsible single parent such as Ryan.

That the man was single, she could only assume, of course. At any rate, there was no wife-mother on the scene, and neither Ryan nor Sawyer had mentioned one. Clearly, the boy was used to seeing to dear old dad. Dani resented the injustice, one she’d experienced herself as a fifteen-year-old when her rancher father died too young and her pampered mother, Eileen, became dependent on her.

Unbidden, scenes from the past, long suppressed, filled her head—scenes of cooking her own breakfast before school so Eileen could sleep late, scenes of nights at home alone while yet another sweet-talking man wined and dined her mother in town. Dani surfaced from the swirling eddy of memories with difficulty and only because she heard someone speak her name.

“Want to tell us your story now?” It was Cliff, and he sat with pencil poised over one of countless forms he’d undoubtedly have to fill out tonight.

“Not much to tell,” Dani replied. “I parked my car at Clearwater Café around seven o’clock—”

“In the back lot?” Cliff asked.

“Yes, the front one was full. I saw the Christmas trees at Smith’s Station next door, so I walked over there to get one before going into the café. I told Kyle—you know, Ed Smith’s youngest?—to tie down the trunk instead of locking it so the branches wouldn’t be crushed, then I went on inside the café to eat. It was awfully crowded, so I didn’t get out of there again until eight-thirty or so.”

“And you were where when you heard Mr. Given in the trunk?”

“Almost home,” Dani said with a sigh, wishing she were there now. Every muscle in her body ached with fatiguenot surprising since her Thursday had begun at 5:00 a.m. “I was talking to Jonni Maynard on that phone you insisted I buy—” she gave Cliff a smile “—when I first heard him banging around back there. I guess he’d just woke up.”

“Actually, I’d just freed my hands and was trying to get your attention,” Ryan grumbled. “I couldn’t make myself heard over your serenade.”

Dani glared at him to cover her embarrassment at being caught singing. “I turned off the radio the moment the phone rang. Why didn’t you try again then?”

“I wanted to hear what you had to say.” He shrugged. “I thought you were the one who locked me up.”

Dani huffed her opinion of that. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“I hadn’t seen you, remember?”

Apparently, he could tell she wasn’t physically capable of hoisting him into the trunk. “I was referring to the radio. Didn’t you think it odd that someone who’d just mugged you would then sing Christmas carols all the way home?”

“Hell, lady, I—”

“Can’t you say a word without cursing?” She shot a meaningful glance at Sawyer, whom she considered to be at a very impressionable age.

To Dani’s surprise—she expected a “Mind your own business!”—Ryan followed her gaze. He flushed beet-red. “Sorry, ma’am. I guess I left my manners in the trunk of your car.” Looking somewhat subdued, he turned to Cliff. “Sawyer and I are in the process of moving to Wyoming, Chief Meeks. We’re going to buy ourselves a ranch there. Everything we own but one suitcase was on that truck, including our traveling cash.”