Trouble At Lone Spur (29 page)

“Well, in that case…” Gil stepped close and took her into his arms. “I thought you looked at that ring the same way you looked at me the night before, when we made love. I wanted to give you everything I had then—and I still do.”

Flustered by the vivid memory, Liz stammered, “But…but what about Dustin? He hates me, Gil. I know he does.”

“I don’t, neither. I swear.” The earnest voice emerged from the shadows.

“He means it,” a second excited child promised. “An’ he won’t pull no more mean tricks on you. ‘Cause he said, and we believe him.” Rusty and Melody dragged Dustin into the center of the room. All three had applepie-filling spread from ear to ear. Dustin tried hard to look humble, but he didn’t have the face for it. He happened to be blessed with red hair, freckles and a devilish gap-toothed smile.

“Grandmother and Grandfather said they’d keep us while you go on vacation,” Melody announced, hurrying up to Gil.

Dusty jabbed her with his good elbow. “Not vacation, Jell-O-brain. Honeymoon. That’s what people do when they get married. Buddy Hodges said they rent a room at some fancy hotel and—”

“That’s quite enough, Dustin,” Gil broke in. “Lizbeth and I will take pictures of Acapulco so you can show Buddy exactly what the hotel and the beach look like. And stop calling Melody names. She’s going to be your sister.”

Liz covered her mouth to keep from laughing. “Wait a minute, guys,” she said. “Haven’t you put the cart before the horse?”

The room got so quiet the occupants could have heard an ash fall. Gil and the twins gazed at Lizbeth. A triple hit of curiosity from matched hazel eyes. Melody’s were darker, but also full of questions. Even her parents hovered in the kitchen doorway, exchanging puzzled glances.

“Honeymoons follow weddings, which normally come after acceptance of a proposal—usually preceded by a declaration of love.” Liz crossed her arms. “It’s a big leap from how I left things at the Lone Spur. A very big leap.”

The twins and Gil all began talking at once. Suddenly a piercing whistle rent the air. Everyone in the room turned and gaped at Lizbeth’s sweet delicate-looking mother. “Seconds on pie, anyone?” Her suggestion was as innocent as her smile. But that was all it took to clear the room. The kitchen door swung gently closed on Toliver Whitley’s heels.

Lizbeth led Gil to the chintz-covered couch. “Suppose you start by telling me why you hired Lex Burnaby to replace me as Lone Spur’s farrier.”

“Suppose I start by telling you how much I love you, Lizbeth Robbins.” And that was exactly what Gil did, which greatly impeded the progress of telling Liz about Ginger’s mischief.

They traded stories throughout the afternoon. By evening their tales were interspersed with lengthy kisses. Nightfall brought a resolution. Gil’s announcement of their forthcoming marriage sent up a cheer from the pielogged family members waiting in the wings.

Late that night, when the house was dark and silent, Gil tiptoed into Lizbeth’s room. “I’m not big on words,” he murmured against her lips, “but I want you to have this as a token of my love forever.” He carefully parted the ties of her white cotton nightie and fastened the golden spur around her neck on a slender chain her mother had lent him.

“I love you, Gil. And I’ll cherish this forever, because one way or another it would have brought us together.”

“Oh? How so?”

An impish smile played at the corners of her mouth. “I was about to march it right back to your ranch and cause more trouble than the Lone Spur’s ever seen.”

Gil kissed her slowly and thoroughly. “Sweetheart, this kind of trouble I can handle.”

L
IZBETH MADE
a beautiful June bride. Nan Littlefield was her only attendant. Unlike her first wedding, this time Toliver Whitley proudly walked her down the aisle. Melody looked sweet and demure as she dropped rose petals from her flower-girl’s basket. The only hitch in the wedding came when the twins, who were charged with carrying the pillow bearing matching wedding bands, didn’t want to share the duty. Somehow in jerking the pillow back and forth, their dad’s ring came undone and flew into the audience.

But what’s a best man for, if not to come to the rescue? Morris Littlefield got down on the knees of his new Western suit and crawled between the church pews until he found the ring.

Gil laughed and gave him a big hand for his performance. The chaos seemed so normal that Liz, who’d been extremely nervous, relaxed and enjoyed their most special day.

Acapulco in June exceeded the beauty promised in travel brochures. Walking down the beach holding hands, Gil finally gave up nibbling Lizbeth’s ear. “That’s your third roll of film,” he reminded her around a groan. “Doesn’t one sunset look like another?”

“At the reception, didn’t you see Buddy Hodges deep in conversation with our kids? I’m going to make that
boy a honeymoon scrapbook so he’ll quit spreading lies about what men and women do when they fall in love.”

“I hope there’ll be gaps in this exposé, my love.” Chuckling, Gil led Liz back to their room, where he soon divested her of the bikini swimsuit that had been one of Nan’s gifts to the bride. Afterward, when they lay naked and entwined in each other’s arms, he reminded her that this would be one very large gap in Buddy’s album.

Two glorious weeks later Buddy’s scrapbook made a big splash all over town.

N
INE MONTHS
from the day of their wedding, Liz gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl. It blew their image, and the small town buzzed with speculation as to how Mr. and Mrs. Gilman Spencer had
really
spent their honeymoon.

Rafe, Luke and Yancy paid a visit to Liz in the hospital. They brought pink and blue gifts for the babies and stayed to lament the loss of the best darned farrier in the state of Texas.

Ben Jones hobbled in, aided by a cane. “Good thing your folks moved into the cottage,” he told Liz. “Tell ‘em to get skateboards. Twins keep a body hoppin’.”

Dusty, Rusty and Melody had a lively argument over names. Surprisingly Dustin insisted his sister be named Rachel. “Like this girl I know at school,” he said shyly. Eventually the three kids settled on Wade as a name for their brother. The book of names Lizbeth had bought suggested someone named Wade was a “cool dude.” Oddly enough Wade happened to be the name of Gil’s grandfather, so it stuck.

During the first lull in visitors, Gil presented Lizbeth with earrings to match her gold-and-diamond spur necklace. “It’s hard to believe, but the first time I laid
eyes on you, I said to myself that you spelled trouble for the Lone Spur. I was right. Another set of twins.” He grinned.

“Trouble? Me?” First Liz looked annoyed, then she threw back her head and chortled. “I thought you were a hardheaded perfectionist who didn’t give second chances.” Leaning forward, she kissed him lingeringly on the lips. “This is one time I’m supremely glad to have been proved wrong.”

“Could somebody get that on tape?” Gil murmured as he gathered her close to deepen the kiss.

“Ick. Suck face,” the three children popped up and shouted in unison. Rolling his eyes, Dustin herded his siblings from the room. “According to Buddy Hodges…”

Gil and Lizbeth ended the kiss and broke up laughing. “I know what the real trouble is at Lone Spur,” Liz confided with a wink. “It’s Buddy Hodges. What do you suppose that kid’ll be if the neighbors ever let him grow up?”

“A marriage counselor,” Gil muttered. “Or a doctor. Come to think of it, I may finance his education myself. At least buy him a good anatomy book. It just might save us going gray before our time, Mrs. Spencer.”

eISBN 978-14592-7808-0

TROUBLE AT LONE SPUR

Copyright © 1996 by Rosaline Fox.

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