Hazard Ranch by Joan Johnston

Author:Joan Johnston [Johnston, Joan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781488097577
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 1991-02-15T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 6

How should you behave in a Woolly West bar?

Answer: You don’t have to behave in a Woolly West bar.

Over the next three weeks Nathan thought about all the ways he could end the Hazard-Alistair feud. And kept coming back to the same one: He could marry Harry-et Alistair. Of course, that solution raised its own set of problems. Not the least of which was how he was going to convince Harry-et Alistair to marry him.

The way Nathan had it figured, marrying Harry-et would have all kinds of benefits. First of all, once they were married, there wouldn’t be any more Alistair land; it would all be Hazard land. Second, the feud would necessarily come to an end, since all future Hazards would also be Alistairs. And third—and Nathan found this argument for marriage both the most and the least compelling—he would have Harry-et Alistair for his wife.

Although Nathan was undeniably attracted to Harry-et, he wasn’t convinced she was the right woman for him. Except every time he thought of a lifetime spent without her, it seemed a bleak existence, indeed. So maybe he was going to have to take care of her more than he would have liked. It wasn’t something he hadn’t done in the past. He could handle it. He’d finally admitted to himself that he was willing to pull ten times the normal load in order to spend his life with Harry-et Alistair.

Only the last time he’d driven onto her place she’d met him at the end of her road with a Winchester. He’d had no choice except to leave. He hadn’t figured out a way yet to get past that rifle.

Nathan was sitting at his regular booth at The Grand, aimlessly stirring his chicken noodle soup, when Slim Harley came running in looking for him.

“She’s done it now!” Slim said, skidding to a stop at Nathan’s booth.

“Done what?”

“Lost Cyrus’s ranch for sure,” Slim said.

Nathan grabbed Slim by his shirt at the throat. “Lost it how? You didn’t call in her bill, did you? I told you I was good for it if you needed the cash.”

“Weren’t me,” Slim said, trying to free Nathan’s hold without success. “It’s John Wilkinson at the bank. Says he can’t loan her any money to pay the lease on her government land. Says she ain’t a good credit risk.”

“Where is she now?”

“At the bank. I just—” Slim found himself talking to thin air as Nathan shoved past him and took off out the door of The Grand, heading for the bank across the street.

When Nathan entered the bank, he saw Harry-et sitting in front of John Wilkinson’s desk. He casually walked over to one of the tellers nearby and started filling out a deposit slip.

“But I’ve told you I have a trust I can access when I’m thirty,” Harry was saying.

“That’s still four years off.”

Nathan folded the deposit slip in half and stuck it in his back pocket. He meandered over toward John’s desk and said, “I couldn’t help overhearing.

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