Double Nickel Ranch outside of Aspen. A ranch belonging to a family named Lassiter.
In two weeks, Russ Underwood, Elizabeth’s father, would marry the matriarch of the Lassiter family, Mary Lassiter.
Coming to Colorado wasn’t easy for her, but Elizabeth couldn’t refuse to attend her father’s wedding. She knew Russ wanted to introduce her to his future bride and his bride’s family.
Russ had told Elizabeth all about the bride’s family. About the three perfect daughters who knew all there was to know about ranching and cows and horses. Daughters who were everything Elizabeth would never be. And the perfect son, an absolute paragon, a cowboy to top all cowboys. A man who could do no wrong in Russ’s eyes.
Unlike Elizabeth’s late husband, who’d rated somewhere below bread mold on Russ Underwood’s judgment scale.
The plane taxied up to the gate in Denver. The man sitting in the window seat next to Elizabeth gave her a dirty look and shot past into the crowded airliner aisle. She didn’t blame him. The last hour and twenty minutes must have seemed interminable to the man.
Elizabeth didn’t blame Jamie either. Her son preferred to approach life at his own speed and on his own terms. The combination of too many strangers, too much noise, too many new experiences, and forced confinement to his mother’s lap had overwhelmed her normally sweet-tempered son.
A short walk brought Elizabeth to the gate for the commuter flight to Aspen. With a half hour to spare, she put Jamie on the floor, giving him a brief spell of freedom. He quickly crawled to the nearest row of chairs and pulled himself up on short, stubby legs. Hanging on for dear life, her son made his way down the row of seats, looking back frequently to confirm his mother’s presence.
Giving Jamie a reassuring smile, Elizabeth dumped her two carry-on bags on the floor and sat, her back sagging wearily against the chair.
A cowboy moved down the center of the concourse in Elizabeth’s direction, his long legs covering ground in a deceptively slow amble. With his wide-brimmed black hat, boots, blue jeans and tan, western-style, sports jacket, he looked as if he’d stepped straight out of a Hollywood western.
For all the man’s loose-limbed amble, something about his walk hinted at harnessed strength and controlled power. A shiver ran down Elizabeth’s spine as an image from a TV documentary flashed across her mind. A mountain lion on the prowl.
He was one of the sexiest-looking men she’d ever seen. His striking good looks and bone-deep self-assurance attracted the interested gaze of every woman in the vicinity.
An interest he reciprocated, judging by the way he inspected each woman he passed. He caught sight of Elizabeth, and his gaze lingered on her, appraising her.
Butterflies fluttered deep in her stomach, and Elizabeth turned away. She was a single mother, a twenty-nine-year-old widow. Sexy hunks had no place in her life.
After a few minutes, a perverse curiosity compelled her to look for the cowboy. He stood on the other side of the boarding area, his casual stance at odds with the way he scrutinized arriving passengers.
From the corner of her eye, Elizabeth saw Jamie drop to all fours and speed toward a discarded candy wrapper on the floor. “Yuk, nasty. Give to Mama.” Down on her knees, she confiscated her son’s treasure, making silly faces to distract him. Jamie grabbed her hair with both fists and giggled with delight. Pulling him toward her, Elizabeth hugged his warmth and blew kisses against his silky neck. She loved this perfect little being more than she would have believed possible.
A pair of dark, worn boots walked into her field of vision. “Mrs. Randall?” asked a deep, pleasant voice.
Elizabeth sat back on her heels and looked up. Way up. “Who are you?”
The man unleashed a slow, toe-curling smile. “Worth Lassiter. You are Elizabeth Randall?”
She should have guessed. The perfect Worth Lassiter. Elizabeth looked like something even the cat would refuse to drag in, and he looked as if he’d never had a bad hair day in his life. “How did you know who I am?”
“Russ told me to look for the prettiest woman with the best-looking kid.”
Irritation flared at the glib lie. Her father would say no such thing, and if he had, Elizabeth in her rumpled, stained clothes and messy hair hardly fit the description. The man had obviously zeroed in on her red hair.
When she made no response, Worth Lassiter squatted on his heels and held out a big hand to Jamie. “Hey there, partner.”
Jamie pressed back against Elizabeth and thrust his thumb in his mouth, his wide eyes staring.
“He doesn’t like strangers,” she said curtly.
Leaving his hand outstretched a few inches from Jamie, Worth Lassiter casually wiggled his fingers and looked at Elizabeth. “I’d hoped to be here in time to meet your plane from Lincoln, but I got hung up in traffic on Pena Boulevard.”
Apprehension prickled unpleasantly at the back of her neck. He could walk and talk as lazily as he wanted, but intuition told her his bright blue eyes would see things she wanted no one seeing. “Why would you meet my plane from Nebraska? I’m flying to Aspen. No one said anything to me about driving there.”
“I had business in Denver. I flew up yesterday and took care of it so I can fly back to Aspen with you. You look as if you could use some help. I’ll bet this little guy runs his mom ragged.”
Elizabeth’s chin rose. She didn’t need some candidate for Hollywood pointing out her disheveled state or assuming she was unable to cope with her son. Worth Lassiter wouldn’t look so smug and self-assured and—and clean if he’d traveled clear across the state of Nebraska with a cranky baby. “You needn’t have troubled,” she said stiffly. “I’m managing just fine on my own.”
The network of squint lines around his eyes deepened. “You’d think a man with three sisters would know better than to suggest a woman needs a man’s help with anything.”
The amusement in his voice scratched against her frayed emotions like fingernails on a chalkboard. She shouldn’t have come. It was going to take more strength than she possessed to make it through this visit.
Jamie giggled and lunged for a wiggling finger.
Elizabeth snatched her son and started to stand, but her right leg had gone to sleep, and she staggered, landing in an undignified sprawl flat on her back on the floor. Jamie squealed with delight at the new game, bouncing excitedly on her stomach. People walking by stared down at her. Squeezing her eyes shut in embarrassment, Elizabeth lay on the floor, praying she’d find herself back in Nebraska when she opened them.
So much for the power of her prayers.
“Are you all right?”
One look at Worth Lassiter’s face told Elizabeth he could barely keep from laughing as he stood and extended his hand.
Once, she might have laughed with him.
Barely maintaining a fingernail grip on what little composure she still possessed, Elizabeth hung on to Jamie. “I don’t need your help. I don’t want your help. Go away.”
Worth Lassiter put both hands in the
