Page 15 of Seven Brides for Beau McBride (The McBrides of Montana #3)

Ellie stepped off the train and into Diana’s shadow.

She was unprepared for the perfume of the place.

It quite knocked her senseless. Pine and woodsmoke, the peppery bright scent of fallen autumn leaves and the loamy scent of earth; even the warmth of the sunshine seemed to carry an aroma—a linen fresh smell, like sheets pulled from the press.

There wasn’t a lick of wind, and the woods were somnolent and lazy in the sunny fall afternoon.

Diana seemed unstruck by the scents and was scanning the platform for her groom. “I can’t see him,” Diana murmured.

“Well, good morning, miss,” the station master greeted Diana, tipping his cap. He was beaming from ear to ear. “Welcome to the fine town of Bitterroot. Population somewhere north of thirty as of yesterday.”

“Thank you.” Diana beamed back at him. The station master didn’t so much as glance at Ellie, he was so dazzled by Diana.

“Miss Newchurch!”

They both turned in the direction of the voice.

Diana seemed composed. Ellie was not.

Because the man greeting Diana was same man who’d attacked the poor girl in blue. He strode away from his victim, abandoning her mid-fight. And when the girl stepped out of the shadows Ellie could see that she couldn’t be more than sixteen. What kind of man threatened a child ?

As the man approached, Ellie saw he was most definitely the man from Diana’s portrait. Only the portrait hadn’t done him justice. Which seemed absurd. How could he be even better looking than a Bourbon prince?

No bit of charcoal could capture the depth of his lush sensuality.

He doffed an expensive hat, his dark curls tumbling whimsically across his high forehead, a charming smile curving that sharp cupid’s bow, his thickly lashed eyes shining like liquid as he took Diana in.

He was tall, broad shouldered and lean hipped, and he moved with lazy grace.

This was Beau McBride.

Ellie watched, appalled, as he smiled at her friend.

No. It couldn’t be him. Not the child-abuser.

And yet, there they were, he and Diana, sizing each other up.

Good lord. They made a stupidly good-looking couple, Ellie thought dumbly.

Diana was silvery as moonlight against Beau McBride’s velvet night.

And, judging by the way they were staring at each other, they both liked what they saw.

Diana even gave a soft breathless sigh, which Ellie had never heard before.

But Diana could only sigh like that because she hadn’t seen him tearing after that poor child, screaming bloody murder. He still had the dirt on his coat from when the station master had sent him sprawling.

“Miss Newchurch,” Beau McBride said softly. His voice was as pretty as his face, a low warm husk, deeper than Ellie expected. He exhaled as he regarded Diana, and his smile broadened. He had perfectly straight, white, beautiful teeth. “I’m Beau.”

“Delighted to meet you… Beau.” Diana lifted her hand for him to take, and he stared at it briefly, a little starry-eyed. Dazed, he bent over it in a ducking little bow.

“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” the poor abused girl in blue declared, kicking a puff of dust in their direction. “You make me sick.” And she stalked off down the length of the platform, peering up at the windows of the train.

“Excuse her, she’s out of sorts,” Beau McBride apologized, without even looking at the girl in blue as she strode off.

“I can’t imagine why,” Ellie said sharply. He’d harassed that girl in broad daylight and now he was completely without shame about it!

Beau McBride finally noticed her, there in Diana’s shadow. He had to peer around Diana to get a clear look at her, his gaze sweeping over her ugly brown dress and figure-hiding shawl, lingering briefly on her messy braids before he met her gaze.

Ellie stared back. She didn’t like bullies.

She’d met a lot of them in her life, starting with her stepfather and continuing with all the overseers at the mill.

Her stepfather had raged at her and manhandled her, and she’d been too young and cowardly to fight back.

But she hadn’t made the same mistake at the mill.

She’d refused to give those browbeaters the satisfaction of seeing her fear.

Because if there was one thing Ellie had learned, it was that if you let a bully take an inch, they’d take a mile.

And she’d seen enough of Beau McBride chasing that poor child to know that he was a bully, through and through.

Even if he did have beautiful liquid dark eyes.

Beau blinked, startled by her bold and frankly disdainful stare.

“Oh.” Diana was smiling prettily, ignoring Ellie’s sharpness. “Beau. This is my friend Ellie. Eleanor. I mean, Miss Eleanor Neale.”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” But he didn’t sound pleased, he sounded disconcerted. With a face like that he was probably used to women melting at his feet, no matter how appalling his behavior.

Honestly, Ellie had a hard time reconciling this man with the letters she’d read.

She couldn’t in her wildest dreams imagine this man lying in a field watching the bugs and butterflies.

He’d mess up his fancy clothes. She’d imagined the Beau McBride from the letters in working clothes, not this fancy blue coat and rolled brim hat.

Even now, he was brushing the dirt off himself with brisk strokes.

She couldn’t imagine him wandering through autumnal woods.

She glanced down at his boots. They might be dusty, but they were new, and they looked expensive.

“You brought your friend with you?” Beau McBride turned back to Diana, effectively dismissing Ellie. His gaze had softened again now it was back on Diana, but he looked puzzled.

“Oh, no. I mean, yes. But she’s also here to get married.” Diana threaded her arm through Ellie’s. “Ellie is my oldest, dearest friend. We’re practically sisters. She also answered an advertisement, so we could be together. I think one of your brothers might be expecting her?”

“Or cousin,” Ellie reminded Diana. After all, no matter how they tried they couldn’t decipher the first name on that letter.

“My…?” Beau McBride blanched, as though someone had stomped on his foot. “She answered an advertisement too…” He seemed at a loss. “ She answered an advertisement? Your friend? She did? To be a wife?”

Ellie flushed. She didn’t like his tone. She might not be a beauty like Diana, but she wasn’t nothing. She was wallpaper, not a ruin , for heaven’s sake. Was it so impossible to believe that someone would want to marry her? Did he think she wasn’t good enough for his brother?

His gaze was back on Ellie now. “ You answered an advertisement?”

“Yes,” she said shortly, feeling more and more insulted. If anything, she was too good for anyone related to this child-assaulter.

Beau McBride was looking pinched. “And what’s his name, this man you’re marrying?”

Ellie flushed. Her ears burned hot as coals. Where was his brother or cousin or whatever he was, anyway?

“Junebug!” Beau’s abrupt yell made Ellie just about jump out of her skin. “Git your ass here now!”

The girl in blue had reached the caboose at the back of the train and had climbed up to peer inside. “I ain’t talking to you!” she yelled back. Her hand jabbed the air in a rude gesture.

A muscle jumped in Beau’s heart-shaped jaw. “I think you’ll find what you’re looking for over here,” he bellowed at the girl. “Sorry for her crudeness,” he apologized to Diana. “She has the manners of an untrained dog.”

“Are you just going to stand there and let him yell at the poor child?” Ellie demanded of the station master, who was watching the exchange with bewildering amiability.

“Oh, he ain’t really yelling,” the man said affably, “he’s just getting her attention.”

“She deserves to be yelled at.” Beau McBride was terse. “Trust me, any yelling I do at her is righteous.”

“Excuse me,” Diana’s cool voice slid into the heated exchange, “may I ask who she is? The girl you may or may not be yelling at?”

Ellie jumped in. Diana had to know. “She’s the girl who was being assaulted when we arrived! And this is the man who was assaulting her.” Ellie pulled on Diana’s arm. “We need to leave here, Diana, you can’t possibly marry a man who assaults children!”

“Assaults children?” Beau McBride was astonished. “I ain’t never assaulted a child in my life! And you should know that she ain’t a child, she’s a demon.”

Ellie glared at him. “I saw you with my own eyes!”

“Well, he ain’t exactly lying,” the station master said, a touch reluctantly, “she can be a bit of a handful.”

“I ain’t no handful!” The girl in blue had joined them and was sizing them all up with snapping grey eyes. “I’m at least an armful, possibly two. More’n he can handle anyway.” She shot Beau McBride a disdainful look.

Now that she was up close, Ellie could see her striking resemblance to Beau McBride.

The same heart-shaped face, the same wild dark curls, the same expressive brows.

The same scowl. Both of them were beautiful, in a profane kind of way.

They were also both the worse for wear, dusty and rumpled from their fight.

“May I introduce my sister,” Beau said tightly, not bothering to hide his exasperation. “Miss Junebug McBride, the biggest pain in the ass this side of the Great Plains.”

Junebug. The sister from the letters. You’ll like her. Everybody does, although mostly against their better judgment.

Beau made a sweeping gesture, drawing Junebug’s attention to Ellie. “And Junebug, may I introduce…?”

He’d forgotten her name already. Ellie lifted her chin and tried to channel Diana’s icy poise. “Miss Eleanor Neale.”

“She’s Miss Newchurch’s friend,” he told his sister pointedly. “They arrived together .”

The girl ignored her brother. She examined Ellie from braids to toe. “You wore a nicer dress in the photograph,” she said eventually, a touch disgruntled. “This thing is hideous.”