Where the Creek Bends

Chapter 1

1

She burst—no, erupted— through a shimmering splash of sunshine, like a human bullet, or an angel busting in from a neighboring realm, where magic was the rule rather than the rare exception.

Half-blinded by the glare—it was mid-July, the Montana sky was sugar-bowl blue, and he was sweating in his town marshal getup—Liam McKettrick squinted hard, sure he was seeing things.

Too much stress, too little sleep.

But she was real.

A bride, in full regalia, veil billowing, lacy skirts and snow-white train trailing in the dry dust of Bitter Gulch’s Main Street, heading straight for the Hard Luck Saloon.

Liam, standing on the balcony outside the make-believe brothel above the very authentic—and currently empty—establishment below, bolted for the back stairs.

Whatever was going on here, he damn well wasn’t about to miss it.

He’d just entered the saloon and established himself behind the long bar, idly wiping out a glass with a piece of cloth, when she arrived.

She pushed back the swinging doors with both palms, then swept across the sawdust floor to the bar.

After hoisting herself onto a stool, she folded back her veil, blew a strand of brown-gold hair off her forehead with a long, resigned breath, and rested one hand on the polished surface between them.

“Set ’em up, bartender,” she said.

Liam was doing his damnedest not to grin.

The situation was wild.

And way more fun than he’d ever expected to have on an ordinary day in the “town” of Bitter Gulch—an oasis of fantasy, a place where men, women and children came to escape the modern world for a while and experience the Old West.

Standing at the southern edge of Painted Pony Creek, Montana, Bitter Gulch was Liam’s brainchild; he’d designed it. Hired his younger brother, Jesse, to oversee the construction phase.

Liam swallowed, unable to look away from the bride, especially now that she was up close and very personal. Just across the bar.

She smelled of dust, subtle perfume and something sugary.

“What’ll it be?” he asked, his voice slightly hoarse. He didn’t use it much, his voice, as a general rule, and it was only eleven o’clock in the morning, according to the huge antique wall clock on the opposite wall.

So his social skills were still resurfacing.

She paused to ponder the question, looking solemn. She had wide hazel eyes, heavily lashed, and full of—something. Indignation, clearly, and confusion.

Pain, too, though she was doing a fairly good job of hiding that.

Liam’s heart, usually heavily defended, like an isolated cavalry fort in those thrilling days of yesteryear, besieged by furious warriors riding painted ponies, hitched, and hitched hard.

“Whiskey,” the woman decided.

“What kind?” Whiskey was whiskey, and he could have poured a shot without asking another question, but he wanted to extend this encounter.

It was amazing.

She was amazing, with those expressive eyes. Her skin was flawless, her lips full, and her shining brown hair, now slightly out of kilter under the exquisitely made veil, a lacy affair that might have been assembled from starlight and spider webs, in some strange and secret place beyond the tattered edges of the ordinary world.

“Any kind,” she responded.

Liam nodded, put his hand out and introduced himself. “Liam McKettrick,” he said.

They shook. Her hand felt dainty, but strong, too.

“Madison Bettencourt,” she replied, straightening her spine and lifting her chin a little. Tears rose along her lower lashes and smudged her mascara when she brushed them away with the back of one hand. “By now, I would have been Madison Sterne ,” she told him. “But I bolted.”

Liam poured two fingers of Maker’s Mark into a clean glass, listening not just with his ears, but with the whole of his being.

It was an unusual thing, the way his senses seemed to be revving up, as if he were a race car instead of a man.

He’d never felt anything quite like this before.

“Ice?” he asked. He pushed the glass toward her—slid it, more like. He wasn’t planning on making any sudden moves, lest she dissolve into sparkling particles and disappear. “Maybe some cola?”

Madison glanced back at the double doors, looking a little uneasy. “Ice,” she said resolutely. “Otherwise, I’ll take it straight.”

Again, Liam wanted to laugh, but he knew that would be a mistake.

He filled a paper cup at the ice machine, brought it to Madison without another word.

“Is this place real?” she asked after dumping the ice unceremoniously into her glass, causing some of it to splash over the rim and stand melting on the scarred wooden surface of the bar.

“What do you mean, is it real?” Liam asked, amused, and not completely able to hide it, try though he did.

“It’s like going back in time or something,” Madison responded, after a long sip of whiskey. “One minute, I was at my wedding , across the road, finding out I’d just said ‘I do’ to a total pushover of a mama’s boy, and the next—” She paused, raised and lowered her shoulders in a semi-shrug, and gazed sadly down into her drink.

A moment later, the lovely shoulders slumped slightly, and the sight gave Liam a twinge, deep in his chest. If he’d known her for more than five minutes, he would have put his arms around her right then and there, held her close. Reassured her somehow.

Yet another bad idea.

A few seconds of silence stumbled by. Then she looked up, met his eyes, and finished with, “The next minute, I was here, in the Old West. In a real saloon.” Another sigh. “You know what I wish, Liam McKettrick the bartender? I wish I really could go back in time. Be somebody else. Live a different life—an entirely different life.”

Madison took another swig of her whiskey. At this rate, she was going to be disastrously drunk, and soon.

Liam moved the bottle out of sight and leaned against the bar, bracing himself with his forearms.

She looked him over, taking in his collarless white cotton shirt, the black waistcoat he always wore when he spent time in Bitter Gulch. Along with his tall, scuffed boots, suspenders and itchy woolen trousers—not to mention the shiny silver star pinned to his coat—the outfit added to the ambience.

And Bitter Gulch was all about ambience.

That was the point of the exercise.

Tourists came from all over the world to don costumes, live the Old West experience. Movies were filmed there, on occasion, along with TV series for all the major players in the streaming game.

Liam knew most of the visitors wouldn’t have lasted a day in the real Old West, but then, that didn’t matter. They were paying to pretend, not to teleport themselves back to a previous century, when most of the amenities they were used to had yet to exist. Hot and cold running water had been a rarity in communities like Painted Pony Creek, electricity a fledgling science, and Wi-Fi—well, nonexistent, of course.

He pictured his kids, Keely, nine, and Cavan, seven, riding in wagons or on horseback everywhere they went, stripped of their cell phones, their tablets, the huge flat-screen TV in their grandparents’ family room, and smiled.

God, he missed them.

“You wouldn’t like it,” he responded, at some length. He’d gotten lost in those lovely eyes of hers, along with his own thoughts.

“I wouldn’t like what?” she asked, still putting on a brave front.

“Life in the past,” he replied. “There are reasons why we’re advised to live in the present, you know.”

She let the remark pass.

“Are you really a lawman?” Madison inquired, having drained her glass while Liam was pondering the situation and, as always, wishing Keely and Cavan were with him instead of far away, staying with their grandparents in Seattle.

Liam allowed himself a minimal grin, really just an uptick at one corner of his mouth, hardly noticeable to the casual observer. “No,” he replied. “I’m an architect.”

Madison frowned, musing again. She was getting tipsy, and Liam wondered how much champagne she’d had before deciding to ditch the mama’s boy.

What a numbskull that guy must be.

“You don’t look like an architect,” she responded solemnly.

“What does an architect look like?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Madison answered, still as serious as the proverbial heart attack. “But I’d have pegged you for an actor, with your dark hair and those indigo-blue eyes and—well,” she paused, gestured with both hands, indicating their surroundings. “When I picture an architect, I guess I see someone more—ordinary. Like an accountant.”

“An accountant,” Liam echoed, hiding another grin.

“Whatever,” Madison said, and now she sounded cheerier, although the word got tangled up in her tongue before she turned it loose.

Resolutely, she slapped the bar again. “More whiskey.”

“Look,” Liam reasoned. “Maybe it isn’t the best idea—”

“Are you cutting me off?” she interrupted, though calmly. Her beautifully shaped eyebrows drew together for a moment.

“No,” Liam replied. “I’m just suggesting that, after what happened today, you might want to pace yourself a bit. That’s all.”

“Do you want to know, Liam McKettrick, architect and barkeep, just what did happen? I mean, bartenders are supposed to be good listeners, right?”

“I’d say I’m a pretty fair listener,” Liam allowed. Then, knowing he’d already lost the argument, unspoken though it was, he picked up the bottle he’d set aside moments before, twisted off the cap, and poured her a double.

“I could use one of those right about now,” Madison replied, after another healthy swig of liquor. “A good listener, I mean.”

“Okay, shoot,” Liam said. He’d done a lot of listening in his life, largely because he was a man, as the saying goes, of few words. So many people were uncomfortable with silence, felt a need to speak into it. “What happened?”

Madison mirrored his earlier posture, leaning on her forearms, all but hidden by puffy sleeves, and said in a confidential tone, “You won’t believe it.”

“Try me,” Liam urged. Standing back a little, to give the runaway bride some space. No sense crowding her.

She seemed solid, but magical, too, which meant she could be a figment of his imagination, not a regular woman.

“I really thought Jeffrey was the man for me,” she began, shaking her head, apparently reflecting upon her previous choices. “He ticked all the right boxes. He was handsome, employed, and he said he wanted kids.”

Liam raised one eyebrow, though he was pretty sure she didn’t notice that. She was too involved in the story she was telling.

“Your first husband?” he prompted casually, picking up the cloth, wiping down the spotless surface of the bar, glancing at the clock again. In less than an hour, Bitter Gulch would be open for business, bustling with appropriately costumed employees and the usual horde of families on summer vacation.

This delightful interlude would be over.

And how many times could something like this happen in one man’s life?

“Yes,” she began. “His name was—is—Tom Wainwright. He’s an airline pilot, very good-looking and very macho. We were married for three years.”

Liam thought of his own marital history. Reminded himself he was in no position to judge, given that he’d gone into that crap show of a marriage with both eyes wide-open.

His late wife, Waverly, a model and sometime actress, had been beautiful, with her fit, slender body, her gleaming dark hair, her stunning green eyes.

She’d also been a walking red flag, vindictive when she was angry, which was often, jealous of just about everybody, and prone to straying, although Liam hadn’t known that until he was in way over his head, with two children to think about.

Inwardly, he sighed. “Go on,” he said.

Madison’s fascinating, chameleon eyes seemed to be fixed on another place and time. “He promised,” she said.

Liam waited.

“Tom knew I wanted children more than anything, and he promised we would start a family as soon as he got promoted, after we moved, that kind of thing. And, like a fool, I believed him.” Madison paused, looked down at her drink. Her left hand, shimmering with a doorknob of a diamond and an impressive wedding band to match, trembled slightly. “Turns out, he never wanted children. He was just stringing me along, waiting for my grandmother to die, so he could raid my inheritance. And if all that wasn’t bad enough, he got another woman pregnant. I divorced him.”

“Understandable,” Liam said, not wanting to break the flow. He felt honored, somehow, receiving her confidences in that quiet and otherwise empty saloon.

And very sympathetic. After all, he could identify. He would have divorced Waverly a lot sooner, for similar reasons, if she hadn’t gotten sick. She’d died only six months after she’d been diagnosed with an aggressive form of leukemia.

Everything he’d felt for her had dried up and blown away like so much dust, once he finally admitted to himself that she’d been unfaithful, not just once or twice, but dozens of times.

But she’d been so desperately ill.

And she was the mother of his children.

He’d had to stand by her, whether he wanted to or not.

And stand by her he had, until the end, though even as she was dying, Waverly had been distant with him, cold.

If it weren’t for you and these kids , she’d said once, lying skeletal in her hospital bed, breathless and bitter, while machines beeped and wheezed around her, I would have been famous. I would have been somebody special.

The memory, brief as it was, caused Liam to shut his eyes for a moment.

When he opened them again, Madison was throwing back more whiskey.

She teetered a little on the stool in the process, so that Liam reached for her, caught himself just short of grabbing her forearm to keep her from falling right into the sawdust.

“Steady there,” he said.

“I definitely dodged a bullet today,” she confided, though wistfully. “I need to rethink my entire life.”

She fell silent again. Staring down at her drink, probably fighting back tears.

Liam had never longed to put his arms around a woman the way he did then, but that was a risk he didn’t want to take.

She might vanish.

Anyway, somebody was bound to come looking for her soon—the erstwhile groom, for example, or maybe her mother, if she had one. It was a wonder no one had tracked her down yet, in fact, since Brynne Garrett’s fancy wedding venue was just on the other side of the road.

He’d noticed the crowd gathered around the flower-draped gazebo earlier, though it wasn’t an unusual sight, since Brynne and her business partner, David Fielding, did a land office business throwing lavish weddings, many of them complete with fireworks, strange costumes and paid extras.

Now he imagined the drama and chaos that must have started when the bride turned her “I do” into an “I don’t,” and fled the scene in a fist-clenching fury.

Again, he allowed himself the faintest of grins, savoring the memory of her spectacular arrival, a creature of light and flame and sweet, sweet frenzy.

“And today, you married Jeffrey,” he ventured, to get the conversation moving again.

“Sort of,” she said, with another sigh and another swirl and another swig.

More like a gulp.

“How do you ‘sort of’ get married?”

“I went through with the ceremony,” she recalled. “We exchanged vows in front of that lovely gazebo, and the minister pronounced us husband and wife. We went into the lodge then, since it was time for the reception to start. Jeffrey’s mother sidled up to me, all smiles, and said she was so thrilled to be going on the honeymoon with us. Turned out, Jeffrey had bought her an airline ticket, behind my back, and even reserved a room for her at our hotel.”

“Uh-oh,” Liam muttered, with conviction. In any other circumstances, he would have added a whistle, for emphasis.

“Jeffrey actually invited his mother to join us on our honeymoon , and I didn’t see it coming. I should have, because there were plenty of warning signs, but I didn’t!”

Liam was sympathetic—and fascinated. “What happened then?”

“I confronted Jeffrey, and he admitted it was true. His mommy needed a vacation, and she’d always wanted to visit Costa Rica. Can you believe it?”

Liam was stuck for an answer, so he didn’t offer one.

“I told Jeffrey we were through, this time for good, and I refused to sign the license, which meant we weren’t legally married. We’d been through the motions, but none of it was binding.

“Jeffrey kept arguing—he said I was being dramatic.”

“Were you?” Liam asked mildly, and felt a smile tug at one corner of his mouth.

“Yes,” Madison replied, after huffing out a sigh. “And I’m not sorry.”

“Understandably,” Liam affirmed. What kind of idiot wanted to take his mother along on a honeymoon ? “I guess this wasn’t the first time Jeffrey’s mother had been a problem?”

Madison drew a deep breath, causing her perfect breasts to rise beneath the silk and lace of her bodice, and exhaled loudly, in obvious frustration.

Remembering, she shook her head. “That woman—Yolanda, I mean—was always interfering. She was awful, actually. Always passive-aggressive—with me , that is. Clingy and possessive, too, forever fawning over Jeffrey, calling him her baby boy.” She paused, shook her head. “I’m such a ninny.”

“You don’t strike me as a ninny,” Liam observed moderately, wondering how long it had been since he’d heard that old-fashioned term. “Maybe you’re being a little too hard on yourself?”

“Kind of you to say so,” Madison said, softly and sadly. “But I have to take full responsibility. I wanted an ordinary man—somebody solid and dependable—not an overgrown jock like Tom. I thought Jeffrey was that man, and he said he wanted children, so I guess I was willing to overlook some of his faults—after all, I’m not exactly perfect myself.”

Liam figured that was debatable, but he didn’t say so. That would have been flattery, and he didn’t deal in that.

“The signs were there, all along,” Madison continued quietly, reflectively. “Yolanda was around way too much. She went to movies with us, for heaven’s sake, and crashed more than one otherwise romantic dinner. We took a day trip to the beach once, and she followed us there.”

“Wow,” Liam said, because speaking his thoughts about Jeffrey’s relationship with his mother would have been rude. Plus, it was none of his business.

Madison fixed her gaze on him in the next moment, eyes slightly narrowed, brows raised. “What’s your mother like?” she asked forthrightly.

The question took Liam aback, unexpected as it was. “Different,” he said, after a few long moments. “From Yolanda, that is.”

“She doesn’t interfere in your life? Invite herself along on your dates?”

“God, no,” Liam said, trying to picture his independent mother behaving the way this Yolanda person apparently did. Cassie McKettrick loved her children, for sure, and she had been a loving, attentive parent when they were young, making sure they led active, happy lives and behaved themselves. For all that, she had always been more than a mother, more than a wife.

She was an artist, a businesswoman, a thriving entity in her own right.

Now that all three of them were grown men—he, Jesse, and Rhett, the youngest—Cassie was too busy sculpting museum-quality pieces, helping to run the family’s sizeable ranch near San Diego, and serving on various charity boards to be overly concerned with what might be happening in the lives of her sons.

The faintest blush pinkened Madison’s cheeks. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked such personal questions.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Liam said. He could hear car doors slamming now, female voices rising and falling, drawing nearer.

It was over, this odd encounter, and Liam wanted it to last longer. A lot longer.

“That will be my friends,” Madison said, draining the last drops of whiskey and melted ice with an obvious swallow.

She was right, of course.

There were footsteps on the wooden sidewalk out front, and some of the chatter was discernible now.

“I’m sure she’s here somewhere,” a woman said.

“I saw her heading this way,” said another.

“I wouldn’t blame her for taking to drink,” offered still another.

And then the saloon doors opened again, and four women in voluminous gowns of pale pastels—pink, blue, green, and yellow—surged into the saloon.

“There you are, Mads!” cried the blonde in pink.

“We were worried about you,” chided the brunette in blue.

“Big-time,” confirmed the redhead in green.

The last of the company, dressed in yellow, wore a turban, and apparently had nothing to add to the conversation.

“Is he gone?” Madison asked, turning slightly to look back at the gaggle of bridesmaids.

She was just as beautiful in profile.

“Gone?” the blonde echoed, pink skirts swishing as she crossed the sawdust floor to touch Madison’s shoulder gently. “For now, yes. He left the venue right soon after the confrontation, with Mommy tripping solicitously along behind him, tsk-tsking all the way.” She laughed, and Liam decided he liked her. “I suppose they’re probably at the hotel by now, recovering from the humiliation.”

The brunette giggled and did a little dance. “Mads,” she said, “this was absolutely the best wedding I’ve ever been to!”

“It was an s-show,” Madison reminded them, somewhat dryly.

“Social media gold, as far as drama,” added the redhead. “All that yelling!”

“Who’s this?” purred the one in the yellow turban, giving Liam the once-over.

“This,” Madison said, with an exaggerated gesture of one hand, “is Liam McKettrick, the bartender/architect/town marshal.”

He inclined his head slightly, in an unspoken hello.

“Liam,” Madison went on expansively, “meet my best friends—”

She reeled off their names, rapid-fire. Not one of them stuck in Liam’s brain.

“I think it’s time we got you home,” the blonde—Alisa, Ariel, Annette?—said, turning her attention back to her friend, the flight-risk bride. “You need to get out of that dress, have something to eat—”

“And sober up,” put in the redhead.

“Home?” Madison ruminated. She was definitely drunk. “And where is that, exactly?”

The blonde hooked an arm through Madison’s and helped her off the bar stool.

The almost-bride hesitated, frowned. “Wait. I didn’t pay for my drink!”

“On the house,” Liam said.

“Thanks,” said the blonde, with a brief glance his way.

With that, having surrounded her, the group maneuvered Madison toward the doors.

Liam followed, at a little distance, amused by the colorfully dressed women, all of them talking at once.

They navigated the wide sidewalk, then made their communal way around the hitching rail and water trough directly in front of the saloon.

Liam leaned against one of the poles supporting the narrow roof above the entrance, watching them move toward a white compact car waiting in the road.

Getting everyone inside was a somewhat jumbled effort, mildly comical.

And then they were driving away.

Liam watched the vehicle—most likely a rental, given its nondescript design—until it zipped beneath the archway at the end of the street and finally disappeared.

Then he went back inside the saloon.

Costumed barmaids and dance hall girls were arriving, having entered through the back way, tying apron strings and adjusting feathery headpieces as they came.

“Wait ’til you hear about that wedding over there at the Lodge, Boss,” chuckled Sylvia Red Bird, the piano player and sometime torch singer. “Craziest one yet.”

Liam pretended to be clueless. “You were there?”

“No,” Sylvia replied, grinning. She was eccentric, to say the least, dressing herself in trousers, a pointy-collared shirt, a striped vest and a top hat for her shift at the Hard Luck. Sometimes, when she helped out in the gift shop across the street, next to the old-time photography place, she wore authentic medicine woman garb, which she created with her own hands. “Didn’t need to be there. It’s all over town, what happened. The ceremony went off without a hitch, according to Miranda from over at Bailey’s restaurant, but when it came time for the reception, all hell broke loose. There was a lot of shouting, and then the bride tore up the wedding license and stormed out of the reception.”

Liam hid a grin. “Is that so?”

“It’s so,” verified Molly Steel, who was paying her way through community college over in neighboring Silver Hills by dancing with, and for, saloon patrons. “I saw the videos. They’re all over YouTube and Instagram and probably TikTok, too. All that show needed was footlights.”

“You better show me those videos,” Sylvia told Molly, “soon as we go on break.”

Slowly, the saloon filled, first with staff, then with customers. A lot of these, it soon became apparent, had been guests at the thwarted wedding.

There were a lot of toasts, followed by laughter and anecdotes told from just about every perspective: old and young men alike, and their female counterparts. The caterers. Even the groomsmen, who were all in a jocular mood, despite the groom—ostensibly their buddy—being summarily dumped at his own wedding reception. They were knocking back liquor like there was no tomorrow, laughing a lot, shaking their heads at their friend Jeffrey’s unnatural attachment to his mother.

Sheriff Eli Garrett stopped in around eight o’clock, as he always did whenever there was a big shindig in or around Painted Pony Creek, accompanied by his good friend the chief of police, Melba Summers.

“Quite a day,” Eli sighed, taking a place at the end of the bar.

“So I hear,” Liam acknowledged. “Whiskey? Maybe a gin and tonic?”

“I wish,” Eli said. “I’m still on duty, so it’s coffee for me, I’m afraid.”

Melba, truly beautiful and tough as logging chain, stood beside Eli, smiling. “Sheriff’s just trying to preserve his stellar reputation,” she remarked. “Afraid I’ll muscle in, one of these election years, and push him out of office.”

Liam laughed, and so did Eli.

Both officers were served coffee—like always.

“The groom’s mother, Yolanda somebody, turned up at my office a few hours ago,” Melba said. “She wanted her son’s would-be wife arrested for creating a public nuisance.”

Eli nearly spat out his coffee. “What?”

“Well,” Melba reminded him, “after the bride left, chaos reigned. And somebody knocked over the wedding cake by accident. Do you have any idea how much a cake like that costs, Sheriff?”

Eli sighed again, shoved a hand through his light brown hair. “Actually, Chief, I do. My wife orchestrates most of these shindigs, and it’s downright scary, the price of goods and services these days. It’s not uncommon for the bridal gown alone to run in the thousands. And all for one day . I sure hope the star of this spectacle got her money’s worth, given the way the event turned out.”

Melba sipped her coffee. “The bride,” she said, “is a Bettencourt. You know, those Bettencourts, the ones who struck silver back in the day? The ones who built that big old house out at the end of Sparrow Bend Road? She’s not hurting for money, I can tell you.”

“I thought all the Bettencourts had died off, except for Coralee, of course,” Eli said, finishing off his coffee and shoving the cup away with a hint of reluctance. “And she’s holding on by a thread, from what I’ve heard.”

“Nope,” Melba said, sounding pleased to set the sheriff straight on the matter. “She’s got a granddaughter, Madison. The woman who was supposed to get married today. In my opinion, she came to her senses just in time to avoid tying herself down to a total waste of human bone and muscle.”

Eli shook his head. “Small towns,” he muttered. Then he thanked Liam and turned to leave.

At the Hard Luck Saloon, officers of the law got their sandwiches, sodas and coffee free. So did firefighters, paramedics and half a dozen old timers who knew how to spin a damn good yarn.

From the sound of things, Madison Bettencourt was going to be starring in more than her fair share of tall tales for a long time to come.

And Liam wanted to hear every last one of them.