Sleigh bells, snow and a rugged rancher!

Christmas Cowboy

Two fantastic novels from

New York Times bestselling author

DIANA PALMER

including the all-new story

Will of Steel

About the Author

With more than forty million copies of her books in print, DIANA PALMER is one of North America’s most beloved authors and considered one of the top ten romance authors in the United States.

Diana’s hobbies include gardening, archaeology, anthropology and music. She has been married to James Kyle for over thirty-five years. They have one son, Blayne, who is married to the former Christina Clayton, and a granddaughter, Selena Marie.

Christmas Cowboy

Diana Palmer

Will of Steel

Winter Roses

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Will of Steel

To the readers, all of you, many of whom are my friends

on my Facebook page. You make this job wonderful

and worthwhile. Thank you for your kindness and

your support and your affection through all

the long years. I am still your biggest fan.

One

He never liked coming here. The stupid calf followed him around, everywhere he went. He couldn’t get the animal to leave him alone. Once, he’d whacked the calf with a soft fir tree branch, but that had led to repercussions. Its owner had a lot to say about animal cruelty and quoted the law to him. He didn’t need her to quote the law. He was, after all, the chief of police in the small Montana town where they both lived.

Technically, of course, this wasn’t town. It was about two miles outside the Medicine Ridge city limits. A small ranch in Hollister, Montana, that included two clear, cold trout streams and half a mountain. Her uncle and his uncle had owned it jointly during their lifetimes. The two of them, best friends forever, had recently died, his uncle from a heart attack and hers, about a month later, in an airplane crash en route to a cattleman’s convention. The property was set to go up on the auction block, and a California real estate developer was skulking in the wings, waiting to put in the winning bid. He was going to build a rich man’s resort here, banking on those pure trout streams to bring in the business.

If Hollister Police Chief Theodore Graves had his way, the man would never set foot on the property. She felt that way, too. But the wily old men had placed a clause in both their wills pertaining to ownership of the land in question. The clause in her uncle’s will had been a source of shock to Graves and the girl when the amused attorney read it out to them. It had provoked a war of words every time he walked in the door.

“I’m not marrying you,” Jillian Sanders told him firmly the minute he stepped on the porch. “I don’t care if I have to live in the barn with Sammy.”

Sammy was the calf.

He looked down at her from his far superior height with faint arrogance. “No problem. I don’t think the grammar school would give you a hall pass to marry me anyway.”

Her pert nose wrinkled. “Well, you’d have to get permission from the old folks’ home, and I’ll bet you wouldn’t get it, either!”

It was a standing joke. He was thirty-one to her almost twenty-one. They were completely mismatched. She was small and blonde and blue-eyed, he was tall and dark and black-eyed. He liked guns and working on his old truck when he wasn’t performing his duties as chief of police in the small Montana community where they lived. She liked making up recipes for new sweets and he couldn’t stand anything sweet except pound cake. She also hated guns and noise.

“If you don’t marry me, Sammy will be featured on the menu in the local café, and you’ll have to live in the woods in a cave,” he pointed out.

That didn’t help her disposition. She glared at him. It wasn’t her fault that she had no family left alive. Her parents had died not long after she was born of an influenza outbreak. Her uncle had taken her in and raised her, but he was not in good health and had heart problems. Jillian had taken care of him as long as he was alive, fussing over his diet and trying to concoct special dishes to make him comfortable. But he’d died not of ill health, but in a light airplane crash on his way to a cattle convention. He didn’t keep many cattle anymore, but he’d loved seeing friends at the conferences, and he loved to attend them. She missed him. It was lonely on the ranch. Of course, if she had to marry Rambo, here, it would be less lonely.

She glared at him, as if everything bad in her life could be laid at his door. “I’d almost rather live in the cave. I hate guns!” she added vehemently, noting the one he wore, old-fashioned style, on his hip in a holster. “You could blow a hole through a concrete wall with that thing!”

“Probably,” he agreed.

“Why can’t you carry something small, like your officers do?”

“I like to make an impression,” he returned, tongue-in-cheek.

It took her a minute to get the insinuation. She glared at him even more.

He sighed. “I haven’t had lunch,” he said, and managed to look as if he were starving.

“There’s a good café right downtown.”

“Which will be closing soon because they can’t get a cook,” he said with disgust. “Damnedest thing, we live in a town where every woman cooks, but nobody wants to do it for the public. I guess I’ll starve. I burn water.”

It was the truth. He lived on takeout from the local café and frozen dinners. He glowered at her. “I guess marrying you would save my life. At least you can cook.”

She gave him a smug look. “Yes, I can. And the local café isn’t closing. They hired a cook just this morning.”

“They did?” he exclaimed. “Who did they get?”

She averted her eyes. “I didn’t catch her name, but they say she’s talented. So you won’t starve, I guess.”

“Yes, but that doesn’t help our situation here,” he pointed out. His sensual lips made a thin line. “I don’t want to get married.”

“Neither do I,” she shot back. “I’ve hardly even dated anybody!”

His eyebrows went up. “You’re twenty years old. Almost twenty-one.”

“Yes, and my uncle was suspicious of every man who came near me,” she returned. “He made it impossible for me to leave the house.”

His black eyes twinkled. “As I recall, you did escape once.”

She turned scarlet. Yes, she had, with an auditor who’d come to do the books for a local lawyer’s office. The man, much older than her and more sophisticated, had charmed her. She’d trusted him, just as she’d trusted another man two years earlier. The auditor had taken her back to his motel room to get something he forgot. Or so he’d told her. Actually he’d locked the door and proceeded to try to remove her clothes. He was very nice about it, he was just insistent.

But he didn’t know that Jillian had emotional scars already from a man trying to force her. She’d been so afraid. She’d really liked the man, trusted him. Uncle John hadn’t. He always felt guilty about what she’d been through because of his hired man. She was underage, and he told her to stay away from the man.

But she’d had stars in her eyes because the man had flirted with her when she’d gone with Uncle John to see his attorney about a land deal. She’d thought he was different, nothing like Uncle John’s hired man who had turned nasty.

He’d talked to her on the phone several times and persuaded her to go out with him. Infatuated, she sneaked out when Uncle John went to bed. But she landed herself in very hot water when the man got overly amorous. She’d managed to get her cell phone out and punched in 911. The result had been … unforgettable.

“They did get the door fixed, I believe.?” she said, letting her voice trail off.

He glared at her. “It was locked.”

“There’s such a thing as keys,” she pointed out.

“While I was finding one, you’d have been …”

She flushed again. She moved uncomfortably. “Yes, well, I did thank you. At the time.”

“And a traveling mathematician learned the dangers of trying to seduce teenagers in my town.”

She couldn’t really argue. She’d been sixteen at the time, and Theodore’s quick reaction had saved her honor. The auditor hadn’t known her real age. She knew he’d never have asked her out if he had any idea she was under legal age. He’d been the only man she had a real interest in, for her whole life. He’d quit the firm he worked for, so he never had to come back to Hollister.

She felt bad about it. The whole fiasco was her own fault.

The sad thing was that it wasn’t her first scary episode with an older man. The first, at fifteen, had scarred her. She’d thought that she could trust a man again because she was crazy about the auditor. But the auditor became the icing on the cake of her withdrawal from the world of dating for good. She’d really liked him, trusted him, had been infatuated with him. He wasn’t even a bad man, not like that other one.

“The judge did let him go with a severe reprimand about making sure of a girl’s age and not trying to persuade her into an illegal act. But he could have gone to prison, and it would have been my fault,” she recalled. She didn’t mention the man who had gone to prison for assaulting her. Ted didn’t know about that and she wasn’t going to tell him.

“Don’t look to me to have any sympathy for him,” he said tersely. “Even if you’d been of legal age, he had no right to try to coerce you.”

“Point taken.”

“Your uncle should have let you get out more,” he said reluctantly.

“I never understood why he kept me so close to home,” she replied thoughtfully. She knew it wasn’t all because of her bad experience.

His black eyes twinkled. “Oh, that’s easy. He was saving you for me.”

She gaped at him.

He chuckled. “He didn’t actually say so, but you must have realized from his will that he’d planned a future for us for some time.”

A lot of things were just becoming clear. She was speechless, for once.

He grinned. “He grew you in a hothouse just for me, little orchid,” he teased.

“Obviously your uncle never did the same for me,” she said scathingly.

He shrugged, and his eyes twinkled even more. “One of us has to know what to do when the time comes,” he pointed out.

She flushed. “I think we could work it out without diagrams.”

He leaned closer. “Want me to look it up and see if I can find some for you?”

“I’m not marrying you!” she yelled.

He shrugged. “Suit yourself. Maybe you can put up some curtains and lay a few rugs and the cave will be more comfortable.” He glanced out the window. “Poor Sammy,” he added sadly. “His future is less, shall we say, palatable.”

“For the last time, Sammy is not a bull, he’s a cow. She’s a cow,” she faltered.

“Sammy is a bull’s name.”

“She looked like a Sammy,” she said stubbornly. “When she’s grown, she’ll give milk.”

“Only when she’s calving.”

“Like you know,” she shot back.

“I belong to the cattleman’s association,” he reminded her. “They tell us stuff like that.”

“I belong to it, too, and no, they don’t, you learn it from raising cattle!”

He tugged his wide-brimmed hat over his eyes. “It’s useless, arguing with a blond fence post. I’m going back to work.”

“Don’t shoot anybody.”

“I’ve never shot anybody.”

“Ha!” she burst out. “What about that bank robber?”

“Oh. Him. Well, he shot at me first.”

“Stupid of him.”

He grinned. “That’s just what he said, when I visited him in the hospital. He missed. I didn’t. And he got sentenced for assault on a police officer as well as the bank heist.”

She frowned. “He swore he’d make you pay for that. What if he gets out?”

“Ten to twenty, and he’s got priors,” he told her. “I’ll be in a nursing home for real by the time he gets out.”

She glowered up at him. “People are always getting out of jail on technicalities. All he needs is a good lawyer.”

“Good luck to him getting one on what he earns making license plates.”

“The state provides attorneys for people who can’t pay.”

He gasped. “Thank you for telling me! I didn’t know!”

“Why don’t you go to work?” she asked, irritated.

“I’ve been trying to, but you won’t stop flirting with me.”

She gasped, but for real. “I am not flirting with you!”

He grinned. His black eyes were warm and sensuous as they met hers. “Yes, you are.” He moved a step closer. “We could do an experiment. To see if we were chemically suited to each other.”

She looked at him, puzzled, for a few seconds, until it dawned on her what he was suggesting. She moved back two steps, deliberately, and her high cheekbones flushed again. “I don’t want to do any experiments with you!”

He sighed. “Okay. But it’s going to be a very lonely marriage if you keep thinking that way, Jake.”

“Don’t call me Jake! My name is Jillian.”

He shrugged. “You’re a Jake.” He gave her a long look, taking in her ragged jeans and bulky gray sweatshirt and boots with curled-up toes from use. Her long blond hair was pinned up firmly into a topknot, and she wore no makeup. “Tomboy,” he added accusingly.

She averted her eyes. There were reasons she didn’t accentuate her feminine attributes, and she didn’t want to discuss the past with him. It wasn’t the sort of thing she felt comfortable talking about with anyone. It made Uncle John look bad, and he was dead. He’d cried about his lack of judgment in hiring Davy Harris. But it was too late by then.

Ted was getting some sort of vibrations from her. She was keeping something from him. He didn’t know what, but he was almost certain of it.

His teasing manner went into eclipse. He became a policeman again. “Is there something you want to talk to me about, Jake?” he asked in the soft tone he used with children.

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. “It wouldn’t help.”

“It might.”

She grimaced. “I don’t know you well enough to tell you some things.”

“If you marry me, you will.”

“We’ve had this discussion,” she pointed out.

“Poor Sammy.”

“Stop that!” she muttered. “I’ll find her a home. I could always ask John Callister if he and his wife, Sassy, would let her live with them.”

“On their ranch where they raise purebred cattle.”

“Sammy has purebred bloodlines on both sides,” she muttered. “Her mother was a purebred Hereford cow and her father was a purebred Angus bull.”

“And Sammy is a ‘black baldy,’” he agreed, giving it the hybrid name. “But that doesn’t make her a purebred cow.”

“Semantics!” she shot back.

He grinned. “There you go, throwing those one-dollar words at me again.”

“Don’t pretend to be dumb, if you please. I happen to know that you got a degree in physics during your stint with the army.”

He raised both thick black eyebrows. “Should I be flattered?”

“Why?”

“That you take an interest in my background.”

“Everybody knows. It isn’t just me.”

He shrugged.

“Why are you a small-town police chief, with that sort of education?” she asked suddenly.

“Because I don’t have the temperament for scientific research,” he said simply. “Besides, you don’t get to play with guns in a laboratory.”

“I hate guns.”

“You said.”

“I really mean it.” She shivered dramatically. “You could shoot somebody by accident. Didn’t one of your patrolmen drop his pistol in a grocery store and it went off?”

He looked grim. “Yes, he did. He was off duty and carrying his little .32 wheel gun in his pants pocket. He reached for change and it fell out and discharged.”

He pursed his lips. “A mistake I can guarantee he will never make again.”

“So his wife said. You are one mean man when you lose your temper, do you know that?”

“The pistol discharged into a display of cans, fortunately for him, and we only had to pay damages to the store. But it could have discharged into a child, or a grown-up, with tragic results. There are reasons why they make holsters for guns.”

She looked at his pointedly. “That one sure is fancy,” she noted, indicating the scrollwork on the soft tan leather. It also sported silver conchos and fringe.

“My cousin made it for me.”

“Tanika?” she asked, because she knew his cousin, a full-blooded Cheyenne who lived down near Hardin.

“Yes.” He smiled. “She thinks practical gear should have beauty.”

“She’s very gifted.” She smiled. “She makes some gorgeous parfleche bags. I’ve seen them at the trading post in Hardin, near the Little Bighorn Battlefield.” They were rawhide bags with beaded trim and fringe, incredibly beautiful and useful for transporting items in the old days for native people.

“Thank you,” he said abruptly.

She lifted her eyebrows. “For what?”

“For not calling it the Custer Battlefield.”

A lot of people did. He had nothing against Custer, but his ancestry was Cheyenne. He had relatives who had died in the Little Bighorn Battle and, later, at Wounded Knee. Custer was a sore spot with him. Some tourists didn’t seem to realize that Native Americans considered that people other than Custer’s troops were killed in the battle.

She smiled. “I think I had a Sioux ancestor.”

“You look like it,” he drawled, noting her fair coloring.

“My cousin Rabby is half and half, and he has blond hair and gray eyes,” she reminded him.

“I guess so.” He checked the big watch on his wrist. “I’ve got to be in court for a preliminary hearing. Better go.”

“I’m baking a pound cake.”

He hesitated. “Is that an invitation?”

“You did say you were starving.”

“Yes, but you can’t live on cake.”

“So I’ll fry a steak and some potatoes to go with it.”

His lips pulled up into a smile. “Sounds nice. What time?”

“About six? Barring bank robberies and insurgent attacks, of course.”

“I’m sure we won’t have one today.” He considered her invitation. “The Callisters brought me a flute back from Cancún when they went on their honeymoon. I could bring it and serenade you.”

She flushed a little. The flute and its connection with courting in the Native American world was quite well-known. “That would be nice.”

“It would?”

“I thought you were leaving.” She didn’t quite trust that smile.

“I guess I am. About six?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll see you then.” He paused with his hand on the doorknob. “Should I wear my tuxedo?”

“It’s just steak.”

“No dancing afterward?” he asked, disappointed.

“Not unless you want to build a bonfire outside and dance around it.” She frowned. “I think I know one or two steps from the women’s dances.”

He glared at her. “Ballroom dancing isn’t done around campfires.”

“You can do ballroom dances?” she asked, impressed.

“Of course I can.”

“Waltz, polka …?”

“Tango,” he said stiffly.

Her eyes twinkled. “Tango? Really?”

“Really. One of my friends in the service learned it down in Argentina. He taught me.”

“What an image that brings to mind—” she began, tongue-in-cheek.

“He didn’t teach me by dancing with me!” he shot back. “He danced with a girl.”

“Well, I should hope so,” she agreed.

“I’m leaving.”

“You already said.”

“This time, I mean it.” He walked out.

“Six!” she called after him.

He threw up a hand. He didn’t look back.

Jillian closed the door and leaned back against it. She was a little apprehensive, but after all, she had to marry somebody. She knew Theodore Graves better than she knew any other men. And, despite their quarreling, they got along fairly well.

The alternative was to let some corporation build a holiday resort here in Hollister, and it would be a disaster for local ranching. Resorts brought in all sorts of amusement, plus hotels and gas stations and businesses. It would be a boon for the economy, but Hollister would lose its rural, small-town appeal. It wasn’t something Jillian would enjoy and she was certain that other people would feel the same. She loved the forests with their tall lodgepole pines, and the shallow, diamond-bright trout streams where she loved to fish when she had free time. Occasionally Theodore would bring over his spinning reel and join her. Then they’d work side by side, scaling and filleting fish and frying them, along with hush puppies, in a vat of hot oil. Her mouth watered, just thinking about it.

She wandered into the kitchen. She’d learned to cook from one of her uncle’s rare girlfriends. It had delighted her. She might be a tomboy, but she had a natural affinity for flour and she could make bread from scratch. It amazed her how few people could. The feel of the dough, soft and smooth, was a gift to her fingertips when she kneaded and punched and worked it. The smell of fresh bread in the kitchen was a delight for the senses. She always had fresh homemade butter to go on it, which she purchased from an elderly widow just down the road. Theodore loved fresh bread. She was making a batch for tonight, to go with the pound cake.

She pulled out her bin of flour and got down some yeast from the shelf. It took a long time to make bread from scratch, but it was worth it.

She hadn’t changed into anything fancy, although she did have on a new pair of blue jeans and a pink checked shirt that buttoned up. She also tucked a pink ribbon into her long blond hair, which she tidied into a bun on top of her head. She wasn’t elegant, or beautiful, but she could at least look like a girl when she tried.

And he noticed the minute he walked in the door. He cocked his head and stared down at her with amusement.

“You’re a girl,” he said with mock surprise.

She glared up at him. “I’m a woman.”

He pursed his lips. “Not yet.”

She flushed. She tried for a comeback but she couldn’t fumble one out of her flustered mind.

“Sorry,” he said gently, and became serious when he noted her reaction to the teasing. “That wasn’t fair. Especially since you went to all the trouble to make me fresh rolls.” He lifted his head and sniffed appreciably.

“How did you know that?”

He tapped his nose. “I have a superlative sense of smell. Did I ever tell you about the time I tracked a wanted murderer by the way he smelled?” he added. “He was wearing some gosh-awful cheap cologne. I just followed the scent and walked up to him with my gun out. He’d spent a whole day covering his trail and stumbling over rocks to throw me off the track. He was so shocked when I walked into his camp that he just gave up without a fight.”

“Did you tell him that his smell gave him away?” she asked, chuckling.

“No. I didn’t want him to mention it to anybody when he went to jail. No need to give criminals a heads-up about something like that.”

“Native Americans are great trackers,” she commented.

He glowered down at her. “Anybody can be a good tracker. It comes from training, not ancestry.”

“Well, aren’t you touchy,” she exclaimed.

He averted his eyes. He shrugged. “Banes has been at it again.”

“You should assign him to school crossings. He hates that,” she advised.

“No, he doesn’t. His new girlfriend is a widow. She’s got a little boy, and Banes has suddenly become his hero. He’d love to work the school crossing.”

“Still, you could find some unpleasant duty to assign him. Didn’t he say once that he hates being on traffic detail at ball games?”

He brightened. “You know, he did say that.”

“See? An opportunity presents itself.” She frowned. “Why are we looking for ways to punish him this time?”

“He brought in a new book on the Little Bighorn Battle and showed me where it said Crazy Horse wasn’t in the fighting.”

She gave him a droll look. “Oh, sure.”

He grimaced. “Every so often, some writer who never saw a real Native American gets a bunch of hearsay evidence together and writes a book about how he’s the only one who knows the true story of some famous battle. This guy also said that Custer was nuts and had a hand in the post trader scandal where traders were cheating the Sioux and Cheyenne.”

“Nobody who reads extensively about Custer would believe he had a hand in something so dishonest,” she scoffed. “He went to court and testified against President Ulysses S. Grant’s own brother in that corruption trial, as I recall. Why would he take such a risk if he was personally involved in it?”

“My thoughts exactly,” he said, “and I told Banes so.”

“What did Banes say to that?”

“He quoted the author’s extensive background in military history.”

She gave him a suspicious look. “Yes? What sort of background?”

“He’s an expert in the Napoleonic Wars.”

“Great! What does that have to do with the campaign on the Greasy Grass?” she asked, which referred to the Lakota name for the battle.

“Not a damned thing,” he muttered. “You can be brilliant in your own field of study, but it’s another thing to do your research from a standing start and come to all the wrong conclusions. Banes said the guy used period newspapers and magazines for part of his research.”

“The Lakota and Cheyenne, as I recall, didn’t write about current events,” she mused.

He chuckled. “No, they didn’t have newspaper reporters back then. So it was all from the cavalry’s point of view, or that of politicians. History is the story of mankind written by the victors.”

“Truly.”

He smiled. “You’re pretty good on local history.”

“That’s because I’m related to people who helped make it.”

“Me, too.” He cocked his head. “I ought to take you down to Hardin and walk the battlefield with you sometime,” he said.

Her eyes lit up. “I’d love that.”

“So would I.”

“There’s a trading post,” she recalled.

“They have some beautiful things there.”

“Made by local talent,” she agreed. She sighed. “I get so tired of so-called Native American art made in China. Nothing against the Chinese. I mean, they have aboriginal peoples, too. But if you’re going to sell things that are supposed to be made by tribes in this country, why import them? ”

“Beats me. Ask somebody better informed.”

“You’re a police chief,” she pointed out. “There isn’t supposed to be anybody better informed.”

He grinned. “Thanks.”

She curtsied.

He frowned. “Don’t you own a dress?”

“Sure. It’s in my closet.” She pursed her lips. “I wore it to graduation.”

“Spare me!”

“I guess I could buy a new one.”

“I guess you could. I mean, if we’re courting, it will look funny if you don’t wear a dress.”

“Why?”

He blinked. “You going to get married in blue jeans?”

“For the last time, I am not going to marry you.”

He took off his wide-brimmed hat and laid it on the hall table. “We can argue about that later. Right now, we need to eat some of that nice, warm, fresh bread before it gets cold and butter won’t melt on it. Shouldn’t we?” he added with a grin.

She laughed. “I guess we should.”

Two

The bread was as delicious as he’d imagined it would be. He closed his eyes, savoring the taste.

“You could cook, if you’d just try,” she said.

“Not really. I can’t measure stuff properly.”

“I could teach you.”

“Why do I need to learn how, when you do it so well already?” he asked reasonably.

“You live alone,” she began.

He raised an eyebrow. “Not for long.”

“For the tenth time today …”

“The California guy was in town today,” he said grimly. “He came by the office to see me.”

“He did?” She felt apprehensive.

He nodded as he bit into another slice of buttered bread with perfect white teeth. “He’s already approached contractors for bids to build his housing project.” He bit the words off as he was biting the bread.

“Oh.”

Jet-black eyes pierced hers. “I told him about the clause in the will.”

“What did he say?”

“That he’d heard you wouldn’t marry me.”

She grimaced.

“He was strutting around town like a tom turkey,” he added. He finished the bread and sipped coffee. His eyes closed as he savored it. “You make great coffee, Jake!” he exclaimed. “Most people wave the coffee over water. You could stand up a spoon in this.”

“I like it strong, too,” she agreed. She studied his hard, lean face. “I guess you live on it when you have cases that keep you out all night tracking. There have been two or three of those this month alone.”

He nodded. “Our winter festival brings in people from all over the country. Some of them see the mining company’s bankroll as a prime target.”

“Not to mention the skeet-and-trap-shooting regional championships,” she said. “I’ve heard that thieves actually follow the shooters around and get license plate numbers of cars whose owners have the expensive guns.”

“They’re targets, all right.”

“Why would somebody pay five figures for a gun?” she wondered out loud.

He laughed. “You don’t shoot in competition, so it’s no use trying to explain it to you.”

“You compete,” she pointed out. “You don’t have a gun that expensive and you’re a triple-A shooter.”

He shrugged. “It isn’t that I wouldn’t like to have one. But unless I take up bank robbing, I’m not likely to be able to afford one, either. The best I can do is borrow one for the big competitions.”

Her eyes popped. “You know somebody who’ll loan you a fifty-thousand-dollar shotgun?”

He laughed. “Well, actually, yes, I do. He’s police chief of a small town down in Texas. He used to do shotgun competitions when he was younger, and he still has the hardware.”

“And he loans you the gun.”

“He isn’t attached to it, like some owners are. Although, you’d never get him to loan his sniper kit,” he chuckled.

“Excuse me?”

He leaned toward her. “He was a covert assassin in his shady past.”

“Really?” She was excited by the news.

He frowned. “What do women find so fascinating about men who shoot people?”

She blinked. “It’s not that.”

“Then what is it?”

She hesitated, trying to put it into words. “Men who have been in battles have tested themselves in a way most people never have to,” she began slowly. “They learn their own natures. They … I can’t exactly express it… .”

“They learn what they’re made of, right where they live and breathe,” he commented. “Under fire, you’re always afraid. But you harness the fear and use it, attack when you’d rather run. You learn the meaning of courage. It isn’t the absence of fear. It’s fear management, at its best. You do your duty.”

“Nicely said, Chief Graves,” she said admiringly, and grinned.

“Well, I know a thing or two about being shot at,” he reminded her. “I was in the first wave in the second incursion in the Middle East. Then I became a police officer and then a police chief.”

“You met the other police chief at one of those conventions, I’ll bet,” she commented.

“Actually I met him at the FBI academy during a training session on hostage negotiation,” he corrected. “He was teaching it.”

“My goodness. He can negotiate?”

“He did most of his negotiations with a gun before he was a Texas Ranger,” he laughed.

“He was a Ranger, too?”

“Yes. And a cyber-crime expert for a Texas D.A., and a merc, and half a dozen other interesting things. He can also dance. He won a tango contest in Argentina, and that’s saying something. Tango and Argentina go together like coffee and cream.”

She propped her chin in her hands. “A man who can do the tango. It boggles the mind. I’ve only ever seen a couple of men do it in movies.” She smiled. “Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman was my favorite.”

He grinned. “Not the ‘governator’ in True Lies?“

She glared at him. “I’m sure he was doing his best.”

He shook his head. “I watched Rudolph Valentino do it in an old silent film,” he sighed. “Real style.”

“It’s a beautiful dance.”

He gave her a long look. “There’s a new Latin dance club in Billings.”

“What?” she exclaimed with pure surprise.

“No kidding. A guy from New York moved out here to retire. He’d been in ballroom competition most of his life and he got bored. So he organized a dance band and opened up a dance club. People come up from Wyoming and across from the Dakotas just to hear the band and do the dances.” He toyed with his coffee cup. “Suppose you and I go up there and try it out? I can teach you the tango.”

Her heart skipped. It was the first time, despite all the banter, that he’d ever suggested taking her on a date.

He scowled when she hesitated.

“I’d love to,” she blurted out.

His face relaxed. He smiled again. “Okay. Saturday?”

She nodded. Her heart was racing. She felt breathless.

She was so young, he thought, looking at her. He hesitated.

“They don’t have grammar school on Saturdays,” she quipped, “so I won’t need an excuse from the principal to skip class.”

He burst out laughing. “Is that how I looked? Sorry.”

“I’m almost twenty-one,” she pointed out. “I know that seems young to you, but I’ve had a lot of responsibility. Uncle John could be a handful, and I was the only person taking care of him for most of my life.”

“That’s true. Responsibility matures people pretty quick.”

“You’d know,” she said softly, because he’d taken wonderful care of his grandmother and then the uncle who’d owned half this ranch.

He shrugged. “I don’t think there’s a choice about looking after people you love.”

“Neither do I.”

He gave her an appraising look. “You going to the club in blue jeans and a shirt?” he asked. “Because if you are, I plan to wear my uniform.”

She raised both eyebrows.

“Or have you forgotten what happened the last time I wore my uniform to a social event?” he added.

She glowered at him.

“Is it my fault if people think of me as a target the minute they realize what I do for a living?” he asked.

“You didn’t have to anoint him with punch.”

“Sure I did. He was so hot under the collar about a speeding ticket my officer gave him that he needed instant cooling off.”

She laughed. “Your patrolman is still telling that story.”

“With some exaggerations he added to it,” Theodore chuckled.

“It cured the guy of complaining to you.”

“Yes, it did. But if I wear my uniform to a dance club where people drink, there’s bound to be at least one guy who thinks I’m a target.”

She sighed.

“And since you’re with me, you’d be right in the thick of it.” He pursed his lips. “You wouldn’t like to be featured in a riot, would you?”

“Not in Billings, no,” she agreed.

“Then you could wear a skirt, couldn’t you?”

“I guess it wouldn’t kill me,” she said, but reluctantly.

He narrowed his eyes as he looked at her. There was some reason she didn’t like dressing like a woman. He wished he could ask her about it, but she was obviously uncomfortable discussing personal issues with him. Maybe it was too soon. He did wonder if she still had scars from her encounter with the auditor.

He smiled gently. “Something demure,” he added. “I won’t expect you to look like a pole dancer, okay?”

She laughed. “Okay.”

He loved the way she looked when she smiled. Her whole face took on a radiance that made her pretty. She didn’t smile often. Well, neither did he. His job was a somber one, most of the time.

“I’ll see you about six, then.”

She nodded. She was wondering how she was going to afford something new to wear to a fancy nightclub, but she would never have admitted it to him.

She ran into Sassy Callister in town while she was trying to find something presentable on the bargain table at the single women’s clothing store.

“You’re looking for a dress?” Sassy exclaimed. She’d known Jillian all her life, and she’d never seen her in anything except jeans and shirts. She even wore a pantsuit to church when she went.

Jillian glared at her. “I do have legs.”

“That wasn’t what I meant.” She chuckled. “I gather Ted’s taking you out on a real date, huh?”

Jillian went scarlet. “I never said …!”

“Oh, we all know about the will,” Sassy replied easily. “It’s sensible, for the two of you to get married and keep the ranch in the family. Nobody wants to see some fancy resort being set up here,” she added, “with outsiders meddling in our local politics and throwing money around to get things the way they think they should be.”

Jillian’s eyes twinkled. “Imagine you complaining about the rich, when you just married one of the richest men in Montana.”

“You know what I mean,” Sassy laughed. “And I’ll remind you that I didn’t know he was rich when I accepted his proposal.”

“A multimillionaire pretending to be a ranch foreman.”

Jillian shook her head. “It came as a shock to a lot of us when we found out who he really was.”

“I assure you that it was more of a shock to me,” came the amused reply. “I tried to back out of it, but he wouldn’t let me. He said that money was an accessory, not a character trait. You should meet his brother and sister-in-law,” she added with a grin. “Her parents were missionaries and her aunt is a nun. Oh, and her godfather is one of the most notorious ex-mercenaries who ever used a gun.”

“My goodness!”

“But they’re all very down-to-earth. They don’t strut, is what I mean.”

Jillian giggled. “I get it.”

Sassy gave her a wise look. “You want something nice for that date, but you’re strained to the gills trying to manage on what your uncle left you.”

Jillian started to deny it, but she gave up. Sassy was too sweet to lie to. “Yes,” she confessed. “I was working for old Mrs. Rogers at the florist shop. Then she died and the shop closed.” She sighed. “Not many jobs going in a town this small. You’d know all about that,” she added, because Sassy had worked for a feed store and was assaulted by her boss. Fortunately she was rescued by her soon-to-be husband and the perpetrator had been sent to jail. But it was the only job Sassy could get. Hollister was very small.

Sassy nodded. “I wouldn’t want to live anyplace else, though. Even if I had to commute back and forth to Billings to get a job.” She laughed. “I considered that, but I didn’t think my old truck would get me that far.” Her eyes twinkled. “Chief Graves said that if he owned a piece of junk like I was driving, he’d be the first to agree to marry a man who could afford to replace it for me.”

Jillian burst out laughing. “I can imagine what you said to that.”

She laughed, too. “I just expressed the thought that he wouldn’t marry John Callister for a truck.” She cocked her head. “He really is a catch, you know. Theodore Graves is the stuff of legends around here. He’s honest and kindhearted and a very mean man to make an enemy of. He’d take care of you.”

“Well, he needs more taking care of than I do,” came the droll reply. “At least I can cook.”

“Didn’t you apply for the cook’s job at the restaurant?”

“I did. I got it, too, but you can’t tell Theodore.”

“I won’t. But why can’t I?”

Jillian sighed. “In case things don’t work out, I want to have a means of supporting myself. He’ll take it personally if he thinks I got a job before he even proposed.”

“He’s old-fashioned.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” Jillian replied with a smile.

“Of course not. It’s just that some men have to be hit over the head so they’ll accept that modern women can have outside interests without giving up family. Come over here.”

She took Jillian’s arm and pulled her to one side. “Everything in here is a three-hundred-percent markup,” she said under her breath. “I love Jessie, but she’s overpriced. You’re coming home with me. We’re the same size and I’ve got a closet full of stuff you can wear. You can borrow anything you like. Heck, you can have what you like. I’ll never wear all of it anyway.”

Jillian flushed red and stammered, “No, I couldn’t …!”

“You could and you’re going to. Now come on!”

Jillian was transported to the Callister ranch in a Jaguar. She was so fascinated with it that she didn’t hear half of what her friend was saying.

“Look at all these gadgets!” she exclaimed. “And this is real wood on the dash!”

“Yes,” Sassy laughed. “I acted the same as you, the first time I rode in it. My old battered truck seemed so pitiful afterward.”

“I like my old car. But this is amazing,” she replied, touching the silky wood.

“I know.”

“It’s so nice of you to do this,” Jillian replied. “Theodore wanted me to wear a skirt. I don’t even own one.”

Sassy looked at her briefly. “You should tell him, Jilly.”

She flushed and averted her eyes. “Nobody knows but you and your mother. And I know you won’t say anything.”

“Not unless you said I could,” Sassy replied. “But it could cause you some problems later on. Especially after you’re married.”

Jillian clenched her teeth. “I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it. I may not marry Theodore. We may be able to find a way to break the will.”

“One, maybe. Two, never.”

That was true. Both old men had left ironclad wills with clauses about the disposition of the property if Theodore and Jillian refused to get married.

“The old buzzards!” Jillian burst out. “Why did they have to complicate things like that? Theodore and I could have found a way to deal with the problem on our own!”

“I don’t know. Neither of you is well-off, and that California developer has tons of money. I’ll bet he’s already trying to find a way to get to one of you about buying the ranch outright once you inherit.”

“He’ll never get it,” she said stubbornly.

Sassy was going to comment that rich people with intent sometimes knew shady ways to make people do what they wanted them to. But the developer wasn’t local and he didn’t have any information he could use to blackmail either Theodore or Jillian, so he probably couldn’t force them to sell to him. He’d just sit and wait and hope they couldn’t afford to keep it. Fat chance, Sassy thought solemly. She and John would bail them out if they had to. No way was some out-of-state fat cat taking over Jillian’s land. Not after all she’d gone through in her young life.

Maybe it was a good thing Theodore didn’t know everything about his future potential wife. But Jillian was setting herself up for some real heartbreak if she didn’t level with him. After all, he was in law enforcement. He could dig into court records and find things that most people didn’t have access to. He hadn’t been in town when Jillian faced her problems, he’d been away at the FBI Academy on a training mission. And since only Sassy and her mother, Mrs. Peale, had been involved, nobody else except the prosecuting attorney and the judge and the public defender had knowledge about the case. Not that any of them would disclose it.

She was probably worrying unnecessarily. She smiled at Jillian. “You are right. He’ll never get the ranch,” she agreed.

They pulled up at the house. It had been given a makeover and it looked glorious.

“You’ve done a lot of work on this place,” Jillian commented. “I remember what it looked like before.”

“So do I. John wanted to go totally green here, so we have solar power and wind generators. And the electricity in the barn runs on methane from the cattle refuse.”

“It’s just fantastic,” Jillian commented. “Expensive, too, I’ll bet.”

“That’s true, but the initial capital outlay was the highest. It will pay for itself over the years.”

“And you’ll have lower utility bills than the rest of us,” Jillian sighed, thinking about her upcoming one. It had been a colder than usual winter. Heating oil was expensive.

“Stop worrying,” Sassy told her. “Things work out.”

“You think?”

They walked down the hall toward the master bedroom. “How’s your mother?” Jillian asked.

“Doing great. She got glowing reports from her last checkup,” Sassy said. The cancer had been contained and her mother hadn’t had a recurrence, thanks to John’s interference at a critical time. “She always asks about you.”

“Your mother is the nicest person I know, next to you. How about Selene?”

The little girl was one Mrs. Peale had adopted. She was in grammar school, very intelligent and with definite goals. “She’s reading books about the Air Force,” Sassy laughed. “She wants to be a fighter pilot.”

“Wow!”

“That’s what we said, but she’s very focused. She’s good at math and science, too. We think she may end up being an engineer.”

“She’s smart.”

“Very.”

Sassy opened the closet and started pulling out dresses and skirts and blouses in every color under the sun.

Jillian just stared at them, stunned. “I’ve never seen so many clothes outside a department store,” she stammered.

Sassy chuckled. “Neither did I before I married John. He spoils me rotten. Every birthday and holiday I get presents from him. Pick something out.”

“You must have favorites that you don’t want to loan,” Jillian began.

“I do. That’s why they’re still in the closet,” she said with a grin.

“Oh.”

Sassy was eyeing her and then the clothes on the bed. “How about this?” She picked up a patterned blue skirt, very long and silky, with a pale blue silk blouse that had puffy sleeves and a rounded neckline. It looked demure, but it was a witchy ensemble. “Try that on. Let’s see how it looks.”

Jillian’s hands fumbled. She’d never put on something so expensive. It fit her like a glove, and it felt good to move in, as so many clothes didn’t. She remarked on that.

“Most clothes on the rack aren’t constructed to fit exactly, and the less expensive they are, the worse the fit,” Sassy said. “I know, because I bought clothes off the sales rack all my life before I married. I was shocked to find that expensive clothes actually fit. And when they do, they make you look better. You can see for yourself.”

Jillian did. Glancing in the mirror, she was shocked to find that the skirt put less emphasis on her full hips and more on her narrow waist. The blouse, on the other hand, made her small breasts look just a little bigger.

“Now, with your hair actually down and curled, instead of screwed up into that bun,” Sassy continued, pulling out hairpins as she went and reaching for a brush, “you’ll look so different that Ted may not even recognize you. What a difference!”

It was. With her long blond hair curling around her shoulders, she looked really pretty.

“Is that me?” she asked, shocked.

Sassy grinned. “Sure is.”

She turned to her friend, fighting tears. “It’s so nice of you,” she began.

Sassy hugged her. “Friends look out for each other.”

They hadn’t been close friends, because Sassy’s home problems had made that impossible before her marriage. But they were growing closer now. It was nice to have someone she could talk to.

She drew away and wiped at her eyes. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to do that.”

“You’re a nice person, Jilly,” Sassy told her gently. “You’d do the same for me in a heartbeat, if our situations were reversed, and you know it.”

“I certainly would.”

“I’ve got some curlers. Let’s put up your hair in them and then we can snap beans.”

“You’ve got beans in the middle of winter?” Jillian exclaimed.

“From the organic food market,” she laughed. “I have them shipped in. You can take some home and plant up. Ted might like beans and ham hocks.”

“Even if he didn’t, I sure would. I’ll bet it’s your own pork.”

“It is. We like organic all the way. Put your jeans back on and we’ll wash your hair and set it. It’s thin enough that it can dry while we work.”

And it did. They took the curlers out a couple of hours later. Jillian was surprised at the difference a few curls made in her appearance.

“Makeup next,” Sassy told her, grinning. “This is fun!”

“Fun and educational,” Jillian said, still reeling. “How did you learn all this?”

“From my mother-in-law. She goes to spas and beauty parlors all the time. She’s still gorgeous, even though she’s gaining in years. Sit down.”

Sassy put her in front of a fluorescent-lit mirror and proceeded to experiment with different shades of lipstick and eye shadow. Jillian felt as spoiled as if she’d been to an exclusive department store, and she said so.

“I’m still learning,” Sassy assured her. “But it’s fun, isn’t it?”

“The most fun I’ve had in a long time, and thank you. Theodore is going to be shocked when he shows up Saturday!” she predicted.

Shocked was an understatement. Jillian in a blue ensemble, with her long hair soft and curling around her shoulders, with demure makeup, was a revelation to a man who’d only ever seen her without makeup in ragged jeans and sweatshirts or, worse, baggy T-shirts. Dressed up, in clothes that fit her perfectly, she was actually pretty.

“You can close your mouth, Theodore,” she teased, delighted at his response.

He did. He shook his head. “You look nice,” he said. It was an understatement, compared to what he was thinking. Jillian was a knockout. He frowned as he thought how her new look might go down in town. There were a couple of younger men, nice-looking ones with wealthy backgrounds, who might also find the new Jillian a hot item. He might have competition for her that he couldn’t handle.

Jillian, watching his expressions change, was suddenly insecure. He was scowling as if he didn’t actually approve of how she looked.

“It isn’t too revealing, is it?” she worried.

He cleared his throat. “Jake, you’re covered from stem to stern, except for the hollow of your throat, and your arms,” he said. “What do you think is revealing?”

“You looked … well, you looked …”

“I looked like a man who’s considering the fight ahead.”

“Excuse me?”

He moved a step closer and looked down at her with pure appreciation. “You really don’t know what a knockout you are, all dressed up?”

Her breath caught in her throat. “Me?”

His big hands framed her face and brought it up to his dancing black eyes. “You.” He rubbed his nose against hers. “You know, I really wonder if you taste as good as you look. This is as good a time as any to find out.”

He bent his head as he spoke and, for the first time in their relationship, he kissed her, right on the mouth. Hard.

Whatever he expected her reaction to be, the reality of it came as a shock

Three

Jillian jerked back away from him as if he’d offended her, flushing to the roots of her hair. She stared at him with helpless misery, waiting for the explosion. The auditor had cursed a blue streak, called her names, swore that he’d tell every boy he knew that she was a hopeless little icicle.

But Theodore didn’t do that. In fact, he smiled, very gently.

She bit her lower lip. She wanted to tell him. She couldn’t. The pain was almost physical.

He took her flushed face in his big hands and bent and kissed her gently on the forehead, then on her eyelids, closing them.

“We all have our own secret pain, Jake,” he whispered. “One day you’ll want to tell me, and I’ll listen.” He lifted his head. “For the time being, we’ll be best buddies, except that you’re wearing a skirt,” he added, tongue-in-cheek.

“I have to confess that very few of my buddies have used a women’s restroom.”

It took her a minute, then she burst out laughing.

“That’s better,” he said, and grinned. He cocked his head and gave her a very male appraisal. “You really do look nice.” He pursed his lips as he contemplated the ensemble and its probable cost.

“They’re loaners,” she blurted out.

His black eyes sparkled with unholy glee. “Loaners?”

She nodded. “Sassy Callister.”

“I see.”

She grinned. “She said that she had a whole closet of stuff she never wore. I didn’t want to, but she sort of bulldozed me into it. She’s a lot like her new husband.”

“He wears petticoats?” he asked outrageously.

She glared at him. “Women don’t wear petticoats or hoop skirts these days, Theodore.”

“Sorry. Wrong era.”

She grinned. “Talk about living in the dark ages!”

He shrugged. “I was raised by my grandmother and my uncle. They weren’t forthcoming about women’s intimate apparel.”

“Well, I guess not!”

“Your uncle John was the same sort of throwback,” he remarked.

“So we both come by it honestly, I suppose.” She noted his immaculate dark suit and the spotless white shirt and blue patterned tie he was wearing with it. “You look nice, too.”

“I bought the suit to wear to John Callister’s wedding,” he replied. “I don’t often have the occasion to dress up.”

“Me, neither,” she sighed.

“I guess we could go a few places together,” he commented. “I like to hunt and fish.”

“I do not like guns,” she said flatly.

“Well, in my profession, they’re sort of a necessity, Jake,” he commented.

“I suppose so. Sorry.”

“No problem. You used to like fishing.”

“It’s been a while since I dipped a poor, helpless worm into the water.”

He chuckled. “Everything in life has a purpose. A worm’s is to help people catch delicious fish.”

“The worm might not share your point of view.”

“I’ll ask, the next time I see one.”

She laughed, and her whole face changed. She felt better than she had in ages. Theodore didn’t think she was a lost cause. He wasn’t even angry that she’d gone cold at his kiss. Maybe, she thought, just maybe, there was still hope for her.

His black eyes were kind. “I’m glad you aren’t wearing high heels,” he commented.

“Why?”

He glanced down at his big feet in soft black leather boots. “Well, these aren’t as tough as the boots I wear on the job. I’d hate to have holes in them from spiked heels, when you step on my feet on the dance floor.”

“I will not step on your feet,” she said with mock indignation. She grinned. “I might trip over them and land in a flowerpot, of course.”

“I heard about that,” he replied, chuckling. “Poor old Harris Twain. I’ll bet he’ll never stick his legs out into the walkway of a restaurant again. He said you were pretty liberally covered with potting soil. You went in headfirst, I believe …?”

She sighed. “Most people have talents. Mine is lack of coordination. I can trip over my own feet, much less someone else’s.”

He wondered about that clumsiness. She was very capable, in her own way, but she often fell. He frowned.

“Now, see, you’re thinking that I’m a klutz, and you’re absolutely right.”

“I was wondering more about your balance,” he said. “Do you have inner ear problems?”

She blinked. “What do my ears have to do with that?”

“A lot. If you have an inner ear disturbance, it can affect balance.”

“And where did you get your medical training?” she queried.

“I spend some time in emergency rooms, with victims and perps alike. I learn a lot about medical problems that way.”

“I forgot.”

He shrugged. “It goes with the job.”

“I don’t have earaches,” she said, and averted her eyes. “Shouldn’t we get going?”

She was hiding something. A lot, maybe. He let it go. “I guess we should.”

“A Latin dance club in Billings.” She grinned. “How exotic! ”

“The owner’s even more exotic. You’ll like him.” He leaned closer. “He was a gun runner in his wild youth.”

“Wow!”

“I thought you’d be impressed. So was I.”

“You have an interesting collection of strange people in your life,” she commented on the way to his truck.

“Goes with the—”

“Job. I guess.” She grinned when she saw the truck. “Washed and waxed it, huh?” she teased.

“Well, you can’t take a nice woman to a dance in a dirty truck,” he stated.

“I wouldn’t have minded.”

He turned to her at the passenger side of the truck and looked down at her solemnly in the light from the security lamp on a pole nearby. His face was somber. “No, you wouldn’t. You don’t look at bank accounts to judge friendships. It’s one of a lot of things I like about you. I dated a woman attorney once, who came here to try a case for a client in district court. When she saw the truck, the old one I had several years ago, she actually backed out of the date. She said she didn’t want any important people in the community to see her riding around in a piece of junk.”

She gasped. “No! How awful for you!”

His high cheekbones had a faint flush. Her indignation made him feel warm inside. “Something you’d never have said to me, as blunt as you are. It turned me off women for a while. Not that I even liked her. But it hurt my pride.”

“As if a vehicle was any standard to base a character assessment on,” she huffed.

He smiled tenderly. “Small-town police chiefs don’t usually drive Jaguars. Although this guy I know in Texas does. But he made his money as a merc, not in law enforcement.”

“I like you just the way you are,” she told him quietly. “And it wouldn’t matter to me if we had to walk to Billings to go dancing.”

He ground his teeth together. She made him feel taller, more masculine, when she looked at him like that. He was struggling with more intense emotions than he’d felt in years. He wanted to grab her and eat her alive. But she needed careful handling. He couldn’t be forward with her. Not until he could teach her to trust him. That would take time.

She felt uneasy when he scowled like that. “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to blurt that out and upset you …”

“You make me feel good, Jake,” he interrupted. “I’m not upset. Well, not for the reasons you’re thinking, anyway.”

“What reasons upset you?”

He sighed. “To be blunt, I’d like to back you into the truck and kiss you half to death.” He smiled wryly at her shocked expression. “Won’t do it,” he promised. “Just telling you what I really feel. Honesty is a sideline with most people. It’s first on my list of necessities.”

“Mine, too. It’s okay. I like it when you’re up-front.”

“You’re the same way,” he pointed out.

“I guess so. Maybe I’m too blunt, sometimes.”

He smiled. “I’d call it being forthright. I like it.”

She beamed. “Thanks.”

He checked his watch. “Got to go.” He opened the door for her and waited until she jumped up into the cab and fastened her seat belt before he closed it.

“It impresses me that I didn’t have to tell you to put that on,” he said as he started the engine, nodding toward her seat belt. “I don’t ride with people who refuse to wear them. I work wrecks. Some of them are horrific, and the worst fatalities are when people don’t have on seat belts.”

“I’ve heard that.”

He pulled out onto the highway. “Here we go, Jake.

Our first date.” He grinned. “Our uncles are probably laughing their ghostly heads off.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it.” She sighed. “Still, it wasn’t nice of either of them to rig the wills like that.”

“I guess they didn’t expect to die for years and years,” he commented. “Maybe it was a joke. They expected the lawyer to tell us long before they died. Except he died first and his partner had no sense of humor.”

“I don’t know. Our uncles did like to manipulate people.”

“Too much,” he murmured. “They browbeat poor old Dan Harper into marrying Daisy Kane, and he was miserable. They thought she was a sweet, kind girl who’d never want anything more than to go on living in Hollister for the rest of her life.”

“Then she discovered a fascination for microscopes, got a science degree and moved to New York City to work in a research lab. Dan wouldn’t leave Hollister, so they got a divorce. Good thing they didn’t have kids, I guess.”

“I guess. Especially with Dan living in a whiskey bottle these days.”

She glanced at him. “Maybe some women mature late.”

He glanced back. “You going to develop a fascination with microscopes and move to New York?” he asked suspiciously.

She laughed out loud. “I hope not. I hate cities.”

He grinned again. “Me, too. Just checking.”

“Besides, how could I leave Sammy? I’m sure there isn’t an apartment in a big city that would let you keep a calf in it.”

He laughed. “Well, they would. But only in the fridge. Or the freezer.”

“You bite your tongue!” she exclaimed. “Nobody’s eating my cow!”

He frowned thoughtfully. “Good point. I’m not exactly sure I know how to field dress a cow. A steer, sure. But cows are, well, different.”

She glared at him. “You are not field dressing Sammy, so forget it.”

He sighed. “There go my dreams of a nice steak.”

“You can get one at the restaurant in town anytime you like. Sammy is for petting, not eating.”

“If you say so.”

“I do!”

He loved to wind her up and watch the explosion. She was so full of life, so enthusiastic about everything new. He enjoyed being with her. There were all sorts of places he could take her. He was thinking ahead. Far ahead.

“You’re smirking,” she accused. “What are you thinking about?”

“I was just remembering how excited you get about new things,” he confessed. “I was thinking of places we could go together.”

“You were?” she asked, surprised. And flattered.

He smiled at her. “I’ve never dated anybody regularly,” he said. “I mean, I’ve had dates. But this is different.” He searched for a way to put into words what he was thinking.

“You mean, because we’re sort of being forced into it by the wills.”

He frowned. “No. That’s not what I mean.” He stopped at an intersection and glanced her way. “I haven’t had regular dates with a woman I’ve known well for years and years,” he said after a minute. “Somebody I like.”

She beamed. “Oh.”

He chuckled as he pulled out onto the long highway that led to Billings. “We’ve had our verbal cut-and-thrust encounters, but despite that sharp tongue, I enjoy being with you.”

She laughed. “It’s not that sharp.”

“Not to me. I understand there’s a former customer of the florist shop where you worked who could write a testimonial for you about your use of words in a free-for-all.”

She flushed and fiddled with her purse. “He was obnoxious.”

“Actually they said he was just trying to ask you out.”

“It was the way he went about it,” she said curtly. “I don’t think I’ve ever had a man talk to me like that in my whole life.”

“I don’t think he’ll ever use the same language to any other woman, if it’s a consolation.” He teased. “So much for his inflated ego.”

“He thought he was irresistible,” she muttered. “Bragging about his fast new car and his dad’s bank balance, and how he could get any woman he wanted.” Her lips set. “Well, he couldn’t get this one.”

“Teenage boys have insecurities,” he said. “I can speak with confidence on that issue, because I used to be one myself.” He glanced at her with twinkling black eyes. “They’re puff adders.”

She blinked. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve never seen one myself, but I had a buddy in the service who was from Georgia. He told me about them. They’re these snakes with insecurities.”

She burst out laughing. “Snakes with insecurities?”

He nodded. “They’re terrified of people. So if humans come too close to them, they rise up on their tails and weave back and forth and blow out their throats and start hissing. You know, imitating a cobra. Most of the time, people take them at face value and run away.”

“What if people stand their ground and don’t run?”

He laughed. “They faint.”

“They faint? ”

He nodded. “Dead away, my buddy said. He took a friend home with him. They were walking through the fields when a puff adder rose up and did his act for the friend. The guy was about to run for it when my buddy walked right up to the snake and it fainted dead away. I hear his family is still telling the story with accompanying sound effects and hilarity.”

“A fainting snake.” She sighed. “What I’ve missed, by spending my whole life in Montana. I wouldn’t have known any better, either, though. I’ve never seen a cobra.”

“They have them in zoos,” he pointed out.

“I’ve never been to a zoo.”

“What?”

“Well, Billings is a long way from Hollister and I’ve never had a vehicle I felt comfortable about getting there in.” She grimaced. “This is a very deserted road, most of the time. If I broke down, I’d worry about who might stop to help me.”

He gave her a covert appraisal. She was such a private person. She kept things to herself. Remembering her uncle and his weak heart, he wasn’t surprised that she’d learned to do that.

“You couldn’t talk to your uncle about most things, could you, Jake?” he wondered out loud.

“Not really,” she agreed. “I was afraid of upsetting him, especially after his first heart attack.”

“So you learned to keep things to yourself.”

“I pretty much had to. I’ve never had close girlfriends, either.”

“Most of the girls your age are married and have kids, except the ones who went into the military or moved to cities.”

She nodded. “I’m a throwback to another era, when women lived at home until they married. Gosh, the world has changed,” she commented.

“It sure has,” he agreed. “When I was a boy, television sets were big and bulky and in cabinets. Now they’re so thin and light that people can hang them on walls. And my iPod does everything a television can do, right down to playing movies and giving me news and weather.”

She frowned. “That wasn’t what I meant, exactly.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“I mean, that women seem to want careers and men in volume.”

He cleared his throat.

“That didn’t come out right.” She laughed self-consciously. “It just seems to me that women are more like the way men used to be. They don’t want commitment. They have careers and they live with men. I heard a newscaster say that marriage is too retro a concept for modern people.”

“There have always been people who lived out of the mainstream, Jake,” he said easily. “It’s a choice.”

“It wouldn’t be mine,” she said curtly. “I think people should get married and stay married and raise children together.”

“Now that’s a point of view I like.”

She studied him curiously. “Do you want kids?”

He smiled. “Of course. Don’t you?”

She averted her eyes. “Well, yes. Someday.”

He sighed. “I keep forgetting how young you are. You haven’t really had time to live yet.”

“You mean, get fascinated with microscopes and move to New York City,” she said with a grin.

He laughed. “Something like that, maybe.”

“I could never see stuff in microscopes in high school,” she recalled. “I was so excited when I finally found what I thought was an organism and the teacher said it was an air bubble. That’s all I ever managed to find.” She grimaced. “I came within two grade points of failing biology. As it was, I had the lowest passing grade in my whole class.”

“But you can cook like an angel,” he pointed out.

She frowned. “What does that have to do with microscopes?”

“I’m making an observation,” he replied. “We all have skills. Yours is cooking. Somebody else’s might be science. It would be a pretty boring world if we all were good at the same things.”

“I see.”

He smiled. “You can crochet, too. My grandmother loved her crafts, like you do. She could make quilts and knit sweaters and crochet afghans. A woman of many talents.”

“They don’t seem to count for much in the modern world,” she replied.

“Have you ever really looked at the magazine rack, Jake?” he asked, surprised. “There are more magazines on handicrafts than there are on rock stars, and that’s saying something.”

“I hadn’t noticed.” She looked around. They were just coming into Billings. Ahead, she could see the awesome outline of the Rimrocks, where the airport was located, in the distance. “We’re here?” she exclaimed.

“It’s not so far from home,” he said lazily.

“Not at the speed you go, no,” she said impudently.

He laughed. “There wasn’t any traffic and we aren’t overly blessed with highway patrols at this hour of the night.”

“You catch speeders, and you’re local law enforcement,” she pointed out.

“I don’t catch them on the interstate unless they’re driving on it through my town,” he replied. “And it’s not so much the speed that gets them caught, either. It’s the way they’re driving. You can be safe at high speeds and dangerous at low ones. Weaving in and out of traffic, riding people’s bumpers, running stop signs, that sort of thing.”

“I saw this television program where an experienced traffic officer said that what scared him most was to see a driver with both hands white-knuckled and close together on the steering wheel.”

He nodded. “There are exceptions, but it usually means someone who’s insecure and afraid of the vehicle.”

“You aren’t.”

He shrugged. “I’ve been driving since I was twelve. Kids grow up early when they live on ranches. Have to learn how to operate machinery, like tractors and harvesters.”

“Our ranch doesn’t have a harvester.”

“That’s because our ranch can’t afford one,” he said, smiling. “But we can always borrow one from neighbors.”

“Small towns are such nice places,” she said dreamily. “I love it that people will loan you a piece of equipment that expensive just because they like you.”

“I imagine there are people in cities who would do the same, Jake, but there’s not much use for them there.”

She laughed. “No, I guess not.”

He turned the corner and pulled into a parking lot next to a long, low building. There was a neon sign that said Red’s Tavern.

“It’s a bar?” she asked.

“It’s a dance club. They do serve alcohol, but not on the dance floor.”

“Theodore, I don’t think I’ve ever been in a bar in my life.”

“Not to worry, they won’t force you to drink anything alcoholic,” he told her, tongue-in-cheek. “And if they tried, I’d have to call local law and have them arrested. You’re underage.”

“Local law?”

“I’m not sanctioned to arrest people outside my own jurisdiction,” he reminded her. “But you could make a citizen’s arrest. Anybody can if they see a crime being committed. It’s just that we don’t advise it. Could get you killed, depending on the circumstances.”

“I see what you mean.”

He got out and opened her door, lifting her gently down from the truck by the waist. He held her just in front of him for a minute, smiling into her soft eyes. “You’re as light as a feather,” he commented softly. “And you smell pretty.”

A shocked little laugh left her throat. “I smell pretty?”

“Yes. I remember my grandmother by her scent. She wore a light, flowery cologne. I recognize it if I smell it anywhere. She always smelled so good.”

Her hands rested lightly on his broad shoulders. He was very strong. She loved his strength, his size.

She smiled into his dark eyes. “You smell good, too. Spicy.”

He nuzzled her nose with his. “Thanks.”

She sighed and slid her arms around his neck. She tucked her face into his throat. “I feel so safe with you,” she said softly. “Like nothing could ever hurt me.”

“Now, Jake, that’s not the sort of thing a man likes to hear.”

She lifted her head, surprised. “Why?”

He pursed his lips. “We want to hear that we’re dangerous and exciting, that we stir you up and make you nervous.”

“You do?”

“It’s a figure of speech.”

She searched his eyes. “You don’t want me to feel comfortable with you?” she faltered.

“You don’t understand what I’m talking about, do you?” he wondered gently.

“No … not really. I’m sorry.”

It was early days yet, he reminded himself. It was disappointing that she wasn’t shaky when he touched her. But, then, she kept secrets. There must be a reason why she was so icy inside herself.

He set her down but he didn’t let her go. “Some things have to be learned,” he said.

“Learned.”

He framed her face with his big, warm hands. “Passion, for instance.”

She blinked.

It was like describing ice to a desert nomad. He smiled wistfully. “You haven’t ever been kissed in such a way that you’d die to have it happen again?”

She shook her head. Her eyes were wide and innocent, unknowing. She flushed a little and shifted restlessly.

“But you have been kissed in such a way that you’d rather undergo torture than have it happen again,” he said suddenly.

She caught her breath. He couldn’t know! He couldn’t!

His black eyes narrowed on her face. “Something happened to you, Jake. Something bad. It made you lock yourself away from the world. And it wasn’t your experience with the traveling auditor.”

“You can’t know …!”

“Of course not,” he interrupted impatiently. “You know I don’t pry. But I’ve been in law enforcement a long time, and I’ve learned to read people pretty good. You’re afraid of me when I get too close to you.”

She bit down hard on her lower lip. She drew blood.

“Stop that,” he said in a tender tone, touching her lower lip where her teeth had savaged it. “I’m not going to try to browbeat you into telling me something you don’t want to. But I wish you trusted me enough to talk to me about it. You know I’m not judgmental.”

“It doesn’t have anything to do with that.”

He cocked his head. “Can’t you tell me?”

She hesitated noticeably. She wanted to. She really wanted to. But.

He bent and kissed her eyelids shut. “Don’t. We have all the time in the world. When you’re ready to talk, I’ll listen.”

She drew in a long, labored breath and laid her forehead against his suit coat. “You’re the nicest man I’ve ever known.”

He smiled over her head. “Well, that’s a start, I guess.”

She smiled, too. “It’s a start.”

Four

It was the liveliest place Jillian had ever been to. The dance band was on a platform at the end of a long, wide hall with a polished wooden floor. Around the floor were booths, not tables, and there was a bar in the next room with three bartenders, two of whom were female.

The music was incredible. It was Latin with a capital L, pulsing and narcotic. On the dance floor, people were moving to the rhythm. Some had on jeans and boots, others were wearing ensembles that would have done justice to a club in New York City. Still others, apparently too intimidated by the talent being displayed on the dance floor, were standing on the perimeter of the room, clapping and smiling.

“Wow,” Jillian said, watching a particularly talented couple, a silver-haired lean and muscular man with a willowy blonde woman somewhat younger than he was.

They whirled and pivoted, laughing, with such easy grace and elegance that she couldn’t take her eyes off them.

“That’s Red Jernigan,” he told her, indicating the silver-haired man, whose thick, long hair was in a ponytail down his back.

“He isn’t redheaded,” she pointed out.

He gave her an amused look. “It doesn’t refer to his coloring,” he told her. “They called him that because in any battle, he was the one most likely to come out bloody.”

She gasped. “Oh.”

“I have some odd friends.” He shrugged, then smiled. “You’ll get used to them.”

He was saying something profound about their future. She was confused, but she returned his smile anyway.

The dance ended and Theodore tugged her along with him to the dance floor, where the silver-haired man and the blonde woman were catching their breath.

“Hey, Red,” he greeted the other man, who grinned and gripped his hand. “Good to see you.”

“About time you came up for a visit.” Red’s dark eyes slid to the small blonde woman beside the police chief. His eyebrows arched.

“This is Jillian,” Theodore said gently. “And this is Red Jernigan.”

“I’m Melody,” the pretty blonde woman said, introducing herself. “Nice to meet you.”

Red slid his arm around the woman and pulled her close. “Nice to see Ted going around with somebody,” he observed. “It’s painful to see a man come alone to a dance club and refuse to dance with anyone except the owner’s wife.”

“Well, I don’t like most modern women.” Theodore excused himself. He smiled down at a grinning Jillian. “I like Jake, here.”

“Jake?” Red asked, blinking.

“He’s always called me that,” Jillian sighed. “I’ve known him a long time.”

“She has,” Theodore drawled, smiling. “She likes cattle.”

“I don’t,” Melody laughed. “Smelly things.”

“Oh, but they’re not smelly if they’re kept clean,” Jillian protested at once. “Sammy is always neat.”

“Her calf,” Theodore explained.

“Is he a bull?” Red asked.

“She’s a heifer,” Jillian inserted. “A little black baldy.”

Red and Melody were giving her odd looks.

“As an acquaintance of mine in Jacobsville, Texas, would say,” Red told them, “if Johnny Cash could sing about a girl named Sue, a person can have a girl animal with a boy’s name.” He leaned closer. “He has a female border collie named Bob.”

They burst out laughing.

“Well, don’t stand over here with us old folks,” Red told them. “Get out there with the younger generation and show them how to tango.”

“You aren’t old, Bud,” Theodore told his friend with twinkling eyes. “You’re just a hair slower than you used to be, but with the same skills.”

“Which I hope I’m never called to use again,” Red replied solemnly. “I’m still on reserve status.”

“I know.”

“Red was a bird colonel in spec ops,” Theodore explained to Jillian later when they were sitting at a table sampling the club’s exquisitely cooked seasoned steak and fancy baked sweet potatoes, which it was as famous as for its dance band.

“And he still is?” she asked.

He nodded. “He can do more with recruits than any man I ever knew, and without browbeating them. He just encourages. Of course, there are times when he has to get a little more creative, with the wilder sort.”

“Creative?”

He grinned. “There was this giant of a kid from Milwaukee who was assigned to his unit in the field. Kid played video games and thought he knew more about strategy and tactics than Red did. So Red turns him loose on the enemy, but with covert backup.”

“What happened?” she asked, all eyes.

“The kid walked right into an enemy squad and froze in his tracks. It’s one thing to do that on a computer screen. Quite another to confront armed men in real life. They were aiming their weapons at him when Red led a squad in to recover him. Took about two minutes for them to eliminate the threat and get Commando Carl back to his own lines.” He shook his head. “In the excitement, the kid had, shall we say, needed access to a restroom and didn’t have one. So they hung a nickname on him that stuck.”

“Tell me!”

He chuckled. “Let’s just say that it suited him. He took it in his stride, sucked up his pride, learned to follow orders and became a real credit to the unit. He later became mayor of a small town somewhere up north, where he’s still known, to a favored few, as ‘Stinky.’”

She laughed out loud.

“Actually, he was in good company. I read in a book on World War II that one of our better known generals did the same thing when his convoy ran into a German attack. Poor guy. I’ll bet Stinky cringed every time he saw that other general’s book on a rack.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

She sipped her iced tea and smiled. “This is really good food,” she said. “I’ve never had a steak that was so tender, not even from beef my uncle raised.”

“This is Kobe beef,” he pointed out. “Red gets it from Japan. God knows how,” he added.

“I read about those. Don’t they actually massage the beef cattle?”

“Pamper them,” he agreed. “You should try that sweet potato,” he advised. “It’s really a unique combination of spices they use.”

She frowned, picking at it with her fork. “I’ve only ever had a couple of sweet potatoes, and they were mostly tasteless.”

“Just try it.”

She put the fork into it, lifted it dubiously to her lips and suddenly caught her breath when the taste hit her tongue like dynamite. “Wow!” she exclaimed. “What do they call this?”

“Red calls it ‘the ultimate jalapeño-brown-sugar-sweet-potato delight.’”

“It’s heavenly!”

He chuckled. “It is, isn’t it? The jalapeño gives it a kick like a mule, but it’s not so hot that even tenderfeet wouldn’t eat it.”

“I would never have thought of such a combination. And I thought I was a good cook.”

“You are a good cook, Jake,” he said. “The best I ever knew.”

She blushed. “Thanks, Theodore.”

He cocked his head. “I guess it would kill you to shorten that.”

“Shorten what?”

“My name. Most people call me Ted.”

She hesitated with the fork in midair. She searched his black eyes for a long time. “Ted,” she said softly.

His jaw tautened. He hadn’t expected it to have that effect on him. She had a soft, sweet, sexy voice when she let herself relax with him. She made his name sound different; special. New.

“I like the way you say it,” he said, when she gave him a worried look. “It’s—” he searched for a word that wouldn’t intimidate her “—it’s stimulating.”

“Stimulating.” She didn’t understand.

He put down his fork with a long sigh. “Something happened to you,” he said quietly. “You don’t know me well enough to talk to me about it. Or maybe you’re afraid that I might go after the man who did it.”

She was astounded. She couldn’t even manage words. She just stared at him, shocked.

“I’m in law enforcement,” he reminded her. “After a few years, you read body language in a different way than most people do. Abused children have a look, a way of dressing and acting, one that’s obvious to a cop.”

She went white. She bit her lower lip and her fingers toyed with her fork as she stared at it, fighting tears.

His big hand curled around hers, gently. “I wish you could tell me. I think it would help you.”

She looked up into quiet, patient eyes. “You wouldn’t … think badly of me?”

“For God’s sake,” he groaned. “Are you nuts?”

She blinked.

He grimaced. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to put it that way. Nothing I found out about you would change the way I feel. If that’s why you’re reluctant.”

“You’re sure?”

He glared at her.

She lowered her eyes and curled her small hand into his big one, a trusting gesture that touched him in a new and different way.

“When I was fifteen, Uncle John had this young man he got to do odd jobs around here. He was a drifter, very intelligent. He seemed like a nice, trustworthy person to have around the house. Then one day Uncle John felt bad and went to bed, left me with the hired man in the kitchen.”

Her jaw clenched. “At first, he was real helpful. Wanted to put out the trash for me and sweep the floor. I thought it was so nice of him. Then all of a sudden, he asked what was my bra size and if I wore nylon panties.”

Theodore’s eyes began to flash.

She swallowed. “I was so shocked I didn’t know what to do or say. I thought it was some sick joke. Until he tried to take my clothes off, mumbling all the time that I needed somebody to teach me about men and he was the perfect person, because he’d had so many virgins.”

“Good God!”

“Uncle John was asleep. There was nobody to help me. But the Peales lived right down the road, and I knew a back way through the woods to their house. I hit him in a bad place and ran out the door as fast as my legs could carry me. I was almost naked by then.” She closed her eyes, shivering with the memory of the terror she’d felt, running and hearing him curse behind her as he crashed through the undergrowth in pursuit,

“I didn’t think what danger I might be placing Sassy Peale and her mother and stepsister in, I just knew they’d help me and I was terrified. I banged on the door and Sassy came to it. When she saw how I looked, she ran for the shotgun they kept in the hall closet. By the time the hired man got on the porch, Sassy had the shotgun loaded and aimed at his stomach. She told him if he moved she’d blow him up.”

She sipped tea while she calmed a little from the remembered fear. Her hand was shaking, but just a little. Her free hand was still clasped gently in Theodore’s.

“He tried to blame it on me, to say I’d flirted and tried to seduce him, but Sassy knew better. She held him at bay until her mother called the police. They took him away.” She drew in a breath. “There was a trial. It was horrible, but at least it was in closed session, in the judge’s chambers. The hired man plea-bargained. You see, he had priors, many of them. He drew a long jail sentence, but it did at least spare me a public trial.” She sipped tea again. “His sister lived over in Wyoming. She came to see me, after the trial.” Her eyes closed. “She said I was a slut who had no business putting a sweet, nice guy like him behind bars for years.” She managed a smile. “Sassy was in the kitchen when the woman came to the door. She marched into the living room and gave that woman hell. She told her about her innocent brother’s priors and how many young girls had suffered because of his inability to control his own desires. She was eloquent. The woman shut up and went away. I never heard from her again.” She looked over at him. “Sassy’s been my friend ever since. Not a close one, I’m sorry to say. I was so embarrassed at having her know about it that it inhibited me with her and everyone else. Everyone would believe the man’s sister, and that I’d asked for it.”

His fingers curled closer into hers. “No young woman asks for such abuse,” he said softly. “But abusers use that argument to defend themselves. It’s a lie, like all their other lies.”

“Sometimes,” she said, to be fair, “women do lie, and men, innocent men, go to jail for things they didn’t do.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “But more often than not, such lies are found out, and the women themselves are punished for it.”

“I guess so.”

“I wasn’t here when that happened.”

“No. You were doing that workshop at the FBI Academy. And I begged the judge not to tell you or anybody else. She was very kind to me.”

He looked over her head, his eyes flashing cold and black as he thought what he might have done to the man if he’d been in town. He wasn’t interested in Jillian as a woman back then, because she was still almost a child, but he’d always been fond of her. He would have wiped the floor with the man.

His expression made her feel warm inside. “You’d have knocked him up and down main street,” she ventured.

He laughed, surprised, and met her eyes. “Worse than that, probably.” He frowned. “First the hired man, then the accountant.”

“The accountant was my fault,” she confessed. “I never told him how old I was, and I was infatuated with him. He was drinking when he tried to persuade me.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe I even did that.”

He stared at her. “You were a kid, Jake. Kids aren’t known for deep thought.”

She smiled. “Thanks for not being judgmental.”

He shrugged. “I’m such a nice man that I’m never judgmental.”

Her eyebrows arched.

He grinned. “And I really can do the tango. Suppose I teach you?”

She studied his lean, handsome face. “It’s a very, well, sensual sort of dance, they say.”

“Very.” He pursed his lips. “But I’m not an aggressive man. Not in any way that should frighten you.”

She colored a little. “Really?”

“Really.”

She drew in a long breath. “I guess every woman should dance the tango at least once.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

He wiped his mouth on the linen napkin, took a last sip of the excellent but cooling coffee and got to his feet.

“You have to watch your back on the dance floor, though,” he told her as he led her toward it.

“Why is that?”

“When the other women see what a great dancer I am, they’ll probably mob you and take me away from you,” he teased.

She laughed. “Okay.” She leaned toward him. “Are you packing?”

“Are you kidding?” he asked, indicating the automatic nestled at his waist on his belt. “I’m a cop. I’m always packing. And you keep your little hands off my gun,” he added sternly. “I don’t let women play with it, even if they ask nicely.”

“Theodore, I’m scared of guns,” she reminded him. “And you know it. That’s why you come over and sit on the front porch and shoot bottles on stumps, just to irritate me.”

“I’ll try to reform,” he promised.

“Lies.”

He put his hand over his heart. “I only lie when I’m salving someone’s feelings,” he pointed out. “There are times when telling the truth is cruel.”

“Oh, yeah? Name one.”

He nodded covertly toward a woman against the wall. “Well, if I told that nice lady that her dress looks like she had it painted on at a carnival, she’d probably feel bad.”

She bit her lip trying not to laugh. “She probably thinks it looks sexy.”

“Oh, no. Sexy is a dress that covers almost everything, but leaves one little tantalizing place bare,” he said. “That’s why Japanese kimonos have that dip on the back of the neck, that just reveals the nape, when the rest of the woman is covered from head to toe. The Japanese think the nape of the neck is sexy.”

“My goodness!” She stared up at him, impressed. “You’ve been so many places. I’ve only ever been out of Montana once, when I drove to Wyoming with Uncle John to a cattle convention. I’ve never been out of the country at all. You learn a lot about other people when you travel, don’t you? ”

He nodded. He smiled. “Other countries have different customs. But people are mostly the same everywhere. I’ve enjoyed the travel most of all, even when I had to do it on business.”

“Like the time you flew to London with that detective from Scotland Yard. Imagine a British case that involved a small town like Hollister!” she exclaimed.

“The perpetrator was a murderer who came over here fishing to provide himself with an alibi while his wife committed the crime and blamed it on her absent husband. In the end, they both drew life sentences.”

“Who did they kill?” she asked.

“Her cousin who was set to inherit the family estate and about ten million pounds,” he said, shaking his head. “The things sensible people will do for money never ceases to amaze me. I mean, it isn’t like you can take it with you when you die. And how many houses can you live in? How many cars can you drive?” He frowned. “I think of money the way the Crow and Cheyenne people do. The way most Native Americans do. The man in the tribe who is the most honored is always the poorest, because he gives away everything he has to people who need it more. They’re not capitalists. They don’t understand societies that equate prestige with money.”

“And they share absolutely everything,” she agreed. “They don’t understand private property.”

He laughed. “Neither do I. The woods and the rivers and the mountains are ageless. You can’t own them.”

“See? That’s the Cheyenne in you talking.”

He touched her blond hair. “Probably it is. We going to dance, or talk?”

“You’re leading, aren’t you?”

He tugged her onto the dance floor. “Apparently.” He drew her gently to him and then hesitated. After what she’d told him, he didn’t want to do anything that would make her uncomfortable. He said so.

“I don’t … well, I don’t feel uncomfortable, like that, with you,” she faltered, looking up into his black eyes. She managed a shaky little smile. “I like being close to you.” She flushed, afraid she’d been too bold. Or that he’d think she was being forward. Her expression was troubled.

He just smiled. “You can say anything to me,” he said gently. “I won’t think you’re being shallow or vampish. Okay?”

She relaxed. “Okay. Is this going to be hard to learn?”

“Very.”

She drew in a long breath. “Then I guess we should get started.”

His eyes smiled down at her. “I guess we should.”

He walked her around the dance floor, to her amusement, teaching her how the basic steps were done. It wasn’t like those exotic tangos she’d seen in movies at first. It was like kindergarten was to education.

She followed his steps, hesitantly at first, then a little more confidently, until she was moving with some elegance.

“Now, this is where we get into the more exotic parts,” he said. “It involves little kicks that go between the legs.” He leaned to her ear. “I think we should have kids one day, so it’s very important that you don’t get overenthusiastic with the kicks. And you should also be very careful where you place them.”

It took her a minute to understand what he meant, and then she burst out laughing instead of being embarrassed.

He grinned. “Just playing it safe,” he told her. “Ready? This is how you do it.”

It was fascinating, the complexity of the movements and the fluid flow of the steps as he paced the dance to the music.

“It doesn’t look like this in most movies,” she said as she followed his steps.

“That’s because it’s a stylized version of the tango,” he told her. “Most people have no idea how it’s supposed to be done. But there are a few movies that go into it in depth. One was made in black and white by a British woman. It’s my favorite. Very comprehensive. Even about the danger of the kicks.” He chuckled.

“It’s Argentinian, isn’t it? The dance, I mean.”

“You’d have to ask my buddy about that, I’m not sure. I know there are plenty of dance clubs down there that specialize in tango. The thing is, you’re supposed to do these dances with strangers. It’s as much a social expression as it is a dance.”

“Really?”

He nodded. He smiled. “Maybe we should get a bucket and put all our spare change into it. Then, when we’re Red’s age, we might have enough to buy tickets to Buenos Aires and go dancing.”

She giggled. “Oh, I’m sure we’d have the ticket price in twenty or thirty years.”

He sighed as he led. “Or forty.” He shook his head. “I’ve always wanted to travel. I did a good bit of it in the service, but there are plenty of places I’d love to see. Like those ruins in Peru and the pyramids, and the Sonoran desert.”

She frowned. “The Sonoran desert isn’t exotic.”

He smiled. “Sure it is. Do you know, those Saguaro cacti can live for hundreds of years? And that if a limb falls on you, it can kill you because of the weight? You don’t think about them being that heavy, but they have a woody spine and limbs to support the weight of the water they store.”

“Gosh. How do you know all that?”

He grinned. “The Science Channel, the Discovery Channel, the National Geographic Channel …”

She laughed. “I like to watch those, too.”

“I don’t think I’ve missed a single nature special,” he told her. He gave her a droll look. “Now that should tell you all you need to know about my social life.” He grinned.

She laughed, too. “Well, my social life isn’t much better. This is the first time I’ve been on a real date.”

His black eyebrows arched.

She flushed. She shrugged. She averted her eyes.

He tilted her face up to his and smiled with a tenderness that made her knees weak. “I heartily approve,” he said, “of the fact that you’ve been saving yourself for me, just like your uncle did,” he added outrageously.

She almost bent over double laughing. “No fair.”

“Just making the point.” He slid his arm around her and pulled her against him. She caught her breath.

He hesitated, his dark eyes searching hers to see if he’d upset her.

“My … goodness,” she said breathlessly.

He raised his eyebrows.

She averted her eyes and her cheeks took on a glow. She didn’t know how to tell him that the sensations she was feeling were unsettling. She could feel the muscles of his chest pressed against her breasts, and it was stimulating, exciting. It was a whole new experience to be held close to a man’s body, to feel its warm strength, to smell the elusive, spicy cologne he was wearing.

“You’ve danced with men before.”

“Yes, of course,” she confessed. She looked up at him with fascination. “But it didn’t, well, it didn’t … feel like this.”

That made him arrogant. His chin lifted and he looked down at her with possession kindling in his eyes.

“Sorry,” she said quickly, embarrassed. “I just blurt things out.”

He bent his head, so that his mouth was right beside her ear as he eased her into the dance. “It’s okay,” he said softly.

She bit her lip and laughed nervously.

“Well, it’s okay to feel like that with me,” he corrected. “But you should know that it’s very wrong for you to feel that way with any other man. So you should never dance with anybody but me for the rest of your life.”

She burst out laughing again.

He chuckled. “You’re a quick study, Jake,” he noted as she followed his steps easily. “I think we may become famous locally for this dance once you get used to it.”

“You think?” she teased.

He turned her back over his arm, pulled her up, and spun her around with skill. She laughed breathlessly. It was really fun.

“I haven’t danced in years,” he sighed. “I love to do it, but I’m not much of a party person.”

“I’m not, either. I’m much more at home in a kitchen than I am in a club.” She grimaced. “That’s not very modern, either, for a woman. I always feel that I should be working my way up a corporate ladder somewhere or immersing myself in higher education.”

“Would you like to be a corporate leader?”

She made a face. “Not really. Jobs like that are demanding, and you have to want them more than anything. I’m just not ambitious, I guess. Although,” she mused, “I think I might like to take a college course.”

“What sort?” he asked.

“Anthropology.”

He stopped dancing and looked down at her, fascinated. “Why?”

“I like reading about ancient humans, and how archaeologists can learn so much from skeletal material.

I go crazy over those National Geographic specials on Egypt.”

He laughed. “So do I.”

“I’d love to see the pyramids. All of them, even those in Mexico and Asia.”

“There are pyramids here in the States,” he reminded her. “Those huge earthen mounds that primitive people built were the equivalent of pyramids.”

She stopped dancing. “Why do you think they built them?”

“I don’t know. It’s just a guess. But most of the earthen mounds are near rivers. I’ve always thought maybe they were where the village went to get out of the water when it flooded.”

“It’s as good a theory as any other,” she agreed. “But what about in Egypt? I don’t think they had a problem with flooding,” she added, tongue in cheek.

“Now, see, there’s another theory about that. Thousands of years ago, Egypt was green and almost tropical, with abundant sources of water. So who knows?”

“It was green?” she exclaimed.

He nodded. “There were forests.”

“Where did you learn that?”

“I read, too. I think it was in Herodotus. They called him the father of history. He wrote about Egypt. He admitted that the information might not all be factual, but he wrote down exactly what the Egyptian priests told him about their country.”

“I’d like to read what he said.”

“You can borrow one of my books,” he offered. “I have several copies of his Histories.”

“Why?”

He grimaced. “Because I keep losing them.”

She frowned. “How in the world do you lose a book?”

“You’ll have to come home with me sometime and see why.”

Her eyes sparkled. “Is that an invitation? You know, ‘come up and see my books’?”

He chuckled. “No, it’s not a pickup line. I really mean it.”

“I’d like to.”

“You would?” His arm contracted. “When? How about next Saturday? I’ll show you my collection of maps, too.”

“Maps?” she exclaimed.

He nodded. “I like topo maps, and relief maps, best of all. It helps me to understand where places are located.”

She smiled secretively. “We could compare maps.”

“What?”

She sighed. “I guess we do have a lot in common. I think I’ve got half the maps Rand McNally ever published!”

Five

“Well, what do you know?” He laughed. “We’re both closet map fanatics.”

“And we love ancient history.”

“And we love shooting targets from the front porch.”

She glowered up at him.

He sighed. “I’ll try to reform.”

“You might miss and shoot Sammy,” she replied.

“I’m a dead shot.”

“Anybody can miss once,” she pointed out.

“I guess so.”

They’d stopped on the dance floor while the band got ready to start the next number. When they did, he whirled her around and they started all over again. Jillian thought she’d never enjoyed anything in her life so much.

Ted walked her to the front door, smiling. “It was a nice first date.”

“Yes, it was,” she agreed, smiling back. “I’ve never had so much fun!”

He laughed. She made him feel warm inside. She was such an honest person. She wasn’t coy or flirtatious. She just said what she felt. It wasn’t a trait he was familiar with.

“What are you thinking?” she asked curiously.

“That I’m not used to people who tell the truth.”

She blinked. “Why not?”

“Almost all the people I arrest are innocent,” he ticked off. “They were set up by a friend, or it was a case of mistaken identity even when there were eyewitnesses. Oh, and, the police have it in for them and arrest them just to be mean. That’s my personal favorite,” he added facetiously.

She chuckled. “I guess they wish they were innocent.”

“I guess.”

She frowned. “There’s been some talk about that man you arrested for the bank robbery getting paroled because of a technicality. Is it true?”

His face set in hard lines. “It might be. His attorney said that the judge made an error in his instructions to the jury that prejudiced the case. I’ve seen men get off in similar situations.”

“Ted, he swore he’d kill you if he ever got out,” she said worriedly.

He pursed his lips and his dark eyes twinkled. “Frightened for me?”

“Of course I am.”

He sighed and pulled her close. “Now, that’s exactly the sort of thing that makes a man feel good about himself, when some sweet little woman worries about him.”

“I’m not little, I’m not sweet and I don’t usually worry,” she pointed out.

“It’s okay if you worry about me,” he teased. “As long as you don’t do it excessively.”

She toyed with the top button of his unbuttoned jacket. “There are lots of safer professions than being a police chief.”

He frowned. “You’re kidding, right?”

She grimaced. “Ted, Joe Brown’s wife was one of my uncle’s friends. She was married to that deputy sheriff who was shot to death a few years ago. She said that she spent their whole married lives sitting by the phone at night, almost shaking with worry every time he had to go out on a case, hoping and praying that he’d come home alive.”

His hands on her slender waist had tightened unconsciously. “Anyone who marries someone in law enforcement has to live with that possibility,” he said slowly.

She bit her lower lip. She was seeing herself sitting by the phone at night, pacing the floor. She was prone to worry anyway. She was very fond of Ted. She didn’t want him to die. But right now, she wasn’t in love. She had time to think about what she wanted to do with her life. She was sure she should give this a lot of thought before she dived headfirst into a relationship with him that might lead very quickly to marriage. She’d heard people talk about how it was when people became very physical with each other, that it was so addictive that they couldn’t bear to be apart at all. Once that happened, she wouldn’t have a chance to see things rationally.

Ted could almost see the thoughts in her mind. Slowly he released her and stepped back.

She felt the distance, and it was more than physical. He was drawing away in every sense.

She looked up at him. She drew in a long breath. “I’m not sure I’m ready, Ted.”

“Ready for what?”

That stiffness in him was disturbing, but she had to be honest. “I’m not sure I’m ready to think about marriage.”

His black eyes narrowed. “Jillian, if we don’t get married, there’s a California developer who’s going to make this place into hot real estate with tourist impact, and Sammy could end up on a platter.”

She felt those words like a body blow. Her eyes, tormented, met his. “But it’s not fair, to rush into something without having time to think about it!” she exclaimed. “The wills didn’t say we have to get married tomorrow! There’s no real time limit!”

There was, but he wasn’t going to push her. She had cold feet. She didn’t know him that well, despite the years they’d been acquainted, and she wasn’t ready for the physical side of marriage. She had hang-ups, and good reasons to have them.

“Okay,” he said after a minute. “Suppose we just get to know each other and let the rest ride for a while? ”

“You mean, go on dates and stuff?”

He pursed his lips. “Yes. Dates and stuff.”

She noticed how handsome he was. In a crowd, he always stood out. He was a vivid sort of person, not like she was at all. But they did enjoy the same sorts of things and they got along, most of the time.

“I would like to see your place,” she said.

“I’ll come and get you Saturday morning,” he said quietly.

He waited for her answer with bridled impatience. She could see that. He wasn’t sure of her at all. She hated being so hesitant, but it was a rushed business. She would have to make a decision in the near future or watch Uncle John’s ranch become a resort. It didn’t bear thinking about. On the other hand, if she said yes to Ted, it would mean a relationship that she was certain she wasn’t ready for.

“Stop gnawing your lip off and say yes,” Ted told her. “We’ll work out the details as we go along.”

She sighed. “Okay, Ted,” she said after a minute.

He hadn’t realized that he’d been holding his breath. He smiled slowly. She was going to take the chance. It was a start.

“Okay.” He frowned. “You don’t have any low-cut blouses and jeans that look like you’ve been poured into them, do you? ”

“Ted!”

“Well, I was just wondering,” he said. “Because if you do, you can’t wear them over at my place. We have a dress code.”

“A dress code.” She nodded. “So your cowboys have to wear dresses.” She nodded again.

He burst out laughing. He bent and kissed her, hard, but impersonally, and walked down the steps. “I’ll see you Saturday.”

“You call that a kiss?” she yelled after him, and shocked herself with the impertinent remark that had jumped out of her so impulsively.

But he didn’t react to it the way she expected. He just threw up his hand and kept walking.

They worked side by side in his kitchen making lunch. He was preparing an omelet while she made cinnamon toast and fried bacon.

“Breakfast for lunch,” she scoffed.

“Hey, I very often have breakfast for supper, if I’ve been out on a case,” he said indignantly. “There’s no rule that says you have to have breakfast in the morning.”

“I suppose not.”

“See, you don’t know how to break rules.”

She gasped. “You’re a police chief! You shouldn’t be encouraging anybody to break rules.”

“It’s okay as long as it’s only related to food,” he replied.

She laughed, shaking her head.

“You going to turn that bacon anytime soon?” he asked, nodding toward it, “or do you really like it raw on one side and black on the other?”

“If you don’t like it that way, you could fry it yourself.”

“I do omelets,” he pointed out. “I don’t even eat bacon.”

“What?”

“Pig meat,” he muttered.

“I like bacon!”

“Good. Then you can eat it. I’ve got a nice country ham all carved up and cooked in the fridge. I’ll have that with mine.”

“Ham is pig meat, too!”

“I think of it as steak with a curly tail,” he replied.

She burst out laughing. He was so different off the job. She’d seen him walking down the sidewalk in town, somber and dignified, almost unapproachable. Here, at home, he was a changed person.

“What are you brooding about?” he wondered.

“Was I? I was just thinking how different you are at home than at work.”

“I should hope so,” he sighed, as he took the omelet up onto a platter. “I mean, think of the damage to my image if I cooked omelets for the prisoners.”

“Chief Barnes used to,” she said. “I remember Uncle John talking about what a sweet man he was. He’d take the prisoners himself to funerals when they had family members die, and in those days, when the jail was down the hall from the police department, he’d cook for them, too.”

“He was a kind man,” Ted agreed solemnly.

“To think that it was one of the prisoners who killed him,” she added quietly as she turned the bacon. “Of all the ironies.”

“The man was drunk at the time,” Ted said. “And, if you recall, he killed himself just a few weeks later while he was waiting for trial. He left a note saying he didn’t want to put the chief’s family through any more pain.”

“Everybody thought that was so odd,” she said. “But people forget that murderers are just like everybody else. They aren’t born planning to kill people.”

“That’s true. Sometimes it’s alcohol or drugs that make them do it. Other times it’s an impulse they can’t control. Although,” he added, “there are people born without a conscience. They don’t mind killing. I’ve seen them in the military. Not too many, thank goodness, but they come along occasionally.”

“Your friend who was a sniper, was he like that?”

“Not at all,” he said. “He was trained to think of it as just a skill. It was only later, when it started to kill his soul, that he realized what was happening to him. That was when he got out.”

“How in the world did he get into law enforcement, with such a background?” she wondered.

He chuckled. “Uncle Sam often doesn’t know when his left hand is doing something different than his right one,” he commented. “Government agencies have closed files.”

“Oh. I get it. But those files aren’t closed to everyone, are they?”

“They’re only accessible to people with top-secret military clearance.” He glanced at her amusedly. “Never knew a civilian, outside the executive branch, who even had one.”

“That makes sense.”

He pulled out her chair for her.

“Thank you,” she said, with surprise in her tone.

“I’m impressing you with my good manners,” he pointed out as he sat down across from her and put a napkin in his lap.

“I’m very impressed.” She tasted the omelet, closed her eyes and sighed. “And not only with your manners. Ted, this is delicious!”

He grinned. “Thanks.”

“What did you put in it?” she asked, trying to decide what combination of spices he’d used to produce such a taste.

“Trade secret.”

“You can tell me,” she coaxed. “After all, we’re almost engaged.”

“The ‘almost’ is why I’m not telling,” he retorted. “If things don’t work out, you’ll be using my secret spices in your own omelets for some other man.”

“I could promise.”

“You could, but I’m not telling.”

She sighed. “Well, it’s delicious, anyway.”

He chuckled. “The bacon’s not bad, either,” he conceded, having forgone the country ham that would need warming. He was hungry.

“Thanks.” She lifted a piece of toast and gave it a cold look. “Shame we can’t say the same for the toast. Sorry. I was busy trying not to burn the bacon, so I burned the toast instead.”

“I don’t eat toast.”

“I do, but I don’t think I will this time.” She pushed the toast aside.

After they ate, he walked her around the property. He only had a few beef steers in the pasture. He’d bought quite a few Angus cattle with his own uncle, and they were at the ranch that Jillian had shared with her uncle John. She was pensive as she strolled beside him, absently stripping a dead branch of leaves, thinking about the fate of Uncle John’s prize beef if she didn’t marry Ted sometime soon.

“Deep thoughts?” he asked, hands in the pockets of his jeans under his shepherd’s coat.

She frowned. She was wearing her buckskin jacket. One of the pieces of fringe caught on a limb and she had to stop to disentangle it. “I was thinking about that resort,” she confessed.

“Here. Let me.” He stopped and removed the branch from the fringe. “Do you know why these jackets always had fringe?”

She looked up at him, aware of his height and strength so close to her. He smelled of tobacco and coffee and fir trees. “Not really.”

He smiled. “When the old-timers needed something to tie up a sack with, they just pulled off a piece of fringe and used that. Also, the fringe collects water and drips it away from the body.”

“My goodness!”

“My grandmother was full of stories like that. Her grandfather was a fur trapper. He lived in the Canadian wilderness. He was French. He married a Blackfoot woman.”

She smiled, surprised. “But you always talk about your Cheyenne heritage.”

“That’s because my other grandmother was Cheyenne. I have interesting bloodlines.”

Her eyes sketched his high-cheekboned face, his black eyes and hair and olive complexion. “They combined to make a very handsome man.”

“Me?” he asked, surprised.

She grinned. “And not a conceited bone in your body, either, Ted.”

He smiled down at her. “Not much to be conceited about.”

“Modest, too.”

He shrugged. He touched her cheek with his fingertips. “You have beautiful skin.”

Her eyebrows arched. “Thank you.”

“You get that from your mother,” he said gently. “I remember her very well. I was only a boy when she died, but she was well-known locally. She was the best cook in two counties. She was always the first to sit with anyone sick, or to take food when there was a funeral.”

“I only know about her through my uncle,” she replied. “My uncle loved her. She was his only sister, much older than he was. She and my father had me unexpectedly, late in life.”

Which, he thought, had been something of a tragedy.

“And then they both died of the flu, when I was barely crawling,” she sighed. “I never knew either of them.” She looked up. “You did at least know your parents, didn’t you?”

He nodded. “My mother died of a stroke in her early thirties,” he said. “My father was overseas, working for an oil corporation as a roughneck, when there was a bombing at the installation and he died. My grandmother took me in, and my uncle moved in to help support us.”

“Neither of us had much of a childhood,” she said. “Not that our relatives didn’t do all they could for us,” she added quickly. “They loved us. Lots of orphaned kids have it a lot worse.”

“Yes, they do,” he agreed solemnly. “That’s why we have organizations that provide for orphaned kids.”

“If I ever get rich,” she commented, “I’m going to donate to those.”

He grinned. “I already do. To a couple, at least.”

She leaned back against a tree and closed her eyes, drinking in the sights and sounds and smells of the woods. “I love winter. I know it isn’t a popular season,” she added. “It’s cold and there’s a lot of snow. But I enjoy it. I can smell the smoke from fireplaces and woodstoves. If I close my eyes, it reminds me of campfires. Uncle John used to take me camping with him when I was little, to hunt deer.”

“Which you never shot.”

She opened her eyes and made a face. “I’m not shooting Bambi.”

“Bull.”

“People shouldn’t shoot animals.”

“That attitude back in colonial times would have seen you starve to death,” he pointed out. “It’s not like those old-timers could go to a grocery store and buy meat and vegetables. They had to hunt and garden or die.”

She frowned. “I didn’t think about that.”

“In fact,” he added, “people who refused to work were turned out of the forts into the wilderness. Some stole food from the Indians and were killed for it. Others starved or froze to death. It was a hard life.”

“Why did they do it?” she wondered aloud. “Why leave their families and their homes and get on rickety old ships and go to a country they’d never even seen?”

“A lot of them did it to escape debtor’s prison,” he said. “They had debts they couldn’t pay. A few years over here working as an indentured servant and they could be free and have money to buy their own land. Or the people they worked for might give them an acre or two, if they were generous.”

“What about when the weather took their crops and they had nothing to eat? ”

“There are strings of graves over the eastern seaboard of pilgrims who starved,” he replied. “A sad end to a hopeful beginning. This is a hostile land when it’s stripped of supermarkets and shopping centers.”

A silence fell between them, during which he stared at the small rapids in the stream nearby. “That freezes over in winter,” he said. “It looks pretty.”

“I’d like to see it then.”

He turned. “I’ll bring you over here.”

She smiled. “Okay.”

His black eyes looked long and deep into hers across the distance, until she felt as if something snapped inside her. She caught her breath and forced her eyes away.

Ted didn’t say anything. He just smiled. And started walking again.

She loved it that he didn’t pressure her into a more physical relationship. It gave her a breathing space that she desperately needed.

He took her to a play in Billings the following weekend, a modern parody of an old play about two murderous old women and their assorted crazy relatives.

She laughed until her sides ached. Later, as they were driving home, she realized that it had been a long time since she’d been so amused by anything.

“I’m so glad I never had relatives like that,” she ventured.

He laughed. “Me, too. The murderous cousin with the spooky face was a real pain, wasn’t he?”

“His associate was even crazier.”

She sat back against the seat, her eyes closed, still smiling. “It was a great play. Thanks for asking me.”

“I was at a loose end,” he commented. “We have busy weekends and slow weekends. This was a very slow one, nothing my officers couldn’t handle on their own.”

That was a reminder, and not a very pleasant one, of what he did for a living. She frowned in the darkness of the cab, broken only by the blue light of the instrument panel. “Ted, haven’t you ever thought about doing something else for a living?”

“Like what?” he asked. “Teaching chemistry to high school students?”

He made a joke of it, but she didn’t laugh. “You’re not likely to be killed doing that.”

“I guess you don’t keep up with current events,” he remarked solemnly, and proceeded to remind her of several terrible school shootings.

She grimaced. “Yes, but those are rare incidents. You make enemies in your work. What if somebody you locked up gets out and tries to kill you?”

“It goes with the job,” he said laconically. “So far, I’ve been lucky.”

Lucky. But it might not last forever. Could she see herself sitting by the phone every night of her life, waiting for that horrible call?

“You’re dwelling on anticipation of the worst,” he said, glancing her way. “How in the world do you think people get by who have loved ones with chronic illness or life-threatening conditions?”

She looked at him in the darkness. “I’ve never thought about it.”

“My grandmother had cancer,” he reminded her. “Had it for years. If I’d spent that time sitting in a chair, brooding on it, what sort of life would it have been for her?”

She frowned. “Lonely.”

“Exactly. I knew it could happen, anytime. But I lived from day to day, just like she did. After a while, I got used to the idea, like she did, and we went on with our lives. It was always there, in the background, but it was something we just—” he searched for the word “—lived with. That’s how husbands and wives of people in law enforcement and the military deal with it.”

It was a new concept for her, living with a terrifying reality and getting used to it.

“You’re very young,” he said heavily. “It would be harder for you.”

It probably would. She didn’t answer him. It was something new to think about.

He walked her up the steps to her front door. He looked good in a suit, she thought, smiling.

“What are you thinking?” he teased.

“That you look very elegant in a suit.”

He shrugged. “It’s a nice suit.”

“It’s a nice man wearing it.”

“Thanks. I like your dress.”

She grinned. “It’s old, but I like the color. It’s called Rose Dust.”

He fingered the lacy collar. He wouldn’t have told her, because it would hurt her feelings, but it looked like the sort of dress a high school girl would wear. It wasn’t sophisticated, or even old enough for her now. But he just smiled.

“Nice color,” he agreed.

She cocked her head, feeling reckless. “Going to kiss me?” she asked.

“I was thinking about it.”

“And what did you decide?”

He stuck his hands in his pockets and just smiled down at her. “That would be rushing things a little too much,” he said gently. “You want to date and get to know each other. I think that’s a good idea. Plenty of time for the other, later.”

“Well, my goodness!”

“Shocked by my patience, are you?” he asked with a grin. “Me, too.”

“Very.”

His eyes were old and wise. “When things get physical, there’s a difference in the way two people are, together. There’s no time to step back and look at how things really are.”

She nodded. “You mean, like Sassy and her husband, John Callister, when they first got married. They couldn’t stand to be apart, even for an hour or two. They still pretty much go everywhere together. And they’re always standing close, or touching.”

“That’s what I mean.”

She frowned. “I haven’t ever felt like that,” she said.

He smiled. “I noticed.”

She flushed. “I’m sorry, I just blurt things out …”

“I don’t mind that you’re honest,” he said. “It helps. A lot.”

She bit her lower lip. “I’d give anything if Uncle John hadn’t hired that man to come work for him.”

“I’m sure your uncle felt the same way. I’m surprised that he never told me about it,” he added curtly.

“I imagine he thought you’d hold him responsible for it. He blamed himself,” she added softly. “He never stopped apologizing.” She sighed. “It didn’t help very much.”

“Of course it didn’t.” He stepped closer and tilted her chin up. “You’ll deal with it. If you don’t think you can, there are some good psychologists. Our department works with two, who live in Billings.”

She made a face. “I don’t think I could talk about something like that to a total stranger.”

He stared at her for a long time. “How about me?” he asked suddenly. “Could you talk about it to me?”

Six

Jillian stared up at him with conflicting emotions. But after a minute she nodded. “I think I could,” she replied finally.

He beamed. His black eyes were twinkling. “That’s a major step forward.”

“Think so?”

“I know so.”

She moved a step closer. “I enjoyed tonight. Thank you.”

He gave her a teasing look and moved a step away. “I did, too, and I’ll thank you to keep your distance. I don’t want to be an object of lust to a single woman who lives alone.”

She gasped theatrically. “You do so!”

“I do?”

“Absolutely!” she agreed. She grinned. “But not right now. Right?”

He laughed. “Not right now.” He bent and brushed a lazy kiss against her forehead. “Get some sleep. I’ll call you Monday.”

“You do that. Not early,” she added, without telling him why. She had a secret, and she wasn’t sharing it.

“Not early,” he agreed. “Good night.”

“Good night, Ted.”

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