Dear Reader,

I really can’t express how flattered I am and also how grateful I am to Harlequin Books for releasing this collection of my published works. It came as a great surprise. I never think of myself as writing books that are collectible. In fact, there are days when I forget that writing is work at all. What I do for a living is so much fun that it never seems like a job. And since I reside in a small community, and my daily life is confined to such mundane things as feeding the wild birds and looking after my herb patch in the backyard, I feel rather unconnected from what many would think of as a glamorous profession.

But when I read my email, or when I get letters from readers, or when I go on signing trips to bookstores to meet all of you, I feel truly blessed. Over the past thirty years I have made lasting friendships with many of you. And quite frankly, most of you are like part of my family. You can’t imagine how much you enrich my life. Thank you so much.

I also need to extend thanks to my family (my husband, James, son, Blayne, daughter-in-law, Christina, and granddaughter, Selena Marie), to my best friend, Ann, to my readers, booksellers and the wonderful people at Harlequin Books—from my editor of many years, Tara, to all the other fine and talented people who make up our publishing house. Thanks to all of you for making this job and my private life so worth living.

Thank you for this tribute, Harlequin, and for putting up with me for thirty long years! Love to all of you.

Diana Palmer

DIANA PALMER

The prolific author of more than a hundred books, Diana Palmer got her start as a newspaper reporter. A multi–New York Times bestselling author and one of the top ten romance writers in America, she has a gift for telling the most sensual tales with charm and humor. Diana lives with her family in Cornelia, Georgia.

Visit her website at www.DianaPalmer.com.

That Burke Man
Diana Palmer

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter One

Todd Burke sank lower in the rickety chair at the steel rail of the rodeo arena, glowering around him from under the brim of his Stetson. He crossed one powerful blue-jeaned leg over the other and surveyed his dusty, cream-colored boots. He’d worn his dress ones for the occasion, but he’d forgotten how messy things got around livestock. It had been a long time since he’d worked on his father’s ranch, and several months since Cherry’s last rodeo.

The girl had a good seat for riding, but she had no self-confidence. His ex-wife didn’t approve of Cherry’s sudden passion for barrel racing. But he did. Cherry was all he had to show for eight years of marriage that had ended six years ago in a messy divorce. He had custody of Cherry because Marie and her new husband were too occupied with business to raise a child. Cherry was fourteen now, and a handful at times. Todd had his own worries, with a huge computer company to run and no free time. He should make more time for Cherry, but he couldn’t turn over the reins of his company to subordinates. He was president and it was his job to run things.

But he was bored. The challenges were all behind him. He’d made his millions and now he was stagnating for lack of something to occupy his quick, analytical mind. He was taking a few weeks off, reluctantly, to get a new perspective on life and business during Cherry’s school holidays. But he was tired of it already.

He hated sitting here while he waited for Cherry’s turn to race. He and Cherry had moved to Victoria, Texas, just recently, where his new head offices were located. Jacobsville, the little town they were now in, attending the rodeo, was a nice, short drive from Victoria, and Cherry had pleaded to come, because a barrel-racing rodeo champion she idolized was supposed to accept an award of some sort here tonight. Cherry’s entry in the competition had been perfunctory and resigned, because she didn’t ride well before an audience and she knew it.

Her name was called and he sat up, watching his daughter lean over her horse’s neck as she raced out into the arena, her pigtail flying from under her wide-brimmed hat. She looked like him, with gray eyes and fair hair. She was going to be tall, too, and she was a good rider. But when she took the first turn she hesitated and the horse slowed almost to a crawl. The announcer made a sympathetic sound, and then she did it again on the next turn.

Todd watched her ride out of the arena as her part in the competition was finished. He had a heavy heart. She’d been so hopeful, but as always, she was going to finish last.

“What a shame,” came a quiet, feminine voice from down the aisle. “She just freezes on the turns, did you see? She’ll never be any good as a competitor, I’m afraid. No nerve.”

A male voice made a commiserating comment.

Todd, infuriated by the superiority in that female voice, waited for its owner to come into view with anger building inside him. When she did, it was a surprise.

The tall beautiful blonde who’d said those things about Cherry Burke was just complimenting herself on her steady progress. For the first time in months, Jane Parker was managing without her wheelchair or her cane. Moreover, her usual betraying limp hadn’t made an appearance. Of course, she was fresh because she’d rested all day, and she hadn’t strained her back. She’d been very careful not to, so that she could get through the opening ceremonies of the annual Jacobsville Rodeo and wait until its end when she was going to accept a plaque on behalf of her father. Tim had raged at her for agreeing to ride today, but it hadn’t done any good. After all, she was her father’s daughter. Her pride wouldn’t let her ride out into the arena in a buckboard.

She stopped along the way to watch the youth competition in barrel racing. That had been her event, and she’d won trophies for it in this and other rodeos around Texas since grammar school. One particular girl caught her eye, and she commented critically on the ride—a poor one—to one of the seasoned riders leaning on the iron arena rail beside her. It was a pity that the girl hadn’t finished in the money, but not surprising.

The girl was afraid of the turns and it showed in the way she choked up on the reins and hindered the horse. Jane commented on it to the cowboy. The girl must be new to rodeo, Jane thought, because her name wasn’t one she knew. Here in south Texas, where she’d lived all her life, Jane knew everyone on the rodeo circuit.

She smiled at the cowboy and moved on, shaking her head. She wasn’t really watching where she was going. She was trying to straighten the fringe on her rhinestone-studded white fringe jacket—which matched her long riding skirt and boots—when a big, booted foot shot across the narrow space between the trailers and slammed into the bottom metal rail of the rodeo arena, effectively freezing the elegant glittery blonde in her tracks.

Shocked, she looked down into steely gray eyes in a lean face framed by thick, fair hair.

The cowboy sitting on the trailer hitch was braiding several pieces of rawhide in his strong fingers. They didn’t still, even when he spoke.

“I heard what you just said to that cowboy about Cherry Burke’s ride,” he said coldly. “Who the hell do you think you are to criticize a cowgirl in Cherry’s class?”

She lifted both eyebrows. He wasn’t a regular on the Texas circuit, either. She and her father had circled it for years. “I beg your pardon?”

“What are you, anyway, a model?” he chided. “You look like one of those blonde dress-up fashion dolls in that outfit,” he added as his eyes punctuated the contempt of his voice. “Are you shacking up with one of the riders or are you part of the entertainment?”

She hadn’t expected a verbal attack from a total stranger. She stared at him, too surprised to react.

“Are questions of more than one syllable too hard for you?” he persisted.

That got through the surprise. Her blue eyes glittered at him. “Funny, I’d have said they’re the only kind you’re capable of asking,” she said in her soft, cultured voice. She looked at his leg, still blocking her path. “Move it or I’ll break it, cowboy.”

“A cream puff like you?” he scoffed.

“That’s where you’re wrong. I’m no cream puff.” In his position on the hitch, he was precariously balanced. She reached over, grimacing because the movement hurt her back, caught his ankle and jerked it up. He went over backward with a harsh curse.

She dusted off her hands and kept walking, aware of a wide grin from two cowboys she passed on her way to the gate.

Tim Harley, her middle-aged ranch foreman, was waiting for her by the gate with Bracket, her palomino gelding. He held the horse for her, grimacing as he watched her slow, painful ascension into the saddle.

“You shouldn’t try this,” he said. “It’s too soon!”

“Dad would have done it,” she countered. “Jacobsville was his hometown, and it’s mine. I couldn’t refuse the invitation to accept the plaque for Dad. Today’s rodeo is dedicated to him.”

“You could have accepted the plaque on foot or in a buckboard,” he muttered.

She glared down at him. “Listen, I wasn’t always a cripple…!”

“Oh, for God’s sake!”

The sound of the band tuning up got her attention. She soothed her nervous horse, aware of angry footsteps coming along the aisle between the trailers and the arena. Fortunately, before the fair-haired cowboy got close, the other riders joined her at the gate and arranged themselves in a flanking pattern.

The youth competition marked the end of the evening’s entertainment. The money for top prizes had been announced and awarded. The band began to play “The Yellow Rose of Texas.” The gate opened. Jane coaxed Bracket into his elegant trot and bit down on her lower lip to contain the agony of the horse’s motion. He was smooth and gaited, but even so, the jarring was painful.

She didn’t know if she’d make it around that arena, but she was going to try. With a wan smile, she forced herself to look happy, to take off her white Stetson and wave to the cheering crowd. Most of these people had known her father, and a good many of them knew her. She’d been a legend in barrel racing before her forced retirement at the age of twenty-four. Her father often said that she was heaven on a horse. She tried not to think about her last sight of him. She wanted to remember him as he had been, in the time before…

“Isn’t she as pretty as a picture?” Bob Harris was saying from the press booth. “Miss Jane Parker, ladies and gentlemen, two-time world’s champion barrel-racer and best all around in last year’s women’s division. As you know, she’s retired from the ring now, but she’s still one magnificent sight on a horse!”

She drank in the cheers and managed not to fall off or cry out in pain when she got to the reviewing stand. It had been touch and go.

Bob Harris came out into the arena with a plaque and handed it up to her. “Don’t try to get down,” he said flatly, holding a hand over the microphone.

“Folks,” he continued loudly, “as you know, Oren Parker was killed earlier this year in a car crash. He was best all-around four years running in this rodeo, and world’s champion roper twice. I know you’ll all join with me in our condolences as I dedicate this rodeo to his memory and present Jane with this plaque in honor of her father’s matchless career as a top hand and a great rodeo cowboy. Miss Jane Parker, ladies and gentlemen!”

There were cheers and more applause. Jane waved the plaque and as Bob held the microphone up, she quickly thanked everyone for their kindness and for the plaque honoring her father. Then before she fell off the horse, she thanked Bob again and rode out of the arena.

She couldn’t get down. That was the first real surprise of the evening. The second was to find that same angry, fair-haired cowboy standing there waiting for her to come out of the ring.

He caught her bridle and held her horse in place while he glared up at her. “Well, you sure as hell don’t look the part,” he said mockingly. “You ride like a raw beginner, as stiff as a board in the saddle. How did a rider as bad as you ever even get to the finals? Did you do it on Daddy’s name?”

If she’d been hurting a little less, she was certain that she’d have put her boot right in his mouth. Sadly she was in too much pain to react.

“No spirit either, huh?” he persisted.

“Hold on, Jane, I’m coming!” came a gruff voice from behind her. “Damned fool stunt,” Tim growled as he came up beside her, his gray hair and unruly beard making him look even more wizened than normal. “Can’t get off, can you? Okay, Tim’s here. You just come down at your own pace.” He took the plaque from her.

“Does she always have to be lifted off a horse?” the stranger drawled. “I thought rodeo stars could mount and dismount all by themselves.”

He didn’t have a Texas accent. In fact, he didn’t have much of an accent at all. She wondered where he was from.

Tim glared at him. “You won’t last long on this circuit with that mouth,” he told the man. “And especially not using it on Jane.”

He turned back to her, holding his arms up. “Come on, pumpkin,” he coaxed, in the same tone he’d used when she was only six, instead of twenty-five as she was now. “Come on. It’s all right, I won’t let you fall.”

The new cowboy was watching with a scowl. It had suddenly occurred to him that her face was a pasty white and she was gritting her teeth as she tried to ease down. The wizened little cowboy was already straining. He was tiny, and she wasn’t big, but she was tall and certainly no lightweight.

He moved forward. “Let me,” he said, moving in front of Tim.

“Don’t let her fall,” Tim said quickly. “That back brace won’t save her if you do.”

“Back brace…” It certainly explained a lot. He felt it when he took her gently by the waist, the ribbing hard under his fingers. She was sweating now with the effort, and tears escaped her eyes. She closed them, shivering.

“I can’t,” she whispered, in agony.

“Put your arms around my neck,” he said with authority. “I’ll take your weight. You can slide along and I’ll catch you when you’ve got the other foot out of the stirrup. Take it easy. Whenever you’re ready.”

She knew that she couldn’t stay on the animal forever, but it was tempting. She managed a wan smile at Tim’s worried figure. “Don’t natter, Tim,” she whispered hoarsely. “I’ve got this far. I’ll get the rest of the way.” She took a deep breath, set her teeth together and pulled.

The pain was excruciating. She felt it in every cell of her body before the cowboy had her carefully in his arms, clear of the ground, but she didn’t whimper. Not once. She lay there against his broad chest, shuddering with pain.

“Where do you want her?” he asked the older man.

Tim hesitated, but he knew the girl couldn’t walk and he sure as hell couldn’t carry her. “This way,” he said after a minute, and led the tall man to a motor home several hundred yards down the line.

It was a nice little trailer, with a large sitting area. There was a sofa along one side and next to it, a wheelchair. When the cowboy saw the wheelchair, his face contorted.

“I told you,” Tim was raging at her. “I told you not to do it! God knows how much you’ve set yourself back!”

“No…not there!” Jane protested sharply when he started to put her down in the wheelchair. “For God’s sake, not there!”

“It’s the best place for you, you silly woman!” Tim snapped.

“On the sofa, please,” she whispered, fighting back a sharp moan as he lowered her gently to the cushions.

“I’ll get your pain capsules and something to drink,” Tim said, moving into the small kitchen.

“Thank you,” Jane told the tall cowboy. It was a grudging thank-you, because he’d said some harsh things and she was angry.

“No need,” he replied quietly. “You might have stopped me before I made a complete fool of myself. I suppose you’ve forgotten more about racing than Cherry will ever learn. Cherry’s my daughter,” he added.

That explained a lot. She grimaced as she shifted. “I’m sorry you took the criticism the wrong way, but I won’t apologize for it,” she said stiffly. “She’s got the talent, but she’s afraid of the turns. Someone needs to help her…get better control of her fears and her horse.”

“I can ride, but that’s about it. I don’t know enough about rodeo to do her any good,” he said flatly, “even though we’re as crazy about rodeo in Wyoming as you Texans are.”

“You’re from Wyoming?” she asked, curious.

“Yes. We moved to Texas a few weeks ago, so that…” He stopped, strangely reluctant to tell her it was because he’d moved his company headquarters there to deal with an expanded market in Texas. “So that we could be closer to Cherry’s mother,” he amended. In fact, that hadn’t influenced his decision to move to Victoria. Marie was no one’s idea of a mother, and she’d been overly critical of Cherry for some time. It was a coincidence that Marie and her husband moved to Victoria from Houston about the same time Todd had moved his company headquarters there. Or so Marie said. “She and her second husband live in Victoria.”

She let her eyes slide over his lean, hard face. “Does her mother ride? Couldn’t she help her?”

His eyes seemed to darken. “Her mother hates horses. She didn’t want Cherry in rodeo at all, but I put my foot down. Rodeo is the most important thing in Cherry’s life.”

“Then she should be allowed to do it,” she agreed, and she was thinking how sad it was that he and his wife were divorced. His poor little girl. She knew what it was like to grow up without a mother. Her mother had died of pneumonia when she was barely in school.

She glanced back at the man. He’d said they were from Wyoming. That explained the lack of a Texas accent. She lay back, and the pain bit into her slender body like teeth. Hot tears wet her eyes as she struggled with the anguish it caused her just to move.

Tim came back and handed her two capsules and a cola. She swallowed the medicine and sipped the cold liquid, savoring the nip of it against her tongue. If only the pain would stop.

“That’s sweet,” she said with a sigh.

The tall man stood looking down at her with a frown. “Are you all right?”

“Sure,” she said. “I’m just dandy. Thanks for your help.”

She wasn’t forthcoming, and he had no right to expect it. He nodded and moved out of the trailer.

Tim came after him. “Thanks for your help, stranger,” he said. “I’d never have got her here by myself.”

They shook hands. “My pleasure.” He paused. “What happened to her?” he added abruptly.

“Her daddy wrecked the car,” he said simply. “He was killed instantly, but Jane was pinned in there with him for three hours or more. They thought she’d broken her back,” he concluded.

There was a harsh intake of breath.

“Oh, it was a herniated disk instead. It’s painful and slow to heal, and she’ll most always have some pain with it. But they can work miracles these days. She couldn’t walk right away, though, and we weren’t sure if she’d be paralyzed. But she got up out of that bed and started working on herself. Stayed in physical therapy until even the doctors grinned. Never knew a girl like her,” he mused. “This thing has taken some of the fight out of her, of course, but she’s no quitter. Her dad would have been proud. Sad about her career, though. She’ll never ride in competition again.”

“What in hell was she doing on that horse this morning?”

“Showing everybody that nothing short of death will ever keep her down,” Tim said simply. “Never did catch your name, stranger.”

“Burke. Todd Burke.”

“I’m Tim Harley. I’m proud to meet you.”

“Same here.” He hesitated for just a minute before he turned and went back along the aisles. He felt odd. He’d never felt so odd in his life before. Perhaps, he thought, it was that he wasn’t used to proud women. She’d surprised him with the extent of her grit and stubbornness. She wasn’t a quitter, in spite of impossible circumstances. He didn’t doubt that she’d ride again, either, even if she didn’t get back into competition. God, she was game! He was sorry he’d managed to get off on the wrong foot with her. He’d been irritated by the remarks she’d made about his daughter. Now he realized that she was trying to help, and he’d taken it the wrong way.

He was sensitive about Cherry. His daughter had taken more vicious criticism from her own mother than she was ever likely to get from a stranger. He’d over-reacted. Now he was left with a case of badly bruised pride and a wounded ego. He smiled a little bitterly at his own embarrassment. He deserved it, being so cruel to a woman in that condition. It had been a long time since he’d made a mistake of such magnitude.

He wandered back down the lane to join his daughter, who was excitedly talking to one of the rodeo clowns.

“Dad, did you see her, that blonde lady who accepted the plaque?” she asked when he was within earshot. “That was Jane Parker herself!”

“I saw her.” He glanced at the young cowboy, who flushed and grinned at Cherry, and then quickly made himself scarce.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Cherry said on a sigh. “Honestly, Dad, I’m fourteen!”

“And I’m an old bear. I know.” He threw an affectionate arm around her. “You did fine, partner. I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks! Where did you disappear to?”

“I helped your idol into her motor home,” he said.

“My idol…Miss Parker?”

“The very same. She’s got a bad back, that’s why she doesn’t ride anymore. She’s game, though.”

“She’s the best barrel racer I ever saw,” Cherry said. “I have a video of last year’s rodeo and she’s on it. The reason I begged to come to this rodeo was so that I could meet her, but she isn’t riding this time. Gosh, I was disappointed when they said she’d retired. I didn’t know she had a bad back.”

“Neither did I,” he murmured. He put an arm around her and hugged her close. She was precious to him, but he tended to busy himself too deeply in his work, especially in the years since her mother had walked out on them. “We haven’t had much time together, have we? I’ll make it up to you while we’re on vacation.”

“How about right now?” She grinned at him. “You could introduce me to Miss Parker.”

He cleared his throat. How was he going to tell her that her idol thought he was about as low as a snake?

“She’s so pretty,” Cherry added without waiting for his answer. “Mother’s pretty, too, but not like that.” She grimaced. “Mother doesn’t want me to come up next week, did she tell you?”

“Yes.” He didn’t add that they’d argued about it. Marie didn’t spend any more time with Cherry than she had to. She’d walked out on the two of them for another man six years ago, declaring that Cherry was just too much for her to handle. It had devastated the young girl and left Todd Burke in the odd position of having to forego board meetings of his corporation to take care of his daughter. He hadn’t minded, though. He was proud of the girl, and he’d encouraged her in everything she wanted to do, including rodeo. Marie had a fit over that. She didn’t approve of her daughter riding rodeo, but Todd had put his foot down.

“What does she see in him?” Cherry asked, her gray eyes flashing and her blond pigtail swinging as she threw her hands up in a temper. “He’s so picky about everything, especially his clothes. He doesn’t like pets and he doesn’t like children.”

“He’s brilliant. He has a national bestseller. It’s number one on the New York Times list. It’s been there for weeks,” Todd replied.

“You’re smart, too. And you’re rich,” she argued.

“Yes, but I’m not in his class. I’m a self-made man. I don’t have a Harvard degree.”

“Neither does he,” Cherry said with a giggle. “He hasn’t graduated. I heard Mama say so—not so that he could hear her, though.”

He chuckled. “Never you mind. If she’s happy, that’s fine.”

“Don’t you love her anymore?” she asked.

His arm contracted. “Not the way I should to be married to her,” he said honestly. “Marriage takes two people working to make each other happy. Your mother got tired of the long hours I had to spend at work.”

“She got tired of me, too.”

“She loves you, in her way,” he replied. “Don’t ever doubt that. But she and I found less in common the longer we lived together. Eventually we didn’t have enough to sustain a marriage.”

“You need someone to look after you,” she told him. “I’ll get married one day, you know, and then where will you be?”

He chuckled. “Alone.”

“Sure,” she agreed, “except for those women you never bring home.”

He cleared his throat. “Cherry…”

“Never mind, I’m not stupid.” She looked around at the dwindling crowd. “But you need someone to come home to, besides me. You work late at the office and go on business trips all over the place, and you’re never home. So I can’t go home, either. I want to go to school in Victoria in the fall. I hate boarding school.”

“You never told me that,” he said, surprised.

“I didn’t want to,” she admitted reluctantly. “But it’s just awful lately. I’m glad I’m out for the summer.” She looked up at him with gray eyes so similar to his own. “I’m glad you took this vacation. We can do some things together, just you and me.”

“I’ve been thinking about it for a long time,” he confessed. “I’m looking forward to having a few weeks off,” he lied convincingly, and wondered how he was going to survive the lack of anything challenging to do.

She grinned. “Good! You can help me work on those turns in barrel racing. I don’t guess you noticed, but I’m having a real hard time with them.”

He recalled what Jane Parker had said about Cherry, and he allowed himself to wonder if it might not do both women good to spend a little time talking together.

“You know,” he mused aloud, “I think I may have some ideas about that.”

“Really? What are they?”

“Wait and see.” He led her toward their car. “Let’s get something to eat. I don’t know about you, but I’m starved!”

“Me, too. How about Chinese?”

“My favorite.”

He put her into the old Ford he’d borrowed while his Ferrari was being serviced, and drove her back into Jacobsville.

They had lunch at the single Chinese restaurant that was nestled among half a dozen barbecue, steak and fast-food restaurants. When they finished, they went back out to the arena to watch the rest of the afternoon’s competitions. Cherry was only in one other event. She did poorly again, though, trying to go around the barrels. When she rode out of the arena, she was in tears.

“Now, now.” Todd comforted her. “Rome wasn’t built in a day.”

“They didn’t have barrel racing in Rome!” she wailed.

“Probably not, but the sentiment is the same.” He hugged her gently. “Perk up, now. This is only the first rodeo in a whole string of them. You’ll get better.”

“It’s a waste of time,” she said, wiping her tears. “I might as well quit right now.”

“Nobody ever got anywhere by quitting after one loss,” he chided. “Where would I be if I’d given up when my first computer program didn’t sell?”

“Not where you are today, that’s for sure,” she admitted. “Nobody does software like you do, Dad. That newest word processor is just radical! Everyone at school loves it. It makes term papers so easy!”

“I’m glad to hear that all those late hours we put into developing it were worth the effort,” he said. He grinned at her. “We’re working on a new accounting package right now.”

“Oh, accounting,” she muttered. “Who wants any boring old stuff like that?”

“Plenty of small businesses,” he said on a chuckle. “And thank your lucky stars or we’d be in the hole.”

Cherry was looking around while he spoke. Her face lit up and her eyes began to sparkle. “It’s Miss Parker!” The smile faded. “Oh, my…”

He turned and the somber expression on his daughter’s face was mirrored in his own. Jane was in the wheelchair, wearing jeans and a beige T-shirt and sneakers, looking fragile and depressed as Tim pushed her toward the motor home with the horse trailer hitched behind it.

Unless he missed his guess, they were about to leave. He couldn’t let her get away, not before he had a chance to ask her about working with Cherry. It had occurred to him that they might kill two birds with one stone—give Miss Parker a new interest, and Cherry some badly needed help.

Chapter Two

“Miss Parker!” Todd called.

She glanced in his direction, aware that he and a young girl with fair hair in a pigtail were moving toward her. The wheelchair made her feel vulnerable and she bit down hard on her lip. She was in a bad temper because she didn’t want that rude, unpleasant man to see her this way.

“Yes?” she asked through her teeth.

“This is my daughter, Cherry,” he said, pulling the young girl forward. “She wanted to meet you.”

Regardless, apparently, of whether Jane wanted the meeting or not. “How do you do,” she said through numb lips.

“What happened to you?” Cherry spluttered.

Jane’s face contorted.

“She was in a wreck,” her father said shortly, “and it was rude of you to ask.”

Cherry flushed. “I’m sorry, really I am.” She went to the wheelchair, totally uninhibited, and squatted beside it. “I’ve watched all the videos you were on. You were just the best in the world,” she said enthusiastically. “I couldn’t get to the rodeos, but I had Dad buy me the videos from people who taped the events. I’m having a lot of trouble on the turns. Dad can ride, but he’s just hopeless on rodeo, aren’t you, Dad?” She put a gentle hand over Jane’s arm. “Will you be able to ride again?”

“Cherry!” Todd raged.

“It’s all right,” Jane said quietly. She looked into the girl’s clear, gray eyes, seeing no pity there, only honest concern and curiosity. The rigidity in her began to subside. She smiled. “No,” she said honestly. “I don’t think I’ll be able to ride again. Not in competition, at least.”

“I wish I could help you,” Cherry said. “I’m going to be a surgeon when I grow up. I make straight A’s in science and math, and Dad’s already said I could go to Johns Hopkins when I’m old enough. That’s the best school of medicine anywhere!”

“A surgeon,” Jane echoed, surprised. She smiled. “I’ve never known anyone who wanted to be a surgeon before.”

Cherry beamed. “Now you do. I wish you didn’t have to leave so soon,” she said wistfully. “I was going to pick your brain for ways to get over this fear of turns. Silly, isn’t it, when the sight of blood doesn’t bother me at all.”

Jane was aware of an emptiness in herself as she stared into the young face. It was like seeing herself at that age. She lowered her eyes. “Yes, well, I’m sorry, but it’s been a long day and I’m in a good deal of pain. And we’re interviewing today.”

“Interviewing?” Cherry asked with open curiosity.

“For a business manager,” Jane said sadly, glancing at Tim, who winced. “Tim can’t manage the books. He’s willing to keep on as foreman, but we’re losing money hand over fist since Dad’s death because neither one of us can handle the books.”

“Gosh, my dad would be perfect for that,” Cherry said innocently. “He’s a wizard with money. He keeps the books for his compu—”

“For the small computer company I work for in Victoria,” Todd said quickly, with a speaking glance that his intelligent daughter interpreted immediately. She shut up, grinning.

Tim stepped forward. “Can you balance books?”

“Sure.”

Tim looked at Jane. “There’s the foreman’s cabin empty, since Meg and I are living in the house with you,” he remarked. “They could live there. And you could help the girl with her turns. It would give you something to do besides brooding around the house all day.”

“Tim!” Jane burst out angrily. She glanced apprehensively at Todd Burke, who was watching her with unconcealed amusement. “I’m sure he has a job already.”

“I do. Keeping books for my…the computer company,” he lied. “But it doesn’t take up all my time. In fact, I think I’d enjoy doing something different for a while.” He pursed his lips. “If you’re interested, that is,” he added with practiced indifference.

Jane’s eyes fell to her lap.

“I’d love to learn how to win at barrel racing,” Cherry said with a sigh. “I guess I’ll have to give it up, though. I mean, I’m so bad that it’s a waste of Dad’s money to keep paying my entrance fees and all.”

Jane glowered at her. She glowered at him, too, standing there like a movie cowboy with his firm lips pursed and his steely gray eyes twinkling with amusement. Laughing at her.

“She won’t hire you,” Tim said with a glare at her. “She’s too proud to admit that you’re just what she needs. She’d rather let the ranch go under while she sits on the porch and feels sorry for herself.”

“Damn you!” She spat the words at Tim.

He chuckled. “See them eyes?” he asked Todd. “Like wet sapphires. She may look like a fashion doll, but she’s all fur and claws when things get next to her, and she’s no quitter.”

Todd was looking at her with evident appreciation. He grinned. “Two week trial?” he asked. “While we see how well we all get along? I can’t do you much damage in that short a time, and I might do you a lot of good. I have a way with balance sheets.”

“We couldn’t be much worse off,” Tim reminded his boss.

Jane was silently weighing pros and cons. He had a daughter, so he had to be settled and fairly dependable, if Cherry was any indication. If she hired anyone else, she’d have no idea if she was giving succor to a thief or even a murderer. This man looked trustworthy and his daughter apparently adored him.

“We could try, I suppose,” she said finally. “If you’re willing. But the ranch isn’t successful enough that I can offer you much of a salary.” She named a figure. “You’ll get meals and board free, but I’ll understand if that isn’t enough—”

“If I can keep on doing my present job, in the evenings, we’ll manage,” Todd said without daring to look at his daughter. If he did, he knew he’d give the show away.

“Your boss won’t mind?” Jane asked.

He cleared his throat. “He’s very understanding. After all, I’m a single parent.”

She nodded, convinced. “All right, then. Would you like to follow us out to the ranch, if you’re through for the day?”

“We’re through, all right,” Cherry said on a sigh. “I’m dejected, demoralized and thoroughly depressed.”

“Don’t be silly,” Jane said gently, and with a smile. “You’ve got an excellent seat, and you’re good with horses. You just need to get over that irrational fear that you’re going to go down on the turns.”

“How did you know?” Cherry gasped.

“Because I was exactly the same when I started out. Stop worrying. I’ll work with you. When we’re through, you’ll be taking home trophies.”

“Really?”

Jane chuckled. “Really. Let’s go, Tim.”

He wheeled her to the cab of the motor home and opened the door. “I guess bringing this thing ten miles looks odd,” Tim murmured to Todd, “but we had to have a place where Jane could rest. We’ve carried this old thing to many a rodeo over the years. She takes a little coaxing sometimes, but she always goes.”

“Like Bracket,” Jane mused, glancing back to the trailer where her palomino gelding rode.

“Like Bracket,” Tim agreed. He reached down. “Let’s get you inside, now, Jane.”

Before he could lift her, Todd moved forward. “Here,” he volunteered. “I’ll do the honors.”

Tim grinned, his relief all too obvious. Jane wasn’t heavy, but Tim was feeling his age a bit.

Todd lifted Jane gently out of the wheelchair and into the cab of the big vehicle, positioning her on the seat with a minimum of discomfort. She eased her arms from around his neck a little self-consciously and smiled. “Thanks.”

He shrugged powerful shoulders and smiled back. “No problem. Where does the chair go, Tim?”

He folded it and the older man climbed up into the motor home and stowed it away. He got behind the wheel and paused long enough to give directions to Todd about where in Jacobsville the ranch was located before he and Jane waved goodbye and drove away.

“Dad!” Cherry laughed. “Are we really going to do it? What will she say when she finds out?”

“We’ll worry about that when the time comes. The ranch budget sounds like a challenge, and you could use some pointers with your riding,” he added. “I think it may work out very well.”

“But what about your company?” Cherry asked.

“I’ve got good people working for me and I’m on holiday.” He ruffled her hair. “We’ll think of it as summer vacation,” he assured her. “It will give us some time together.”

“I’d like that,” she said solemnly. “After all, in four years I’ll be in school, and you probably won’t get to see me twice a year. I’ll have to study very hard.”

“You’re smart. You’ll do fine.”

“Yes, I will,” she assured him with a grin. “And you can have all your medical care free.”

“I can hardly wait.”

“Don’t be sarcastic,” she chided. “And you have to be nice to Miss Parker, too.”

“She doesn’t like me very much.”

“You don’t like her, either, do you?” she asked curiously.

He stuck his hands into his pockets and frowned. “She’s all right.”

“If you don’t like her, why are you going to help her?”

He couldn’t answer that. He didn’t know why. She was a woman in a wheelchair, who looked as if in her heyday she’d been nothing more than a fashion doll on a horse. But she was crippled and in bad financial circumstances, and all alone, apparently. He felt sorry for her. Funny, that, because since his failed marriage, he didn’t like women very much except when he had an overwhelming desire for someone female in his arms. Loving and leaving wouldn’t be possible with Jane Parker. So why was he going out of his way to help her? He didn’t know.

“Maybe I feel sorry for her,” he told Cherry finally.

“Yes, so do I, but we mustn’t let her know it,” she said firmly. “She’s very proud, did you notice?”

He nodded. “Proud and hot tempered.”

“What familiar traits.”

He glowered at her, but she just grinned.

At the luxurious house Todd had bought in Victoria, they packed up what gear they’d need for a few days, explained their forthcoming absence to their puzzled housekeeper, Rosa, promised to be back soon and drove in the borrowed Ford down to Jacobsville to the Parker ranch.

It wasn’t much to look at from the road. There was a rickety gray wood and barbed-wire fence that had been mended just enough to hold in the mixed-breed steers in the pasture. The barn was still standing, but barely. The dirt road that led past a windmill to the house had potholes with water standing in them from the last rain. It had no gravel on it, and it looked as if it hadn’t been graded in years. The yard was bare except for a few rosebushes and a handful of flowers around the long porch of the white clapboard house. It was two stories high, and needed painting. One of the steps had broken through and hadn’t been replaced. There was a rickety ramp, presumably constructed hastily for the wheelchair, on the end of the porch. There was the motor home and horse trailer in the yard, next to a building that might be used as a garage by an optimist. A small cabin was nestled in high grass that needed cutting; the foreman’s cabin, Todd thought, hoping that it was more than one room. Nearby was a bigger structure, a small one-story house. It was in better condition and it had rocking chairs on the porch. The bunkhouse?

“Welcome!” Tim called, coming out to meet them.

They got out and Todd shook hands with him. “Thanks. If you’ll tell me where to put our stuff…?” He was looking toward the cabin.

“Oh, that’s where old man Hughes lives.” Tim chuckled. “He helps me look after the livestock. He can’t do a lot, but he’s worked here since he was a boy. We can’t pension him off until he’s sixty-five, two more years yet.” He turned. “Here’s where you and the girl will bunk down.” He led them toward the small house and Todd heaved a sigh of relief.

“It needs some work, like everything else, but maybe you can manage. You can have meals with us in the house. There are three other hands who mend fences and look after the tanks and the machinery, do the planting and so forth. They’re mostly part-time these days, but we hire on extra men when we need them, seasonally, you know.”

The house wasn’t bad. It had three big bedrooms and a small living room. There was a kitchen, too, but it didn’t look used. There was a coffeepot and a small stove and refrigerator.

“I could learn to cook,” Cherry began.

“No, you couldn’t,” Todd said shortly. “Time enough for that later.”

“My wife Meg’ll teach you if you want to learn,” Tim said, volunteering his wife with a grin. “She likes young people. Never had any kids of our own, so she takes up with other people’s. When you’ve settled, come on over to the house. We’ll have sandwiches and something to drink.”

“How’s Miss Parker?” Cherry asked.

Tim grimaced. “Lying down. She’s not well. I’ve called the doctor.” He shook his head. “I told her not to get on that horse, but she wouldn’t listen to me. Never could do anything with her, even when she was a youngster. It took her papa to hold her back, but he’s gone now.”

“She had no business on that horse,” Todd said, pointedly.

“That was a bad attack of pride,” Tim told him. “Some newspaperman wrote a column about the rodeo and mentioned that poor Jane Parker would probably come out to accept the plaque for her father in a wheelchair, because she was crippled now.”

Todd’s face hardened. “Which paper was it in?”

“That little weekly they publish in Jacobsville,” he said with a grimace. “She took it to heart. I told her it was probably that Sikes kid who just started doing sports. He’s fresh out of journalism school and fancies himself winning a Pulitzer for covering barrel racing. Huh!” he scoffed.

Todd mentally stored the name for future reference. “Will the doctor come out?”

“Sure!” the wizened little man assured him. “His dad was Jane’s godfather. They’re great friends. He has an assistant now, though—a female doctor named Lou. She might come instead.” He chuckled. “They don’t see eye to eye on anything. Amazing how they manage a practice between them.”

“The doctor isn’t married?”

He shook his head. “He was sweet on Jane, but after the accident, she cut him dead if he so much as smiled at her. That was just before Lou went into practice with him. Jane doesn’t want to get involved, she says.”

“She won’t always be in that chair,” Todd murmured as they walked toward the house.

“No. But she’ll always have pain when she overdoes things, and she won’t ride well enough for competition again.”

“That’s what she told Cherry.”

Tim gave him a wary glance. “You won’t hurt her?” he asked bluntly.

Todd smiled. “She’s very attractive, and I like her spirit, but I’ve had a bad marriage and I don’t want to risk another failure. I don’t get serious about women anymore. And I’m not coldhearted enough to play around with Jane.”

Tim sighed. “Thanks. I needed to hear that. She’s more vulnerable than she realizes right now. I’m not related to her, but in a lot of ways, I’m the only family she’s got—well, Meg and me.”

“She’s a lucky woman,” Todd replied.

He shrugged. “Not so lucky, or she wouldn’t be in that chair, would she?”

They walked up onto the porch, avoiding the broken step. “Meant to fix that, but I never get time,” Tim murmured. “Now that you’re here to tear your hair out over the books, maybe I’ll be able to get a few odds and ends done.”

“I can help, if you need me,” he volunteered. “I do woodwork for a hobby.”

“Do you!” Tim’s face brightened. “There’s a woodworking shop in the back of the barn. We built it years ago for her dad. He made all the furniture in the house. She’ll like having it in use again.”

“Are you sure?” he asked doubtfully.

“You can always ask her.”

They walked into the living room. Jane was lying on the sofa, putting up a brave front even though her face was stark white with the effort. Cherry was curled up in an armchair beside the sofa, her cheek on her folded arms, listening raptly to her idol.

“Doctor should be here soon,” Tim told Jane. He paused to pat her gently on the shoulder. “Hang on, kid.”

She smiled at him, and laid her hand briefly over the one on her shoulder. “Thanks, Tim. What would I do without you?”

“Let’s agree never to find out,” he returned drily.

“Okay.” She glanced toward Todd Burke. The expression on his lean face made her angry. “I’m not a cripple,” she said belligerently.

He knelt by the sofa and pushed back a strand of her hair. It was wet, not with sweat, but with tears she’d shed involuntarily as the pain bit into her. He felt more protective about her than he could understand.

“Don’t you have something to take?”

“Yes,” she said, shaken by his concern. “But it isn’t working.”

He tucked the strand of hair behind her small, pretty ear and smiled. “Guess why?”

She made a face. “I wouldn’t have tried to ride out into the arena if it hadn’t been for that damned reporter,” she said gruffly. “He called me a cripple!”

“Cherry and I will rush right in to town and beat the stuffing out of him for you.”

That brought a pained smile to her face. “Cover him in ink and wrap him up in his newspaper and hang him from a printing press.”

“They don’t have printing presses anymore,” Cherry said knowledgeably. “Everything’s cold type now…offset printing.”

Jane’s blue eyes widened. “My, my, you are a well-spring of information!” she said, impressed.

Cherry grinned smugly. “One of my new teachers used to work for a newspaper. Now he teaches English.”

“She knows everything,” Todd said with a resigned air. “Just ask her.”

“Not everything, Dad.” She chuckled. “I don’t know how to do barrel-racing turns.”

“I hear a car,” Tim said, glancing out the window. “It’s him.”

Todd frowned at the way Jane’s eyes fell when he looked into them. Did she have mixed feelings about the doctor and was trying to hide it? Maybe Tim had been wrong and Jane had been sweet on the doctor, not the other way around.

Todd got to his feet as a tall man with red hair came into the room, carrying a black bag. He was dressed in a nice gray Western-cut suit with a white shirt and a black string tie. Boots, too. He removed a pearl gray Stetson from his head, and tossed it onto the counter. Pale blue eyes swept the room, lingering on Todd Burke, who stared back, unsmiling.

“This is Dr. Jebediah Coltrain,” Tim introduced the tall, slim man. “When he was younger, everybody used to call him Copper.”

“They don’t anymore. Not without a head start,” the doctor said. He didn’t smile, either.

“This is Todd Burke and his daughter, Cherry,” Tim said, introducing them. “Todd’s going to take over the book work for us.”

Coltrain didn’t say much. He gave Todd a piercing stare that all but impaled him before he nodded curtly, without offering a hand in greeting. He was less reserved with Cherry, if that faint upturn of his thin lips was actually a smile.

“Well, what fool thing have you done this time?” Coltrain asked Jane irritably. “Gone riding, I guess?”

She glared at him through waves of pain. “I wasn’t going to let them push me out into that arena in a wheelchair,” she said furiously. “Not after what that weasel of a sports reporter wrote about me!”

He made a sound deep in his throat that could have meant anything. He set about examining her with steely hands that looked menacing until they touched and probed with a tenderness that set Todd’s teeth on edge.

“Muscle strain,” Coltrain pronounced at last. “You’ll need a few days in bed on muscle relaxers. Did you rent that traction rig I told you to get?”

“Yes, we did, under protest,” Tim said with a chuckle.

“Well, get started, then.”

He lifted her as if she were a feather and carried her off to her bedroom. Todd, incensed out of all reason, followed them with an audible tread.

Coltrain glanced over his shoulder at the other man with a faintly mocking smile. He didn’t need a road map to find a marked trail, and he knew jealousy when he saw it.

He put Jane down gently on the double bed with its carved posts with the traction apparatus poised over it.

“Need to make a pit stop before I hook you up?” Coltrain asked her without a trace of embarrassment.

“No, I’m fine,” she said through clenched teeth. “Go ahead.”

He adjusted the brace that lifted her right leg, putting a pleasant pressure on the damaged hip that even surgery hadn’t put completely back to rights. “This won’t work any miracles, but it will help,” Coltrain told her. “You put too much stock in articles written by idiots.”

“He didn’t write it about you!”

He lifted an eyebrow. “He wouldn’t dare,” he said simply.

She knew that. It irritated her. She closed her eyes. “It hurts.”

“I can do something for that.” Coltrain reached in his bag and drew out a small bottle and a syringe. He handed a package to Todd. “Open that and swab the top of the bottle with it.”

He had the sort of voice that expects obedience. Todd, who never took orders, actually did it with only a lopsided grin. He liked the doctor, against his will.

Coltrain upended the bottle when Todd had finished, inserted the needle into the bottle and then drew up the correct amount of painkiller.

He handed Todd another package containing an alcohol-soaked gauze. “Swab her arm, here.”

He indicated a vein in her right arm and Todd looked at him.

“It’s not addictive,” the doctor said gently. “I know what I’m doing.”

Todd made a rough murmur and complied. It embarrassed him to show concern for a woman he barely knew. Coltrain’s knowing look made it worse.

He swabbed her arm and Coltrain shot the needle in, efficiently and with a minimum of pain.

“Thanks, Copper,” Jane told him quietly.

He shrugged. “What are friends for?” He took a few sample packages out of the bag and gave them to Todd. “Two every six hours for severe pain. They’re stronger than the others I gave you,” he told Jane. “You can push this to five hours if you can’t bear it, but no sooner.” Coltrain fastened his bag and gave Jane a reassuring smile. “Stay put. I’ll check on you tomorrow.”

“Okay.” Her eyes were already closing.

“I’ll sit with you until you go to sleep,” Cherry volunteered, and Jane smiled her agreement.

Coltrain jerked his head toward the living room. Tim and Todd followed. He closed the bedroom door behind them.

“I want her X-rayed,” he told them without pre amble. “I think it’s muscular, but I’m not going to stake my life on it. The last thing she needed was to get on a horse.”

“I tried to stop her,” Tim told him.

“I realize that. I’m not blaming you. She’s a handful.” He eyed Todd openly. “Can you keep her off horses?”

Todd smiled slowly. “Watch me.”

“That’s what I thought. She isn’t safe to be let out alone these days, always trying to prove herself.” He grabbed his Stetson and started toward the door. “She’s in too much pain to be moved today. I’ll send an ambulance for her in the morning and make all the necessary arrangements at Jacobsville Memorial. She won’t like it,” he added wryly.

“But she’ll do it,” Todd replied easily.

For the first time, Coltrain chuckled. “I’d like to be a fly on the wall tomorrow when that ambulance gets here.”

The telephone rang and Tim answered it. He grimaced, holding it out to Coltrain.

The other man picked it up with a rough sigh. “Coltrain,” he said as if he knew who was calling.

His face grew harder by the second. “Yes. No. I don’t give a damn, it’s my practice and that’s how I do things. If you don’t like it, get out. Damn the contract!” He glanced at the wide-eyed faces near him and shifted his posture. “We’ll talk about this when I get back. Yes, you do that.” He put the receiver down with a savagely controlled jerk of his lean hand. His eyes glittered like blue water on a snake’s back. “Call me if you need me.”

After he was gone, and was driving away in a cloud of dust, Tim whistled through his teeth. “It won’t last.”

“What won’t?” Todd replied.

“Him and Lou,” he said, shaking his head. “They’ll kill each other one day, him with his old-fashioned way of practicing and her with all this newfangled technology.”

Todd found himself vaguely relieved that the doctor had someone besides Jane to occupy his mind. He wasn’t sure why, but he didn’t like the tenderness Coltrain had shown Jane.

Chapter Three

Jane was restless all through the night. When Cherry went to bed, Todd sat with Jane. Tim had handed over the books earlier, so he took the heavy ledger with him. He looked through it while Jane slept, his reading glasses perched on his straight nose and a scowl between his eyes as he saw the inefficiency and waste there on the paper.

The ranch had almost gone under, all right, and there was no need. In addition to the beef cattle, Jane had four thoroughbred stallions, two of whom had won ribbons in competition, and on the racetrack before her father’s death. She wasn’t even putting them at stud, which could certainly have added to the coffers. The equipment she was using was obsolete. No maintenance had been done recently, either, and that would have made a handsome tax deduction. From what he’d seen, there was plenty of room for improvement in the equipment shed, the outbuildings, the barn and even the house itself. The ranch had great potential, but it wasn’t being efficiently used.

He scowled, faintly aware of a tingling sensation, as if he were being watched. He lifted his head and looked into curious blue eyes.

“I didn’t know you wore glasses,” Jane said drowsily.

“I’m farsighted,” he said with a chuckle. “It’s irritating when people think I’m over forty because of these.” He touched the glasses.

She studied his lean, hard face quietly. “How old are you?”

“Thirty-five,” he said. “You?”

She grinned. “Twenty-five. A mere child, compared to you.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “You must be feeling better.”

“A little.” She took a slow breath. “I hate being helpless.”

“You won’t always be,” he reminded her. “One day, you won’t have to worry about traction and pills. Try to think of this as a temporary setback.”

“I’ll bet you’ve never been helpless in your whole life.”

“I had pneumonia once,” he recalled. His face hardened with memory. He’d been violently ill, because he hadn’t realized how serious his chest cold had become until his fever shot up and he couldn’t walk for pain and lack of breath. The doctor had reluctantly allowed him to stay at home during treatment, with the proviso that he had to be carefully watched. But Marie had left him alone to go to a cocktail party with his best friend, smiling as she swept out the door. After all, it was just a little cough and he’d be fine, she’d said carelessly. Besides, this party was important to her. She was going to meet several society matrons who were potential clients for her new interior-design business. She couldn’t pass that up. It wasn’t as if pneumonia was even serious, she’d laughed lightly on her way out the door.

“Come back,” Jane said softly.

His head jerked as he realized his thoughts had drifted away. “Sorry.”

“What happened?” she persisted.

He shrugged. “Nothing much. I had pneumonia and my wife left me at home to go to a cocktail party.”

“And?” she persisted.

“You’re as stubborn as a bulldog, aren’t you?” he asked irritably. “You’re prying.”

“Of course I am,” she said easily. “Tell me.”

“She went on to an all-night club after the cocktail party and didn’t come home until late the next morning. She’d put my antibiotics away and hadn’t told me where, and I was too sick to get up and look for them. By the time she got home, I was delirious with fever. She had to get an ambulance and rush me to the hospital. I very nearly died. That was the year Cherry was born.”

“Why, the witch!” Jane said bluntly. “And you stayed with her?”

“Cherry was on the way,” he said starkly. “I knew that if we got divorced, she wouldn’t have the baby. I wanted Cherry,” he said stiffly.

He said it as if it embarrassed him, and that made her smile. “I’ve noticed that you take fatherhood seriously.”

“I always wanted kids,” he said. “I was an only child. It’s a lonely life for a kid on a big ranch. I wanted more than one, but…” He shrugged. “I’m glad I’ve got Cherry.”

“Her mother didn’t want her?”

He glowered. “Marie likes her when she’s having guests, so that she can show the world what a sweet, devoted mother she is. It wins her brownie points in her business affairs. She’s an interior designer and most of her work comes from very wealthy, very conservative, Texans. You know, the sort who like settled family men and women on the job?”

“Does Cherry know?”

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