It’s the most wonderful time of the year...for rugged ranchers to fall in love! Diana Palmer spins two fan-favorite tales of love, joy and happily-ever-after under the mistletoe.

Winter Roses—Handsome rancher Stuart York was never one to mince words. Ivy Conley, his younger sister’s best friend, found that out the hard way. During a night’s stay at his Jacobsville ranch, Ivy wound up in Stuart’s arms. Knowing she was too young for him, Stuart closed his heart to her. Now, years later, Ivy is determined to be treated like a grown woman. But can she tame the one man determined to avoid her embrace?

Cattleman’s Choice—Carson Wayne has come to Mandelyn Bush with the ultimate request: he needs her to teach him how to treat a lady. There’s no doubt he asked the right person. Beautiful Mandelyn is as polished and feminine as Carson is rough and reclusive.

It’s too intriguing a challenge for Mandelyn to turn down. She’s always been curious about what lies beneath the outlaw’s hard shell. But what she didn’t count on were her own feelings for the irresistible rebel.

Christmas on the Range

Diana Palmer

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Title Page

Winter Roses

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

Cattleman’s Choice

Dedication

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Extract

Copyright

Winter Roses

1

It was late, and Ivy was going to miss her class. Rachel was the only person, except Ivy’s best friend, who even knew the number of Ivy’s frugal prepaid cell phone. The call had come just as she was going to her second college class of the day. The argument could have waited until the evening, but her older sister never thought of anyone’s convenience. Well, except her own, that was.

“Rachel, I’m going to be late,” Ivy pleaded into the phone. She pushed back a strand of long, pale blond hair. Her green eyes darkened with worry. “And we’ve got a test today!”

“I don’t care what you’ve got,” her older sister snapped. “You just listen to me. I want that check for Dad’s property, as soon as you can get the insurance company to issue it! I’ve got overdue bills and you’re whining about college classes. It’s a waste of money! Aunt Hettie should never have left you that savings account,” she added angrily. “It should have been mine, too. I’m the oldest.”

She was, and she’d taken everything she could get her hands on, anything she could pawn for ready cash. Ivy had barely been able to keep enough to pay the funeral bills when they came due. It was a stroke of luck that Aunt Hettie had liked her and had left her a small inheritance. Perhaps she’d realized that Ivy would be lucky if she was able to keep so much as a penny of their father’s few assets.

It was the same painful argument they’d had for a solid month, since their father had died of a stroke. Ivy had been left with finding a place to live while Rachel called daily to talk to the attorney who was probating the will. All she wanted was the money. She’d coaxed their father into changing his will, so that she got everything when he died.

Despite the fact that he paid her little attention, Ivy was still grieving. She’d taken care of their father while he was dying from the stroke. He’d thought that Rachel was an angel. All their lives, it had been Rachel who got all the allowances, all the inherited jewelry—which Rachel pawned immediately—all the attention. Ivy was left with housework and yardwork and cooking for the three of them. It hadn’t been much of a life. Her rare dates had been immediately captivated by Rachel, who took pleasure in stealing them away from her younger, plainer sister, only to drop them days later. When Rachel had opted to go to New York and break into theater, their father had actually put a lien on his small house to pay for an apartment for her. It had meant budgeting to the bone and no new dresses for Ivy. When she tried to protest the unequal treatment the sisters received, their father said that Ivy was just jealous and that Rachel needed more because she was beautiful but emotionally challenged.

Translated, that meant Rachel had no feelings for anyone except herself. But Rachel had convinced their father that she adored him, and she’d filled his ears with lies about Ivy, right up to accusing her of sneaking out at night to meet men and stealing from the garage where she worked two evenings a week keeping books. No protest was enough to convince him that Ivy was honest, and that she didn’t even attract many men. She never could keep a prospective boyfriend once they saw Rachel.

“If I can learn bookkeeping, I’ll have a way to support myself, Rachel,” Ivy said quietly.

“You could marry a rich man one day, I guess, if you could find a blind one,” Rachel conceded, and laughed at her little joke. “Although where you expect to find one in Jacobsville, Texas, is beyond me.”

“I’m not looking for a husband. I’m in school at our community vocational college,” Ivy reminded her.

“So you are. What a pitiful future you’re heading for.” Rachel paused to take an audible sip of her drink. “I’ve got two auditions tomorrow. One’s for the lead in a new play, right on Broadway. Jerry says I’m a shoo-in. He has influence with the director.”

Ivy wasn’t usually sarcastic, but Rachel was getting on her nerves. “I thought Jerry didn’t want you to work.”

There was a frigid pause on the other end of the line. “Jerry doesn’t mind it,” she said coolly. “He just likes me to stay in, so that he can take care of me.”

“He feeds you uppers and downers and crystal meth and charges you for the privilege, you mean,” Ivy replied quietly. She didn’t add that Rachel was beautiful and that Jerry probably used her as bait to catch new clients. He took her to party after party. She talked about acting, but it was only talk. She could barely remember her own name when she was on drugs, much less remember lines for a play. She drank to excess as well, just like Jerry.

“Jerry takes care of me. He knows all the best people in theater. He’s promised to introduce me to one of the angels who’s producing that new comedy. I’m going to make it to Broadway or die trying,” Rachel said curtly. “And if we’re going to argue, we might as well not even speak!”

“I’m not arguing...”

“You’re putting Jerry down, all the time!”

Ivy felt as if she were standing on a precipice, looking at the bottom of the world. “Have you really forgotten what Jerry did to me?” she asked, recalling the one visit Rachel had made home, just after their father died. It had been an overnight one, with the insufferable Jerry at her side. Rachel had signed papers to have their father cremated, placing his ashes in the grave with those of his late wife, the girls’ mother. It was rushed and unpleasant, with Ivy left grieving alone for a parent who’d never loved her, who’d treated her very badly. Ivy had a big, forgiving heart. Rachel did manage a sniff into a handkerchief at the graveside service. But her eyes weren’t either wet or red. It was an act, as it always was with her.

“What you said he did,” came the instant, caustic reply. “Jerry said he never gave you any sort of drugs!”

“Rachel!” she exclaimed, furious now, “I wouldn’t lie about something like that! I had a migraine and he switched my regular medicine with a powerful narcotic. When I saw what he was trying to give me, I threw them at him. He thought I was too sick to notice. He thought it would be funny if he could make me into an addict, just like you...!”

“Oh, grow up,” Rachel shouted. “I’m no addict! Everybody uses drugs! Even people in that little hick town where you live. How do you think I used to score before I moved to New York? There was always somebody dealing, and I knew where to find what I needed. You’re so naive, Ivy.”

“My brain still works,” she shot back.

“Watch your mouth, kid,” Rachel said angrily, “or I’ll see that you don’t get a penny of Dad’s estate.”

“Don’t worry, I never expected to get any of it,” Ivy said quietly. “You convinced Daddy that I was no good, so that he wouldn’t leave me anything.”

“You’ve got that pittance from Aunt Hettie,” Rachel repeated. “Even though I should have had it. I deserved it, having to live like white trash all those years when I was at home.”

“Rachel, if you got what you really deserved,” Ivy replied with a flash of bravado, “you’d be in federal prison.”

There was a muffled curse. “I have to go. Jerry’s back. Listen, you check with that lawyer and find out what’s the holdup. I can’t afford all these long-distance calls.”

“You never pay for them. You usually reverse the charges when you call me,” she was reminded.

“Just hurry up and get the paperwork through so you can send me my check. And don’t expect me to call you back until you’re ready to talk like an adult instead of a spoiled kid with a grudge!”

The receiver slammed down in her ear. She folded it back up with quiet resignation. Rachel would never believe that Jerry, her knight in shining armor, was nothing more than a sick little social climbing drug dealer with a felony record who was holding her hostage to substance abuse. Ivy had tried for the past year to make her older sibling listen, but she couldn’t. The two of them had never been close, but since Rachel got mixed up with Jerry, and hooked on meth, she didn’t seem capable of reason anymore. In the old days, even when Rachel was being difficult, she did seem to have some small affection for her sister. That all changed when she was a junior in high school. Something had happened, Ivy had never known what, that turned her against Ivy and made a real enemy of her. Alcohol and drug use hadn’t helped Rachel’s already abrasive personality. It had been an actual relief for Ivy when her sister left for New York just days after the odd blowup. But it seemed that she could cause trouble long-distance, whenever she liked.

Ivy went down the hall quickly to her next class, without any real enthusiasm. She didn’t want to spend her life working for someone else, but she certainly didn’t want to go to New York and end up as Rachel’s maid and cook, as she had been before her sister left Jacobs-ville. Letting Rachel have their inheritance would be the easier solution to the problem. Anything was better than having to live with Rachel again; even having to put up with Merrie York’s brother, Stuart, in order to have one true friend.

* * *

It was Friday, and when she left the campus for home, riding with her fellow boarder, Lita Dawson, who taught at the vocational college, she felt better. She’d passed her English test, she was certain of it. But typing was getting her down. She couldn’t manage more than fifty words a minute to save her life. One of the male students typing with both index fingers could do it faster than Ivy could.

They pulled up in front of the boardinghouse where they both lived. Ivy felt absolutely drained. She’d had to leave her father’s house because she couldn’t even afford to pay the light bill. Besides, Rachel had signed papers to put the house on the market the same day she’d signed the probate papers at a local lawyer’s office. Since Ivy wasn’t old enough, at almost nineteen, to handle the legal affairs, Rachel had charmed the new, young attorney handling the probate and convinced him that Ivy needed looking after, preferably in a boardinghouse. Then she’d flown back to New York, leaving Ivy to dip into a great-aunt’s small legacy and a part-time job as a bookkeeper at a garage on Monday and Thursday evenings to pay for her board and the small student fee that Texas residents paid at the state technical and vocational college. Rachel hadn’t even asked if Ivy had enough to live on.

Merrie had tried to get Stuart to help Ivy fight Rachel’s claim on the bulk of the estate, but Ivy almost had hysterics when she offered. She’d rather have lived in a cardboard box by the side of the road than have Stuart take over her life. She didn’t want to tell her best friend that her brother terrified her. Merrie would have asked why. There were secrets in Ivy’s past that she shared with no one.

“I’m going to see my father this weekend.” Lita, dark-haired and eyed, smiled at the younger woman. “How about you?”

Ivy smiled. “If Merrie remembers, we’ll probably go window-shopping.” She sighed, smiling lazily. “I might see something I can daydream about owning,” she chuckled.

“One day some nice man is going to come along and treat you the way you deserve to be treated,” Lita said kindly. “You wait and see.”

Ivy knew better, but she only smiled. She wasn’t anxious to offer any man control of her life. She was through living in fear.

She went in the side door, glancing over to see if Mrs. Brown was home. The landlady must be grocery shopping, she decided. It was a Friday ritual. Ivy got to eat with Mrs. Brown and Lita Dawson, the other tenant, on the weekends. She and Lita took turns cooking and cleaning up the kitchen, to help elderly Mrs. Brown manage the extra work. It was nice, not having to drive into town to get a sandwich. The pizza place delivered, but Ivy was sick of pizza. She liked her small boardinghouse, and Lita was nice, if a little older than Ivy. Lita was newly divorced and missing her ex-husband to a terrible degree. She fell back on her degree and taught computer technology at the vocational college, and let Ivy ride back and forth with her for help with the gas money.

She’d no sooner put down her purse than the cell phone rang.

“It’s the weekend!” came a jolly, laughing voice. It was Merrie York, her best friend from high school.

“I noticed,” Ivy chuckled. “How’d you do on your tests?”

“I’m sure I passed something, but I’m not sure what. My biology final is approaching and lab work is killing me. I can’t make the microscope work!”

“You’re training to be a nurse, not a lab assistant,” Ivy pointed out.

“Come up here and tell that to my biology professor,” Merrie dared her. “Never mind, I’ll graduate even if I have to take every course three times.”

“That’s the spirit.”

“Come over and spend the weekend with me,” Merrie invited.

Ivy’s heart flipped over. “Thanks, but I have some things to do around here...”

“He’s in Oklahoma, settling a new group of cattle with a sale barn,” Merrie coaxed wryly.

Ivy hesitated. “Can you put that in writing and get it notarized?”

“He really likes you, deep inside.”

“He’s made an art of hiding his fondness for me,” Ivy shot back. “I love you, Merrie, but I don’t fancy being cannon fodder. It’s been a long week. Rachel and I had another argument today.”

“Long distance?”

“Exactly.”

“And over Sir Lancelot the drug lord.”

“You know me too well.”

Merrie laughed. “We’ve been friends since middle school,” she reminded Ivy.

“Yes, the debutante and the tomboy. What a pair we made.”

“You’re not quite the tomboy you used to be,” Merrie said.

“We conform when we have to. Why do you want me there this weekend?”

“For selfish reasons,” the other woman said mischievously. “I need a study partner and everybody else in my class has a social life.”

“I don’t want a social life,” Ivy said. “I want to make good grades and graduate and get a job that pays at least minimum wage.”

“Your folks left you a savings account and some stocks,” Merrie pointed out.

That was true, but Rachel had walked away with most of the money and all of the stocks.

“Your folks left you Stuart,” Ivy replied dryly.

“Don’t remind me!”

“Actually, I suppose it was the other way around, wasn’t it?” Ivy thought aloud. “Your folks left you to Stuart.”

“He’s a really great brother,” Merrie said gently. “And he likes most women...”

“He likes all women, except me,” Ivy countered. “I really couldn’t handle a weekend with Stuart right now. Not on top of being harassed by Rachel and final exams.”

“You’re a whiz at math,” her friend countered. “You hardly ever have to study.”

“Translation—I work math problems every day for four hours after class so that I can appear to be smart.”

Merrie laughed. “Come on over. Mrs. Rhodes is making homemade yeast rolls for supper, and we have all the pay per view channels. We can study and then watch that new adventure movie.”

Ivy was weakening. On weekends, it was mostly takeout at the boardinghouse. Ivy’s stomach rebelled at the thought of pizza or more sweet and sour chicken or tacos. “I could really use an edible meal that didn’t come in a box, I guess.”

“If I tell Mrs. Rhodes you’re coming, she’ll make you a cherry pie.”

“That does it. I’ll pack a nightgown and see you in thirty minutes, or as soon as I can get a cab.”

“I could come and get you.”

“No. Cabs are cheap in town. I’m not destitute,” she added proudly, although she practically was. The cab fare would have to come out of her snack money for the next week. She really did have to budget to the bone. But her pride wouldn’t let her accept Merrie’s offer.

“All right, Miss Independence. I’ll have Jack leave the gate open.”

It was a subtle and not arrogant reminder that the two women lived in different social strata. Merrie’s home was a sprawling brick mansion with a wrought-iron gate running up a bricked driveway. There was an armed guard, Jack, at the front gate, miles of electrified fence and two killer Dobermans who had the run of the property at night. If that didn’t deter trespassers, there were the ranch hands, half of whom were ex-military. Stuart was particular about the people who worked for him, because his home contained priceless inherited antiques. He also owned four herd sires who commanded incredible stud fees; straws of their semen sold for thousands of dollars each and were shipped all over the world.

“Should I wear body armor, or will Chayce recognize me?”

Chayce McLeod was the chief of security for York Properties, which Stuart headed. He’d worked for J.B. Hammock, but Stuart had offered him a bigger salary and fringe benefits. Chayce was worth it. He had a degree in management and he was a past master at handling men. There were plenty of them to handle on a spread this size. Most people didn’t know that Chayce was also an ex-federal agent. He was dishy, too, but Ivy was immune to him.

Stuart’s ranch, all twenty thousand acres of it, was only a part of an empire that spanned three states and included real estate, investments, feedlots and a ranching equipment company. Stuart and Merrie were very rich. But neither of them led a frantic social life. Stuart worked on the ranch, just as he had when he was in his teens—just as his father had until he died of a heart attack when Merrie was thirteen. Now, Stuart was thirty. Merrie, like Ivy, was only eighteen, almost nineteen. There were no other relatives. Their mother had died giving birth to Merrie.

Merrie sighed at the long pause. “Of course Chayce will recognize you. Ivy, you’re not in one of your moods again, are you?”

“My dad was a mechanic, Merrie,” she reminded her friend, “and my mother was a C.P.A. in a firm.”

“My grandfather was a gambler who got lucky down in the Caribbean,” Merrie retorted. “He was probably a closet pirate, and family legend says he was actually arrested for arms dealing when he was in his sixties. That’s where our money came from. It certainly didn’t come from hard work and honest living. Our parents instilled a vicious work ethic in both of us, as you may have noticed. We don’t just sit around sipping mint juleps and making remarks about the working class. Now will you just shut up and start packing?”

Ivy laughed. “Okay. I’ll see you shortly.”

“That’s my buddy.”

Ivy had to admit that neither Merrie nor Stuart could ever be accused of resting on the family fortune. Stuart was always working on the ranch, when he wasn’t flying to the family corporation’s board meetings or meeting with legislators on agricultural bills or giving workshops on new facets of the beef industry. He had a degree from Yale in business, and he spoke Spanish fluently. He was also the most handsome, sensuous, attractive man Ivy had ever known. It took a lot of work for her to pretend that he didn’t affect her. It was self-defense. Stuart preferred tall, beautiful, independent blondes, preferably rich ones. He was vocal about marriage, which he abhorred. His women came and went. Nobody lasted more than six months.

But Ivy was plain and soft-spoken, not really an executive sort of woman even if she’d been older than she was. She lived in a world far removed from Stuart’s, and his friends intimidated her. She didn’t know a certificate of deposit from a treasury bond, and her background didn’t include yearly trips to exotic places. She didn’t read literary fiction, listen to classical music, drive a luxury car or go shopping in boutiques. She lived a quiet life, working and studying hard to provide a future for herself. Merrie was in nursing school in San Antonio, where she lived in the dorm and drove a new Mercedes. The two only saw each other when Merrie came home for the occasional weekend. Ivy missed her.

That was why she took a chance and packed her bag. Merrie wouldn’t lie to her about Stuart being there, she knew. But he frequently turned up unexpectedly. It wasn’t surprising that he disliked Ivy. He’d known her sister, Rachel, before she went to New York. He was scathing about her lifestyle, which had been extremely modern even when she was still in high school. He thought Ivy was going to be just like her. Which proved that he didn’t know his sister’s best friend in the least.

Jack, the guard on the front gate at Merrie’s house, recognized Ivy in the local cab, and grinned at her. He waved the cab through without even asking for any identification. One hurdle successfully passed, she told herself.

Merrie was waiting for her at the front steps of the sprawling brick mansion. She ran down the steps and around to the back door of the cab, throwing her arms around Ivy the minute she opened the door and got out.

Ivy was medium height and slender, with long, straight, pale blond hair and green eyes. Merrie took after her brother—she was tall for a woman, and she had dark hair and light eyes. She towered over Ivy.

“I’m so glad you came,” Merrie said happily. “Sometimes the walls just close in on me when I’m here alone. The house is way too big for two people and a housekeeper.”

“Both of you will marry someday and fill it up with kids,” Ivy teased.

“Fat chance, in Stuart’s case,” Merrie chuckled. “Come on in. Where’s your bag?”

“In the boot...”

The Hispanic driver was already at the trunk, smiling as he lifted out Ivy’s bag and carried it all the way up to the porch for her. But before Ivy could reach into her purse, Merrie pressed a big bill into the driver’s hand and spoke to him in her own, elegant Spanish.

Ivy started to argue, but the cab was racing down the driveway and Merrie was halfway up the front steps.

“Don’t argue,” she told Ivy with a grin. “You know you can’t win.”

“I know,” the other woman sighed. “Thanks, Merrie, but...”

“But you’ve got about three dollars spare a week, and you’d do without lunch one day at school to pay for the cab,” came the quiet reply. “If you were in my place, you’d do it for me,” she added, and Ivy couldn’t argue. But it did hurt her pride.

“Listen,” Merrie added, “one day when you’re a fabulously rich owner of a bookkeeping firm, and driving a Rolls, you can pay me back. Okay?”

Ivy just laughed. “Listen, no C.P.A. ever got rich enough to own a Rolls,” came the dry reply. “But I really will pay you back.”

“Friends help friends,” Merrie said simply. “Come on in.”

* * *

The house was huge, really huge. The one thing that set rich people apart from poor people, Ivy pondered, was space. If you were wealthy, you could afford plenty of room in your house and a bathroom the size of a garage. You could also afford enough land to give you some privacy and a place to plant flowers and trees and have a fish pond...

“What are you brooding about now?” Merrie asked on the way up the staircase.

“Space,” Ivy murmured.

“Outer?”

“No. Personal space,” Ivy qualified the answer. “I was thinking that how much space you have depends on how much money you have. I’d love to have just a yard. And maybe a fish pond,” she added.

“You can feed our Chinese goldfish any time you want to,” the other girl offered.

Ivy didn’t reply. She noticed, not for the first time, how much Merrie resembled her older brother. They were both tall and slender, with jet-black hair. Merrie wore her hair long, but Stuart’s was short and conventionally cut. Her eyes, pale blue like Stuart’s, could take on a steely, dangerous quality when she was angry. Not that Merrie could hold a candle to Stuart in a temper. Ivy had seen grown men hide in the barn when he passed by. Stuart’s pale, deep-set eyes weren’t the only indication of bad temper. His walk was just as good a measure of ill humor. He usually glided like a runner. But when he was angry, his walk slowed. The slower the walk, the worse the temper.

Ivy had learned early in her friendship with Merrie to see how fast Stuart was moving before she approached any room he was in. One memorable day when he’d lost a prize cattle dog to a coyote, she actually pleaded a migraine headache she didn’t have to avoid sitting at the supper table with him.

It was a nasty habit of his to be bitingly sarcastic to anyone within range when he was mad, especially if the object of his anger was out of reach.

Merrie led Ivy into the bedroom that adjoined hers and watched as Ivy opened the small bag and brought out a clean pair of jeans and a cotton T-shirt. She frowned. “No nightgown?”

Ivy winced. “Rachel upset me. I forgot.”

“No problem. You can borrow one of mine. It will drag the floor behind you like a train, of course, but it will fit most everywhere else.” Her eyes narrowed. “I suppose Rachel is after the money.”

Ivy nodded, looking down into her small bag. “She was good at convincing Daddy I didn’t deserve anything.”

“She told lies.”

Ivy nodded again. “But he believed her. Rachel could be so sweet and loving when she wanted something. He drank...” She stopped at once.

Merrie sat down on the bed and folded her hands in her lap. “I know he drank, Ivy,” she said gently. “Stuart had him investigated.”

Her eyes widened in disbelief. “What?”

Merrie bit her lower lip. “I can’t tell you why, so don’t even ask. Suffice it to say that it was an eye-opening experience.”

Ivy wondered how much information Stuart’s private detective had ferreted out about the private lives of the Conley family.

“We just knew that he drank,” Merrie said at once, when she saw her friend’s tortured expression. She patted Ivy’s hand. “Nobody has that perfect childhood they put in motion pictures, you know. Dad wanted Stuart to raise thoroughbreds to race in competition. It was something he’d never been able to do. He tried to force Stuart through agricultural college.” She laughed hollowly. “Nobody could force my brother to do anything, not even Dad.”

“Were they very much alike?” Ivy asked, because she’d only met the elder York a few times.

“No. Well, in one way they were,” she corrected. “Dad in a bad temper could cost us good hired men. Stuart cost us our best, and oldest, horse wrangler last week.”

“How?”

“He made a remark Stuart didn’t like when Stuart ran the Jaguar through the barn and into its back wall.”

2

Ivy could hardly contain her amusement. Merrie’s brother was one of the most self-contained people she’d ever known. He never lost control of himself. “Stuart ran the Jag through the barn? The new Jaguar, the XJ?”

Merrie grimaced. “I’m afraid so. He was talking on his cell phone at the time.”

“About what, for heaven’s sake?”

“One of the managers at the Jacobsville sales barn mixed up the lot numbers and sold Stuart’s purebred cows, all of whom were pregnant by Big Blue, for the price of open heifers,” she added, the term “open heifer” denoting a two-year-old female who wasn’t pregnant. Big Blue was a champion Black Angus herd sire.

“That was an expensive mistake,” Ivy commented.

“And not only for us,” Merrie added, tongue-in-cheek. “Stuart took every cattle trailer we had and every one he could borrow, complete with drivers, went to the sale barn and brought back every single remaining bull or cow or calf he was offering for sale. Then he shipped them to another sale barn in Oklahoma by train. That’s why he’s in Oklahoma. He said this time, they’re going to be certain which lots they’re selling at which price, because he’s having it written on their hides in magic marker.”

Ivy just grinned. She knew Stuart would do no such thing, even if he felt like it.

“The local sale barn is never going to be the same,” Merrie added. “Stuart told them they’d be having snowball fights in hell before he sent another lot of cattle to them for an auction.”

“Your brother is not a forgiving person,” Ivy said quietly.

The other girl nodded. “But there’s a reason for the way he is, Ivy,” she said. “Our father expected Stuart to follow in his footsteps and become a professional athlete. Dad never made it out of semipro football, but he was certain that Stuart would. He started making him play football before he was even in grammar school. Stuart hated it,” she recalled sadly. “He deliberately missed practices, and when he did, Dad would go at him with a doubled-up belt. Stuart had bruises all over his back and legs, but it made him that much more determined to avoid sports. When he was thirteen, he dug his heels in and told Dad he was going into rodeo and that if the belt came out again, he was going to call Dallas Carson and have him arrested for beating him. Dallas,” she reminded Ivy, “was Hayes Carson’s father. He was our sheriff long before Hayes went into law enforcement. It was unusual for someone to be arrested for spanking a child twenty years ago, but Dallas would have done it. He loved Stuart like a son.”

It took Ivy a minute to answer. She knew more about corporal punishment than she was ever going to admit, even to Merrie. “I always liked Dallas. Hayes is hard-going sometimes. What did your father say to that?” she asked.

“He didn’t say anything. He got Stuart in the car and drove him to football practice. Five minutes after he left, Stuart hitched a ride to the Jacobsville rodeo arena and borrowed a horse for the junior bulldogging competition. He and his best friend, Martin, came in second place. Dad was livid. When Stuart put his trophy on the mantel, Dad smashed it with a fire poker. He never took the belt to Stuart again, but he browbeat him and demeaned him every chance he got. It wasn’t until Stuart went away to college that I stopped dreading the times we were home from school.”

Involuntarily, Ivy’s eyes went to the painting of Merrie and Stuart’s father that hung over the fireplace. Stuart resembled Jake York, but the older man had a stubborn jaw and a cruel glimmer in his pale blue eyes. Like Stuart, he’d been a tall man, lean and muscular. The children had been without a mother, who died giving birth to Merrie. Their mother’s sister had stayed with the family and cared for Merrie until she was in grammar school. She and the elder York had argued about his treatment of Stuart, which had ended in her departure. After that, tenderness and unconditional love were things the York kids read about. They learned nothing of them from their taciturn, demanding father. Stuart’s defiance only made him more bitter and ruthless.

“But your father built this ranch,” Ivy said. “Surely he had to like cattle.”

“He did. It was just that football was his whole life,” Merrie replied. “You might have noticed that you don’t ever see football games here. Stuart cuts off the television at the first mention of it.”

“I can see why.”

“Dad spent the time between football games running the ranch and his real estate company. He died of a heart attack when I was thirteen, sitting at the boardroom table. He had a violent argument with one of his directors about some proposed expansions that would have placed the company dangerously close to bankruptcy. He was a gambler. Stuart isn’t. He always calculates the odds before he makes any decision. He never has arguments with the board of directors.” She frowned. “Well, there was one. They insisted that he hire a pilot to fly him to business meetings.”

“Why?”

Merrie chuckled. “To stop him from driving himself to them. Didn’t I mention that this is his second new XJ in six months?”

Ivy lifted her eyebrows. “What happened to the first one?”

“Slow traffic.”

“Come again?”

“He was in a hurry to a called meeting of the board of directors,” Merrie said. “There was a little old man driving a motor home about twenty miles an hour up a hill on a blind curve. Stuart tried to pass him. He almost made it, too,” she added. “Except that Hayes Carson was coming down the hill on the other side of the road in his squad car.”

“What happened?” Ivy prompted when Merrie sat silently.

“Stuart really is a good driver,” his sister asserted, “even if he makes insane decisions about where to pass. He spun the car around and stopped it neatly on the shoulder before Hayes got anywhere near him. But Hayes said he could have killed somebody and he wasn’t getting out of a ticket. The only way he got his license back was that he promised to go to traffic school and do public service.”

“That doesn’t sound like your brother.”

Merrie shrugged. “He did go to traffic school twice, and then he went to the sheriff’s department and showed Hayes Carson how to reorganize his department so that it operated more efficiently.”

“Did Hayes actually ask him to do that?”

“No. But Stuart argued that reorganizing the chaos in the sheriff’s department was a public service. Hayes didn’t agree. He went and talked to Judge Meacham himself. They gave Stuart his license back.”

“You said he didn’t hit anything with the car.”

“He didn’t. But while it was sitting on the side of the road, a cattle truck—one of his own, in fact—took the curve too fast and sideswiped it off the shoulder down a ten-foot ravine.”

“I don’t guess the driver works for you anymore,” Ivy mused.

“He does, but not as a driver,” Merrie said, laughing. “Considering how things could have gone, it was a lucky escape for everyone. It was a sturdy, well-built car, but those cattle trucks are heavy. It was a total loss.”

“Even if I could afford a car, I don’t think I want to learn how to drive,” Ivy commented. “It seems safer not to be on the highway when Stuart’s driving.”

“It is.”

They snacked on cheese and crackers and finger sandwiches and cookies, and sipped coffee in perfect peace for several minutes.

“Ivy, are you sure you’re cut out to be a public accountant?” Merrie asked after a minute.

Ivy laughed. “What brought that on?”

“I was just thinking about when we were still in high school,” she replied. “You had your heart set on singing opera.”

“And chance would be a fine thing, wouldn’t it?” Ivy asked with a patient smile. “The thing is, even if I had the money to study in New York, I don’t want to leave Jacobsville. So that sort of limits my options. Singing in the church choir does give me a chance to do what I love most.”

Merrie had to agree that this was true. “What you should really do is get married and have kids, and teach them how to sing,” she replied with a grin. “You’d be a natural. Little kids flock around you everywhere we go.”

“What a lovely idea,” she enthused. “Tell you what, you gather up about ten or twelve eligible bachelors, and I’ll pick out one I like.”

That set Merrie to laughing uproariously. “If we could do it that way, I might get married myself,” she confessed. “But I’d have to have a man who wasn’t afraid of Stuart. Talk about limited options...!”

“Hayes Carson isn’t scared of him,” Ivy pointed out. “You could marry him.”

“Hayes doesn’t want to get married. He says he likes his life uncluttered by emotional complications.”

“Lily-livered coward,” Ivy enunciated. “No guts.”

“Oh, he’s got guts. He just doesn’t think marriage works. His parents fought like tigers. His younger brother, Bobby, couldn’t take it, and he turned to drugs and overdosed. It had to affect Hayes, losing his only sibling like that.”

“He might fall in love one day.”

“So might my brother,” Merrie mused, “but if I were a betting woman, I wouldn’t bet on that any time soon.”

“Love is the great equalizer.”

“Love is a chemical reaction,” Merrie, the nursing student, said dryly. “It’s nothing more than a physical response to a sensory stimulus designed to encourage us to replicate our genes.”

“Oh, yuuuck!” Ivy groaned. “Merrie, that’s just gross!”

“It’s true—ask my anatomy professor,” Merrie defended.

“No, thank you. I’ll take my own warped view of it as a miracle, thanks.”

Merrie laughed, then she frowned. “Ivy, what are you eating?” she asked abruptly.

“This?” She held up a cookie from the huge snack platter that contained crackers, cheese, cakes, little finger sandwiches and cookies. Mrs. Rhodes loved to make hors d’oeuvres. “It’s a cookie.”

Merrie looked worried. “Ivy, it’s a chocolate cookie,” came the reply. “You know you’ll get a migraine if you eat them.”

“It’s only one cookie,” she defended herself.

“And there’s a low pressure weather system dumping rain on us, and you’ve had the stress of Rachel worrying you to death since your father’s funeral,” she replied. “Not to mention that your father’s only been dead for a few weeks. There’s always more than one trigger that sets off a migraine, even if you don’t realize what they are. Stuart gets them, too, you know, but it’s red wine or aged cheese that causes his.”

Ivy recalled one terrible attack that Stuart had after he’d closed a tricky big business deal. It had been the day after he’d attended a band concert at Ivy and Merrie’s school soon after the girls had become friends. They were both in band. It had been Ivy who’d suggested strong coffee and then a doctor for Stuart. He’d never realized that his terrible sick headaches were, in fact, migraines, much less that there were prescriptions for them that actually worked. Ivy had suffered from them all her life. Her mother and her mother’s father had also had migraine headaches. They tended to run in families. They ran in Stuart’s, too. Even though Merrie hadn’t had one, her father had suffered with them. So had an uncle.

“The doctor gave Stuart the preventative, after diagnosing the headache,” Merrie commented.

“I can’t take the preventative,” Ivy replied. “I have a heart defect, and the medication causes abnormal heart rhythms in me. I have to treat the symptoms instead of the disease.”

“I hope you brought your medicine.”

Ivy looked at the chocolate cookie and ruefully put the remainder down on her plate. “I forgot to get it refilled.” Translated, that meant that she couldn’t afford it anymore. There was one remedy that was sold over the counter. She took it in desperation, although it wasn’t as effective as the prescription medicines were.

“Stuart has pain medicine as well as the preventative,” Merrie said solemnly. “If you wake up in the night screaming in pain because of that cookie, we can handle it. Maybe when your father’s estate is settled, Rachel will leave you alone.”

Ivy shook her head. “Rachel won’t rest until she gets every penny. She convinced Dad that I was wilder than a white-tailed deer. He cut me out of his will.”

“He knew better,” Merrie said indignantly.

She laughed. “No, he didn’t.” Nor had he tried to find out. He drank to excess. Rachel encouraged him to do it. When he was drunk, she fed him lies about Ivy. The lies had terrible repercussions. That amused Rachel, who hated her prim younger sister. It made Ivy afraid every day of her life.

She pulled her mind from the past and forced a smile. “If having the estate will keep Rachel in New York, and out of my life, it will be worth it. I still have Aunt Hettie’s little dab of money. That, and my part-time job, will see me through school.”

“It’s so unfair,” her friend lamented. “It’s never been like that here. Stuart split everything right down the middle between us. He said we were both Dad’s kids and one shouldn’t be favored over the other.”

Ivy frowned. “That sounds as if one was.”

She nodded. “In Dad’s will, Stuart got seventy-five percent. He couldn’t break the will, because Dad was always in his right mind. So he did the split himself, after the will was probated.” She smiled. “I know you don’t like him, but he’s a great brother.”

It wasn’t dislike. It was fear. Stuart in a temper was frightening to a woman whose whole young life had been spent trying to escape male violence. Well, it was a little more than fear, she had to admit. Stuart made her feel funny when she was around him. He made her nervous.

“He’s good to you,” Ivy conceded.

“He likes you,” she replied. “No, really, he does. He admires the way you work for your education. He was furious when Rachel jerked the house out from under you and left you homeless. He talked to the attorney. It was no use, of course. It takes a lot to break a will.”

It was surprising that Stuart would do anything for her. He always seemed to resent her presence in his house. He tolerated her because she was Merrie’s best friend, but he was never friendly. In fact, he stayed away from home when he knew Ivy was visiting.

“He’s probably afraid of my fatal charm,” Ivy murmured absently. “You know, fearful that he might succumb to my wiles.” She frowned. “What, exactly, are wiles anyway?”

“If I knew that, I’d probably have a boyfriend,” Merrie chuckled. “So it’s just as well I don’t. I’m going to get my nursing certificate before I get involved with any one man. Meanwhile, I’m playing the field like crazy. There’s a resident in our hospital that I adore. He takes me out once in a while, but it’s all very low-key.” She eyed Ivy curiously. “Any secret suitors in your life?”

Ivy shook her head. “I don’t ever want to get married,” she said quietly.

Merrie frowned. “Why not?”

“Nobody could live with me,” she said. “I snore.”

Merrie laughed. “You do not.”

“Anyway, I’m like you. I just want to graduate and get a real job.” She considered that. “I’ve dreamed of having my own money, of supporting myself. In a lot of ways, I led a sheltered life. Dad didn’t want to lose me, so he discouraged boys from coming around. I was valuable, free hired help. After all, Rachel couldn’t cook and she’d never have washed clothes or mopped floors.”

Merrie didn’t smile. She knew that was the truth. Ivy had been used her whole young life by the people who should have cherished her. She’d never pried, but she noticed that Ivy hardly ever talked about her father, except in a general way.

“You really do keep secrets, don’t you?” Merrie asked gently. She held up a hand when Ivy protested. “I won’t pry. But if you ever need to talk, I’m right here.”

“I know that.” She smiled back. “Thanks.”

“Now. How about a good movie on the pay channels? I was thinking about that fantasy film everyone’s raving about.” She named it.

Ivy beamed. “I really wanted to see that one, but it’s no fun going to the movies alone.”

“I’ll ask Mrs. Rhodes for some popcorn to go with it. In fact, she might like to watch it with us. She doesn’t have a social life.”

“She’s married, isn’t she?” Ivy probed gently.

“She was,” came the reply. “He was an engineer in the Army and he went overseas with his unit. He didn’t come back. They had no kids; it was just the two of them for almost twenty years.” She grimaced. “She came to us just after it happened, looking for a live-in job. She’d lost everything. He got a good salary and was career Army, so she hadn’t worked except as a temporary secretary all that time. When he was gone, she had to go through channels to apply for widow’s benefits, and the job market locally was flat. She came to work for us as a temporary thing, and just stayed. We all suited each other.”

“She’s very sweet.”

“She’s a nurturing person,” Merrie agreed. “She even gets away with nurturing Stuart. Nobody else would dare even try.”

Ivy wouldn’t have touched that line with a pole. She just nodded.

* * *

She was looking through the program guide on the wide-screen television when Merrie came in with a small, plump, smiling woman with short silver hair.

“Hi, Mrs. Rhodes,” Ivy said with a smile.

“Good to see you, Ivy. I’m making popcorn. What’s the movie?”

“We wanted to see the fantasy one,” Merrie explained.

“It’s wonderful,” came the surprising reply. “Yes, I went to the theater to see it, all by myself,” Mrs. Rhodes chuckled. “But I’d love to see it again, if you wouldn’t mind the company.”

“We’d love it,” Ivy said, and meant it.

“Then I’ll just run and get the popcorn out of the microwave,” the older woman told them.

“I’ll buy the movie,” Merrie replied, taking the remote from Ivy. “This is the one mechanical thing I’m really good at—pushing buttons!”

* * *

The movie was wonderful, but long before it was over, Ivy was seeing dancing colored lights before her eyes. Soon afterward, she lost the vision in one eye; in the center of it was only a ragged gray static like when a television channel went off the air temporarily. It was the unmistakable aura that came before the sick headaches.

She didn’t say a word about it to Merrie. She’d just go to bed and tough it out. She’d done that before. If she could get to sleep before the pain got bad, she could sleep it off most of the time.

She toughed it out until the movie ended, then she yawned and stood up. “Sorry, I’ve got to get to bed. I’m so sleepy!”

Merrie got up, too. “I could do with an early night myself. Mrs. Rhodes, will you close up?”

“Certainly, dear. Need anything else from the kitchen?”

“Could I have a bottle of water?” Ivy asked. “I always keep one by my bed at home.”

“I’ll bring it up to you,” Mrs. Rhodes promised. “Merrie?”

Merrie shook her head. “No, thanks, I keep diet sodas in my little fridge. I drink enough bottled water at school to float a boat!”

“You said you could lend me a nightgown?” Ivy asked when they were at the top of the staircase.

“Can and will. Come on.”

Merrie pulled a beautiful nightgown and robe out of her closet and presented it to Ivy. It was sheer, lacy, palest lemon and absolutely the most beautiful thing Ivy had ever seen. Her nightgowns were cheap cotton ones in whichever colors were on sale. She caught her breath just looking at it.

“It’s too expensive,” she protested.

“It isn’t. It was a gift and I hate it,” Merrie said honestly. “You know I never wear yellow. One of my roommates drew my name at Christmas and bought it for me. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it wasn’t my color, I hugged her and said thank you. Then I hung it in the closet.”

“I would have done the same,” Ivy had to admit. “Well, it’s beautiful.”

“It will look beautiful on you. Go on to bed. Sleep late. We won’t need to get up before noon if we don’t want to.”

“I never sleep past seven, even when I try,” Ivy said, smiling. “I always got up to make breakfast for Dad and Rachel, and then just for Dad after she left home.”

“Mrs. Rhodes will make you breakfast, whenever you want it,” Merrie said. “Sleep well.”

“You, too.”

Ivy went into the bedroom that adjoined Merrie’s. There was a bathroom between the guest room and Stuart’s room, but Ivy wasn’t worried about that. Stuart was out of town and she’d have the bathroom all to herself if she needed it. She probably would, if she couldn’t sleep off the headache. They made her violently ill.

She put on the nightgown and looked at herself in the full-length mirror. She was surprised at how she looked in it. Her breasts were small, but high and firm, and the gown emphasized their perfection. It flowed down her narrow waist to her full hips and long, elegant legs. She’d never worn anything so flattering.

With her long blond hair and dark green eyes and silky, soft complexion, she looked like a fairy. She wasn’t pretty, but she wasn’t plain, either. She was slender and medium height, with a nice mouth and big eyes. Only one of the big eyes was seeing right now, though, and she needed sleep.

There was a soft knock at the door. She opened it, and there was Mrs. Rhodes with the water. “Dear, you’re very pale,” the older woman said, concerned. “Are you all right?”

Ivy sighed. “It was the chocolate. I’ve got a headache. I don’t want Merrie to know. She worries. I’ll just go to sleep, and I’ll be fine.”

Mrs. Rhodes wasn’t convinced. She’d seen Ivy have these headaches, and she’d seen Stuart suffer through them. “Have you got something to take?”

“In my purse,” Ivy lied. “I’ve got aspirin.”

“Well, if you need something stronger, you come wake me up, okay?” she asked gently. “Stuart keeps medicine for them. I know where to look.”

She smiled. “Thanks, Mrs. Rhodes. I really mean it.”

“You just get some sleep. Call if you need me. I’m just across the hall from Merrie.”

“I will. Thanks again.”

* * *

She dropped down on the queen-size bed and pulled the silken covers up over her. The room was a palace compared to her one-room apartment. Even the bathroom was larger than the room she lived in. Merrie took such wealth and luxury for granted, but Ivy didn’t. It was fascinating to her.

The pain was vicious. The headaches always settled in one eye, and they felt as if a knife were being pushed right through the pupil. Some people called them “head-bangers” because sufferers had been known to knock their heads against walls in an effort to cope with the pain. Ivy groaned quietly and pushed her fist against the eye that had gone blind. The sight had returned to it, and the pain came with it.

Volumes had been written on the vicious attacks. Comparing them to mild tension headaches was like comparing a hurricane to a spring breeze. Some people lost days of work every year to them. Others didn’t realize what sort of headaches they were and never consulted a doctor about them. Still others wound up in emergency rooms pleading for something to ease the pain. Hardly anything sold over the counter would even faze them. It usually took a prescription medicine to make them bearable. Ivy had never found anything that would stop the pain, regardless of its strength. The best she could hope for was that the pain would ease enough that she could endure it until it finally stopped.

Around midnight, the pain spawned nausea and she was violently sick. By that time, the pain was a throbbing, stabbing wave of agony.

She dabbed her mouth and eyes with a wet cloth and laid back down, trying again to sleep. But even though the nausea eased a little, the pain increased.

She would have to go and find Mrs. Rhodes. On the way, she’d stop in the bathroom long enough to wet the cloth again.

She opened the door, half out of her mind with pain, and walked right into a tall, muscular man wearing nothing except a pair of black silk pajama bottoms. Blue eyes bit into her green ones as she looked up, a long way up, into them.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Stuart York demanded with a scowl.

3

Ivy hadn’t seen him in months. They didn’t travel in the same circles, and he was never at home when she was visiting Merrie. The sight of him so unexpectedly caused an odd breathlessness, an ache in the pit of her stomach.

He was watching her intently, and there was an odd glint in his pale blue eyes, as if she’d disappointed him. He rarely smiled. He certainly wasn’t doing it now. His wide, sexy mouth was thin with impatience. She couldn’t take her eyes off him. His chest was broad and muscular and thick with black, curling hair that narrowed on its way down his belly. The silk pajama bottoms clung lovingly to the hard muscles of his thighs. He was as sexy as any television hero. Even with his thick, straight black hair slightly tousled and his eyes red from lack of sleep, he was every woman’s dream.

“I was...looking for something,” she faltered.

“Me?” he drawled sarcastically, and he reached for her. “Rachel told me all about you before she left town. I didn’t believe her at first.” His eyes slid down her exquisite body in the revealing gown. “But it looks as though she was right about you all along.”

The feel of all that warm strength so close made her legs wobbly. There was the faint scent of soap and cologne that clung to his skin, and the way he was looking at her made it even worse. Over the years, she’d tried very hard not to notice Stuart. But close like this, her heart ran away with her. She felt sensations that made her uneasy, alien sensations that made her want things she didn’t understand. She couldn’t take her eyes off him, but he was misty in her vision. Her head was throbbing so madly that she couldn’t think. Which was unfortunate, because he misinterpreted her lack of protest.

A split second later, she was standing with her back against the cold wall with Stuart’s hard body pressing down against hers. His hands propped against the wall, pinning her, while his eyes took in the visible slope of her breasts in the wispy gown. He couldn’t seem to stop looking at her.

“I need...” she began weakly, trying to focus enough to ask for some aspirin, for anything that might make the headache ease.

“...me?” he taunted. His voice was deep and velvety soft, husky with emotion as his head bent. His pale eyes went to her parted lips. “Show me, honey.”

While she was working out that odd comment, his mouth was suddenly hard and insistent on her own. She stiffened with apprehension. She’d never been so close, so intimately close, to a man before. His mouth was demanding, twisting on hers as though he wanted more than he was getting.

She really should protest the way he was holding her, so that she felt every inch of muscle that pressed against her. But his mouth was erotic, masterful. She’d only been kissed a few times, mostly at parties, and never by a boy who knew much about intimacy. It had been her good fortune that she’d never felt violent attraction to a man who wouldn’t accept limits. But her luck had just run out, with Stuart. He knew what he was doing. His mouth eased and became coaxing, caressing. His teeth nipped tenderly at her lower lip, teasing it to move down so that he had access to the whole of her soft, warm mouth.

She shivered a little as passion grew inside her. She felt his bare chest under her hands, and she loved the warmth and strength of him so close. Her fingers burrowed through the thick hair that covered the hard muscle, making them tingle even as she felt the urgent response of his body to the soft caress. She let her lips part as he pressed harder against them and she moved, involuntarily, closer to the source of the sudden pleasure she was feeling.

It was like an invitation, and he took it. His hips ground into hers and she felt the sudden hardness of him against her with real fear. He groaned harshly. His body became even more insistent. He didn’t seem capable, at that moment, of stopping.

The throbbing delight she felt turned quickly to fear as his hands dropped to her hips and dragged them against the changing contours of his body with intent enough that even a virgin could feel his rising desire. Frightened by his headlong ardor, she pushed at his chest frantically, trying to drag her lips away from the hard, slow drugging pressure of his mouth.

He was reluctant to stop. He could feel his own body betraying his hunger for her. He couldn’t help it. She was exquisite to touch, and she tasted like sweet heaven. He couldn’t think past her body under him in the bed behind them. But finally the violence of her resistance got through to his foggy brain. He managed to lift his head just long enough to meet her eyes.

When he saw the fear, he began to doubt for the first time what Rachel had said about her little sister. If this was the permissive behavior that had been described to him, it was unlikely that she’d had many boyfriends. On the contrary, she looked as if she was scared to death of what came next.

“No,” she choked huskily, her eyes bright with feeling, pleading with his. “Please don’t.”

For just an instant, his hands tightened on her waist. But her gasp and stiffening posture told its own story. Promiscuous? This little icicle? Just on the strength of her response, he would have bet his life on her innocence.

As his head began to clear, anger began to smolder in his chest. He’d lost his self-control. He’d betrayed his hunger for her. He couldn’t pretend that he hadn’t felt desire while he was kissing her. She’d felt his momentary weakness. His own raging desire had betrayed him, with this innocent child-woman who was only eighteen years old. Eighteen!

Anger and shame and guilt overwhelmed him. He pushed her away from him roughly, his eyes blazing as he looked down at her body in the revealing nightgown. Despite everything, he still wanted her, desperately.

“What did you expect, when you go looking for a man, in the middle of the night, dressed like that!?” He emphasized her attire with one big hand.

Shivering, her arms crossed over her breasts. She swayed, putting a hand up to her eye. She’d forgotten the headache for a few seconds while he’d been kissing her, but it came back now with a fury. She leaned back against the wall for support. Stronger than shame, than anger, was pain, stabbing into her right eye like a heated poker.

Her face was white and contorted. It began to occur to him that she was unwell. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked belatedly.

“Migraine,” she whispered huskily. “I was looking for aspirin.”

He made a rough sound in his throat. “Aspirin, for a migraine,” he scoffed. He bent suddenly, swung her up into his arms and strode back into his bedroom with her. The feel of her softness in his arms was intoxicating. She was as light as a feather. He noticed that she wasn’t protesting the contact. In fact, her cheek was against his bare chest and he could hear her breathing change, despite the pain he knew she was feeling. “You’ll get something stronger than aspirin to stop the pain, but not before I’ve checked with your doctor. Sit.” He put her down on the bed and went to the dresser to pick up his cell phone.

“It’s Dr. Lou Coltrain,” she began.

He ignored her. He knew who her doctor was. “Lou? Sorry to bother you so late. Ivy Conley’s spending the weekend with Merrie, and she’s got a migraine. Can she take what you give me for it?”

There was a pause, during which he stared at Ivy, trying not to look at her the way he felt like looking. She was beautifully formed. But her age tortured him. She was too young for him. He was thirty, to her eighteen. He didn’t dare touch her again. In order to keep his distance, he was going to have to hurt her. He didn’t want to, but she was looking at him in a different way already. The kiss had been very much a shared pleasure until he’d turned up the heat and frightened her.

A minute later he shifted, listened, nodded. “Okay. Yes, I’ll send her in to the clinic tomorrow if she isn’t better by morning. Thanks.”

He hung up. “She said that you can have half the dose I take,” he said, pulling a prescription bottle from his top drawer and shaking out one pill. He poured water from a carafe into a crystal glass and handed her the pill and the glass. “Take it. If you’re not better in the morning, you’ll need to go to her clinic and be seen.”

“Could you stop glaring at me?” she asked through the pain.

“You aren’t the only one who’s got a pain,” he said bluntly. “Take it!”

She flushed, but she put the pill in her mouth and swallowed it down with two big sips of water.

He took the glass from her, helped her up from the bed and marched her back through the bathroom to her own room. He guided her down onto the bed.

“I didn’t know you’d be home,” she defended herself. “Merrie promised you wouldn’t. I didn’t expect to walk into the bathroom and run into you.”

“That goes double for me. I didn’t know you were on the place,” he added curtly. “My sister has a convenient memory.”

In other words, she hadn’t told him Ivy was here. Ivy wondered if her friend knew he was due back home. It would have been a dirty trick to play, and Merrie was bigger than that. So maybe she hadn’t known.

“Thank you for the pill,” she said tautly.

He let out a harsh breath. “You’re welcome. Go to bed.”

She slid the covers back and eased under them, wincing as the movement bumped the pain up another notch.

“And don’t read anything romantic into what just happened,” he added bluntly. “Most men are vulnerable at night, when temptation walks in the door scantily clad.”

“I didn’t know...!”

He held up a hand. “All right. I’ll take your word for it.” His eyes narrowed. “Your sister fed me a pack of lies about you. Why?”

“Why were you even talking to her about me?” she countered. “You always said you couldn’t stand her, even when you were in the same class in high school.”

“She phoned me when your father died.”

“Ah, yes,” she said, closing her eyes. “She didn’t want to take any chances that you might come down on my side of the fence during the probate of the will.” She laughed coldly. “I could have told her that would never happen.”

“She thought you might ask Merrie for help.”

She opened her eyes. The pain was throbbing. She could see her heartbeat in her own eyes. “She would have. Not me. I can stand on my own two feet.”

“Yes,” he said slowly, studying her pale face. “You’ve done remarkably well.”

That was high praise, coming from him. She looked up into his lean face and wondered how it would have felt if she hadn’t pulled back. Warm color surged into her cheeks.

“Stop that,” he muttered. “I won’t be an object of desire to some daydreaming teenager.”

His tone wasn’t hostile. It was more amused than angry. Her eyebrows arched. “Are you sure?” she asked, returning the banter. “Because I have to have somebody to cut my teeth on. Just think, I could fall into bad company and become a lost sheep, and it would all be your fault, because you wouldn’t let me obsess over you.”

At first he thought she was being sarcastic. Then he saw the twinkle in those pretty green eyes.

“You’re too young to be obsessing over a mature man. Go pick on a boy your own age.”

“That’s the problem,” she pointed out, pushing her hand against her throbbing eye. “Boys my own age are just boys.”

“All men started out that way.”

“I guess so.” She groaned. “Could you please hit me in the head with a hammer? Maybe it would take my mind off the pain.”

“It takes pills a long time to work, doesn’t it?” he asked. He moved to sit beside her on the coverlet. “Want a cold wet cloth?”

“I’d die before I’d ask you to go and get one.”

He laughed shortly. But he got up, went into the bathroom and was back a minute later with a damp washcloth. He pressed it over her eyes. “Does it help?”

She held it there and sighed. “Yes. Thank you.”

“I have to have heat,” he replied conversationally. “I can’t bear cold when my head’s throbbing.”

“I remember.”

“Where did you get the chocolate, Ivy?” he asked after a minute.

She grimaced. He really did know too much about her. “There was a cookie this afternoon. I didn’t realize it was chocolate until I’d eaten half of it. Merrie warned me.”

“I can eat ten chocolate bars and they don’t faze me.”

“That’s because chocolate isn’t one of your triggers. But Merrie says you won’t drink red wine.”

“Wine is no substitute for a good Scotch whiskey. I gave it up years ago.”

“Aged cheese probably has the same effect.”

He grimaced. “It does. I love Stilton and I can’t eat it.”

She smiled. “A weakness! I thought you were beyond them.”

“You’d be surprised,” he replied, and he was looking at her with an expression he was glad she couldn’t see.

The door opened suddenly and Merrie stopped, frozen, in the doorway. “Are you having a pajama party?” she asked the occupants of the room.

“Yes, but you’re not invited. It’s exclusive to migraine sufferers, and you don’t have migraines,” he added with a faint smile.

She closed the door and came in, to stand by the bed. “I was afraid of this,” she told Ivy. “I should have noticed there was chocolate on the tray.”

“She’s the one who should have noticed,” Stuart said harshly.

“Well, talk about intolerance,” Ivy muttered from under the washcloth. “I’ll bet nobody fusses at you for what you ate when you’ve got one of these. I’ll bet you’d throw them out the window if they did.”

“You’re welcome to try throwing me out the window,” he offered.

“Don’t be silly. I’d never be able to lift you.”

“Do you need some aspirin, Ivy?” Merrie asked, sending a glare at her brother.

“I’ve already given her something.”

Merrie was outraged. “We’re taught that you never give anything to another person without consulting their physician...!”

“I’m glad you know procedure, but so do I,” Stuart replied. “I phoned Lou before I gave it to her.” He glanced toward the clock on the bedside table. “It should be taking effect very soon.”

It was. Ivy could hardly keep her eyes open. “I’m very sleepy,” she murmured, amazed at the sudden easing of the pain that had been so horrific at first.

“Good. When you wake up, your head will feel normal again,” Stuart told her.

“Thanks, Stuart,” she said, the words slurring as the powerful medication did its job.

“You’re welcome,” he replied. “I know a thing or two about migraines.”

“And she taught you a thing or two about seeing the doctor for medicine that actually helped them,” Merrie couldn’t resist saying.

He didn’t reply. His eyes were on Ivy’s face as she went to sleep. He lifted the washcloth and took it away. Her eyes were closed. Her breathing regulated. He was glad that the cover was up to her chin, so that he didn’t have to see that perfect body again and lie awake all night remembering it.

He got up from the bed, gently so as not to awaken her, the washcloth still clutched in his hand.

“That was nice of you, to get her something to take,” Merrie said as they left Ivy’s room.

He shrugged. “I know how it feels.”

“How did you come out in Oklahoma?” she asked.

“Everything’s ready for the auction,” he replied. “I still can’t believe they let me down like that at the Jacobsville sales barn.”

“They don’t have a history of messing up the different lots of cattle they sell,” she said in their defense.

“One mistake that big can be expensive,” he reminded her. “In this economic climate, even we have to be careful. Losing the Japanese franchise hurt us.”

“It hurt the Harts and the Dunns worse,” she replied. “They’d invested a lot in organic beef to send over there. They were sitting in clover when the ban hit.”

“But they recovered quickly, and so did we, by opening up domestic markets for our organic beef. This organic route is very profitable, and it’s going to be even more profitable when people realize how much it contributes to good health.”

“Our signature brand sells out quickly enough in local markets,” she agreed.

“And even better in big city markets,” he replied. “How’s school?”

She grinned. “I’m passing everything. In two years, I’ll be working in a ward.”

“You could come home and go to morning coffees and do volunteer work,” he reminded her with a smile.

She shook her head, returning the smile. “I’m not cut out for an easy, cushy life. Neither are you. We come from hardworking stock.”

“We do.” He bent and brushed his mouth over her cheek. “Sleep tight.”

“Are you home for the weekend?”

He glanced at her. “Are you wearing body armor?”

“You and Ivy could get along for two days,” she pointed out.

“Only if you blindfold me and gag her.”

She blinked. “Excuse me?”

“It’s an in-joke,” he said. “I have to fly to Denver tomorrow to give a speech at the agriculture seminar on the subject of genetically engineered grain,” he added.

She grimaced. “Don’t come home with a bloody nose this time, will you?”

He shrugged. “I’m only playing devil’s advocate,” he told her. “We can’t make it too easy on people who want to combine animal cells and vegetable cells and call it progress.” His pale eyes began to glitter. “One day, down the road, we’ll pay for this noble meddling.”

She reached up and touched his face. “Okay, go slug it out with the progressives, if you must. I’ll treat Ivy to the new Imax movie about Mars.”

“Mars?”

“She loves Mars,” Merrie told him.

“I’d love to send her there,” he replied thoughtfully. “We could strap her to a rocket...”

“Stop that. She’s my best friend.”

He shook his head. “The things I do for you,” he protested. “Okay, I’ll settle for sending her to the moon.”

“She’s only just lost her father, her house and she’ll soon lose her inheritance as well,” she said solemnly. “I could strangle Rachel for what she’s done.”

He could have strangled Rachel himself, for the lies she’d fed him about Ivy. He should have known better. She’d never been forward with men, to his knowledge. He was certain now that she wasn’t. But he wondered why Rachel would make a point of downgrading her to him. Perhaps it was as Ivy said—her sister wanted him to stay out of the probate of her father’s will. Poor Ivy. She’d never get a penny if Rachel had her way.

“You look very somber,” Merrie observed.

“Ivy should have had the house, at least,” he said, betraying the line of his thoughts.

“She couldn’t have lived there, even if she’d inherited it,” she told him. “There’s no money for utilities or upkeep. She can barely keep herself in school and pay her rent.”

His eyes narrowed. “We could pay it for her.”

“I tried,” Merrie replied. “Ivy’s proud. She won’t accept what she thinks of as charity.”

“So she works nights and weekends to supplement that pitiful amount of money her aunt left her,” he grumbled. “At least one of those mechanics she keeps books for is married and loves to run around with young women.”

“He did ask Ivy out,” Merrie replied.

He looked even angrier. “And?”

“She accidentally dropped a hammer on his foot,” Merrie chuckled. “He limped for a week, but he never asked Ivy out again. The other men had a lot of fun at his expense.”

He felt a reluctant admiration for their houseguest. If she’d been older, his interest might have taken a different form. But he had to remember her age.

“Rachel called her today harping about the probate,” she said slowly. “I expect that’s why she had the migraine. Rachel worries her to death.”

“She needs to learn to stand up to her sister.”

“Ivy isn’t like that. She loves Rachel, in spite of the way she’s been treated by her. She doesn’t have any other relatives left. It must be lonely for her.”

“She’ll toughen up. She’ll have to.” He stretched. “I’m going to bed. I probably won’t see you before I leave. I’ll be back sometime Monday. You can reach me on my cell phone if anything important comes up.”

“Chayce handles the ranch very well. I expect we’ll cope,” she said, smiling. “Have fun.”

“In between fistfights, I might,” he teased. “See you.”

“See you.”

He went back to his room and closed the door. He had to put Ivy out of his mind and never let history repeat itself. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to have himself photographed with some pretty socialite. He didn’t like publicity, but he couldn’t take the chance that Ivy might warm up to him.

He recalled reluctantly the dossier a private detective had assembled on Ivy’s father. The man had been a closet alcoholic and abusive to his late wife as well as Ivy, although he’d never touched Rachel. He’d wanted to know why Ivy had backed away from him once when he’d been yelling at one of the cowboys. He was never going to tell her what he’d learned. But he was careful not to yell when she was nearby. Still, he told himself, he had to discourage her from seeing him as her future. It would be a kindness to kill this attraction before it had a chance to bloom. She was years too young for him.

The rest of the weekend passed without incident. The two women worked on Merrie’s anatomy exam. They watched movies and shared their dreams of the future. On Monday morning, Merrie dropped Ivy off at the local college on her way to San Antonio.

“I’ll phone you the next time I have a free weekend,” Merrie promised as they parted. “Don’t let Rachel make you crazy, okay?”

“I’ll try,” Ivy said, smiling. “It was a lovely weekend. Thanks.”

“I had fun, too. We’ll do it again. See you!”

“See you!”

* * *

Ivy spent the week daydreaming about what had happened in the guest room at Merrie’s house. The more she relived the torrid interlude with Stuart, the more she realized how big a part of her life he was. Over the years she’d been friends with Merrie, Stuart had always been close, but in the background. Because of the age difference, he didn’t really hang out in the places that Merrie and Ivy frequented. He was already a mature man while they were getting through high school.

But now, with those hard, insistent kisses, everything between them had changed. Ivy had dreams about him now; embarrassing, feverishly hot dreams of a future that refused to go away. Surely he had to feel something for her, even if it was only desire. He’d wanted her. And she’d wanted him just as much. It was a milestone in her young life.

But toward the end of the week, as she waited in line at the grocery store to pay for her meager purchases, she happened to look at one of the more lurid tabloids. And there was Stuart, with a beautiful, poised young woman plastered against his side, looking up at him adoringly. The caption read, Millionaire Texas Cattleman Donates Land to Historical Trust. Apparently the woman in the photo was the daughter of a prominent businessman who was head of the trust in question. She was a graduate of an equally prominent college back east. The article went on to say that there was talk of a merger between the millionaire and the socialite, but both said the rumors were premature.

Ivy’s heart shattered like ice. Apparently Stuart hadn’t been as overwhelmed by her as she had been by him, and he was making it known publicly. She had no illusions that the story was an accident. Stuart knew people in every walk of life, and he numbered publishers among his circle of friends. He wanted Ivy to know that he hadn’t taken her seriously. He’d chosen a public and humiliating way to do it, to make sure she got the point. And she did.

Merrie called her to ask if she’d seen the story.

“Oh, yes,” Ivy replied, her tone subdued.

“I don’t understand why he’d let himself be used like that,” Merrie muttered irritably. It was obvious that she knew nothing of what had happened between her brother and her best friend, or she’d have said so. She never pulled her punches.

“Even the most reclusive person can fall victim to a determined reporter,” Ivy said in his defense. “Maybe the photographer caught him at a weak moment.”

“Maybe he’s giving a public cold shoulder to some woman who’s pursuing him, too,” Merrie said innocently. “It would be like him. But there hasn’t been anybody in his life lately. Nobody regular, I mean. I’m sure he takes women out. He just doesn’t get serious about any of them.”

“How did you do on your exam?” Ivy asked, deliberately changing the subject.

“Actually, I passed with flying colors, thanks to you.”

“You’re welcome,” came the pert reply. “You can do the same for me when I have my finals.”

“That won’t be for a while yet. Coming over next weekend?”

Ivy thought quickly. “Merrie, I promised my roommate that I’d drive up to Dallas with her to see her mother. She doesn’t like to make that drive alone.” It wasn’t the whole truth. Lita had asked her to go, and Ivy had promised to think about it. Now, she was sure that she’d agree.

“Well, it’s nice of you to do it.” There was a pause. “I’m not going to be able to come home much, once I take the job I’ve been offered at the hospital here. I’ll be working twelve-hour shifts four days a week, and a lot of them will be on weekends.”

“I understand,” Ivy said quickly, thankful that she wouldn’t have to come up with so many excuses to escape seeing Stuart again. “When I graduate, I’ll be doing some weekend work myself, I’m sure. But when I can afford a car, I can drive up to see you and we can go to a movie or out to eat or something.”

“Of course we can.” There was a pause. “Ivy, is anything wrong?”

“No,” she said at once. “The lawyer is ready to hand over Dad’s estate to Rachel. I’m to get a small lump sum. Maybe Rachel will leave me alone now.”

“I hope so. Please keep in touch,” Merrie added.

“I will,” Ivy agreed. But she crossed her fingers. It was suddenly imperative that she find a way to avoid Stuart from now on. She couldn’t afford to let her heart settle on him again, especially now that he’d made his own feelings brutally clear. She’d miss Merrie, but the risk was too great. Broken hearts, she assured herself, were best avoided.

4

Two years later...

“Ivy, would you like a cup of coffee while you work?” her latest client asked from the doorway of the office where she was writing checks and balancing bank statements.

She looked up from her work, smiling, her long blond hair neatly pinned on top of her head. Her green eyes twinkled. “I’d love one, if it isn’t too much trouble,” she said.

Marcella smiled back. “I just made a pot. I’ll bring it in.”

“Thanks.”

“It’s no trouble at all, really. You’ve saved me from bankruptcy!”

“Not really. I just discovered that you had more money than you thought you did,” she replied.

The older woman chuckled. “You say it your way, I’ll say it mine. I’ll bring the coffee.”

Ivy contemplated the nice office she was using and the amazing progress she’d made in the past two years since her disastrous weekend at Merrie’s house. She’d been able to give up the part-time job at the garage when Dorie Hart offered her a bookkeeping service, complete with clients. Dorie had enjoyed the work very much, and she’d kept handling the books for her clients long after her marriage to Corrigan Hart. But her growing family kept her too busy to continue with it. Ivy had been a gift from heaven, Dorie told her laughingly. Now she could leave her clients in good hands and retire with a clear conscience.

Dorie had some wonderful accounts. There was a boutique owner, a budding architect, the owner of a custom beef retail shop, an exercise gym and about a dozen other small businesses in Jacobsville. Ivy had met the businesspeople while she was in her last semester of college, when Dorie had approached her with the proposal. Dorie and Lita, who carpooled with Ivy, were friends. Lita had mentioned Ivy’s goals and Dorie had gone to see her at the boardinghouse. It had been an incredible stroke of good luck. Ivy had resigned herself to working in a C.P.A. firm. Now she was a businesswoman in her own right.

And as if her blessings hadn’t multiplied enough, she’d also volunteered to do the occasional article for the Jacobs County Cattlemen’s Association in what little free time she had. She would have done it as a favor to the Harts, since Corrigan was this year’s president, but they wouldn’t hear of it. She got a check for anything she produced. Like her math skills, her English skills were very good.

Merrie was nursing at a big hospital in San Antonio. The two spoke on the phone at least twice a month, but they stayed too busy for socializing. Ivy had never told her friend what had happened that last night she spent under Stuart’s roof. She never asked about Stuart, either. Merrie seemed to sense that something had gone wrong, but she didn’t pry. She didn’t talk about her brother, either.

Autumn turned the leaves on the poplars and maples beautiful shades of gold and scarlet. Ivy felt restless, as if something was about to change in her life. She did her job and tried not to think about Stuart York, but always in the back of her mind was the fear of something unseen and unheard. A premonition.

There was a party to benefit a local animal shelter, which Shelby Jacobs had organized. Ivy wouldn’t have gone, but Sheriff Hayes Carson was on the committee that had planned the party, and he was showing an increasing interest in Ivy.

She didn’t know if she liked it or not. She was fond of Hayes, but her heart didn’t do cartwheels when he was around. Maybe that was a good thing.

When he showed up at her boardinghouse late one Friday afternoon, she sat on the porch swing with him. Her room contained little more than a bed and a vanity, and she was uncomfortable taking a man there. Hayes seemed to know that, because he sat down in the swing with no hesitation at all.

“We’re having the benefit dance next Friday night,” he told her. “Go with me.”

She laughed nervously. “Hayes, I haven’t danced in years. I’m not sure I even remember how.”

His dark eyes twinkled. “I’ll teach you.”

She studied him with pursed lips. He really was a dish. He had thick blond hair that the sun had streaked, and a lean, serious face. His dark eyes were deep-set, heavy browed. His uniform emphasized his muscular physique. He was built like a rodeo rider, tall, with wide shoulders, narrow hips and long, powerful legs. Plenty of single women around Jacobsville had tried to land him. None had succeeded. He was the consummate bachelor. He seemed immune to women. Most of the time, he looked as if he had no sense of humor at all. He rarely smiled. But he could be charming when he wanted to, and he was turning on the charm now.

Ivy hadn’t been asked out in months, and the man who’d asked had a reputation that even Merrie knew about, and Merrie didn’t live at home anymore.

Having turned down the potential risk, Ivy kept to herself. Now Hayes was asking her to a dance. She walked around in jeans. She looked and acted like a tomboy. She frowned.

“Come on,” he coaxed. “All work and no play will run you crazy.”

“You ought to know,” she tossed back. “Didn’t you take your last vacation day four years ago?”

He chuckled deeply. “I guess so. I love my job.”

“We all noticed,” she said. “Between you and Cash Grier, drug dealers have left trails of fire behind them running for the border.”

“We’ve got a good conviction rate,” he had to admit. “What’s holding you back? Nursing a secret passion for someone hereabouts?”

She laughed. It was half true, but she wasn’t admitting it. “Not really,” she said. “But I’m not used to socializing. I didn’t even do it in college.”

He frowned. “I know why you don’t date, Ivy,” he said unexpectedly. “You can’t live in the past. And not every man is like your father.”

Her face closed up. Her hands clenched in her lap. She stared out at the horizon, trying not to let the memories eat at her consciousness. “My mother used to say that she thought he was a perfect gentleman before they married. They went together for a year before she married him. And then she discovered how brutal a man he really was. She was pregnant, and she had no place to go.”

He caught one of her small hands in his big one. “He was an outsider,” he reminded her. “He moved here from Nevada. Nobody knew much about him. But you know people in Jacobsville.” He pursed his lips. “I daresay you know all about me.”

That droll tone surprised her into laughing. “Well, yes, I do. Everybody does. The only brutal thing about you is your temper, and you don’t hit people unless they hit you first.”

“That’s right. So you’d be perfectly safe with me for one evening.”

She sighed. “You’re hard to refuse.”

“You’ll have fun. So will I. Come on,” he coaxed. “We’ll help add some kennel space to the animal shelter and give people something to gossip about.”

“It would be fun,” she came back. “You don’t date anybody locally.”

He shrugged. “I like my own company too much. Besides,” he said ruefully, “there’s Andy. He stunts my social life.”

She shivered. “I’m not going home with you,” she pointed out.

“I know. I haven’t found a single woman who will.” He sighed resignedly. “He’s really very tame. He’s a vegetarian. He won’t even eat a mouse.”

“It won’t work. Your scaly roommate is going to keep you single, just like Cag Hart’s did.”

“I’ve had him for six years,” he said. “He’s my only pet.”

“Good thing. He’d eat any other pet you brought home.”

He scowled. “He’s a vegetarian.”

“Are you sure? Have any dogs or cats disappeared on your place since you got him?” she teased.

He made a face at her. “It’s silly to be afraid of a vegetarian. It’s like being afraid of a cow!”

Her eyebrows arched. “Andy doesn’t look like any cow I ever saw,” she retorted. “His picture was on the front page of the paper when you took him to that third grade class to teach them about herpetology. I believe there was some talk about barring you from classrooms...?”

He glowered. “He wasn’t trying to attack that girl. She was the tallest kid in the room, and he tried to climb her, that’s all.”

She had to fight laughter. “I’ll bet you won’t take him out of the cage at a grammar school ever again,” she said.

“You can bet on that,” he agreed. He frowned thoughtfully. “I expect he’ll have a terror of little girls for the rest of his life, poor old thing.”

She shook her head. “Well, I’m not going into the room with him unless he’s confined.”

“He hates cages. He’s too big for most of them, anyway. Besides, he sits on top of the fridge and eats bugs.”

“You need to get out more,” she pointed out.

“I’m trying to, if you’ll just agree,” he shot back.

She sighed. “All right, I’ll go. But people will gossip about us for weeks.”

“I don’t care. I’m immune to gossip. So are you,” he added when she started to protest.

“I guess I am. Okay. I’ll go. Is it jeans and boots?”

“No,” he replied. “It’s nice dresses and high heels.”

“I hate dressing up,” she muttered.

“So do I. But I can stand it if you can. And it’s for a good cause,” he added.

“Yes, it is.”

“So, I’ll pick you up here at six next Friday night.”

She smiled. “I’ll buy a dress.”

“That’s the spirit!”

* * *

Word got around town that she was going to the dance with Hayes. Nobody ever knew exactly how gossip traveled so fast, but it was as predictable as traffic flow in rush hour.

Even Merrie heard about it, although Ivy had no idea how. She phoned her best friend two days before the dance.

“Hayes actually asked you out?” Merrie exclaimed. “But he doesn’t date anybody! At least, he hasn’t dated anybody since that Jones girl who dumped him for the visiting Aussie millionaire.”

“That was two years ago,” Ivy agreed, “and I still don’t think he’s really over her. We’re only going to a dance, Merrie. He hasn’t asked me to marry him.”

“You never know, though, do you?” the other girl wondered aloud. “He might be feeling lonely. He loves kids.”

“Slow down!” Ivy exclaimed. “I don’t want to get married any more than Hayes does!”

“Why not?”

“I like living by myself,” she said evasively. “Anyway, I expect Hayes doesn’t know that many single women.”

“There are plenty of divorced ones around,” came the droll reply.

“The dance will benefit our animal shelter,” Ivy told her. “It will add new kennels. We’ve got so many strays. It’s just pitiful.”

“I like animals, too, but Hayes isn’t asking you to any dance because of stray dogs, you mark my word. Maybe he’s going to flash you to deter some woman who’s chasing him. That’s the sort of thing my brother does.”

“Your brother is better at it than Hayes is,” Ivy said, not wanting to think of Stuart. She hadn’t seen him in a long time.

“Well, of course he is. He gets plenty of practice.” There was a sigh. “Except he doesn’t seem to be dating anybody lately. I asked him why and he said it wasn’t fun anymore. If I didn’t know him better, I’d think he’d found someone he wanted to get serious about.”

“That’s unlikely,” Ivy said, but she wondered if Merrie was right. It made her sad.

“Unlikely, but not impossible. I think I might come to the dance, too,” she said out of the blue. “I can get someone to work my shift. Everybody owes me favors.”

“Who will you come with?”

“I’ll come by myself,” Merrie returned. “I don’t need a date. Tell Hayes to save me a dance, though.”

Ivy laughed. “He can take both of us. That will really shake people up locally. They’ll think he’s putting around a new sort of double-dating.”

Merrie laughed, too. “I had a flaming crush on Hayes when we were in high school, but he couldn’t see me for dust. That was about the time he fell in with the she-tiger who ditched him for the Aussie. Served him right. Anybody could see that she was only a gold digger.”

“Hayes owns his own ranch,” she began.

“And he inherited a trust from his grandfather,” Merrie agreed. “But Hayes isn’t the sort to live on an income he didn’t earn. He’s like Stuart. They’re both independent.”

“Same as you,” Ivy accused.

She laughed. “I guess so.”

“How do you like being a nurse?”

“I love it,” Merrie said honestly. “I’ve never enjoyed anything so much. I love knowing that I helped keep someone alive. It’s the best job in the whole world.”

“Merrie, you work all day with sick people,” Ivy pointed out.

“Sick people? Me? Are you sure?”

“You work in a hospital,” Ivy returned.

“No kidding? No wonder there are sick people everywhere!”

Ivy laughed. “Okay, you made your point. You’re in the right place. I’m glad you like your job. You might not believe it, but I like mine just as much. I’m working with some really interesting people.”

“So I’ve heard,” Merrie replied. “I’m glad you’re happy. But speaking of pleasant things, have you heard from Rachel?”

Ivy’s happy face fell. She drew in a long breath. “As a matter of fact, I haven’t. Not in over two months. The last I heard, she was trying to get away from Jerry the drug dealer so that she could shack up with a richer man. She wouldn’t tell me his name. She did mention that he was married.”

“Married. Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

“I could barely make sense of what she said,” Ivy replied. “She slurred her words so badly that she was incoherent. I can’t imagine what a rich man would see in a woman who stays stoned all the time. How she can still act in that condition is beyond me.”

“As long as she’s leaving you alone, that has to be a bonus.”

“I suppose. I just worry about her. She’s the only living relative I have,” she added. “Maybe the rich guy will wean her off drugs and get her away from Jerry for good. Unless his wife finds out.” She groaned. “That’s just what it would take to send Rachel over the edge. I’m sure she’s convinced herself that he’ll divorce his wife to stay with her. I don’t think he will.”

“Most of them don’t,” Merrie agreed. “Did she argue with the drug dealer?”

“I have no idea. But from what I understood, she thinks she’s landed in a field of clover. The rich guy buys her diamonds.”

“I won’t ask what he gets in return.”

Ivy grimaced. “Neither would I.”

“Well, I’ll see you at the dance. Where is it, and when?”

Ivy gave her the particulars, but she was morose when she hung up. What if Rachel was involved with someone well-known and the wife found out and went after her in the press? Rachel was brassy and demanding and totally lacking in compassion. But she was weak in every other way. A scandal would drive her over the edge. There was no telling what she might do.

There had been something unusual in their last conversation as well. Rachel had asked her to pass a message along to the owner of the only bakery in town, the Bun Shop. It hadn’t made sense to Ivy; something about a shipment of flour that hadn’t arrived on schedule. She wanted to know why Rachel was concerned with a bake shop. Rachel said it was a friend who needed the message passed along.

That conversation had been more volatile than she felt comfortable divulging to Merrie. Rachel had mentioned the ultimatum she’d given her rich lover, that either he divorce his wife or she’d go public with the truth of their relationship. Ivy had pleaded with her to do no such thing, that if the man was that rich, his wife could hire someone to hurt her. Rachel had only laughed, saying that the wife was a cold fish who was half out of her mind, and that she posed no threat at all. But in case that fell through, she said, she’d discovered another good way to get a lot of money. She taunted Ivy with her newfound sources of wealth, intimating that Ivy couldn’t get a man even if she had millions. Ivy didn’t care. She was tired of Rachel’s sarcasm.

They’d parted on not good terms. Rachel had accused her of being jealous. She’d never gotten the attention Rachel had, not even from their father. Ivy was just a loser, Rachel said, and she’d never be more than a clerk. Ivy had agreed that Rachel had gotten more attention at home, by lying about Ivy to their father and letting her take the punishment their father had deemed appropriate for her supposed sins.

Rachel had sounded shocked at the description of their father’s idea of punishment. Ivy was lying, she’d accused. The old man hadn’t had a violent bone in his body. He loved Rachel, Ivy reminded her sister bitterly. Ivy was just the servant, and the more Rachel denounced her, the more critical and angry he became.

For a few seconds, Rachel actually sounded regretful. But it passed, as those rare bouts of sympathy always did. Rachel hung up abruptly, mumbling that her lover was at the door.

Ivy put down the phone and realized that she was shaking. Reliving those last days Rachel was at home made her miserable. Her memories were terrible.

* * *

She did go shopping for a dress, but the boutique owner she kept books for insisted on letting her borrow one of her own designs for the affair.

“It’s my display model,” Marcella Black insisted, “and just your size. Besides, it’s the exact shade of green that your eyes are. You come by here at five, and I’ll help you into it and I’ll do your hair and makeup as well. No arguments. You’re going to be a fairy princess Friday night.”

“I’ll turn into the frog at midnight,” Ivy teased.

“Fat chance.”

“All right. I’ll come by at five on Friday. And thanks, Marcella. Really.”

The older woman wrinkled her nose affectionately. “You just tell everybody who made that dress for you, and we’re even.”

“You bet I will!”

* * *

Hayes wasn’t wearing his uniform. He had on a dark suit with a white cotton shirt and a blue patterned tie. His shoes were so shiny that they reflected the porch light at Mrs. Brown’s rooming house.

Ivy had just returned in the little used VW she’d bought and learned to drive two years earlier from Marcella’s boutique, where she’d been dressed and her long blond hair had been put up in a curly coiffure. She had on just enough makeup to make her look sensational. She was shocked at the results. She’d never really tried to look good. Her mirror told her that she did.

Hayes gave her a long, appreciative stare. “You look lovely,” he said quietly. He produced a plastic container with a cymbidium orchid inside. He offered it with a little shrug. “She said that women wear them on their wrists these days.”

“Yes,” she said, “so they don’t get crushed when we dance. You didn’t have to do this, Hayes,” she said, taking the orchid out of the box. “But thank you. It’s just beautiful.”

“I thought you might like it. Ready to go?”

She nodded, pulling the door closed behind her. She had a small evening bag that Marcella had loaned her to go with the dress. She really did feel like Cinderella.

* * *

The community center was full to the brim with local citizens supporting the animal shelter. Two of the veterinarians who volunteered at the animal clinic were there with their spouses, and most of the leading lights of Jacobsville turned up as well. Justin and Shelby Ballenger came with their three sons. The eldest was working at the feedlot with Justin during the summer and working on his graduate degree in animal husbandry the rest of the year. The other two boys were still in high school, but ready to graduate. The three of them looked like their father, although the youngest had Shelby’s blue-gray eyes. The Tremayne brothers and the Hart boys came with their wives. Micah Steele and his Callie came, and so did the Doctors Coltrain, Lou and her husband “Copper.” J. D. Langley and Fay, and Matt Caldwell and his wife Leslie, and Cash Grier with his Tippy were also milling around in the crowd. Ivy spotted Judd Dunn and his wife, Christabel, in a corner, looking as much in love as when they’d first married.

“Amazing, isn’t it, that the hall could hold all these people?” Hayes remarked as he led Ivy up the steps into the huge log structure.

“It really is. I’ll bet they’ll be able to add a whole new kennel with what they make tonight.”

He smiled down at her. “I wouldn’t doubt it.”

They bumped into another couple, one of whom was Willie Carr, who owned the bakery. Then she remembered Rachel’s odd message that she was supposed to give him.

“Willie, Rachel asked me to tell you something,” she said, frowning as she struggled to remember exactly what it was.

Willie, tall and dark, looked uncomfortable. He laughed. “Now why would Rachel be sending me messages?” he asked, glancing at his wife. “I’m not cheating on you, baby, honest!”

“Oh, no, it wasn’t that sort of message,” Ivy said quickly. “It was something about a shipment of flour you were expecting that didn’t arrive.”

Willie cleared his throat. “I don’t know anything about any shipment of flour that would go to New York City, Ivy,” he assured her. “Rachel must have been talking about somebody else.”

“Yes, I guess she must have. Sorry,” she said with a sheepish smile. “She’s incoherent most of the time lately.”

“I’d say she is, if she’s sending me messages about flour!” Willie agreed. He nodded at her and then at Hayes, and drew his wife back out onto the dance floor.

Hayes caught her hand and pulled her aside. “What shipment of flour was Rachel talking about?” he asked suddenly, and he wasn’t smiling.

“I really don’t know. She just said to tell Willie one was missing. She doesn’t even eat sweets...”

“How long ago did she tell you to give Willie that message?” he persisted.

“About two days ago,” she said. She frowned. “Why?”

Hayes took her by the hand and drew her along the dance floor to where Cash Grier was standing at the punch bowl with his gorgeous redheaded wife, Tippy.

“How’s it going?” Cash greeted them, shaking hands with Hayes.

Hayes stepped closer. “Rachel sent Willie over there—” he jerked his head toward Willie, who was oblivious to the attention he was getting “—a message.”

Cash was all business at once. “What message?”

Hayes prompted Ivy to repeat it.

“Code?” Cash asked Hayes.

The other man nodded. “It was two days ago that Ivy got the message.”

Cash’s dark eyes twinkled. “What a coincidence.”

“Yes.”

“Which proves that connection we were discussing earlier.” He turned to Ivy. “If your sister sends any more messages to Willie, or anyone else, by you, tell Hayes, would you?”

She was all at sea. “Rachel’s mixed up in something, isn’t she?”

“Not necessarily,” Hayes said at once. “But she knows someone who is, we think. Don’t advertise this, either.”

Ivy shook her head. “I’m no gossip.” She grimaced. “Rachel’s getting mixed up with some rich man, and she’s trying to get away from her boyfriend, who deals drugs. The rich man is married. I’m afraid it’s all going to end badly.”

“People who get involved with drugs usually do end badly,” Hayes said somberly.

“Yes, they do,” Ivy had to agree. She smiled at Tippy, who was wearing a green and white dress made of silk and chiffon. “You look lovely.”

“Thanks,” Tippy replied, smiling. “So do you, Ivy. Marcella made my dress, you know. She made yours, too, didn’t she?”

Ivy nodded, grinning. “She’s amazing.”

“I think so, too,” Tippy agreed. “I’ve sent photos of her work to some friends of mine in New York. Don’t tell her. It’s a surprise.”

“If anything comes of it, she’ll be so thrilled. That was sweet of you.”

Tippy waved away the compliment. “She’s so talented, she deserves a break.”

“Well, I came here to dance,” Hayes informed them, taking Ivy’s hand.

Cash pursed his lips. “Really?”

“I know I’m not in your league, Grier,” Hayes said dourly, “but I can do the Macarena, if we can get somebody to play it.”

“You can?” Cash chuckled. “By a strange coincidence, so can I. And I taught her.” He indicated Tippy.

“In that case,” Hayes replied, grinning, “may the best sheriff win.”

And he went off to talk to the bandleader.

The band stopped suddenly, talked among the members and they all started grinning when Hayes came back to wrap his arm around Ivy.

“One, two, three, four,” the bandleader counted off, and the band broke into the Macarena.

Ivy knew the steps, having watched a number of important people dance it on television some years before. She wasn’t the only one who remembered. The dance floor filled up with laughing people.

Hayes performed the quick hand motions with expertise, laughing as hard as Ivy was. They got through the second chorus and Ivy almost collapsed into Hayes’s strong arms, resting her cheek against his chest.

“I’m out of shape!” she exclaimed breathlessly. “I need to get out more!”

“Just what I was thinking,” he replied, smiling down at her.

Ivy happened to glance toward the doorway at that moment. Her gaze met a pair of pale blue eyes that were glittering like a diamondback rattlesnake coiling. Ivy’s heart ran away as Stuart York gave her a look that could have fried bread.

5

Ivy had never seen that particular expression in Stuart’s pale eyes, and she was amazed that he seemed so furious. Beside him, Merrie was also watching her with Hayes, and even though she smiled, she seemed a little shocked.

The two Yorks moved through the crowd, pausing now and again to exchange greetings as they came to stand beside Ivy and Hayes, who had broken apart by then. Ivy stared helplessly at Stuart. It had been a long time since she’d seen him. She knew that he’d been avoiding her ever since the unexpected and explosive interlude that last night she’d spent at Merrie’s house, over two years ago.

If she was self-conscious, he wasn’t. His pale eyes were narrow, glittering, dangerous as they met hers.

“I thought you didn’t dance, Hayes,” Merrie said. She was smiling, but she seemed ill at ease.

“I don’t, as a rule,” he agreed, smiling back. “But I can manage it once in a while.”

“We’re all here to support the local animal shelter,” Ivy told Merrie. “From the looks of this crowd, they’re going to end up with plenty of donations.”

“I send them a check every year,” Stuart said curtly.

“Did you two come together?” Hayes asked curiously.

“We were both at a loose end tonight,” Merrie replied. “I got someone to cover for me at the hospital. I really came because I knew Ivy would be here. I haven’t seen her in so long!”

Ivy was bemused. She wondered why Merrie seemed so unlike herself.

“I never believed you’d make a nurse,” Hayes told Merrie with a grin. “I still remember you fainting when we had to sew up a wound on that old horse you used to trot around on.”

“I wish I could forget.” Merrie groaned. “It wouldn’t have been so bad, except for where I landed.”

“It was the only fresh manure on the place,” Stuart inserted with a chuckle. “I swear she took three baths that day before she got rid of the smell.”

The band started up again, this time playing a dreamy slow tune. Hayes looked down at Merrie. “Want to dance?”

She hesitated.

“Go on,” Ivy coaxed, smiling.

Merrie relaxed a little and let Hayes take her hand. He led her onto the dance floor and into a lazy box step. Was it Ivy’s imagination, or did Merrie look as if she’d landed in paradise, wrapped up in Hayes Carson’s strong arms?

“Do you dance, Mr. York?” Tippy asked.

He shook his head, sliding his big hands into his pockets. “Afraid not.”

She smiled. “Neither do I. At least, not very well. I’m learning, though.”

Cash drew her to his side. “Yes, you are, baby,” he said affectionately. “Come on. We can always do with a little practice. See you both later,” he added.

Which left Ivy alone with Stuart for the first time in over two years. She was ill at ease and it showed.

He turned and looked down at her deliberately, his pale eyes narrow and searching. “I like the dress,” he said, his voice deep and slow.

“Thanks,” she said, a little self-conscious because of the way he was looking at her. “I keep books for a boutique owner. It’s a model she’s hoping to sell.”

“So what are you, walking advertising?” he asked.

She smiled. “I suppose so.”

He glanced at his sister dancing with Hayes. “She used to have a horrific crush on him,” he said out of the blue. “I was glad when she outgrew it. Hayes takes chances. He’s been in two serious gun battles since he became sheriff. He barely walked away from the last one. She’d never make a lawman’s wife.”

“She made a nurse,” she pointed out.

“Yes, well, patients go home when they’ve healed. But a lawman’s wife waits up all hours, hoping he’ll come home at all.” He looked down at her. “There’s a difference.”

She felt guilty when she remembered the way Merrie had looked when Hayes asked her to dance, as if she’d trespassed on someone else’s property. Considering Stuart’s attitude, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that Merrie might be hiding her interest in Hayes. Stuart liked him, but he’d always said that Hayes was too old for his sister, not to mention being in one of the more dangerous professions. Merrie idolized her brother. She wouldn’t deliberately cross him.

“Why are you here with Hayes?” he asked abruptly.

She blinked at the boldness of the question. She should have told him it was none of his business. But she couldn’t. He had that air of authority that had always opened doors for him.

“He didn’t want to come alone and neither did I,” she said.

“He’s well off, and he’s a bachelor,” he replied.

“Are you making a point?” she asked.

His eyes narrowed on her face. “You’ll be twenty-one soon.”

She was surprised that he kept up with her age. “Yes, I suppose so.”

He didn’t blink. “Merrie said you wanted to study opera.”

“Then she must have also said that I don’t want to leave Jacobsville,” she replied. “It would be a waste of time to train for a career I don’t want.”

“Do you want to keep books for other people for the rest of your life?”

“I like keeping books. You might remember that I also do the occasional article for the local cattlemen’s association.”

He didn’t reply to that. His eyes went back to his sister, moving lazily around the dance floor with Hayes. After a minute, his big hand reached down and caught Ivy’s. He tugged her gently onto the dance floor and slid his hand around her waist.

“You said you didn’t dance,” she murmured breathlessly.

He shrugged. “I lied.” He curled her into his body and moved gracefully to the music, coaxing her cheek onto his chest. His arm tightened around her, bringing her even closer.

She could barely breathe. The proximity was intoxicating. It brought back that one sweet interlude between them, so long ago. It was probably a dream and she’d wake up clutching a pillow in her own bed. So why not enjoy it, she thought? She closed her eyes, gave him her weight, and sighed. For an instant, she could almost have sworn that a shudder passed through his tall body.

She felt his lips against her forehead. It was the closest to heaven she’d ever come.

But all too soon it was over. The music ended and Stuart stepped away from her.

She felt cold and empty. She wrapped her arms around herself and forced a smile that she didn’t really feel.

Stuart was watching her intently. “That shade of green suits you,” he said quietly. “It matches your eyes.”

She didn’t know how to handle a compliment like that from him. She laughed nervously. “Does it?”

He smiled slowly. It wasn’t like any smile she’d ever had from him. It made his pale eyes glitter like sun-touched diamonds, made him look younger and less careworn. She smiled back.

Merrie joined them, an odd little smile touching her lips. “Having fun?” she asked Ivy.

“It’s a very nice dance,” Ivy replied, dragging her eyes away from Stuart.

“It is,” Merrie agreed.

Hayes had been stopped on the way off the dance floor by a somber Harley Fowler, who motioned Cash Grier to join them. Hayes made a face before he rejoined them, disappointment in his whole look.

“We’ve had word of a drug shipment coming through,” he said under his breath. “Harley was watching for it. He says they’ve got a semi full to the brim with cocaine. I have to go. We’ve been setting this sting up for months, and this is the first real break we’ve had.” He stared at Ivy. “I can get one of my deputies to swing by and take you home,” he began.

“She can ride with us,” Stuart said easily. “No problem.”

“Thanks,” Hayes said. He grinned at Ivy. “Our first date and I blew it. I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”

“I’m not upset, Hayes,” she replied. “You go do your job. There will be other dances.”

“You’re a good sport. Thanks. See you, Merrie,” he added with a wink, nodding to Stuart as he headed for the front door.

Merrie was biting her lower lip, her eyes on Hayes’s back as he left. Ivy noticed and didn’t say a word.

“How about some of this punch?” Ivy asked her best friend. “It looks very good.”

Merrie was diverted. “Yes. I’ll bet it tastes good, too. But I want a word with Shelby Ballenger before I indulge. I’ll be right back.” She went toward Shelby. Ivy filled two glass cups with punch and handed one to Stuart.

He made a face. “It’s tropical punch, isn’t it? I hate tropical punch.”

“They have coffee, too, if you’d rather,” Ivy told him, putting the punch down on the table.

He met her searching eyes. “I would. Cream. No sugar.”

She poured coffee into a cup, adding just a touch of cream. She handed it to him, but her hands shook. He had to put his around them, to steady them.

“It’s all right,” he said softly. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

She didn’t understand what was happening to her. The feel of his big, warm hands around hers made her heart race. The look in his pale eyes delighted, thrilled, terrified. She’d never had such a headlong physical reaction to any other man, and especially not since that incredible night when he’d held her and kissed her as if he couldn’t bear to let her go. It had haunted her dreams for more than two years, and ruined her for a relationship with any other man.

She let go of the cup with a nervous little laugh. “Is that enough cream?” she asked.

He nodded. He sipped it in silence while she sipped at her punch. The music was playing again, this time a slow, bluesy two-step.

Merrie came back to them, grinning. “I asked Shelby if she’d save me one of those border collies she and Justin are breeding. They’re great cattle dogs.”

Stuart scowled at her. “What the hell do you need with a cattle dog?”

“It’s not for me,” she replied. “There’s a sweet little girl on my ward who has to have a tumor removed from her brain. She’s scared to death. I asked her parents what might help her attitude, and they said she’d always wanted a border collie. It might be just what she needs to come through the surgery. You see,” she added sadly, “they don’t know if it’s malignant yet.”

“How old is she?” Ivy asked.

“Ten.”

Ivy winced. “What a terrible age to have something so deadly.”

“At least she’ll have something to look forward to,” Stuart added. “You really are a jewel, Merrie.”

She made an affectionate face at him. “So are you. Now let’s dance or eat or something so we don’t burst into tears and embarrass Ivy.”

He cocked an eyebrow and gave Ivy a mischievous look. “God forbid that we should embarrass her.” He put down his coffee cup. “Dancing seems more sensible.”

He took Ivy’s glass of punch and put it down, only to draw her back onto the dance floor.

* * *

It was the sweetest evening of Ivy’s life. She danced almost exclusively with Stuart, and he didn’t seem to mind that people were watching them with fond amusement. It was well-known that Stuart played the field, and that Ivy didn’t date anyone. The attention Stuart was showing her raised eyebrows.

Merrie didn’t lack for partners, either, but she seemed subdued since Hayes had left. Ivy wondered if there wasn’t something smoldering under Merrie’s passive expression that led back to that old crush she’d had on Hayes.

When it came time to leave, Merrie informed Stuart that she was going to ride home with one of the Bates twins, who passed right by their house. She didn’t give a reason, but Stuart didn’t ask for one, either. He linked his fingers into Ivy’s and drew her outside to his big, sleek Jaguar.

“I can’t remember when I’ve enjoyed a party more,” he remarked.

“It was fun,” she agreed, smiling. “I don’t get out much at night. Usually I’m trying to keep up with the accounts, including doing estimated taxes for all my clients four times a year. It keeps me close to home.”

“You and Merrie have lost touch since she went to work in San Antonio.”

“A little, maybe,” she replied. “But Merrie is still the best friend I have. That doesn’t go away, even when we don’t see each other for months at a time.”

He was quiet for a minute. “Have you heard from Rachel?” he asked.

She drew in a painful breath. “Yes. Last week.”

“How was she?”

She wondered why he was asking her questions about her sister, whom he hated. “Pretty much the same, I guess.” Except that she was steadily higher than a kite when she called Ivy, and she was running around with someone else’s rich husband, she added silently.

He shot a glance at her. “That isn’t what I hear.”

Her heart welled up in her throat. She’d forgotten that he moved in the same circles as other rich, successful men. Rachel’s garden slug of a boyfriend knew such people in New York. Stuart might even know Rachel’s latest lover. “What do you hear?” she asked.

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