Dear Reader,

Welcome to the second of three books starring twin Creeds Conner and Brody, and their cousin, Steven—relatives of the Montana Creeds and the McKettricks. Now Steven has settled down in Stone Creek, Arizona, with a ranch, an adopted five-year-old son and a new bride, Melissa. Back in Lonesome Bend, Colorado, where Steven and the twins were raised as brothers, the lovely Tricia McCall catches Conner’s eye. Will he be able to resist her charms? Or can this rancher tame himself into a happy domestic life with a beautiful bride of his own?

I also wanted to write today to tell you about a special group of people with whom I’ve become involved in the past couple of years. It is The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), specifically their Pets for Life program.

The Pets for Life program is one of the best ways to help your local shelter—that is, to help keep animals out of shelters in the first place. Something as basic as keeping a collar and tag on your pet all the time, so if he gets out and gets lost, he can be returned home. Being a responsible pet owner. Spaying or neutering your pet. And not giving up when things don’t go perfectly. If your dog digs in the yard, or your cat scratches the furniture, know that these are problems that can be addressed. You can find all the information about these—and many other common problems—at www.petsforlife.org. This campaign is focused on keeping pets and their people together for a lifetime.

As many of you know, my own household includes two dogs, two cats and six horses, so this is a cause that is near and dear to my heart. I hope you’ll get involved along with me.

With love,

Praise for the novels of Linda Lael Miller

“[Miller] is one of the finest American writers in the genre.”

—RT Book Reviews

“Completely wonderful. Austin’s interactions with Paige

are fun and lively and the mystery…

adds quite a suspenseful punch.”

—RT Book Reviews on McKettricks of Texas: Austin

“Miller is the queen when it comes to creating sympathetic,

endearing and lifelike characters. She paints each scene so

perfectly readers hover on the edge of delicious voyeurism.”

—RT Book Reviews on McKettricks of Texas: Garrett

“A passionate love too long denied drives the action

in this multifaceted, emotionally rich reunion story

that overflows with breathtaking sexual chemistry.”

—Library Journal on McKettricks of Texas: Tate

“All three titles should appeal to readers who like their

contemporary romances Western, slightly dangerous, and

graced with enlightened (more or less) bad-boy heroes.”

—Library Journal on the Montana Creeds series

“[Miller] paints a brilliant portrait of the good,

the bad and the ugly, the lost and the lonely, and the

power of love to bring light into the darkest of souls.

This is western romance at its finest.”

—RT Book Reviews on The Man from Stone Creek

“Linda Lael Miller creates vibrant characters

and stories I defy you to forget.”

—#1 New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber

Creed’s Honor
Linda Lael Miller

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To some of my favorite Laels:

Mike and Sara and Courtney and Chandler

Creed’s Honor

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

Lonesome Bend, Colorado

TRICIA MCCALL WAS NOT THE TYPE to see apparitions, but there were times—especially when lonely, tired or both—that she caught just the merest flicker of a glimpse of her dog, Rusty, out of the corner of one eye. Each time that happened, she hoped for the impossible; her heartbeat quickened with joy and excitement, and her breath rushed up into the back of her throat. But when she turned, no matter how quickly, the shepherd-Lab-setter mix was never there.

Of course, he wasn’t. Rusty had died in his sleep only six months before, contented and gray-muzzled and full of years, and his absence was still an ache that throbbed in the back of Tricia’s heart whenever she thought of him. Which was often.

After all, Rusty had been her best friend for nearly half her life. She was almost thirty now, and she’d been fifteen when she and her dad had found the reddish-brown pup hiding under a picnic table at the campground, nearly starved, flea-bitten and shivering.

She and Joe McCall had debugged him as best they could, fed him and taken him straight to Dr. Benchley’s office for shots and a checkup. From then on, Rusty was a member of the family.

“Meow,” interrupted a feline voice coming from the general vicinity of Tricia’s right ankle.

Still wearing her ratty blue chenille robe and the pink fluffy slippers her best friend, Diana, had given her for Christmas many moons ago as a joke, Tricia looked down to see Winston, a black tom with a splash of white between his ears. He was a frequent visitor to her apartment, since he lived just downstairs, with his mistress, Tricia’s great-grandmother, Natty. The separate residences were connected by an inside stairway, but Winston still managed to startle her on a regular basis.

“Meow,” the former stray repeated, this time with more emphasis, looking earnestly up at Tricia. Translation: It’s cat abuse. Natty McCall may look like a harmless old woman, but I’m being starved, I tell you. You’ve got to do something.

“A likely story, sardine-breath,” Tricia replied, out loud. “I was there when the groceries were delivered last Friday, remember? You wouldn’t go hungry if we were snowed in till spring.”

Winston twitched his sleek tail in a jaunty, oh-well-I-tried sort of way and crossed the small kitchen to leap up onto Tricia’s desk and curl up on a tidy stack of printer paper next to the keyboard. He watched Tricia with half-closed amber eyes as she poured herself a cup of coffee and meandered over to boot up the PC. Maybe there would be an email from Hunter; that would definitely lift her spirits.

Not that she was down, exactly. No, she felt more like someone living in suspended animation, a sort of limbo between major life events. She was marking time, marching in place. And that bothered her.

At the push of a button, the monitor flared to life and there it was: the screensaver photo of her and Hunter, beaming in front of a ski lodge in Idaho and looking like—well—a couple. Two happy and reasonably attractive people who belonged together, outfitted for a day on the slopes.

With the tip of one finger, Tricia touched Hunter’s square-jawed, classically handsome face. Pixels scattered, like a miniature universe expanding after a tiny, silent big bang. She set her cup on the little bit of desk space Winston wasn’t already occupying and plunked into the chair she’d dragged away from the dinette set.

She sat very still for a moment or so, the cup of coffee she’d craved from the instant she’d opened her eyes that morning cooling nearby, her gaze fixed on the cheerfully snowy scene. Big smiles. Bright eyes.

Maybe she ought to change the picture, she thought. Put the slide show of Rusty back up. Trouble was, the loss was still too fresh for that.

So she left the ski-lodge shot where it was. She and Hunter had had a good thing going, back in Seattle, in what seemed like a previous lifetime now even though it had only been a year and a half since the passion they’d been so sure they could sustain had begun to fizzle.

As soon as she sold the failing businesses she’d inherited when her dad died—the River’s Bend Campground and RV Park and the decrepit Bluebird Drive-in theater at the edge of town—she could go back to her real life in the art world of Seattle. Open a little gallery in the Pike Place Market, maybe, or somewhere in Pioneer Square.

Beside her, Winston unfurled his tail so the end of it brushed the back of Tricia’s hand, rolled it back up again and then repeated the whole process. Gently jolted out of her reverie, she watched as wisps of black fur drifted across her line of vision and then settled, with exquisite accuracy, onto the surface of her coffee.

Tricia shoved back her chair, the legs of it making a loud, screeching sound on the scuffed linoleum floor, and she winced before remembering that Natty was out of town this week, visiting her eighty-nine-year-old sister in Denver, and therefore could not have been disturbed by the noise.

Muttering good-naturedly, she crossed to the old-fashioned sink under the narrow window that looked out over the outside landing, dumped the coffee, rinsed the cup out thoroughly and poured herself a refill.

Winston jumped down from the desktop, making a solid thump when he landed, as he was a somewhat rotund fellow.

Leaning back against the counter, Tricia fortified herself with a couple of sips of the hot, strong coffee she knew—even without Natty’s subtle reminders—she drank too often, and in excessive quantities.

Winston had been right to put in his order for breakfast, she reflected; it was her job to feed him and empty his litter box while her great-grandmother was away.

“Come on,” she said, coffee in hand, heading toward the doorway that led down the dark, narrow stairs to Natty’s part of the house. “I wouldn’t want you keeling over from hunger.”

You’re not even thirty, commented a voice in her head, and you’re talking to cats. You seriously need a life.

With a sigh, Tricia flipped on the single light in the sloping ceiling above the stairs and started down, careful because of Winston’s tendency to wind himself around her ankles and the bulky slippers, which were a tripping hazard even on a flat surface.

Natty’s rooms smelled pleasantly of recent wood fires blazing on the stone hearth, some lushly scented mix of potpourri and the lavender talcum powder so many old ladies seemed to favor.

Crossing the living room, which was stuffed with well-crafted antique furniture, every surface sporting at least one intricately crocheted doily and most of them adorned with a small army of ornately framed photographs as well, Tricia smiled. At ninety-one, Natty was still busy, with friends of all ages, and she was pretty active in the community, too. Until the year before, she’d been in charge of the annual rummage sale and chili feed, a popular event held the last weekend of October. Members of the Ladies’ Auxiliary—the organization they’d been auxiliary to was long defunct—donated the money they raised to the local school system, to be used for extras like art supplies, musical instruments and uniforms for the marching band. And while Natty had stepped down as the group’s chairperson, she attended every meeting.

Natty’s kitchen was as delightfully old-fashioned as the rest of the house—although there was an electric stove, the original wood-burning contraption still dominated one corner of the long, narrow room. And Natty still used it, when the spirit moved her to bake.

Without the usual fire crackling away, the kitchen seemed a little on the chilly side, and Tricia shivered once as she headed toward the pantry, setting her coffee mug aside on the counter. She took a can of Winston’s regular food—he was only allowed sardines on Sundays, as a special treat—from one of the shelves in the pantry, popped the top and dumped the contents into one of several chipped but still beautiful soup bowls reserved for his use.

Frosty-cold air seemed to emanate from the floor as she bent to put the bowl in front of him. Tricia felt it even through the soles of those ridiculous slippers.

While Winston chowed down, she ran some fresh drinking water and placed the bowl within easy reach. Then, hugging herself against the cold, she glanced at the bay windows surrounding Natty’s heirloom oak table, half expecting to see snowflakes drifting past the glass.

A storm certainly wouldn’t be unusual in that part of Colorado, even though it was only mid-October, but Tricia was holding out for good weather just the same. The summer and early fall had been unusually slow over at the campground and RV park, but folks came from all over that part of the state to attend the rummage sale/chili feed, and a lot of them brought tents and travel trailers, and set up for one last stay along the banks of the river. The modest fees Tricia charged for camping spots and the use of electrical hookups, as well as her cut of the profits from the vending machines, would carry her through a couple of months.

Some benevolent soul could still happen along and buy the properties Joe had left her, but so far all the For Sale signs hadn’t produced so much as a nibble.

Tricia sighed, watched Winston eat for a few moments, then started for the stairs. Yes, it was early, but she had a full workday ahead over at River’s Bend. She’d already let the seasonal crew go, which meant she manned the registration desk by herself, answering the phone on the rare occasions when it rang and slipping away for short intervals to clean the public showers and the restrooms. After the big weekend at the end of the month, she would shut everything down for the winter.

A lump of sadness formed in Tricia’s throat as she climbed the stairs, leaving the door at the bottom open for Winston as she would the one at the top. As a child, she’d loved coming to River’s Bend for the summers, “helping” her dad run the outdoor theater and the campground, the two of them boarding with Natty and a series of pampered cats named for historical and/or political figures the older woman admired.

One had been Abraham; another, General Washington. Next came a redoubtable tabby, Laurel Roosevelt, and now there was Winston, for the cigar-smoking prime minister who had shepherded England through the darkest hours of World War II.

Tricia was smiling again by the time she reached her own kitchen, which was warmer. She was about to sit down at the computer again to check her email, as she’d intended to do earlier, when she heard the pounding at the back door downstairs.

Startled, Winston yowled and shot through the inside doorway like a black, furry bullet, his trajectory indicating that he intended to hide out in Tricia’s bedroom, under the four-poster, maybe, or on the high shelf in her closet.

Once, when something scared him, he’d climbed straight up her living room draperies, and it had taken both her and Natty to coax him down again.

The pounding came again, louder this time.

“Oh, for pity’s sake,” Tricia grumbled, employing a phrase she’d picked up from Natty, tightening the belt of her bathrobe and moving, once more, in the direction of the stairs. She followed the first cliché up with a second, also one of Natty’s favorites. “Hold your horses!”

Again, the impatient visitor knocked. Hard enough, in fact, to rattle every window on the first floor of the house.

A too-brief silence fell.

Tricia was halfway down the stairs, steam-powered by early-morning annoyance, when the sound shifted. Now whoever it was had moved to her door, the one that opened onto the outside landing.

Murmuring a word she definitely hadn’t picked up from her great-grandmother, Tricia turned and huffed her way back up to her own quarters.

Winston yowled again, the sound muffled.

“I’m coming!” she yelled, spotting a vaguely familiar and distinctly masculine form through the frosted glass oval in her door. Lonesome Bend was a town of less than five thousand people, most of whom had lived there all their lives, as had their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents, so Tricia had long since gotten out of the habit of looking to see who was there before opening the door.

Conner Creed stood in front of her, one fist raised to knock again, a sheepish smile curving his lips. His blond hair, though a little long, was neatly trimmed, and he wore a blue denim jacket over a white shirt, along with jeans and boots that had seen a lot of hard use.

“Sorry,” he said, with a shrug of his broad shoulders, when he came face-to-face with Tricia.

“Do you know what time it is?” Tricia demanded.

His blue eyes moved over her hair, which was probably sticking out in all directions since she hadn’t yet brushed and then tamed it into a customary long, dark braid, her coiffure of choice, then the rag-bag bathrobe and comical slippers. That he could take a liberty like that without coming off as rude struck Tricia as—well—it just struck her, that’s all.

“Seven-thirty,” he answered, after checking his watch. “I brought Miss Natty a load of firewood, as she wanted, but she didn’t answer her door. And that worried me. Is she all right?”

“She’s in Denver,” Tricia said stiffly.

His smile practically knocked her back on her heels. “Well, then, that explains why she didn’t come to the door. I was afraid she might have fallen or something.” A pause. “Is the coffee on?”

Though Tricia was acquainted with Conner, as she was with virtually everybody else in town, she didn’t know him well—they didn’t move in the same social circles. She was an outsider raised in Seattle, except for those golden summers with her dad, while the Creeds had been ranching in the area since the town was settled, way back in the late 1800s. Being ninety-nine percent certain that the man wasn’t a homicidal maniac or a serial rapist—Natty was very fond of him, after all, which said something about his character—she stepped back, blushing, and said, “Yes. There’s coffee—help yourself.”

“Thanks,” he said, in a cowboy drawl, ambling past her in the loose-limbed way of a man who was at ease wherever he happened to find himself, whether on the back of a bucking bronco or with both feet planted firmly on the ground. The scent of fresh country air clung to him, along with a woodsy aftershave, hay and something minty—probably toothpaste or mouthwash.

Tricia pushed the door shut and then stood with her back to it, watching as Conner opened one cupboard, then another, found a cup and helped himself at the coffeemaker.

Torn between mortification at being caught in her robe with her hair going wild, and stunned by his easy audacity, Tricia didn’t smile. On some level, she was tallying the few things she knew about Conner Creed—that he lived on the family ranch, that he had an identical twin brother called Cody or Brody or some other cowboy-type name, that he’d never been married and, according to Natty, didn’t seem in any hurry to change that.

“I’m sure my great-grandmother will be glad you brought that wood,” she said finally, striving for a neutral conversational tone but sounding downright insipid instead. “Natty loves a good fire, especially when the temperature starts dropping.”

Conner regarded Tricia from a distance that fell a shade short of far enough away to suit her, and raised one eyebrow. Indulged himself in a second leisurely sip from his mug before bothering to reply. “When’s she coming back?” he asked. “Miss Natty, I mean.”

“Probably next week,” Tricia answered, surprised to find herself having this conversation. It wasn’t every day, after all, that a good-looking if decidedly cocky cattle rancher tried to beat down a person’s door at practically the crack of dawn and then stood in her kitchen swilling coffee as if he owned the place. “Or the week after, if she’s having an especially good time.”

“Miss Natty didn’t mention that she was planning on taking a trip,” Conner observed thoughtfully, after another swallow of coffee.

The statement irritated Tricia—since when was Conner Creed her great-grandmother’s keeper? All of a sudden, she wanted him gone, from her kitchen, from her house. He didn’t seem to be in any more of a hurry to leave than he was to get married, though.

And he was using up all the oxygen in the room.

Did he think she’d bound and gagged Natty with duct tape, maybe stuck her in a closet?

She gestured toward the inside stairway. “Feel free to see for yourself if it will ease your mind as far as Natty is concerned. And, by the way, you scared the cat.”

He flashed that wickedly innocent grin again; it lighted his eyes, and Tricia noticed that there was a rim of gray around the blue irises. He had good teeth, too—white and straight.

Stop, Tricia told her racing brain. Her thoughts flew, clicking like the beads on an abacus.

“I believe you,” he said. “If you say Miss Natty is in Denver, kicking up her heels with her sister, then I reckon it’s true.”

“Gee, that’s a relief,” Tricia said dryly, folding her arms. Then, after a pause, “If that’s everything…?”

“Sorry about scaring the cat,” Conner told her affably, putting his mug in the sink and pushing off from the counter, starting for the door. “Truth is, the critter’s never liked me much. Must have figured out that I’m more of a dog-and-horse person.”

Tricia opened her mouth, shut it again. What did a person say to that?

Conner curved a hand around the doorknob, looked back at her over one of those fine, denim-covered shoulders of his. Mischief danced in his eyes, quirked up one corner of his mouth. “If you wouldn’t mind letting me in downstairs,” he said, “I could fill up the wood boxes. There’s room in the shed for the rest of the load, I guess.”

Tricia nodded. She had an odd sense of disorientation, as if she’d suddenly been thrust underwater and held there, and on top of that had to translate everything this man said from some language other than her own before his meaning penetrated the gray matter between her ears.

“I’ll meet you at Natty’s back door,” she said, still feeling muddled, as he went out.

She stood rooted to the spot, listening as the heels of Conner’s boots made a rapid thunking sound on the outside steps.

Winston crept out of the short hallway leading to the apartment’s one bedroom and slinked over to Tricia, purring companionably while he turned figure eights around her ankles.

Wishing she had time to pull on some clothes, fix her hair and maybe even slap on a little makeup, Tricia went back down to Natty’s place, bustled through to the kitchen, turned the key in the lock and undid the chain, and wrenched open the door.

Conner was already there, standing on the porch, grinning at her. After looking her over once more in that offhand way that so disconcerted her, he shook his head slightly and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.

“Thanks,” he said, his tone husky with amusement. “I’ll take it from here.”

Tricia felt heat surge into her cheeks, spark in her eyes. He knew she was uncomfortable and not a little embarrassed, damn him, and he was enjoying it.

“I’ll come back in a few minutes to lock up behind you,” she replied, ratcheting her chin up a notch in hopes of letting Conner know he wasn’t getting to her.

Well, maybe he was, a little, she admitted to herself, terminally honest. But it wasn’t because of the invisible charge buzzing around them. She wasn’t used to standing around in her bathrobe talking to strange men, that was all.

“Fine with me,” Conner answered, lifting the collar of his jacket against a gust of wind as he turned to descend the steps of Natty’s back porch. His truck, large and red, with mud-splattered tires and doors, was parked alongside the woodshed.

Possessed of a peculiar and completely unreasonable urge to slam the door behind him, hard, Tricia instead shut it politely, turned on one heel and fled back upstairs to her apartment.

There, in her small bedroom, she hastily exchanged her robe and pajamas for jeans and a navy blue hooded sweatshirt, replaced the slippers with sneakers. Advancing to the bathroom—she’d had larger closets, she thought, flustered—Tricia washed her face, brushed her teeth and whipped her renegade hair into a tidy plait.

Intermittently, she heard the homey sound of wood clunking into the boxes beside Natty’s fireplace and the old stove in the kitchen.

She nearly tripped over Winston, who was lounging in the hallway, just over the bedroom threshold.

“That,” Tricia sputtered, righting herself, “is a great place to stretch out.”

“Meow,” Winston observed casually, flicking his tail and giving no indication that he planned on moving anytime soon. He was quite comfortable where he was, thank you very much.

Tricia took a moment to collect her wits—why was she rushing around as though the place were on fire, anyway?—smoothing her hands down the thighs of her jeans and drawing in a deep, slow breath.

Consuming a carton of low-fat yogurt for breakfast, she stood on tiptoe to look out the window over her kitchen sink, which afforded her a clear view of the backyard.

And she forgot all about reading her email.

AFTER HE’D FILLED Miss Natty’s wood boxes, making sure she had plenty of kindling, Conner unloaded the pitch-scented pine—a full cord—stacking it neatly in the shed. With that done, he could check the delivery off his mental to-do list and move on to the next project—stopping by the feed store for a dozen fifty-pound bags of the special mix of oats and alfalfa he gave the horses. When he finished that errand, he’d head for Doc Benchley’s office to pick up the special serum for the crop of calves born that spring. Doc had served as the town’s one and only veterinarian since way back.

Unlike a lot of people in his profession, Hugh Benchley didn’t specialize. He treated every animal from prize Hereford bulls to Yorkshire terriers small enough to fit in a teacup, and had no evident intention of retiring in the foreseeable future, even though he was well past the age when his fellow senior citizens preferred to spend their days fishing or patronizing the flashy new casino out on the reservation.

“I won’t last six months from the day I close my practice,” Doc had told Conner more than once.

Conner understood, since he thrived on work himself—the more physically demanding, the better. That way, he didn’t have time to think about things he wished were different—like his relationship, if you could call it that, with his twin brother, Brody.

Dusting his leather-gloved hands together, the last of the wood safely stowed for Miss Natty’s use, he started for the driver’s-side door of his truck. Something made him look up at the second-story window, a feeling of prickly sweetness, utterly strange to him, and he thought he saw Tricia McCall peering through the glass.

Wishful thinking, he told himself, climbing into the rig.

He’d seen Tricia lots of times, usually at a distance, but close-up once or twice, too.

How was it that he’d never noticed how appealing Natty’s great-granddaughter was, with her fresh skin and her dark, serious eyes? She had a trim little body—he’d figured that out right away, her sorry bathrobe notwithstanding—and just standing in the same room with her had put him in mind of an experience when he and Brody were kids. Nine or ten and virtually fearless, they’d dared each other to touch the band of electric fence separating the main pasture from the county road that ran past the ranch.

It had been raining until a few minutes earlier, and they were both standing in wet grass. The jolt had knocked them both on their backsides, and once they’d caught their breath, they’d lain there laughing, like the pair of fools they were.

Because any memory involving Brody tended to be painful, the good ones included, Conner avoided them when he could. Now, as he shifted the truck into gear and eased out of Miss Natty’s gravel driveway, his thoughts strayed right back to Tricia like deer to a salt lick.

He signaled a right turn at the corner, heading for Main Street, and the feed store.

As a kid, he recalled, Tricia had spent summers in Lonesome Bend with her dad. Shy, she’d kept to herself, sticking to Joe’s heels as he went happily about his business. Even then, the run-down drive-in theater, with its bent screen, had been a losing proposition, and the campground hadn’t been much better.

Like all his friends, Conner had gone swimming at River’s Bend every chance he got, but he didn’t remember ever seeing Tricia so much as dip a big toe into the water. She’d sit cross-legged and solemn on the dock, always wearing a hand-me-down swimsuit, with a towel rolled up under one arm, and watch the rest of them, though, as they splashed and showed off for each other.

At the time, it was generally agreed that Tricia McCall was a little weird—probably because her parents were divorced and lived in different states, an unusual situation in those days, in Lonesome Bend if not in the rest of the country.

Since his older cousin, Steven, split his time between the ranch and a mansion back in Boston, neither Tricia nor her situation had struck Conner as strange—she was just quiet, liked to keep to herself. He’d been mildly curious about her, but nothing more. After all, she always left town at the end of August, the way Steven did, turning up again sometime in June.

Drawing up to the feed store, Conner pulled into the parking lot and backed the truck up to one of two loading docks. He shut off the engine, got out of the rig and vaulted up onto the platform to help with the bags, stacked and waiting to be collected.

And still Tricia lingered in his mind.

As a teenager, Tricia continued to visit her dad every summer, and she went right on marching to her own private drumbeat, too. The popular girls had declared her a snob, a snooty city girl who thought she was too good for a bunch of country kids. But she was wearing some guy’s class ring on a chain around her neck, Conner recollected, and he’d steered clear because he figured she was going steady.

And because he’d been bone-headed crazy about Joleen Williams, the platinum blonde wild child with the body that wouldn’t quit.

Somebody elbowed Conner, and that brought him back to the here and now, pronto. Malcolm, Joleen’s half brother and a classmate of Conner’s since kindergarten, grinned as he pushed past with a bag of horse feed under each arm. “Clear the way, Creed,” Malcolm teased, his round face red and sweaty with effort and a penchant for triple cheeseburgers and more beer than even Brody could put away. “People are trying to work here.”

Conner grinned and slapped his friend on the back in greeting. The day was cool and crisp, but the sun was climbing higher into a sky blue enough to make a man’s heart catch, and the aspen trees, lining the streets of Lonesome Bend and crowding the foothills all around it, were changing color. Splashes of bright crimson and gold, pale yellow and rust, and a million shades in between, blazed like fire everywhere he looked.

“How’ve you been, Malcolm?” he asked, because in small towns people always asked each other how they were, even if they’d seen each other an hour before at the post office or the courthouse or the grocery store. Moreover, they cared about the answer.

“I was fine until you showed up,” Malcolm answered, tossing the feed bags into the bed of the pickup and turning to go back for more. “What kind of fancy horses are you keeping out on that ranch these days, anyhow? Thoroughbreds, maybe? This stuff costs double what the generic brand runs, and I swear it’s heavier, too.”

Conner laughed and hoisted a bag. “Maybe you ought to sit down and rest,” he joked. “It would suck if you had a heart attack right here on the loading dock.”

“It would suck if I had a heart attack anyplace,” Malcolm countered, continuing to load the truck. “Hell, I’m only thirty-three.”

Conner, sobered by the picture the conversation had brought to mind, didn’t answer.

“You heard about Joleen?” Malcolm asked, when they’d finished piling the bags in the back of the truck.

Conner jumped down to level ground and put up the tailgate on his rig with more of a bang than the task probably called for. He’d been over Malcolm’s sister for years, but any mention of her always stuck in his craw. “What about her?” he asked, looking up at Malcolm, who stood rimmed in dazzling sunlight on the loading dock like some overweight archangel.

“She’s coming back to Lonesome Bend,” Malcolm answered. His tone was strange. Almost cautious.

“No offense, Malcolm,” Conner replied, “but I couldn’t care less.”

Malcolm was quiet for a moment. Then, in a rush of words, he added, “You want this feed put on your bill, as usual?”

“That’ll be fine,” Conner said, opening the door of his truck and setting one booted foot on the running board, about to climb behind the wheel. “Thanks, Malcolm.”

“Conner?”

Halfway into the rig, Conner ducked out again. Malcolm had shifted his position, and his features were clearly visible now. He wasn’t smiling.

“What?” Conner asked.

Malcolm sighed heavily, swept off his billed cap and dried the back of his neck on one shirtsleeve. “She’s with Brody,” he said, as though it pained him. “I guess they’ve been—seeing each other.”

Everything inside Conner went still. It was as if the whole universe had ground to a halt all around him.

Finally, he found his voice. “I guess that’s their business,” he said, flatly dismissive, “not mine.”

CHAPTER TWO

THE WIND RUFFLED THE SURFACE of the river, placid enough where it nestled in the tree-sheltered bend, the stony beach curving easy around it, like a cowboy’s arm around his girl’s shoulders, but wilder out in the middle. There, the currents were swift and, a mile downriver, there were rapids, leading straight to the falls.

Every so often, some hapless soul would be swept away in a canoe or even an inner tube, and find himself rushing at top speed toward a seventy-five-foot drop over the waterfall and onto the jagged boulders below.

It was a miracle nobody had been killed, Tricia thought, pulling her jacket more tightly around her and surveying the rocky shore in front of her. The area was littered with crushed beer cans, cigarette butts and fast food wrappers—kids had been partying there again.

Sighing, Tricia pulled a pair of plastic gloves from her pocket and snapped them on, then unfolded the large trash bag she’d tucked into the waistband of her jeans. There were No Trespassing signs posted, of course, but they seemed to have no more effect that the ones that read For Sale.

She picked up all the aluminum cans first—those were destined for the recycling bin—then collected the rest of the trash, using a smaller bag.

Tricia liked being outside, chilly as it was, under that blue, blue sky, breathing in the singular scents of autumn, though cleaning up after thoughtless people wasn’t her favorite chore. It would be a nice day for a bonfire, she reflected, bending to retrieve a potato chip bag that looked as though it had been chewed up right along with its contents.

It was then that she made eye contact with the dog.

Nestled beneath the very same picnic table where she and Joe had found Rusty all those years ago was a painfully thin mutt with burrs and twigs caught in its coat and sorrow in its liquid brown eyes.

“Hey,” Tricia said, dropping to her knees.

The dog whimpered, tried to scoot out of her reach when she moved to touch him.

“It’s okay,” she murmured. She tried to harden her heart a little, but it remained tender. “I won’t hurt you, buddy.”

Resting on her haunches, her hands on her thighs, Tricia studied the animal carefully. He was probably yellow under all that dirt, she concluded, though there would be no way to know for sure until he’d been cleaned up a little. Since he wasn’t wearing a collar, let alone ID tags, Tricia never seriously entertained the idea that some anxious pet owner was out there somewhere, searching frantically for the family dog.

She extended one hand cautiously, still wearing the plastic gloves, though they wouldn’t protect her from a bite. The poor creature snarled feebly in warning.

Tricia drew back. “No worries,” she said gently. “Wait here, and I’ll bring you something to eat.”

She got to her feet and headed for the log building that housed the office and a couple of vending machines, tossing the trash bags into a Dumpster as she passed it, the gloves following quickly behind.

Inside the tiny space, measuring no more than twelve by twelve in its entirety, a fire burned in the Franklin stove, exuding pleasant warmth, and the varnish on the front of the big rustic reception counter bisecting the room reflected the dancing flames.

For just a moment, Tricia paused, feeling a pang of regret at the prospect of moving away. This place had seen a lot of happy times in days gone by—families eager to camp out in a tent, cook their meals under the sky, swim in the calm inlet of the river. As eager as she was to sell everything and return to Seattle for good, letting go would be hard.

Shaking off the spell, she rounded the counter, took her purse from one of the shelves underneath it and scrabbled around in the bottom of the bag for the change she continually tossed in. Maybe she’d get one of those little plastic coin holders, the kind that gaped open like a grin when you squeezed either end. For now, though, the slapdash method had to do.

When she had a palm full of quarters, dimes and nickels, Tricia approached the vending machine. Chester, the man who ran the route, dropping sandwiches and candy bars and snack-size bags of chips into the slots, hadn’t been around recently. It was the end of the season, and the pickings were slim.

She finally decided on a ham sandwich, sealed inside a carton with a see-through top—the edges of the bread were curling up—dropped the appropriate number of quarters into the slot and pushed the button. The sandwich clunked into the tray.

Tricia studied it with distaste, then sighed and marched herself toward the door. Outside, she peeled back the top of the container, and walked back to the picnic table.

A part of her had been hoping the dog would be gone when she got back, she realized as she knelt again, but of course he was right there where she’d left him. He raised his head off his outstretched forelegs and sniffed tentatively at the air.

Tricia smiled, broke half the sandwich in two and held out a portion to the dog.

He hesitated, as though expecting some cruel trick—the world clearly hadn’t been kind to him—then decided to chance it. He literally wolfed down the food, and Tricia gave him more, and then more, in small, carefully presented chunks, until there was nothing left.

“Come out of there,” Tricia coaxed, fallen leaves wetting the knees of her jeans through and through, “and I’ll buy you another sandwich.”

The dog appeared to consider his—or her—options.

Tricia stood up again, backed off a few feet and called for a second time.

A frigid wind blew in off the river and seeped into her bones like a death chill. She longed for hot coffee and the radiant coziness of the fire in the Franklin stove, but she wasn’t going to leave the dog out here alone.

It took a lot of patience and a lot of persuasion, but the poor little critter finally low-crawled out from under the picnic table and stood up.

Definitely a male, Tricia thought. Probably not neutered.

“This way,” she said, very softly, turning and leading the way toward the structure her dad had euphemistically referred to as “the lodge.” The dog limped along behind her, head down, hip bones and ribs poking out as he moved.

Tricia’s heart turned over. Was he a lost pet or had someone turned him out? Dropped him off along the highway, thinking he’d be able to fend for himself? That happened way too often.

The dog crossed the threshold cautiously, but the heat of the stove attracted him right away. He teetered over on his spindly legs and collapsed in front of it with a deep sigh, as though he’d come to the end of a long and very difficult journey.

Tears stung Tricia’s eyes. There was no animal shelter in Lonesome Bend, though Hugh Benchley, the veterinarian, kept stray dogs and cats whenever he had room in the kennels behind his clinic. His three daughters, who all worked for him, made every effort to find homes for the creatures, and often succeeded.

But not always.

Those who didn’t find homes ended up living on the Benchleys’ small farm or, when they ran out of room, in one of the shelters in nearby Denver.

This little guy might be one of the lucky ones, Tricia consoled herself, and wind up as part of a loving household. In the meantime, she’d give him another vending machine sandwich and some water. Most likely, he’d been drinking out of the river for a while.

While the dog ate the second course, Tricia called Dr. Benchley’s office to say she was bringing in a stray later, for shots and a checkup. It went without saying that a permanent home would be nice, too.

Becky, Doc’s eldest daughter, who kept the books for her father’s practice and did the billing at the end of the month, picked up. Fortyish, plump and happily married to the dairy farmer on the land adjoining the Benchleys’, Becky had a heart the size of Colorado itself, but she sighed after Tricia finished telling her what little she knew about the dog’s condition.

“It never stops,” Becky said sadly. “We’re bulging at the seams around here as it is, and at Dad’s place, too, and Frank says if I bring home one more stray, he’s going to leave me.”

Frank Garson adored his wife, and was unlikely to leave her for any reason, and everybody knew it, but Becky had made her point. Bottom line: there was no room at the inn.

“Maybe I could keep him for a little while,” Tricia said hesitantly. Then she blushed. “The dog, I mean. Not Frank.”

Becky laughed, sounding more like her old self, but still tired. Maybe even a little depressed. “That would be good.”

“But not forever,” Tricia added quickly.

“Still not over losing Rusty?” Becky asked, very gently. As a veterinarian’s daughter, she was used to the particular grief that comes with losing a cherished pet. “How long’s it been, Tricia?”

Tricia swallowed, watching as the stray got to his feet and stuck his muzzle into the coffee can full of water, lapping noisily. “Six months,” she said, in a small voice.

“Maybe it’s time—”

Tricia squeezed her eyes shut, but a tear spilled down her right cheek anyway. “Don’t, Becky. Please. I’m not ready to choose another dog.”

“We don’t choose animals,” Becky said kindly. “They choose us.”

She couldn’t possibly be expected to understand, of course. As soon as a real-estate miracle happened—and Tricia had to believe one would or she’d go crazy—she’d be moving away from Lonesome Bend, probably living in some condo in downtown Seattle, where only very small dogs were allowed.

She swallowed again. Dashed at her cheek with the back of her free hand. The canine visitor knocked over the coffee can, spilling what remained of his water all over the bare wooden floor. “Be that as it may—”

“How’s eleven-thirty?” Becky broke in, brightening. “For the appointment, I mean?”

Tricia guessed that would be fine, and said so.

She hung up and hurried into the storage room for a mop, and the dog cowered as she approached.

Tricia’s heart, already pulverized by Rusty’s passing, did a pinchy, skittery thing. “Nobody’s mad at you, buddy,” she said softly. “It’s all ok.”

She swabbed up the spilled water and made a mental note to stop off at the discount store for kibble and bowls and maybe a pet bed, preferably on sale, since the trip to the vet was bound to cost a lot of money. The dog—he needed a name, but since giving him one implied a commitment she wasn’t willing to make, the dog would have to do—could live right here at the office until other arrangements could be made.

Taking him home, like naming him, would only make things harder later on. Besides, Winston would probably take a dim view of such a move, and then there was the matter of seeing another dog in all the places where Rusty used to be.

She did wish she hadn’t been in such a hurry to give Rusty’s gear away, though. She could have used that stuff right about now.

The dog looked up at her with an expression so hopeful that the sight of him wrenched at something deep inside Tricia. Then he meandered, moving more steadily now that he’d eaten, over to the vending machine. Pressed his wet nose to the glass.

Tricia chuckled in spite of herself. “Sorry,” she said. “No more stale sandwiches for you.”

He really seemed to understand what she was saying, which was crazy. The similarities between finding Rusty and finding—well, the dog—were getting to her, that was all, and it was her own fault; she was letting it happen.

She brought him more water, and this time, he didn’t tip the coffee can over.

Gradually, they became friends, a three steps forward, two steps back kind of thing, and while Tricia doubted he’d tolerate being scrubbed down under one of the public showers, he did let her remove the twigs and thistles from his coat.

At 11:15, she hoisted him into the backseat of her secondhand blue Pathfinder without being bitten in the process. A good omen, she decided. Things were looking up.

Maybe.

Doc Benchley’s clinic was housed in a converted Quonset hut left over from the last big war, with an add-on built of cinder blocks. As buildings went, it was plug-ugly, maybe even a blight on the landscape, but nobody seemed to mind. Folks around Lonesome Bend appreciated Doc because he’d come right away if a cow fell sick, or a horse, whether it was high noon or the middle of the night. He’d saved dozens, if not hundreds, of dogs and cats, too, along with a few parrots and exotic lizards.

He drove his ancient green pickup truck through snowstorms that would daunt a lesser man and a much better vehicle, and once or twice, in a pinch, he’d treated a human being.

Distracted, Tricia didn’t notice the other rigs in the clinic’s unpaved parking lot; she wanted to borrow a leash and a collar before she brought the dog inside, in case something spooked him and he took off. And she was totally focused on that.

She fairly collided with Conner Creed in the big double doorway; his arms were full of small boxes and he was wearing a battered brown hat that cast shadows over his facial features.

“Sorry,” she said, after gulping her heart back down into its normal place. Nearly, anyway.

He said something in reply—maybe “Excuse me”—but Tricia had already started to go around him, unaccountably anxious to get away.

Becky stood behind the counter, wearing colorful scrubs with pink cartoon kittens frolicking all over the fabric, holding out the leash and collar without being asked. Her eyes sparkled as she looked at Tricia, then past her, to Conner.

“Thanks,” Tricia said.

She turned around, and Conner had disappeared. Her relief was exceeded only by her disappointment.

All for the best, she told herself firmly. It’s not as if you’re in the market for a man. You’ve got Hunter, remember? Never mind that she hadn’t seen or even spoken to Hunter lately.

Outside, Conner was just turning away from his truck, where he’d stowed the boxes he’d been carrying before. He adjusted his hat, giving her another of those frank assessments he seemed to be so good at.

“Need help?” he asked, at his leisure.

Tricia realized that she’d stopped in her tracks and made herself move again, but color thumped in her cheeks. “I can manage,” she said.

Conner approached, nonetheless, and when she opened one of the Pathfinder’s rear doors, he eased her aside. “Let me,” he said, taking the leash and collar from her hand. He lifted the panting dog out of the vehicle and set him down, offering the leash to Tricia. “What’s his name?”

“I call him the dog,” Tricia said.

“Imaginative,” Conner replied, with another of those tilted grins.

Tricia bristled. “He’s a stray. I found him hiding under one of the picnic tables at River’s Bend, just this morning.”

What all this had to do with naming or not naming the animal Tricia could not have said. The words just tumbled out of her mouth, as though they’d formed themselves with no input at all from her brain.

“So you’re leaving him here?” Conner asked. His grin lingered, but it wasn’t as dazzling as before, and his voice had a slight edge.

“No,” Tricia said. She’d just gotten her feathers smoothed down, and now they were ruffled again. “He’ll be staying at the office until I can find him somewhere to live.”

She’d hoped that would satisfy Conner and he’d go away, but he didn’t. He dropped to his haunches in front of the dog and stroked its floppy ears.

“A name doesn’t seem like too much to ask,” the rancher said mildly.

Tricia tugged at the leash, to no real avail. “We’ll be late,” she fretted. As if she had anything to do for the rest of the day except clean restrooms at the campground. “Come on—dog.”

Conner stood up again. He towered over Tricia, so her neck popped when she tilted her head back to look into his face.

She liked shorter men, she reflected, apropos of nothing. Hunter, at five-eight, was tall enough. Perfect, in fact. He was the perfect man.

If you didn’t mind being ignored most of the time.

Or if you set aside the fact that he didn’t want children. Or that he didn’t like animals much.

“He’ll be here at the clinic awhile,” Conner said, ostensibly referring to the dog. “Have lunch with me.”

Tricia blinked. She didn’t know what she’d expected, if indeed she’d expected anything at all, but it hadn’t been an invitation to lunch. Was this a date? The thought sent a small, shameful thrill through her.

“Natty’s a good friend of mine,” Conner went on, adjusting his hat again. “And since you and I seem to have started off on the wrong foot, I thought—”

“We haven’t,” Tricia argued, without knowing why. The strange tension between them must have made her snappish. “Started off on the wrong foot, I mean.”

Again, that slow grin that settled over her insides like warm honey. Agitated, she tugged at the leash again and this time, the dog was willing to follow her lead. Relieved, she made her way to the doors.

But Conner came right along with her. He was a persistent cuss—she’d say that for him.

“My, my,” Becky said, rounding the desk to take the leash from Tricia but looking all the while at the dog. “I see a bath in your future,” she told him. Then, meeting Tricia’s gaze, she added, “We’re looking at an hour and a half at the least. More likely, two. Dad’s schedule is packed.”

The dog whined imploringly, his limpid gaze moving between Tricia and Conner, as though making some silent appeal. Please don’t leave me.

She’d better toughen up, Tricia thought. And now was the time to start.

“Mr. Creed and I are going to lunch,” she heard herself say, in a perfectly ordinary tone of voice, and was amazed. “I’ll check back with you later on.”

“Good idea,” Becky agreed, with a little twinkle.

Just as Conner had done earlier, the woman crouched to look into the dog’s eyes. “Don’t you be scared, now,” she said. “We’re going to take good care of you, I promise.”

He licked her face, and she laughed.

“Hey, Valentino,” Becky said. “You’re quite the lover.”

Valentino, Tricia thought.

Oh, God, he had a name now.

But as Becky rose and started to lead the dog away, into the back, he made a sound so forlorn that Tricia’s eyes filled.

“We have your cell number on file, don’t we?” Becky turned to ask Tricia, who was still standing in the same place, feeling stricken. “You haven’t changed it or anything?”

“You have it,” Tricia managed to croak. She felt Conner take a light hold on her elbow. He sort of steered her toward the doors, through them and out into the parking lot.

“Lunch,” he reminded her quietly.

Her cell phone chirped in her purse, and she took it out, looked at the screen, and smiled, though barely. There was a text from Diana’s ten-year-old daughter, Sasha. “Hi,” it read. “Mom let me use her phone so I could tell you that we’re on a field trip at the Seattle Aquarium and it’s awesome!”

Tricia replied with a single word. “Great!”

“No sense in taking two rigs,” Conner commented.

The next thing Tricia knew, she was in the passenger seat of his big truck, the cell phone in her pocket.

It’s just lunch, she told herself, as they headed toward the diner in the middle of town. Except for the upscale steakhouse on the highway to Denver, Elmer’s Café was the only sit-down eating establishment in Lonesome Bend.

All the ranchers gathered there for lunch or for coffee and pie, and the people who lived in town liked the place, too. It was continually crowded, but the food was good and the prices were reasonable. Tricia occasionally stopped in for a soup-and-sandwich special, sitting at one of the stools at the counter, since she was always alone and the tables were generally full.

Today, there was a booth open, a rare phenomenon at lunchtime.

Tricia wondered dryly if the universe always accommodated Conner Creed and, after that, she wondered where in the heck that thought had come from.

Conner took off his hat and hung it on the rack next to the door, as at home as he might have been in his own kitchen. He nodded to Elmer’s wife, Mabel, who was the only waitress in sight.

Mabel, a benign gossip, sized up the situation with a good, hard look at Tricia and Conner. A radiant smile broke over her face, orangish in color because of her foundation, and she sang out, “Be right with you, folks.”

Conner waited until Tricia slid into the booth before sitting down across from her and reaching for a menu. She set her cell phone on the table, in case there was another communiqué from Sasha, or a call from Doc Benchley’s office about Valentino. Then she extracted a bottle of hand sanitizer from her bag and squirted some into her palm.

Conner raised an eyebrow, grinning that grin again.

“You can’t be too careful,” Tricia said, sounding defensive even to herself.

“Sure you can,” Conner replied easily, reaching for a menu.

Tricia pushed the bottle an inch or so in his direction.

He ignored it.

“There are germs on everything,” she said, lowering her voice lest Mabel or Elmer overhear and think she was criticizing their hygiene practices.

“Yes,” Conner agreed lightly, without looking up from the menu. “Too much of that stuff can compromise a person’s immune system.”

Tricia felt foolish. Conner was a grown man. If he wanted to risk contracting some terrible disease, that was certainly his prerogative. As long as he wasn’t cooking the food, what did she care?

She dropped the bottle back into her purse.

Mabel bustled over, with a stub of a pencil and a little pad, grinning broadly as she waited to take their orders.

Tricia asked what kind of soup they were serving that day, and Mabel replied that it was cream of broccoli with roasted garlic. Her own special recipe.

Women in and around Lonesome Bend were recipe-proud, Tricia knew. Natty guarded the secret formula for her chili, a concoction that drew people in droves every year when the rummage sale rolled around, claiming it had been in the family for a hundred years.

Tricia ordered the soup. Conner ordered a burger and fries, with coffee.

Then, as soon as Mabel hurried away to put in the order, he excused himself, his eyes merry with amusement, and went to wash his hands.

Tricia actually considered making a quick exit while he was gone, but in the end, she couldn’t get around the silliness of the idea. Besides, her SUV was still over at the veterinary clinic, a good mile from Elmer’s Café.

So she sat. And she waited, twiddling her thumbs.

DAMN, CONNER SAID SILENTLY, addressing his own reflection in the men’s-room mirror. It was no big deal having a friendly lunch with a woman—it was broad daylight, in his hometown, for God’s sake—so why did he feel as though he were riding a Clydesdale across a frozen river?

Sure, he’d been a little rattled when Malcolm told him Brody and Joleen were on their way back to Lonesome Bend, but once the adrenaline rush subsided, he’d been fine.

Now, he drew a deep breath, rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and hit the soap dispenser a couple of times. He lathered up, rinsed, lathered up again. Smiled as he recalled the little bottle of disinfectant gel Tricia was carrying around.

Of course there was nothing wrong with cleanliness, but it seemed to Conner that more and more people were phobic about a few germs. He dried his hands and left the restroom, headed for the table.

Tricia sat looking down at the screen on her cell phone, and the light from the window next to the booth rimmed her, caught in the tiny hairs escaping that long, prim braid of hers, turning a reddish gold.

Conner, not generally a fanciful man, stopped in midstride, feeling as though something had slammed into him, hard. Like a gut punch, maybe, but not unpleasant.

Get a grip, he told himself. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mabel and everybody at the counter looking at him.

Pride broke the strange paralysis. He slid into the booth on his side, and was immediately struck again, this time by the translucent smile on her face. He’d never seen anybody light up that way—Tricia’s eyes shone, and her skin glowed, too.

“Good news?” he asked.

She didn’t look at him, but he had a sinking feeling the text was from a guy.

“Very good news,” she said. Her gaze lingered on the phone for a few more moments—long ones, for Conner—and then, with a soft sigh, she put the device down again.

Conner waited for her to tell him what the good news was, but she didn’t say anything about it.

“Do you have a dog?” she asked Conner.

Momentarily tripped up by the question, he had to think before he could answer. “Not at the moment,” he said.

“Maybe you’d like one?”

Mabel arrived with their food, and Conner flirted with the older woman for a few seconds. “Maybe,” he said, very carefully, when they were alone again. “Sometime.”

“Sometime?”

“We’re pretty busy out on the ranch these days,” he told her, picking up a French fry and dunking it into a cup of catsup on the side of his plate. “A dog’s like a child in some ways. They need a lot of attention, right along.”

Belatedly, Tricia took up her spoon, dipped it into her soup and sipped. He could almost see the gears turning in her head.

“Dogs are probably happier in the country than anywhere else,” she ventured, and her eyes were big and soulful when she looked at him. He felt an odd sensation, as if he were shooting down a steep slope on a runaway toboggan.

“Plenty of townspeople have dogs,” he said, once he’d caught his breath. He knew damn well what she was up to—she wanted him to take Valentino off her hands—but he played it cool. “Even in big cities, you see every size and breed walking their owners in the parks and on the sidewalks.”

Some of the color in her cheeks drained away, and he could pinpoint the change in her to the millisecond—it had happened when he said “big cities.”

“I wouldn’t want to keep a dog shut up in an apartment or a condo all day, while I was working,” she said. Even though she spoke casually, there was a slight tremor in her voice. “Not a big one, anyway.”

He thought of that morning, when he’d poured himself a cup of coffee in her kitchen above Miss Natty’s place. Her apartment had looked small, but he didn’t think she’d been referring to her present living quarters.

Suddenly Conner remembered all those For Sale signs. Of course—Tricia was planning to leave town when she finally sold the campground and the RV park and that albatross of a drive-in theater. These days, when folks wanted to see a movie, they downloaded one off the net, or rented a DVD out of a vending machine. Or drove to Denver to one of the multiscreen “cinaplexes.”

Conner cut his burger in half and picked up one side. He’d been hungry—breakfast time rolled around early on a ranch, and he hadn’t eaten for hours—but now his appetite was a little on the iffy side.

“You planning on leaving Lonesome Bend one of these days?” he asked, when he thought he could manage a normal tone of voice. As far as he knew, the properties she’d inherited from her dad weren’t exactly attracting interest from investors—in town or out of it.

She glanced at her phone again, lying there next to the salt and pepper shakers and the napkin holder, and a fond expression softened her all over. A little smile crooked one side of her mouth. “Yes,” she answered, and this time she looked straight into his eyes.

“When?” he asked, putting down his burger.

“As soon as something sells,” she said, her gaze still steady. “The campground, the RV park, the drive-in—whichever. Of course, I’d like to get rid of all three at once, but even one would make it possible.”

“I see,” Conner said. Why should it matter to him that this woman he barely knew was ready to get out of Dodge? He couldn’t answer that, yet it did matter.

Then she smiled in a way that turned his brain soft. “Now, about the dog…”

CHAPTER THREE

TRICIA WAS GETTING NOWHERE with Conner Creed and she knew it. The dog wasn’t going to have a home on the range—not the Creed range, anyway.

“I’d better get back to the clinic and pick up my car,” she said, watching as Mabel removed their plates and silverware from the table and hurried away at top speed as though she thought she was interrupting something. “I have things to do while Doc Benchley is treating Valentino.”

It was dangerous, saying the name, actually giving voice to it. She might start caring for the dog now, and where would that lead? To another fracture of the heart, that’s where.

Conner paid for their lunches, shaking his head in the negative when Tricia offered to chip in, and they left the diner, headed for the parking lot where his truck was parked. He held the door for her while she climbed in, like the gentleman he probably wasn’t.

He was quiet during the drive back to the clinic, even a little cool.

“Thanks for lunch,” she told him when they drew up alongside her Pathfinder, getting her keys out of her purse and unsnapping her seat belt.

Conner was wearing his hat again; he simply tugged at the brim and said, “You’re welcome,” the way he might have said it to the meter reader from the electric company or a panhandler expressing gratitude for a cash donation.

Tricia got out of the truck, shut the door.

Conner nodded at her and waited until she was behind the wheel of her own rig, with the engine running. Then he backed up, turned around and drove away.

Why did she feel sad all of a sudden? To cheer herself up, Tricia pulled her phone from its special pocket in her purse and pressed one of the buttons. Hunter’s smiling face appeared on the screen, along with the message he’d texted earlier.

I miss you. Let’s get together—soon.

Tricia waited to be overtaken by delight and excitement—hadn’t she been missing Hunter for a year and a half, yearning to “get together” with him?—but all she felt was a strange letdown that seemed to have more to do with Conner Creed than the man she believed she loved. Weird.

There was no figuring it out, she decided with a sigh. She put the phone away and went over her mental shopping list as she headed for the big discount store where a person could buy pretty much anything.

The dog beds weren’t on sale, but she found a nice, fluffy one for a decent price and wadded it into her cart. On top she piled a small bag of kibble, two large plastic bowls, a collar and a leash and, because she didn’t want Valentino to feel lonely when she left him at the office for the night, she sprang for a toy—a blue chicken with a squeaker but no stuffing—to keep him company.

There were a few other things Tricia needed to pick up, but none of them were urgent and her cart was full, so she wheeled her way up to the long row of checkout counters and got in line.

Twenty minutes later—a woman ahead of her paid for a can of soup with a credit card—she drove back to the campground office with her purchases, arranging the bed in front of the woodstove and hauling the kibble to the storeroom, where she opened it and filled the bowls—one with food and one with water.

She set them carefully within reach of the dog bed, adjusted everything and was finally satisfied that the arrangement looked welcoming. As the finishing touch, Tricia removed the price tag from the blue chicken and laid the toy tenderly on the bed, the way she might have set out a teddy bear for a child.

“There,” she said aloud, though there was nobody around to hear. Talking to herself—she had definitely been alone too much lately, she decided ruefully, especially since Natty had left to visit her sister.

Conner popped into her mind, but Tricia blocked him out—with limited success—and told herself to think about Hunter instead. In the end, she had to bring up the phone picture again just to remember what Hunter looked like.

And even then the image didn’t stick in her mind when she looked away.

NOT GOOD, CONNER THOUGHT when he pulled in at the ranch and saw Davis, his uncle, waiting in the grassy stretch between the ranch house and the barn. Davis’s expression would have said it all, even if he hadn’t been pacing back and forth like he was waiting for a prize calf to be born.

“What?” Conner asked, once he’d stopped the truck, shut it down and stepped out onto the running board.

Davis was an older version of his son, Steven, with the same dark blond hair and blue eyes. He was a little heavier than Steven, and his clothes, like Conner’s, weren’t fancy. He was dressed for work.

Steven had a ranch of his own now, down in Stone Creek, Arizona, not to mention a beautiful wife, Melissa, a six-year-old son named Matt and another of those intermittent sets of twins, both boys, that ran in the Creed family.

In fact, if Conner hadn’t loved Steven like a brother—had the same strong bond with his cousin that he’d once shared with Brody—it would have been easy to hate him for having more than his share of luck.

“Did you get the serum?” Davis asked, as though Conner were on an urgent mission from the CDC, carrying the only known antidote to some virus fixing to go global.

Conner gave his uncle—essentially the only father he’d ever known, since his own, Davis’s older brother, Blue, had died in an accident when Conner and Brody were just babies—a level look. “Yeah,” he answered, “I got the serum. Didn’t know it was a rush job, though.”

Davis sighed, rummaged up a sheepish smile. “We’ve still got plenty of daylight left,” he said. “Kim and I had words a little while ago, that’s all. She put my favorite boots in the box of stuff she’s been gathering up to donate to the rummage sale. I took issue with that—they’re good boots. Just got ’em broken in right a few years ago—”

Conner laughed. Kim, Davis’s wife, was a force of nature in her own right. And she’d been a mother figure to her husband’s orphaned twin nephews, never once acting put upon. It was a shame, Conner had always thought, that Kim and Davis had never had any children together. They were born parents.

“I reckon it would be easier to buy those boots back at the rummage sale than argue with Kim,” Conner remarked, amused. The woman could be bone-stubborn; she’d had to be to hold her own in that family.

“We won’t be here then,” Davis complained. “I’ve got half a dozen saddles ready, and we’ll be on the road for two weeks or better.”

“I remember,” Conner said, opening a rear door and reaching into the extended-cab pickup for the boxes of serum he’d picked up at Doc Benchley’s clinic. There were still a few hours of daylight left; if they saddled up and headed out right away, they could get at least some of the calves inoculated.

So Conner thrust an armload of boxes at Davis, who had to juggle a little to hold on to them.

“You’ll be here, though,” Davis went on innocently. “You could buy those boots back for me, Conner, and hide them in the barn or someplace—”

Conner chuckled and shook his head. “And bring the wrath of the mom-unit down on my hapless head? No way, Unc. You’re on your own with this one.”

“But they’re lucky boots,” Davis persisted. “One time, in Reno, I won $20,000 playing poker. And I was wearing those boots at the time.”

“We’re doomed,” Conner joked.

“That isn’t funny,” his uncle said.

Davis and Kim lived up on the ridge, in a split-level rancher they’d built and moved into the year Brody and Conner came of age. Because Blue had been the elder of the two, the firstborn son and therefore destined to inherit the spread, the ranch belonged to them.

Conner occupied the main ranch house now, and since Brody was never around, he lived by himself.

He hated living alone, eating alone and all the rest. He frowned. There he went, thinking again.

“Everything all right?” Davis asked, looking at him closely.

“Fine,” Conner lied.

Davis was obviously skeptical, but he didn’t push for more information, as Kim would have done. “Let’s get out there on the range and tend to those calves,” he said. “As many as we can before sunset, anyhow.”

“You ever think about getting a dog?” Conner asked his uncle, as they walked toward the barn. “Old Blacky’s been gone a long time.”

Davis sighed. “Kim wants to get a pair of those little ankle biters—Yorkies, I guess they are. She’s got dibs on two pups from a litter born back in June—we’re supposed to pick the critters up on this trip, when we swing through Cheyenne.”

It made Conner grin—and feel a whole lot better—to imagine his ultramasculine cowboy uncle followed around by a couple of yappers with bows in their hair. Davis would be ribbed from one end of the rodeo circuit to the other, and he’d grouse a little, probably, but deep down, he’d be a fool for those dogs.

Reaching the barn, they took the prefilled syringes Conner had gotten from Doc Benchley out of their boxes and stashed them in saddlebags. They chose their horses, tacked them up, fetched their ropes and mounted.

Once they were through the last of the gates and on the open range, Davis let out a yee-haw, nudged his gelding’s sides with the heels of his boots, and the race was on.

VALENTINO LOOKED LIKE a different dog when Becky brought him out into the waiting area, all spiffy. His coat was a lovely, dark honey shade, and when he spotted Tricia, he immediately started wagging his tail. She’d have sworn he was smiling at her, too.

“See?” Becky bent to tell him. “I told you she’d come back.”

Tricia felt a stab at those words—she was only looking after this dog temporarily, not adopting him—but when she handed over her ATM card to pay the bill, she got over the guilt in short order.

Good heavens, what had Doc done? Performed a kidney transplant?

Taking Valentino’s new collar and leash from her bag, Tricia got him ready to leave. While she was bending over him, he gave her a big, wet kiss.

“Eeeew,” she fussed, but she was smiling.

“Looks like we’re due for a change in the weather,” Becky commented, nodding her head toward the big picture window looking out over the parking lot and the street beyond. She sighed. “I guess it’s typical for this time of year. Winter will be on us before we know it.”

Tricia had noticed the dark clouds rolling in to cover the blue, but she hadn’t really registered that there was a storm approaching. She’d been thinking about Valentino, and Hunter’s text message—and Conner Creed.

“Let’s hope the snow holds off until after the big rummage sale and the chili feed,” Tricia said, her tone deceptively breezy. If the weather was bad, the campers and RVers wouldn’t show up for that all-important final weekend of the season, and if that happened, she was going to have to dip into her savings to pay the bills.

“Amen to that,” Becky said, but her old smile was back. She leaned down to pat Valentino’s shiny head. “Aren’t you the handsome fella, now that you’ve had a bath?” she murmured.

A light sprinkle of rain dappled the dry gravel in the parking lot, raising an acrid scent of dust, as Tricia and Valentino hurried toward the Pathfinder. She opened the rear hatch and was about to hoist the dog inside when he leaped up there on his own, nimble as could be. “You are pretty handsome,” Tricia told him, once she’d gotten behind the wheel and turned the key in the ignition. She’d just buckled her seat belt when the drizzle suddenly turned into a downpour so intense that the windshield wipers couldn’t keep up, even on their fastest setting.

Thunder boomed, directly over their heads, it seemed, and Valentino gave a frightened yelp.

“We’re safe, buddy,” Tricia said gently, looking back over one shoulder.

The dog stood with his muzzle resting on the top of the backseat, looking bravely pathetic.

“Now, now,” she murmured, in her most soothing voice, “you’re going to be fine, I promise. We’re just going to sit right here in the parking lot until the storm lets up a little, and then we’ll go back to the office and you can eat and drink out of your new bowls and sleep on your new bed and play with your new blue chicken—”

Tricia McCall, said the voice of reason, you are definitely losing it.

Another crash of thunder seemed to roll down out of the foothills like a giant ball, and that was it for Valentino. He sprang over the backseat, squirmed over the console and landed squarely in Tricia’s lap, whining and trembling and trying to lick her face again.

That was the bad news. The good news was that even though there was more thunder, and a few flashes of lightning to add a touch of Old Testament drama, the rain stopped coming down so hard.

After gently shifting Valentino off her thighs and onto the passenger seat, Tricia put the SUV in gear and went slowly, carefully on her way.

Valentino, panicked before, sat stalwartly now, probably glad to be up front with Tricia instead of all alone in the back.

“You’re not going to make this easy, are you?” she asked the dog, as they crept along the rainy streets with the other traffic.

Valentino made that whining sound again, low in his throat.

“I’ll take that as a no,” Tricia said.

They got back to River’s Bend in about twice the time it would normally have taken to make the drive, and by then, the rain was pounding down again. Tricia parked as close to the office door as she could, but she and Valentino both got wet before they made it inside.

Shivering and shedding her jacket as she went, Tricia headed straight for the stove and added wood to the dwindling fire inside.

Valentino sniffed his kibble bowl and drank some water, then went back to the kibble again. There was more thunder, loud enough to raise the roof this time, and flashes of lightning illuminated the angry river out past the safety ropes that were supposed to keep swimmers within bounds.

Tricia wondered how Winston was faring, back at the house; he didn’t like loud noises any more than Valentino did, and the poor cat was all alone at home, probably terrified and hiding under a bed. He’d want his supper pretty soon, too, she thought, biting her lip as she stood looking out at the storm. Winston liked his routine.

She turned from the window and smiled as Valentino gulped the last of his kibble ration, washing it down with the rest of the water. Then he inspected the bed, sniffed the blue chicken, and turned three circles before giving a big yawn and curling up for a snooze.

Tricia refilled his water dish at the restroom sink and put it back in place, then checked the office voice mail, hoping for a few reservations for the last weekend of the month, but there had been no calls.

Resigned, she fired up the outdated computer she used at work, and waited impatiently while it booted up. The black Bakelite office phone with a rotary dial rang while she was waiting.

Over by the fire, Valentino began to snore.

Smiling a little, Tricia checked the screen on her phone, saw Diana’s number and answered with a happy “Hello!”

“You’ll never guess,” said Diana. A smashing redhead, Diana had been the most popular girl in high school and probably college, too. She was smart and outgoing, then as now, and she was the best friend Tricia had ever had.

“What?” Tricia asked, leaning on the back of the counter and grinning. “You won the lottery? Paul’s been elected president by secret ballot? Sasha is bored with fifth grade and signing up for law school?” Paul was Diana’s husband; the two had been happily married since they were nineteen.

“Better,” Diana replied, laughing. “Paul got that promotion, Tricia. We’ll be moving to Paris for at least two years—Sasha will love it, and we’ve already found the perfect private school for her.” Diana, a teacher, home-schooled Sasha, not to keep her out of the mainstream but because the child had a positively ravenous capacity for absorbing information. “The French school is famously progressive. Of course, we have to go over there as soon as possible, to look for an apartment…”

It was a dream come true, and Tricia was happy for her friend, and happy for Paul and Sasha—she truly was. But Paris was so far away. She could hardly get to Seattle these days. How was she supposed to visit France?

“That’s…great….” she managed.

“You’ll come over often,” Diana said quickly. She was perceptive; that was one of the countless reasons she and Tricia were so close.

“Right,” Tricia said doubtfully.

Valentino’s snores reached an epic crescendo and then started to ebb.

Diana went on. “Paul and I were hoping—well—that Sasha could stay with you while we’re away, checking out real estate. Paul’s folks would look after her, but they’re traveling in Australia, and mine—well, you know about my parents.”

Diana’s mother had a drinking problem, and her dad went through life on autopilot. Letting them babysit Sasha was out of the question.

Tricia closed her eyes. She loved Sasha but, frankly, the responsibility scared her to death. What if the adventurous ten-year-old got hurt or sick or, God forbid, disappeared? It happened; you couldn’t turn on the TV or the radio without hearing an Amber alert. “Okay,” she said. “Sure.”

“Don’t be too quick to agree,” Diana said, with a smile in her voice. “We’ll be gone for two weeks.”

Tricia swallowed. “Two weeks?” The words came out sounding squeaky. “What about her schoolwork? Won’t she get behind?”

“Sasha is way ahead on her lessons,” Diana assured her. “Two weeks will be a nice break for her, actually.”

“You don’t want to take her to Paris?”

Diana chuckled. “It’s a long flight, especially from the West Coast. We’d rather she didn’t have to make that round-trip twice. Besides, we don’t get that many opportunities for a romantic, just-the-two-of-us getaway.”

“Two weeks,” Tricia mused aloud, then blushed because she’d only meant to think the words, not say them.

This time Diana laughed. “Feel free to say no,” she said sincerely. “I know you’re busy with whatever it is you do down there in Colorado. Paul can go to Paris alone—he’s perfectly capable of choosing an apartment that will suit us—and I’ll stay here in Seattle with Sasha.”

Affection for her friend, and for Sasha, warmed Tricia from the inside. Made her forget about the driving rainstorm she had to drive through to get home, for the moment at least. “Nonsense,” she said. “Paul is real-estate challenged and you know it. Remember the time he almost bought that mansion with the rotting floors and only half a roof? I’ll be glad to have my goddaughter visit for two weeks.” She paused. “Unless you’d rather I came over there.”

“Sasha’s never been to Colorado,” Diana said gently. “She’ll love it. You do have room for her, don’t you?”

The apartment had one bedroom, but the living room couch folded out. “Of course I do,” Tricia responded.

“It’s settled, then,” Diana said.

“It’s settled,” Tricia agreed, already starting to look forward to Sasha’s visit. The child was delightful and Tricia adored her.

“So what do you hear from the biggest loser these days?” Diana asked.

Tricia sighed. That was Diana’s nickname for Hunter, whom she had never liked, though, to her credit, she’d always been polite to him. “I had a text from him today, as a matter of fact,” she replied lightly. “He misses me.”

“I’ll just bet he does,” Diana said dryly.

“Diana,” Tricia replied, good-naturedly but with the slightest edge of warning.

“When were you planning to rendezvous?” Diana asked, with genuine concern. “Are Paul and I messing up your love life by dumping our brilliant, well-behaved and incomparably beautiful child on you, Trish?”

What love life? Tricia wanted to ask, but she didn’t.

“Hunter and I have waited this long,” she said practically. “A few more weeks won’t matter. And I can’t wait to see Sasha.”

“You’re a good friend,” Diana said.

“So are you,” Tricia replied. Okay, so Diana wasn’t Hunter’s greatest fan. She didn’t really know him, that was all. She was protective of all her friends, especially the ones who had been painfully shy in high school, like Tricia.

“Trish—”

Tricia tensed, sensing that Diana was about to say something she didn’t want to hear. “Yes?”

Diana sighed. “Nothing,” she said. When she went on, the usual sparkle was back in her voice. “Listen, I’ll make Sasha’s flight arrangements and email her itinerary to you. I suppose she’ll fly into Denver. Is that going to be a problem for you? Getting to the airport, I mean?”

Tricia smiled. “No, Mother Hen,” she said. “It will not be a problem.” Diana really was a mother hen, but not in an unhealthy way. She liked taking care of people, but she knew when to back off, too. She’d learned that the hard way, she’d once confided in Tricia, courtesy of her profoundly dysfunctional parents. “All right, then,” Diana said. There was another pause. “By the way, do you have plans for Thanksgiving? Paul doesn’t have to start his new job until after New Year’s, so you could join us in Seattle—”

Valentino stretched, got to his feet and went to press his nose against the door, indicating that he wanted to go out.

Point in his favor, Tricia thought. He’s house-trained.

“Thanksgiving is Natty’s favorite holiday,” she reminded Diana, crossing to open the door for Valentino. “We always spend it together.”

Standing on the threshold, Tricia noted that the rain had slowed again, but the sky looked ready to pitch a fit.

Valentino went out, showing no signs of his previous phobia.

Tricia remained in the doorway, keeping an eye on him, the phone still pressed to her ear.

“I knew you’d say that,” Diana said.

Tricia laughed. It was still midafternoon, but thanks to the overcast sky and the drizzle, she had to squint to see Valentino. “It’s always good to be invited,” she said.

The dog lifted his leg against one end of a picnic table and let fly.

The conversation wound down then, to be continued online, with email and instant messaging.

Tricia said goodbye to her friend and put down the phone before going back to the open door and squinting into the grayish gloom.

There was no sign of the dog.

“Valentino!” she called, surprised by the note of panic in her voice.

Just then, he rounded the row of trash receptacles, trotting merrily toward her and wearing a big-dog grin.

By the time Tricia left for home an hour later, Valentino was sound asleep on his new bed. She carefully banked the fire, made sure he had plenty of water and an extra scoop of kibble in case he needed a midnight snack. She’d been dreading the moment she had to leave him, but he didn’t seem concerned.

She promised she’d be back first thing in the morning and, apparently convinced, Valentino stretched on his cozy bed and closed his eyes.

DAVIS AND CONNER RODE BACK toward home with a hard rain beating at their backs and soaking their clothes. They’d managed to rope and tie at least a dozen calves, injecting each of them with serum before letting them up again.

In the barn, they unsaddled their horses and brushed the animals down in companionable silence.

“You sure you won’t buy those boots back for me?” Davis asked, with a tilted grin that reminded Conner of Steven and made him feel unaccountably lonesome. “At the rummage sale, I mean? You’re not really all that scared of a little bitty thing like Kim—”

Conner rustled up a grin. “Nope,” he admitted. “I’m not scared of Kim. But I do have some pride. You think I want the whole town of Lonesome Bend knowing I bought your broken-down old boots?”

Davis chuckled, sweeping off his hat and running a wet shirtsleeve over his wet face. “Since when do you give a damn what the ‘whole town’ thinks about anything?”

Conner rested a hand briefly on his uncle’s shoulder. “You go on home,” he said. “Change your clothes before you come down with pneumonia or something. I’ll finish up here.”

“Kim thought you might want to come over for supper tonight,” Davis ventured. He and Kim worried about him almost as much as they did Brody. “She’s making fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy—”

Conner’s mouth watered, but the idea of cadging a meal from the people who’d raised him, though it was an offer he would have gladly accepted most times—especially when his favorite foods were being served—didn’t sit so well on that rainy night. “No, thanks,” he said.

He wanted a hot shower, a fire in the wood-burning stove that dated back to homestead days, and something to eat, the quicker and easier to cook, the better.

Those things, he could manage. It was the rest of what he wanted that always seemed just out of reach: a woman there to welcome him home at night, the way Kim welcomed Davis. Not that he’d mind if she had a career—that would probably make her more interesting—as long as she wanted a family eventually, as he did…

“Conner?” Davis said.

He realized he’d been woolgathering and blinked. “Yeah?”

“You sure you don’t want to have supper with us?”

“I’m sure,” Conner said, turning away from Davis, silently reminding himself that he had horses to feed. “Go on and get out of here.”

Davis sighed, hesitated for a long moment and then left.

Moments later, Conner heard his uncle’s truck start up out front. He went back to thinking about his nonexistent wife while he worked—and damn if she didn’t look a little like Tricia McCall.

WINSTON SAT ON A WINDOWSILL in the kitchen, looking out at the rain. The wind howled around the corners of Natty’s old house, but the cat didn’t react; it took thunder and lightning to scare him.

And there hadn’t been any since Tricia had arrived home, taken a quick shower to ease the chill in her bones and donned sweatpants and an old T-shirt of Hunter’s. Every light in the room was blazing, and she’d even turned on the small countertop TV—something she rarely did. That night, she felt a need for human voices, even if they did belong to newscasters.

Tricia couldn’t help thinking about Valentino, alone at the office, and when she managed to turn off the flow of that guilt-inducing scenario, Conner Creed sneaked into her mind and wouldn’t leave.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she told Winston, opening the oven door to peer in and check on her dinner, a frozen chicken potpie with enough fat grams for three days. “That I should be eating sensibly. But tonight, I want comfort food.”

Winston made a small, snarly sound, and his tail bushed out. He pressed his face against the steamy glass of the window and repeated insistently, “Reowww—”

Tricia frowned as she shut the oven door. And that was when she heard the scratching.

Winston began to pace the wide windowsill like a jungle cat in a cage. His tail was huge now, and his hackles were up.

Again, the scratching sound.

Tricia went to the door, squinting as she approached, but there was no one on the other side of the glass oval.

“What on earth—?” She opened the door and looked down.

Valentino sat on the welcome mat, drenched, gazing hopefully up at her.

“How did you get here?” Tricia asked, stepping back and, to her private relief, not expecting an answer.

Valentino’s coat was muddy, and so were his paws. He walked delicately into Tricia’s kitchen, as though he were worried about intruding.

Winston, to her surprise, didn’t leap on the poor dog with his claws bared, despite all that previous pacing and tail fluffing. He simply sat on his sleek haunches as Tricia closed the door and began grooming himself.

Valentino plunked down in the middle of the floor, dripping and apologetic.

Tricia’s throat tightened, and her eyes burned. Somehow, he’d gotten out of the office, and then found his way through town and straight to her door.

She bent to pat his head. “I’ll be right back with a towel,” she told him. “In the meantime, don’t move a muscle.”

CHAPTER FOUR

WITHIN THREE SHORT DAYS, during which the rainstorms dwindled and finally passed, leaving the scrubbed-clean sky a polished, heartrending shade of blue, Valentino charmed his way into Tricia’s affections and even won Winston over.

Of course she was still telling herself the Valentino arrangement was temporary that Saturday morning, and she wrote her festive mood off to her lifelong love of autumn and the fact that she would be meeting Sasha’s plane in a couple of hours. She’d been in regular contact with Hunter, though mostly by email, because he was so busy getting ready for a big show at a new gallery on Bainbridge Island. Also, it didn’t hurt that virtually every camping spot and RV space was booked for the following weekend—plus a big group had reserved the whole campground for a Sunday barbecue.

The deposits had fattened Tricia’s bank account considerably, and thus it was with figurative change jingling in her jeans that Tricia loaded Valentino into the back of the Pathfinder a few minutes after 10:00 a.m. and set out for the Denver airport.

She put on a Kenny Chesney CD as soon as she cleared the city limits—this was the only context in which Lonesome Bend, population 5,000, was ever referred to as a “city”—so she and Valentino could rock out during the drive.

Kenny’s voice made her think of Conner Creed, though, and she switched it off after the third track, annoyed. Shouldn’t it be Hunter she had on her mind? Hunter she imagined herself dancing with slow and close to the jukebox in some cowboy bar? After all, she hadn’t seen Conner since their lunch date.

Hunter, on the other hand, had invited her to join him on a cruise to Mexico the week between Christmas and New Year’s, going so far as to buy the tickets and forward them to her as an attachment to one of his brief, manic emails.

Remembering that, she frowned. She was—thrilled. Who wouldn’t be? It was just that he hadn’t consulted her first, had just assumed she’d be willing to drop everything—or worse yet, that she didn’t have any holiday plans in the first place—meet him at LAX on Christmas night, and board the ship the next morning.

She knew a sunny, weeklong respite from a Colorado winter would be welcome when the time came and, besides, all that merry-merry, jing-jing-jingling stuff always gave her a low-grade case of the blues. Sure, she had Natty to celebrate with, but the music and the decorations and the lights and the rest of it made her miss her dad so keenly that her throat closed up, achy-tight. Joe McCall had loved Christmas.

To her mother, Laurel, December 25 was a nonevent at best and an orgy of capitalistic conspicuous consumption at worst. A skilled trauma nurse, too-busy-for-her-own-daughter Mom was always in the thick of some international disaster these days—floods in Pakistan, earthquakes in China, tsunamis in the Pacific, mudslides in South American countries whose names and borders changed with every political coup.

Suffice it to say, Laurel and Tricia weren’t all that close, especially now that Tricia was a grown-up. To be fair, though, except for her parents’ quiet divorce when she was seven, and all the subsequent schlepping back and forth between Colorado and Washington state, her childhood had been a fairly secure one. Until Tricia started college, Laurel had stayed right there in Seattle, working at a major hospital, making the mortgage payments on their small condo without complaint, and showing up for most of her only child’s parent-teacher conferences, dance recitals and reluctant performances in school plays.

If there had been a coolness, a certain distance in Laurel’s interactions with Tricia, well, there were plenty of people who would have traded places with her, too, weren’t there? So what if she’d been a little lonely when she wasn’t staying with Joe and Natty in Lonesome Bend?

She’d had a home, food, decent clothes, a college education.

Not that Laurel considered a BA degree in art history even remotely useful. She’d recommended nursing school, at least until one of those Bring Your Kid to Work things rolled around when Tricia was thirteen. Laurel had been in charge of Emergency Services then, and it was a full moon, and Tricia was so shaken by the E.R. experience, with all its blood and screaming and throwing up, that she’d nearly been admitted herself.

Even now, though, on the rare occasions when they Skyped or spoke on the phone, Laurel was prone to distracted little laments like, “It would be different if you were an artist—your degree would make some kind of sense then—” or “You do realize, don’t you, that this Hunter person is just using you?”

Tightening her hands on the steering wheel, Tricia shook off these reflections, determined not to ruin a happy day by dwelling on things that couldn’t be changed. Better to concentrate on the road to Denver, and Sasha’s much-anticipated visit.

Valentino, meanwhile, sat quietly in the back, watching with apparent interest as mile after flat mile rolled past the Pathfinder’s windows. He was good company, that dog. No trouble at all.

When they reached the airport, and she rolled a window down partway and promised she’d be back before he knew she’d even been gone, he settled himself in for a midmorning nap.

Tricia locked the rig and headed for the nearest bank of elevators, checking her watch as the doors slid open and she stepped inside. Sasha was scheduled to land in less than half an hour.

So far, so good.

THE BIG TOUR BUS ROLLED UP the dusty road to the Creed ranch house just before noon, and the sight of it made Conner smile. The monstrosity belonged to Steven’s wife Melissa’s famous brother, the country-western singer Brad O’Ballivan, and there was an oversize silhouette of his head painted on one side, along with the singer’s name splashed in letters that probably could have been read from a mile away, or farther.

Davis and Kim had postponed their own road trip as soon as they learned that the Stone Creek branch of the family had decided on a spur-of-the-moment visit, and they were standing right next to Conner, grinning from ear to ear at the prospect of seeing their three grandchildren.

Conner, just as pleased as his aunt and uncle were, had nevertheless been waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop ever since he’d learned that Brody was headed home, with Joleen Williams in tow. Several days had gone by since Malcolm had broken the news on the loading dock at the feed store, and there’d been no sign of David and Bathsheba in the interim, but Conner remained on his guard just the same. Brody would show up in Lonesome Bend, if not on the ranch, that was a given; it was only a question of when.

The Bradmobile came to a squeaky-braked stop in between the main ranch house and the barn, and the main door opened with a hydraulic whoosh. Six-year-old Matt and his faithful companion, a dog named Zeke, if Conner recalled correctly, burst through the opening.

Sparing a grin for his “Uncle Conner” as he dashed straight past him, the little boy hurtled off the ground like a living rocket, and Davis, laughing, caught the child in his arms.

“Hey, boy,” he said.

Steven got out of the bus next, turning to extend a hand to his spirited wife, Melissa, a pretty thing with a great figure, a dazzling smile and a law degree.

“Where are those babies?” Kim demanded good-naturedly.

Smiling, Melissa put a finger to her lips and mouthed the word Napping.

Steven approached, shaking his father’s hand and then turning to look at Conner. “Any word from Brody?” Steven asked.

Conner stiffened, a move that would have been imperceptible to most people, but Steven knew him too well to miss any nuances, however subtle. “Now, why would you ask me that, cousin?” Conner retorted.

Steven’s nonchalant shrug didn’t fool Conner, because the nuance thing worked two ways. “He told Melissa and me he might be headed this way,” he said. “That was a week ago, at least. I figured he’d be here by now.”

“He might be in town someplace,” Conner allowed, his tone casual. “Staying under the radar.”

Steven gave a snortlike chuckle at that. “As if Brody Creed has ever stayed under the radar,” he replied. His eyes were watchful, and gentle in a way that made Conner wary of what would come next. “You know he and Joleen hooked up somewhere along the line, right?”

Conner cleared his throat, watching as Kim and Melissa crept into the tour bus for a glimpse of the six-month-old twins, Samuel Davis, called Sam, and Blue, named for Conner and Brody’s dad. Davis, Matt and the dog were headed for the barn, because Matt had a serious addiction to horses.

“Yeah,” Conner said belatedly, and his voice came out sounding huskier than he’d meant it to. “I heard.” He displaced his hat, shoved splayed fingers through his hair and sighed. “Why does everybody seem to think I’m going to have to be talked in off some ledge because Brody and Joleen are up to their old tricks?”

Steven rested a hand on Conner’s shoulder and squeezed. “‘Everybody’ doesn’t think any such thing,” he said quietly. “It’s a long way in the past, what happened. Maybe far enough that you and Brody could lay the whole thing to rest and get on with it.”

Conner made a derisive sound. “I’m sure that’s what he wants, all right,” he said sarcastically. “Why else would he be bringing Joleen with him?”

Steven sighed. Dropped his hand from Conner’s shoulder. “This is Brody we’re talking about,” he reminded his cousin. “My guess would be, he figures bygones are bygones after all this time.”

Kim and Melissa emerged from the bus, each of them carrying a bundled-up baby and beaming. Conner wondered if Kim had “accidentally” awakened the twins from their naps.

“That is some bus,” he said, shaking his head. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you wanted to attract as much attention as possible, cousin.”

Steven laughed. “We’ve stirred up some interest at gas stations and rest stops between here and Stone Creek,” he admitted. “But as soon as folks realize Brad O’Ballivan isn’t going to pop out and strum a few tunes on his guitar, they leave us alone.”

Kim and Melissa went on by, headed for the house with the babies, and Steven ducked into the bus, returning moments later with a fold-up gizmo that might have been either a portable crib or a playpen.

The sight gave Conner a pang, and he wasn’t very proud of himself, knowing that what he was feeling was plain old envy.

Steven had a ranch and a wife and, now, kids. Pretty much everything Conner had ever hoped to have himself.

Steven read Conner’s expression as he passed. “Let’s get inside,” he said easily. “It’s colder than a well-digger’s ass out here and, besides, we’ve got a lot to catch up on.”

A FEMALE FLIGHT ATTENDANT ESCORTED SASHA out into the arrivals area.

“That’s her!” Sasha whooped, pointing at Tricia and practically jumping up and down. “That’s my Aunt Tricia!”

Beaming, Tricia opened her arms. The flight attendant smiled, watching as the child, bespectacled and pigtailed, clad in a pink nylon jacket, a sweater and little jeans with the flannel lining showing at the cuffs, left her carry-on bag and ran into Tricia’s hug at top speed.

“I got to sit in first class!” Sasha announced, when Tricia and the flight attendant had had a brief exchange, the purpose of which was to verify Tricia’s identity. “I was next to a man who kept clearing his sinuses!”

Tricia chuckled. “Yuck,” she commented.

Sasha grasped the handle of the carry-on and jabbed at her smudged glasses where the wire rims arched across her tiny, freckled nose. “We don’t even have to stop at baggage claim,” she informed Tricia proudly. “All my stuff is right here in this suitcase. Mom said I didn’t need to bring my whole wardrobe since you probably have a washer and dryer.”

“There’s a set downstairs, in my great-grandmother’s section of the house,” Tricia said, taking Sasha’s free hand and leading her toward the first of several moving walkways. “Do you need to use the restroom or anything?”

Sasha shook her head, making her light brown pigtails fly again. “I did that on the plane,” she said. “There wasn’t even a line in first class.”

“Wow,” Tricia said. “What about food? Are you hungry?”

Sasha grinned up at her. Her permanent teeth were coming in, too big for her face. She’d be a beauty when she got older, Tricia knew, just like Diana, but right now, she was headed into an awkward stage. “Aunt Tricia,” she said patiently, “I was in first class.”

Tricia laughed again. “So you mentioned,” she teased.

On the way to the parking garage, Sasha chattered on about the upcoming move to Paris, and how she’d be attending a real school over there, with other kids and different teachers for different classes and everything, because her mom and dad had been able to find one that could provide “the necessary academic challenges.” Homeschooling was okay, she stressed to Tricia, but it would be fun to ride buses and have a school song and all that stuff.

Tricia listened in delight, though a part of her was already missing Sasha and Diana and Paul, which was silly, when they hadn’t actually moved yet.

When they reached the Pathfinder, Valentino was standing with his nose pressed to the window on the rear hatch, steaming up the glass. “You have a dog!” Sasha crowed, obviously thrilled by the discovery. “You actually got another dog!”

“Not exactly,” Tricia said, but Sasha didn’t hear her. She was totally focused on Valentino.

Tricia unlocked the doors and lifted the hatch, fielding Valentino with one hand, so he wouldn’t jump out of the vehicle and hurt himself, and hefting up Sasha’s surprisingly heavy bag with the other.

Sasha tried to scramble into the back with Valentino, and Tricia stopped her. It was only then that she realized she didn’t have a booster seat for the child to ride in. Feeling incredibly guilty, she helped Sasha onto the backseat and waited while she buckled up.

“In Washington,” Sasha informed her cheerfully, “I have to use a booster seat. It’s against the law not to.”

It’s against the law here, too, Tricia thought ruefully, rummaging up a smile. “We’ll stop and buy one first thing,” she said.

“What’s the dog’s name?” Sasha asked, straining to pat his head, when Tricia was behind the wheel, belted in, and ready to head out.

“Valentino,” Tricia answered, wondering if she ought to explain that she was just keeping him until she could find him a good home and deciding against the idea in the next instant. Sasha wouldn’t understand.

When the time came, Tricia thought sadly, neither would Valentino.

“Doesn’t he need to get out of the car before we go?” Sasha inquired, ever practical. She got that from her dad; Diana was smart, but impulsive.

“We’ll hit the first rest stop,” Tricia promised.

“What if he can’t wait?” Sasha fretted.

“He’s a good boy,” Tricia said, driving slowly along the aisle leading to the nearest exit. “He’ll wait.”

“Not if he can’t,” Sasha said.

“Sash,” Tricia said gently. “He’ll be okay.”

“He doesn’t look anything like Rusty,” the little girl observed, after a short silence, while Tricia was stopped at the pay window, handing over her ticket and the price of parking.

The remark gave Tricia a bittersweet feeling, a combination of affection for the child and grief for Rusty. “No,” she said softly, as they pulled away. “He’s not Rusty.”

“That’s okay,” Sasha said earnestly, evidently addressing Valentino. “Rusty was a really nice dog, but you’re nice, too.”

Tricia smiled, though her eyes stung a little.

They stopped at the first shopping center they passed and took Valentino on a little tour of the grassy dividers in the parking lot before settling him in the Pathfinder again and dashing into a chain store, hand in hand, to buy a proper booster seat.

Though Tricia was at a loss, Sasha knew the layout of the store from visiting the branch nearest her home in Seattle, and she went straight to the section with car seats. Once the purchase was made and they were back at the car again, they wrestled the bulky seat out of its box, laughing the whole time, and it was Sasha who showed Tricia how the various straps and buckles worked.

She had a booster seat just like it, she said.

A store employee, rounding up red plastic shopping carts, took charge of the empty box, and they were good to go.

“Now we’re legal,” Sasha said. “Valentino and I would be stranded if you got arrested.”

Tricia drove out of the lot and onto the highway. “The most important thing is that you’re safer now,” she told her goddaughter. “But even if something did happen, you wouldn’t be left to manage on your own.”

“But who’s going to use this seat when I’m in Paris?” Sasha asked. “It cost a lot of money.”

There it was again—her practical side. How many kids troubled their heads about such things?

“Not to worry,” Tricia answered, wanting to reassure the child. “It’ll come in handy now, and when you visit again.”

Sasha sighed. “But it might be a long time before that happens,” she said. “I might be too big to even need a booster seat next time I come to Colorado. I might even be a teenager by then.” From her tone, she didn’t find the idea of being a teen completely unappealing.

“It’ll be a while,” Tricia said, though she knew Sasha would be grown-up long before anybody else—Diana and Paul included—was the least bit ready for that to happen.

Mercifully, Sasha moved between subjects like a firefly flitting from branch to bough, and her concern over the expense of the booster seat was apparently forgotten. “Are we going to do fun stuff while I’m staying with you?” she asked.

Tricia reached up and adjusted the rearview mirror just far enough, and just long enough, to catch a glimpse of Sasha’s face. Valentino, living up to his name, rested his muzzle against the little girl’s cheek.

“Yes,” she said. “We are going to do fun stuff.”

“Like what?”

“Well, we could go out for pizza. And rent some DVDs at the supermarket—”

Tricia couldn’t help thinking how ordinary those activities must sound to an urban child, and she stumbled a little. “And there’s a barbecue at River’s Bend tomorrow afternoon. We’re invited.”

The mysterious Sunday reservation had been made under the name “Stone Creek Cattle Company,” and Tricia had regarded the invitation as a formality, never intending to attend as a guest. Now that she had a child to entertain, it sounded like a good idea after all—the sort of Western shindig one might expect to see in Lonesome Bend, Colorado.

“Will it be like a party?” Sasha piped up, clearly intrigued. “With music and sack races and games of horseshoes and stuff?”

“I don’t know,” Tricia confessed, mildly deflated. Good heavens, she was really batting a thousand here.

“You’re invited, but you don’t know what kind of party it’s going to be?”

Sasha, Tricia thought wryly, would probably grow up to be a lawyer.

“The people are from out of town,” she said. “I had the impression that it’s a pretty big gathering.”

“They’re strangers?”

“I guess so, but—”

“A barbecue might be fun. They have them in people’s backyards sometimes, in Seattle, but I’ll bet cookouts are pretty unusual in France.”

Tricia smiled. “Probably,” she agreed. “But the French are very good cooks.”

“My friend Jessie,” Sasha remarked, “says the French don’t like Americans.”

“Jessie?” Tricia countered, stalling so she could think for a few moments.

“Jessie’s mom homeschools her and her brother, the same way my mom does me,” Sasha said. “She’s ten, just like me—Jessie, I mean—but she doesn’t have to sit in a booster seat anymore because she’s taller than I am. A lot taller.” She paused, drew a breath. “What if I don’t grow any bigger? What if I’m as old as you and Mom and I still have to ride in a stupid booster seat, like a baby, because I’m short? Jessie says it could happen.”

“Jessie sounds—precocious,” Tricia said. “You aren’t through growing, kiddo—take it from me. Your dad is six-two, and your mom is five-seven. What are the genetic chances that you’ll be short?”

“Grandma is short,” Sasha reasoned.

“I’ve met your grandmother,” Tricia responded. “And you don’t take after her at all.”

“But she is short,” Sasha insisted.

“I guess,” Tricia allowed, picturing Paul’s sweet mother, who was indeed vertically challenged. “Care to make a wager?”

“What kind of wager?” Sasha asked, sounding eager.

“I’ll bet that when you come home from France, you’ll be at least five-five.”

“What if I win? I mean, suppose I’m still four-six-and-a-half?”

“I’ll buy you a whole season, on DVD, of whatever shows your mom will let you watch.”

“Mom hates TV,” Sasha said. “But I get to watch an hour a day when we live in Paris, if I have all my homework done, because that will help me learn the language.”

Tricia barely kept from rolling her eyes. Sometimes Diana, who had been adventurous in the extreme before Sasha came along, overdid the whole responsible-parenting thing. “Okay,” she said. “What would work for you?”

“The Twilight series,” Sasha answered, with a marked lack of hesitation. “All the books in it.”

“Deal,” Tricia said, hoping she wouldn’t have to pay up before Sasha was old enough to read about teenage vampires in love.

“What do you get if I lose?” Sasha wanted to know.

Tricia considered carefully before she replied. “Well, you could draw me a picture.”

“I’d be willing to do that anyway,” Sasha said, sweet thing that she was. “Your prize has to be something better than that.”

“Let’s think about it,” Tricia suggested.

“Pizza for supper tonight?” Sasha asked.

“Pizza for supper tonight,” Tricia confirmed.

“Yes!” Sasha shouted, punching the air with one small fist. “Mom never lets me eat real pizza, but Dad and I sneak it sometimes.”

Valentino, caught up in the excitement of the moment, barked in happy agreement.

THE STONE CREEK CATTLE COMPANY, Tricia discovered the next day, when she and Sasha arrived at the campground to attend the barbecue, was owned by none other than Steven Creed.

There were Creeds everywhere—Davis and Kim, whom Tricia liked very much, were in attendance, each of them carrying a duplicate baby, dressed up warm. Conner was there, too, looking better than good, hazy in the heat mirage rising from the big central bonfire.

“Hello, Tricia,” Steven said, when she stopped in her tracks. Suddenly, all her youthful shyness was back; she might actually have fled the scene if Sasha hadn’t been with her, all primed for a Wild West experience she could brag about when she started school in Paris.

“Steven,” she said, with a polite nod. “How are you?”

“Fantastic,” Steven replied. “Married, with children.” His blue gaze shifted to Sasha, who was staring at him in apparent fascination, probably thinking, as a lot of people did, that he looked like Brad Pitt. “Is this lovely young lady your daughter?”

Sasha gave a peal of laughter at that, as if it was totally inconceivable that her honorary aunt could be somebody’s mother.

“No,” she answered. “Aunt Tricia is my mom’s best friend. I’m visiting for two whole weeks because we’re moving to Paris in a couple of months—”

“Nice to see you again, Steven,” Tricia said, after laying a hand lightly on Sasha’s small shoulder to stem the flow.

He looked around, probably for his wife, and when his eyes landed on the friendly woman bouncing one of the matching babies on one hip while she chatted with some other guests, they softened in a way that moved Tricia deeply and unexpectedly.

Had Hunter ever looked at her that way? If he had, she hadn’t noticed.

“Looks like Melissa is caught up in conversation,” Steven mused, smiling. “Don’t take off before I get a chance to introduce you two.”

“Sure,” Tricia answered, blushing. “I’d like that.”

Steven nodded, excused himself and walked away. Sasha had wandered off to play with some of the other kids, but Tricia wasn’t alone for long. She followed him with her gaze, and when she looked back at the space he’d occupied before, Conner was there.

“Hi,” he said.

She smiled up at him, even though she felt incredibly nervous. The dancing-to-a-jukebox fantasy from the day before, when she’d had to turn off Kenny Chesney, filled her mind.

“Hi,” she replied. Oh, she was a sparkling conversationalist, all right.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Conner said. She wouldn’t have known that by his expression; he wasn’t smiling. In fact, he looked as though he were trying to work out some complex equation in his head. “How’s the dog?”

“Valentino’s fine,” she answered. She’d thought she was over her childhood shyness, but here it was, back again. “He’s at home, with Natty’s cat.”

Could she sound any more inane?

Conner finally grinned, a spare, slanted motion of his mouth. “He’s going to be big when he’s full grown, you know,” he remarked.

Was it possible that Conner Creed was shy, too? Nah, she decided.

“That’s why I’m hoping to find him a home in the country someplace,” she said. “Where he can run.”

Conner merely nodded at that.

Tricia blushed, wishing the tension would subside. It didn’t, of course, and she couldn’t stand the brief silence that had settled between them, at once a bond and a barrier, so she burst out with, “He was supposed to live here, in the office, but he wouldn’t stay put. He managed to escape somehow, and showed up on my doorstep in the middle of that last big rainstorm—”

Stop babbling, she ordered herself silently.

Conner frowned. “How could he have gotten out?” he asked, and when he walked over to examine the office door, Tricia followed right along. The rest of the world seemed to fall away, forgotten. “You locked up, right?”

“I forget sometimes,” Tricia said, enjoying his apparent concern for her personal security more than she probably should have. “And the lock is old, like the rest of this place, and it doesn’t always catch. A gust of wind could have blown it open.”

“Or somebody could have broken in,” Conner said, taking the dark view evidently. “Did you call Jim Young and report what happened?”

“No,” Tricia said. “I drove over here and checked things out myself, after I got Valentino dried off and settled at the apartment. Nothing was missing, or anything like that.”

Just then, Steven’s attractive wife joined them, baby tugging happily at a lock of her bright hair.

“I’m Melissa Creed,” she said, smiling at Tricia, putting out her free hand.

Tricia took the other woman’s hand and smiled back. “Tricia McCall,” she said.

Melissa slanted a mischievous glance at Conner, who was just standing there, contributing nothing at all. “Of course I might have expected you to introduce me,” she told him.

He shoved a hand through his hair, sighed. He looked mildly uncomfortable now, as though he might bolt. “Clearly,” he said, “that wasn’t necessary.”

Melissa laughed at that, and her eyes shone as she turned her attention back to Tricia. “The food is almost ready,” she said. “Women and children get to be first in line.”

By tacit agreement, they started toward the picnic area, where the huge grill was emitting delicious aromas, savory-sweet.

Tricia called to Sasha, who came reluctantly. She’d already made friends with some of the other kids, though they’d only been there a few minutes.

Melissa stayed at Tricia’s side while they waited their turns.

“What’s the occasion?” Tricia asked, taking in the crowds of people. She recognized most of them, but there were some strangers, too. “For the party, I mean?”

Melissa smiled. “My husband likes to bring people together,” she said. “The more, the merrier, as far as Steven’s concerned.”

“Oh,” Tricia said, at a loss again.

Just then, Melissa spotted some new arrival and waved, smiling. “Excuse me,” she said. “I might have to referee.”

With that, she hurried away.

Tricia turned her head, and there was Brody Creed in the distance, looking so much like his brother that it made her breath catch.

CHAPTER FIVE

BRODY.

Conner couldn’t have claimed he was surprised to see his brother; he’d been warned well ahead of time, after all. But he still felt as though he’d stepped through an upstairs doorway and found himself with no floor to stand on, falling fast.

Careful as Conner was to keep a low profile, Brody’s gaze swept over the crowd and found him with the inevitability of a heat-seeking missile. It was, Conner supposed, the twin thing. He’d nearly forgotten that weird connection between him and Brody, they’d been apart for so long. As kids, they’d been a little spooked by the phenomenon sometimes, though mostly it was fun, like scaring the hell out of each other with stories about escaped convicts with hooks for hands, or swapping identities and maintaining the deception for days before anyone caught on.

Brody narrowed his eyes. His hair was longer than Conner’s, he hadn’t shaved in a day or two, and his clothes were scruffy, but for all that, seeing him was, for Conner, disturbingly like looking into a mirror.

Where was Joleen? Conner wondered, subtly scanning Brody’s immediate orbit. There was no sign of her—which didn’t mean she wasn’t around somewhere, of course. Like Brody, Joleen had a talent for turning up unexpectedly, in his thoughts if not in the flesh; she probably enjoyed the drama of it all. Joleen had always been big on drama.

Now Brody made his way through the clusters of people, smiling and speaking a word of greeting here and there, but he was headed straight for Conner. Pride made Conner dig in his boot heels and stay put, though he didn’t feel ready to deal with Brody just then. He folded his arms, tilted his head to one side, and waited. If he bolted, Brody and whoever else was looking might think Conner was afraid of his brother—and he wasn’t. It was just that there was so damn much going on under the surface of things, and Conner had trouble maintaining his perspective, at least as far as Brody was concerned.

“Hello, little brother,” Brody drawled, when the two of them were standing face-to-face. He’d been born four minutes ahead of Conner, as the story went, and he’d always enjoyed bringing it up.

Like it gave him some advantage or something.

Conner gave a curt little nod, realized his arms were still folded across his chest, and let them fall to his sides. “Brody,” he said, in gruff acknowledgment that the other man existed, if nothing else.

Brody indulged in a cocky grin, his mouth tilting up at one corner, his blue eyes mischievous, but watchful, too. Despite all his folksy affability, Brody was on high alert, just as Conner was. Maybe it had slipped his mind that they’d always been able to read each other like bold print on a billboard, but Conner definitely remembered.

“I’m just passing through,” Brody said, and while his voice was easy, his eyes gave the lie to the impression he was doing his best to give. Whatever his reasons for returning to Lonesome Bend might be, they were important to him. “So there’s no need for you to get all bent out of shape or anything.”

“Who says I’m bent out of shape?” Conner asked, sensing that he had the upper hand. Since they’d always been so evenly matched that all either of them ever gained from a fistfight, for instance, was a lot of cuts and bruises but no clear victory, the insight came as something of a revelation.

“Just going by past history,” Brody replied, raising both eyebrows. “Last time we ran into each other, at that rodeo in Stone Creek, you landed on me before I could get so much as a howdy out of my mouth.”

Conner felt a twinge of shame, recalling that incident, though he wasn’t about to concede that he’d started the row—it had been a mutual, and instantaneous, decision. And, as usual, it had ended in a standoff.

“What do you want, Brody?” he asked now. His arms were folded again. When had that happened?

“Just a place to hang my hat for a while,” Brody replied, sounding sadly aggrieved.

“How about on Joleen’s bedpost?” Conner asked, and then could have kicked himself, hard. Not because the remark had been unkind, but because of the way Brody might interpret it.

That slow, Brody-patented grin spread across his brother’s beard-stubbled face. “So that’s the way it is,” he said, hooking his thumbs in the belt loops of his jeans, like some old-time cowpuncher surveying the herd. Next, he’d probably turn his head to one side and spit. “I don’t mind telling you, little brother—I didn’t figure you’d give a damn what Joleen and I might do together, after all this time.”

The old rage seethed inside Conner, but glancing past Brody, he caught a momentary glimpse of Tricia McCall, sitting at one of the picnic tables, in the midst of a crowd of other diners, and something shifted inside him, just like that.

It hurt, like having a disjointed bone yanked back into its socket, but there was an element of relief, too. What the hell?

“You’re right,” Conner told his brother stiffly, finally paying attention to the conversation again. “The two of you can join the circus and swing from trapezes for all I care.”

Brody put one hand to his chest, his fingers splayed wide, and feigned emotional injury. “Then you shouldn’t have a problem with me bunking out at the ranch for a couple of weeks,” he said. “Especially since the place is half mine anyhow.”

By that time, Davis had worked his way over to them, probably dispatched by Kim. She wouldn’t want any fights breaking out, with all those kids and women around, and if anything happened, the gossip wouldn’t die down for years.

“You two are bristling like a couple of porcupines,” Davis observed dryly, his Creed-blue eyes swinging from one brother to the other. “I don’t need to tell you, do I, that this is neither the time nor the place for trouble of the sort you’re probably cooking up right about now?”

Conner let out his breath, rolled his shoulders again.

Brody grinned at their uncle. “Just saying hello to my brother,” he said, sounding guileless, but unable to resist adding, “and meeting with the usual hostile response, of course.”

“Where’s Joleen?” Davis asked quietly, watching Brody.

Brody rolled his eyes and flung his hands out from his sides. “Why the hell does everybody keep asking me that?” he wanted to know. Fortunately, he didn’t raise his voice; that would have been like dropping a lighted match into a puddle of spilled kerosene. “I’m not the woman’s keeper, for God’s sake.”

Just her lover, Conner thought, automatically, and waited for the rush of testosterone-laced adrenaline. It didn’t come. And that threw him a little.

Brody thrust out a dramatic sigh, looking like a man who’d bravely fought the good fight, heroic in the face of great tragedy, won the battle but lost the war. “Look,” he said, still careful to speak quietly, since half the town was present and watching out of the corners of their eyes. “Joleen and I met up by accident, at a rodeo in Lubbock, that’s all. She’d just split the sheets with some yahoo, and she was too broke to even buy a bus ticket back home, so I brought her, since I happened to be headed in this general direction anyway. End of story.”

Conner leaned in until his nose and Brody’s were almost touching. “You’ve obviously mistaken me,” he growled, “for somebody who gives a rat’s ass why you and Jolene came back to Lonesome Bend.”

“That’s enough,” Davis said sternly, as in days of old, when Brody and Conner had been even more hotheaded than they were now. “That will be enough. This is a party, not some dive of a bar in Juarez. If you want to beat the hell out of each other, be my guests, but do it at home, behind the barn. Not here.”

A brief and highly incendiary silence fell.

“Sorry,” Conner finally ground out, insincerely.

“Me, too,” Brody added, lying through his teeth. “Fact is, I’ve lost my appetite anyhow, so I’ll just be heading home to the ranch—if nobody minds.”

Like he cared whether or not anybody minded anything, ever. Brody had always done whatever he damn well pleased, and people who got in his way were just expected to deal.

“Kim and I will be hitting the trail right after Steven and Melissa and the kids leave tomorrow,” Davis said, watching Brody. “I’d offer to let you stay at our place and look after things while we’re gone, but Kim’s already made other arrangements.”

Brody raised both hands, palms out, like the not-too-worried victim of a stick-up. “No problem,” he said, after a pointed look at Conner. “I’ve got a yen to sleep in my own bed, in my own room, anyway. ’Course I’ll have to sleep with one eye open, since I’ll be about as welcome as an unrepentant whore in church.”

Davis leveled a glance at Conner, put an arm around Brody’s shoulders and steered him away, toward the barbecue area, where the grill was smoking and food was being handed out. “Don’t say anything to Kim,” the older man began, his voice carrying back to Conner, “but there’s this pair of boots she donated to the rummage sale—”

In spite of everything, Conner chuckled. If Davis Creed was anything, he was persistent—some would say stubborn—just like the rest of their kin.

After giving himself a few moments to cool off, Conner made his way to Kim’s side. She immediately turned to face him.

“Thanks for not making a scene,” she said, not unkindly but with the quiet directness they’d all come to expect from her. “This get-together means a lot to Steven. It’s his way of showing off his wife and kids to the hometown folks, and I’d hate to see that get ruined.”

“I hear you, Kim,” Conner replied. Brody and Davis were in line for grub by then, each of them holding a throwaway plate and jawing with folks around them. “But if anybody ruins this shindig, it won’t be me.”

Real pain flickered in Kim’s eyes. Conner’s biological mother had died soon after giving birth to him and Brody, leaving Blue alone and grief-stricken, with no clue as to how to look after two squalling, premature newborns, and this woman had stepped up, loved them like her own. She’d been firm, even strict sometimes, Kim had, but there had never been a single moment when Conner had doubted her devotion, and he was pretty sure Brody would have said the same.

They’d been lucky to have Kim in their lives, and even luckier to have Davis, because their uncle had run the ranch for them after Blue’s death, and guarded their interests with absolute integrity. On top of that, he’d been a father to them.

“If only you and Brody could get along,” Kim said sadly.

“That requires trust,” Conner replied, his voice quiet. “And Brody and I don’t have that anymore.” Without conscious effort, he sought Tricia again, with his eyes, found her, and he was heartened by the mere sight of her.

Why was that?

Kim, typically, had followed Conner’s gaze, registered that he was watching Tricia, even though he would have preferred to keep that particular tidbit of information to himself. “Tricia McCall?” Kim asked, her voice very soft, pitched to go no further than Conner’s ears. “My faith in your judgment is restored, Conner Creed. Frankly, it’s a mystery to me why a woman like that is still single.”

“Maybe she likes being single,” Conner suggested.

“The way you like being single, Conner?” Kim immediately retorted.

His hackles didn’t exactly rise, but they twitched a little. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“You know perfectly well what it means,” she answered, but she rested a hand on his forearm and squeezed. “Even without these two eyes in my head, I would still have known how much you want somebody to share your life. Whenever you so much as look at Steven, or Melissa, or any of those kids—even the dog, for heaven’s sake—it’s right there in that handsome mug of yours. A sort of lonely hunger.”

“‘Lonely hunger’?” Conner asked, with a lightness he didn’t feel. “You read too many of those romance novels.”

“It wouldn’t hurt you or Brody or, for that matter, Davis, to read a few romances,” Kim said, undaunted. “That way, you might know how a woman likes to be treated.”

Conner let out a huff. “My point,” he said, “is this—don’t get carried away—Tricia’s involved with some guy in Seattle. Keeps his picture on her computer monitor as a screen saver.”

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