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Cherry had been surprised that his sister preferred living in the two-story log house instead of the mansion their father had built. Carson understood only too well. But he would have made the old man build him his own house, something new and modern and even farther away. Clearly, he wasn’t his sister.
The twilight cast a soft silver sheen over the land, making the dark pines shimmer as he crossed the cattleguard and approached the house. This far north, the sun didn’t set in the summer months until almost eleven. Now, though, it was getting dark by eight-thirty. Soon it would be dark by five.
The wind had picked up even more, he noticed distractedly. Something was definitely blowing in. The wind was so strong in this part of Montana that it had blown over semis on the interstate and knocked train cars off their tracks.
It was worse in the winter when wind howled across the eaves and whipped snow into huge sculpted drifts. He remembered waking to find he couldn’t get out to help feed the animals because the snow had blown in against the door. Often he’d had to plow the road out so he and Destry could get to the county road to catch the school bus.
It had become a state joke that while other states closed their schools when they got a skiff of snow or the thermometer dropped below zero, Montana schools remained open in blinding blizzards and fifty-below-zero temperatures. Carson remembered too many days when the ice was so thick on the inside of the school bus windows that he couldn’t see outside. He hadn’t missed the cold, especially enjoying winters in Las Vegas.
He reminded himself that, with luck, he and Cherry would be back there before their vacations were up.
Carson found his sister unloading firewood from the back of a flatbed truck and stacking it along the rear of the house. As a kid, she’d always turned to hard work or horseback when she was upset. He watched her for a moment. She was working off something, that was for sure.
“I thought we had hired hands for that?” he asked, only half joking.
She grinned and tossed a sawn chunk of log in his direction. He had to step out of the way to keep it from hitting him.
“Think you got enough wood there?” he asked as he fell in to help stack the truckload of logs along the back of the house. Firewood had been stacked in that spot for as long as he could remember.
“Takes quite a few cords to get through the winter with this latest weather pattern,” Destry said.
“I can’t imagine what it must take up at the Big House.” He’d heard her call it that and thought how appropriate it was to compare WT’s mansion with prison.
“Dad doesn’t heat with wood,” she said. “Went with a gas furnace. The wood fireplaces are just for show.”
He stopped, already winded from the exertion of trying to keep up with his sister. “Why do you stay here?”
“You know I’ve always loved this old house.”
“I’m not talking about this house. I’m talking about this ranch, Montana. I gave you some good advice before I left.” He’d told her to go away to college and not come back. To run as far away from WT as she could get. She should have listened. “You obviously didn’t take it.”
“But I appreciated the advice.” Destry stopped throwing down wood long enough to smile at him. “I was able to get my degree in business and ranch management and still stay around here, so it all worked out for the best.”
“Destry, what’s here for you but work?”
“I love this work.” She looked out at the darkening land beyond the grove of trees for a moment, her expression softening. “I couldn’t breathe without open spaces.”
He wondered what had happened either before she’d left to see about the cows—or while she was gone. Maybe it was just his return that had her upset. “Destry, you know I can’t stay here.”
She jumped down to stack logs, making short order out of the pile she’d thrown from the truck bed. “What does Dad say about that?”
“What do you think he says?” He felt his blood pressure rise. “I don’t know how you can put up with him. I can’t.”
“What will you do?”
He shook his head. He didn’t have a clue. The old man definitely had him between a rock and a hard place. Destry was in an even worse corner, but he didn’t have the heart to tell her.
She stacked more of the wood for a moment. “I’ll pick you up early in the morning,” she said, stopping to study him. “Be ready.”
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
He smiled at his sister. “I’ve missed you.”
“Yeah, I’ve missed you, too.”
* * *
RYLAN HAD JUST THROWN a couple of elk steaks into a cast-iron skillet sizzling with melted butter. A large baked potato wrapped in foil sat on the counter since the steaks wouldn’t take long.
The secret with wild meat was not to overcook it. He’d learned that at hunting camp when he was a boy. At least today he wasn’t cooking over an open campfire. The wonderful scent of the steaks filled the cabin, and for the first time in weeks, he felt as if he was finally home.
The knock at the door made him curse under his breath. He really wasn’t in the mood for company.
When he went to the door, he was shocked to find Destry standing outside on the wooden step. He tried to hide his surprise as well as his pleasure in seeing her again. Leaning his hip against the door frame, he studied her for a moment as he waited for her to speak—that was until he remembered his steaks and swore as he hurried back to the stove.
When he looked up from flipping the beautifully browned steaks, she had come in and closed the door behind her. The cabin immediately felt smaller. Too small and too warm.
“I assume you’re not here for supper,” he said, wondering what she was here for. Being this close to her jolted his heart, reminding him of things he’d spent years trying to forget. “I’m a pretty good cook if you’re interested.”
“No, thanks.” She appeared as uncomfortable as he felt in the tight quarters, which surprised him. He’d only seen her lose control of her emotions once. The reminder of their night together did nothing to ease his tension. He pulled the steaks off the stove, his mouth no longer watering for them, though, and gave her all his attention.
Destry was the only woman he knew who could make a pair of jeans and a flannel work shirt sexy. Her chestnut plaited hair hung over one shoulder, the end falling over her breast. He remembered the weight of her breasts in his hands, the feel of her nipple in his mouth. His fingers itched to unbraid her hair and let it float around her bare shoulders.
“I’ll make this quick since I don’t want your steaks to get cold,” she said. “Thank you for changing your mind about going to the W Bar G earlier.”
He shook his head. “Don’t. You don’t know how close I came.”
“You stopped before it was too late,” she said quietly.
“Yeah, but that was today. I can’t make any promises about tomorrow.”
Her blue eyes shone like banked flames. Even in the dull light of the cabin, he could see the sprinkling of freckles that arced across her cheeks and nose. She looked as young as she had in high school. The girl next door, he used to joke. And that was still what she was.
Only now she was all woman, a strong, independent, resilient woman who made his pulse quicken and heart ache at the sight of her. Pain and pleasure, both killers when your heart was as invested as much as his was.
He wanted to reach for her, to pull her into his arms, to kiss that full mouth....
“Enjoy your steaks,” she said, turning toward the door.
He couldn’t think of anything to say, certainly not something that would make her stay. He listened to her get into her pickup, the engine cranking over, the tires crunching on the gravel as she drove away.
He dumped his steaks onto a plate, but he’d lost his appetite. Destry was determined to make him a saint when he was far from it. Now he wished he’d kicked Carson’s butt.
But he figured Destry would have still ended up on his doorstep tonight—only she wouldn’t have been thanking him. She would probably have come with a loaded shotgun and blood in her eye.
* * *
THE STORM BLEW IN WITH a vengeance just after midnight. Destry woke to rain and the banging of one of the shutters downstairs. She rose and padded down the steps wearing nothing but the long worn T-shirt she’d gone to bed in.
As she stepped off the bottom stair, she slowed, surprised to feel the chilled wind on her face. Had she left one of the windows open?
The air had a bite to it, another indication that winter wasn’t far off. This time of year the days could be hot as summer, but by night the temperature would drop like a stone. Soon the water in the shallow eddies of the creek would have a skim of ice on them in the morning and the peaks in the Crazies would gleam with fresh snow.
She thought about her brother’s earlier visit. What had he walked all the way down here for? She’d been too worked up over seeing Rylan at the time to question him. Later she’d had the feeling he wanted to tell her something. Whatever it was, he’d apparently changed his mind.
After they’d finished stacking the wood, she’d invited him in, but he’d declined. Just as he had when she’d offered to give him a ride back up to their father’s house.
“I need the exercise,” he’d said and had taken off before it became completely dark.
Her thoughts turned to her visit with Rylan earlier that night. Just the memory of him cooking steaks in that small cabin, warmed her still. It had seemed so normal, so welcoming, like the Rylan she once knew. He might come after Carson again when she wouldn’t be there to talk him out of it. But at least it wouldn’t be tonight.
Destry hugged herself from the chill as she started across the open living room. The worn wood floor beneath her bare feet felt freezing cold. The shutter banged a monotonous beat against the side of the house. The wind curled the edge of the living room rug and flapped the pages of a livestock grower’s magazine left on an end table.
It wasn’t until she reached the back of the house that she realized it wasn’t a window that had been left open—it was the back door.
A chill rattled through her that had nothing to do with the wind or the cold. Through the open doorway, the pines appeared black against the dark night. They whipped in the wind and rain below a cloud-shrouded sky.
Destry reached to close the door but stopped as she caught movement out beyond the creek. Something at the edge of the trees. Without taking her eyes off the spot, she reached for the shotgun she kept by the back door to chase away bears. She didn’t have to break it down to know it was loaded. There were two shells, one in each barrel.
She stared through the darkness at the spot in the pines and cottonwoods where she would have sworn she saw something move just moments before.
As she stood in the doorway, large droplets of rain pinged off the overhang, splattering her with cool mist. The wind blew her hair back from her face and molded the worn T-shirt to her body.
What had she seen? Or had she just imagined the movement?
Another chill raced across her bare flesh. She hated the way her heart pounded. Worse, that whatever had been out there had the ability to spook her.
The door must not have been latched and had blown open. But as she started to close the door, she recalled the downed fence and the tracks leading into the trees behind her house that she’d seen from the air. With everything that had happened, she’d forgotten about them.
Few people who lived out in the country locked their doors, especially around Beartooth. Destry never had. But tonight she closed the door, locked it and, leaving the shotgun by the back door, took her pistol up to her bedroom.
CHAPTER SIX
NETTIE BENTON DIDN’T notice the broken window when she opened the Beartooth General Store early the next morning. She hadn’t gotten much sleep, thanks to Bob and the bad dreams he’d had during the night. She’d awakened to find him screaming in terror—as if his snoring wasn’t bad enough.
He’d finally moved in to the guest room, or she wouldn’t have slept a wink. When she’d gone to open the store’s front door, she’d looked across the street and seen the new owner of the café chatting with a handful of customers. Just the sight of Kate LaFond threatened to ruin an already bad day.
The woman had purchased the Branding Iron after the former owner had dropped dead this spring. Just days after the funeral, Kate LaFond had appeared out of nowhere. No one knew anything about her or why she’d decided to buy a café in Beartooth.
The community had been so grateful that she had kept the café open, they hadn’t cared who she was or where she’d come from. Or what the devil she was doing here.
Everyone but Nettie. “I still say it’s odd,” she said to herself now as she stood at the window watching Kate smiling and laughing with a bunch of ranchers as she refilled their coffee cups.
An attractive thirtysomething brunette, Kate had apparently taken to the town like a duck to water. It annoyed Nettie that, after only a few months, most people seemed fine with her. They didn’t care, they said, that they didn’t know a single relative fact about the woman’s past.
“It’s just nice to have the café open,” local contractor Grayson Brooks had told her. Nettie had noticed how often Grayson stopped by the café mornings now. Grayson owned Brooks Construction and was semiretired at forty-five because of his invalid wife, Anna. He had a crew that did most of the physical work, allowing him, apparently, to spend long hours at the Branding Iron every morning.
“Kate’s nice and friendly and she makes a pretty good cup of coffee,” Grayson had said when Nettie had asked him what he thought of the woman. “I think she makes a fine addition to the town.”
“Doesn’t hurt that she’s young and pretty, I suppose,” Nettie had said.
Grayson had merely smiled as if she wasn’t going to get an argument out of him on that subject, although everyone knew, as good-looking as he was, he was devoted to his wife.
“Did you ever consider it’s none of our business?” her husband, Bob, had asked when Nettie had complained about Kate LaFond to him. He’d been sitting in his office adding up the day’s receipts.
“What if she has some dark past? A woman like that, she could have been married, killed several husbands by the age of thirty-five, even drowned a few of her children.”
Bob had looked up at her, squinting. After forty years of marriage, he no longer seemed shocked by anything she said.
“Why on earth would you even think such a thing?” he’d asked wearily.
“There’s something about her. Why won’t she tell anyone about her past if she has nothing to hide? I’m warning you, Bob Benton, there is something off about that woman. Why else would she buy a café in a near ghost town, far away from everything? She’s running from something. Mark my words.”
“Sometimes, Nettie” was all Bob had said with one of his big sighs, before leaving to walk up the steep path to their house.
Now, Kate LaFond looked up. Their gazes met across the narrow stretch of blacktop that made up the main drag of Beartooth. The look Kate gave her made a shudder run the length of Nettie’s spine.
“That woman’s dangerous,” she said to herself. It didn’t matter that there was no one around to hear. No one listened to her anyway.
Nettie moved from the window and went about opening the store as she did every morning. Lost in thought, she barely heard something crunch under her boots. She blinked, stumbling to a stop to look down. That’s when she saw the glass from the broken window.
* * *
DESTRY DROVE UP TO THE big house, anxious to spend some time with her brother. She hadn’t slept well last night after discovering the open door, so she’d had a lot of time to think.
She was worried about her brother. Even more worried about what he might have come down to the house to tell her last night.
This afternoon she would be rounding up the last of the cattle from the mountains. After a season on the summer range, they would be bringing down the last of the fattened-up calves, and all but the breeding stock would be loaded into semis and taken to market.
Destry always went on the last roundup in the high country before winter set in. The air earlier this morning had been crisp and cold, the ground frosty after last night’s rain. But while clouds still shrouded the peaks of the Crazies, the sun was out down here in the valley, the day warming fast.
As she pulled up to the house and honked, she was surprised when her brother came right out. He’d never been an early riser even as a boy. He must really be desperate to get away from their father. Or was it his fiancée?
“Okay, where are we going?” Carson asked as he climbed into the pickup.
Destry nodded her head toward the bed of the truck and the fishing tackle she’d loaded this morning.
“Fishing?” He shook his head as she threw the pickup into gear. “Did you forget I don’t have a fishing license?”
“With all your problems, you’re worried about getting caught without a fishing license?”
He laughed. “Good point.” He leaned back in the seat as she tore down the road, and for a moment, she could pretend they were kids again heading for the reservoir to go fishing after doing their chores.
Destry barreled forward, having driven more dirt roads in her life than paved ones. The pickup rumbled across one cattle guard after another, then across the pasture, dropping down to the creek.
Because it was late in the year, the creek was low. She slowed as the pickup forded the stream, tires plunged over the rocks and through a half foot of crystal clear water before roaring up the other side.
