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“Don’t speed!” her father called to her.
She only chuckled, diving into her sports car. She remembered belatedly that she didn’t have either purse or car keys, or her face fixed, and jumped right back out again to rectify those omissions.
Ten minutes later, she was parking her car in front of the Jacobsville Hardware Store. With a wildly beating heart, she noticed one of the black double-cabbed Hart Ranch trucks parked nearby. Leo! She was certain it was Leo!
With her heart pounding, she checked her makeup in the rearview mirror and tugged her hair gently away from her cheeks. She’d left it down today deliberately, remembering that Leo had something of a weakness for long hair. It was thick and clean, shining like a soft brown curtain. She was wearing a long beige skirt with riding boots, and a gold satin blouse. She looked pretty good, even if she did say so herself! Now if Leo would just notice her…
She walked into the hardware store with her breath catching in her throat as she anticipated Leo’s big smile at her approach. He was the handsomest of the Hart brothers, and really, the most personable. He was kindness itself. She remembered his soft voice in her kitchen, asking what was wrong. Oh, to have that soft voice in her ear forever!
There was nobody at the counter. That wasn’t unusual, the clerks were probably waiting on customers. She walked back to where the gloves were kept and suddenly heard Leo’s deep voice on the other side of the high aisle, unseen.
“Don’t forget to add that roll of hog wire to the order,” he was telling one of the clerks.
“I won’t forget,” Joe Howland’s pleasant voice replied. “Are you going to the Cattleman’s Ball?” Joe added just as Janie was about to raise her voice and call to Leo over the aisle.
“I guess I am,” Leo replied. “I didn’t plan to, but a pretty friend needed a ride and I’m obliging.”
Janie’s heart skipped and fell flat. Leo already had a date? Who? She moved around the aisle and in sight of Leo and Joe. Leo had his back to her, but Joe noticed her and smiled.
“That friend wouldn’t be Janie Brewster, by any chance?” Joe teased loudly.
The question made Leo unreasonably angry. “Listen, just because she caught the bouquet at Micah Steele’s wedding is no reason to start linking her with me,” he said shortly. “She may have a good family background, she may be easy on the eyes, she may even learn to cook someday—miracles still happen. But no matter what she does, or how well, she is never going to appeal to me as a woman!” he added. “Having her spreading ludicrous gossip about our relationship all over town isn’t making her any more attractive to me, either. It’s a dead turnoff!”
Janie felt a shock like an electric jolt go through her. She couldn’t even move for the pain.
Joe, horrified, opened his mouth to speak.
Leo made a rough gesture with one lean hand, burning with pent-up anger. “She looks like the rough side of a corncob lately, anyway,” Leo continued, warming to his subject. “The only thing she ever had going for her were her looks, and she’s spent the last few weeks covered in mud or dust or bread flour. She’s out all hours proving she can compete with any man on the place and she can’t stop bragging about what a great catch she’s made with me. She’s already told half the town that I’m a kiss short of buying her an engagement ring. That is, when she isn’t putting it around that I’m taking her to the Cattleman’s Ball, when I haven’t even damned well asked her! Well, she’s got her eye on the wrong man. I don’t want some half-baked kid with a figure like a boy and an ego the size of my boots! I wouldn’t have Janie Brewster for a wife if she came complete with a stable of purebred Salers bulls, and that’s saying something. She makes me sick to my stomach!”
Joe had gone pale and he was grimacing. Curious, Leo turned… and there was Janie Brewster, staring at him down the aisle with a face as tragic as if he’d just taken a whittling knife to her heart.
“Janie,” he said slowly.
She took a deep, steadying breath and managed to drag her eyes away from his face. “Hi, Joe,” she said with a wan little smile. Her voice sounded choked. She couldn’t possibly look for gloves, she had to get away! “Just wanted to check and see if you’d gotten in that tack Dad ordered last week,” she improvised.
“Not just yet, Janie,” Joe told her in a gentle tone. “I’m real sorry.”
“No problem. No problem at all. Thanks, Joe. Hello, Mr. Hart,” she said, without really meeting Leo’s eyes, and she even managed a smile through her tattered dignity. “Nice day out, isn’t it? Looks like we might even get that rain we need so badly. See you.”
She went out the door with her head high, as proudly as a conquering army, leaving Leo sick to his stomach for real.
“Why the hell didn’t you say something?” Leo asked Joe furiously.
“Didn’t know how,” Joe replied miserably.
“How long had she been standing there?” Leo persisted.
“The whole time, Leo,” came the dreaded reply. “She heard every word.”
As if to punctuate the statement, from outside came the sudden raucous squeal of tires on pavement as Janie took off toward the highway in a burst of speed. She was driving her little sports car, and Leo’s heart stopped as he realized how upset she was.
He jerked his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed the police department. “Is that Grier?” he said at once when the call was answered, recognizing Jacobsville’s new assistant police chief’s deep voice. “Listen, Janie Brewster just lit out of town like a scalded cat in her sports car. She’s upset and it’s my fault, but she could kill herself. Have you got somebody out on the Victoria road who could pull her over and give her a warning? Yeah. Thanks, Grier. I owe you one.”
He hung up, cursing harshly under his breath. “She’ll be spitting fire if anybody tells her I sent the police after her, but I can’t let her get hurt.”
“Thought she looked just a mite too calm when she walked out the door,” Joe admitted. He glanced at Leo and grimaced. “No secret around town that she’s been sweet on you for the past year or so.”
“If she was, I’ve just cured her,” Leo said, and felt his heart sink. “Call me when that order comes in, will you?”
“Sure thing.”
Leo climbed into his truck and just sat there for a minute, getting his bearings. He could only imagine how Janie felt right now. What he’d said was cruel. He’d let his other irritations burst out as if Janie were to blame for them all. What Marilee had been telling him about Janie had finally bubbled over, that was all. She’d never done anything to hurt him before. Her only crime, if there was one, was thinking the moon rose and set on Leo Hart and taking too much for granted on the basis of one long kiss.
He laughed hollowly. Chances were good that she wouldn’t be thinking it after this. Part of him couldn’t help blaming her, because she’d gone around bragging about how he was going to marry her, and how lucky he was to have a girl like her in his life. Not to mention telling everybody he was taking her to the Cattleman’s Ball.
But Janie had never been one to brag about her accomplishments, or chase men. The only time she’d tried to vamp Leo, in fact, had been in her own home, when her father was present. She’d never come on to him when they were alone, or away from her home. She’d been old-fashioned in her attitudes, probably due to the strict way she’d been raised. So why should she suddenly depart from a lifetime’s habits and start spreading gossip about Leo all over Jacobsville? He remembered at least once when she’d stopped another woman from talking about a girl in trouble, adding that she hated gossip because it was like spreading poison.
He wiped his sweaty brow with the sleeve of his shirt and put his hat on the seat beside him. He hated what he’d said. Maybe he didn’t want Janie to get any ideas about him in a serious way, but there would have been kinder methods of accomplishing it. He didn’t think he was ever going to forget the look on her face when she heard what he was saying to Joe. It would haunt him forever.
Meanwhile, Janie was setting new speed records out on the Victoria Road. She’d already missed the turnoff that led back toward Jacobsville and her father’s ranch. She was seething, hurting, miserable and confused. How could Leo think such things about her? She’d never told anybody how she felt about him, except Marilee, and she hadn’t been spreading gossip. She hated gossip. Why did he know so little about her, when they’d known each other for years? What hurt the most was that he obviously believed those lies about her.
She wondered who could have told him such a thing. Her thoughts went at once to Marilee, but she chided herself for thinking ill of her only friend, her best friend. Certainly it had to be an enemy who’d been filling Leo’s head full of lies. But… she didn’t have any enemies that she knew of.
Tears were blurring her eyes. She knew she was going too fast. She should slow down before she wrecked the car or ran it into a fence. She was just thinking about that when she heard sirens and saw blue lights in her rearview mirror.
Great, she thought. Just what I need. I’m going to be arrested and I’ll spend the night in the local jail….
She stopped and rolled down her window, trying unobtrusively to wipe away the tears while waiting for the uniformed officer to bend down and speak to her.
He came as a surprise. It wasn’t a patrolman she knew, and she knew most of them by sight at least. This one had black eyes and thick black hair, which he wore in a ponytail. He had a no-nonsense look about him, and he was wearing a badge that denoted him as the assistant chief.
“Miss Brewster?” he asked quietly.
“Y… yes.”
“I’m Cash Grier,” he introduced himself. “I’m the new assistant police chief here.”
“Nice to meet you,” she said with a watery smile. “Sorry it has to be under these circumstances.” She held out both wrists with a sigh. “Want to handcuff me?”
He pursed his lips and his black eyes twinkled unexpectedly. He didn’t look like a man who knew what humor was. “Isn’t that a little kinky for a conversation? What sort of men are you used to?”
She hesitated for just a second before she burst out laughing. He wasn’t at all the man he appeared to be. She put her hands down.
“I was speeding,” she reminded him.
“Yes, you were. But since you don’t have a rap sheet, you can have a warning, just this once,” he added firmly. “The speed limit is posted. It’s fifty on all county roads.”
She peered up at him. “This is a county road?” she emphasized, which meant that he was out of his enforcement area.
Nodding, he grinned. “And you’re right, I don’t have any jurisdiction out here, so that’s why you’re getting a warning and a smile.” The smile faded. “In town, you’ll get a ticket and a heavy scowl. Remember that.”
“I will. Honest.” She wiped at her eyes again. “I got a little upset, but I shouldn’t have taken it out on the road. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”
“See that you don’t.” His dark eyes narrowed as if in memory. “Accidents are messy. Very messy.”
“Thanks for being so nice.”
He shrugged. “Everybody slips once in a while.”
“That’s exactly what I did…”
“I didn’t mean you,” he interrupted. His lean face took on a faintly dangerous cast. “I’m not nice. Not ever.”
She was intimidated by that expression. “Oh.”
He wagged a finger at her nose. “Don’t speed.”
She put a hand over her heart. “Never again. I promise.”
He nodded, walked elegantly to his squad car and drove toward town. Janie sat quietly for a minute, getting herself back together. Then she started the car and went home, making up an apology for her father about his gloves without telling him the real reason she’d come home without them. He said he’d get a new pair the next day himself, no problem.
Janie cried herself to sleep in a miserable cocoon of shattered dreams.
As luck would have it, Harley Fowler, Cy Parks’s foreman, came by in one of the ranch pickup trucks the very next morning and pulled up to the back door when he saw Janie walk out dressed for riding and wearing a broad-brimmed hat. Harley’s boss Cy did business with Fred Brewster, and Harley was a frequent visitor to the ranch. He and Janie were friendly. They teased and played like two kids when they were together.
“I’ve been looking for you,” Harley said with a grin as he paused just in front of her. “The Cattleman’s Ball is Saturday night and I want to go, but I don’t have a date. I know it’s late to be asking, but how about going with me? Unless you’ve got a date or you’re going with your dad…?” he added.
She grinned back. “I haven’t got a date, and Dad’s away on business and has to miss the ball this year. But I do have a pretty new dress that I’m dying to wear! I’d love to go with you, Harley!”
“Really?” His lean face lit up. He knew Janie was sweet on Leo Hart, but it was rumored that he was avoiding her like measles these days. Harley wasn’t in love with Janie, but he genuinely liked her.
“Really,” Janie replied. “What time will you pick me up?”
“About six-thirty,” he said. “It doesn’t start until seven, but I like to be on time.”
“That makes two of us. I’ll be ready. Thanks, Harley!”
“Thank you!” he said. “See you Saturday.”
He was off in a cloud of dust, waving his hand out the window as he pulled out of the yard. Janie sighed with relief. She wanted nothing more in the world than to go to that dance and show Leo Hart how wrong he was about her chasing him. Harley was young and nice looking. She liked him. She would go and have a good time. Leo would be able to see for himself that he was off the endangered list, and he could make a safe bet that Janie would never go near him again without a weapon! As she considered it, she smiled coldly. Revenge was petty, but after the hurt she’d endured at Leo’s hands, she felt entitled to a little of it. He was never going to forget this party. Never, as long as he lived.
Chapter Three
The annual Jacobsville Cattleman’s Ball was one of the newer social events of the year. It took place the Saturday before Thanksgiving like clockwork. Every cattleman for miles around made it a point to attend, even if he avoided all other social events for the year. The Ballenger brothers, Calhoun and Justin, had just added another facility to their growing feedlot enterprise, and they looked prosperous with their wives in gala attire beside them. The Tremayne brothers, Connal, Evan, Harden, and Donald, and their wives were also in attendance, as were the Hart boys; well, Corrigan, Callaghan, Rey and Leo at least, and their wives. Simon and Tira didn’t attend many local events except the brothers’ annual Christmas party on the ranch.
Also at the ball were Micah Steele, Eb Scott, J. D. Langley, Emmett Deverell, Luke Craig, Guy Fenton, Ted Regan, Jobe Dodd, Tom Walker and their wives. The guest list read like a who’s who of Jacobsville, and there were so many people that the organizers had rented the community center for it. There was a live country-western band, a buffet table that could have fed a platoon of starving men, and enough liquor to drown a herd of horses.
Leo had a highball. Since he hadn’t done much drinking in recent years, his four brothers were giving him strange looks. He didn’t notice. He was feeling so miserable that even a hangover would have been an improvement.
Beside him, Marilee was staring around the room with wide, wary eyes.
“Looking for somebody?” Leo asked absently.
“Yes,” she replied. “Janie said she wasn’t coming, but that isn’t what your sister-in-law Tess just told me.”
“What did she say?”
Marilee looked worried. “Harley Fowler told her he was bringing Janie.”
“Harley?” Leo scowled. Harley Fowler was a courageous young man who’d actually backed up the town’s infamous mercenaries—Eb Scott, Cy Parks and Micah Steele—when they helped law enforcement face down a gang of drug dealers the year before. Harley’s name hadn’t been coupled with any of the local belles, and he was only a working-class cowboy. Janie’s father might be financially pressed at the moment, but his was a founding family of Jacobsville, and the family had plenty of prestige. Fred and his sister-in-law Lydia would be picky about who Janie married. Not, he thought firmly, that Janie was going to be marrying Harley….
“Harley’s nice,” Marilee murmured. “He’s Cy Parks’s head foreman now, and everybody says he’s got what it takes to run a business of his own.” What Marilee didn’t add was that Harley had asked her out several times before his raid on the drug lord with the local mercenaries, and she’d turned him down flat. She’d thought he bragged and strutted a little too much, that he was too immature for her. She’d even told him so. It had made her a bitter enemy of his.
Now she was rather sorry that she hadn’t given him a chance. He really was different these days, much more mature and very attractive. Not that Leo wasn’t a dish. But she felt so guilty about Janie that she couldn’t even enjoy his company, much less the party. If Janie showed up and saw her with Leo, she was going to know everything. It wasn’t conducive to a happy evening at all.
“What’s wrong?” Leo asked when he saw her expression. “Janie’s never going to get over it if she shows up and sees me with you,” she replied honestly. “I didn’t think how it would look…”
“I don’t belong to anybody,” Leo said angrily. “It’s just as well to let Janie know that. So what if she does show up? Who cares?”
“I do,” Marilee sighed.
Just as she spoke, Janie came in the door with a tall, good-looking, dark-haired man in a dark suit with a ruffled white shirt and black bow tie. Janie had just taken off her black velvet coat and hung it on the rack near the door. Under it, she was wearing a sexy white silk gown that fell softly down her slender figure to her shapely ankles. The spaghetti strips left her soft shoulders almost completely bare, and dipped low enough to draw any man’s eyes. She was wearing her thick, light brown hair down. It reached almost to her waist in back in a beautiful, glossy display. She wore just enough makeup to enhance her face, and she was clinging to Harley’s arm with obvious pleasure as they greeted the Ballengers and their wives.
Leo had forgotten how pretty Janie could look when she worked at it. Lately, he’d only seen her covered in mud and flour. Tonight, her figure drew eyes in that dress. He remembered the feel of her in his arms, the eager innocence of her mouth under his, and he suddenly felt uneasy at the way she was clinging to Harley’s arm.
If he was uncomfortable, Marilee was even more so. She stood beside Leo and looked as if she hated herself. He took another long sip of his drink before he guided her toward Harley and Janie.
“No sense hiding, is there?” he asked belligerently.
Marilee sighed miserably. “No sense at all, I guess.”
They moved forward together. Janie noticed them and her eyes widened and darkened with pain for an instant. Leo’s harsh monologue at the hardware store had been enough to wound her, but now she was seeing that she’d been shafted by her best friend, as well. Marilee said Janie didn’t know her date, but all along, apparently, she’d planned to come with Leo. No wonder she’d been so curious about whether or not Janie was going to show up.
Everything suddenly made perfect sense. Marilee had filled Leo up with lies about Janie gossiping about him, so that she could get him herself. Janie felt like an utter fool. Her chin lifted, but she didn’t smile. Her green eyes were like emerald shards as they met Marilee’s.
“H… hi, Janie,” Marilee stammered, forcing a smile. “You said you weren’t coming tonight.”
“I wasn’t,” Janie replied curtly. “But Harley was at a loose end and didn’t have a date, so he asked me.” She looked up at the tall, lean man beside her, who was some years younger than Leo, and she smiled at him with genuine affection even through her misery. “I haven’t danced in years.”
“You’ll dance tonight, darlin’,” Harley drawled, smiling warmly as he gripped her long fingers in his. He looked elegant in his dinner jacket, and there was a faint arrogance in his manner now that hadn’t been apparent before. He glanced at Marilee and there was barely veiled contempt in the look.
Marilee swallowed hard and avoided his piercing gaze.
“I didn’t know you could dance, Harley,” Marilee murmured, embarrassed.
He actually ignored her, his narrow gaze going to Leo. “Nice turnout, isn’t it?” he asked the older man.
“Nice,” Leo said, but he didn’t smile. “I haven’t seen your boss tonight.”
