Montana Red
Which made no sense at all, since during that time she’d clung to every picture of her mother she could find, yet her mother was irrevocably gone.
That was before she’d learned that nothing is forever.
She should’ve already known.
She took the turn carefully, mindful of the way the trailer was tracking because the gravel road wasn’t very wide and the last thing she needed right now was to hang a wheel off the end of the tin horn. Once she’d straightened out the rig and headed up the first rise on the winding road into the hills, Clea let herself believe it. She was here.
And Ariel was here.
Feeling even more efficient, Clea looked at her odometer so she could measure the last leg of the journey and turn in at the correct driveway.
Then she rolled down her window so she could smell this place. Sage, she knew that smell, and a hint of pine but the dry air carried other scents, too. It was such dry air and thinner than she was used to. A whole new world from the ground up.
A chuckle began deep inside, rolled up into her throat and came out as a short but sincere belly laugh.
“Hey, Brock,” she said into the enormous space that surrounded her. “Catch me if you can.”
She’d told him once or twice that she would love to live—which was true—in northern New Mexico. Live in an artists’ colony and do nothing but take pictures in that fabulous light, she had said. He might look for her there.
Or not. Half the time, he didn’t listen to a word she said.
She glanced to her left, down into the valley along the river that flashed in and out behind some trees. There was a small ranch house and barn and some other outbuildings. Who lived there? Would she ever meet them?
How far was it on up to her place? She looked at the faxed map again and checked her mileage one more time. Not far.
Here was another hill, another ridge that led on up toward the big mountains with their striped bluffs and trees with snow still on their tops. The first high ridge. That had to be it.
Clea was going into the next switchback when she saw him. She’d turned away from the glare of sunlight off the rearview mirror and there he was, an arm’s length inside the fence, riding down the slope on the right-hand side of the road.
Coming out of the trees like a cowboy in a Russell painting, his blue shirt like sky against the green. Exactly like that.
Her heart lurched. Exactly like that, with a name like Saving the Baby or Mama’s Gone. He carried a small bright sorrel foal in front of his saddle; its long legs dangled off the sides of the big gray horse.
She couldn’t take her eyes off him—something about the sure way he sat the horse, something about the easy way his left hand held the reins and his right one rested on the baby he was rescuing. He had a presence.
Without taking her eyes from him, she slowed the rig still more and grabbed her camera from the slot in the console where she always carried it. Slipping it from the case, she raised it to her eye as she slowed even more.
The rider was looking at the foal. His hat was tilted down, but just as she passed him by he lifted his head and swept his gaze across her rig. She took the shot. Broad shoulders, a lock of black hair on his forehead, a blaze of green eyes imprinted on her mind’s eye. Then she was moving again, on around the curve.
It was one of the best photos she’d ever taken. She knew it in her gut. She knew it because she could feel that a huge smile was splitting her face and she was bubbling deep inside. What a moment! What a shot! And she’d been ready!
This had to be a good omen for her new life.
She would name it Montana Cowboy.
The sight of him haunted her as she finished the short drive to the ranch entrance that matched the X on her map. Even as she turned in under the swinging hand-carved wooden sign that read Elkhorn Ranch and started looking for her cabin, she could still see the whole gorgeous scene of the cowboy and the bright foal.
The epitome of cowboy gallantry—rescuing a creature weaker than himself. Sacrificing his time and effort to make sure that this baby would be all right instead of rounding up cattle or fixing fences or breaking colts or whatever other jobs he had to do.
She spotted the cabin sitting up a long driveway in a little meadow with blazing yellow and red leaves on the trees at its back. Fall was a fantastic time of year and one that at home often was either way too short or non-existent. She was going to enjoy this one to the fullest. She was going to love it here.
Clea parked and got out, then reached into the backseat for her jean jacket. The fall wind in Montana carried a bite of coolness that would be months yet reaching Texas.
She checked on Ariel, then left her standing in the trailer while she ran through the grass to check out the barn and the pen around it. Her lungs grabbed for more of the thin, dry air that roused her blood. This was exciting. She didn’t want to sleep after all.
The barn door stood open.
Inside, she stopped short and breathed in the smell—like that of any barn but with an overlay of age and seasoned wood. Cedar. Her eyes tried to take it all in at once. It had been built of cedar logs a long, long time ago and it had been well used. It was clean; a little neglected but not bad. The realtor had assured her everything was clean.
She smiled. Talk about different! This barn was as different from any she’d ever used as Ariel was from the horses Clea imagined had lived here before. She loved its atmo-sphere—all rustic and rough and built to be serviceable. Everything useful; nothing fancy just for show.
Somebody had left some grooming brushes and buckets in the little feed room, but she had her own, of course. Same with the feed in the barrel and the hay. They looked and smelled pretty fresh, so the former tenant must’ve just moved out.
The water tank in the pen was nearly full, too. She unloaded the mare and led her around the perimeters to let her get acclimated, then left her delirious with freedom to run around inside the pen. Clea went to the back door of the house and to her shock found it unlocked. It swung open into a kitchen with the same look as the barn: functional, rustic and actually—no doubt unintentionally—charming. The furniture was the really rough kind made of logs but there was an old blanket-covered couch in the living room that looked soft and comfortable. She loved that there was a fireplace in the wall that opened to both rooms.
The basic pots, pans and dishes were in the kitchen as promised, but the supplies weren’t at all what Clea had ordered. Right then, she didn’t even care. She’d go to town tomorrow. And she’d be sure to pay only for what she got and not what she ordered when she went by the realtor’s office.
Also, she would point out to him that neither the cabin nor the barn was exactly what he’d described to her. Try to keep him honest.
And maybe talk him down on the rent? What a good idea! She’d insist on it. She had to save money where she could.
Hurriedly, she went through the rest of the house, which turned out to be two bedrooms and a bath. The view from one bedroom was better than in the other, so it would be hers. She smiled. Or if she wanted, she could make the living room do double duty because it’d be great to have a fireplace in her bedroom.
Wood. There was quite a bit stacked neatly on the back porch and more in the yard, but she’d need a lot for a whole winter. Another thing to put on her list of questions for the realtor.
Clea pulled her rig up closer to the front door and started bringing things in. There were sheets on the bed in the room she decided she’d use for the bedroom but she wanted her own, of course. And judging by the breeze, she’d need her comforter tonight. She had to check out the thermostat and maybe get the heat going now before the house got too cool. That would save money on the electric bill, wouldn’t it? She was learning to think like a woman who couldn’t afford to be wasteful anymore.
Happily, she worked at making the house hers and brought in most of what she had in the truck and trailer. She was tired, but moving around and using her muscles was energizing her. It was so much fun to create a new nest and watch it come to life, that she couldn’t quit until she was done.
The things she’d shipped should be at the freight place by now. When she went to town she’d arrange to have them delivered.
Finally, as the sun started to slide down, exhaustion dragged at her.
All she wanted was something hot in her stomach and to lay her body down. The bed was already made with her colorful serape-striped sheets. The perfect ambience for a new life in the West.
There were eggs in the refrigerator.
She could take a hot shower and….
No! It hit her like a slap. She still had chores to do. There was no one else to take care of her mare. No sense reaching for the cell phone because nobody was close enough to do her bidding.
Clea dropped down onto the couch and let her head fall into her hands. This was it. She was on her own. It didn’t matter one bit how tired she was or what she’d rather do. Poor Ariel had nobody else to depend on.
Her eyes closed. Her body, aching for sleep now that she’d thought about it, longed to turn, lift her legs onto the sofa and stretch out. Just to reach for the blanket over the back of it and cover up….
Clea ripped herself off the couch and onto her feet. “Cowgirl up,” she muttered, made a face at herself and headed for the barn.
It took an unbelievable hour for her to orient herself, decide on a stall, bring in the feed, hay and bedding that she’d brought with her, bed the stall, set up the water bucket and fill it, catch the ornery Ariel, check her over, brush her down and put her in with her feed. When the mare was happily crunching away, Clea heaved a huge sigh of relief and trudged to the house. She didn’t feel like running anymore.
In fact, she didn’t feel like anything but a shower and sleep.
Still, there were more chores. She locked up the house and dragged a chair in front of each door. This was out in the middle of nowhere. She would have to get a dog.
Then she took her shotgun into the bedroom and slid it under the edge of the bed; thoughts of outlaws and bears and cougars drifted through her head. At that moment, as she had been those nights on the road, she was very glad she’d learned to protect herself.
Turned out the water was hot, thank goodness, and she stood under it until it ran cold. Drying off with one of the delicious, fluffy towels that matched her sheets, she could barely make her arms move. Her muscles ached. But she took an extra moment or two just to enjoy the luxurious feel of the cotton against her skin.
She wouldn’t be able to buy towels like this again for a long, long time.
Finally, she finished up, dried her hair until it was only barely damp, climbed into her new cowgirl retro-print flannel pajamas and fell into bed. Just before her eyes fell closed, she saw by the moonlight streaming in at the window that the open closet—which, like the barn, seemed to have some stuff left in it—was tiny. Really, really tiny. Far too small to even be called a closet.
That realtor was definitely going to come down on the rent.
CHAPTER THREE
SOMETIMES JAKE felt like a man he didn’t know, in some place he’d never expected to be. Like now, driving down the road in a rig so new and fancy that it had a closed-circuit TV system between the truck and trailer, meant for show horses but used for wild ones. How crazy was that? If wild horses could survive on the rough, barren ranges where they’d been confined for generations, they could survive a trip down the highway without a babysitter.
But his employer, Natural Bands, was a horse-rescue organization—from California, which said it all. They aimed to keep the horses in their natural wild state and babysit them at the same time. And here he was, working for them. He had even gone so far as to sign a contract—and for a year, no less. Usually he insisted on the handshake approach to all agreements. Why do business with someone whose word is no good?
He’d made an exception for Natural Bands, though, because they had such deep pockets. Therefore, he felt like a stranger to himself. Every other job he’d ever had was one he’d taken because it offered him some adventure, or a chance to see some new country, or a big challenge, or excitement. Or because it would give him a chance to learn something.
Which, in his opinion, was the only true way to live.
Maybe so, but it’s not the best way you’ve ever tried, Hoss.
His gut tightened. True. The best way was living with Victoria and her two boys, loving all of them and feeling their love in return. But he’d never live that way again because it depended on other people, and that was a risk. A big one.
A woman might love a man temporarily. She might go back to an ex-husband because of money. Money was a poison.
Yet here he was, where he never would’ve thought he’d be, tied down for at least a year bustin’ his butt every day for Natural Bands and riding other people’s colts half the night. For what reason? Money.
Wanting something that cost a lot of money changed a man.
“Listen here, Jake. Don’t tell that woman boss of yours we’ve got that orphan filly. I aim to make a helluva usin’ horse outta her.”
Jake turned in time to see the conspiratorial wink from his uncle Buck, sitting over there in the passenger seat, scheming his schemes.
Buck’s buddy, Teddy, spoke up from the backseat. “Funny thing to me, this our orphan business,” he said loftily. “I might have some claim to that little mustang but, Buck, you shore don’t.”
“How you figger that?”
“I’m the one raisin’ her. I took the night shift last night. So far, you ain’t done nothin’ but try to boss me and Jake.”
“We ain’t had her a week yet,” Buck said. “She’ll still need her milk fer a few more days. I still got time to do more chores than you do.”
“Quit lyin’. You won’t do a damn thing. You never do. You couldn’t make my silly aunt Polly believe that.”
Here was something else as incredible as working on a contract: Jake Hawthorne hanging out all the time with two old men who talked too much and kept nosing into his business. Living with them, in fact—but only for a couple of weeks—so he’d have help feeding the little filly he had so foolishly saved. Every four hours. He’d never get anything else done if he had to do all the feeding himself.
So, for that reason it was good that he had let them stay when they appeared in his yard a couple of months ago to announce that they’d come to help him with his new job. “Seeing as how we know all about wild horses and you don’t know squat,” they’d said.
He still couldn’t believe that he’d let them attach themselves to him like that. He was a natural loner and he couldn’t tolerate constant company. Even if Tori had stayed with him, he would’ve gotten tired of her and the boys. And from the minute they’d gone, with tears pouring down their little faces, he’d sworn he would never again take responsibility for the health and happiness of any creature except himself—and Stoney, of course.
Yet here he was with a helpless foal and these two old men on his hands.
Right this minute he was wishing like crazy that he’d sent them packing the minute they showed up. He hated being cooped up in a truck with them when they argued. Which was what they did for fun.
“That orphan baby is Jake’s,” Teddy declared. “He’s the one who found her.”
Jake spoke up to try to put an end to this new foolishness.
“When she gets a little older I’ll probably take her up to the Great Divide for Elle to raise her. Little sister’s always been good with young animals. She’s the rescuer of the family.”
They ignored him.
“She’s Jake’s all right, but I aim t’ trade for her,” Buck said.
“Trade what? You ain’t got no horses but Topper and you need him.”
“I seen Jake throw a jealous glance or two at my old pickup.”
Teddy chuckled and said, “You’ll play hell gittin’ that trade done. And even if you did, then you wouldn’t have no way to git around.”
“You don’t understand me, Ted,” Buck said. “I’m only tradin’ him the right to drive my truck some.”
That made them laugh. Jake, too.
Sometimes it wasn’t so bad having the old guys around all the time.
“Forget Celeste,” Jake said. “She knows the filly can’t keep up with the wild bands. Even if she could, there’d be no wet mares to feed her—if they would. This is a freak deal, that mare foaling so late in the year.”
“Yeah, but remember it’s Montana Red that’s the sire,” Teddy said wisely. “That old devil breeds as he pleases. He probably stole that mare and bred her at the wrong time just so’s she’d lose the other stud’s baby.”
“Surprises me Celeste knows that much,” Buck said, ignoring Teddy entirely. “Reckon she knows that white devil we just now hauled to her Cal-i-forn-y man will drive them young bachelor studs outta his band pretty soon and the family won’t all be together anymore?”
He and Teddy chuckled over that and shook their heads.
“Them old-time mustangers would laugh their heads off at this whole deal,” Buck said. “Whoever heard of tryin’ to keep wild-horse families together? Can’t even do that for people.”
Teddy nodded. “Plus out there on the range, sometimes the mares switch bands. Them old-timers could tell Celeste that, too.”
Jake smiled to himself. Teddy and Buck themselves were old-time mustangers.
“I don’t care if they put ‘em in houses and buy ‘em a bed,” Buck said. “Long as they keep on payin’ us the big money.”
That’s where you made your mistake, Jake. You shouldn’t have started paying them so much. If they were making less, maybe they’d go away.
No, they wouldn’t. They didn’t care any more about money than he used to. They were helping him for the adventure of it. If he cut off their wages right now, they’d still hang around and help him for nothing until the work was all done. They would finish what they’d started because that was one of the rules of the code they’d lived by for fifty years or more.
“There,” Teddy said. “There’s our turn up ahead, Jake.”
The backseat driving got on Jake’s nerves as much or more than anything else about being with the old boys all day.
“Comin’ right up, too,” Teddy said. “Jake. You just as well to start to shuttin’ ‘er down.”
Sometimes it was so bad having the old guys around all the time.
“I’ve got a handle on it, Ted,” he said.
“Cain’t tell it from how fast you’re drivin’. You gotta slow down now. Ain’t that right, Buck?”
Jake clamped his jaw shut. Complaining had never shut Teddy up, so he might as well save his breath and the hurt feelings that were bound to result if he said what he wanted to say.
“Put a lid on it, Ted,” Buck said. “You talk too much anyhow.”
“You’re runnin’ your mouth right now,” Ted snapped back.
Jake slowed the truck and turned up Firecreek Mountain Road.
“What was I thinking when I let you two hook up with me?” he asked, just to break the cycle of petty sniping. “You sound like a couple of magpies.”
“You mean to say ‘what was you thinking when you killed that cat that was only doing what comes naturally so’s you could pick up that little broomtail scrub for me to raise?’” Theodore’s tone sounded so dignified and righteously offended that Jake and Buck laughed again.
“Just hang in there, Ted,” Jake said. “It won’t be long ‘til she’ll be on grain and grass. Besides, Buck just told you—broomtail or not—she’s gonna make a helluva usin’ horse.”
He made the turn and pulled the full length of the trailer onto the graveled road before he stepped on the accelerator again and started up the hill.
“I’m gonna stop at my house to pick up some more clean clothes,” he said. “Might as well take some of that food in the fridge, too, so it won’t go to waste.”
“Well, don’t think you can stay at yore house,” Teddy said. “You’re gonna take your turn on them foal feedings just like the rest of us.”
“Jake’s got colts to ride,” Buck said.
“And they’re over at the big barn, too, ain’t they?” Teddy said. “You jist as well get all your gear, Jake, and move in with us because you already brought us all your responsibilities.”
Jake tuned them out and looked at the mountains as the rig pulled the grade and wound its way up the hill. This was a pretty area all right, but to his eye not as beautiful as it was up in the Garnet Range where he was buying his place. If….
No. Not if. When. He was in this now and he had the land half paid for. He could finish paying it off in a couple more years if he stayed hitched and worked as hard as he’d been working. He wanted that place like he’d never wanted anything. Well…anything that could be bought with money.
But the thought of settling down in one place scared the hell out of him, too. What else would he do? He’d lost his yearning to roam.
Tori was gone for good and he was not making a landowner out of himself to acquire “something to offer her and her boys.”
He didn’t want her back anyhow, unless he could turn back time to the way things were when she and the boys first moved in with him. He could never take her back now, even if she wanted to come back, because he’d never be able to trust her again. She’d chosen a remarriage with no passion and no love—she’d gone back to the very opposite of Jake—for the sake of security. “He has something to offer me and my boys” was what she’d said when she broke the news.
No, he was not buying his own place so that next time he’d have something to offer a woman. There wasn’t going to be a next time. He would never live with a woman again. The remote, beautiful land he’d bought was going to be a place for himself, a place where he could live alone and raise some horses that would support him so he wouldn’t have to drive all over creation shut up in a truck with two garrulous, bossy old men.
He began slowing for the turn as Teddy was still urging him to do, clamping his jaw shut as he took the road into the ranch and then, soon after, the driveway that led to the little cabin he’d added to the rental deal after the old guys had showed up and moved into the big one with him. He’d had to have a private hideout or lose his mind. He just wasn’t made to live with other people.
His eyes widened as they neared the house. “Hey, what’s this? Looks like I got company.”
“Company pullin’ a trailer,” Buck said. “Reckon it’s thieves? Good thing your horses ain’t here.”
“I’ll block ‘em in, just in case,” Jake said, and pulled up to park so his trailer would be across the driveway.
The front door flew open and a beautiful woman with a shotgun in her hands strode out onto the porch. The surprise of it made all three men draw in an involuntary breath.
Teddy said, “Looks like they’re makin’ thieves a lot prettier these days.” Jake and Buck both started opening their doors. The woman raised the gun.
“Don’t get out,” she yelled.
“If she’s a thief, she’s a damn-sure successful one,” Jake muttered. “That vest she’s got on is real fox fur.”
That and everything else about her screamed money. She was polished and burnished and shiny all over, from the pale hair swinging around her face to the little thread of gold in her turtleneck sweater to the tips of her pointed-toe shoes. Her legs, slim and as long as forever, were wrapped tight in bootcut jeans with flowers embroidered up the side. The shoes were those killer ones with high, skinny heels that would stab desire into a man’s heart with every step they took toward him—and despair with every step away.