Steel Resolve

“All you do is work, then hide out in your apartment not to be seen again until you do the same thing the next day,” Rick had argued. “You might just have fun and I cook damned good barbecue. Come on, it’s just a few friends.”

He’d gone, planning not to stay longer than it took to drink a couple of beers and have some barbecued ribs. He’d been on his second beer when he’d seen her. Fiona stood out among the working-class men and women at the party because she’d come straight from her job at a local real estate company.

She wore high heels that made her long legs look even longer. Her curvaceous body was molded into a dark suit with a white blouse and gold jewelry. Her long blond hair was pulled up, accentuating her tanned throat against the white of her blouse.

He’d become intensely aware of how long it had been since he’d felt anything but anguish over his breakup with Mary and his mother’s sickness, and the secret that she’d taken with her.

“Fiona Barkley,” she’d said, extending her hand.

Her hand had been cool and dry, her grip strong. “Chase Steele.”

She’d chuckled, her green eyes sparking with humor. “For real? A cowboy named Chase Steele?”

“My father was an extra in a bunch of Western movies,” he lied since he had no idea who his father had been.

She cocked a brow at him. “Really?”

He shook his head. “I grew up on a ranch in Montana.” He shrugged. “Cowboying is in my blood.”

Fiona had taken his almost empty beer can from him and handed him her untouched drink. “Try that. I can tell that you need it.” The drink had been strong and buzzed through his bloodstream.

Normally she wasn’t the type of woman he gravitated toward. But she was so different from Mary, and it had been so long since he’d even thought about another woman. The party atmosphere, the urn behind his pickup seat and the drinks Fiona kept plying him with added to his what-the-hell attitude that night.

“How long have you two been dating?” Rick asked now in the cool dark of the bar.

“We never dated. I told her that first night that I was in love with someone else. But I made the mistake of sleeping with her. Sleeping with anyone given the way I feel about the woman back home was a mistake.”

“So you told Fiona there was another woman.” His boss groaned. “That explains a lot. Fiona now sees it as a competition between her and the other woman. She won’t give up. She hates losing. It’s what makes her such a great Realtor.”

“Well, it’s all moot now since I’m leaving for Montana.”

Rick didn’t look convinced that it would be that easy. “Does she know?”

He nodded.

“Well, hopefully you’ll get out of town without any trouble.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“Sorry, but according to Patty, when Fiona feels the man pulling away... Well, it makes her a little...crazy.”

Chase shook his head. “This just keeps getting better and better.” He picked up his beer, drained it and got to his feet. “I’m going home to pack. The sooner I get out of town the better.”

“I wish I could talk you out of leaving,” Rick said. “You’re one of the best finish carpenters I’ve had in a long time. I hope you’re not leaving because of Fiona. Seriously, she’ll latch on to someone else. I wouldn’t worry about it. It’s just Fiona being Fiona. Unless you’re going back to this woman you’re in love with?”

He laughed. “If only it were that easy. She’s the one who broke it off with me.” He liked Rick. But the man hadn’t warned him about Fiona, and if Rick mentioned to Patty who mentioned to Fiona... He knew he was being overly cautious. Fiona wouldn’t follow him all the way to Montana. She had a job, a condo, a life here. But still, he found himself saying, “Not sure what I’m doing. Might stop off in Colorado for a while.”

“Well, good luck. And again, sorry about Fiona.”

As he left the bar, he thought about Mary and the letter he’d hidden in his sock drawer with her phone number. He’d thought about calling her to let her know he was headed home. He was also curious about the package she’d said a friend of his mother had left for him.

Since getting the letter, he’d thought about calling dozens of times. But what he had to say, he couldn’t in a phone call. He had to see Mary. Now that he was leaving, he couldn’t wait to hit the road.

* * *

MARY CARDWELL SAVAGE reined in her horse to look out at the canyon below her. The Gallatin River wound through rugged cliffs and stands of pines, the water running clear over the colored rocks as pale green aspen leaves winked from the shore. Beyond the river and the trees, she could make out the resort town that had sprouted up across the canyon. She breathed in the cool air rich with the scent of pine and the crisp cool air rising off the water.

Big Sky, Montana, had changed so much in her lifetime and even more in her mother’s. Dana Cardwell Savage had seen the real changes after the ski resort had been built at the foot of Lone Peak. Big Sky had gone from a ranching community to a resort area, and finally to a town with a whole lot of housing developments and businesses rising to the community’s growing needs.

The growth had meant more work for her father, Marshal Hud Savage. He’d been threatening to retire since he said he no longer recognized the canyon community anymore. More deputies had to be hired each year because the area was experiencing more crime.

Just the thought of the newest deputy who’d been hired made her smile a little. Dillon Ramsey was the kind of man a woman noticed—even one who had given her heart away when she was fifteen and had never gotten it back.

Dillon, with his dark wavy hair and midnight black eyes, had asked her out, and she’d said she’d think about it. If her best friend Kara had been around, she would have thought Mary had lost her mind. Anyone who saw Dillon knew two things about him. He was a hunk, and he was dangerous to the local female population.

Since telling him she’d think about it, she had been mentally kicking herself. Had she really been sitting around waiting to hear from Chase? What was wrong with her? It had been weeks. When she’d broken it off and sent him packing, she hadn’t been sitting around moping over him. Not really. She’d been busy starting a career, making a life for herself. So what had made her write that stupid letter?

Wasn’t it obvious that if he’d gotten her letter, he should have called by now? Since the letter hadn’t come back, she had to assume that it had arrived just fine. The fact that he hadn’t called or written her back meant that he wasn’t interested. He also must not be interested in the package his mother’s friend had left for him either. It was high time to forget about that cowboy, and why not do it with Dillon Ramsey?

Because she couldn’t quit thinking about Chase and hadn’t been able to since she’d first laid eyes on him when they were both fifteen. They’d been inseparable all through high school and college. Four years ago he’d told her he was going to have to leave. They’d both been twenty-four, too young to settle down, according to her father and Chase had agreed. He needed to go find himself since not knowing who his father was still haunted him.

It had broken her heart when he’d left her—and Montana. She’d dated little after he left town. Mostly because she’d found herself comparing the men she had dated to Chase. At least with Dillon, she sensed a wild, dangerousness in him that appealed to her right now.

Her father hadn’t liked hearing that Dillon had asked her out. “I wish you’d reconsider,” he’d said when she’d stopped by Cardwell Ranch where she’d grown up. She’d bought her own place in Meadow Village closer to the center of town, and made the first floor into her office. On the third floor was her apartment where she lived. The second floor had been made into one-bedroom apartments that she rented.

But she still spent a lot of time on the ranch because that’s where her heart was—her family, her horses and her love for the land. She hadn’t even gone far away to college—just forty miles to Montana State University in Bozeman. She couldn’t be far from Cardwell Ranch and couldn’t imagine that she ever would. She was her mother’s daughter, she thought. Cardwell Ranch was her legacy.

Dana Cardwell had fought for this ranch years ago when her brothers and sister had wanted to sell it and split the money after their mother died. Dana couldn’t bear to part with the family ranch. Fortunately, her grandmother, Mary Cardwell, had left Dana the ranch in her last will, knowing Dana would keep the place in the family always.

Ranching had been in her grandmother’s blood, the woman Mary had been named after. Just as it was in Dana’s and now Mary’s. Chase hadn’t understood why she couldn’t walk away from this legacy that the women in her family had fought so hard for.

But while her mother was a hands-on ranch woman, Mary liked working behind the scenes. She’d taken over the accounting part of running the ranch so her mother could enjoy what she loved—being on the back of a horse.

“What is wrong with Dillon Ramsey?” Dana Cardwell Savage had asked her husband after Mary had told them that the deputy had asked her out.

“He’s new and, if you must know, there’s something troublesome about him that I haven’t been able to put my finger on yet,” Hud had said.

Mary had laughed. She knew exactly what bothered her father about Dillon—the same thing that attracted her to the young cocky deputy. If she couldn’t have Chase, then why not take a walk on the wild side for once?

She had just finished unsaddling her horse and was headed for the main house when her cell phone rang, startling her. Her pulse jumped. She dug the phone out and looked at the screen, her heart in her throat. It was a long-distance number and not one she recognized. Chase?

Sure took him long enough to finally call, she thought, and instantly found herself making excuses for him. Maybe he was working away from cell phone coverage. It happened all the time in Montana. Why not in Arizona? Or maybe her letter had to chase him down, and he’d just now gotten it and called the moment he read it.

It rang a second time. She swallowed the lump in her throat. She couldn’t believe how nervous she was. Silly goose, she thought. It’s probably not Chase at all but some telemarketer calling to try to sell her something.

She answered on the third ring. “Hello?” Her voice cracked.

Silence, then a female voice. “Mary Cardwell Savage?” The voice was hard and crisp like a fall apple, the words bitten off.

“Yes?” she asked, disappointed. She’d gotten her hopes up that it was Chase, with whatever excuse he had for not calling sooner. It wouldn’t matter as long as he’d called to say that he felt the same way she did and always had. But she’d been right. It was just some telemarketer. “I’m sorry, but whatever you’re selling, I’m not inter—”

“I read your letter you sent Chase.”

Her breath caught as her heart missed a beat. She told herself that she’d heard wrong. “I beg your pardon?”

“Leave my fiancé alone. Don’t write him. Don’t call him. Just leave him the hell alone.”

She tried to swallow around the bitter taste in her mouth. “Who is this?” Her voice sounded breathy with fear.

“The woman who’s going to marry Chase Steele. If you ever contact him again—”

Mary disconnected, her fingers trembling as she dropped the phone into her jacket pocket as if it had scorched her skin. The woman’s harsh low voice was still in her ears, furious and threatening. Whoever she was, she’d read the letter. No wonder Chase hadn’t written or called. But why hadn’t he? Had he shown the letter to his fiancée? Torn it up? Kept it so she found it? Did it matter? His fiancée had read the letter and was furious, and Mary couldn’t blame her.

She buried her face in her hands. Chase had gone off to find himself. Apparently he’d succeeded in finding a fiancée as well. Tears burned her eyes. Chase was engaged and getting married. Could she be a bigger fool? Chase had moved on, and he hadn’t even had the guts to call and tell her.

Angrily, Mary wiped at her tears as she recalled the woman’s words and the anger she’d heard in them. She shuddered, regretting more than ever that stupid letter she’d written. The heat of humiliation and mortification burned her cheeks. If only she hadn’t poured her heart out to him. If only she had just written him about the package and left it at that. If only...

Unfortunately, she’d been feeling nostalgic the night she wrote that letter. Her mare was about to give birth so she was staying the night at the ranch in her old room. She’d come in from the barn late that night, and had seen the package she’d promised to let Chase know about. Not far into the letter, she’d become sad and regretful. Filled with memories of the two of them growing up together on the ranch from the age of fifteen, she’d decide to call him only to find that his number was no longer in service. Then she’d tried to find him on social media. No luck. It was as if he’d dropped off the face of the earth. Had something happened to him?

Worried, she’d gone online and found an address for him but no phone number. In retrospect, she should never have written the letter—not in the mood she’d been in. What she hated most since he hadn’t answered her letter or called, was that she had written how much she missed him and how she’d never gotten over him and how she regretted their breakup.

She’d stuffed the letter into the envelope addressed to him and, wiping her tears, had left it on her desk in her old room at the ranch as she climbed into bed. The next morning before daylight her mother had called up to her room to say that the mare had gone into labor. Forgetting all about the letter, she’d been so excited about the new foal that she’d put everything else out of her mind. By the time she remembered the letter, it was gone. Her aunt Stacy had seen it, put a stamp on the envelope and mailed it for her.

At first, Mary had been in a panic, expecting Chase to call as soon as he received the letter. She’d played the conversation in her head every way she thought possible, all but one of them humiliating. As days passed, she’d still held out hope. Now after more than two weeks and that horrible phone call, she knew it was really over and she had to accept it.

Still her heart ached. Chase had been her first love. Did anyone ever get over their first love? He had obviously moved on. Mary took another deep breath and tried to put it out of her mind. She loved summer here in the canyon. The temperature was perfect—never too cold or too hot. A warm breeze swayed the pine boughs and keeled over the tall grass in the pasture nearby. Closer a horse whinnied from the corral next to the barn as a hawk made a slow lazy circle in the clear blue overhead.

Days like this she couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. She took another deep breath. She needed to get back to her office. She had work to do. Along with doing the ranch books for Cardwell Ranch, she had taken on work from other ranches in the canyon and built a lucrative business.

She would get over Chase or die trying, she told herself. As she straightened her back, her tears dried, and she walked toward her SUV. She’d give Deputy Dillon Ramsey a call. It was time she moved on. Like falling off a horse, she was ready to saddle up again. Forgetting Chase wouldn’t be easy, but if anyone could help the process, she figured Dillon Ramsey was the man to do it.

Chapter Three

Chase was carrying the last of his things out to his pickup when he saw Fiona drive up. He swore under his breath. He’d hoped to leave without a scene. Actually, he’d been surprised that she hadn’t come by sooner. As she was friends with Rick’s wife, Patty, Chase was pretty sure she had intel into how the packing and leaving had been going.

He braced himself as he walked to his pickup and put the final box into the back. He heard Fiona get out of her car and walk toward him. He figured it could go several ways. She would try seduction or tears or raging fury, or a combination of all three.

Hands deep in the pockets of her jacket as she approached, she gave him a shy smile. It was that smile that had appealed to him that first night. He’d been vulnerable, and he suspected she’d known it. Did she think that smile would work again?

He felt guilty for even thinking that she was so calculating and yet he’d seen the way she’d worked him. “Fiona, I don’t want any trouble.”

“Trouble?” She chuckled. “I heard you were moving out today. I only wanted to come say goodbye.”

Chase wished that was the extent of it, but he’d come to know her better than that. “I think we covered goodbye the last time we saw each other.”

She ignored that. “I know you’re still angry with me—”

“Fiona—”

Tears welled in her green eyes as if she could call them up at a moment’s notice. “Chase, at least give me a hug goodbye. Please.” Before he could move, she closed the distance between them. As she did, her hands came out of her jacket pockets. The blade of the knife in her right hand caught the light as she started to put her arms around his neck.

As he jerked back, he grabbed her wrist. “What the—” He cursed as he tightened his grip on her wrist holding the knife. She was stronger than she looked. She struggled to stab him as she screamed obscenities at him.

The look in her eyes was almost more frightening than the knife clutched in her fist. He twisted her wrist until she cried out and dropped the weapon. The moment it hit the ground, he let go of her, realizing he was hurting her.

She dived for the knife, but he kicked it away, chasing after it before she could pick it up again. She leaped at him, pounding on his back as she tried to drag him to the ground.

He threw her off. She stumbled and fell to the grass and began to cry hysterically. He stared down at her. Had she really tried to kill him?

“Don’t! Don’t kill me!” she screamed, raising her hands as if she thought he was going to stab her. He’d forgotten that he’d picked up the knife, but he wasn’t threatening her with it.

He didn’t understand what was going on until he realized they were no longer alone. Fiona had an audience. Some of the apartment tenants had come out. One of them, an elderly woman, was fumbling with her phone as if to call the cops.

“Everything is all right,” he quickly told the woman.

The older woman looked from Fiona to him and back. Her gaze caught on the knife he was holding at his side.

“There is no reason to call the police,” Chase said calmly as he walked to the trash cans lined up along the street, opened one and dropped the knife into the bottom.

“That’s my best knife!” Fiona yelled. “You owe me for that.”

He saw that the tenant was now staring at Fiona, who was brushing off her jeans as she got to her feet.

“What are you staring at, you old crone? Go back inside before I take that phone away from you and stick it up your—”

“Fiona,” Chase said as the woman hurriedly turned and rushed back inside. He shook his head as he gave Fiona a wide berth as he headed toward his apartment to lock up. “Go home before the police come.”

“She won’t call. She knows I’ll come back here if she does.”

He hoped Fiona was right about the woman not making the call. Otherwise, he’d be held up making a statement to the police—that’s if he didn’t end up behind bars. He didn’t doubt that Fiona would lie through her teeth about the incident.

“She won’t make you happy,” Fiona screamed after him as he opened the door to his apartment, keeping an eye on her the whole time. The last thing he wanted was her getting inside. If she didn’t have another weapon, he had no doubt she’d find one.

Stopping in the doorway, he looked back at her. Her makeup had run along with her nose. She hadn’t bothered to wipe either. She looked small, and for a moment his heart went out to her. What had happened to that professional, together woman he’d met at the party?

“You need to get help, Fi.”

She scoffed at that. “You’re the one who needs help, Chase.”

He stepped inside, closed and locked the door, before sliding the dead bolt. Who’s to say she didn’t have a half dozen spare keys made. She’d lied about the building manager opening the door for her. She’d lied about a lot of things. He had no idea who Fiona Barkley was. But soon she would be nothing more than a bad memory, he told himself as he finished checking to make sure he hadn’t left anything. When he looked out, he saw her drive away.

Only then did he pick up his duffel bag, lock the apartment door behind him and head for his truck, anxious to get on the road to Montana. But as he neared his pickup, he saw what Fiona had left him. On the driver’s-side window scrawled crudely in lipstick were the words You’ll regret it.

That was certainly true. He regretted it already. He wondered what would happen to her and feared for the next man who caught her eye. Maybe the next man would handle it better, he told himself.

Tossing his duffel bag onto the passenger seat, he pulled an old rag from under the seat and wiped off what he could of the lipstick. Then, climbing into this truck, he pointed it toward Montana and Mary, putting Fiona out of his mind.

* * *

THERE WERE DAYS when Dana felt all sixty-two of her years. Often when she looked at her twenty-eight-year-old daughter, Mary, she wondered where the years had gone. She felt as if she’d merely blinked and her baby girl had grown into a woman.

Being her first and only daughter, Mary had a special place in her heart. So when Mary hurt, Dana did too. Ever since Chase and Mary had broken up and he’d left town, her daughter had been heartsick, and Dana had had no idea how to help her.

She knew that kind of pain. Hud had broken her heart years ago when they’d disagreed and he’d taken off. But he’d come back, and their love had overcome all the obstacles that had been thrown at them since. She’d hoped that Mary throwing herself into her accounting business would help. But as successful as Mary now was with her business, the building she’d bought, the apartments she’d remodeled and rented, there was a hole in her life—and her heart. A mother could see it.

“Sis, have you heard a word I’ve said?”

Dana looked from the window where she’d been watching Mary unsaddling her horse to where her brother sat at the kitchen table across from her. “Sorry. Did you just say cattle thieves?”

Jordan shook his head at her and smiled. There’d been a time when she and her brother had been at odds over the ranch. Fortunately, those days were long behind them. He’d often said that the smartest thing he’d ever done was to come back here, make peace and help Dana run Cardwell Ranch. She couldn’t agree more.

“We lost another three head. Hud blames paleo diets,” Jordan said, and picked up one of the chocolate chip cookies Dana had baked that morning.

“How many does this make?” she asked.

“There’s at least a dozen gone,” her brother said.

She looked to her husband who sat at the head of the table and had also been watching Mary out the window. Hud reached for another cookie. He came home every day for lunch and had for years. Today she’d made sandwiches and baked his favorite cookies.

“They’re hitting at night, opening a gate, cutting out only a few at a time and herding them to the road where they have a truck waiting,” the marshal said. “They never hit in the same part of any ranch twice, so unless we can predict where they’re going to show up next... We aren’t the only ones who’ve had losses.”

“We could hire men to ride the fences at night,” Jordan said.

“I’ll put a deputy or two on the back roads for a couple of nights and see what we come up with,” Hud said and, pushing away his plate and getting to his feet, shot Dana a questioning look.

Jordan, apparently recognizing the gesture, also got to his feet and excused himself. As he left, Hud said, “I know something is bothering you, and it isn’t rustlers.”