by Diana Palmer
It was incredible to help deliver a calf. The process of birth was fascinating to anyone who worked around livestock. The cycle of life and death was a never-ending one on a ranch.
Morie loved working outdoors, away from the city, away from traffic and regimented life. Here, the time clock was the sun. They got up with it and went to bed with it. They learned how to identify birds by their songs. They learned the subtle weather signs that were lost in electronic prognostication. They were of the earth. It was the most wonderful job going, Morie thought, even if the pay wasn’t top scale and the work was mostly physical labor that came with mussed, stained clothing. She wouldn’t have traded it to model Paris gowns, and she’d once been offered that opportunity. It had amused and pleased her mother, who wasn’t surprised when Morie said she’d rather learn how to rope calves.
Her father would never teach her. Her brother, Cort, got the ranch training. Her primitive dad, who was living in the Stone Age, she often told him, wanted her to be a lady of leisure and do feminine things. She told him that she could work cattle every bit as well as her brother and she wanted to prove it. Her dad just laughed and walked off. Not on his ranch. Not ever.
So she found someone else’s ranch to prove it on. She’d gotten her college degree. Her dad should be happy that she’d accomplished at least one thing he’d insisted upon. Now she was going to please herself.
She threw on a nightshirt and a pair of pajama bottoms and climbed into bed. She was asleep in seconds.
THE NEXT MORNING, the boss came down to the barn, where she was feeding out a calf whose mother had been attacked by a pack of wolves. The mother had died and state agencies had been called in to trap the wolves and relocate them.
Mallory looked down at her, with the calf on her knees, and something cold inside him started to melt. She had a tender heart. He loved the picture she made, nursing that calf. But he pulled himself up taut. That couldn’t be allowed. He wasn’t having any more embarrassing interludes with the hired help that could come back to bite him.
She looked up and saw him watching her. She averted her eyes. “Morning, boss,” she said. “Morning.”
His tone wasn’t reassuring. She sighed. “I’m in trouble again, I guess.”
“Gelly said you put a visitor up to insulting her when she told you to get back to work in the kitchen,” he said flatly.
Morie just sighed.
“Well?” he persisted.
“The guy was a superior court judge who wanted my canapé recipe for his housekeeper, so I went outside with him to give it to him,” she replied wearily. “Miss Bruner interrupted us, and he was angry at the way she spoke to me. I didn’t put him up to anything.”
He frowned. “A judge?”
“Well, he said he was,” she replied, flushing. She wasn’t supposed to know the occupations of his guests.
“I see.”
No, you don’t, she fumed silently. You don’t see anything. Gelly leads you around by your temper, and you let her.
He hesitated. “The canapés were very good.”
“Thanks. Mavie and I worked hard.”
“Yes.” His dark eyes narrowed. “How is it,” he continued suspiciously, “that you know so much about how to organize a high-society party? And just where did you learn it?”
CHAPTER FIVE
MORIE STARED UP AT HIM with wide eyes while she searched frantically for an answer that wouldn’t give her away.
“The, uh, the last place I worked,” she said. “The housekeeper knew all that stuff and the boss didn’t like to hire staff, so I had to learn how to do those things to help her out.”
“I see.”
“It’s just something I picked up, and, honestly, I’d rather feed calves than work in the kitchen,” she added. “Just in case you had in mind to ask me to work with Mavie instead of out here.”
“I didn’t have that in mind.”
She nodded. “Good.”
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “You don’t like Gelly.”
“It’s not my place to like or dislike one of your friends, boss,” she replied in a subdued tone. “I’m just the newest hire…that’s all I am.”
“Gelly feels threatened by you, God knows why,” he added unconsciously. She might have been pretty if she did something to her hair and wore makeup and nice clothing. But she was scruffy and not very attractive most of the time. It still shook him that he’d kissed her and enjoyed it so much. He tried not to revisit that episode.
“Not my problem,” she murmured, and hoped she didn’t sound insolent.
“She said that the judge seemed to know you.”
“Can’t imagine why,” she said, looking up innocently. “I sure don’t travel in those circles. He might have seen me in the kitchen where I used to work, though.”
“Where was that?” he asked. “The place you used to work?”
She stared at him blankly. She’d made up the name of the place, although she’d given the phone number of a friend’s housekeeper who’d promised to sound convincing if anybody checked her out.
“Well?” he persisted.
She was flushed and the soy calf formula was leaking out of the oversize bottle she was using to feed him. Just when it seemed as if she was going to blow her own cover, a sudden loud noise came from outside the barn. It was followed by a barrage of range language that was even worse than what Morie had heard come out of her father during roundup.
Mallory rushed out. Morie, curious, put the calf back in his stall, set the empty bottle on a nearby shelf and followed.
Cane was throwing things. A saddle was lying on the ground. In the distance, a horse was galloping away.
“Mud-brained, unshod son of a…!” he raged, until he spotted Morie and bit down hard on the last word.
“What in the world is the matter with you?” Mallory asked.
Cane glared at him. His thick, short black hair was in disorder all over his head. His dark brown eyes, large and cold, were glittery with bad temper. His sensuous mouth was pulled tight against his teeth.
“I was trying to put a saddle on Old Bill,” he muttered. “I thought I could manage him. I haven’t been on a horse since I came home. The damned outlaw knocked me down on the saddle and ran off.”
The empty sleeve, pinned at the elbow where his arm had been amputated, was poignant. Cane was ultrasensitive about his injury. He never spoke of the circumstances under which he’d lost part of his arm, or about his military service. He drank, a lot, and kept to himself. He was avoided by most of the men, especially when he was turning the air blue, like now.
Morie sighed and went to the barn. She brought out one of the other older saddle horses they kept for visitors. This one was quite gentle, like the one that had run away. She heard Mallory telling one of the men to go after it.
She picked up Cane’s saddle, ignoring his outraged, indignant look. She turned the horse and draped the saddle over his back, pulling up the cinch and fastening it deftly.
“Don’t fuss,” she told Cane when she handed him the bridle. “Everybody needs a little help now and then. It’s not demeaning to let someone do you a favor. Even the hired help.”
He glared down at her for a few seconds, during which she thought he was probably going to storm away or dress her down for her insolence.
But finally he just shook his head. “Okay. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” She handed him the reins.
He was looking at the horse dubiously. It was obvious that he hadn’t tried to mount one since he was wounded.
“We have a friend back in Texas that we used to go riding with,” she said, without giving away much. “He lost an arm doing merc work overseas. He mounted offside so that he could use his good hand on the pommel to spring up into the saddle. Worked like a charm.”
His dark eyebrows went up under the wide brim of his hat. “You don’t let anybody intimidate you, do you?”
She smiled. “You’re not
intimidating. You’re just a little scary sometimes.”
He shook his head again. “Okay, I’ll try it. But if I land on my face, you’re fired.”
“You can’t fire her,” Mallory pointed out. “Unless you hired her, and you didn’t. Get on that horse and let’s go search out straggling heifers. They really are right about snow this time.”
Cane looked at his brother. “I’ll give it a shot.”
He fumbled the first time and almost fell. But he tried again, and again, until he got the rhythm just right. He sprang up into the saddle with a heavy sigh and took the reins in his hand. He wheeled the horse around and looked down at Morie. “Thanks.”
She gave him an encouraging look. “You’re welcome.”
Mallory rode in between them. “Let’s go. Daylight’s burning.”
“I’m right behind you.”
Mallory glanced at Morie and he wasn’t smiling. He didn’t like Cane smiling at her. He didn’t know why, and that made him even angrier.
“Get back to work,” he told her. He rode off behind his brother without another word.
Morie glared after him. “I was going to,” she muttered. “What did you think, I had a date to go sailing on the Caribbean or something?”
“Talking to yourself,” Darby teased. “Better watch that. They’ll be sending men with nets after you.”
“If they do, I’ll tell them the boss drove me batty,” she assured him.
“Nice, what you did for Cane,” he said, sobering. “He hasn’t tried to get on a horse since he came back. I thought he’d give up after Old Bill ran off. None of us would have dared to do what you did. Saw him punch a cowboy once for even offering, a few months ago.”
“He’s just hurting,” she said. “He doesn’t know how to cope, how to interact with people, how to go on doing normal things. I heard that he won’t go to physical therapy or even talk to a psychologist. That’s hurting him, too. It must be horrible, for a man so active and vital, to lose an arm.”
“He was the rodeo champ,” he replied solemnly. “Killed him when he had to stop competing.”
“He’ll adjust,” she said softly. “It will take time, and help. Once he realizes that, and starts going back to the therapist, he’ll learn to live with it. Like our friend did.”
His eyes narrowed. “Odd friend. A mercenary.”
“We have friends of all sorts.” She laughed. “My dad likes renegades and odd people.”
“Well, I suppose it takes all kinds to run the world,” he replied. His eyes sparkled. “And we had better get back to work. Bad time to lose a job, in this economy.”
“Tell me about it!”
WHEN CANE AND THE BOSS came back, she was riding out to check the fence line.
“You keep that music box in your pocket and those earphones out of your ears while you’re out alone, got that?” Mallory ordered abruptly.
She knew without asking that Tank had told him how he found her moving the broken tree limb. She grimaced. “Okay, boss.”
“What sort of music do you like?” Cane asked conversationally.
“Every sort,” she said with a grin. “Right now my favorite is the soundtrack from August Rush.”
His eyebrows arched. “Nice. Tank loves it, too. He bought the score. He’s still trying to master it.”
“Dalton plays?” she blurted out. She flushed and laughed when Mallory stared at her. “I noticed the grand piano in the living room. I wondered who played it.”
“Tank’s good,” Cane said, smiling. He nodded toward Mallory. “He plays, too. Of course, he’s mostly tone-deaf, but that doesn’t stop him from trying.”
“I can play better than Tank,” Mallory said, insulted.
“Not to hear him tell it,” Cane observed.
“We got the fence fixed,” Mallory told her. His eyes narrowed. “You should never have tried to move that limb by yourself.” He was looking pointedly at the scratch on her cheek.
She touched it self-consciously. “It only grazed me. I heal quickly.”
“Even I would have called somebody to help me,” Mallory persisted.
Her eyebrows arched. “Aren’t you the same man who tried to lift the front end of a parked car to move it when it was blocking the barn?” she asked with a bland smile.
He glared down at her. “I would usually have called somebody to help me. I’m the boss. You don’t question what I do…you just do what I say.”
“Oh, yes, sir,” she replied.
“And stop giggling,” he muttered.
Her eyebrows arched. “I wasn’t!”
“You were, inside, where you thought I couldn’t hear it. But I can hear it.”
She pursed her lips. “Okay.”
He shook his head. “Let’s go,” he told his brother.
But Cane didn’t follow. He was still looking at Morie with eyes that saw more than Mallory’s did. “You know, you look very familiar to me,” he said, frowning slightly. “I think I’ve seen you before, somewhere.”
She’d had that very same feeling when she first met Cane. But she didn’t remember him from any of her father’s gatherings. However, he might have been with one of the cattlemen’s groups that frequently toured Skylance to view King Brannt’s exquisite Santa Gerts. She wasn’t sure. It made her nervous. She didn’t want Cane to remember where he’d seen her, if he had.
“I just have that kind of face, I expect,” she said, assuming an innocent expression. “They say we all have a counterpart somewhere, someone who looks just like us.”
“That might be true.” He paused for a moment. “What you did—getting the horse saddled for me—that was kind. I’m sorry I was so harsh.”
“It was nothing. Besides, I’m used to harsh. I work for him.” She pointed toward Mallory.
“One more word and you’re a memory,” Mallory retorted, but his lips twitched upward at the corners.
She laughed and went back to work.
THAT NIGHT, THEY HAD A SERIES of old movies on one of the classic channels, starring Morie’s grandmother, Maria Kane. It was fascinating to watch her work, to see flashes of Shelby Kane and even herself in that beautiful, elfin face and exquisite posture.
“I wish I’d known you,” she whispered to the television screen. But Maria had died even before Shelby married Kingston Brannt. In fact, her funeral had been the catalyst that convinced King he couldn’t live without Shelby.
Morie had heard all about her parents’ romance. King and Shelby had been enemies from their earliest acquaintance. She and his brother, Danny, had been good friends who went out together on a strictly platonic basis. Then Danny had asked Shelby to pretend to be engaged to him, and he’d taken her home to Skylance. King had been eloquent in his antagonism to the match. It had provoked him into truly indefensible treatment of Shelby, for which he was later very sorry. Shelby, remembering, said that King had treated her like a princess from the day they married, trying to make up to her for all his former harsh treatment and rough words. He’d changed so much that Shelby often wondered if he was the same man she’d known in the beginning, she told her daughter.
“I can’t picture Dad being mean to you.” Morie had laughed. “He brings you flowers and chocolates all the time, buys you something every time he goes out of town, lavishes you with beautiful jewelry, takes you to Paris shopping….”
“Yes, he’s the most wonderful husband any woman could ask for, now,” Shelby had replied, smiling. “But you didn’t know him before.” She shook her head. “It was a very difficult courtship. He was hurt by another relationship and he took it out on me.” She sighed, smiling at some secret memory. “I was showing a Western collection in New York during Fashion Week when he turned up in the audience. He picked me up and carried me out of the building. I was kicking and protesting, but he never missed a step.”
Morie burst out laughing. “I can imagine Dad doing something like that,” she remarked.
Shelby sighed, her eyes dreamy. “We had coffee and
a misunderstanding. He took me back to my apartment, prepared to say goodbye for good.”
“Then what happened?” Morie asked, fascinated by the fact that her parents had once been young like her. It was hard to think of them as a dating couple.
“I asked him to kiss me goodbye,” she continued, and actually flushed. “We got engaged in the car and we were married three long days later.” She shook her head. “You never really know somebody until you live with them, Morie,” she added gently. “Your father always seemed to be the hardest, angriest, most untamable man on earth. But when we were alone…” She cleared her throat. The flush grew as she recalled their tempestuous, passionate wedding night and the unbelievable pleasure that had kept them in the hotel room for two days and nights with only bottled water and candy bars to sustain them through a marathon of lovemaking that had produced their first child, Cort. They were so hungry for each other that precautions had never entered their minds. But they’d both wanted children very much, so it hadn’t been a problem. The memory was so poignant that it could still turn her face red.
Morie laughed. “Mom, you’re blushing.”
Shelby chuckled self-consciously. “Yes, well, your father is a class of his own in some ways, and I won’t discuss it. It’s too personal. I just hope that you’re half as lucky as I’ve been in your choice of husbands.”
Morie grimaced. “If I don’t get out of here, I’ll never get married. Everybody wants me because I’ve got a rich father.”
“Some man will want you just for yourself. The traveling accountant was a bad choice. You were vulnerable and he was a predator,” Shelby said with a flash of anger. “He was very lucky that he got out of town before your father could get to him.”
“I’ll say.” She studied Shelby. “Why won’t Dad let me work on the ranch like Cort?”