He took a deep breath. So forget about it. So you shared a tumble or two when you were both young and consumed by hormones. That's all it had been, a lustful mating of two young healthy animals, remember? To his everlasting disgust, he did remember—too goddamn well, for his own liking. And, Jesus, he wished he had a cigarette.
The past wasn't something that he dwelled on. Irritated with himself and most especially with his reaction to the mere glimpse of Shelly Granger, Sloan spun on his heels and climbed back into the big Suburban.
The weight of a small warm body landing in his lap immediately softened his bleak expression. A pair of paws hit his chest, and a damp tongue caressed his cheek. His mood lightened, and he grinned down into the luxuriously be-whiskered face of a tiny silver-and-black miniature schnauzer female. Two expressive black eyes regarded him fixedly from beneath a pair of overhanging silver eyebrows.
“OK. OK. I know you're there and anxious for us to reach the cabin,” he muttered, as he ran a hand over her haunches, wondering not for the first time how he had ended up with a bearded and mustached dog no bigger than a cat. Fastidious as a cat, too, and as arrogant and demanding—and downright prissy in the bargain, Sloan admitted with a grin. Pandora was certainly not the sort of dog he had ever thought to own…or the sort of dog he had thought to be owned by!
Away from the boardrooms and offices of Ballinger Development, headquartered in Santa Rosa, Sloan was an avid rider and outdoorsman, his heart firmly lodged in Oak Valley and the sprawling ranch that his many-times-greatgrandfather, York, had first torn from the wilderness. In York's day and for some generations after that, the Ballingers had raised cattle and logged the forests, but in the last fifteen or so, under Sloan's guidance, they had begun to raise horses. Very, very expensive horses—American paint horses of impeccable lineage and breathtaking performance abilities—as anyone who had seen them cut cattle could attest. Being a big, athletic man, used to hard, physical work when it was called for and with his rock-carved features, he wouldn't have hesitated to say that his taste in dogs ran to the larger and more robust. If it had been a rottweiler or pit bull sharing the vehicle with him, no one would have thought it strange—least of all Sloan.
It was all Samantha's fault, he thought as he avoided another swipe of the pink tongue, and it had come about a couple of years ago when he had driven up to his youngest sister's house on the outskirts of Novato to wish her a happy trip to Mexico. She was flying down the next day to visit the Mexican branch of the family for an extended stay—her marriage had ended two months previously, and Sloan had thought that it would be a good idea for her to get away for a while. Not only had he stopped by to wish her a good trip, but he'd wanted to be easy in his own mind that she was definitely going to be on the plane tomorrow and hadn't slid back into the blue funk she'd been in since the divorce. She'd looked fine, happier than he had seen her in several months. He was just congratulating himself on his clever engineering of getting her away for a while when he had found himself gingerly holding a tiny black ball of fur.
As a hobby Sam showed and raised miniature schnauzers, specializing in the uncommon black and silvers. Sloan knew that the puppy was out of Sam's favorite bitch, Gemini, a finished champion—he'd been by to admire the litter several times during the past weeks, using the puppies as an excuse to check on Sam's well-being. Not a stupid man, he had felt alarm flags fly all over the place when he looked down at the little creature leaning confidingly against his chest and then across at his sister's expectant features.
“Uh, is there a reason I'm standing here holding this fur-ball? I thought you'd sold all of them.”
“Well, not exactly,” Sam had hedged. “There's a lady in the LA area who thinks she might want this one. She just hasn't made up her mind yet.”
One of Sloan's eyebrows cocked. “And this affects me how?”
“Um. I thought maybe you could keep her for me, until either the lady makes up her mind, or I get back.”
“Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you going to be gone for six weeks or so?”
“Oh, I'm sure you won't have to keep her that long,” Sam said airily. “Midge is bound to make up her mind within a week or two.”
Sloan smiled sweetly and thrust the puppy at Sam. “Then I suggest that you tell Midge in which kennel you have placed the animal, and if she decides to buy it, that she can make arrangements for its delivery through them.”
Sam jumped nimbly away, her eyes laughing at him as she put her hands behind her back. “Sloan, she's only three months old! She's too young to be put in a kennel for six weeks while I'm gone.”
“Aha! I knew there was no Midge involved. Sorry, kiddo, but it won't work. The furball's all yours.”
Sam made a face. “I knew I shouldn't have tried to trick you. But what am I going to do with her? I've already tried to get Ross or Roxanne to keep her for me, but they both said absolutely not! And Ilka is out of town—she went with Mom and Dad on that trip to Greece. The puppy is just too young to be placed in a kennel for that long.” She sighed. “Of course, if you won't take her, I suppose I'll just have to cancel my trip.” A hint of tears suddenly appeared in her eyes. “It's been such a long time since I've gone anywhere and I've been so looking forward to seeing Tio Ward and Tia Madalena and all the others….” A quiver entered her voice, and she turned her head away, a curtain of dark hair hiding her features. Nobly she said, “It was my decision to breed Gemini, and so it's my responsibility to take care of her offspring. If you won't watch her for me, I'll just forget about my trip.”
Sloan knew when he was being manipulated, and while he had a reputation as a cold, hard negotiator in business, his family saw an entirely different side of him. He glanced down at the puppy, which had begun to chew happily on one of his fingers, then across at his sister—his sister who he suspected was grinning to herself. He sighed. “All right. I'll watch her for you. But I'm warning you, Sam, I want you to pick her up within twenty-four hours of your arrival back in the States. And dammit, I mean it!”
Tears magically gone, Sam had giggled and bounced over to kiss his cheek. “Of course, that goes without saying.”
Sloan smiled at the memory, and Pandora gave him another lick on the chin, then jumped back into her carrying case on the other seat of the vehicle. When Sam had returned, there had never been any question of giving Pandora back—as his wily sister had known.
His sour mood vanquished, he put the key in the ignition, and the engine turned over. Gliding back onto the road, he kept his foot steady on the gas. Since he planned to stay at his cabin in the mountains at the northern end of the valley, he'd better get a move on. He hadn't planned on arriving this late, but that last meeting over dinner at Ross's town house before he began an extended vacation, one he hoped would become permanent, had taken much longer than he or his younger brother had estimated. By the time they'd hashed out all the final details of Ross taking over the reins as CEO of Ballinger Development, it had been near midnight. At almost thirty-two, Ross was well qualified to run their various development deals—he'd grown up in the business and had been Sloan's right-hand man for the past three years. Sloan grinned. If it worked out as expected, both of them were getting what they wanted; Ross got to run Ballinger Development, and Sloan got to devote his full attention to his passion; raising horses. A yawn overtook him. He was looking forward to arriving at his destination—after he'd traveled the final ten, eleven miles of road—the last six of it, winding and graveled.
Shelly woke the next morning, disoriented and confused. She lay in bed, blinking up at the netting, trying to get her bearings. Then she remembered. She was home. In Oak Valley. And Josh was dead.
She buried her head in the pillows, wondering how long it would be before she stopped waking up and facing each day with that painful knowledge. From the moment she'd received Mike Sawyer's phone call, it seemed that a black pall had settled over her. Maybe, she thought, once Josh's ashes are scattered. And today, she reminded her
self, was the day she would do that one last thing for Josh. Mike Sawyer was driving up from Ukiah this morning, bringing the urn with Josh's ashes in it. Together they planned to carry out Josh's final wish. She sighed. Not exactly a task she was looking forward to, and yet once it was done…
She sighed again. Once it was done, she could begin to heal. She hoped.
Shelly glanced at the clock on the nightstand and groaned. Ten o'clock, but her body felt as if she had never gone to sleep. Not getting to bed until three-thirty in the morning would have been bad enough on her system, but jet lag added its very own problems. She made a face. By the time her plane had landed and she'd picked up the new Bronco from the dealership where it had been waiting for her, it had been well into evening. She should have stayed overnight in San Francisco—as her more seasoned traveling friends had advised. Oh, well, she had never been very good at taking advice—“but you'd think I'd learn,” she muttered, as she dragged herself from the bed and staggered toward the bathroom.
Half an hour later, freshly showered, her wet hair hanging around her shoulders and wearing a worn pair of blue jeans, she wandered down the stairs. The scent of coffee teased her nostrils the same moment her bare feet hit the bottom step. Maria?
A flutter in her stomach, tension knotting across her shoulders, Shelly pushed open the door to the kitchen. A sturdy, dark-haired woman, her salt-and-pepper hair neatly caught in a bun at the back of her neck, was in the act of pouring a cup of coffee. At Shelly's entrance she glanced in her direction.
An uncertain smile curved the woman's lips. There was just the faintest hint of a Mexican accent as she said, “Good morning, Miss Shelly. I hope you slept well after the long drive in last night. Did you find everything you needed?”
Maria Rios had not changed overmuch in seventeen years. She was not quite the same dark-eyed, smiling young woman Shelly remembered so well from her youth, but she recognized her instantly. As well she should! Maria had come to work for the family when Maria had been a shy twenty-year-old and Shelly had been a two-year-old toddler. Some of her earliest memories were of Maria's lilting voice and soft, warm, comforting body. There were a lot more strands of gray these days in the gleaming black hair and more lines and creases on the smooth olive skin of her face than there had been when Maria had been thirty-six and Shelly had seen her last. But she was still Maria.
Seeing Maria, the kindness and sympathy, the pain reflected in her brown eyes, Shelly's tension fled. “Oh, Maria,” she cried, the missing years vanishing as if they had never been as they met in the center of the kitchen and embraced, “it is so good to see you—even under these circumstances.”
There were more hugs, tearful exchanges, half-started sentences, smiles that crumpled, but above all Shelly was aware of the warm welcome and the shared grief.
“Well, well,” drawled a half-remembered voice, “what you don't see when you haven't got a gun.”
Shelley spun around, noticing for the first time the sun-worn face of the old cowboy seated at the oak table in the sunroom attached to the kitchen. She stared at him for several seconds, trying to place that dark, creased face, the white hair of his head, and the truly magnificent handlebar mustache that draped the lower half of his face. It was the mustache that gave him away.
“Acey!” she cried happily. “I didn't expect you to be here.”
He rose to his feet, revealing a small, wiry frame, the worn blue jeans fitting his narrow hips in a way that younger men envied. “No reason you should, girl,” he said as he swept her into a hard embrace. “It's damn fine to see you again—even under these circumstances.”
Acey Babbitt had to be over seventy, and yet there was nothing but his lined features and heavily veined hands to reveal it. Certainly his age was not apparent in the bear hug he gave her. When she caught her breath again, Shelly grinned at him, and said, “How have you been? Still teaching hardheaded little know-it-alls, like I was, to ride?”
He nodded, a twinkle in his dark eyes. “Yep. And chasing wimmen, too.” His eyebrows wriggled suggestively. “Got my eye on a comfy widow lady this time.” He smacked his lips. “By golly, but she's an armful. Demanding, too. Why, she's likely to plumb love me into my grave.” His mustache twitched. “You know that old saying, girl—there may be snow on the mountain, but there's still a fire in the furnace.”
“A roaring fire where you're concerned,” Maria said tartly. She shook a finger at him. “I heard about you and that woman up at Shawnee Dick. You better take care, old man. Jim Madden has been keeping company with her for the past six months. And you know that Jim doesn't have red hair for nothing. Get him mad enough, and he's likely to take a scrawny old rooster like you apart—and in about ten seconds flat!”
Acey waved a dismissing hand. “Don't you worry none. I ain't serious about the widow.”
Maria snorted and rolled her eyes at Shelly. “He'll be seventy-three in June, and you'd think that at his age, he'd have learned some sense.”
“Well at least I've got more sense than to spout gossip to the girl here on her first morning back,” he commented as he picked up his hat from the table and put it on his head with a flourish. “I got stock to see to. Don't have time to sit around and yammer.” He flashed Shelly a glance. “You grew up just fine, honey. Good to see you.” And strolled out the door with the rolling gait of a man who had spent most of his life in the saddle.
Maria looked stricken, but Shelly laughed and put her arms around the older woman. “Nothing could make me feel more at home than listening to you two still squabbling—and about the same thing! Don't let him get you all ruffled—you know he does it on purpose.” For as long as Shelly could remember, Maria had always scolded Acey about his women, and she had suspected even then that he made up half the stories of his amatory exploits just to get a rise out of Maria. It still seemed to work.
Maria smiled. “I know, but I can't help worrying about the old devil. He acts as if he's not a day over forty—he continues to train horses and work cattle—by himself most of the time, although a lot of the other ranchers try to keep an eye on him. He can still work rings around most men half his age, but I worry about him riding out in the hills by him-self—he just doesn't seem to realize that he is not a young man anymore. Accidents happen, and they are harder and more dangerous on someone his age. Nick volunteered to go with him last fall to gather cattle, and he came home exhausted—said Acey might be old and he might move slower these days, but he keeps moving. It took Nick a week to recover from the pace Acey set, and he's only thirty!”
The conversation became more general, but it was several minutes later when both women were seated at the oak table that Acey had vacated before Shelly was finally able to ask the question that had been uppermost in her mind.
“Why, Maria? Why did Josh do it?”
Her dark eyes full of sadness, Maria shook her head. “I do not know, chica. I have asked myself that same question a dozen times, but I cannot come up with an answer.”
“Did he seem different? Did he say anything to you that day that seemed odd, something that seemed out of place, anything that might have been a clue to what he planned to do?”
“No. The afternoon it happened…” Her voice faltered, then picked up. “He pinched my cheek before he left for the barn to saddle his horse—you remember how he used to do. He said that he wanted to get away for a while—and that he wanted a heart attack on a plate for dinner—steak, French fries, and apple pie with ice cream for dessert.” Her eyes filled. “I cannot believe that he is gone.”
They were silent for several minutes as they sipped their coffee and brooded over Josh's suicide. Eventually, though, they began to talk of other things, Maria asking about Shelly's life in New Orleans; Shelly catching up on some of the major events that had happened in the valley since she had left—there weren't many—change came slowly to Oak Valley—one of its charms. Maria relayed news of the marriages, births, and deaths of the various residents and mentioned the few new busine
sses in town before the conversation drifted to Maria's two children.
Shelly remembered them; the boy, Nick, as an adventurous holy terror, the younger girl, Raquel, as a wide-eyed little shadow silently following Maria around as she did her work in the house.
“I can't imagine them all grown-up,” Shelly exclaimed. “My God—they were just kids when I last saw them. And now you tell me that Raquel is working in Santa Rosa as a dental assistant and Nick has started his own business. Wow! I can hardly believe it! It doesn't seem possible that so many years have passed.”
Maria smiled and rose to her feet, picking up the two mugs. “It does to me—especially every morning when my knees pop and creak when I get out of bed.”
The sound of an approaching vehicle cut off Shelly's reply. “Oh, jeez! That's Mike Sawyer, and I'm not ready.” Jumping up from her chair, she said, “Would you let him in and serve him some coffee? I need to change my clothes.” She looked down at her faded blue jeans. “Josh wouldn't care what I wore, but I'd feel better if I were dressed better than this.”
A shadow crossed Maria's face. “Are you going to spread his ashes today?”
Shelly nodded, the primary reason why she was here crushing down on her. “Yes. Mike thought I would want to get it behind me as soon as possible. He said he didn't want me to think about it too long. He offered to come with me—he feels that I should have someone else with me.” She made a face. “I think, as the family lawyer, he wants to see for himself that I actually do scatter Josh's ashes and don't just set the urn on the top shelf of my closet.”
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