“So why don’t you?” he’d asked.

  She’d looked startled by the question, then laughed. “I don’t stay here because I’m trapped. Is that what you think?” She shook her head. “My grandfather left the ranch to my brother, Bobby. But Bobby didn’t want anything to do with ranching.”

  Chance concentrated on his chords.

  “You don’t understand the power that land has over me,” she said. “Sometimes when I’m up in the high meadow beyond Ross Peak I can almost feel my grandfather’s spirit. That’s where I go when I get the urge to travel. In Ross Peak Meadow, I find the peace I need.”

  Chance didn’t tell her he’d seen her there and envied the carefree woman he’d witnessed. He wondered if he would ever find peace. And he knew A.J. was probably wondering the same thing.

  She rose and dusted off the back of her jeans. “I’d best be getting back.”

  “What is it you see in me?” he asked suddenly.

  She smiled and didn’t pretend not to understand. “I’ve watched the way you work with horses. You’re a gentle, loving man, Chance. But for some reason, you’re running from that side of you.” She squinted at him for a long moment, then said, “Good night.”

  Chance couldn’t help thinking of that night now as he rode through a stand of cottonwoods. Shadows played tag in the moonlight. Once he thought he saw a horse and rider at the far end of the trees, but as he grew closer, he could see the shadows of the cottonwoods pointing like fingers into the night, beckoning him with false promises.

  He circled on up the mountain, the cold night air chilling him only when he thought of A.J. and what might have happened to her.

  “A.J.!” he called. The words echoed in the hollow and boomeranged back at him. His horse stomped the dirt and neighed. “A.J.!”

  In the silence that followed, he listened. The trees moaned softly. A limb cracked in the darkness, followed by the swift fall of a deer’s hooves. Chance urged his horse over the ridge.

  The pines held him in their darkened shelter, then suddenly opened. He blinked in surprise as moonlight splashed over him and the meadow. Tall grass stretched silken toward the heavens. Flowers now gone to seed still shared their sweet scents with the night.

  And there on the opposite edge of the meadow was Midnight.

  The stallion stood silhouetted against the night, his head high, his back free and empty. Chance swallowed hard and scanned the scene for A.J.

  He caught movement on a rock outcropping. She was sitting among the boulders watching Midnight.

  Chance dismounted and walked to her, the grass whispering, the moon seeming to grow larger with each step.

  A.J. glanced at the sound of his approach. He saw her tears and stepped forward, then stopped, afraid she’d been thrown. But at her feet lay Midnight’s Indian blanket and saddle. In her hands she clutched a hackamore and she cried softly.

  Chance knelt beside her. He knew that something much worse than being bucked off a horse had happened and the hurt would take much longer to heal.

  “I let him go,” she whispered. “I let him go.”

  Chance turned to stare at the stallion, a shiny, black demon in the moonlight. Why didn’t the horse turn and run away now that he was free?

  He pulled his bandanna from his pocket and handed it to A.J.

  She wiped her tears. “Will you take me home?”

  He nodded. “Leave the saddle here. Someone can come get it in the morning.” He mounted his horse and pulled her up behind him.

  Midnight watched unmoving until they had almost reached the pines. Then he turned and galloped over the edge of the rise and disappeared.

  “What does A.J. stand for?” he asked have they had ridden a ways.

  He felt her stir behind him. “Alycia Jane.”

  Chance tried her name on his lips. “Alycia. Alycia Jane.” He told her then about his wife and children, the fire, everything. She never said a word, just kept her arms wrapped around his waist. It wasn’t until they were almost to the valley floor then he felt her tears damp on the back of his western shirt.

  When they reached the corral, A.J. slipped off the horse. It was late enough that no one else was around. Just the two of them standing near the corral in the moonlight.

  “Alycia,” he whispered as he dismounted and took her in his arms. In the darkness, he unfastened the barrette at the nape of her neck.

  Her hair fell around her shoulders. He ran his fingers through it and buried his face in its silky coolness. “Alycia.” He sought her lips, knowing if he found them, he’d never be able to leave.

  A.J. pulled away. “I’m not going to ask you to stay. I don’t want to ever look into your eyes and see regret.” She smiled through her tears. “You’re as free as Midnight. I just hope that one day you find what you’re searching for.”

  He wanted to tell her he wasn’t looking for anything, just traveling through life trying hard not to get stuck anywhere too long for fear of caring too much. And then losing everything again.

  “But if you ever get itchy feet and should come back this way...” She stepped to him, kissed him quickly and ran toward the ranch house.

  With only the moon witnessing his leaving, Chance drove out through the gate. He told himself not to look back. But he did.

  Midnight came wandering into the Double M Ranch yard a week later. He looked ragged and tired. Mercy was the first to see him. “A.J.!” she shouted. “It’s that blamed horse!”

  A.J. came out of the barn. Slowly, talking softly, she slipped a halter on Midnight. He didn’t fight it, but came willingly as she led him back into his corral.

  She stayed with Midnight for a long time, stroking and whispering to him like a lover in the stillness of afternoon. And later when she stepped from the corral, she looked up the road half expecting to see an old pickup kicking up dust as it sped toward the ranch.

  A.J. smiled as she walked toward the house. Chance would come home too. There was no hurry. She wasn’t going anywhere.

  Best Friends

  By B.J. Daniels

  Copyright 2011 B.J. Daniels

  Smashwords Edition

  I’m saddling my horse, cussing both my bad luck and Cooper McCleod, when he rides up.

  “You’d better dress for bad weather, it’s going to storm,” says a man who I’ve heard makes some women in this part of the county swoon.

  I am certainly not one of those women. “Storm?” I ask, not even bothering to hide my skepticism. I glance up at the cloudless blue sky overhead, then at the person whom I’ve almost always considered my best friend.

  Cooper McCleod is six-feet-two inches worth of walking trouble, all the way from his worn cowboy boots up to his white Stetson.

  Ask any female resident of Pine Creek, Montana. Or better yet, just ask me.

  “You’re still mad, huh?” he says sheepishly, then flashes me that irresistible grin of his. It’s all cowboy charm and dimples.

  But today not even those big baby blues of his are going to weaken my resolve. I keep right on saddling my horse, not giving him the time of day.

  “You going to give me a chance to explain?” he asks. When I don’t answer, he says, “I’m sorry about the other night, Jenna. I acted like a jerk.”

  Well, at least we agree on one thing. He sounds so sincere, I begin to weaken a little. I finish cinching my saddle and steal a look at him. It’s hopeless. He even looks sincere.

  “Forgive me?” he asks. “Please?”

  “Maybe.” I’m a sucker for sincerity—and for Cooper McCleod. I tell myself it’s because he needs me. He has always had a lot of girlfriends, but he’s only got one best friend—me.

  “I knew you couldn’t stay mad at me,” he says as he smiles at me.

  And I know what he’s going to say next, so I beat him to it. “You’re the best buddy a guy could ever have,” I say, mimicking his silver-tongued tone.

  I expect him to laugh. Instead, he just studies me for a moment and says, “It’s true, you know.”

  I do know. And that’s one reason I want to keep it that way. But it worries me the way Cooper acted the other night, the way he’s acting right now—serious. It’s not like him.

  I figure he’s in some sort of trouble. No doubt it’s trouble with a woman, that’s the only kind Cooper seems to know.

  And ever since we were kids, he’s come to me for help. That is, until lately.

  “We’d better get going so we can move those strays down before the storm hits,” he says, glancing at the mountains ahead of us.

  I look again at the clear blue sky, shake my head and ride after him toward the high country without a word.

  Being neighboring ranchers, we’ve always helped each other with cattle drives, calving and branding. Since we share some of the same range, we usually round up strays together too.

  We ride in silence through the dense, cool shade of the pines. Eventually the trees open into beautiful sun-drenched meadows.

  I think of all the days Cooper and I have ridden this country. Usually he’s joking and telling me stories. I try to remember a time he was as quiet as he is today. I can think of only one time.

  It was the summer right after we got out of high school—the summer Cooper and I dated. It still hurts to think about it. I thought I was in love with him.

  But we were young, and neither of us was really ready to settle down, much less think about a commitment.

  By the time we both realized that, we had almost destroyed our friendship. By the time we worked our way back to being best friends, we made a promise to each other then that we would never let anything like that happen to us again.

  “What were you saying about a storm?” I ask now, motioning to the still cloudless blue sky over the tops of the trees.

  We’ve rounded up a half dozen strays and have stopped in a small meadow to eat the lunch I packed. The cows bellow around us.

  “It’ll storm,” he says, sounding like it’s the least of his worries. “About the other night--.”

  He sits down beside me on a rock. I hand him one of the sandwiches I brought.

  “It was my fault,” I say. “I shouldn’t have butted in.”

  We’d argued outside the theater about his recent breakup with a girl I kind of set him up with, Tanya Walker.

  “You dumped Tanya after only one date?” I’d accused, angry that he didn’t seem to know anything about women. “She’s the first nice woman you’ve dated in years. Not to mention the fact that she’s my best friend.” It was a huge exaggeration. I should have known he would call me on it.

  “I thought I was your best friend?” he’d yelled back, then quieted down. “Look, I had my reasons, all right?”

  He’d started to step past me. I’d grabbed him by the arm. “I don’t understand you sometimes, Cooper.”

  “No, you don’t,” he’d shot back, pulling free. “But it’s my life, all right?”

  That hurt. We’d always been so close. I knew everything about his life and he knew everything about mine. He came to me with his problems and I went to him with mine. It had always been that way with us.

  “I just didn’t want to talk to you about Tanya,” he said, picking at his sandwich now. “You’re the last person I would ever want to hurt. I’m just not interested in her.”

  “All right,” I say. “But I worry about you.”

  He grins. “Oh, yeah?”

  “Yeah. You seem to be drifting.”

  He laughs and shakes his head. “Or maybe I’m just tired of drifting.”

  That surprises me. Has he met someone he’s serious about and he hasn’t told me. That shakes me more than I want to admit.

  We eat in silence. Cooper eats quickly and gets to his feet. “Is everything all right?” I ask.

  “It’s just that storm pushing us, that’s all,” he says and mounts his horse.

  “What storm are you talking about?” I ask again, but he’s already riding off. I watch him, his movements so familiar to me.

  I want so much for us to always be best friends, because I can’t imagine not having him in my life. After all, he is the only man in my life. The few men I do find time to date almost always bore me.

  We’re headed back down the mountain when I notice the first storm cloud. It moves across the sky on a hot wind that kicks up leaves and dust. Lightning flickers over the tops of the pines, followed moments later by the low rumble of thunder and a slice of lightning in the distance. The air suddenly feels heavy and tense.

  Cooper shoots me one of those I-told-you-so grins as he pulls out his yellow rain slicer. I dig out mine, making a face at him.

  The storm moves in fast. Raindrops hit my cheeks, wet and cold as snow. This time the lightning is closer, the thunder right behind it.

  The cattle mill around, uneasy. A bolt of lightning strikes so close that I feel the hair on the back of my neck stand up. A few of the cattle break into a run. Cooper rides up to turn them as the rain begins to fall in large wet drops.

  “Let’s go to the line shack until it blows over,” I yell, riding up beside him. There are corrals there for the cattle and we can find shelter from the storm.

  Cooper glances at the cattle, then looks back at me. I wonder what could possibly make him hesitate. Another bolt of lightning splinters the sky around us.

  “All right,” he answers. But he still sounds reluctant.

  It isn’t very far to the old line shack. The clouds have grown so dark that it feels like nightfall except when the lightning explodes through the hard-driving rain like flashbulbs.

  We ride with the storm, the lightning following us like a stray dog.

  “I’ll take care of the cattle,” Cooper yells, motioning for me to go inside as he heads toward the corrals.

  Inside the one-room shack, I get out of my wet slicker and boots and pad across the wood floor to build a fire in the old barrel stove.

  The dry wood crackles and burns quickly. I’m kneeling down to add more wood to the fire when the door swings open on a gust of wind.

  Cooper stand in the doorway, his slicker dripping on the worn pine floor. A sliver of lightning cuts the dark sky behind him as he closes the door on the storm. Thunder reverberates through the shack.

  I watch him drag his cowboy hat from his head. His hair curls at his neck, wet and dark. I feel a tightness in my chest, something pulling at me with an intensity I’ve never felt before. I get to my feet.

  Slowly, he lifts his gaze to mine. My breath catches at what I see in those baby blues of his.

  Lightning flashes, drawing my attention to the only window. The flash illuminates the room and is gone, leaving nothing but darkness beyond the glass and my reflection.

  I stare at it, trying to see what Cooper sees. A woman. Tanned from the sun. Lean but curved beneath her wet western clothes. A woman, not a buddy.

  I turn to look at him, feeling afraid and unsure. He drags a hand through his hair and shifts uneasily, his gaze never leaving my face.

  “I don’t want to lose you as a friend, Jenna,” he says. “But I'm tired of fighting the way I feel.”

  His voice is a caress. I think I understand now why those women swoon.

  “And I’m tired of killing time pretending that I’m waiting for someone else to come along, promise or no promise. I want you, Jenna. Only you.”

  I stare at him, wanting to laugh—and feeling like I’m going to cry. How long have I waited to hear those words from him and not even realized it?

  I warn myself I could lose him as a friend. But there is something between us that’s as strong and powerful as the storm. I take a step toward him.

  The thunderstorm rumbles outside. We can hear the pounding rain outside. Inside, the fire blazes. I can feel my heart pounding in my chest, my pulse a river of heat.

  Electricity dances around us as rain drums overhead. That electricity dances between us as Cooper reaches for me. Lightning. He wraps me in his arms. Thunder. I can feel his heart next to mine in absolute perfect sync.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he whispers. And in his arms I am. It feels so right as I lean up to meet his lips and the storm closes around us.

  Breakfast at Betty's

  By B.J. Daniels

  Copyright 2011 B.J. Daniels

  Smashwords Edition

  The morning of the murder I was sitting in Betty’s Café having a Diet Coke for breakfast. I was trying to talk myself out of a piece of banana cream pie while I listened to a fight Clara and Bud Barnes were having in the back booth.

  It was snowing like crazy outside, one of those awful storms that often hit Mill Creek, Montana, in late fall.

  In the back booth, Clara and Bud toned down their argument, which disappointed me because I was about to find out whether or not Bud was off to meet up with Mary Lou when Clara caught him climbing down that big willow tree beside their house.

  Bud and Mary Lou had a thing before he married Clara. Actually a lot of Mill Creek males have had a thing with Mary Lou Carson.

  I’d just decided to have a piece of banana cream pie when the bell over the door jangled and I turned to see Sheriff Mitch Tanner come in. He saw me right away and I quickly turned back to my soda.

  Mitch and I once had our own thing going. Now we try to stay out of each other’s way, which isn’t easy under the circumstances. I’m Charity Jenkins, reporter, editor and owner of the Mill Creek Gazette. My business is to be nosy, especially about the goings-on here in town in regard to the law.

  When I turned around, I heard Mitch tell Deputy Daniels that one of Mill Creek’s two spinsters – Lorinda Nichols – had been murdered.

  I swiveled on my stool to look around the tiny café. Betty’s only had three booths and four stools. Deputy Daniels was in the middle booth. The Rev. Deke Wilder had the booth by the door and Clara and Bud were in the back.

  That left me on one stool and old Twila Langlsley – Mill Creek’s other old maid – at the opposite end of the counter.