She knew John would have wanted this because she would have wanted the same for him. To move on and build a new life, preferably a happy one. She never would have wanted to deprive him of that.

  All these troubles seemed to have kicked her into gear, pushing her out of neutral, out of stasis.

  That was a good thing, right?

  While she might daydream about Mitch, she had no right to expect him to feel the same. He was already doing too much for her, entirely too much.

  She couldn’t stand alone. She knew it. Whatever was going on, there was no way she could face this solo. That annoyed her and scared her. Problems too big to handle on her own. She hadn’t had them before, not really.

  Except with the sheep. She’d been forced to face reality there, as well. One person couldn’t do it on any useful scale. She’d had a choice: sell them or pare the flock down until they were essentially pets. Neither solution would have helped her keep the ranch.

  She was grateful to Mitch for the way he had stepped in. He’d made it clear he wanted the sheep, all without her mentioning her increasing troubles, but as part of the deal he’d insisted she lease him most of her pasture and would sell him her hay crop.

  “How am I supposed to graze the animals without the land?” he’d asked her.

  Good question. The answer, she thought, was good business for them both.

  Now he was stepping in again, this time with no apparent motive except to protect her. His concern warmed her but also worried her. She didn’t want to become dependent.

  She didn’t want him to step back once again, either. Like it or not, she was growing dependent on his company.

  That could be a very bad thing.

  Eventually sleep snuck up on her and carried her into some surprisingly pleasant dreams. The nightmares didn’t reach her.

  Chapter 16

  Mitch waited to wake Grace until the first very early gray light began to wash out the stars. He hadn’t had the least trouble staying awake and he hated to rouse her.

  He also figured her wrath wasn’t worth letting her sleep. He went to her bedroom door and called her gently, not wanting to frighten her.

  “Huh?” she asked drowsily.

  “Your turn on watch. I’ll go make you some coffee and rustle up some food.”

  If she woke up, good. If she went back to sleep, not his problem. Hah!

  He needed some breakfast, too, and looking in her fridge he found eggs and some shredded cheese. A promising start. He opened the breadbox beside the stove and discovered English muffins. Good accompaniment. Plenty of butter in the fridge. Hidden in her pantry was an unopened jar of raspberry preserves.

  He could already taste the food to come.

  He turned his head as he heard her behind him.

  “I can cook,” she said.

  “I know you can.”

  “You must be tired. And you let me sleep too late.”

  “Late is a matter of perception, I can sleep just as well during the morning, and look, lady, I can cook. So just sit yourself down and enjoy the service.”

  Hell, she didn’t look fully awake yet. Mitch suspected she hadn’t slept very long.

  The coffeepot finished brewing just as he was cracking eggs into a bowl. “Scrambled okay?”

  She nodded, her chin on her hand. “Thanks.” Her eyelids kept drooping, which amused him. Yeah, she was awake. Barely.

  He poured her a big mug of caffeine to help, then set about toasting bread and whipping the eggs with a dash of milk and a lot of cheese. “I am such a skilled cook that I’ll take your breath away. Well, not really. I warn you, I couldn’t begin to hold a candle to Lila.”

  That drew a weary chuckle from her. “I don’t think anyone could.”

  “I think it helps that she loves cooking. Me, I’m a survivalist when it comes to that.”

  “I think I’ve pretty much become one, too. Feed me before I faint.”

  He laughed. “I read you.”

  * * *

  Across the road, in the foothills of the huge mountains where pines towered and a few cottonwoods succeeded, Carl and Larry lazed in the warming day, awaiting their next assignment—if one was needed.

  “I’m going to town,” Carl announced abruptly.

  “You sure you should?”

  “Look, I’m sick of eating out of cans. I want me some decent food. A burger and some fries. A milkshake. You sure as hell can’t make a milkshake over a camp stove.”

  Larry didn’t put up a fuss over that. “Milkshake sounds good,” he admitted. “Beer’s getting cold enough in that stream, but you’re right about anything colder. Hell, I’d just be glad of the taste, even melted.”

  “You see? I’m gonna get us something decent.”

  Larry rolled over and looked at Carl. “What about the boss?”

  “She ain’t asked us to do one damn thing except at night. I’ll be back before then. You can take a message...if she ain’t done with us.”

  * * *

  In her small apartment in Conard City, Betty Pollard brushed her hair. Dan was a figment, an imaginary boyfriend to throw a concealing cloak of normalcy over her real plan for Grace.

  All these years later, Betty still grew furious at the chain of events that had ripped that ranch from her father. So what if he hadn’t paid his property taxes? Did that mean a man should lose everything?

  She ignored the other debts that had mounted, debts she didn’t know about until it was too late. Most ranchers and farmers ran an open line of credit to deal with major expenses. Her dad had eventually stopped paying those, too.

  The foreclosure had come from taxes and that lien was filed first. Since the county wasn’t trying to make a profit, and the lenders had accepted the newer equipment for collateral and not the land, the auction had been for peanuts. Peanuts! That whole damn place was worth a hell of a lot more.

  But Betty had only been a high schooler. She’d learned about the taxes but hadn’t been able to do anything because she didn’t have any money. She’d told her dad to sell off a parcel, but he refused.

  “It’ll get better, honey. It always does.”

  It had in prior years. But this time he’d let it go too long, and the county foreclosed well before Betty expected it. As soon as the lenders had heard about the foreclosure, they’d moved in to take anything of value.

  Then her father had died, with nothing left to live for, and Grace and John had bought the homestead for a song.

  Betty didn’t have a personal grudge against the Halls, but she wanted her childhood home again. She wanted it with an enduring ache and unrequited fury.

  Thanks to a legacy from a nearly forgotten aunt, she now had the money to pay a fair price for the ranch. A decent price. She wasn’t trying to rip anyone off.

  Without John, it seemed crazy for Grace to hang on to the land and the house. It was fair for her to be reluctant about selling, but managing the ranch was entirely too much for one person alone. Hell, as near as Betty could tell, Grace was having trouble keeping up. Of course, she had those two shepherds but Betty sensed an opportunity.

  Betty sighed and poured herself a double shot of bourbon. She tried to contain her anger, but since John’s death her self-control had grown increasingly difficult.

  While she didn’t want Grace to see that anger, it simmered in her anyway. She had finally gotten to the point of trying to scare Grace away.

  Nothing that would actually hurt Grace. She didn’t want to do that. She felt terrible about Grace’s burns but she hadn’t known there were horses out there, and apparently neither had the men she had hired for this job.

  But if Grace didn’t fear that she was being targeted, then she was stupider than Betty would have believed.

  So why wasn’t she hightailing it to town? Away from the repeated threats?

  Betty finished off her bourbon and poured another. It was too soon to demand that Larry and Carl do something else to scare Grace.

  Give it time to sink in, Betty decided. Let the threat linger longer.

  Then she would tell those two idiots to get going and warn them again about not hurting Grace. Hell, she was paying them enough with a bonus at the end. And they were despicable enough to do it. The whole barn-burning, while it had seemed like a good idea when those guys proposed it, still made her sick to her stomach. What was she paying those men for? They should have known there were horses in that barn.

  But the break-in should have been enough to drive the point home to Grace. Especially when nothing had been taken but an old computer and TV.

  “Hell,” she said, this time aloud. Then several times she repeated the word emphatically.

  It made her feel only a bit better.

  * * *

  Mitch slept until nearly noon, which was fine by him. He expected the worst of the danger would come at night, that the mornings were free of the threat. The earlier events had given him reason to think so.

  He sat up, closing the recliner, ignoring the stiffness that came from not being able to move much in his sleep. Well, it was better than bedding down on rocky ground.

  He could hear Grace on the porch, so he took the opportunity to shower and change. He’d brought extra clothes with him, enough for a few days, and the change was welcome.

  By now he must have the same stench as a barn animal. His chaps still hung over the back of a chair, needing that oiling he couldn’t give them just yet. They’d do okay for a while.

  And now he’d do okay smelling more like shampoo and soap. Only thing he regretted was that he must be smelling like a field of lavender.

  Funny he hadn’t noticed that aroma when it lingered around Grace. But maybe it had been part of her all this time, like her wide smile, her pleasantly curved figure, her light and enchanting voice.

  Oh, boy. He was getting it bad.

  Then he realized he also smelled bread. He sniffed with pleasure, then stepped outside to find Grace, her shotgun nearby, leaning against a stanchion and surveying the property toward the county road.

  “Do I smell bread?” he asked.

  She pivoted and smiled. “Gotta do something during this stakeout.”

  “But bread? That’s a lot of work, especially with your hands.”

  She raised her arms. “More like a workout for the upper body. It felt good. As for my hands, we’ve come to an agreement. They’re going to hurt regardless. Anyway, four more loaves coming up since the remaining ones are getting stale.”

  “Four?”

  “If I was going to do one, I might as well do more. Same mess. The kneading part is great exercise. Cleaning flour off the whole damn kitchen, not so much.”

  A grin emerged, stretching his face. “You’re a messy cook?”

  “More like a messy baker. I might do drop biscuits later.”

  “I love biscuits.”

  “Who doesn’t?” Grace resumed her watch. “Nothing. I even walked around the house and the barn to see if I could catch sight of anything at all.”

  His heart skipped. “Grace—”

  “I know. Skip it, Mitch. I went alone because I’ve been doing it for years. If someone wants to take a potshot at me, then this whole thing wasn’t going to end well anyway.”

  He could see that stiffening in her backbone. Not a good time to press her. The obstinate Grace was out in full force.

  “I’ll make us some coffee. Want some?”

  She nodded. “Thanks. I guess it’s almost time for lunch.”

  “I’ll take care of that. I have this delusional idea that I can be good for something.”

  At least that drew a laugh from her. “Good for a whole lot, Mitch. Like staying here when I need some help.”

  “Such a sacrifice,” he joked. No sacrifice at all. He had people he could rely on for his ranch. She had no one else.

  Besides, he was seeing parts of her that he hadn’t seen since John. He liked them.

  * * *

  Mitch had rustled up sandwiches made with cold cuts, lettuce and mayonnaise. He brought them along with coffee out to Grace.

  “Thank you,” Grace said as she accepted a paper plate. She looked at the thickness of the sandwich and asked, “Did you use up all my cold cuts?”

  “Yup. I like ’em hearty. Don’t worry about it. Lila will replace them and more. Just enjoy.”

  Enjoy enough for two people, she thought, surveying the size of the sandwich. Gamely she bit into it and decided his choice had been a good one. “Delicious,” she said.

  “I’m sure the bread would have been better if it was yours.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. “Believe it. It must be close to done with the final rise, so I need to check on it after lunch.”

  “Making bread is a mystery to me.”

  “It was to me, too, until I made my first loaf.”

  A songbird seemed have taken up residence on the porch roof and provided a happy accompaniment to the meal.

  * * *

  The world still sounded cheerful, Grace thought as she listened to the bird. And the food and coffee still tasted good. She needed to hang on to those things, to remember the beauty nature offered. The beauty of having a friend make her a stupendous lunch.

  She was seeing Mitch so much differently now, more than a friend and neighbor. As a man. Her first real inkling was when she had watched him mount his horse to set out on a hunt for the transgressors. Now she felt it even more.

  A man. An attractive, weather-hardened, work-hardened man. A stand-up guy. If he had any real failings, she hadn’t encountered them. Or at least none that bothered her enough for them to rise to her awareness.

  The bird continued to tweet happily as the sky overhead darkened. The wind shifted a little, bringing new scents to the world.

  “Rain soon,” she remarked.

  “Smells like it. I hope it doesn’t blow over. I saw some dry patches in the pasture when I was out yesterday.”

  Amusement struck her. Such a prosaic and ordinary conversation between two ranchers. As if the weather and the state of a pasture were all that mattered. As if the threat of danger didn’t lie in every shadow.

  A comfortable rhythm, however, dredging up memories of many conversations over the years, with John and neighbors. In ordinary times, such thoughts were essential. They usually led to conversations about livestock, feed, pasturage, crops, the most important thing in most lives around her. Common ground indeed.

  It still felt odd to be having such a conversation in these circumstances. Both of them sitting there with shotguns ready to blast away. Both of them scanning the countryside for any sign of threat.

  A jarring counterpoint.

  As soon as she finished her sandwich, she rose to go check on her bread. Almost ready for the oven, she decided. The rising could be slow or fast depending on ambient temperature. Today, inside, there was a coolness that probably lingered from the night before and she wouldn’t have expected the dough to rise so fast.

  She turned on the oven, set a timer, then headed back to the porch with the coffeepot. “Top you off?”

  “Sure. Thanks.” He held out his mug.

  She topped her own mug, then placed the pot on the table between them. “This,” she said as she sat again, “feels too much like an ordinary summer day.”

  “It is,” he said.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  His gray eyes twinkled as they settled on her. “Well, apart from that. Let’s enjoy it. In a bit, I’ll walk around, maybe ride out again to look for problems.”

  “Did you get Burt Stiller?” she asked.

  “I got his voice mail. He’s probably out on the range.”

  “Yeah.” The idea deflated her a little. Mitch would go out to cover the same territory he’d covered yesterday and learn exactly nothing.

  The timer inside beeped and she returned to the kitchen to put the loaves in the oven. Four, side by side, just like she used to bake when...

  She cut that thought off. She couldn’t let every damn thing carry her back to the past. Today was a new day, one that carried its own set of problems. Time to deal with here and now.

  She set a timer for the bread, then went outside again in time to see a pickup coming up her drive. “Who’s that?”

  “I guess we’ll find out.” Mitch stood with the shotgun cradled in his arms. A warning to whoever.

  No warning needed. Out of the car stepped Jenny Wright, a ranch wife Grace had once known but hadn’t seen again until the barn raising. A lot of things had disappeared after John, mostly her own fault.

  “Hey,” Jenny called with a cheerful wave. “Thought it was time to be a good neighbor, so I brought you my famous chicken and green bean casserole. The beans are from my kitchen garden and while you’ll taste the white wine, it won’t make you drunk.” She grinned almost ear to ear, then leaned back inside her car to bring out a very large casserole dish. She carried it up to the porch. “At least enough for several meals, even with a hungry cowboy around.”

  “Thank you so much!” Grace was touched. How had she pushed people like this away?

  “I’d give you a hug of greeting, but I’d like to set this down somewhere it won’t draw flies and other critters.”

  Mitch spoke. “You ladies go on inside. I’ll stay out here.”

  Inside, Jenny placed the casserole on the counter. “Mmm, I smell baking bread. Got ambitious this morning?”

  “I did,” Grace agreed. “Stay awhile and I’d be happy to send you home with a loaf.”

  Jenny shook her head. “I’d love it, but I have to get back. I left three boys with an overwhelmed husband who would rather be herding cattle.”