Abby stared at her ringless hands. “I hope nobody else did,” she said.
“He’s thirty-six now,” Melly reminded her. “Inevitably, he’ll marry sooner or later.”
Abby laughed bitterly. “Will he? He hasn’t exactly been in a flaming hurry to commit himself to anybody. You know what he used to say about marriage? That it was a noose only a fool stuck his head into.”
“He’s a lonely man, Abby,” came the surprising reply. “I know better than anybody—I work for him. I see him every day. He works himself into the ground, but there are still evenings when he sits on the porch by himself and just stares off into the horizon.”
That hurt. Abby turned her face away to keep Melly from seeing how much. “He could have any woman he wanted,” she said, forcing herself not to let her voice show the emotion she was feeling. “He used to stay out with some woman or other every day I was here.”
“So he let you think,” Melly murmured. “He runs three ranches—a corporation the size of a small city—and in his spare time he sleeps. When does he have the time to be a playboy? I’ll grant you, he’s got the money to be one, even if he weren’t so good-looking. But he’s a puritan in his outlook. It even makes him uncomfortable when Jerry kisses me in front of him.”
“Just like Donavan,” she agreed, remembering Cade’s father. “Remember the night you were kissing Danny Johnson on our front porch and Donavan rode by with Cade? Whew! I didn’t think Danny would ever come back again after that lecture.”
“Neither did I. Donavan had an overdeveloped sense of propriety. No wonder Cade’s got so many inhibitions. Of course, being brought up in a small place like Cheyenne Lodge...”
“Only you could call Montana a small place,” Abby teased.
“This little teeny corner of it, I meant,” came the irrepressible reply. “I’ll bet you get culture shock every time you come here from New York,” she added.
“No,” Abby denied. Her eyes began to glow softly. “It’s like homecoming every time. I never realize how much I miss it until I come back.”
“And stand at the window, hoping for a glimpse of Cade,” Melly said quietly, nodding when Abby flushed. “Oh, yes, I’ve caught you at it. You watch him with such love in your eyes, Abby. As if the sight of him would sustain you through any nightmare.”
Abby turned away. “Stop that. I’ll wear my heart out on him, and you know it. No,” she said firmly when Melly started to speak. “No more. Melly, you do love Jerry, don’t you?” she added, concern replacing the brief flare-up of irritation.
“Unbearably,” Melly confessed. “We fought like animals the first few weeks I worked here, when I came home from business college. But then, one day he threw me down in the hay and fell on me,” she added with a grin. “And we kissed like two starving lovers. He asked me to marry him on the spot and I said yes without even thinking. We’ve had our disagreements, but there’s no one I’ll ever love as much.”
Abby thought about being pushed down and fallen on, and she trembled with reaction. She felt herself stiffen, and Melly noticed.
“Sorry,” she said quickly, touching Abby’s arm. “I didn’t think about how it might sound to you.”
“It’s just the thought of being helpless,” she said in a suppressed tone. Her eyes came up. “Melly, men are so strong...you don’t realize how strong until you try to get away and can’t!”
“Don’t think about it,” Melly said softly. “Come on, we’ve got to decide on the trimmings for this dress. Calla has a bag full of material samples she got from the fabric shop. We’ll look through them, and she’ll go into town and get what you need tomorrow, okay?”
“Okay.” Abby hugged her warmly. “I love you,” she said in a rare outburst of emotion.
“I love you, too,” Melly returned, smiling as she drew away. “Now, here, this is what I liked especially...” She pulled out a swatch of material and the girls drifted into a discussion of fabrics that lasted until bedtime.
Abby spent the next few days reacquainting herself with the ranch. She was careful to keep out of the way of the men—and Cade—but she trudged through the barns looking at calves and sat on the bales of hay in the loft and remembered back to her childhood on her family’s ranch. It was part of Painted Ridge now, having been bought by Cade at Jesse Shane’s death. It would have gone on the auction block otherwise, because neither Melly nor Abby had any desire to try to run it. Ranching was a full-time headache, best left to experts.
When the snow melted and the weather turned springlike again, Abby wandered through the gates up to a grassy hill where a small stand of pines stood guard, and settled herself under one of the towering giants. It was good to breathe clean air, to sit and soak in the cool, green peace and untouched beauty of this land.
Where else were there still places like this, where you could look and see nothing but rolling grassy hills that stretched to the horizon—with tall, ragged mountains on the other side and the river that cut like a wide ribbon through it all? Cade had liked to fish in that river in the old days, when Donavan was still alive to assume some of the burden of their business. Abby went with him occasionally, watching him land big bass and crappie, rainbow trout and channel catfish.
The nice thing about Cade, she thought dreamily, was that he had such a love for the land and its protection. He was constantly investigating new ways of improving his own range, working closely with the Soil Conservation Service to protect the natural resources of his state.
Her eyes turned toward the gate as she heard a horse’s hooves, and she found Cade riding up the ridge toward her on his big black gelding. He sat a horse so beautifully, reminding her of a Western movie hero. He was all muscle and grace, and she respected him more than any man she’d ever known.
He reined in when he reached her and swung one long leg around the pommel, a smoking cigarette in his lean, dark hands as he watched her from under the wide brim of his gray Stetson.
“Slumming, miss model?” he teased with a faint smile.
“This is the place for it,” she said, leaning back against the tree to smile up at him. Her long, pale hair caught the breeze and curved around her flushed cheeks. “Isn’t it peaceful here?” she asked. “No wonder the Indians fought so very hard to keep it.”
His eyes darkened, narrowed. “A man does fight to keep the things he wants most,” he said enigmatically, studying her. “Why do you wear those damned baggy things?” he demanded, nodding toward her bulky shirt and loose jeans.
She shrugged, avoiding that piercing gaze. “They’re comfortable,” she said inadequately.
“They look like hell. I’d rather see you in transparent blouses,” he added coldly.
Her eyebrows arched. “You lecherous old thing,” she accused.
He chuckled softly, deeply, a sound she hadn’t heard in a long time. It made him seem younger. “Only with you, honey,” he said softly. “I’m the soul of chivalry around most women.”
Her eyes searched his. “You could have any woman you want these days,” she murmured absently.
“Then isn’t it a hell of a shame that I have such a fussy appetite?” he asked. He took a draw from the cigarette and studied her quietly. “I’m a busy man.”
“You look it,” she agreed, studying the dusty jeans that encased his hard, powerful legs, and his scuffed brown boots and sweat-stained denim shirt. There was a black mat of hair under that shirt, and a muscular chest that she remembered desperately wanting to touch.
“It’s