“What were they like?”
“They were honest, hardworking folks. My father’s name was Joe, my mother’s was Eleanor. Everyone called her Ellie. They were good people, and like most ranchers around here, they were used to doing without. I guess some things never change. The bachelors can attest to that. We’ve certainly had to get used to doing without, and I can’t think of anybody who’s happy about it, except maybe Isabell.”
Lisa laughed. It was the last thing he’d expected her to do, but it made him feel a little taller, a little broader. Her laugh was deep, throaty, sexy. It let him know that she was well aware of exactly what it was he’d been doing without.
“I’m sorry, Wyatt. I don’t mean to seem irreverent about what happened to your parents. Tragedy has a way of shaping us, forever changing us. It’s just that I think you’re right. Old Isabell is probably as pleased as punch about your, er, predicament.”
Heat crept through him. He knew where it came from, and he knew where it was headed. He hadn’t been exaggerating. The nights out here had grown longer and lonelier with every passing month. In its heyday some thirty years ago, Jasper Gulch had had more than seven hundred residents. With the steady departure of its single women these past three decades, the number barely reached five hundred today. Sixty-two of the current residents were bachelors between the ages of twenty and seventy-five. Until Lisa and Jillian’s arrival last month, and a handful of single women since, there had only been six marriageable women.
Feeling her eyes on him, he said, “Then you believe me when I say we’ve suffered?”
She turned her head, but not before he saw her smile. “Oh, I believe you. I’m just a little surprised so many women left, that’s all.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, there aren’t many job prospects out here, other than becoming a rancher’s wife, that is. The girls who left didn’t want the seclusion of a rancher’s life. They wanted more.”
“I’m surprised at least one of them didn’t want you.”
Lisa clamped her lips together, thinking her mouth was going to be the death of her yet. It had gotten her into a lot of trouble over the years. Until about five seconds ago, she’d thought she’d outgrown it. Since there wasn’t much she could do except look at Wyatt to gauge his reaction, she turned her head.
She was in trouble all right. His eyes had closed partway and had warmed to a darker shade of brown. One corner of his mouth lifted, creasing one lean cheek. If she’d been a woman who played games, she would have touched that crease with the back of her finger. But she hadn’t come all the way to Jasper Gulch to play games. She came to start over and to find a man like her.
No matter how interested Wyatt was, no matter how that interest made her feel, she knew what she had to do. This time she’d do it in a way that didn’t hurt his feelings.
She was still trying to find the proper words when he said, “Now that you know about my past, how about telling me about yours?”
Lisa’s mind cleared, and her objectivity returned. She’d been searching frantically for a way to put an end to his interest once and for all. Unknowingly he’d handed her the perfect opportunity. Now if she could just bring herself to talk about her least favorite subject in all the world.
Pretending to watch the scenery going by, she said, “What would you like to know?”
“For starters,” Wyatt said in a voice just loud enough to be heard over the country-western song playing on the radio, “you could tell me where you grew up.”
Lisa tried to concentrate on the way the wind whipped her hair into her eyes. She tried to imagine how long it was going to take to get the tangles out, and how much work she had ahead of her emptying boxes once she got back to the store. She tried to think about anything that didn’t have to do with her childhood. But Wyatt had asked, and she knew she’d answer, eventually.
She would have preferred him to ask why she’d decided to come to South Dakota or why she’d wanted to open a clothing store or how she’d earned her living before moving out here. But people always seemed more interested in where she’d been and what she’d done a long time ago.
Taking a deep breath, she began in the usual way. “I was born in Chicago, but I grew up in a lot of places.”
“Did your parents move around when you were a kid?”
“I moved around on my own.” If she’d looked at him, she probably would have seen questions in his eyes, but she had to hand it to him, he didn’t pry.
Since she had good reason for telling him about her childhood, she waded through a few more moments of silence then said, “I ran away a couple of days before I turned fifteen.”
He didn’t ask why. He didn’t ask how. He simply waited for her to continue. After a while she said, “Come on, Sheriff, you must be dying to know why I ran away.”
He seemed to be taking his time searching for the appropriate reply. By the time he spoke, they’d reached the village limits on the north end of town. “I’d be surprised if you didn’t have good reasons for doing what you did. Did you ever go back?”
It wasn’t the question people normally asked at this point. It confused her and sent a strange, disquieting feeling through her. He didn’t know her very well, yet he seemed to believe in her. What was a woman supposed to do with a man like that?
Staring at the hard, lean lines of his profile, she said, “I went back a few times. The cops’ idea, not mine. But I always left again.”
Wyatt could see Lisa out of the corner of his eye. She’d let go of her hair, and it was whipping across her face, into her eyes and mouth. He’d wondered where she’d acquired her strength and her independence of spirit. He was beginning to get a pretty good idea. In his mind he pictured a police officer dragging a skinny girl whose dark brown eyes were too big for her face back to a place she didn’t want to go. Something told him she wouldn’t have been a willing passenger. Oh, no, Lisa Markman had probably gone back kicking and screaming bloody murder.
“No wonder you’re leery of a man wearing a badge.”
“What makes you think that?”
It was his turn to be surprised. “You implied that.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Then you don’t dislike men in uniform?” he asked.
“Of course not.”
“What about me? Do you dislike me?”
“I think you’re very nice.”
Easing into a small, tentative smile, he said, “Nice enough to take in dinner and a movie with me?”
“Too nice for that.”
Suddenly the word nice sounded as grating as fingernails scraping a blackboard. “I beg your pardon?” he croaked.
Her hands covered her cheeks. “Oh, my gosh. I’ve done it again, haven’t I? I’m sorry if that sounded like an insult. It was far from intentional. You really are a very nice man. You’re like one of those good guys on TV, right down to your white hat. You probably go to bed by eleven every night and to church every Sunday. Heck, you were probably a choirboy when you were a kid. Now that you know about my past, you should understand why I’m looking for someone completely different.”
It took a lot to make Wyatt mad, but no matter what she said, he was no saint. He clamped his mouth shut and jerked the car to a stop in a parking space in front of the store. He threw the gearshift into Park, got out, kicked his door shut and gave the back door a yank. Slightly