“Once she gets better, she’ll want her job back,” Faith said, worried that was true.
“Nope. You’ll be doing what’s left of her stunt work for the remainder of the shoot. She talked the director into hiring her as assistant stunt coordinator. She can’t do stunts, but she can help set them up.”
Faith swallowed back her guilt at that news. She couldn’t help but be anxious and thrilled at the same time. Jud had seen to everything. “Are you always so accommodating?” she asked only half-joking.
“I made an exception just for you. I should warn you,” he added, “this film is pretty low budget. As well as doing stunts, I’m also the stunt director. But don’t worry. I think you’ll be pleased with what I got you for pay.”
As if she wouldn’t have done it for free, Faith thought.
“Celebrate,” Jud said.
Again she felt that small insistent thrill that seemed to warm her blood. “Jud?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
He laughed. “Thank me after this film is over. This will either cure you of your need to trick ride or—”
“Or kill me?” she asked with a nervous laugh.
“Or hook you so badly you won’t want to ever quit,” he said. “Either way, you may not thank me when it’s over.”
She wondered about that as she hung up and felt like pinching herself. Her secret desire was about to be realized. She just had to be careful that Jud Corbett didn’t ignite any other secret desires in her.
As she started to leave, she noticed some wadded-up papers in the wastebasket near the phone. She pulled one out and saw that it was the list of numbers for Constance Small and C. Small. Every name had been scratched out.
Dropping the paper back into the trash, she glanced toward the porch where Eve was still sitting and felt an overwhelming sadness for her sister. If only her dreams could come true.
MARY ELLEN HATED FLYING. She’d brought along some needlepoint for the flight, but she hadn’t touched it. Her mind was reeling. What did she hope to accomplish by flying to Montana? Just the thought of returning to Whitehorse made her blood run cold.
Had she been able, she would have gotten off the plane and gone home where she belonged. But as she felt the plane begin its descent into Billings, Mary Ellen knew she’d come too far to turn back now. She had to see why after all these years someone would call about Constance.
There would be a rental car waiting for her at the airport on the rock rims above Montana’s largest city, but she was arriving so late that she planned to spend the night and drive the three hours to Whitehorse in the morning.
From Billings she could drive north through Roundup and Grass Range, the only two towns for hundreds of miles between Billings and Whitehorse. Roundup was small, and Grass Range was even smaller.
Mary Ellen tightened her seat belt and closed her eyes. She hated cold even more than flying. At least it was July in Montana. Had it been winter like the last time she was in Whitehorse, Mary Ellen knew she wouldn’t have come.
It would be hard enough returning to the past.
As the plane began its descent into Billings, Mary Ellen wished she were on speaking terms with God. But she suspected any prayers from her would be futile given all her sins—her greatest sin committed in Whitehorse, Montana, thirty-four years ago.
AS FAITH TOPPED THE HILL in her pickup, her horse trailer towed behind, she saw the movie encampment below: the two circles of trailers and past it the small town that had been erected. All of it had a surreal feel to it—not unlike this opportunity that had landed in her lap.
Captured in the dramatic light of the afternoon sun, the small Western town in the middle of the Montana prairie looked almost real with its false storefronts, wooden sidewalks, hitching posts with horses tied to them and people dressed as they would have been a hundred years ago.
She’d barely gotten out of her pickup when Jud Corbett walked up.
“Feel like saddling up and going for a ride?” he asked.
“Sure.” She hadn’t been on her horse all day, and the offer definitely had its appeal. Even more so because it would be with Jud, although she wasn’t about to admit that, even to herself.
They saddled their horses and rode along the edge of the ravine overlooking the movie camp. She and Jud compared childhoods, both finding that they’d grown up on ranches some distance from town, both loved horses and both had begun riding at an early age.
“I can’t believe how much we have in common,” Jud said, his gaze warming her more than the afternoon summer sun. “Do you believe in fate?”
She chuckled. “Let me guess. It’s fate that you and I met?”
“Don’t you think so?” he asked. He was grinning, but she saw that he was also serious.
“I suppose I do.” If he hadn’t taken the back road to his family ranch that evening, and if Laney and Laci hadn’t gone into labor when they had so Faith could go riding, then what was the chance that she and Jud would be here right now?
“Fate, whatever, I’m just glad you and I crossed paths,” he said, then drew up his horse, as below them the ghost town came into view.
Jud leaned on his saddle horn to stare down at it. “Spooky looking, even from here.”
She felt a chill as she followed his gaze. A tumbleweed cartwheeled slowly down the main street of the ghost town to come to rest with a pile of others against the side of one of the buildings. Remarkable there were any buildings still standing.
“So are the stories true?” Jud asked.
“At least some of them,” she said. “The descendants of the Brannigan family still live on down the river.” She saw his surprise. “Some of the descendants of Kid Curry and his brothers also still live around here.”
He shook his head. “But what about the town and this thing with the rag dolls?”
She looked down at what was left of Lost Creek. “I’m sure you’ve heard the story, since apparently it’s what the script of this film is based on.”
“Some outlaws rode into town and killed a woman and her little girl while the townspeople stood by and did nothing. The husband and eldest son returned, saw his dead wife and child in the middle of the street and picking up the little girl’s rag doll from the street, swore vengeance on everyone who’d stood back and let it happen. Does that about size it up?”
She smiled. “Just about.”
“Then the townspeople started finding rag dolls on their doorstep and terrible things began to happen to them until one night everyone in town disappeared.”
“That’s the way the story goes,” Faith admitted.
“Don’t you think its more than likely the townspeople left knowing that the outlaws would be back and more of them would die?” Jud asked.
She said nothing.
“What happened to the father?”
“Orville Brannigan and the rest of his children moved downriver to live like hermits. Their descendants still do. The little girl’s gravestone is about all that’s left up at the cemetery on the hill. Emily Brannigan. The historical society comes out a couple of times a year and puts flowers on her grave.”
“The poor family,” Jud said.
“It always amazes me how many families struggled to tame this land and still do.”
“Like your family.”
She