Montana Sky (26 page)

“Pink.” Lily slanted her eyes left at Tess's chortle of laughter. “I like pink teddy bears. And I've won a good dozen of them while you've been shooting thin air.”

“Oh, now she's getting nasty. I think we should have a contest. Not you, killer,” Tess said, nudging Willa aside. “Just me and the teddy bear lover.” She leaned closer to Lily. “Let's see if you can handle the pressure, sister.”

“Then I suggest you reload.” Willa bent down for the ammo. “You're both going to be shooting empty.”

“What's the winner get?” Carefully reloading, Tess hunkered down. “Besides satisfaction. We need a prize. I do best with clear, set goals.”

“Loser does the laundry for a week,” Willa decided. “Bess could use a break.”

“Oh.” Lily rose. “I'd be happy to—”

“Shut up, Lily.” With a shake of her head, Willa looked at Tess. “Agreed?”

“Everyone's laundry. Including delicates?”

“Including your fancy French panties.”

“By hand. No silks in the washing machine.” Satisfied with the deal, Tess stepped back. “You go first,” she told Lily.

“Twelve shots each, in two rounds of six. When you're ready, Lily.”

“Okay.” She took a breath, replayed everything Willa had taught her about stance, breathing. It had taken her days to stop slamming her eyes shut as she squeezed the trigger, and she was proud of her progress. She fired slowly, steadily, and watched four cans fly.

“Four out of six. Not too shabby. Guns down, ladies,” Willa ordered as she walked over to reset the targets.

“I can do that.” Tess straightened her shoulders. “I can hit all of them. They're all that freckle-faced bastard Joey
Columbo. I bet he's on his second divorce by now. Two-timing Kool-Aid swiller.”

She shocked everyone, including herself, by knocking three cans from their perch. “I hit that other one. I heard it ping.”

“It did,” Lily agreed, generously. “We're tied.”

“Reload.” Enjoying herself, Willa strolled over to reset. When she turned and spotted Nate heading their way, she lifted an arm in salute.

“Hold your fire.” He stopped short and threw his hands up when Lily and Tess turned. “I'm unarmed.”

“Want to put an apple on your head?” Fluttering her lashes, Tess stepped closer and met him with a kiss.

“Not even for you, Dead Eye.”

“We're in the middle of a shoot-off,” Willa informed him. “Lily, you're up. I see a giant pink teddy bear in your future.” She laughed and set her hands on her hips. “You had to be here,” she told Nate, then whooped when Lily hit five out of six. “Sign her up for the Wild West Show. Beat that, Hollywood.”

“I can do it.”

But her palms were sweaty. She caught a whiff of horses and cologne that was Nate and rolled her tensed shoulders. She took aim, squeezed the trigger, and missed all six shots.

“I was distracted,” she claimed as Willa cheered and pulled Lily's hand up over her head. “You distracted me,” she told Nate.

“Honey, you're a wonder. Not everybody can hit thin air six times out of six.” Nate cautiously took the gun, unloaded or not, out of her hand and gave her a hard kiss in consolation.

Willa smirked. “Don't forget to separate the whites, laundry girl. And pick up your spent shells.”

Lily moved close as she and Tess gathered up shells. “I'll help you,” she whispered.

“The hell you will. A bet's a bet.” Tess cocked her head. “But next time, we arm-wrestle.”

“I'm heading into Ennis for some supplies.” Nate rocked back on his heels and tried, too obviously, not to stare at
the denim straining over Tess's butt as she picked up spent shells from the ground. “Thought I'd stop by and see if you needed anything.”

Like hell, Willa thought, noting just where his eyes kept wandering. “Thanks, but Bess went in a couple days ago and stocked up.”

Tess straightened. “Want some company on the ride?”

“That'd be good.”

Her eyes stayed on his as she dumped her handful of shells into Willa's open palm. “I'll just get my purse.” She tucked her arm through Nate's and shot a sly look over her shoulder. “Tell Bess I won't be back for dinner.”

“Just be back for wash day,” Willa shouted after her. “She's got a clamp on his balls all right.”

“I think they're nice together,” Lily said. “Handsome and easy. His smile just breaks out whenever he sees her.”

“That's because he knows his pants are going to end up around his ankles.” She laughed at Lily's disapproving look. “Good for them. I just don't get the sex thing, that's all.”

“Are you afraid of it?”

The question was so unexpected, considering the source, Willa could only gape. “Huh?”

“I was. Before Jesse, with him. After.” Automatically Lily walked over to stack the target cans. “I think it's natural, before, you know. When you just can't know how things will be, whether you'll do something wrong or make a fool of yourself.”

“It's pretty basic stuff. What could you do wrong?”

“A lot of things. I did a lot of things wrong. Or thought I did. But I wasn't afraid with Adam. Not when I realized he cared for me. I wasn't afraid at all with Adam.”

“Who could be?”

A smile played around Lily's mouth, then she sobered. “You haven't said anything about . . . I know that you know that I'm—with him.” She let out a breath, watched it fog in the chilly air, then disappear. “That I'm sleeping with him.”

“Really?” Willa tucked her tongue in her cheek. “I
thought he waited for you at the side door every night, then walked you back at dawn because you were holding a secret canasta tournament. You mean you're having sex? I'm shocked.”

The smile came back. “Adam said we wouldn't fool anyone.”

“Why would you want to?”

“He . . . he asked me to move into his house, but I didn't know how you'd feel about it. He's your brother.”

“You make him happy.”

“I want to.” She hesitated, then slipped a chain from under her shirt, keeping her fingers closed around something that dangled from it. “He wants . . . He gave me this.”

Stepping closer, Willa looked at what rested in Lily's open palm. It was a simple ring, Black Hills gold etched with a diamond pattern. “It was my mother's,” Willa whispered as her throat closed. “Adam's father gave it to her when they were married.” She lifted her eyes to Lily.

“Adam asked you to marry him.”

“Yes.” He'd done so beautifully, Lily remembered, with simple words and quiet promises. “I couldn't give him an answer yet. It didn't feel right. I made such a mess of things before—” She broke off, cursed herself. “I was in such a mess before,” she corrected. “And I've only been here a few months. I felt I had to speak with you first.”

“It has nothing to do with me. It doesn't,” Willa insisted when Lily began to protest. “This is between you and Adam, completely. I only have the benefit of being tremendously happy. Take it off the chain, Lily, put it on, and go find him. No, don't cry.” She leaned forward and kissed Lily's cheek. “He'll think something's wrong.”

“I love him.” Lily slipped the chain over her head, slid the ring off. “With everything I have, I love him. It fits,” she managed as she put the ring on her finger. “He said it would.”

“It fits,” Willa agreed, “beautifully. Go on and tell him. I'll finish up here.”

• • •

A
S THEY BUMPED ALONG THE ACCESS ROAD
.
TESS
stretched luxuriously.

“You're looking awfully smug for someone who just lost a shoot-out.”

“I'm feeling smug. I don't know why.” Lowering her arms, she scanned the scenery, the snow-covered mountains, the long lay of the land. “Life's a mess. There's a mad killer still at large and I haven't had a manicure in two months. I'm actually thrilled with the prospect of going into some little bumfuck town and window-shopping. God help me.”

“You like your sisters.” Nate shrugged at her arch look.

“You've gone ahead and bonded despite yourselves. I watched the three of you out there, and I'm telling you, Tess, I saw a unit.”

“A common goal, that's all. We're protecting ourselves, and our inheritance.”

“Bull.”

She scowled, folded her arms. “You're going to wreck my fine mood, Nate.”

“I saw the Mercy women. Teamwork, affection.”

“The Mercy women.” She laughed carelessly, then pursed her lips. It has a ring, doesn't it? she mused. “Maybe I don't think Will's quite as big a pain in the butt as I did. But that's because she's adjusting.”

“And you're not?”

“Why would I have to? There was nothing wrong with me.” She trailed a finger up his thigh. “Was there?”

“Other than being stuck-up, ornery, and hardheaded, not a thing.” He hissed through his teeth when her fingers streaked up, found his weakness, and pinched.

“And you love it.” Inspired, she struggled out of her coat.

“Too warm?” Automatically he reached down to adjust the heater.

“It's going to be,” she promised, and tugged her sweater over her head.

“What are you doing?” Shock made him nearly run off the road. “Put that back on.”

“Uh-uh. Pull over.” And she flicked the front hook of
her bra so that her breasts spilled out like glory.

“It's a public road. It's broad daylight.”

She reached over, tugged down his zipper, and found him hard and ready. “And your point is?”

“You're out of your mind. Anybody could come along and . . . Christ Jesus, Tess,” he managed as she slid her head under his arm and clamped her mouth on him. “I'll kill us.”

“Pull over,” she repeated, but the teasing note had fled. Now there was hoarse and husky need as she tore open his shirt. “Oh, God, I want you inside me. All the way in. Hard, fast. Now.”

The rig rocked, the wheels spun, but he managed to get to the shoulder of the road without flipping them over. He jerked on the brake, fought himself free of the seat belt. In one rough move he had her on her back, all but folded on the seat while he struggled with her jeans.

“We'll be arrested,” he panted.

“I'll risk it. Hurry.”

“We—oh, God.” There was nothing under the denim but her. “You should have frozen.” Even as he said it he was dragging her hips free. “Why aren't you wearing long johns?”

“I must be psychic.” Right now she was simply desperate, and she arched up. Her moan was deep and throaty and melded with his as he rammed himself into her.

Then there were only gasps and groans and pants. The windows steamed, the seat squeaked, and they came almost in unison in less than a dozen thrusts.

“Good God.” He would have collapsed on her if there'd been room. “I must be crazy.”

She opened her eyes, then started to laugh. Her ribs were aching before she could control it. “Nate, the respected attorney and salt of the earth, how the hell are you going to explain my bootprints on the ceiling of your truck?”

He looked up, studied them, and sighed. “Pretty much the same way I'm going to explain the fact that I no longer have a single button on this shirt.”

“I'll buy you a new one.” She sat up, managed to locate her bra and snap it on. Giving her hair a quick shake, she boosted her hips to get her sweater. “Let's go shopping.”

“Y
OU GOT A MINUTE
,
WILL
?”

Willa looked up from the papers spread over the desk, pulled herself out of the figures. Christ, grass seed was dear, but if they were going to rebroadcast she wanted to start now. Birth and wean weights circled in her head as she closed a ledger.

“Sorry. Sure, Ham. Problem?”

“Not exactly.”

He held his hat in his hands and eased himself into a chair. The winter had been hard on his bones. Age was hard on the bones, he corrected, and he was starting to feel the years more with every passing wind.

“I went down to the feedlot like you wanted. Looks good. Ran into Beau Radley from over High Springs Ranch?”

“Yes, I remember Beau.” She rose to put another log on the fire. She knew Ham's bones as well as he did. “Lord, Ham, he must be eighty.”

“Eighty-three this spring, so he tells me. When you can get a word in.” Ham set his hat on his lap, tapped his fingers on the arms of the chair.

It was odd sitting there, where he'd sat so many times. Seeing Willa behind the desk, with coffee at her elbow, instead of the old man with a glass of whiskey in his hand.

Jumping up Jesus, that man could drink.

Willa struggled with impatience. Ham took his time, and everyone else's, when he had a point to make. She often thought conversations with him were like watching a glacier move. Generations were born and died before you got to the end of it.

“Beau Radley, Ham?”

“Uh-huh. You know his young'un moved on down to Scottsdale, Arizona. Must be twenty, twenty-five years ago. That'd be Beau Junior.”

Who would be, by Willa's estimation, about sixty. “And?”

“Well, Beau's missus, that's Heddy Radley. She makes those watermelon pickles that always take first prize at the county fair? Seems she's got the arthritis pretty bad.”

“I'm sorry to hear that.” If they got a break in the weather early, Willa thought as her mind wandered, she would see if Lily wanted to start a kitchen garden. A real one.

“Winter's been hard,” Ham commented. “Don't seem to be letting up, and it's coming to calf-pulling time.”

“I know. I'm thinking about adding another pole barn.”

“Might be an idea,” Ham said noncommittally, then took out his tobacco and began to meticulously roll a cigarette. “Beau's selling out and moving down with his boy to Scottsdale.”

“Is he?” Willa's attention snapped back. High Springs had excellent pastureland.

“Done made him a deal with one of those developers.” Ham laid his tongue over the paper, spat lightly. Whether it was a comment on developers or tobacco in his mouth, Willa couldn't have said. “Going to break it up, put in some cussed dude ranch resort and raise frigging buffalo.”

“The deal's already made?”

“Said it was, paid him three times what the land's worth for ranching. Goddamn city jackals.”

“Well, that's that. We'd never match the price.” She blew out a breath, rubbed her hands over her face, then lowered them as another idea came to her. “What about his equipment, his cattle, horses?”

“I'm getting to it.”

Ham blew out smoke, watched it drift to the ceiling. Willa imagined cities being built, leveled, new stars being born, novas.

“He's got a new baler. Barely three seasons old. Wood sure would like to have it. Don't think much of his string of horses, but he's a good cattleman, Beau is.” He paused, smoked some more. Oaks grew from acorns. “Told him I thought you'd pay two-fifty a head for what he had on the feedlot. He didn't seem insulted by it.”

“How many head?”

“About two hundred, good Hereford beef.”

“All right. Make the deal.”

“All right. There's more.” Ham tapped his cigarette out, settled back. The fire was warm, the chair soft. “Beau's got two hands. One's a college boy he just signed on last year out of Bozeman. One of those animal husbandry fellas. Beau says he's got highfalutin ideas but he's smart as a whip. Knows to beat all about crossbreeding and embryo transplants. The other's Ned Tucker, known him ten years easy. Good cowboy, steady worker.”

“Hire them,” Willa said into the next pause. “At whatever wage they were getting at High Springs.”

“Told Beau I figured that. He liked the idea. Feels warm toward Ned. Wants him to be settled at a good spread.” He started to rise, then settled back again. “I got something else to say.”

Her brow raised. “So say it.”

“Maybe you think I can't handle my job no more.”

Now it was shock, plain and simple, on her face. “Why would I think that? Why would you think that?”

“Seems to me you're doing your work and half of mine besides, with a little of everybody else's tossed in. If you ain't in here going over your papers, then you're out riding
fence, checking pasture, looking at the equipment, doctoring cows.”

“I'm operator now, and you know damn well I couldn't run this place without you.”

“Maybe I do.” But it had been an opening and had gotten her full attention. “And maybe I been asking myself what the hell you're trying to prove to a dead man.”

She opened her mouth, closed it, swallowed. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Hell you don't.” Anger hastened his words and brought him out of the chair. “You think I don't see, I don't know. You think somebody who tanned your hide when you needed it and bandaged your hurts don't know what's inside your head? You listen to me, girl,' cause you're too big and mean for me to turn over my knee like I used to. You can beat yourself into the ground from here to the Second Coming and it don't mean a damn to Jack Mercy.”

“It's my ranch now,” she said evenly. “Or a third of it is.”

He nodded, pleased to hear the echo of resentment in her tone. “Yeah, and he slapped you with that too, just like he slapped you all your life. He didn't do what was right for you, what was fitting. Now, maybe I think more of those two girls than I did when they first came around, but that ain't the point. He did what he did to you 'cause he could, that's all. And he brought in overseers from outside Mercy.”

Even as her temper simmered to the surface, she realized something she'd overlooked. “It should have been you,” she said quietly. “I'm sorry, Ham. It never even occurred to me. It should have been you supervising the ranch through this year. I should have thought of that before, and realized how insulting it was.”

Insulting it was, but insults—some insults—he could live with. “I ain't asking you to think of it. And I ain't particularly insulted. It was just like him.”

“Yeah.” She sighed once. “It was just like him.”

“I don't have anything against Ben and Nate, they're good men. Fair. And it would take a brainless moose not to see what Jack was up to, bringing Ben around here. Around
you. But I ain't talking about that.” He waved a hand at her as she scowled. “You got nothing to prove to Jack Mercy, and it's time somebody said so to your face.” He nodded briskly. “So I am.”

“I can't just push it away. He was my father.”

“We pump sperm out of a bull and stick it in a cow, that don't make that bull a father.”

Stunned, she got to her feet. “I never heard you talk about him like this. I thought you were friends.”

“I had respect for him as a cattleman. Never said I respected the man.”

“Then why did you stay on, all these years?”

He looked at her, shook his head slowly from side to side. “That's a damn fool question.”

For me, she thought, and felt both foolish and humbled. Unable to face him, she turned, stared out the window.

“You taught me to ride.”

“Somebody had to.” His voice went rusty, so he cleared it. “Before you broke your fool neck climbing on when nobody was looking.”

“When I fell and broke my arm when I was eight, you and Bess took me to the hospital.”

“The woman was too flustered to be driving you herself. Likely have wrecked the rig.” Uneasy, he shifted in his chair, drummed his stubby fingers.

If his wife had lived past their first two years of marriage, he might have had kids of his own. He'd stopped thinking of that, and the lack, because there'd been Willa to tend to.

“And I ain't talking about all that. I'm talking now. You gotta back off a little, Will.”

“There's so much going on. Ham, I keep seeing that girl, and Pickles. If I let my mind go clear, I see them.”

“Nothing you can do to change what happened, is there? And nothing you did to make it happen. This bastard, he's doing what he's doing 'cause he can.”

It was too close to what he'd said about her father—it made her shudder. “I don't want another death on my hands, Ham. I don't think I could stand it.”

“Goddamn it, why don't you listen?” The furious shout
made her turn, stare at him. “It's not on your hands, and you're a big-headed fool if you think so. What happened happened, and that's that. This ranch don't need you to be fussing over every acre of it twenty hours a day, either. It's about time you tried being a female for a while.”

Her mouth fell open. Shouting wasn't his way unless he was riled past patience. And never could she recall him referring to her gender. “Just what does that mean?”

“When's the last time you put on a dress and went out to kick up your heels?” he demanded, even though it made him flush to say it. “I'm not counting New Year's and whatever that thing was you were almost wearing that had the boys spilling drool out their mouths.”

She laughed at that and, intrigued, slid a hip onto the corner of the desk. “Is that so?”

“If I'd been your pa, I'd have sent you back upstairs for a proper dress, with your ears ringing, too.” Embarrassed by his outburst, he crushed his hat onto his head. “But that's done, too. Now I'm saying why don't you get that McKinnon boy to take you out to a sit-down dinner or a picture show or some such thing instead of you spending every waking hour in a pair of muddy boots? That's what I'm saying.”

“And you've certainly had a lot to say this afternoon.” Which meant, she reflected, that he'd been storing it up. “Just what makes you think I'd be interested in a sit-down dinner with Ben McKinnon?”

“A blind man coulda seen the way you two were plastered together pretending to be dancing.” He decided not to mention the fact that at the poker game at Three Rocks the week before, Ben had pumped him dry for information on her. Conversation over five-card stud was as sacrosanct as that in a confessional. “That's all I have to say about it.”

“Sure?” she asked sweetly. “No observations on my diet, my hygiene, my social skills?”

Oh, she's a sassy one, he thought, and bit back a smile. “You ain't eating enough to fill a rabbit, but you clean up good enough. Far as I can see, you ain't got any social skills.” He was pleased to have worked a fresh scowl out
of her. “I got work to do.” He started out, then paused. “I hear Stu McKinnon is feeling poorly.”

“Mr. McKinnon's ill? What's wrong with him?”

“Just a flu bug, but he ain't feeling up to snuff. Bess made a sweet potato pie. Be nice if you took it over. He's got a partiality for sweet potato pie, and for you. Be neighborly.”

“And I could work on my lack of social skills.” She glanced at the desk, the papers, the work. Then looked back at the man who'd taught her everything worth knowing. “All right, Ham. I'll run over and see him.”

“You're a good girl, Will,” he said, and sauntered out.

 

H
E
'
D GIVEN HER PLENTY TO THINK ABOUT ON THE DRIVE
over, two new men, another two hundred head of cattle. Her own stubborn need to prove herself worthy to a man who had never cared.

And, perhaps, her lack of sensitivity to a man who had always cared, and had always been there for her.

Had she been infringing on Ham's territory the last few months? Probably. That, at least, she could fix. But his words on the murder, however steady and sensible, couldn't wipe out her sense of responsibility.

Or her fear.

She shivered, bumped up the heater in the rig. The road was well plowed, easily navigated. Snow was heaped on the sides so that it was like driving through a white tunnel with white peaks spearing up into a hard blue sky.

There'd been an avalanche to the northwest that had buried three skiers. And some hunters camped in the high country had gotten caught in a blizzard and had to be brought out by copter and treated for frostbite. A neighboring ranch had lost some of its range cattle to wildcat looking for food. And two hikers climbing in the Bitterroots had been lost.

And somewhere, despite the brutal nature of winter, was a killer.

The Big Sky ski area was doing record business. More fortunate hunters claimed game was so plentiful this year that they hardly needed a weapon. Foals were already being
dropped, and cattle were growing fat in feedlots and basin pastures.