Montana

“This place is a dump.”

“Thomas, stop!” She would hear none of this. None of it! “This is our home.”

“We were better off in the apartment.”

Molly’s fingers ached from her death grip on the steering wheel. “It’ll be just as beautiful as ever in no time,” she said forcefully, defying the boys to contradict her.

Either they recognized the determination in her voice or were too tired to argue.

Molly had half expected Gramps to be on the porch waiting for her when she arrived and was disappointed when he wasn’t. She pulled the car around to the back of the house, close to the barn where Gramps generally parked his vehicles. Two dogs, one of them hugely pregnant, began barking furiously.

She turned off the engine and a man stepped out of the shadows from inside the barn. He removed his hat and wiped his forearm across his brow, then paused to study her.

This could only be Sam Dakota. Her grandfather’s foreman. The boys scrambled out of the car, eager to escape its confines. They were obviously anxious to explore, but stayed close to the Taurus, waiting for her. The instant he was out the door, Clay squatted down and petted the pregnant dog, lavishing her with affection. The other dog continued his high-pitched barking.

Molly worried when she still didn’t see Gramps. Her immediate fear was that she’d arrived too late and her grandfather was already dead. Sam would’ve had no way of contacting her while she was on the road. It’d been foolish not to phone from the hotel, just in case … As quickly as the idea entered her head, she pushed it away, refusing to believe anything could have happened to Gramps. Not yet! She opened her car door and stepped into the early-afternoon sunshine.

Sam walked toward her, which gave Molly ample opportunity to evaluate his looks. After that first glimpse, when he’d briefly removed his Stetson, she couldn’t see much of his facial features, which were hidden beneath the shadowed rim of his hat. The impression of starkly etched features lingered in her mind, his face strong and defined. He was tall and whipcord-lean.

If his clothes were any indication, he didn’t shy away from hard work. His jeans were old, faded by repeated washings. The brightly colored shirt with the sleeves rolled past his elbows had seen better days. He pulled off his right glove, and even from a distance Molly could see that those gloves had been broken in long ago.

“You must be Sam Dakota,” she said, taking the initiative. She walked forward and offered him her hand; he shook it firmly—and released it quickly. “I’m Molly Cogan and these are my boys, Tom and Clay. Where’s Gramps?”

“Resting. He thought you’d arrive earlier. He waited half the morning for you.” The censure in his gruff voice was unmistakable.

Involuntarily Molly stiffened. Clay moved next to her and she slid her arm around his neck, pressing him close. “How’s Gramps feeling?” she asked, choosing to ignore the foreman’s tone.

“Not good. He had another bad spell this morning.”

Molly frowned in concern. “Did you take him to the clinic? Shouldn’t he be in the hospital?”

“That’d be my guess, but Walt won’t hear of it. It would’ve taken twenty mules to budge that stubborn butt of his.”

Molly smiled faintly. “My grandmother was the only person who could get him to change his mind, and that was only because he loved her so much.”

An answering smile flashed from his eyes. “Unfortunately he holds no such tenderness for me,” he murmured, then turned his attention to Tom and Clay. “Are you boys thirsty? There’s a pitcher of lemonade in the fridge.” Without waiting for a response, he led the way into the house.

With a mixture of joy and dread, Molly followed. She paused as she stepped into the kitchen—it was even worse than she’d feared. The once-spotless room was cluttered and dirty. A week’s worth of dirty dishes was stacked in the sink. The countertops, at least what was visible beneath the stacks of old newspapers, mail and just about everything else, looked as if they hadn’t been cleared in weeks. The windows were filthy—Molly could tell they hadn’t been washed in years—and the sun-bleached curtains were as thin as tissue paper.

Molly wasn’t nearly as meticulous a housekeeper as her grandmother had been; as a working mother, she didn’t have the time for more than once-a-week cleaning. Nevertheless she had her standards and this house fell far short of them.

“Is lemonade all you got?” Tom asked when Sam took three glasses from the cupboard. Molly was surprised there were any clean dishes left. “What about a Pepsi? A Coke? Anything?” Tom whined.

“Water,” Sam suggested, then winked at Clay, who had no problem accepting the homemade offering.

Tom tossed his mother a look of disgust and snatched up the glass of lemonade as if he was doing them all a favor.

“Your grandfather’s asleep in the living room,” Sam said, motioning toward it.

Molly didn’t need directions, but she said nothing. Not wanting to startle Gramps, she tiptoed into the room. She stood there for a moment watching him. He leaned back in his recliner, feet up, snoring softly. Even asleep, he looked old and frail, nothing like the robust man he’d been only ten years ago.

It demanded both determination and pride to keep her eyes from filling with tears. Her heart swelled with love for this man who was her last link to the father she barely remembered. She’d been so young when her father died. A child of six. Her entire world had fallen apart that day of the car accident; she missed him still. Her mother had remarried less than a year later, and Molly had a baby brother the year after that. And the summer she graduated from high school, her mother, stepfather and half brother had immigrated to Australia.

Kneeling beside the recliner, Molly gently brushed the white hair from Gramps’s brow. Needing to touch him, needing to feel a physical connection, she let her hand linger.

“Gramps,” she whispered, so softly she could hardly hear her own voice.

No response.

Tenderly Molly placed her hand over his. “We’re here, Gramps.”

His eyes flickered open. “Molly girl,” he whispered, reaching out to caress the side of her face. “You’re here at last. To stay?”

“I’m here to stay,” she assured him.

His smile made it to his eyes long before it reached his mouth. “What kept you so damn long?” he asked in his familiar brusque tone.

“Stubbornness. Pride,” she said, and kissed his weathered cheek. “I can’t imagine where I got that.”

Gramps chuckled, looking past her. “Where are those young’uns of yours? I’ve been waitin’ all day for this, and none too patiently, either.”

Tom and Clay stepped into the room. Tom had his arms folded and a scowl on his face. He lagged behind Clay, who was grinning and energetic, unable to hold still. “Hi, Gramps!” Clay’s exuberant greeting was echoed by Tom’s reluctant “Hi.”

Gramps studied her sons for what seemed like minutes before he nodded. It was then that Molly saw the sheen of tears in his tired eyes. He sat up and braced both hands on his knees.

“You’ve done a fine job raising these boys of yours, Molly. A fine, fine job.”

“That her?” Lance whispered, staring out from the alley between the café and hardware store. He motioned with his head toward Molly Cogan.

She walked out of the Sweetgrass bank, glancing up at the man beside her. He wore a Stetson and walked like a cowboy.

Monroe’s gaze followed his fellow Loyalist’s to the other side of the street. It surprised him that a cantankerous old guy like Wheaton would have a granddaughter this attractive. From what he understood, she’d been divorced a number of years. A woman who’d been that long without a husband might appreciate some attention from the right kind of man. He’d heard redheads could be real wild women in the sack.

He quickly banished the thought from his mind. It’d be a mistake to mix business with pleasure. And it could end up being a costly mistake. Once this matter of getting hold of the ranch was settled, he’d show her the difference between a Montana man and a city boy.

Oh, yeah. Monroe had heard all about those men in California, especially in the San Francisco area. Those gay boys sure didn’t know what to do with a woman. Seemed they were stuck on each other, if you could imagine that! The whole damn country was going to hell in a handbasket—but not if he could help it. That’s what the Loyalists were all about. They were a militia group—been around for ten years or so. At their last meeting, more than a hundred men had crammed the secret meeting place to show their support for the changes he and the other Loyalists were planning to bring about. Of course some folks who didn’t know any better took exception to the cause. Walt Wheaton, for one. The old cuss was as stubborn as they came. Monroe had done everything in his power to convince the rancher to sell out. Subtly of course. Guarding his own identity and his position of power in the organization was crucial. Only Loyalists knew him as Monroe, and although he’d attended the last meeting, no one in Sweetgrass had any idea how deeply involved he was with the militia. His cover was useful and too important for Loyalist purposes to break.

After a careful study of possible sites for their training grounds, the group had decided old man Wheaton’s property was the ideal location. But Walt Wheaton had remained inflexible. As his banker, Dave Burns was in a position to put the pinch on him, but it hadn’t worked. When things hadn’t fallen into place, the head of the Loyalists had sent Lance to help them along. Monroe didn’t think much of Lance, but he kept his opinions to himself.

In a last-ditch effort to keep violence out of the picture—not that he was opposed to using force, if necessary—he’d convinced the powers-that-be to give him one last chance to reason with the old rancher. He hated like hell to see a hothead like that fool Lance get credit for obtaining the property when he might finesse the deal himself—with a little assistance.

That was when he put the pressure on a third cousin of his to make the old man an offer he couldn’t refuse. Now that Walt’s granddaughter was in town, they might finally make some headway. The ranch was on its last legs, Burns had seen to that, refusing Wheaton any more loans and calling in the ones he already had.

“How much longer is the old guy gonna live?” Lance asked, cutting into his thoughts.

“Not long,” Monroe said under his breath. If necessary he’d let Lance give Wheaton a good shove into the hereafter, but he’d prefer to avoid that. Too messy. And the last thing the Loyalists needed was a passel of state cops and reporters looking in their direction.

“Who’s that with her?”