Christmas On His Ranch: Maggie's Dad / Cattleman's Choice

She didn’t say a word. She only looked at him. “You know the truth,” she said wearily. “You just don’t want to believe it.”

“George paid your way through college,” he reminded her.

“Yes, he did,” she agreed, smiling. “And I rewarded him by graduating with honors, second in my graduating class. He was a philanthropist and the best friend my family ever had. I miss him.”

“He was a rich old man with designs on you, whether you’ll admit it or not!”

She searched his deep-set black eyes. They never smiled. He was a hard man, and the passing years had only added to his sarcastic, harsh demeanor. He’d grown up dirt poor, looked down on in the community because of his parents. He’d struggled to get where he was, and she knew how difficult it had been. But his hard life had warped his perception of people. He looked for the worst, always. She’d known that, somehow, even when they were first engaged. And now, he was the sum of all the tragedies of his life. She’d loved him so much, she’d tried to make up to him for the love he’d never had, the life his circumstances had denied him. But even while he was courting her, he’d loved Sally most. He’d told Antonia so, when he broke their engagement and called her a streetwalker with a price tag….

“You’re staring,” he said irritably, ramming his hands into the pockets of his dark slacks.

“I was remembering the way you used to be, Powell,” she said simply. “You haven’t changed. You’re still the loner who never trusted anyone, who always expected people to do their worst.”

“I believed in you,” he replied solemnly.

She smiled. “No, you didn’t. If you had, you wouldn’t have swallowed Sally’s lies without—”

“Damn you!”

He had her by both shoulders, his cigar suddenly lying in the snow at their feet. He practically shook her, and she winced, because she was willow thin and he had the grip of a horseman, developed after long years of back-breaking ranch work long before he ever made any money at it.

She looked up into blazing eyes and wondered dimly why she wasn’t afraid of him. He looked intimidating with his black eyes flashing and his straight black hair falling down over his thick eyebrows.

“Sally didn’t lie!” he reiterated. “That’s the hell of it, Antonia! She was gentle and kind and she never lied to me. She cried when you had to leave town over what happened. She cried for weeks and weeks, because she hadn’t wanted to tell me what she knew about you and George! She couldn’t bear to see you two-timing me!”

She pulled away from him with a strength she didn’t know she had. “She deserved to cry!” she said through her teeth.

He called her a name that made her flush. She only smiled.

“Sticks and stones, Powell,” she said in a steady, if husky, tone. “But if you say that again, you’ll get the same thing I gave you the summer after I started college.”

He remembered very well the feel of her shoe on his shin. Even through his anger, he had to stifle a mental smile at the memory. Antonia had always had spirit. But he remembered other things, too; like her refusal to talk to him after her mother’s death, when he’d offered help. Sally had been long dead by then, but Antonia wouldn’t let him close enough to see if she still felt anything for him. She wouldn’t even now, and it caused him to lose his temper when he’d never meant to. She wouldn’t let go of the past. She wouldn’t give him a chance to find out if there was anything left of what they’d felt for each other. She didn’t care.

The knowledge infuriated him.

“Now, if you’re quite through insulting me, I have to go home,” she added firmly.

“I could have helped, when your mother died,” he said curtly. “You wouldn’t even see me!”

He sounded as if her refusal to speak to him had hurt. What a joke that would be. She didn’t look at him again. “I had nothing to say to you, and Dad and I didn’t want your help. One way or another, you had enough help from us to build your fortune.”

He scowled. “What the hell do you mean by that?”

She did look up, then, with a mocking little smile. “Have you forgotten already? Now if you’ll excuse me…?”

He didn’t move. His big fists clenched by his sides as she just walked around him to get into the car.

She started it, put it into Reverse, and pointedly didn’t look at him again, not even when she was driving off down the street toward the main highway. And if her hands shook, he couldn’t see them.

He stood watching, his boots absorbing the freezing cold of the snow around them, snowflakes touching the wide brim of his creamy Stetson. He had no idea what she’d meant with that last crack. It made him furious that he couldn’t even get her to talk to him. Nine years. He’d smoldered for nine years with seething outrage and anger, and he couldn’t get the chance to air it. He wanted a knock-down, drag-out argument with her, he wanted to get everything in the open. He wanted…second chances.

“Do you want some hot chocolate?” Ben Hayes called from the front door.

Powell didn’t answer him for a minute. “No,” he said in a subdued tone. “Thanks, but I’ll pass.”

Ben pulled his housecoat closer around him. “You can damn her until you die,” he remarked quietly. “But it won’t change one thing.”

Powell turned and faced him with an expression that wasn’t easily read. “Sally didn’t lie,” he said stubbornly. “I don’t care what anyone says about it. Innocent people don’t run, and they both did!”

Ben studied the tormented eyes in that lean face for a long moment. “You have to keep believing that, don’t you,” he asked coldly. “Because if you don’t, you’ve got nothing at all to show for the past nine years. The hatred you’ve saved up for Antonia is all that’s left of your life!”

Powell didn’t say another word. He strode angrily back to his four-wheel-drive vehicle and climbed in under the wheel.

Chapter Three (#ub88dd233-2ec8-5cf7-915f-b52f0618cec1)

Antonia made it back to Tucson without a hitch, although there had been one or two places along the snow-covered roads that gave her real problems. She was shaken, but it never affected her driving. Powell Long had destroyed enough of her life. She wasn’t going to give him possession of one more minute of it, not even through hatred.

She kept busy for the remainder of her vacation and spent New Year’s Eve by herself, with only a brief telephone call to her father for company. They didn’t mention Powell.

Barrie stopped by on New Year’s Day, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt and trying not to look interested in Dawson’s visit to Antonia’s father’s house. It was always the same, though. Whenever Antonia went to Wyoming, Barrie would wait patiently until her friend said something about Dawson. Then she pretended that she wasn’t interested and changed the subject.

But this time, she didn’t. She searched Antonia’s eyes. “Does he…look well?” she asked.

“He’s fine,” Antonia replied honestly. “He’s quit smoking, so that’s good news.”

“Did he mention the widow?”

Antonia smiled sympathetically and shook her head. “He doesn’t have much to do with women, Barrie. In fact, Dad says they call him ‘the iceman’ around Bighorn. They’re still looking for a woman who can thaw him out.”

“Dawson?” Barrie burst out. “But he’s always had women hanging on him…!”

“Not these days. Apparently all he’s interested in is making money.”

Barrie looked shocked. “Since when?”

“I don’t know. For the past few years at least,” Antonia replied, frowning. “He’s your stepbrother. You’d know more about that than I would. Wouldn’t you?”

Barrie averted her eyes. “I don’t see him. I don’t go home.”

“Yes, I know, but you must hear about him….”

“Only from you,” the other woman said stiffly. “I don’t…we don’t have any mutual friends.”

“Doesn’t he ever come to see you?”

Barrie went pale. “He wouldn’t.” She bit off the words and forced a smile to her face. “We’re poison to each other, didn’t you know?” She looked at her watch. “I’m going to a dance. Want to come?”

Antonia shook her head. “Not me. I’m too tired. I’ll see you back at work.”