Her Montana Cowboy

Big if.

Gigantic if.

He got into the tractor and waited until she pulled past him in the giant boat of a car with the Texas plates. Was it really her grandfather’s car? A prop? His head was starting to ache.

Life had been so freaking simple only twenty-four hours ago, when he’d thought he was beginning a new chapter in his life. One he’d planned for so carefully. Those plans had not included Lillie Jean Hardaway.

If that was her real name.

* * *

THAD LOOKED GRIM when Gus followed Lillie Jean into the house after the car rescue. She excused herself and headed down the hall, an overjoyed Henry prancing close behind her. Thad waited until they heard the door shut before saying, “I called Lyle’s accountant—the one Betts sends the checks to and she gave me the lawyer’s name. The lawyer’s assistant is calling me back within the hour.” Thad looked past Gus toward the hall where Lillie Jean had disappeared. “I need more time.”

“When he calls, maybe you can nail down the reason they didn’t contact you the minute the will surfaced?”

The bedroom door opened again and he and Thad exchanged looks.

“I think she should stay here until we know more.” Thad shifted his weight in the chair. “If she’s who she says she is, we need to talk. If she’s not, we need to know. I want all the facts before we make any kind of decision.”

“I agree.” The door closed, and footsteps sounded on the old wooden floorboards. “In fact, I have some work to do.”

“Guess you could use some company,” Thad murmured in a low voice as Henry danced into the kitchen without his reindeer sweater. “Maybe show our guest some country.”

“Uh-huh.” There were heavy cows to check, a hole in the fence line between the H/H and Carson Craig’s ranch, which the King of Montana demanded be fixed, even though it was a joint boundary and they were both responsible for upkeep and repair. As near as he could tell, Carson’s idea of joint maintenance was for him to order Thad to fix the damned fence. Now.

An uncomfortable silence settled over the room as Lillie Jean entered, and then Thad said to Gus in an overly casual voice, “You better get going before Craig has kittens.”

Gus gave a nod and glanced over at Lillie Jean. “You want to ride along?”

Instant suspicion. “Where?”

“I have to fix a hole in the fence. You’ve come this far, you may as well see some of the ranch before it snows.”

“Snow?” She looked shocked.

“Supposed to have snow tomorrow.”

She glanced over at Thad who nodded. “But the forecast changes hourly. May not be any snow at all. But if you want to go, I’ll babysit your little dog,” he said in a reassuring tone. “And when you get back we’ll have a sit-down.”

“Or the dog can come with us,” Gus said. Dumb sweater and all.

Lillie Jean’s jaw shifted sideways, as if she was well aware that she was being played. “All right. Yes. I’d like to see some of the property.” She glanced down at her dog, who was giving her a beseeching “don’t abandon me” stare. “I’ll leave Henry here where it’s warm.”

“I’ll enjoy the company,” Thad said, making Gus wonder if maybe his uncle needed a dog of his own.

Henry didn’t look all that pleased with the decision, but when Thad reached down and scooped him up with one big hand, the little dog settled on his lap, watching Lillie Jean closely as she gestured toward the coats hanging on hooks next to the back door in the mudroom. “Maybe I could borrow a warmer coat?”

“Sure, but I promise it’ll be plenty warm in the truck.”

“Unless you break down,” Thad said, idly scratching Henry’s ear.

Was that a hint?

“Good point,” Gus said. He headed into the mudroom where he pulled his spare coat off a hook and handed it to Lillie Jean. She slipped into it, put her hands in the pockets and then grimaced. No matter how many times a guy turned his pockets inside out and beat on them, there was always bits of itchy hay there. He reached for a new pair of gloves and handed them to her.

“No hay,” he said. “You might want to grab one of those fleece hats in the basket.”

“Thanks.” She lifted a hat out of the wicker basket that sat on the floor beneath the coats while he wrapped his wild rag around his neck. If he’d had a clean scarf, he would have given it to her, but he didn’t, so she’d simply have to turn up the collar of his coat. But like he’d said, it’d be plenty warm in the truck. It wasn’t that far below freezing, but according to the weather station on the kitchen windowsill, the windchill had knocked the temperatures down below twenty degrees.

He put on his cowboy hat, then pulled open the door and stepped back to let Lillie Jean precede him outside. Before following her into the crisp air, he once again met his uncle’s gaze. Thad gave him a grim nod. The dog on his uncle’s lap looked as if he were about to implode from anxiety, but he stayed put as Lillie Jean stepped out of the house. Gus just hoped Thad had some answers when he got back. He looked determined. The one benefit of almost being scammed last year was that his uncle had no intentions of being played again.

* * *

THE HEAVY COAT Lillie Jean wore smelled of hay and earth and Gus. The warm scents teased her nostrils as she followed the man across the frosty driveway, making her feel as if she was encroaching on intimate territory instead of simply wearing a borrowed coat to keep the wind from cutting through her. She should have simply believed Gus when he said the truck heater would keep her warm enough, and worn her own less than adequate coat.

The wind was blowing stronger than it had been when Gus had pulled her car out of the bottomless pit. Clouds were moving in from the north, a solid bank, grayish at the top, dark charcoal at the bottom, pushing the wind ahead of it. She pulled the coat around her more tightly, the gloves still in her hand. She didn’t want to put them on yet. They were huge but preferable to putting her hands in the prickly pockets of the coat if she needed to warm her fingers. She sincerely hoped she wouldn’t.

Her grandfather’s old car looked ridiculous parked next to the barn—like a time machine. It did not belong on this ranch, and she couldn’t picture her grandfather on the ranch, either. He’d never seemed all that rural to her. He and her grandmother had lived quietly on a one-acre rented lot near the edge of town. They hadn’t kept livestock, or even much of a garden, except for her grandmother’s flowers and tomatoes. He’d worked for nearly three decades at first as a welder, then a shop foreman. For relaxation, he tinkered with motorcycles.

Had he ever been on this ranch? Had he invested with Thad? Were he and Thad friends? Enemies? What?

She was going to get answers before she left.

She hoped. Gus’s grim profile wasn’t making her feel particularly optimistic, but since arriving at the ranch, her mission had crystallized. She’d left Texas to get away from Andrew and the stress of losing her business, losing her grandfather, but the answers she thought she’d like to have, had become answers she needed to have.

Gus led the way to an old truck loaded with posts, wire and tools that looked as if it would fall apart if she breathed on it. But it sounded solid enough when he wrestled open the passenger door and motioned for her to get inside. Everything he needed must have been in the mechanical beast, because after closing her door with a clang that reverberated through the mostly metal interior, he walked around to his side, got in and started the engine. It chugged a few times, then fired to life with a blast of exhaust. The entire cab vibrated.

Lillie Jean couldn’t help frowning over at Gus, who ignored her as he put the vehicle in gear and started down the driveway, stopping at a gate. He got out and opened it, drove through, then got out and closed it again. They drove across the pasture to another gate. This time Lillie Jean said, “Would you like me to open it?” It only seemed polite.

“This one is kind of tricky.”

“I can probably handle it. We do have gates in Texas.” She’d spent time on her best friend’s tiny ranchette during high school. They had wire gates very similar to the one in front of them.

“Have at it.”

She got out and went to the latch, where she realized she’d never seen anything like it before. There was a lever and a loop and, feeling a little foolish at having to take her time to study the contraption, she finally managed to pop the loop off the top of the wire gate and drag it open so that Gus could drive through.

“That lever is kind of counterintuitive,” she said as she got back into the truck.

“I’m not a fan,” he agreed.

Common ground. She brushed the thought aside. What did she care if he agreed with her or not? Especially when it was patently obvious that she was with him because he hadn’t wanted to leave her alone with Thad. What did he think she would do? Weave some kind of a hypnotic spell over his uncle?

No. He thought she might listen in on phone calls. A phone had been sitting on the table when she and Gus had returned to the house, as if Thad had been making or waiting for calls. She didn’t blame him. She would have done the same. She could have helped him do the same, but that was neither here nor there. They didn’t trust her, and she couldn’t force them to. Let Thad get his answers—then perhaps he’d give her some.

Gus drove across the grassy pasture to the tree line and then followed the narrow road through the deciduous trees that were just leafing out. They came to another field and then a fence. Gus turned to the truck to follow the wire along what was more of a trail than a road. The grass was short and slick with frost in the high area between the two ruts that the tires were following.

“Is it always this cold in March?”