Page 28 of Wyoming Heart

“Well, the man shot at him first,” he said defensively.

Her heart almost stopped. The thought of Cort being shot down made her feel sick at her stomach. She couldn’t understand why. She hardly even knew him. She didn’t want to know him. He made her knees weak.

“He and the sheriff in his county back home in Texas are good friends,” he told her. “And he’s well thought of by the Special Rangers—those are the Texas Rangers assigned to investigate livestock and ranch-and farm-related cases of cattle theft. The man Cort shot got thirty years in prison for stealing sixty head of cattle.”

“Thirty years?” she exclaimed.

He nodded. “Texas is hard on cattle thieves. Here in Wyoming, it’s ten years, tops. But in Texas, it’s a third-degree felony, punishable by ten years in prison for stealing ten head of cattle. Sixty head, sixty years, it should have been—but the guy had a good lawyer so he only got thirty years.”

“I will never steal even one head of cattle in Texas as long as I live,” she said, putting her hand over her heart. “I swear!”

He laughed. “Me, too.”

“I guess I’d better get back home. I’m stuck in the middle of a chapter on the next book. I thought getting out in the clean air might help me think. It sure did.”

“You going to get serious about Jake?” he asked conversationally, and his eyes twinkled as he glanced at her. “You could do worse.”

“He’s really nice,” she began.

He grimaced. “Ouch. Nice!”

“Well, he is.”

He shook his head. “He’s got all his own teeth, mostly, and he owns a private jet. He’s filthy rich, got ranch holdings everywhere, and he’s good-looking to boot!”

“And he’s nice.”

He just shook his head.

She glanced at him as they left the barn. “Are you sure your cousin isn’t on some Wanted list somewhere?” she wondered.

“Not that I know of,” he promised, and burst out laughing. “He’s a good man. Temperamental, hot tempered, and he can be arrogant. But he’s steady and strong.”

“And if you’re offering him to me—no, thank you,” she said firmly.

“Could I ask why not?”

She turned and looked at him. “Because he’s a cowboy, Bart,” she replied. “I know about cowboys. I’ve been around them all my life. They carouse when they’ve got free time. They’ve got a girl in every little town who thinks she’s the only girl. A lot of them move from ranch to ranch because they get the wanderlust. They don’t settle down and they never love just one woman.” She looked out over the pasture to the snowcapped mountains beyond. “A man who works the land enjoys his own company,” she said after a minute. “He’s a loner. Men like that...” She smiled sadly. “Well, they don’t settle. Do they?”

He was caught between a rock and a hard place. What could he say that wouldn’t blow Cort’s cover?

“Some of them do,” he replied. “What about Joe Stamper? He was a rounder, and he settled down with Martha. They have three sons. He’s the foreman over at the McGuire Ranch.”

“I’d forgotten Joe.”

“I could name you two or three others who got married and made good husbands and fathers,” he added.

She sighed. “I guess so. But marriage isn’t something I want, Bart,” she said sadly. “I guess I’ve had a close look at the worst of it, and it warped something inside me. I don’t believe in happy endings anymore. Life,” she added, “is not a fairy tale.”

“That depends,” he said.

“On what?”

He looked beyond her to the mountains she’d been watching. “It depends on the people involved,” he replied. “Life is what you make of it.”

“I stand corrected.” She grinned at him. “But you’re not married.”

“She ran off with another man,” he reminded her.