The Cowboy And The Debutante. Stella Bagwell

remark. But she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of letting him know he riled her. For years Anna had trained herself to be a cool, sophisticated woman. It was an image she projected to her audience and even her family. She wasn’t about to let this man know he could make her lose control.

      “Goodbye, Mr. Chavez,” she said bluntly, then touched her heels to the horse’s sides and left him and the cool, dim interior of the stables behind.

      She rode south, forging across the shallow Hondo, then up into the mountains where the pines grew thick and the carpet of needles beneath them silenced the mare’s hooves.

      At a rocky ledge halfway up, she reined Ginger to a halt and gazed back down on the valley below.

      To Anna there was no place like the Hondo Valley. Santa Fe, where she’d played her last engagement, was known for its art and culture and mysticism, but this was the New Mexico Anna loved. There was everything in the valley. Horses, cattle, fruit orchards, forest and desert and something mixed of the two. And it was home. Nothing was better than that.

      Ginger shook her head as a mosquito buzzed around her ears. Anna swatted the insect away, then patted the mare’s neck. As she did, the lean, dark image of Miguel Chavez skipped through her mind.

      The man had been a complete surprise to her. Not that having a Mexican-American working on the Bar M was anything unusual. Quite the contrary. Her parents normally hired more Hispanics than Anglos and they were as much a part of this area as the Apaches. When she’d looked into his handsome face, his ancestry had been the last thing on her mind.

      There was something about Miguel that had made her feel different in a way she’d never quite felt before. When he’d looked at her and grinned that outlandishly sexy grin at her, all she’d been able to think was that she was a woman and he was a man. It was ridiculous!

      But Anna had far more important things to think about than a tough cowboy who was at least ten years older than her and probably married, besides. She had to gather herself together, refuel her mind and her body. Otherwise, after these next six weeks passed, she didn’t know whether she could make herself go back on the road again.

      She loved playing the piano, but she was growing weary of the nomadic life and the demands of performing for an audience. The weight of her job was taking a toll on her body. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept the whole night through. Fatigue was her constant companion and her once-healthy appetite had almost vanished.

      To please her parents last week, she’d gone for a medical checkup. When the doctor had assured Anna there was nothing physically wrong, both her mother and father had quickly assumed she was still grieving over her breakup with Scott. And Anna had found it easier to let them go on thinking she was simply suffering from a broken heart.

      Truth was after she’d gotten over the initial shock of walking in and finding Scott in another woman’s arms, Anna had come to realize she had never loved him with the same wild, deep need that her mother and father felt for each other. She hadn’t been devastated when their relationship ended. She’d been relieved. And that in itself worried her. She was beginning to fear she was going to be like her birth mother, who’d flitted from one man and one bad relationship to the next.

      With a heavy sigh, Anna reined the paint away from the ledge and headed her back down the mountain. The sun was dipping lower in the west, and her father would soon be home for supper. For his sake she was going to change clothes, put on her cheeriest face and make herself eat a whole plate of food.

      Back at the stables there was no sign of Miguel Chavez. Although there were several wranglers working around the ranch yard doing last-minute evening chores, she unsaddled her mount, then brushed and fed her herself. The last thing she wanted was for word to get back to the foreman that she was a spoiled little rich girl. In her opinion the man was already far too smug. She didn’t want to give him reason to be even more so.

      Later that evening after supper, Anna helped her mother clear away the dirty dishes, then Chloe carried a pot of coffee out to the courtyard at the back of the ranch house where redwood furniture was grouped beneath a stand of piñon pines.

      Her father had taken about two sips when his pager beeped. Mumbling his annoyance, he checked the number, then rose to his feet. “Looks like I’m going to have to leave you two beautiful ladies. Sander’s Gas Exploration is calling.”

      “We’ll try to do without you for a few minutes, darling,” Chloe told him.

      Anna watched her father head back into the house, then with a little sigh, snuggled deeper into the cushioned chair.

      “Are you cold, honey? Would you rather go back in?” Chloe asked her.

      Cooler air had moved in with the night, but Anna had pulled on a sweater before she’d left the house. “No. I’m fine. It’s beautiful out tonight.”

      A few feet away an oval swimming pool was edged with huge terra-cotta pots filled with geraniums, marigolds and zinnias. Anna wished the water was warm enough to dive into. She couldn’t remember when she’d taken the time for a leisurely swim. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone at anything in a leisurely way.

      A few feet away, Anna’s mother, Chloe, studied her daughter’s quiet profile for several moments, then said, “I wish you were enjoying yourself more. You’ve been back on the ranch for three days now, and I don’t think I’ve heard you laugh yet.”

      Anna twisted her head around to face her mother. “I’m enjoying myself, Mother. You know how long I’ve wanted to come home.”

      Chloe didn’t look a bit convinced. “Yes. But now that you’re here I’m not so sure it’s what you were really needing.”

      Grimacing, Anna rose from the chair and strolled over to the swimming pool. “Mother, please don’t tell me I’d be happier if I were out looking for a man. Men are off-limits!”

      Chloe laughed, then just as quickly apologized. “I’m sorry, honey, I’m not laughing at you. I realize you’re miserable, but to hear you say your love life has ended is...ridiculous.”

      Kneeling down near the edge of the pool, Anna trailed her fingers through the clear water. Just as she expected, it was still freezing. “I mean what I said earlier, Mother. I’m swearing off men. This last thing with Scott proved to me that they’re not to be trusted.”

      She walked back over to where her mother sat stretched out on a chaise lounge, studying her with troubled eyes. “Believe me, Anna, I felt just as you did before I met your father. You haven’t forgotten that a man left me after we’d already planned to get married.”

      Anna hadn’t forgotten the story Chloe had related to her years before. “I remember. You told him you couldn’t bear children and he ran out on you. How could you have wanted to marry a piece of scum like that?”

      Chloe chuckled. “I could ask you the same thing about Scott? Why fret over someone who isn’t worth it?”

      Sighing again, Anna lifted her eyes to the sky. The night was clear, and stars blazed by the millions over the mountains. Deep in her heart Anna was beginning to think this was where she really belonged, not in some civic center a thousand miles away.

      “Believe me, Mother, Scott opened my eyes. If it wasn’t for seeing how much you and Daddy adore each other, I think I’d quit believing in love altogether.”

      “Anna! You’re just angry now. Besides, what about your aunts, Rose and Justine? They’ve both had long, wonderful marriages. And now your cousins Emily and Charlie are both happily married.”

      Chloe was right. Most of her relatives had been lucky in love. But her mother hadn’t mentioned Anna’s birth parents, Belinda and Tomas. The two of them had been terribly unlucky. In fact, Belinda had more or less died from a broken heart and so had Tomas. But Anna loved Chloe too much to bring up that painful part of their lives.

      “Mother...I think it’s time I told you...I haven’t been totally honest with you and Dad.”

      Chloe’s