The Wrangler's Bride. Justine Davis

sourly, leave the females to Joker.

      Four

      Mercy stretched, then retreated into the warmth of her curled-up shape when her toes found nothing but cold sheets. She opened her eyes to dim gray light, and sleepily wondered what time it was. A few minutes passed before she decided she cared enough to look at the bedside clock; she hadn’t been sleeping well for a long time, and was hesitant to end last night’s relatively peaceful rest.

      When she saw the clock read past 8:00 a.m., she came awake in a rush; she hadn’t slept this late in months. She sat up, rubbing her arms against the room’s chill, realizing now that the fire had probably died down to embers, if Grant had been up and out before dawn, as usual. She’d have to hurry downstairs and stoke it before it died out altogether.

      She yawned as she scrambled into her jeans and a heavy dark green sweater, then pulled on the sheepskin boots that were the only thing she’d ever found that kept her feet warm no matter what. And yawned again. No wonder the man fell asleep in his chair, she thought. She hadn’t been at all surprised when she found him there that night.

      What had surprised her was the book she found resting across his broad chest. Somehow she hadn’t expected the rugged cowboy who ramrodded this big ranch to be prone to reading Shakespeare. But there was no doubt he’d been doing just that—the collected tragedies, to be exact. She’d glanced at the shelves behind the sleeping man, and seen more Shakespeare, Molière and a few more classics tucked in among a selection of much more recent technothrillers, reminding her that Grant had been torn between majoring in literature and studying engineering, despite his never-wavering determination to return to the ranch.

      Then she realized she shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d known perfectly well that Grant had graduated college with honors; Kristina had told her so, proud of her big brother’s success. She remembered when he’d left for college that last summer when she was fourteen. She’d wept, certain her white knight was leaving forever and she’d never see him again. And then she’d started high school herself, and by the following summer she’d been far too sophisticated to spend her time mooning over a childhood crush.

      But that hadn’t stopped her that night from simply standing beside the worn leather chair, watching Grant McClure sleep. The mouth that was so mobile, as quick to smile as it was to frown or quirk in wry amusement, had looked warm and relaxed, and the sandy brown semicircles of his lashes had looked thick and soft against his tanned cheeks. Free for the moment of the responsibility of keeping this ranch going, he had looked much as he had when she last saw him, eighteen and off to conquer the world.

      And her world hadn’t ended, as she’d feared it would. No, she’d left her childhood passion far behind. No longer was her singular goal in life to snag Grant McClure’s attention. And the fact that when he joked that he might appreciate her attention now her heart had taken a sudden leap, and a burst of heat had shot through her, was something she would just as soon ignore. It reminded her far too much of the infatuated child she’d been.

      She yawned again, and stretched as she went down the stairs. Still sleepy-eyed, she stirred the coals in the stove until they were glowing brightly, then added three small, dry pieces of kindling. They caught quickly, and she added two larger pieces of wood. When they were burning, too, she shut the stove door. She stood there for a few minutes, until the heat began to radiate again, warming her hands at the rekindled fire.

      Somewhat absently, still pondering the near miracle of her almost restful night’s sleep, she wandered over to the front window and lifted the curtain she’d mended last week. And blinked.

      Snow. Everything was covered with it. As if all color had been wiped from the earth’s palette, revealing a spotless canvas.

      She’d always welcomed the first snow back in the city. The pristine white cloak seemed to mask, even if only for a while, the ugliness she too often encountered in her work. She knew it was only a facade, that all the ugliness was still there, but it lightened the load just a little to pretend for a short time that the world was as clean and bright as it looked after that first snow. But here the landscape itself had its own clean, stark beauty, and the coating of snow softened it all to a gentle loveliness.

      She went for her heavy shearling coat and pulled it on, then trotted to the door. The moment she stepped outside, she took in a long, deep breath of crisp air that seemed so clean she could almost taste the purity of it. She found herself smiling, and her smile widened as she stepped off the porch into the pure white and heard it crunch under her feet.

      She grinned widely to herself.

      And then she stopped dead, marveling. She’d been doubtful when Kristina suggested this; going to a quiet place with nothing to do but think hadn’t seemed to her a wise thing to do. Even though she’d thought seeing Grant after all these years, and seeing how her childhood hero had turned out, might be an interesting distraction, she hadn’t thought it would be enough to get her mind off Nick. And the fact that more than anything, she knew, she should be back home, hunting down the men who had killed him.