The Black Sheep's Inheritance. Maureen Child

      Three

      The Big Blue ranch seemed empty without the larger-than-life presence of J.D. Lassiter. Colleen glanced out the window of the bedroom that had been hers for the past several weeks and smiled sadly. She was going to miss this place almost as much as she would miss J.D. himself.

      But it was always like this for her, she thought sadly. As a private nurse, she slipped into the fabric of families—sometimes at their darkest hours. And when her job was done, she left, moving on to the next client. The next family.

      She tugged on the zipper of her suitcase, flipped the lid open and then sighed. Colleen hated this part of her assignments. The packing up of all her things, the saying goodbye to another chapter in her life. Positioning these memories onto a high shelf at the back of her mind, where they could be looked at later but would be out of the way, making room for the next patient.

      Only this time...maybe there wouldn’t be another family.

      She shook her head and realized that the silence of the big house was pressing down on her. The only other people at Big Blue right now were the housekeeper and the cook, and it was as if the big house was...lonely. It wouldn’t be for long, though. Soon, Marlene, Angelica and Chance would be returning, and she wanted to be gone before they got home. They didn’t need her here anymore. By rights, she should have left two weeks ago after J.D.’s death, but she’d stayed on at Marlene’s request, to help them all through this hard time.

      Colleen walked to the closet and gathered an armful of clothes, carrying them back to the bed. On autopilot, she folded and then stacked her clothing neatly in the suitcase and then went back for more. It wouldn’t take long to empty the closet and the dresser she had been using. She’d only brought a few things with her when she moved into the guest room.

      Normally, she didn’t live in when she took a private client. But J.D. had wanted her close by and had been willing to pay for the extra care, to spare his family having to meet all of his needs. In the past couple of months, Colleen had grown to love this place. The ranch house was big, elegant and yet still so cozy that it wasn’t hard to remember that it was, at its heart, a family home.

      At that thought, Sage crept back into her mind. He, his brother and sister had all grown up here on this ranch, and if she listened hard enough, she was willing to bet she would be able to hear the long-silent echoes of children playing.

      And strange, wasn’t it, how her mind continually drifted back to thoughts of Sage? To be honest, he had been on her mind since the rehearsal dinner. He starred nightly in her dreams and even his coldly furious outburst that morning hadn’t changed anything. In fact, it had only made her like him more. That outburst had shown her just how much he had cared for his father, despite their estrangement. And the sympathy she felt for the loss he’d suffered was enough to color his accusations in a softer light.

      Her brief conversation with Sage Lassiter had left Colleen more shaken than the news that she was now a millionaire. Maybe because the thought of so much money was so foreign to her that her brain simply couldn’t process it. But having the man of her dreams actually speak to her was so startling, she couldn’t seem to think of anything but him. Even though he’d insulted her.

      “Not his fault,” she assured herself again as she folded her clothes and stuffed them into the suitcase. “Of course he’d be suspicious. He doesn’t know me. He just lost his father. Why should he trust me?”

      All very logical.

      And yet the sting of his words still resonated with her. Because she couldn’t get past the thought that everyone else would believe what he’d blurted out. That somehow she had tricked a sick old man into leaving her money. Maybe she should turn it down. Go back to the lawyer, tell him to donate the money to charity or something.

      Releasing a breath, she stopped packing and lifted her gaze to the window of the room that had been home for the past three months. The view outside was mesmerizing, as always.

      There were no curtains on the windows at Big Blue. In the many talks Colleen and J.D. had had, she’d learned that was a decree from J.D.’s late wife, Ellie. She’d wanted nothing to stand between her and the amazing sweep of sky. There were trees, too—all kinds of trees. Pines, oaks, maples, aspen. There was a silence in the forest that was almost breathtaking. She loved being here in the mountains and wasn’t looking forward to going back to her small condo in a suburb of Cheyenne.

      But, a tantalizing voice in her mind whispered, with your inheritance, you could buy a small place somewhere out here. Away from crowds. Where you could have a garden and trees of your own and even a dog. A dog. She’d wanted one for years. But she hadn’t gotten one because first, her father had been sick, and then when she and her mother moved to Cheyenne, they’d lived in apartments or condos. It hadn’t seemed fair to her to leave an animal cooped up all day while she and her mom were at work.

      Now, though...her mind tempted her with the possibilities that had opened up to her because of J.D. She could quit her job, focus on getting her nurse practitioner’s license and start living the dream that had been fueling her for years. More than that, she could help her mom, make her life easier for a change. That thought simmered in her mind, conjuring up images that made her smile in spite of everything.

      The winters in Cheyenne were beginning to get to Colleen’s mother. Laura Falkner was always talking about moving to Florida to live with her widowed sister and maybe the two of them taking cruises together. Seeing the world before she was too old to enjoy it all.

      With this inheritance, Colleen could make not only her own dreams come true, but her mother’s, as well. Her hands fisted on the blue cotton T-shirt she held. Should she take the money as the gift it had been meant to be? Or should she reject it because she was afraid what small-minded people might say?

      “Wouldn’t that be like a slap in the face to J.D.?” she asked aloud, not really expecting an answer.

      “Lots of people wanted to slap J.D. over the years.”

      She whirled around to face Sage, who stood in the open doorway, one shoulder braced against the doorjamb. He leaned there casually, looking taller and stronger and somehow more intimidating than he had in the parking lot. And that was saying something. His cool blue gaze was locked on hers and Colleen felt the slam of that stare from all the way across the room.

      Her heartbeat jumped into a gallop, her mind went blessedly blank for a second or two and her mouth dried up completely. There was a buzzing sensation going on inside her, too, and it was tingling long-comatose parts of her body back into life. What was it about this man that could turn her into such a hormonal wreck just by showing up?

      “What? I mean,” she muttered, irritated that once again she felt tongue-tied around him. She’d always thought of herself as a simple, forthright kind of woman. Before now, she had never had trouble talking to anyone. But all Sage had to do was show up and her mouth was so busy thinking of doing other more interesting things that it couldn’t seem to talk. “I didn’t know you were there.”

      “Yeah,” he said, pushing away from the wall and strolling confidently into the room. “You seemed a little...distracted.” He glanced around the sumptuous room, taking in the pale blue quilt, the dozen or more pillows stacked against a gleaming brass headboard and the brightly colored throw rugs covering the polished wood floor. “This place has changed some.”

      “It’s a lovely room,” she said, again feeling a pang about leaving.

      He glanced at her and shrugged. “When I was a kid, this was my room.”

      His room. Oh, my. A rush of heat swept through her system so completely, she felt as if she’d gotten a sudden fever. She’d been living in Sage’s room for the past few months. If she’d known that before, she might not have been able to sleep at all.

      She smiled hesitantly. “I’m guessing it looks a lot different to you, then.”

      “It does.” He walked to the window, looked out, and then turned back to her with a quick grin. “The trellis