Diamond Spur. Diana Palmer

developed between Jason and herself, born out of an equally odd confrontation one night when he’d been drinking. He didn’t let anyone very close, even Kate, but she was allowed privileges that no one else was. He was protective of her, in a rough sort of way; a kind of unrelated older brother. Of course, that wasn’t at all what Kate wanted from him. But it was as much as she could expect from a man who kept to himself the way he always did.

      There was a lot of road between the open range with its spacious improved grazing land, green now that spring had arrived, and the house resting in its solitary nest of trees. In one pasture, cows with new calves were grazing. In another, young castrated bulls made up the steer crop. In still another, huge Santa Gertrudis bulls had been turned out with hearty longhorn-Santa Gertrudis crossbred cows for the third stage in Diamond Spur’s three-crossbreed breeding program. In still another pasture, purebred longhorn bulls had been introduced to the crop of two-year-old heifers for their first breeding. The longhorn papas would insure that the new mothers dropped small calves, insuring an easy delivery and less herd losses.

      Kate smiled at the efficiency of it all. Jason was a wizard with cattle. His sprawling cow-calf commercial operation had a spotless reputation with its customers, and a large part of it was due to Jason’s personal interest in his ranch and the time he spent overseeing every part of its operation. He was always the first to try new techniques, to use better methods of production. That ability to change with the times, to bend to the demands of modern cattle marketing, had kept his Diamond Spur ranch solvent. When, several years back, other ranchers had turned to investing heavily in new land acquisitions, Jason was experimenting with artificial insemination and embryo transplants and innovative methods of nutritional supplementation.

      Kate pushed back her long, dark brown braid and settled lower in the saddle. She grimaced as her jean-clad leg brushed over a nail peeking through the leather. She’d designed and decorated these jeans herself. She hoped they weren’t torn because they were part of a collection she hoped to sell to the manufacturing company where she worked. She really couldn’t afford any new denim. Things were in bad shape at the small place she shared with her mother, but she didn’t want Jason to know just how bad. Anyway, he didn’t need any more worry at the moment. The cattle industry was depressed, and even a man with Jason’s business sense could go broke. If he lived, she thought with black irritation, remembering how impossible he was about injuries. Jason never would go to a doctor with a cut. He’d try to treat it himself and the only way he’d have it seen about was if it got badly infected, or if Kate stuck her nose in. For Jason’s foreman Gabe to run off in the middle of a roundup hunting her, and risking the boss’s temper asking her to intervene, it must be pretty bad this time.

      Nobody ever seemed to guess that she wasn’t as confident as she pretended to be with Jason. He intimidated her, too. After all, he was thirty—almost ten full years her senior. But she’d learned over the years to hide her uncertainty. Now her dark, slender eyebrows drew together as she wondered if he’d done some irreparable damage to his tough hide. He was male perfection itself, as most of the single women around San Frio would have agreed. It was a pity that he’d become such a dyed in the wool misogynist. She wondered how he’d ever get an heir for Diamond Spur with that attitude. And if anything happened to Jason, his younger brother Gene would never be strong enough to hold the family finances together.

      The Diamond Spur had belonged to Jason Donavan since the death of his father, although Gene would inherit a good share of it. Old J.B. Donavan had drowned when the Frio River came down in flood one spring morning eight years ago. But the ranch’s name went back a lot longer than eight years. Back in 1873, a Civil War veteran named Blalock Donavan had chanced to sit in on a poker game in San Antonio. In a game that went on all night, and during which one man was killed for cheating, the young Confederate sergeant from Calhoun County, Georgia, won the last hand with a legendary straight diamond flush—and without any wild cards to make that impossible feat any more possible.

      In the pot had been a total of one hundred Yankee dollars—and the deed to a broken down cattle ranch in Frio County, Texas. The ranch hadn’t had a name at the time. Everyone locally just called it the Bryan place. But Blalock Donavan had won it on a Royal Diamond Flush, with a silver spur in the kitty as his part of the ante. So the Diamond Spur it became. The Diamond Spur it remained. And a Donavan still owned it, 113 years later.

      Kate’s pale green eyes softened as she saw the heavyset woman bending over a pan on the front porch. Diamond Spur was one of the richest cattle ranches in Texas, enabling Jason to drive a Mercedes and a new very classy black Bronco. The interior of the house was like an antique museum, with pieces from around the world. And Jason entertained on a lavish scale. In fact, Jason’s kitchen had every modern convenience, but his housekeeper, Sheila James, still did her own canning.

      Sheila was an institution at the ranch. Rumor had it that she’d been madly in love with old J.B. Donavan, but that gentleman had no use for women after his Nell deserted him and his two sons. The old man took to strong drink and became a holy terror. They said even Sheila had grown afraid of him after that, but that she’d stayed on to look after the boys. She had character and an uncanny tolerance for people. She had a lot of perseverence, too, because old J.B. Donavan had been a hardcase with a mean temper. Jason still was, although Kate could reach him when no one else could. That was something of a joke locally, Kate knew, but nobody laughed about it in front of Jason.

      Sheila looked up from the lazy rhythm of the front porch swing, her blue eyes sparkling as Kate came closer. “I sent Gabe after you. I hope you don’t mind,” she said apologetically. “I figured Jason would bleed to death and become an eyesore out there because his men would be too scared to bury him.”

      She paused in the act of snapping green beans and stringing them, the shallow pan across the knees of her brilliant green and yellow checked housedress, her salt and pepper hair short and sweaty. She was fifty and looked it. Even Jason gave her a measure of respect, but Sheila was no match for his temper when it was aroused.

      “Can’t you do anything with him?” Kate replied mischievously.

      “Not without a loaded gun,” came the dry reply. “Gabe told me that Jason finally stopped the bleeding and bandaged himself, but the blood was still seeping through when he went out again. I’m afraid it needs stitches.”

      “Well, I’ll see what I can do,” Kate promised. “Is he where Gabe left him, with the crew out on the Smith bottoms?”

      “That’s what Gabe said. Thanks, Kate,” Sheila replied.

      Kate smiled as she turned the horse. “Old-fashioned transportation, isn’t it?” She grinned. “But it’s a long walk, and Mom has the car at work, since it’s grocery store day.”

      “And you wouldn’t ride over with Gabe because he’s sweet on you?” Sheila asked knowingly.

      Kate, who was twenty and a little nervous about men because of an extremely sheltered background, nodded. Her father and mother had raised her in the same strict fashion they’d been raised. They were old-fashioned, church-going people. And even though her father was dead, her mother was still a stickler for morality and didn’t hesitate to ask Jason’s opinion of Kate’s infrequent dates. That rankled, too, but Kate’s mother, Mary, thought the sun rose and set on the man. Kate’s late father had been Jason’s foreman, and she sometimes thought that was one reason Jason seemed to feel responsible for her and Mary.

      She drew her mind back to the present. “Gabe is a very nice man, but I want to be a fashion designer. I don’t want to get married for ages yet.”

      Sheila nodded, thinking privately that Kate and Jason got along so well because both of them wanted their independence. Jason would probably never marry since that Maryland woman had thrown him over for a movie contract.

      “Good luck,” she murmured. “He was already wound up and cussing when he went out the door this morning. Had some terrible things to say about what I did to his eggs.” She sniffed, snapping beans with renewed vengeance. “Nothing wrong with salsa and refried beans on top of them. Well, is there?” she asked Kate.

      Kate knew how Sheila made salsa, and having tasted the extremely