by Nora Roberts
That’s what Jesse told himself as he relived every moment of the ambush. It had been the rifle, the sight, the wind. It hadn’t been him, hadn’t been his aim, hadn’t been his fault.
Just bad fucking luck, that was all.
He could still see the way the half-breed, wife-stealing bastard’s horse had reared. He’d thought, oh, for one sweet moment he’d thought he nailed the target.
But the sight had been off.
It had been impulse, too. He hadn’t planned it out. If he’d planned it out instead of having it all just happen, Wolfchild would be cold and dead—and maybe McKinnon would be dead too. And maybe he’d have taken a taste of Lily’s half sister for good measure.
Jesse blew out smoke, stared into the dark, and cursed.
He’d get another chance, sooner or later, he’d get another chance. He’d make sure of it.
And wouldn’t Lily be sorry then?
E VERY NIGHT FOR A WEEK WILLA WOKE IN THE GRIP OF A nightmare, drenched in sweat, with screams locked in her throat. Always the same: She was naked, wrists bound. Night after night she struggled to free herself, felt the cord bite into her flesh as she whimpered and writhed. Smelled her own blood as it trickled down her bare arms.
Always, just before she pulled herself awake, there was the glint of a knife, that shimmering arc as the blade swept down to work on her.
Every morning she shoved it away, knowing that, like a rat, it would gnaw free in the night.
The signs of spring, those early hesitant signs, should have thrilled her. The brave glint of crocus her mother had planted scattered such hopeful color. There was the growing spread of earth where the snow melted back to thinning patches, the sounds of young cattle, the dance of foals in pasture.
The time to turn the earth was coming, to plant it and watch it grow. And the time when the cottonwoods and aspens and larches would take on a lovely haze of green. The lupine would bloom, and even the high meadows would be bright with it, with the neon signs of Indian paintbrush, with the sunny faces of buttercups.
The mountains would show more silver than white, and the days would be long again and full of light.
It was inevitable that winter would whisk back at least once more. But spring snows were different; they lacked the brutal harshness of February’s. Now that the sun was smiling, bumping the temperature up to the balmy sixties, it was easy to forget how quickly it could change again. And easy to cherish every hour of every bright day.
From the window of her office, Willa could see Lily. She was never far from Adam these days, had rarely left his side since the night they had come back from high country. Willa watched Lily touch Adam’s shoulder, as she often did, fussing with the sling he wore.
He was healing. No, she thought, they were healing each other.
How would it be to have someone that devoted, that much in love, that blind to everything but you? How would it be to feel exactly that same way about someone?
Scary, she thought, but maybe it would be worth those jiggles of fear and doubt to experience that kind of unfettered emotion. It would be an exhilarating trip, that wild ride on pure feeling, pure need. And more, she realized, beyond the moment, the promise and permanence that was so easily read on the faces of Lily and Adam when they looked at each other.
The little secret smiles, the signals that were so personal. So theirs. What a thrill, she mused, and what security to know there was someone who would be there for you, always. To have someone who thought of you first, and last.
Silly, she told herself, and turned away from the window. Daydreaming this way with so much to be done, so much at stake. And she would never be the kind of woman a man thought of first. Even her own father hadn’t thought of her first.
She could admit that now, here in his office that still held so much of him trapped in the air, like a scent ground into the fibers of carpet. He had never thought of her first, and he had certainly not thought of her last.
And what was she? Deliberately Willa sat in the chair that was still his, laid her hand on the smooth leather arms where his had rested countless times. What had she ever been to him? A substitute. A poor one at that, she thought, certainly by Jack Mercy’s standards.
No, not even a substitute, she thought as her hands curled into fists. A trophy, one of three that he hadn’t even bothered to keep a memento of. Something easily discarded and forgotten, not even worth the space of a snapshot on his desk.
Not worth as much as the heads of the game kills mounted on the walls.
The fury, the insult of it was rising up in her so quick, so huge, she didn’t fully realize what she was doing until she’d done it. Until she was up and yanking the first glassy-eyed head from the wall. The left antler of the six-point buck cracked as it hit the floor, and the sound, almost like a gunshot, mobilized her.
“The hell with it. The hell with him. I’m not a fucking trophy.” She scrambled onto the sofa, tugged at the bighorn sheep that stared at her with canny eyes. “It’s my office now.” Grunting, she heaved the head aside and attacked the next. “It’s my ranch now.”
Later, she might admit she went a little insane. Pulling, pushing, dragging at the mountings, a macabre task, stripping the walls of those disembodied heads, breaking nails as she pried them loose. Her lips were peeled back in a snarl matching that of the mountain cat she wrestled from its perch.
For a moment Tess just watched from the doorway. She was too stunned to do much more as she saw the grisly heap growing on the floor, and her sister muttering oaths as she muscled the towering grizzly out of its corner.
If she hadn’t known better, Tess would have said Willa was locked in a life-and-death battle, with the bear in the lead. Since she did know better, she wasn’t certain whether she should laugh or run away.
Instead of either, she pushed the hair back from her face, cleared her throat. “Wow. Who opened the zoo?”
Willa whirled, her face contorted in rage, her eyes alive with it. The bear lost the edge of gravity and toppled like a tree. “No more trophies,” Willa said, and panted to get her breath. “No more trophies in this house.”
Sanity seemed called for. Hoping to instill it, Tess leaned negligently against the doorjamb. “I can’t say that I’ve ever cared for the decor in here, or elsewhere. Field and Stream isn’t my style. But what brought on this sudden urge to redecorate?”
“No more trophies,” Willa repeated. Desperation had cemented into conviction. “Not them. Not us. Help me get them out.” She took a step, held out a hand. “Help me get them the hell out of our house.”
When realization came, it was sweet. Stepping forward, Tess rolled up her sleeves, and there was a gleam in her eyes now. “My pleasure. Let’s evict Smokey here first.”
Together they heaved and dragged the stuffed and snarling bear to the doorway, then through it. They’d made it to the top of the steps before Lily came running up them.
“What in the world—For a minute I thought—” She pressed a hand to her speeding heart. “I thought you were about to be eaten alive.”
“This one had his last meal some time ago,” Willa managed to say, and tried for a better grip.
“What are you doing?”
“Redecorating,” Tess announced. “Give us a hand with this bastard. He’s heavy.”
“No, screw it.” Willa blew out a breath. “Back off,” she warned, and when the stairs were clear she began to shove. “Come on, help me push.”
“Okay.” Tess made a show of spitting on her hands, then put her back into it. “Push, Lily. Let’s dump this big guy together.”
When he went, he went with a flourish, tumbling down the staircase with the noise of a thunderclap, dust puffing, claws clattering. At the din, Bess came rushing out from the kitchen, her face red with the effort and her hand on the .22 Baretta she’d taken to keeping in her apron pocket.
“Name of God Almighty.” Huffing for air, Bess slapped her hands on her hips. “What are you girls up to? You’ve
got a bear in the foyer.”
“He was just leaving,” Tess called out, and began to whoop with laughter.
“I’d like to know who’s going to clean up this mess.” Bess nudged the trophy with her toe, considering it every bit as nasty dead as alive.
“We are.” Willa swiped her palms over her jeans. “Just consider it spring cleaning.” She turned on her heel and marched back into the office.
Now, with the first thrust of fury deadened, she could see clearly what she’d done. Heads and bodies were strewn all over the room like bomb victims after a blast. Wooden mountings were cracked or chipped where she’d thrown them. Eerily, a loosened glass eye stared up at her from the beautiful pattern of the carpet.
“Oh, my God.” She let out one long breath, then another. “Oh, my God,” she said again.
“You sure showed them, pal.” Tess gave her a light thump on the back. “They didn’t have a chance against you.”
“It’s—” Lily pressed her lips together. “It’s horrible, isn’t it? Really horrible.” She hiccuped, turned away, pressed her lips tighter. “I’m sorry. It’s not funny. I don’t mean to laugh.” She struggled to hold it back by crossing her arms hard over her stomach. “It’s just so awful. Like a wildlife garage sale or something.”
“It’s hideous.” Tess lost her slippery hold on composure and began to giggle. “Hideous and morbid and obscene, and—oh, Jesus, Will, if you’d seen yourself when I first walked in. You looked like a madwoman doing the tango with a stuffed bear.”
“I hate them. I’ve always hated them.” Her own laughter bubbled up until she simply sat on the floor and let it go.
Then the three of them were sprawled on the floor, howling like loons amid the decapitated heads.
“They’re all going,” Willa managed, and pressed a hand to her aching side. “As soon as I can stand up, they’re all going.”
“Can’t say I’ll miss them.” Tess wiped her streaming eyes. “But what the hell are we going to do with them?”
“Burn them, bury them, give them away.” Willa moved her shoulders. “Whatever.” She took a cleansing breath and pushed herself to her feet. “Clean sweep,” she announced, and hauled up a mounted elk’s head.
They carted them out—elk, moose, deer, sheep, bear. There were stuffed birds, mounted fish, lonely antlers. As the pile in front of the porch began to build, the men wandered over to make a fascinated and baffled audience.
“Mind if we ask what you ladies are doing?” As unofficial liaison, Jim stepped forward.
“Spring cleaning,” Willa told him. “You think Wood can fire up the backhoe and dig a hole big enough to dump these in, give them a decent burial?”
“You’re just going to dump them in a hole?” Shocked, Jim turned back as the men began to mumble. It took only a few minutes in a huddle to come to an agreement. This time Jim cleared his throat. “Maybe we could have a few for down to the bunkhouse and thereabouts. It’s a shame just to bury ’em. That buck there’d look fine over the fireplace. And Mr. Mercy, he put store by that bear.”
“Take what you want,” Willa said.
“Can I have the cat, Will?” Billy hunkered down to admire it. “I sure would appreciate it. He’s a beauty.”
“Take what you want,” she repeated, and shook her head as the men began to argue, debate, and lay claim.
“Now you’ve done it.” Ham moseyed over while four of the men muscled the bear into the back of a rig. “I’m going to have that damn ugly bastard staring at me every morning and every night. They’ll be storing what don’t fit on the walls in one of the outbuildings, too, mark my words.”
“Better there than in my house.” Willa cocked her head. “I thought you liked that bear, Ham. You were with him when he took it down.”
“Yeah, I was with him. Don’t mean I harbor an affection for it. Jesus. Billy, you’re going to break that rack you keep that up. Have a care, for God’s sake. Be hanging their hats from it,” he muttered as he stalked over to supervise.
“Damn idiot cowboys.”
“Now everybody’s happy,” Tess observed.
“Yep. Library’s next.”
“I can give you an hour.” Tess glanced at her watch. “Then I’ve got to get ready. I’ve got a hot date.”
She had some new lingerie, delivered just that afternoon from Victoria’s Secret. She wondered how long it would take Nate to get her out of it.
Not long, she speculated. Not long at all.
She let her thoughts circle back to Will. “And isn’t this the night for you and Ben to take in your weekly picture show?” she said with her tongue in her cheek.
“I guess it is.”
“Lily’s fixing a fancy dinner for Adam tonight.”
Distracted, Willa glanced back. “Oh?”
“Well, it’s sort of the anniversary of when we first . . . first,” Lily finished, and blushed.
She’d gotten a delivery from Victoria’s Secret too.
“And it’s Bess’s night off.” Casually, Tess studied her nails. Evicting wildlife had been tough on her manicure. “I heard she was going down to Ennis to spend the night with her gossipmate Maude Wiggins. Since I’m planning on staying at Nate’s, you’ll have the house all to yourself.”
“Oh, you shouldn’t be alone,” Lily jumped in. “I can—”
“Lily.” Tess rolled her eyes. “She won’t be alone unless she’s incredibly slow or incredibly stupid or just plain stubborn. A quick woman, a smart one, a flexible one, would get herself all polished and perfumed and suggest a quiet evening in.”
“Ben would think I’d lost my mind if I got all dressed up, then said I wanted to stay in.”
“Wanna bet?”
At Tess’s slow smile, Willa felt her own lips curving. “Things are too complicated now. I’ve got too much on my mind to be thinking of wrestling with Ben.”
“When aren’t things complicated?” Tess took Willa’s arms, turned her face-to-face. “Do you want him or not? Yes or no.”
Willa thought of the flutter that had been in her stomach all day. Because he’d been on her mind. “Yes.”
Tess nodded. “Now?”
“Yeah.” Willa let out a breath she hadn’t been aware of holding. “Now.”
“Then leave the rest of the spring cleaning for tomorrow. It’ll take Lily and me at least an hour to find something halfway sexy in that closet of yours.”
“I didn’t say I wanted you to dress me again.”
“It’s our pleasure.” Mind on her mission, Tess pulled Willa back inside. “Isn’t it, Lily? Hey, where are you going?”
“Candles,” Lily called out as she dashed across the road. “Willa doesn’t have nearly enough candles in her room. I’ll be right there.”
“Candles.” Willa dragged her feet. “Fancy clothes, pretending I don’t want to see a movie, candles in my bedroom. It feels like I’m setting a trap.”
“Of course it does, because that’s exactly what you’re doing.”
At the doorway of Willa’s room, Tess stopped, put her hands on her hips. There was work to be done here, she determined, if the scene was to be properly set. “And I guarantee, he’s not only going to love being caught, he’s going to be grateful.”
TWENTY-ONE
“I FEEL LIKE AN IDIOT.”
“You don’t look like an idiot.” Tess tilted her head and studied Willa from top to toe.
Yes, the hair swept up was a good touch—Lily’s. With only a few pins anchoring all that mass, it would tumble down satisfactorily at a man’s impatient handling.
Then there was the long dress—simple, full-skirted, nipped just a bit at the waist. Too bad it wasn’t white, Tess mused, but Willa’s limited wardrobe hadn’t run to long white dresses. And the pale gray was quiet, almost demure. Except that Tess had left the long line of front buttons undone to the thigh.
The tiny silver hoops at Willa’s ears were Lily’s contribution again. The makeup was Tess’s, and she knew Willa had b
een relieved that she’d used a light hand. But she didn’t think Willa understood the power of innocence on the verge.
“You look,” Tess finally decided, “like a virgin eager to be sacrificed.”
Willa rolled her eyes. “Oh, God.”
