Big Sky Secrets

by Linda Lael Miller

  A wood nymph, dressed in faded blue jeans, battered boots and a pale green Western shirt, stood in the center of the small clearing just ahead, both arms wrapped around the trunk of a lone cottonwood tree. Her hair was brown and shiny and thick, just brushing her shoulders, and it caught the leaf-filtered light, threw it around like colored beams in a prism. Her head was tilted back slightly, her eyes closed, and the expression on her fine-boned face was downright blissful.

  What the hell?

  Zane could have watched her for hours—just looking at the woman gave him the same belly-clenching thrill he’d gotten in his bronc-riding days, in that moment before the chute gate swung open and the official eight-second countdown began—but, suddenly off his game, he took an unintended half step in her direction, a twig snapped under the sole of his boot and the moment was over.

  The nymph’s eyes were wide, hazel or maybe green or pale gray, and at the moment, seeing him, they were shooting fire. She backed away from the tree, and Zane noticed that her shirt was open and she was wearing a tank top underneath. She had great breasts, neither too big nor too small, and bits of bark clung to her clothes. As she glared at him, she let her arms drop briefly to her sides, then fisted up both hands and pressed the knuckles hard against her well-made hips. He knew she recognized him when he saw her jawbones lock together, and that struck a wistful note somewhere in the vicinity of his heart. He’d have given a lot, in that moment, to be his pre-Hollywood self, just another cowboy with a cocky grin, an attitude and a line or two.

  “What are you doing here?” the sprite demanded, finding her voice at last. She took a few marching steps toward him, evidently thought better of coming too close and stopped while there was still a safe distance between them. Her emphasis on the word you, though slight, chapped Zane’s hide a little, since, after all, he wasn’t the one trespassing on somebody else’s land, now was he?

  “I live here,” he replied reasonably, in his own good time, standing with his feet planted slightly apart and his arms folded. The irritation he’d felt was short-lived, quickly replaced by a sort of amused delight. Whoever the lady was, the fact that she might have rescued those clean but otherwise shabby clothes of hers from somebody’s ragbag notwithstanding, she was most definitely a looker.

  She didn’t come any closer, nor did she say anything, but it did seem that she’d lost some of her zip.

  And Zane couldn’t resist adding, “Were you just hugging that tree, or was I imagining things?”

  She blushed then, her cheeks going a glorious, peachy shade of pink. Her mouth was wide and expressive—inherently kissable. And, now that they weren’t standing so far apart, he could see that her eyes were hazel. The color probably changed, depending on what she was wearing, her present mood or even the weather.

  “I was doing a personal-growth exercise,” she informed him stiffly, as though any idiot would have known that without asking, and Zane could tell she resented telling him even that much. She was proud and stubborn, he decided, and competent at everything she did.

  But what the devil was a “personal-growth exercise,” exactly? Something she’d picked up watching the Oprah Winfrey Network?

  He walked slowly toward her, put out his hand for a friendly shake, hoping she’d get the message that he wasn’t fixing to pounce. “Zane Sutton,” he said, by way of introduction.

  She looked at his hand, then at his face, then ran both palms down the thighs of her jeans before shaking the offered hand for a full nanosecond. “Brylee Parrish.” She gave up the name grudgingly, like it was a state secret. “And I knew who you were without being told, thanks.”

  Clearly, Brylee Parrish was not impressed by stardom, his or anyone else’s.

  And he liked that, liked it a lot, because he’d never been all that dazzled by the phenomenon himself, based as it was on appearances instead of reality.

  “Then you had an advantage,” Zane replied mildly.

  Brylee cocked her head to one side, studying him skeptically. “You actors,” she finally said, not quite scoffing, but coming real close.

  Zane chuckled. “I like to consider myself a recovering actor,” he said.

  “Please,” she said, and though there was mockery in her tone, she wasn’t being sarcastic. Her hands were still on her hips, though, and her chin still jutted out, and everything about her warned, Stay back.

  “You don’t think we can recover?”

  She sighed, considering the question. “I’d say it’s unlikely,” she decided, at some length. “Show business people are—show business people.”

  “Which means?”

  “You come and go. You buy or build ridiculously big, elaborate houses, not just in Montana, but in Colorado and New Mexico and Arizona, too—all over the West, in fact, basically scarring the landscape and squandering natural resources. You get on your high horse and boycott things—beef, for instance—thereby putting good people out of business after generations of honest effort. You get involved in local politics just long enough to cause lasting problems, maybe start a few bitter feuds among the local yokels, and then you sell your property to some other famous so-called idealist know-it-all and move merrily on to ruin yet another community.”

  Zane gave a long, low whistle of amused exclamation. There was some truth to her words—maybe a lot of it—but he didn’t like being lumped in with all those well-meaning but too-often fickle celebrities. Hello? He was a rodeo cowboy at heart, raised country by a woman who waited on tables for a living—the movie stuff had been thrust upon him, greatness not included. “Why not just come right out and say what you mean, instead of sugarcoating your opinions so I’ll feel all warm and toasty and welcome?” he gibed.

  Brylee sagged a little at the shoulders, as though sighing with her whole body. “Most of us were hoping you wouldn’t show up,” she said. “That you’d just let the ranch sit there, instead of hitting Three Trees like some kind of consumer storm trooper, putting in media rooms, restaurant-style kitchens the Food Channel would envy, tennis courts and indoor swimming pools—Olympic-size, of course.”

  “Gee,” Zane answered dryly. “Thanks for the generous assessment. Seems like you’re assuming a lot, though.”

  “Am I?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I believe you are. You don’t know a damn thing about me, Ms. Parrish, except that I used to live and work in Hollywood. And I happen to like the house I’m in now, pretty much the way it is. Except, of course, for the antiquated plumbing, the dry-rot in some of the walls, the missing floorboards and the sagging roof. Oh, and I’ll be glad when they switch the electricity on later today, I admit. But you’d probably view any improvements as conspicuous consumption, unless I miss my guess.”

  “You won’t stay,” Brylee said flatly, after giving his words due consideration and then, obviously, dismissing them. And him.

  “You’ll see,” he replied, every bit as nettled as he was intrigued.

  And that was the end of their first conversation. She went one way, and he went the other.

  Hardly an encouraging start, in Zane’s opinion, but a start, nonetheless.

  Something—God knew what, but something—had just begun, he knew that by the strange tightening in his gut, and whatever it was, there would be no stopping it.

  By the time he’d crossed the creek again, he was grinning.

  * * *

  BRYLEE STORMED BACK to her office/warehouse, just beyond Zane Sutton’s property line, her emotions veering wildly between fury and chagrin. Of all the people in the world who might have caught her in the middle of a sincere effort to ground herself, via a method she’d learned in a motivational seminar held for her salespeople, why did he have to be the one?

  Snidely, her German shepherd, greeted her with a wagging tail and a wide dog grin as she entered her building by the back door. Since it was Saturday, the office and warehouse workers weren’t around, so she and her faithful companion had the place to themselves.

  Normally, Brylee enjoy
ed the peace and quiet, and got a lot done because the usual weekday interruptions weren’t a factor, but that day, she’d have liked to vent to someone. Anyone.

  For the time being, Snidely would have to do.

  “We have a new neighbor,” she told the dog, who, as usual, seemed fascinated by every word she said, however unintelligible to the canine brain. “He’s a smart aleck and he’s arrogant as all get-out and darned if he isn’t way too good-looking for his own good or anybody else’s. Mine, for instance.”

  Brylee locked the back door behind her and headed across the wide concrete floor of the warehouse, toward her nondescript cubicle of an office. Snidely, the most devoted of dogs, naturally followed, tail still swishing back and forth, eyes hopeful.

  “Not that we have anything to worry about,” she ranted on, chattily, in a singsong voice. “Because, like most of his breed, Zane Sutton will move on to greener pastures, sooner rather than later, if we’re lucky.”

  Why did that prospect give her a swift, sudden pang?

  She stepped behind her desk—army surplus, no frills, like the rest of the furniture—and booted up her computer. Her company, Décor Galore, was an international operation; all over the world, hostesses held parties in their living rooms, directed by one of her salespeople—aka independent contractors—in return for a carefully chosen gift and discounts based on total sales, and invited their friends and relatives to buy wall hangings and figurines, prints of classic paintings, bouquets of exquisite silk flowers and every conceivable kind of candle.

  When Brylee started Décor Galore, less than six years back, she’d been a one-woman sales force, setting up home parties, lugging card tables and two-page catalogs around the county, selling items she’d either imported or purchased wholesale, at a gift show. Now, she had over a thousand people signed up to sell and, except for the local discount store and the Native American casino just over the Idaho border, she employed more people than any other business owner in the area.

  She’d expected this kind of success to be a lot more satisfying than it was, though. Not that she’d ever admitted as much to anybody, especially after she’d been so driven, worked so hard. Now, she had money enough to last for three lifetimes, never mind one.

  She had a closet full of beautiful, custom-made clothes—which she never wore unless she was conducting management meetings or leading sales seminars. She could live anywhere she wanted, go anywhere she wanted. Over the past few years, she’d traveled to every continent on earth, staying in the best hotels and dining in the finest restaurants.

  Perhaps more important, at least to her way of thinking, she’d helped put Three Trees, Montana, on the map. Her sales conventions brought hordes of people to the town—people with money to spend. She’d set up scholarships for high school seniors in both Parable and Three Trees, and, damn it, she’d made a real difference.

  So why wasn’t she happier than she was?

  Frowning, no nearer to answering that question than before, Brylee went online, scanned reports filed by her district and regional sales managers—the movers and shakers who headed up teams, drove company cars, took exotic all-expenses-paid vacations and, to a woman, earned at least twice as much money as the President of the United States, even in the current white-water economy. As usual, the managers were outdoing themselves, and doing their level best to outdo one another, too.

  The result of all this constructive competition, which she actively encouraged? More money. Another record quarter. Why, if she chose to, she could take Décor Galore public, walk away and do whatever she wanted to for the rest of her life.

  Unfortunately, she wasn’t entirely sure what that would look like. Would she still be herself, or some woman she didn’t know?

  Once upon a time, engaged to Hutch Carmody, a rancher from over near the town of Parable, Brylee had thought she had it all figured out. A sort of romantic slam-dunk. She’d love Hutch, have his babies, content to be a wife and mother, albeit a very rich wife and mother, and grow old alongside her undeniably sexy man—that was the plan.

  Of course, things hadn’t worked out that way. Hutch had called off their wedding, and not without fanfare, either. Not ahead of time, when she could have saved face, sent back the gifts, canceled the five-tier cake, uninvited the guests, talked to the photographer. No, she’d been standing in the church entryway in her wedding dress, her arm looped through her brother Walker’s, about to step into the next phase of her life, when her devastatingly handsome bridegroom had suddenly broken rank with his best man and the preacher, walked halfway down the aisle and said, “Hold it.”

  Remembering, Brylee squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. Even now, the humiliation was vivid, visceral, an actual ache in her middle, like the aftermath of a hard punch.

  Oh, but time heals most wounds, or at least desensitizes them a little. She’d eventually made peace with Hutch—he was now married to the former Kendra Shepherd, also of Parable, and they had two beautiful children, with another on the way. They were happy, and Brylee certainly didn’t begrudge them that.

  Just the same, there were still times, like now, when she flashed back to the whole scene, and when that happened, it seemed the proverbial rug had been yanked out from under her feet all over again, leaving her breathless, figuratively wheeling her arms in a hopeless attempt to maintain her balance.

  Once the internal roller-coastering stopped, she logged out of the program on her computer and rested her elbows on the edge of her desk, her face pressed into her palms. She wasn’t going to get any more work done today, might as well accept it.

  Snidely gave a small, sympathetic whimper and rested his muzzle on her thigh, lending what comfort he could.

  Brylee lifted her face, gave a broken chuckle and tousled the dog’s ears. “If I ever meet a man who’s half as loyal as you are,” she told Snidely, “I’d marry him in a heartbeat. Even if I have to hog-tie him first and then drag him to the altar.”

  Snidely whined again, as if in agreement.

  Brylee bent and planted a smacking kiss on the top of his sleek, hairy head and pushed back her desk chair carefully, so she wouldn’t run over one of Snidely’s paws. “Let’s go home,” she said, with gentle resignation.

  Home was the family ranch, Timber Creek, and she and Walker owned it jointly, though Walker ran the place and did most of the work involved. Brylee and Snidely lived in a spacious apartment, an add-on behind the kitchen, and those quarters had always suited her just fine, since she spent most of her time at Décor Galore, anyway.

  Now, though, Walker had married his singing-cowgirl sweetheart, Casey Elder, whom Brylee loved dearly, as she loved their two teenage children, Clare and Shane, and their new baby, three-month-old Preston. Casey and Walker were adding on to the house—they planned on having several more children—and happy chaos reigned.

  As hard as her brother and sister-in-law tried to include her in things, though, Brylee felt like a third wheel, even an intruder. Walker and Casey were still on their honeymoon, even after a year of marriage, and the way those two loved each other, they’d probably be perpetual newlyweds.

  They needed privacy, family time.

  Besides, Brylee was beginning to feel like a spinster aunt, the legendary old maid hovering on the fringes of everybody else’s lives.

  Was it wrong to want a home, a husband and children of her own? Or was she asking too much? After all, she had a fabulous business, one she’d built with her own two hands, and barring global financial catastrophe, money would never be a problem. Maybe it was just greedy to want more, especially when so many people didn’t have enough of anything, including the basic necessities of life.

  She was still debating the subject when she arrived at the home-place, minutes later, in her trusty-dusty SUV. Casey sat in the porch swing, gently rocking the little bundle that was Preston in her arms.

  Casey was a fiery redhead, beautiful and talented, but in that moment she resembled nothing so much as a Renaissance woman in a pai
nting by one of the masters, a vision in shades of titian and green.

  She smiled as Brylee and Snidely got out of Brylee’s rig.

  “Come sit a minute,” she said, in her soft Texas drawl, patting the cushion beside her. “Preston is sleeping, and I’m just sitting here thinking about how I’m the luckiest woman in the world.”

  Something of what she was feeling must have shown in Brylee’s face as she approached, because Casey’s expression changed for an instant, and there was a flicker of sadness in her eyes. “You know,” she said fretfully, “it’s a wonder I can walk right, what with one foot in my mouth at all times.”

  Brylee smiled, climbed the porch steps, joined Casey and her sleeping nephew on the ancient swing. It had been there for as long as she could remember, that swing, the place where, as a little girl, she’d cried every time her mother left again. The place where she’d dreamed big dreams, and talked herself out of the blues a thousand times, especially after the breakup with Hutch.

  Would she ever rock her own sleeping baby there, as Casey was doing now?

  For some reason, Zane Sutton popped into her mind just then, and she must have blushed, because Casey narrowed her green eyes and studied her closely, missing little or nothing.

  “What’s up?” Casey asked. “And don’t say ‘nothing,’ Brylee Parrish, because I wasn’t born yesterday, and you look as though you might be coming down with a fever, you’re so flushed. Your eyes are bright, too. Do you feel okay?”

  Brylee sighed, feeling pretty lucky herself, albeit in a melancholy way. Maybe she didn’t have a husband and a baby, but she had Casey, and Walker. Clare and Shane, too, and a lot of friends who genuinely cared about her.

  “I just ran into Zane Sutton,” she confessed. “In the woods, between Décor Galore headquarters and his ranch house. Technically, I guess I was trespassing.”