Angels Fall

chops look good enough to eat."
    They did, Brody thought, and were presented with a generous portion of scalloped potatoes and lima beans. The food was artistically arranged on the plain white plate, unlike the haphazard mounds Joanie normally served up.
    "Saw you out in the boat the other day," Mae commented. "Catch anything?"
    "Wasn't fishing." He cut into one of the chops, sampled.
    "That's one of the things about you. Brody. You go on out on the lake now and then but you don't fish. Go out in the woods now and then but you don't hunt."
    "If I caught anything or shot anything. I'd have to cook it."
    "There's that. Well?"
    "It's good." Brody cut another bite. "Pretty damn good."
    Since Mac Drubber was one of the few people Brody would voluntarily spend an evening with, he loitered over his coffee while Mac finished plowing through his own meal. "Beans taste different. Fancier. Got to say better, too, but you repeat that where Joanie gets wind. I'll call you a stinking liar."
    "She's putting up at the hotel, she may not be planning on staying long."
    "Booked a week." Mac liked knowing what went on. and who it went on about, in his town. He not only ran the mercantile, he was mayor. Gossip, he liked to think, was part of his duties. "Truth is. Brody. I don't think the girl has much money" He wagged his fork at Brody before stabbing the last of the beans. "Paid cash for the radiator hose, and the hotel. I hear."
    No credit cards. Brody mused, and wondered if the mystery woman was running under the radar. "Could be she doesn't want to leave a trail for someone, or something, to follow."
    "You got a suspicious mind." Mac worked off the last sliver oi elk from the bone. "And if she doesn't, she'll have a reason for it. She's got an honest face.' ''
    "And you have a romantic bent. Speaking of romance." Brody cocked his head toward the door.
    The man who came in wore Levi's and a chambray shirt under a black barn coat. He accented it with snakeskin boots, a Sam Brown belt and a stone-gray Stetson in a way that screamed cowboy.
    Sandy, sun-streaked hair curled under his hat. He had a smooth, even-featured face set off by a shallowly clefted chin and light blue eyes that, everyone knew, he used as often as possible to charm the ladies.
    He swaggered—there was no other way to describe the deliberate, rolling gait—to the counter and perched on a stool.
    "Lo's coming 'round to see if the new girl's worth his time." Mac shook his head, scooped up the last of his potatoes. "You can't help but like Lo. He's an affable sort, but I hope she's got more sense."
    Part of the entertainment Brody had enjoyed in and around the Fist the past year was watching Lo knock over women like tenpins. "Ten bucks says he sweet-talks her, and she adds a notch to his bedpost before the end of the week."
    Mac's brows knit in disapproval. "That's no way to talk about a nice girl like that."
    "You haven't known her long enough to be so sure she's a nice girl."
    "I say she is. So I'm going to take that bet, just so it costs you."
    Brody gave a half laugh. Mac didn't drink, he didn't smoke, and if he chased women he didn't do it where anyone noticed. And Brody found his slightly puritanical bent part of his charm. "It's just sex. Mac." Then he let out a full grin when the tips of Mac's ears went red. "You remember sex, don't you?
    "I got a vague recollection of the process."
    In the kitchen, Joanie set a piece of apple pie on the work counter. "Take a break," she ordered Reece. "Eat the pie."
    "I'm not really hungry, and I need to—'
    "Didn't ask if you were hungry, did I? Eat the pie. No charge on it. It's the last of the dish, and it won't be any good tomorrow anyway. You see the one just sat down at the counter?"
    "The one who looks like he just rode in off the trail? "
    "That would be William Butler. Goes by Lo. That's short for Lothario, which he got labeled with when he was a teenager and proceeded in making it his life's work to bed every female within a hundred miles."
    "Okay."
    "Now on most Saturday nights, Lo would have himself a hot date, or he'd be hanging out down at Clancy's with his pals, trying to decide which heifer to cut out of that partictilar herd. He's come in here to get a look at you."
    Because she didn't see she had any real choice, Reece began to eat the pie. "I don't imagine there's much to see at this point."
    "Regardless, you're new, you're female, young and, as far as it goes.
    unattached. To give him his due, Lo doesn't