Montana Sky

everythingthat was yours, that should have been yours, was taken out of your control, you dealt with it.”
    Willa remembered, too. Remembered she hadn’t been kind. “I didn’t have much choice.”
    “There’s always a choice,” Lily said quietly. “Mine was usually running away. I’d have run that day if there’d been any place left to go. And I don’t think I would have had the courage to stay when the horrible things started to happen if not for you.”
    “I didn’t have anything to do with it. You stayed for Adam.”
    “Adam.” Everything about Lily softened—voice, eyes, mouth. “Yes. But I wouldn’t have had the courage to go to him, to let myself feel for him. I looked at you, at everything you were doing, had done, and thought, She’s my sister and she’s never run from anything. There must be something inside me that matches what’s in her. So I dug for it. It’s the first time in my life I’ve stuck when things got rough.”
    Willa pushed her coffee aside and leaned forward. “Look, I grew up the way I wanted to, did what I wanted to. I never found myself trapped in a relationship where someone used me for a punching bag.”
    “Didn’t you?” Lily gathered her courage again when Willa said nothing. “Bess told me how hard our father was on you.”
    Bess talked too damn much, was all Willa could think.
    “An occasional backhand from a parent isn’t the same as a fist in the face from a husband. Running from that wasn’t cowardly, Lily. It was right and it was smart.”
    “Yes. But I never fought back. Not once.”
    “Neither did I,” Willa murmured. “I may not have run from my father, but I never fought back either.”
    “You fought back every time you got on a horse, pulled a calf, rode a fence.” Lily kept her eyes steady when Willa’s flicked over her face. “You made Mercy yours. That’s how you fought back. You dug your roots. I didn’t know him, and he never chose to know me. But, Willa, I don’t think he knew you either.”
    “No.” Her voice was soft and slow with the realization. “I don’t suppose he did.”
    Lily drew a deep breath. “I’d fight back now, and that’s in very large part because of you, because of Tess, because of the chance I’ve had here. Jack Mercy didn’t give me that chance, Will. You did. You should have hated us. You had every right to hate us. But you don’t.”
    She’d wanted to, Willa remembered. It just hadn’t been possible. “Maybe hate just takes too much energy.”
    “It does, but not everyone understands that.” Lily paused, toyed with her cup. “When Tess and I were shopping the other day, I thought—for a minute I thought I saw Jesse. Just a flash, just a glimpse.”
    “You saw him in Ennis?” Willa bolted straight up in her chair, fists curled.
    “No.” Dazzled by her, Lily smiled a little. “See, that’s your first reaction, fight back. Mine was to run. I used to think I saw him everywhere, I could imagine him everywhere. It hasn’t happened in a while. But the other day, some face in the crowd, the tilt of a head . . . But I didn’t run. I didn’t panic. And I think if I ever had to, really had to, I’d fight back. I owe that to you.”
    “I don’t know, Lily. Sometimes running’s a fine choice.”
     
    I T WENT SO WELL LILY COULD HARDLY BELIEVE IT WAS HER life. Her new life. People she had grown to love were sitting in the cozy dining room, taking second helpings of food she’d prepared, laughing with each other like friends. Arguing with each other like family.
    It was Tess who had started that, quite deliberately, Lily realized, by telling Willa the dress they’d picked out for her was a fuchsia organdy with a six-flounce skirt and puffed sleeves. With a bustle.
    “You’re out of your mind if you think you’ll get me into something like that. What the hell is fuchsia anyway? Isn’t that pink? No way I’m wearing pink flounces.”
    “You’ll look so sweet in it,” Tess purred. “Especially with the hat.”
    “What hat?”
    “Oh, it’s adorable, matching color, enormous floppy brim decked in a garden of spring flowers. English primroses. And the crown’s cut out so we can dress your hair up high. Then there’s the gloves. Elbow length, very chic.”
    Because Willa had gone dead pale, Lily took pity on her. “She’s just teasing you. The dress is lovely. Pale blue silk with pearl buttons at the back and just a touch of lace on the bodice. It’s very simple, very