Montana Sky

shield of glass between them.
    What would he have done, she wondered, if her door hadn’t been locked, her window up?
    “That’s where I saw him.” She shuddered when she thought of how he’d flashed that grin at her, called her by name. “I couldn’t put it together. He was right there all along. He’s been here, playing poker with the men. Right down in the bunkhouse playing cards.”
    She shook herself, looked at Ben, and saw the weight he was carrying. Not anger so much as guilt, she thought. And she knew the sharp edge of it too well. “It’s not your fault.” She touched his face, and her words were as gentle as fingertips. “You couldn’t know.”
    “No, I couldn’t know.” He’d chewed over that until it had made him as ill as spoiled beef. “But it doesn’t change it. I had him work on Shelly’s rig. She had him in for coffee—her and the baby alone with him. He fixed mymother’s bathroom sink. He was in the house with my mother.”
    “Stop.” She did bend, enough to put her arms around him, to draw him down until he sat beside her. “He’s done now.”
    “He’s done, but it’s not.” He took her by the shoulders, turning her so they faced each other on the edge of the bed. “Whoever killed him, Willa, works for you, or for me.”
    “I know that.” She’d thought of it, thought of it constantly on the racing ride back from the cave, during her helpless pacing of Adam’s living room. “Maybe it was payback, Ben, for the others. Maybe Jesse killed the others, and whoever found him did it for them. Lily wasn’t hurt. She was alone, and sick, but he didn’t touch her.”
    “And maybe one at a time’s enough for him. Will, the chances that we’ve got two men who do that with a knife are slim. Cooke carried a small boot knife, a four-inch blade hardly bigger than a toy. You don’t do that kind of damage with an undersized blade.”
    “No.” It all played back in her head. “No, you don’t.”
    “Then there’s that first steer we found, up toward the cabin. No way he did that. I’d barely signed him on. He didn’t know his way around high country then.”
    She had to moisten her lips, they’d become so dry. “You’ve told all this to the police.”
    “Yeah, I told them.”
    “Okay.” She rubbed her fingers dead center of her brow. There wasn’t a headache there yet, just intense concentration. “We go on the way we have. Keep the guards, the men working in teams and shifts. I know my men.” She rapped a fist on her knee. “I know them. The two new ones I just hired on—Christ, I shouldn’t have taken on any new hands until this was done.”
    “You have to stop riding out alone.”
    “I can’t take a damn bodyguard every time I’ve got cattle to check.”
    “You stop riding out alone,” he said evenly, “or I’ll use the old man’s will to block you. I’ll put down that I consideryou incompetent as operator. I can convince Nate to go along with me.”
    What little color she had left drained out of her face as she got to her feet. “You son of a bitch. You know goddamn well I’m as competent as any rancher in the state. More.”
    He rose as well, faced her. “I’ll say what I need to say, and I’ll do what I have to do. You butt against me on this, you risk losing Mercy.”
    “Get the hell out of here.” She whirled away, balled fists at her sides. “Just get the hell out of my house.”
    “You want to keep it your house, you don’t ride out without Adam or Ham. You want me out, you get into bed and get some sleep.”
    He could have forced her down again. It would have been easier than saying what he had to say. “I care about you, Willa. I’ve got feelings for you, and they go pretty deep.” It was harder yet when she turned and stared at him. “Maybe I don’t know what the hell to do with them, but they’re there.”
    Her heart hurt all over again, but in a way she didn’t expect. “Threatening me is sure a damn fool way of showing them.”
    “Maybe. But if I asked you nice, you wouldn’t listen.”
    “How do you know? You never ask nice.”
    He dragged a hand through his hair, regrouped. “I’ve got to get through my day too. Worrying about you’s putting a hitch in my stride. If you’d do this one thing for me, it’d make it easier.”
    This was interesting, she thought. When her mind was clear again, she’d have to ponder it. “Do you ride out alone, Ben?”
    “We’re not talking about me.”
    “Maybe I’ve