Montana Sky

unfriendly, and riding on a power trip. That’s more than enough for me.” No, she realized as she got to her feet, the temper wasn’t going to settle. “I haven’t done a damn thing to deserve that attitude from her. I didn’t ask to be stuck out here, and I sure as hell didn’t ask to be related to that gnat-assed witch.”
    “She didn’t ask for it either.” Nate sat on the arm of a chair, methodically rolled a cigarette. He had a little time and thought there were things that needed to be said. “Let me ask you something. How would you feel if you suddenly found out your home could be taken away? Your home, your life, everything you’ve ever loved?”
    His eyes were mild as he struck a match, held it to the tip of the cigarette. “To keep it, you have to rely on strangers, and even if you manage to hold on, you won’t keep it all. Good chunks of it are going to belong to those strangers. People you don’t know, never had the opportunity to know, are living in your house with as much legal right as you. There’s nothing you can do about it. Added to that, you’ve got all the responsibility, because these strangers don’t know squat about ranching. It’s up to you to hold it together. All they have to do is wait, and if they wait, they’ll get as much as you, even though you were the one to work, to sweat, to worry.”
    Tess opened her mouth, closed it again. Put that simply, it changed the hue. “I’m not to blame for it,” she said quietly.
    “No, you’re not. But neither is she.” He turned his head, studied the portrait of Jack Mercy above the fireplace. “And you didn’t have to live with him.”
    “What was he—” She broke off, cursed herself. She didn’t want to ask. Didn’t want to know.
    “What was he like?” Nate blew out smoke. “I’ll tell you. He was hard, cold, selfish. He knew how to run a ranch,better than anyone I know. But he didn’t know how to raise a child.” Remembering that, thinking of that, fired him up. Now his voice was clipped. “He never gave her an ounce of affection or, as far as I know, one single word of praise, no matter how she worked her skin off for him. She was never good enough, or fast enough, or smart enough to suit him.”
    Guilt wasn’t going to work, Tess told herself. He wasn’t going to make her feel guilt or sympathy. “She could have left.”
    “Yeah, she could have left. But she loved this place. And she loved him. You don’t have to grieve for your father, Tess. You lost him years ago. But Willa’s grieving. It doesn’t matter that he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t want her any more than he wanted you, or Lily, but she wasn’t lucky enough to have a mother.”
    All right, guilt was going to work. A little. “I’m sorry about that. But it doesn’t have anything to do with me.”
    He took a slow drag on his cigarette, then crushed it out carefully as he rose. “It has everything to do with you.” He studied her, and his eyes were suddenly cool and detached and uncomfortably lawyerlike. “If you don’t understand that, you’ve got too much of Jack Mercy in you. I’ll be going.” He touched the brim of his hat in farewell and walked out.
    For a long time, Tess stood where she was, staring up at the portrait of the man who’d been her father.
     
    M ILES AWAY ON THREE ROCKS LAND , JESSE COOKE whistled between his teeth as he changed the points and plugs in an old Ford pickup. He was feeling fine, pumped up from the conversation over breakfast about the animal mutilations at Mercy. What was more rewarding, what was so damn perfect, was that Lily had come across that headless cat.
    He only wished he could have seen it.
    But Legs Monroe had it straight from Wood Book over at Mercy that the little city woman with the black eye had screamed her head off.
    Oh, that was sweet.
    Jesse whistled a country tune as his clever fingers made adjustments. He’d always hated country music, the whiny women sobbing over their men, dickless men moaning over their women. But he was adjusting. Every damn one of his bunkhouse mates was a fan, and it was all anyone listened to. He could handle it. In fact, he was beginning to think Montana was the place for him.
    It was a land for real men, he’d decided. Men who knew how to handle themselves and keep their women in line. After he’d taught Lily a proper lesson, they’d settle down here. She was going to be rich.
    The thought of that had him chuckling and tapping his foot to his