Montana Sky

bacon was crispenough to crack. “Nobody cooks like my ma,” he said, and grinned at her.
    “Nobody eats like my Ben.” She settled back and waited.
    He said nothing for a while, enjoying the food, the smells, the light glowing through the window as morning spread. Enjoying her. She was as dependable as the sunrise, he thought. Sarah McKinnon, with her pretty green eyes and her shiny strawberry blond hair. She had the milky-white Irish complexion that defied the sun. There were lines on it, he mused, but they were so soft, so natural, you didn’t even see them. Instead you saw that smile, warm and confident.
    She was a slip of a woman, slim in her jeans and plaid shirt. But he knew the strength in her. Not just the physical, though she had lifted him off his feet with her hand on his rump many a time, could ride tirelessly on horse or tractor through the bitter cold or the merciless heat, and could heft a fifty-pound bag of feed on her shoulder like a woman lifting a cooing baby.
    But what was inside, where it counted most, was iron. She never faltered. In all his life, he’d never seen her turn her back on a challenge, or a friend.
    If he couldn’t find a woman as strong, as kind, as generous, he’d live his life a bachelor.
    The idea of that would have rocked Sarah’s heart.
    “I’ve been thinking about Willa Mercy.”
    Sarah’s brows lifted, perked by a kernel of hope. “Oh? Have you?”
    “Not that way, Ma.” Though he had. He very much had. “She’s in a bad spot.”
    The dancing light in her eyes faded. “I’m sorry for that. She’s a good girl, doesn’t deserve this heartache. I’ve been thinking of riding over, paying a call. But I know how busy she is just now.” Sarah’s lips curved. “And I’m dying of curiosity about the others. I didn’t get much time to look them over at the funeral.”
    “I think Will would appreciate a visit.” Biding his time, he forked up more flapjacks. “We’ve got things under control around here. I think I could spare a little extra time over at Mercy. Not that Will would like it, but having an extraman around there, now and again, might smooth things out some.”
    “If you wouldn’t poke at her so much, you’d get along better.”
    “Maybe.” He lifted a shoulder. “The fact is, I don’t know how much of the managing she did before the old man died. You have to figure she can handle it, but with Mercy dead, they’re a man short. I haven’t heard anything about her hiring another hand.”
    “There was some speculation she’d hire someone out of the university as foreman.” That was how gossip ran from ranch to ranch—speculations over the phone wires. “A nice young man with experience in animal husbandry. Not that Ham doesn’t know his business, but he’s getting on in years.”
    “She won’t do it. She’s got too much to prove, and too much fondness for Ham. I can give her a hand,” he continued. “Not that she thinks much of my college degree. I thought I’d ride over later this morning, feel her out.”
    “I think that’s very kind of you, Ben.”
    “I’m not doing it to be kind.” He grinned over the rim of his cup, and it was the same wicked devil of a grin he’d had since childhood. “It’ll give me the chance to poke at her again.”
    She chuckled and rose to fetch the coffeepot. She’d heard her husband’s feet hit the floor. “Well, that’ll help keep her mind off her troubles.”
     
    S HE COULD HAVE USED A DISTRACTION . WOOD ’ S BOYS HAD snuck into the bull pasture to play matador with their mother’s red Christmas apron. They’d escaped with their lives, and only one sprained ankle between them. She’d rescued them herself, hauling a dazed and clammy-faced Pete over the fence and leaving an angry, fire-eyed bull behind.
    The ensuing lecture she’d delivered to two hanging heads had given her no pleasure—nor had the bone-shaking fear that the incident had shot through her. She ended up playing accessory after the fact by taking the red apron and agreeing to launder it herself before Nell could notice it was missing.
    This earned her undying and desperate admiration from the culprits. And, Willa hoped, instilled enough fear in them to keep them from shouting “ Toro ” at a snorting black Angus bull again anytime in the near future.
    One of the tractors had thrown a rod, and she’d had to ship Billy off to town for parts. Elk had broken through a portion of the northwest fence again, and now