LITMIR.BIZ

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      Maybe the truck would be safe but the brothers wouldn’t be if they came to fetch it tomorrow. Duane would be watching it and waiting.

      She had to stop this now. She knew Duane, knew what he would do to this cowboy. “You have to let me go,” she said as she reached for the doorknob again. “You don’t know my husband. He’ll come after you—”

      “I think I do know your husband,” Tanner said and gently touched her cheek under her left eye with his fingertips. She flinched, not because her bruised cheek still hurt, but because she’d forgotten about her healing black eye and now this kind cowboy knew her hidden shame.

      At the sound of a truck pulling up outside the building, Tanner said, “That will be Marshall.” He opened the door a crack and looked out as if checking to make sure the coast was clear. “I come from a large ranch family that sticks together. I have five brothers. Your husband isn’t going to take on the six of us, trust me.”

      Before she could argue, he quickly ushered her out to a large ranch truck. She noticed the sign printed on the side: Chisholm Cattle Company. Tanner opened the truck door, then taking her waist in both of his large hands, lifted her in before sliding into the bench seat next to her.

      “Marshall, meet Billie Rae. Billie Rae, my big brother Marshall.”

      The cowboy behind the wheel grinned. Like his brother, Marshall had dark hair and brown eyes reflecting his Native American ancestry. Both men were very handsome but there was also something kind and comforting in their faces.

      “I’d appreciate it if you got this truck moving,” Tanner said, glancing in his side mirror. He turned back to Billie Rae, plucked a cowboy hat from the gun rack behind her and dropped it onto her long, dark, curly hair.

      Marshall laughed. “So you got yourself into some kind of trouble and apparently involved this pretty little lady in the midst of it, huh?” He shook his head, but he got the truck moving.

      As they drove out the back way of the fairgrounds, Billie Rae stared through the windshield from under the brim of the hat, afraid she’d see Duane in the dispersing crowd. Or worse, Duane would see her—and the name of the ranch painted on the side of the truck.

       Chapter Two

      Duane Rasmussen leaned against his father’s pickup, arms crossed over his chest, his heart pounding with both anger and anticipation.

      The fairgrounds were still clearing out. His head hurt from searching the crowd and waiting to see Billie Rae’s contrite face.

      She would come crawling back, apologizing and saying how sorry she was. She’d be a lot sorrier when he got through with her. The thought kicked up his pulse to a nice familiar throb he could feel in his thick neck.

      As his daddy used to say, “A man who can’t control his woman is no man at all.”

      He used to think his old man was a mean SOB. But Duane hadn’t understood what his father had to contend with when it came to living with a woman. Sometimes just opening the door and seeing Billie Rae with that look on her face …

      Duane couldn’t describe it any other way than as a deer-in-the-headlights look. It made him want to wipe it off her face. He hated it when she acted as if she had to fear him.

      He had told her repeatedly that he loved her and that the only reason he had to get tough with her sometimes was because she made him mad. Or when she acted like she was walking around on eggshells, treating him as if she thought he might go off at any moment and slap her.

      Didn’t he realize how that would make him even angrier with her?

      Duane shook his head now. He’d never be able to understand his wife.

      Like this little trick she’d just pulled, taking off on him. What the hell was she thinking? She’d been so sweet and compliant when they were dating. She’d liked it when he took care of her, told her what was best for her, didn’t bother her with making any of the decisions.

      He couldn’t understand what had changed her. It was a mystery to him especially since he’d given the woman everything—she didn’t even have to work outside the home.

      He’d squashed all talk of her looking for a job after they’d moved. No wife of his was working. Every man knew that working outside the home ruined a woman. They got all kinds of strange ideas into their heads. Let a woman be too independent and you were just asking for trouble.

      With a curse, he saw that the parking area was almost empty. Only a few stragglers wandered out from the direction of the rodeo grandstands. The rodeo cowboys had loaded up their stock and taken off. The parking lot in the field next to the fairgrounds was empty.

      A sliver of worry burrowed under his skin. Where was Billie Rae? Still hiding in those trees to the west of the fairgrounds? The night air was cooling quickly. She wasn’t dressed for spending the night in the woods, not this far north in Montana.

      That was another thing that puzzled him, the way she’d taken off. She hadn’t planned this as far as he could tell. He’d found her purse and her house key. She hadn’t even taken a decent jacket, and it appeared she’d left with nothing more than the clothes on her back. How stupid was that?

      He settled in to wait. When she got cold and hungry she’d come back to the pickup. She’d know he would be waiting for her, so she’d come with her tail between her legs. He smiled at the thought. Of course Billie Rae would come back. Where else could she go?

      EMMA CHISHOLM TOOK ONE LOOK at the woman her stepson had brought home from the rodeo and recognized herself—thirty years ago. It gave her a start to have a reminder show up at her front door after all these years.

      All of it was too familiar, the terror in the young woman’s eyes, the fading bruises, the insecurity and indecision in her movements and the panic and pain etched in her face.

      The worst part, Emma knew, was the memory of the tearful promises that would be forgotten in an instant the next time. But it was those tender moments that gave every battered woman hope that this time, her lover really would never do it again. They called it the honeymoon period. It came right before the next beating—and that beating was always worse than the one before.

      It made her heart ache just to look at the woman. A part of Emma wanted to distance herself, deny that she had been this young woman, but if there was one thing she’d learned, it was that all things circled back at you for a reason.

      “This is Billie Rae Johnson,” Tanner said. “Her car broke down at the rodeo. I told her we had plenty of room and that we’d get her fixed up in the morning.”

      Emma smiled and held out her hand to the young woman. “I’m Emma. We are delighted to have you stay with us as long as you’d like.” Her gaze shifted to Tanner.

      He’d never been one to exaggerate or lie, but she didn’t believe his story for a moment. Billie Rae was on the run. Emma knew the look, remembered it only too well. Her heart went out to Billie Rae.

      “I don’t want to be an imposition.” Billie Rae was a beauty, but Emma knew that her stepson had seen beyond that. Tanner was like his father, who brought home those in need. Was that one reason Hoyt had fallen in love with her? Because he’d seen the need in Emma herself?

      “I promise you it is no imposition,” Emma said. “I love having guests, especially female ones. I’m so outnumbered around here.”

      “Thank you,” Billie Rae said. She looked exhausted. No doubt she’d been running on adrenaline and fear for hours and was about to crash.

      “Why don’t I show you up to one of our many guest rooms?” Emma said quickly. “Since all six of the boys have their own places now, we have more empty bedrooms than you can shake a stick at. Then I’ll get you a snack. It always helps me sleep.”

      Billie Rae glanced at Tanner, who smiled and nodded, then she followed Emma without a word.

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