LITMIR.BIZ

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him, and collapsing rubble crashed into his back. A heavy object grazed his forehead, and the coppery taste of blood filled his mouth. Dust and smoke saturated the air, and he couldn’t breathe. He attempted to rise, but a falling beam caught him between his shoulder blades and knocked him flat once more.

      Won’t have to look for the bomb, he thought woozily and would have laughed if his lungs hadn’t hurt so badly and had held enough air. Looks like the bomb found me.

      With every nerve ending screaming with pain, he drifted into merciful darkness.

      Chapter One

      Five years later

      Buttoning her suede jacket against the early evening chill, Catherine Erickson stepped onto the broad front porch of the ranch house and stared at the snow-capped peaks along the Montana-Canada border.

      Although the air was cool, the angle of the sun hanging high above the western mountains even this late in the evening heralded the approach of summer. Wrapping her hands around a mug of hot coffee, she settled into one of the rough bark chairs, propped her boots on the porch rail and, lost in memories, gazed across the rolling upper pastures of High Valley Ranch.

      She missed Ryan.

      Catherine always missed Ryan, but somehow in summer she missed him more, when the dull, ever-present pain transformed into a sharp, unbearable ache.

      Instead of focusing on the cattle feeding on the tall lush grass or, beyond them, the river swollen with melted snow, she saw in her mind’s eye a tall, muscular figure striding toward her up the front walk, his mahogany-colored hair and khaki-brown eyes glinting in the sun, his broad grin accentuating the cleft in his strong, square chin, his arms open wide in greeting. His nose, broken once in a boyhood brawl, was his handsome face’s only imperfection, but even that flaw added to his rakish appeal, and she had never been happier than when those strong arms closed around her and lifted her off her feet and his deep, smooth baritone voice sounded her name.

      Her smile at the recollection grew wistful. He hadn’t always been so glad to see her.

      When Marc brought his college roommate home for the summer the year she was sixteen, Ryan had followed her brother’s lead, yanked playfully at her braids and called her the Pest. Cat, on the other hand, had immediately been smitten. She’d always thought Marc hung the moon, but his handsome young friend from Chicago had been the perfect manifestation of all her adolescent fantasies. Ryan, however, seemed unaware that she existed most of the time.

      Not that he was ever inconsiderate or rude. His innate good manners made him the perfect guest. He arrived with books or candy for her and a bottle of fine whiskey or a box of hand-rolled cigars for her father. And unlike Marc and her dad, who considered the kitchen women’s territory, Ryan insisted on helping her with the washing up after meals.

      “You don’t have to do this,” she’d protested that first night when he’d entered the kitchen, picked up a dish towel and begun drying the skillet she’d just scrubbed. “Marc and Dad wouldn’t be caught dead in here.”

      “Everybody pitched in where I grew up,” Ryan had said with an easy grin. “Made the work go faster.”

      His hand grazed hers when she passed him a pan, and the unexpected contact had sent her teenage heart into a wild flutter. She pivoted quickly toward the sink to hide her blushing cheeks.

      Ryan chatted constantly as they worked, but always about the ranch. His curiosity about their way of life had seemed insatiable.

      “What’s a quarter horse?” he would ask, or, “How did your dad choose which breed of cattle to raise?” or, “How many head can your acreage support?”

      He’d posed plenty of questions about the ranch and Montana, all right, but never any about her. Cat had soon accepted that Ryan didn’t even think of her as a girl, much less a woman. When he wasn’t teasing her or helping out in the kitchen, he’d treated her as if she were a fence post. Which wasn’t surprising. Why should he notice her? A fence post was the ideal description of her feminine attributes. She’d never bothered with how she looked. And she’d been too tongue-tied with awe to converse wittily with their handsome visitor.

      Until the summer she’d turned twenty.

      Before Ryan and Marc arrived to spend their leave prior to their first overseas posting, she’d carefully planned her campaign and laid her trap like the best military strategist. Ryan hadn’t visited the ranch in over a year, and in that interval, Cat had learned to show off her best features. Choosing well-cut and properly fitted clothes instead of wearing Marc’s cast-offs made even her usual jeans and plaid shirts alluring.

      With an art close to magic, Madge Kennedy down at the Kut ’n Kurl in town had trimmed Cat’s untamed hair into an attractive shoulder-length style that showed off her heart-shaped face to best advantage. Adding subtle makeup, a killer sky-blue dress that emphasized her shapely figure and matched her eyes and sporting strappy heels that showed off long legs formerly hidden beneath denim and boots, Cat had paced nervously in her bedroom until Ryan’s arrival.

      She usually waited for her brother and Ryan on the front porch, then ran flying down the path into Marc’s arms for a bear hug upon their arrival, but that day she delayed, holding back until she heard them enter the spacious living room. Then she made her entrance.

      When Marc spotted her, his jaw dropped and his eyes widened. “Who are you, and what have you done with the Pest?” he demanded, circling her for a closer inspection and shaking his head in amazement.

      Her attention darted immediately to Ryan, who had dropped his bag, crossed his arms over his chest and leaned one shoulder against the doorjamb, his expression serious but his eyes shining. “Looks like your little sister is all grown up now, cowboy.”

      She reveled in the obvious approval in Ryan’s voice but said nothing, afraid she’d spoil the effect she’d worked so hard to create.

      “Man, oh, man.” Marc blinked in disbelief. “If I’d known you’d turned into such a hot number, Pest, I’d never have brought this ladykiller into the house.”

      “Ladykiller?” Cat experienced a moment of panic. Somehow she’d neglected to consider the possibility that Ryan already had a girlfriend. Marc had never mentioned one. Fixing her anxious gaze on Ryan, she was glad he couldn’t hear her heart pounding beneath the scooped neckline of her dress. He met her glance, but his expression remained inscrutable.

      “Yeah, the women are wild about him,” Marc explained with the fraternal grin that made her tingle with happiness to have her brother home again. “Everywhere we go, women are always throwing themselves at him. Many a time I’ve had to sacrifice and place myself between him and harm’s way.”

      “Sacrifice?” Ryan said with a wry laugh. “So that’s what you call it.”

      Marc shrugged. “You’ve never seemed interested in any of the female attention. I was just trying to save you the aggravation.”

      Ryan stared at Cat with a laser look that heated her from head to toe. “I think,” he said in a deliciously languid tone, “my interest has just been piqued.”

      Inwardly savoring the possibility of victory, Cat remained outwardly cool. “I’m sure plenty of girls will be happy to hear that at the dance tonight.”

      “What dance?” Marc asked.

      “You’ve been away too long, brother dear,” Cat said. “How could you forget the annual Territorial Celebration at the town hall?”

      Marc turned to Ryan. “The music’s kind of hokey, but the food’s always good. Want to go?”

      “If you guys are too tired,” Cat said quickly, “I have a casserole I can heat for your supper before I leave.”

      She held her breath, waiting for their reply. She’d dreamed for months of dancing with Ryan, wondering how his arms would feel around her, dying to talk with him alone without Marc claiming all his attention.

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