LITMIR.BIZ

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in her youth she had dreamed about Chance Reilly, how many hours of those youthful days she’d wasted fantasizing about the handsome brown-haired young man whose green eyes had burned with the fierce intensity of tumultuous emotions.

      Silly dreams and ridiculous fantasies, she now thought. She’d long ago outgrown the crush she’d once had on Chance Reilly. Chance was every teenage girl’s heartthrob but he was not the material for everlasting love.

      She stood, knowing she needed to get back inside. Before she’d left the house to seek out Chance, she’d been serving as an unofficial hostess. And if she knew her mother, Inez Ramirez would be in the kitchen, washing up after everyone and replenishing the food on the dining room table.

      Shoving aside her conversation with Chance, she went back inside the house. Chance stood near the dining room table, talking with several of the other ranchers in the area who had shown up to pay their respects.

      There was no denying that time had only increased the man’s attractiveness. His brown hair was now sun-streaked with gleaming blond strands, the variegated color only appearing to deepen the hazel green of his eyes. Time had only seemed to better define the lines of his square face, his strong nose and full lips. The shoulders that had seemed broad before now seemed impossibly so.

      She consciously tore her gaze from him and headed for the kitchen. Sure enough, her mother was there, standing at the sink with her arms half-buried in soap suds.

      “Mama, you don’t have to do this,” Lana protested.

      Inez flashed her daughter a warm smile. “I don’t mind. Chance has nobody else to help out.”

      Lana picked up a dish towel and took a plate from her mother to dry. For a moment, the two women worked in a companionable silence.

      Lana fought the impulse to tell her mother what she’d just offered Chance. She knew instinctively that her mother would never understand. Lana’s parents had married for love, and that love had not weakened through the years, but had rather strengthened. Inez would never understand her daughter settling for less than true love.

      “And so your work here is done,” Inez said as she finished the last of the dishes.

      Lana nodded. “I’ll pack up my things and move back to my apartment this evening.” The sooner the better, she thought to herself. She wasn’t particularly eager to face Chance again. Funny, but she wasn’t particularly eager to move back to her silent, empty apartment, either.

      Within thirty minutes her parents had left and Lana excused herself from the remaining crowd to go to the room she had called home for the past six months.

      It was a small room right next door to the master bedroom. It had been Jim Hastings, one of the local doctors, who had set up the arrangement for a home nurse for Tom Reilly.

      Despite the fact that a series of strokes had left him partially paralyzed, Tom refused to be hospitalized, and also refused to call his only son home to take care of him.

      She lost track of time as she folded clothes and carefully placed them in her suitcase. No matter how difficult the patient, there was always an edge of sadness inside her when one finally succumbed to death.

      When she had all her clothes packed, she remembered she’d left a book she’d been reading in Tom’s bedroom where she’d spent long hours sitting by his bedside.

      As she walked down the short hallway between the small bedroom and the master, she realized the house had grown silent and night had fallen completely.

      A small lamp burned on the table next to the bed. No ghost of Tom Reilly haunted the room. Tom had been hospitalized the day before his death. Lana had remained here, hoping he would rally and be returned to his home, but it had not been so.

      She grabbed the book from the stand and stood for a moment, staring at the bed as she said a silent prayer for Tom Reilly’s soul. He had not been a pleasant man and she had a feeling he could use all the prayers that were offered on his behalf.

      “I’ll bet he’s barking orders in hell right about now.”

      Lana jumped in surprise and whirled toward the window, where she spied Chance sitting in the shadows of the room. “You scared me half to death,” she exclaimed and clapped the paperback book over her breast to still her thudding heart.

      “Sorry,” he said.

      “I just came in for my book,” she explained. “I’m all packed, so I guess I’ll just say goodbye.” She turned to leave, but stopped in the doorway as he softly called her name.

      “Have a cup of coffee with me.” He stood and approached her, stopping just before he got close enough to invade her personal space.

      In the dimness of the room, his features looked stark, taut with tension. “Everyone else has gone home and now the house seems so quiet…” His voice trailed off.

      “I’d like a cup of coffee before I leave,” she said softly. Although Chance had always professed to hate his father, Lana remembered a time when all Chance had wanted was a kind touch, a word of encouragement and a simple acknowledgment of affection from the man.

      There must be a small part of him that was grieving, and Lana couldn’t walk away despite the fact that she still was embarrassed by her earlier outburst.

      She turned and left the room, conscious of him just behind her as they walked down the hall toward the living room and kitchen.

      When she’d first moved in here, she’d been struck by how plain, how austere the place was. Each room held the utilitarian furniture necessary, but little else. There were no floral arrangements, no little knickknacks, no pictures or personal items to make the house feel like a home.

      In the kitchen, she sat at the table and watched as Chance made coffee. At some point during the evening, he’d taken off his suit jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt, exposing tanned, muscled forearms.

      She searched for something to say to break the silence, but her usual shyness rose up to hinder any efforts she might make toward conversation.

      He didn’t speak until he placed a cup of coffee before her. “Cream or sugar?” he asked.

      She shook her head. “No, this is fine.”

      He poured himself a cup, then joined her at the table. “I haven’t had a chance to thank you for all you did for Sarge,” he said.

      She shrugged. “I was just doing my job.” She cleared her throat, desperately wanting to fill the silence that once again fell between them. “I understand you travel a lot with your job.”

      He nodded, the overhead kitchen light gleaming on the sun-kissed strands of his hair. “I’m usually on the road six days of the week.”

      He leaned back in his chair, for the first time since arriving home he looked relaxed. “I love it. No ties, no binds, new places and new faces all the time. I spent the first twenty years of my life trying to please Sarge, now I please nobody but myself.”

      Although he appeared to be relaxed, Lana felt the tension that rolled from him, saw the sparks of anger that still torched the depths of his eyes.

      “Then I guess you don’t care that this place will all go to charity,” she said.

      He sat back up, his gaze burning into hers. “Yes, I care.” He pushed away from the table and stood, then drew a deep breath and raked a hand through his collar-length hair as if to steady himself.

      “Even though the last thing I ever want to do is ranch, and despite the fact that this place holds only terrible memories, I wanted it.” His voice was low, deep with barely suppressed emotion. “I wanted to sell this place and take the money and start my own business. He owed me this, Lana. Damn him, he owed me this.”

      She heard the pain beneath the anger, and her heart ached for him. “Then take it,” she said with the bravado that was uncharacteristic. “Marry me and claim the ranch. Fix it up

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