LITMIR.BIZ

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and was trying to come up with something better when she heard a soft knock at the back door.

      A quick glance at the clock over the stove showed it was nearly ten—a little late for company.

      Maybe Joe had some unfinished ranch business he needed to discuss. It wasn’t unusual for him to stop by after the evening chores were done to talk about what needed to be done the next day—a gesture she appreciated but which she’d tried to tell him repeatedly wasn’t necessary. She trusted his instincts completely.

      It would take a long time to build up that kind of trust with whomever she finally hired to replace him. She set the pencil down so hard the lead snapped off, and went to answer the door.

      To her surprise, it wasn’t Joe she found in the light of the back porch at all but Luke Mitchell, looking nervous and edgy and, if possible, even younger than normal.

      “Luke! Is something wrong?”

      “No. I just…” the ranch hand shifted his weight, “I wanted to talk to you tonight. Are you busy?”

      “No. Just trying to write an ad for a new foreman. Come in.”

      She helped brush snow off his black slicker in the mudroom, then led the way into the kitchen. “Can I get you something? I was having a cup of tea and there’s plenty more hot water.”

      He shook his head. The movement seemed to remind him of his manners because he abruptly yanked the cowboy hat from his head, leaving a flat line haloing his blond hair.

      She took her seat again and pointed to another chair. “Why don’t you sit down, then.”

      He shook his head again, a quick, restless gesture. Shoulders tense, he stood in the doorway and began measuring the brim of his hat with his fingers. Round and round he went, first in one direction then the other, over and over until—given her lingering headache and the uproar of her emotions—she had to fight the urge to yank the blasted thing away from him and throw it on the table.

      He opened his mouth to speak twice, but both times he jerked it shut again, and she could tell he was trying to work up his nerve for some kind of major announcement.

      Fiddlesticks. She had absolutely no energy left to deal with this after the day she’d had. “It’s late,” she finally said, when it looked like he was going to stand in her kitchen fidgeting all night. She should probably try to be more patient, but she just wasn’t in the mood tonight. “What can I do for you, Luke?”

      “I’d like to apply for the foreman job,” he blurted out, so loudly it startled both of them.

      The foreman job? She stared at him, shocked, watching a flush creep up those baby-smooth cheeks. Of all the possibilities racing through her head about what he might be doing there at ten o’clock at night, the idea that he wanted Joe’s job never would have occurred to her.

      “I know I’m young and all but I’m a hard worker. Joe’s always sayin’ so. I’m strong and I’m willing and I’ve been around cattle all my life. If my daddy hadn’t had lost our spread because of the damn banks—excuse my language, ma’am—I’d be on my way to runnin’ my own place by now.”

      Like so many ranching families, the Mitchells had been hurt by the recent run of low beef prices. They had run a pretty big spread near Big Sky and she knew his father slightly.

      She heard he was trying to support his large family by working in a ranch supply store over in Bozeman now. It had been one of the reasons she’d taken a chance and hired Luke two months earlier, in an effort to give the family one less mouth to feed.

      Compassion for the eager young man washed over her. To grow up thinking he would take over the reins of the family ranch someday and then to lose it all with the bang of an auctioneer’s gavel must have been devastating. Heaven knows, it was one of her own biggest fears.

      “You could do a whole lot worse, ma’am,” Luke went on, “if you don’t mind me sayin’.”

      Drat Joe for putting her in this position. She rubbed suddenly clammy hands on her jeans beneath the table. The last thing she wanted to do was hurt his fragile pride by telling him she didn’t think he was man enough for the job.

      Especially when life had already dealt him a rough hand—and when he had more than a slight crush on her. “I… You’ve been a real asset to the Double C, Luke.”

      “Thank you.” His wide grin made him look not much older than C.J. “I could be even more of an asset as foreman. I have some real good ideas about improving things around here. Not that Joe hasn’t done a good job, mind, but I’ve been reading about these fancy new low-cholesterol breeds they got out there and I think it might be worth your while to look into it.”

      He went on for several minutes about the direction he’d like to take the Double C. She listened with only half an ear, trying to figure out how she could let him down gently. Finally she realized he had wound down and was waiting expectantly for an answer.

      She cleared her throat. “I have to say, those certainly sound like interesting ideas.”

      “Does that mean you’re willing to give me a chance?”

      She paused, feeling like she was about to drop-kick a puppy, then finally drew in a deep breath and took aim. “Luke, you’re a good cowhand. Like you said, you’re a hard worker, always willing to dig in and do what has to be done, no matter what. And while I’ll certainly keep you in mind for the foreman’s job, I have to be honest with you. I was hoping for somebody with a little more experience.”

      “I told you, I’ve been around cattle all my life. That’s twenty years of experience right there.”

      Twenty years. Oh mercy. He wasn’t even as old as she had thought he was. She felt like a shriveled up old lady compared to all this youthful exuberance.

      “It’s more than just experience.”

      She fumbled for words for a few moments, then decided she would just have to be blunt, as much as she hated it, and as much as it might hurt. “The foreman of a ranch like the Double C has to have a certain…authority. Not just with the hands who work on the ranch, but out in the community, too—with other ranchers, with our suppliers, when we take stock to auction. He has to be able to command respect in the ranching community and that’s something that comes not just with experience, but with age.”

      And something Joe still struggled with, at least with the ranchers around Madison Valley who couldn’t forget his history. She frowned, wondering if that was one of the reasons he was leaving, if he thought his presence was somehow detrimental to the Double C’s bottom line.

      “So what you’re sayin’ is you’re not gonna hire me because I’m too young?” The boy couldn’t have looked more offended if she had just told him his horse was ugly.

      “I’m not saying you could never be foreman of the Double C,” she answered. “But I have to be honest with you. I just don’t know if it’s a responsibility you’re ready for yet.”

      Hurt flickered in his pale blue eyes and with it she glimpsed a deep anger that somehow made him look much older. Just as quickly, the anger disappeared and she wondered if she had imagined it.

      “I see.” His voice was low in the hushed kitchen, so quiet she could barely hear him. “So that’s it?”

      She nodded. “I’m sorry, Luke. I’d like nothing better than to hire you for the job right now. Maybe in a few more years, though.”

      “You’re wrong.” Though he spoke in the same quiet, intense voice, he gripped his hat so hard it creased the soft brown felt. He shoved the hat on his head. “I could do a helluva lot better job than Redhawk. I could prove it to you if you’d only give me a chance.”

      He didn’t wait for an answer but stalked out of the kitchen and into the storm.

      She watched through the window as he made his way back to the bunkhouse, shoulders hunched

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