Riding Home

Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

Prologue (#ulink_eba65b85-90f9-58c4-81c8-e262739875af)

From the diary of Eleanor Chance

August 15, 1990

WHEN YOUR CHILD MARRIES, you instantly become related to a whole lot more folks. Sometimes that’s a lovely thing and sometimes it’s not. But in the case of our only son, Jonathan, marrying Sarah Gillespie eight years ago, we lucked out. Judy and Bill are salt-of-the-earth.

When I told Judy that, she called it a supreme compliment. She’s lived in Shoshone for more than thirty years, but some locals still think of her as an uppity Easterner. I admit when she first arrived she caused quite a stir, and people around here have long memories.

She blew in from New York City, flush with money from her modeling career and wearing pricey designer outfits. She immediately bought a small ranch and hired one of Jackson Hole’s most eligible bachelors, Bill Gillespie, to help run it. We all predicted they’d get married, which they did, and within a year little Sarah was born.

But then Judy made the mistake of announcing she’d only have one child in order to keep her figure. That didn’t sit well with the town busybodies. Personally, I didn’t give a hoot. She had the right to make that decision for herself.

I liked her from the get-go. She was generous with her money, always willing to support local charity efforts, and she worked right alongside Bill as they turned their place into a cute little guest ranch. She worked hard to make the place cozy and profitable until they chose to sell and move into town.

Judy came over today so she, Sarah and I could have a confab about Jack’s twelfth birthday party next month. Judy keeps trying to get that boy to warm up to her, but Jack’s a funny one. He’s never quite recovered after his mother left when he was a toddler.

Consequently he got it into his head that because Sarah is not his “real” mother, he has no right to claim Judy as his grandmother. He thinks his brothers are the only ones who deserve that privilege. No amount of reasoning works with him. Next to the word stubborn in the dictionary is a picture of my grandson Jack.

But Judy keeps trying, and the birthday present she’s bought for Jack is a perfect example. She asked a rare book dealer in New York to track down an autographed copy of one of Jack’s favorite Louis L’Amour titles. I don’t even want to know what she paid for it, and Jack won’t realize the effort and expense involved, but I’m sure he’ll treasure the book. Maybe someday he’ll realize what a gift of love it is.

In any case, I’ll be forever grateful that Judy chose Wyoming as her landing spot after she left modeling. Besides giving birth to the amazing Sarah, she’s also been an asset to the community. In my opinion, we could use a few more Easterners blowing into town to shake things up and keep us from getting too set in our ways.

1 (#ulink_c2f513ad-8684-538b-9c09-de4e8d82a628)

Last Chance Ranch

Present day

ON HIS KNEES inside an empty stall, Zach Powell concentrated on nailing a loose board in place. Except for one horse with medical issues, Zach was alone in the barn. Or so he thought until he stopped hammering and heard the echo of footsteps.

Whoever was wandering around wasn’t wearing cowboy boots, either. Boots made a distinctive clump-clump sound on the wooden barn floor, whereas this was a sharper click-click. After spending years in L.A. courtrooms, Zach was familiar with that noise.

For some reason, this woman was wearing stilettos in the barn. He’d only been working here a few weeks, but he hadn’t seen a woman in stilettos anywhere on the ranch, let alone in the barn. He was curious enough to stand up and take a look.

She was five stalls down and totally focused on Ink Spot, a black-and-white Paint who’d been kept in because of a recent sprain. Tall, slender and blond, the woman wore cream-colored dress pants and a lemon-yellow blouse, probably silk. The shoes that peeked out were also yellow and probably designer, judging from the rest of her ensemble—gold bangles on her wrists and gold hoop earrings. No doubt her short, sleek haircut was courtesy of a pricey salon.

She looked completely out of place here, except for the way she stroked the horse’s nose. Whoever she was, she knew horses, which made her outfit even more puzzling. She touched the horse with great affection, reaching up to scratch under his forelock as she murmured softly.

Something about the way she communed with Ink Spot told Zach that she wasn’t eager for company. He should just finish up his hammering and leave by the back door. On the other hand, she didn’t look very happy. Zach knew all about unhappiness.

She’d been so motivated to seek the comfort of horses that she’d risked her expensive outfit by coming out to the barn. That meant she must be really upset, and by speaking to her, he could be intruding on a private moment. Plus, they didn’t know each other.

He’d about decided to go back to his hammering when she turned toward him. “You’re probably wondering what the hell I’m doin’ here dressed like a Sunday school teacher.”

No Sunday school teacher he’d ever known had looked like that, but the Southern accent clued him in. This had to be Jeannette Trenton from Virginia. Everybody on the ranch knew her story, even a new hire like Zach.

Last year she’d been Regan O’Connelli’s fiancée, but then she’d cheated on him with Regan’s best friend, Drake Brewster. Consequently Regan had left Virginia and moved to Wyoming. He was related by blood or marriage to quite a few Chance family members, and they’d all been incensed about Drake and Jeannette’s betrayal.

Since then Regan had found a new love, Lily King. Then Drake had shown up to make amends, and in the process he’d become chummy with a local woman, Tracy Gibbons. Drake had also invited Jeannette to Wyoming so the three former friends could bury the hatchet. They seemed to have done that, but members of the Chance family weren’t so quick to forgive and forget.

Zach could imagine why Jeannette had come out to be with the horses for a while. Even in his brief time here, he’d figured out that angering a Chance, or someone connected to a Chance, was a huge mistake. He gave both Drake and Jeannette props for braving that disapproval in order to repair their friendship with Regan.

So this was the woman at the heart of the controversy. He had no trouble picturing that, because she was stunning. Apparently she’d known that he’d been staring. Maybe she was used to men looking at her, because if she’d been attractive in profile, she was breathtaking full-on. Those green eyes were showstoppers, not to mention her kissable mouth.

He cleared his throat. “Um, I didn’t mean to bother you. I heard you come in, and I thought maybe...” What? His mind went blank. Pretty embarrassing for someone who used to make his living as an entertainment lawyer, someone who’d dealt with A-list actors, directors and producers every day. She didn’t have to know that, though. He wasn’t that guy anymore.

“I was tryin’ to help with the food for Regan and Lily’s engagement party, but...” She gestured to her blouse. “As you can see, kitchen duty is not my talent.”

He walked closer. Yeah, now he noticed flecks of something that could be meringue or white frosting on the front of her blouse. “It sort of matches your pants.”

That brought out a sad little smile. “You know, I told them that very thing, but they were all worried about the blouse, which I surely appreciated, but they don’t have time to mess around with a klutz like me. I’d already dropped a bowl of chocolate chips. I thought I could frost that danged cake. I swear, how hard can that be? Turns out it’s harder than it looks on TV.”

He couldn’t help smiling back. “Everything’s harder than it looks on TV.”

“Isn’t that the God’s truth? Anyway, I decided to make myself scarce and just naturally gravitated to the barn.”

“I completely understand. You obviously know your way around horses.”

“My folks raise them.” She turned back to the horse. “Who is this, by the way?”

“Ink Spot. He’s nursing a sprain, so he didn’t get to go out.”

“His bad luck, but my good luck. I wasn’t thinkin’ the horses would be out in the pasture, but of course they would be on a fine day like this. Back home they tend to bring them into the air-conditioning in the heat of the day.” She stroked the gelding’s neck. “And who would you be?”

Because she wasn’t looking at him, he didn’t immediately understand she was asking for his name. But he’d already supplied the horse’s name, so she had to mean him. “I’m Zach. Zach Powell.”

She continued to caress the horse. “I suppose you know who I am.” Her version of I sounded more like ah.

“I didn’t until I heard your accent.”

She was quiet for a moment. “It’s real strange, knowin’ that people talk about you behind your back. Of course, people do that all the time. You just don’t know it for sure. In this case, I do.”

“For what it’s worth, I have no stake in this situation. I started working here last month and I’m not related to any of the players.” He could add that his law training predisposed him to remain impartial until he’d heard all sides of a story. But for now, he was just a cowhand, and that suited him fine.