Free Montana Sky by Nora Roberts Page B

courage to talk to her, to ask if there’s something I could do around here to help.”
    â€œYou don’t have to be afraid of her, either.” He brushed his fingertips against hers, continuing to stroke the mare even when Lily’s hand slid out of reach. “But meanwhile, you could ask me. I can use some help. With the horses,” he added, when she only stared at him.
    â€œYou want me to help you with the horses?”
    â€œIt’s a lot of work, more when winter gets here.” Knowing he’d planted the seed, he stepped back. “Think about it.” Then he cupped his hands, smiled again. “I’ll give you a leg up. You can walk her around the corral, get acquainted, while I saddle up.”
    Her throat was closed so that she had to swallow hard to clear it. “You don’t even know me.”
    â€œI figure we’ll get acquainted too.” He stood as he was, hands linked in a cup, his eyes patient on hers. “You just have to put your foot in my hands, Lily, not your life.”
    Feeling foolish, she grabbed the saddle horn and let himboost her into the saddle. She looked down at him, her eyes solemn in her battered face. “Adam, my life is a mess.”
    He only nodded as he checked her stirrups. “You’ll have to start tidying it up.” He rested a hand on her ankle a moment, wanting her to grow easy to his touch. “But today, you just have to take a ride into the hills.”
    Â 
    T HE LITTLE BITCH , LETTING THAT HALF - BREED PAW HER . Sniveling little whore thought she could get rid of Jesse Cooke, figured she could run and he wouldn’t catch her. Put the cops on his ass. She was going to pay for that.
    Jesse stared through the field glasses while little bubbles of fury burst in his blood. He wondered if the half-breed horse wrangler had already gotten Lily on her back. Well, the bastard would pay too. Lily was Jesse Cooke’s wife, and he was going to be reminding her of that soon enough.
    Stupid little cunt thought she was real clever hightailing it to Montana. But the day Jesse Cooke couldn’t outwit a woman was the day the sun didn’t rise in the east.
    He’d known she wouldn’t make a move without contacting her dear old mama. So he’d just camped himself within sight of the pretty house in Virginia. And every morning he’d gotten to the mail and checked through it for a letter from Lily.
    Persistence had paid off. The letter had come, as he’d known it would. He’d taken it back to the motel room, steamed it open. Oh, Jesse Cooke was nobody’s fool. He’d read it, seen where she was going, what she was up to.
    Going to cash in on an inheritance, he thought bitterly. And cut her own husband out of his share of the pie. Not in this lifetime, Jesse mused.
    The minute the letter had been resealed and put back in the box, he’d headed for Montana. And had gotten there, he thought now, two full days before his idiot wife. Long enough for a man as smart as Jesse Cooke to get the lay of the land and get himself a job on Three Rocks.
    A miserable fucking job, he thought now, keeping machines in repair. Well, he knew his way around engines, and there was always a rig that needed fine-tuning. When hewasn’t doing that, they had him out checking fences day and night.
    But that came in handy, damn handy, like now. A man out riding in a four-wheel to check fences could take a little detour and check out what else was going on.
    And he saw plenty.
    Jesse rubbed his fingers over the moustache he’d grown and dyed like his hair, medium brown. Just a precaution, he thought, just a temporary disguise, in case Lily blabbed about him. If she did, they’d have their eye out for a clean-shaven man with blond hair. He had let his hair grow too and would keep on letting it grow. Like a fucking pansy, he thought, resenting the necessity of giving up his severe Marine Corps crew cut.
    It would all be