Free The Reluctant Bride by Leigh Greenwood Page B

with you.”
    “That’s his problem.”
    “Will you fight back if he tries to take your cattle or run you out of your valley?”
    “Of course.”
    “If he burns your house or barns, will you burn his?”
    “Probably.”
    “If his men kill some of your men, will you retaliate?”
    “Without hesitation.”
    “Then you’ll end up dead or in prison. And what’s more, if we have sons, future generations will be drawn into the fight.”
    “Not if I kill Stocker. He doesn’t have any future generations.”
    “I’m sure he has uncles, cousins, other relatives who’d want to avenge his death.”
    “This is all nonsense.”
    “It’s not nonsense. I grew up in the middle of a feud that killed my whole family. I know how feuds start and what keeps them going.”
    His look was penetrating. “Are you sure you’re not making this up to keep from telling me you don’t like me and don’t want to marry me?”
    “It’s not that at all,” Tanzy hastened to assure him. “I find you very attractive and nice. I was especially impressed you would come to meet the stage to make sure I arrived safely. Your pursuit of the thieves shows you have courage and a high sense of moral responsibility. I know you work hard because you couldn’t have built up your ranch if you didn’t. I also know you take good care of your men, or they wouldn’t have remained faithful to you. Everybody knows you’re unafraid of danger and willing to stand up for yourself against any odds. You’ve exactly the kind of man every woman dreams of having for a husband.”
    “If I’m so perfect, why won’t you marry me?”
    “Because of the feud.”
    There is no feud.”
    “I disagree.”
    “I live here. I know what’s going on.”
    “You’re so bound up in your anger at Stocker, you don’t see what both of you are doing.”
    “And you don’t understand that a man has to defend his property. If he doesn’t, he won’t have it long.”
    “You haven’t forgotten your sister’s death, and Stocker hasn’t forgotten his brother’s. That’s more than enough to keep the two of you at each other’s throats.”
    “Good Lord, woman, I can’t believe you’re foolish enough to build an argument into a war.”
    His words were like a slap in the face. “That’s something else I find unacceptable.”
    “What?” Russ asked. “I didn’t say anything.”
    “The fact that you don’t realize what you said makes it even worse.”
    “I don’t like guessing games. Tell me what you’re talking about.”
    “You clearly don’t respect my opinions.”
    “That’s because they’re wrong.”
    “It’s also clear you don’t expect your wife to have any say in how you run the ranch.”
    “I’m not going to tell her what to cook. I don’t care—”
    “That’s not what I mean.”
    “Then say what you mean. Say something a man can understand instead of all this nonsense.”
    “You did it again.”
    “Did what again?” He was getting increasingly impatient.
    “You dismissed my opinion as nonsense.”
    “Because it is.”
    “It’s not nonsense to me.”
    “That’s because you don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
    “You expect me to accept your opinions without question, without your taking the time to explain to me why they aren’t nonsense, without your taking the time to listen to my concerns and give them the same amount of consideration as your own.”
    “No self-respecting rancher is going to let his wife make all the decisions, any more than he would expect to run the household.”
    “Of course you’d tell me how to run the household,” Tanzy replied. “You’d tell me what you wanted to eat and when, you’d decide how much money I had to spend, and you’d tell me when I could go into town. And if my doing the wash on any given day got in the way of your plans, you’d tell me that, too.”
    “You didn’t put any of this in your letters,” Russ said.
    “You didn’t say anything about the