"Good."
"Speaking of being sick, are you sure you should be on your feet? That was a fair fever you were running yesterday."
"I'm glad Mariah isn't sick," Nevada said, settling the saddle gently over the skittish Appaloosa. "She and Cash should have fine, strapping children. I'm looking forward to hearing another healthy baby around here hollering for mama to bring his next meal. Carla's new baby is really something." Nevada cinched up the saddle girth with a swift, smooth motion, moving so quickly that the horse had no time to object. "Like your Carolina. That's one fine set of lungs the little lady has. She and Logan make a real pair."
Ten smiled dryly and accepted that Nevada wasn't going to talk about flu, rest, and a cold ride into the mountains. "Glad you like having babies around. Mariah will give us two more little screamers sometime in May or June."
Nevada looked over his shoulder. "Twins?"
"Yeah. Cash was so excited he could hardly talk. He and Mariah had been hoping, but they hadn't said anything until they were sure everything was fine."
"Tell her to be extra careful. Twins tend to be born small, and small babies have a harder time."
"Tell her yourself. She'll be here tomorrow."
"I won't." Nevada gestured with his head toward MacKenzie Ridge. "I'm going to spend a few days tracking cats. Supposed to be fresh snow by afternoon up toward Wildfire Canyon. It may be the last tracking snow of the winter."
And maybe, just maybe, when I'm chasing cats rather than fighting fever dreams, I'll be able to see something other than extraordinary hazel eyes and a warm mouth that trembles at the lightest touch of a man's finger.
The back door of the ranch house slammed as someone left the dining room. The Appaloosa shied wildly. Nevada cursed in the silence of his mind and brought his attention back to the horse.
"I can see why Luke gelded that one," Ten muttered. "Target has more brains in his spotted butt than between his ears."
Nevada shrugged. "As long as you pay attention, he's the best winter horse on the Rocking M." With the unconscious ease of a man performing a familiar task, Nevada gathered the roping rein, stepped into the stirrup and mounted in a single easy motion. "Especially in fresh snow. Target's big enough not to get bogged down in the drifts."
"Wouldn't life be simpler if you just shot the cougars with a tranquilizer dart, put a radio collar on them and tracked them from the air?"
"Simpler? Maybe. A hell of a lot more expensive for sure. And a hell of a lot less fun for the cats – and me."
Ten laughed softly. "That's what Luke said. I didn't argue." Ten started to turn away, then remembered something else. "You know that old cabin just beyond Wildfire Canyon?"
"The one at the end of that abandoned logging road?"
Ten nodded. "A guy from the government called yesterday to tell us that some cougar specialist will be using the cabin as a base camp for the next month or two, depending on the cats. So if you find signs of someone moving around in the high country, don't worry. Luke and I agreed to give free access to Rocking M land as long as we got a copy of whatever report is filed about the cougars."
At the word cabin, Nevada went very still. A conversation that was three days old echoed in his mind. There's no other store between here and the government cabin.
"Did anyone mention the name of the cat expert?" Nevada asked.
"I don't think so. Why?"
For a moment Nevada said nothing, remembering Eden's gentle voice and surprisingly strong hands, and the utter lack of fear in her eyes when she had seen the elemental violence in his.
Do you make a habit of collecting and taming wild animals?
No. I'm a wildlife biologist, not a zookeeper.
Eden's voice, her scent, the tactile memory of her alluring warmth… they had haunted Nevada's waking hours. They might have haunted his sleep as well, but he would never know. It was a pact he had made with himself years ago. He never remembered dreams.
"There was a young woman in West Fork last Saturday," Nevada said evenly. "She said something about being a wildlife expert."
"Last Saturday?" Ten said, his gray eyes narrowing.
Though Nevada had said nothing, word of the fight had gone through the Four Corners area of Colorado like forked lightning.
Nevada nodded.
"A woman, huh?"
Nevada nodded again.
"Pretty?" Ten asked, his handsome face expressionless.
"Why? You getting tired of Diana?"
The idea was so ridiculous that Ten laughed aloud. Then his smile vanished and he looked every bit as hard as his younger brother.
"The next time you go one on five," Ten said, "I'd take it as a personal favor if you'd let me guard your back. Luke made the same offer. So did Cash."
The left corner of Nevada's mouth turned up very slightly, as close as he ever came to a smile. "Cash, too, huh? Does that mean he's finally forgiven me for noticing that Mariah was pregnant before he did?"
"When a man is unsure of a woman, he's apt to be a bit blind," Ten said in a bland voice.
"He's apt to be a horse's buff."
"Your turn will come."
"Yours sure did," Nevada retorted, remembering the tense months before Ten had finally admitted that he was irrevocably bound to Diana. "I'll tell you, Tennessee, if I never tangle with you again, it will be too soon."
"Yeah, well, the hands are taking bets on that one too, especially since word got out that Utah's coming back as soon as he gets out of the hospital. Guess he's finally gotten his fill of jungle fighting."
"At least they don't need to worry about Utah getting in a brawl over a woman. Not since Sybil." Nevada leaned forward in the saddle. A flick of his hand freed the packhorse's lead rope from the corral railing. "The real shame about Sybil is that she wasn't a man," Nevada continued, reining Target toward the mountains. "If she were a man, I'd have killed her."
Before Ten could speak, Nevada kicked the big Appaloosa. "Shake a leg, Target. We've got a long ride ahead."
Even with the eager, powerful Appaloosa beneath him, it was afternoon before Nevada rode into Wildfire Canyon's wide mouth. In all but the worst winter storms, the canyon's alignment with the prevailing winds kept the flat floor swept relatively free of snow. Patches of evergreens clothed the sloping sides of the canyon, tall trees whose ages were almost all the same. The fire that had given the canyon its name had swept through eighty years before, burning the living forest to ash, leaving behind a ghost forest of heat-hardened skeletons. A few of those skeletons still stood upright amid the new forest, their weather-smoothed shapes silver and black in the full sun or moonlight.
The on-again, off-again warmth of March had melted the snow in places, revealing dark ground. Snowdrifts remained in narrow gullies and ravines, and beneath the most dense forest cover. Yet even in the higher altitudes, winter was slowly losing its white grip on the land. Water sparkled and glittered everywhere, testimony to melting snow. Drops gathered into tiny rivulets, joined in thin streams, merged into small, rushing creeks. Today the drops would freeze again, but only for a short time. Soon they would be free to run down to the distant sea once more.