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  “Yes.”

  “I know you’re walking every day, and still working too-long hours. But you’re disgustingly healthy. Just don’t let your emotions drag you down. I’ll see you in two weeks, okay?”

  Grace agreed and walked as far as the door before turning back. “You never did answer. If you were pregnant by a man you hardly knew and he wanted to get married, would you?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. But I do know I wouldn’t rule it out simply because we weren’t in love. Love’s a wonderful thing, Grace, but none of us are guaranteed that we’ll find it. Even if we’re lucky enough to find it, there’s no guarantee that we’ll be able to make it last. Sometimes it’s better to settle for a commitment based on something solid, like a child, than to hold out for something so elusive as love.”

  Grace’s smile felt unsteady as she said goodbye. Better to settle. Was Callie too cynical, or was Grace too much the dreamer? All her life she’d settled for what little she’d been given, accepting that she wasn’t getting more. And then she’d gotten pregnant. Having a baby to love was almost as good as having a loving husband, maybe even better. Of course, other women got to have both, but for someone who’d never expected either, one was enough. It was a blessing.

  Now Ethan was offering half of the rest of her dream. There was no love involved, but she would have a husband. Her house would no longer be so empty, nor would her life be so lonely. No matter how few months—or maybe even weeks—the marriage lasted, she would always be able to say my husband.

  And she should be satisfied with that. She should settle, just as she’d settled for twenty-five years.

  Well, damn it, she wasn’t going to.

  She didn’t need a husband who had no feelings for her other than a sense of obligation that stretched to include her. She didn’t need a father for her child who might devote the next eighteen years of his life to being the best dad in the world or might disappear minutes after she was born, never to be heard from again. Her daughter certainly didn’t need a father who drifted in and out of her life the way Ethan’s own father had.

  She wasn’t going to settle for anything less than love, commitment, permanence. Other women held out for it all and got it. She wanted it, too.

  And if it meant living the rest of her life alone except for her daughter?

  She gazed up at the night-dark sky as she trudged along, and her breath caught in her chest. She’d lived with someone without love for twenty-five years, and she would never do it again. She deserved better than Ethan’s guilt-inspired offer, better than marriage to a man who never would have looked at her again if she weren’t pregnant, better than to be left behind by a man who knew all there was to know about leaving and nothing about staying.

  She deserved better than Ethan James.

  Chapter 4

  Saturday morning dawned gray and cold. Unable to sleep, Ethan got up and dressed, then put on a pot of coffee. He hadn’t left the cabin since delivering Olivia’s groceries Thursday afternoon, and the space was beginning to make him feel itchy. Usually when he got that itch, he loaded up the truck and took off down the road, but that wasn’t an option this time, at least not yet. Not until he’d decided what he thought was best and saw how that fit with what Grace thought was best.

  He didn’t expect it to be a very good match.

  As soon as the coffee was ready, he poured a cup and stood at the window, gazing toward Guthrie’s house and the barn out back. In the thin morning light, he saw his brother come out of the tack room, a saddle braced against one hip. A lot of people Ethan had known wouldn’t think much of Guthrie’s life. It was all hard work with very little profit, stuck in the same backwater town where he was born, with simple needs and simpler rewards.

  But truth was, Guthrie was damn lucky. This place was as much a part of him as his brown hair and his sterling reputation. He spent his days working the land he loved, his evenings with the family he adored and his nights with Olivia. He earned enough to pay his bills, and he had friends, respect and that untarnished reputation.

  Ethan had never found anything he truly loved, he had disreputable acquaintances rather than friends, and his reputation had lost its shine when he was little more than a kid.

  Grace had certainly heard enough about him to scare her away. She intended to make certain his child heard nothing about him. She was convinced that was in the child’s best interests, and he couldn’t even argue the point, because he thought it might be, too.

  But it still hurt.

  Too restless to stand there one moment longer, he put down his coffee, grabbed his jacket and went outside. The northwest wind bit right through the denim and chilled his ears and fingers before he’d gone twenty feet. He didn’t turn back, though. Hunching deeper in the coat, he crossed the frozen yard to the corral, where Guthrie was tightening the girth on his gelding’s saddle.

  His brother gave him an impassive look but didn’t speak. Ethan didn’t, either, until he was finished with the task. “Is that the horse Easy gave you years ago?”

  “Yup. This is Buck.”

  The Rafferty family had lived down the road a bit, and Easy and Guthrie had been best friends from the cradle. They’d done everything together and had even planned to go into the horse-and-cattle business together after high school—at least, until Easy had run off with Guthrie’s fiancée a couple days before the wedding. For the first time in his life, Ethan hadn’t borne the brunt of Guthrie’s disapproval and hostility by himself. He hadn’t been able to enjoy it, though. Losing his fiancée and best friend at the same time had been hard on Guthrie. It would have been easier all around if he’d simply continued hating Ethan, who was used to it, and had gotten over Shay and Easy.

  Ethan assumed he was over it now. Shay had been at Guthrie and Olivia’s wedding last summer, and according to Grace, she and Easy were married now, too. No doubt all those years of friendship had eventually won out over Guthrie’s sense of betrayal and he’d forgiven them both.

  Too bad his capacity for forgiving family was more limited than his capacity for forgiving friends.

  “What are you doing up so early?”

  Ethan’s nerves tightened as he looked for some subtly critical undertone to the question. After a moment, he cautioned himself to treat it as exactly what it appeared and nothing else. “I couldn’t sleep. I was wondering…I’d kinda like to go for a ride. If it’s all right. If I can use one of the…” Trailing off, he shrugged awkwardly.

  “How long has it been since you’ve been on a horse?”

  “Ten years.” The time was significant to both of them. Their mother had just died, and for some godforsaken reason, Guthrie had offered him one half of the ranch’s acreage if he’d stay and work it with him. Ethan had been flabbergasted—and flattered beyond belief—and he’d accepted the offer, fully intending to live up to his end of the bargain.

  Of course he hadn’t. It wasn’t that he was lazy, though that was what everyone had thought. He’d hated the days on horseback, fixing fence, clearing pasture and grading roads. He’d hated digging ponds and cutting hay, had hated the very sight, smell and sound of the cattle. Ranching just wasn’t in his blood, and so he’d done the only thing he did really well. He’d sneaked off in the middle of the night.

  And a few years down the line, when he’d needed money, he’d used that deed to phony up another, and he’d sold the ranch, lock, stock and barrel, out from under his brother.

  But Guthrie said nothing about that now. Instead, he leaned on the board fence and gestured to the horses inside. “Maverick’s a little small for you, and Mustang’s a little high-spirited. You’d probably be better off with Dusty.” He gave a short, sharp whistle, and the mottled gray horse trotted over for a scratch. “Everything you need is in the tack room. But you’d better get a heavier coat and some gloves. It’s not going to get much warmer today. You can borrow mine from the laundry room.”

  Ethan moved beside him to stroke the gray. “Thanks.”

>   After a moment, Guthrie looked at him. “Are you in trouble? Should we be expecting the sheriff to show up out here sometime?”

  “You always expect the sheriff when I’m around.” Ethan’s quiet words brought a flush to his brother’s face. He hastily went on. “It’s not that kind of trouble.”

  “Anything you want to talk about?”

  He’d give damn near anything to talk to someone, but not Guthrie. He’d get the first sentence out—I’m the bastard who seduced Grace Prescott and got her pregnant, then left her—and whatever generosity had prompted Guthrie’s question would disappear in anger. “I can’t. Not now.”

  Guthrie accepted his offer with a nod, then untied Buck from the fence. Before he could swing into the saddle, pounding footsteps approached from the house.

  “Daddy, Daddy, wait! Can I ride out with you this morning? Mama said it’s okay with her if it’s okay with you. Is it? Can I?”

  Guthrie swung Elly into his arms, settling her on one hip. “Hey, what happened? You got all soft and squishy, like a snowman.”

  “That’s ’cause I’ve got lots of clothes on like you taught me. Jeans and sweatpants, a T-shirt, a sweatshirt and a jacket, and gloves and a scarf and a hat. Can I go with you?”

  “Sure. I’d like the company. Have a seat—” he settled her onto the top fence rail “—and I’ll get Cherokee’s saddle.”

  The scene reminded Ethan of similar versions they’d played out themselves years ago. He’d always wanted to tag along with Guthrie and Easy whether they were working or playing, and for a good number of years, Guthrie had let him. Then one day he’d started making excuses to turn him down, and before long that had changed to simple, flat refusals. No excuses, no apologies, just terse, angry nos.

  Ethan would bet his life that his brother never got terse or angry with Elly and Emma. He was a good father. Of course.

  What kind of father would he be? He tried to imagine himself cradling a baby, playing with a toddler, patiently answering the six million questions a kid like Elly could come up with in one breath. What would it be like to teach a daughter of his own how to ride a horse or drive a car? What would it feel like to watch her go out on her first date, to pace and worry the first night she came home late, to see her graduate from high school?

  All he could imagine was the awesome responsibility. Not the fun. Not the pleasure. Not the love. Just the incredible obligation to do it right, to not screw up, to not make his child feel the way his father had always made him feel.

  Grace was ready for all that. He wasn’t.

  But he wasn’t ready to walk away, either.

  Becoming aware of intense scrutiny directed his way, Ethan brought his mind back to the here and now to find Guthrie gone inside the tack room and Elly studying him as if he were some alien creature. He summoned a faint smile for her, which she returned a hundred times brighter.

  “You’re my uncle Ethan. I’m Elly.”

  “I remember.”

  “Really? Me and Emma’s almost identical twins, ’cept we’re not really very much alike, I don’t think. Emma’s shy. That’s what Mama says I should call her instead of prissy and timid and scaredy cat. We met you when Mama and Daddy got married last summer.”

  “You were wearing a red cowboy hat. What happened to it? Did you lose it in a thundering stampede, or did some dirty, thieving outlaw shoot it off your head?”

  She giggled. “It got too small for my head, so’s Daddy given me this one for Christmas.” She snatched the kid-size hat from her head with a flourish, then clamped it back on. “Miss Mary says you’re an outlaw. Is ’at true?”

  Mary Stephens was one of their closest neighbors and had been Nadine’s best friend for years. It was her daughter Shay who’d jilted Guthrie for Easy, and it was Mary herself who’d heatedly insisted to Nadine that she was better off without that lying, two-timing scoundrel of a husband. Why, he was no good and never had been, which was no surprise. Being no good was the only thing a James did well.

  Ethan hadn’t known whether to defend his father or to run and hide. When Mary had caught him listening, he’d chosen to hide. It had taken Nadine an hour to find him and another to coax him out. She hadn’t known what to say—after all, Mary had told the truth—and so she’d said nothing. She’d pretended the conversation hadn’t happened, and to make her happy, so had he.

  But he’d never forgotten it.

  Elly was waiting for an answer, but this time he didn’t know what to say. He’d been arrested more times than he wanted to remember, so he couldn’t honestly deny Mary’s description. But he was damned if he wanted to stand there and tell his bright-eyed little niece just what kind of man fate had given her for an uncle.

  “Well?” she prompted. “Are you an outlaw?”

  “What kind of question is that to ask a person?” Guthrie balanced a small saddle over the rail, then gave Elly a swat that she couldn’t possibly feel through all her layers of clothing.

  “Well, Miss Mary said,” she replied in her own defense.

  “Miss Mary was wrong. Call Cherokee so we can saddle up.” After she raced off, Guthrie fixed his attention on Ethan. “The easy answer to that question is no.”

  “What about the truthful answer?”

  “Kids Elly’s age don’t always require the truth. On some subjects, they don’t need it.”

  “So it’s okay to lie to them.”

  “At times.”

  “And how do you know when it’s one of those times?”

  “You learn.”

  He didn’t even know how to talk to a kid. How in hell could he be a father to one? Parents were supposed to guide, teach, love. He wasn’t sure he was capable of any of the three, and he wasn’t sure he could learn.

  Elly returned leading a pinto. “Are you coming with us, Uncle Ethan? I can catch Mustang or Dusty for you if you want.”

  “No, thanks, Elly.” Though riding with them held a certain appeal, it would defeat his purpose. There’d be no time to think, not with Elly’s chatter and Guthrie’s silences.

  They climbed into the saddles and headed off around the barn. Ethan watched until they were out of sight, then started toward the house. The back door was unlocked, and the heavier coat that Guthrie had offered was hanging on a hook just inside. He left his jacket in its place, buttoned up the fleece-lined corduroy, then pulled on the gloves tucked into the pockets as he headed back to the corral.

  It took only a few minutes to saddle Dusty, only a few minutes more to leave the ranch buildings behind. Naturally he didn’t know the property as well as Guthrie did, but he didn’t have a particular destination in mind. He just wanted to get out, to smell the clean air, to feel the cold.

  To find some hope or advice or courage.

  While hanging around the cabin yesterday, he’d found his old high school yearbooks in a bookcase and had pulled out the one for his senior year. Grace had been a sophomore and had looked very young, very pale and scared. There’d been no activities listed underneath her name, nothing but the fact that she was a permanent fixture on the honor roll. The class photo had been the only one—no candid shots, no club shots, not even one inadvertent shot with her in the background. There was just that one photo, a bad picture of a plain girl who appeared scared of her own shadow.

  Ten years hadn’t changed her. She still wore no makeup, wore her hair in that severe, unflattering way, dressed in ill-fitting clothes with no color or style. Even her glasses frames appeared to be the same.

  And yet, if she chose, she could also look like Melissa. It was an amazing transformation, and he wondered why she didn’t make it every day. She could cut, curl or color her hair, trade the glasses for contact lenses, use a bit of makeup, get some clothing advice from the friend who’d dressed her for her big night out and knock the socks off every man in three counties.

  Or she could stay the way she was and attract attention from no one but him. Attention she didn’t want. I don’t want your name. My baby can’t escap
e being Jed’s granddaughter, but she can escape the stigma of being…Ethan James’s daughter.

  If he cooperated. If he told no one that he was the father. If he left town before anyone started counting. If Olivia and Shay kept the secret. If the baby bore no resemblance to her uncle Guthrie or her soon-to-be-born cousin.

  So was he going to cooperate? To leave town before anyone figured it out? To never come back for a visit—or, if he did, to avoid Grace and the child completely so no one would figure out the connection?

  He didn’t think so.

  Realizing his rider’s attention had strayed, Dusty came to a stop at the crest of a hill and lowered his muzzle to the yellowed grass. Ethan gazed across the land, land that had been in Guthrie’s family for generations, land that Guthrie had learned with his father, that he was now sharing with his daughters.

  The Jameses had never put down roots like the Harrises. The lack of ties had made it easier for them to pick up and leave whenever life got difficult. Got a problem? Don’t bother trying to work it out. Just move on. That had been his father’s philosophy, and his grandfather’s, and certainly his own.

  Maybe it was time to change.

  Moving on wouldn’t solve this problem. It wouldn’t ease his guilt. It wouldn’t erase that night with Grace and the consequences from his memory. It wouldn’t stop him from looking at every child he passed and thinking, Does my son look like that? Does my daughter walk and talk like that? It wouldn’t stop him from feeling like the most selfish bastard the James family had ever produced.

  Moving on wouldn’t allow him to think ever again that he was a better man than his father.

  So he would stay, and he would try to be a decent father to his kid.

  The decision sent something he thought might be relief mixed with satisfaction through him. It didn’t last long, though, because right on its heels came the next problem.

  How in the world would he persuade Grace to let him near their child?