Mary J. - The Man From Montana

And then there was Susie’s death….

The memory twisted a knot in Ash’s gut. Now a Rocky Times reporter wanted to rent the little cottage she’d designed and he’d built? Never.

“Dad?”

He turned from retrieving a currycomb off the tack room wall to his fifteen-year-old daughter standing in the doorway. A sprite like her mother with big green eyes, a mop of long red curls. But strong enough to lift the saddle she carried to a loop hanging from the ceiling rafters.

His heart bumped. “Hey, Daiz. Need some fresh bedding for Areo?”

“Already did that this morning.”

He crossed the room and wove the loop into the hole on the pommel and around the horn.

“Thanks.” She tossed the blanket over a wooden drying rack in a corner. “What did Mi—that woman want?”

“Nothing important.”

Daisy reached for a second currycomb. “You chased her off.”

“She works for the Times.” And that should explain it. He went into Northwind’s stall. “You know how I feel about them.” About Shaw Hanson, Junior, and his crew of sleazy reporters.

“Yeah,” she said slowly. “I know.”

He glanced over his shoulder. Her expression sent a shaft of pain across his chest. She still missed her mother, missed their girl chats, Susie’s laughter, her hugs. Hell, he missed those hugs. He combed Northwind’s powerful withers. “I won’t let her hurt you, honey. And I won’t let her come near your grandpa.” Or this ranch.

“Oh, Dad.” She sighed and turned into the corridor.

What the hell?

“Daisy?” He peered around the door as she disappeared into Areo’s stall. For a moment, he stood wondering if he’d heard right. Her voice had held resignation, not sorrow. Had he disappointed her by chasing off that journalist? He shook his head. No. She knew how their family felt about the Hansons and their editorial finesse. It had to be something else. Well, she’d tell him in time.

Back in Northwind’s stall, he brushed down the big dapple-gray stallion, then filled his water bucket and manger. As Ash finished, Daisy exited Areo’s stall. “All done, pint?” He strode down the aisle toward his daughter. The dogs, Jinx and Pedro, trotted ahead.

“Yep.”

“All right. Let’s see what Grandpa’s got for lunch.”

They headed from the warmth of the barn into clear cold air. Hoof and boot prints pockmarked last night’s snow. Ash slowed his stride for his daughter. They walked in silence toward the two-story yellow Craftsman house that Tom’s great-grandfather, an immigrant from Ireland, had built in 1912.

Ash set a hand on Daisy’s shoulder. “Good thing your teachers had that in-service today. Don’t know if I could’ve moved those steers without you.”

“Oh, Dad. You and Ethan do it all the time when I’m at school.”

Ethan Red Wolf, their foreman. A good man. “You know Wednesday is Eth’s day off. Anyway, things go ten times faster with you helping.”

“You always say that.”

“And I mean it.”

A grunt. “What did the reporter want?”

Back to that. His pixie-girl, forever the little dog with an old shoe when she focused on some particular subject. While her tenacity baffled the heck out of him at times, he was damned proud when she brought home her straight-A report card. “She wanted to talk to Grandpa about renting the guest cottage.”

“Are you gonna let her?”

“No.”

“Why not? We could use the money.”

He rubbed Daisy’s shoulder. “We’re not so hard up, honey, that we need to rent to a reporter.” Never mind that the woman in question had him thinking about things he hadn’t thought of in a long time. Like how pretty a female could be and how feminine her voice sounded on the cold morning air—even though she pushed with her words.

“Got any homework that needs doing?” he asked, veering off the thought of Rachel Brant and her attributes.

“Some social studies and English.”

The thought of Shakespeare and essays had him sweating. “Better get at it after lunch.”

“I need Grandpa’s help. We’re doing this project in socials.” A small sigh. “I have to ask him some questions.”

“What kind of project?” They walked up the wheelchair ramp to the mudroom door at the side of the house. Tom was good at English, good at reading and writing. If his blood had run in Ash’s veins maybe—

“We’re supposed to pretend we’re journalists.” Shrugging off her coat, Daisy trudged into the mudroom ahead of Ash. Her eyes wouldn’t meet his. “And…and we’re supposed to interview a veteran, so I was thinking of asking Grandpa.”

Speak of the devil. First a real reporter and now a make-believe one in the guise of his daughter. No wonder he had hated school. Teachers were always pushing kids into role-playing and projects, pretending they were real life. Just last week, John Reynolds’s eleventh grader brought home an egg and said it was a baby. Ash snorted. What the hell was the world coming to anyway? Eggs as babies? Kids playing war correspondents?

Ash closed the door, hooked the heel of his left boot on a jack. “You know Gramps won’t talk, Daiz.”

Holding back her long, thick hair, Daisy removed her own boots. “Well, dammit, maybe it’s time, y’know?”

Ash glowered down at his child. “Watch your language, girl.”

A tolerant sigh. “Dad, it’s been, like, thirty-six years. Why won’t Grandpa talk about his tours? I mean, jeez. It’s not like they happened yesterday. He even got the Purple Heart.” Frustrated, she kicked her boots onto the mat with a “Get over it already” and flounced into the kitchen.

Ash watched her go. They had been over this subject two dozen times in the past three years, the instant she reached puberty. She wanted to know episodes of her heritage, about her mother, about him, about Tom.

Ash had no intention of talking about Susie or her death. Too damn painful, that topic. What if he accidentally let out the truth, that his wife was as much to blame for the accident as that two-bit journalist?

He shook his head. No, he couldn’t chance it. Hell, thinking about it gave him hives.

Maybe one day he would tell Daisy, but not during her “hormone phase,” as Tom put it.

As for Tom…Vietnam was the old man’s business.

Ash entered the quaint country kitchen. “Hey, Pops.”

His stepfather, bound to a wheelchair for three-and-a-half decades, swung around the island, a loaf of multigrain bread in his lap. “Daisy in a mood?” On the counter lay an array of butter, cheese, tomatoes and ham slices ready for Tom’s specialty: grilled sandwiches.

Ash walked to the sink to wash his hands. “In a mood” was the old man’s reference to Daisy’s monthlies. “She’s upset about a couple things, yeah.”

“What things?”

“Wants us to rent out the cottage to a reporter.”

Tom snorted. “You’re kidding, right?”

“New one hired on with the Times. Drove out here this morning while we were moving the yearlings.”

“You tell him we’re not interested?” The chair whined behind Ash. In his mind’s eye, he saw his stepfather pressing a lever, raising the seat so he could maneuver his stump legs into the open slot Ash had constructed under the counter years ago.

“Not him. Her.” A sassy-mouthed woman with big eyes.

“Her?”

Ash leaned against the sink and crossed his arms. The reporter splashing the ASPCA story across the front of the Rocky Times twenty years ago had been a woman and Hanson Senior’s wife.

Tom slapped cheese and ham onto a slice of bread, cut the tomatoes deftly with his right hand.

“What’d you tell this reporter?”

“That she’s not welcome.” He glanced toward the stairs, warned, “Daiz sees it differently. Figures we need the money.”