Diana Palmer - Rough Diamonds

It was incredible to help deliver a calf. The process of birth was fascinating to anyone who worked around livestock. The cycle of life and death was a never-ending one on a ranch.

Morie loved working outdoors, away from the city, away from traffic and regimented life. Here, the time clock was the sun. They got up with it and went to bed with it. They learned how to identify birds by their songs. They learned the subtle weather signs that were lost in electronic prognostication. They were of the earth. It was the most wonderful job going, Morie thought, even if the pay wasn’t top scale and the work was mostly physical labor that came with mussed, stained clothing. She wouldn’t have traded it to model Paris gowns, and she’d once been offered that opportunity. It had amused and pleased her mother, who wasn’t surprised when Morie said she’d rather learn how to rope calves.

Her father would never teach her. Her brother, Cort, got the ranch training. Her primitive dad, who was living in the Stone Age, she often told him, wanted her to be a lady of leisure and do feminine things. She told him that she could work cattle every bit as well as her brother and she wanted to prove it. Her dad just laughed and walked off. Not on his ranch. Not ever.

So she found someone else’s ranch to prove it on. She’d gotten her college degree. Her dad should be happy that she’d accomplished at least one thing he’d insisted upon. Now she was going to please herself.

She threw on a nightshirt and a pair of pajama bottoms and climbed into bed. She was asleep in seconds.

THE NEXT MORNING, the boss came down to the barn, where she was feeding out a calf whose mother had been attacked by a pack of wolves. The mother had died and state agencies had been called in to trap the wolves and relocate them.

Mallory looked down at her, with the calf on her knees, and something cold inside him started to melt. She had a tender heart. He loved the picture she made, nursing that calf. But he pulled himself up taut. That couldn’t be allowed. He wasn’t having any more embarrassing interludes with the hired help that could come back to bite him.

She looked up and saw him watching her. She averted her eyes. “Morning, boss,” she said.

“Morning.”

His tone wasn’t reassuring. She sighed. “I’m in trouble again, I guess.”

“Gelly said you put a visitor up to insulting her when she told you to get back to work in the kitchen,” he said flatly.

Morie just sighed.

“Well?” he persisted.

“The guy was a superior court judge who wanted my canapé recipe for his housekeeper, so I went outside with him to give it to him,” she replied wearily. “Miss Bruner interrupted us, and he was angry at the way she spoke to me. I didn’t put him up to anything.”

He frowned. “A judge?”

“Well, he said he was,” she replied, flushing. She wasn’t supposed to know the occupations of his guests.

“I see.”

No, you don’t , she fumed silently. You don’t see anything. Gelly leads you around by your temper , and you let her .

He hesitated. “The canapés were very good.”

“Thanks. Mavie and I worked hard.”

“Yes.” His dark eyes narrowed. “How is it,” he continued suspiciously, “that you know so much about how to organize a high-society party? And just where did you learn it?”

MORIE STARED UP AT HIM with wide eyes while she searched frantically for an answer that wouldn’t give her away.

“The, uh, the last place I worked,” she said. “The housekeeper knew all that stuff and the boss didn’t like to hire staff, so I had to learn how to do those things to help her out.”

“I see.”

“It’s just something I picked up, and, honestly, I’d rather feed calves than work in the kitchen,” she added. “Just in case you had in mind to ask me to work with Mavie instead of out here.”

“I didn’t have that in mind.”

She nodded. “Good.”

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “You don’t like Gelly.”

“It’s not my place to like or dislike one of your friends, boss,” she replied in a subdued tone. “I’m just the newest hire…that’s all I am.”

“Gelly feels threatened by you, God knows why,” he added unconsciously. She might have been pretty if she did something to her hair and wore makeup and nice clothing. But she was scruffy and not very attractive most of the time. It still shook him that he’d kissed her and enjoyed it so much. He tried not to revisit that episode.

“Not my problem,” she murmured, and hoped she didn’t sound insolent.

“She said that the judge seemed to know you.”

“Can’t imagine why,” she said, looking up innocently. “I sure don’t travel in those circles. He might have seen me in the kitchen where I used to work, though.”

“Where was that?” he asked. “The place you used to work?”

She stared at him blankly. She’d made up the name of the place, although she’d given the phone number of a friend’s housekeeper who’d promised to sound convincing if anybody checked her out.

“Well?” he persisted.

She was flushed and the soy calf formula was leaking out of the oversize bottle she was using to feed him. Just when it seemed as if she was going to blow her own cover, a sudden loud noise came from outside the barn. It was followed by a barrage of range language that was even worse than what Morie had heard come out of her father during roundup.

Mallory rushed out. Morie, curious, put the calf back in his stall, set the empty bottle on a nearby shelf and followed.

Cane was throwing things. A saddle was lying on the ground. In the distance, a horse was galloping away.

“Mud-brained, unshod son of a…!” he raged, until he spotted Morie and bit down hard on the last word.

“What in the world is the matter with you?” Mallory asked.

Cane glared at him. His thick, short black hair was in disorder all over his head. His dark brown eyes, large and cold, were glittery with bad temper. His sensuous mouth was pulled tight against his teeth.

“I was trying to put a saddle on Old Bill,” he muttered. “I thought I could manage him. I haven’t been on a horse since I came home. The damned outlaw knocked me down on the saddle and ran off.”

The empty sleeve, pinned at the elbow where his arm had been amputated, was poignant. Cane was ultrasensitive about his injury. He never spoke of the circumstances under which he’d lost part of his arm, or about his military service. He drank, a lot, and kept to himself. He was avoided by most of the men, especially when he was turning the air blue, like now.

Morie sighed and went to the barn. She brought out one of the other older saddle horses they kept for visitors. This one was quite gentle, like the one that had run away. She heard Mallory telling one of the men to go after it.

She picked up Cane’s saddle, ignoring his outraged, indignant look. She turned the horse and draped the saddle over his back, pulling up the cinch and fastening it deftly.

“Don’t fuss,” she told Cane when she handed him the bridle. “Everybody needs a little help now and then. It’s not demeaning to let someone do you a favor. Even the hired help.”

He glared down at her for a few seconds, during which she thought he was probably going to storm away or dress her down for her insolence.

But finally he just shook his head. “Okay. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” She handed him the reins.

He was looking at the horse dubiously. It was obvious that he hadn’t tried to mount one since he was wounded.

“We have a friend back in Texas that we used to go riding with,” she said, without giving away much. “He lost an arm doing merc work overseas. He mounted offside so that he could use his good hand on the pommel to spring up into the saddle. Worked like a charm.”