notice you, I’ll make sure it never happens again,” she added, lowering her voice. “You won’t be the first person I’ve helped off this ranch. It isn’t wise to make an enemy of me.”
“I work here,” Morie said, growing angry. She had her mother’s looks, but her father’s fiery temper. “And nobody threatens me.”
Gelly shifted. She wasn’t used to people who fought back. “My people are well-to-do,” she said stiffly. “And you won’t like how I get even.”
Morie raised an eyebrow. “Ditto.”
“Well, you just stay away from Mallory,” she said bluntly. “He’s mine and I don’t share!”
“Does he know?”
Gelly blinked. “Know what?”
“That he belongs to you? Perhaps I should ask him… .”
“You shut up!” The blonde woman’s fists balled at her sides and her face grew flushed with temper. “I’ll get you!”
“Wind and water,” Morie said philosophically. “Words.”
Gelly drew back her hand and started to slap the younger woman, but Morie threw up her forearm instinctively and blocked the move.
“I have a brown belt in Tae Kwon Do,” she told Gelly in a soft voice. Her dark eyes glittered. “Try that again, and you’ll wish you hadn’t.”
Gelly let out a furious sound. “I’ll tell Mallory!”
“Be my guest,” Morie offered. “I can teach him a few moves, too, in case you try that with him.”
Gelly stomped back off toward the house, muttering to herself.
Morie shook her head at the retreating figure.
“Unwise,” Darby said, joining her. He watched Gelly walk away. “She makes a bad enemy. We lost a hand because she accused him of stealing. Told you about that.”
“She’ll think she’s poked a hornet’s nest if she tries it with me. Nobody warns me off people and gets away with it,” she said curtly. “I don’t have any designs on the boss, for God’s sake! I don’t even know him. I just work here!”
Darby patted her on the shoulder paternally. “There, there, don’t let it get you down. Two nights’ sleep and you’ll forget why you argued with her. Come on in and eat. We’ve got chili and Mexican corn bread that Mavie made for us. She’s a wonderful cook.”
“Yes, she is,” Morie agreed. She grimaced. “Sorry. I don’t usually lose my temper, but she set me off. What a piece of work!”
“I do agree. But she’s the boss’s headache, not ours, thank God.”
“I suppose so.”
She followed him inside.
BUT THAT WASN’T THE END of it. Mallory called Morie up to the big house, and he wasn’t smiling as he motioned her into the living room and closed the door.
“Sit down, please.” He indicated a leather chair, not the cushy brocade-covered white sofa. Her jeans were stained with grass and mud from helping with calving. Probably he didn’t want a brown-spotted couch, she thought wickedly.
She sat. “Yes, sir?”
He paced. “Gelly said that you threatened her.”
“Did she?” She sounded amazed. “How odd.”
He turned and stared down at her with piercing dark eyes. “I’d like to hear your side of the story before I decide what to do.”
She cocked her head and studied him. “I’ll tell you, if you’re sure you want to know, boss. But I won’t sugarcoat it, even though I need this job.”
He seemed surprised. “Okay. That’s a deal. Shoot.”
“She warned me off you,” she said simply. “Then she threatened to have me fired. Finally, she tried to slap me and I blocked the move. She left and I went back to work.”
“In between, there’s some stuff missing,” he pointed out. “Like what you said that made her try to slap you.”
“She said that I was after you because you were rich and I was poor,” she added. The words did sting, despite Morie’s background. “She also said cowboys were smelly and stupid and that she could get me fired if she liked. I told her that I didn’t like threats and that perhaps I should ask you if you were her personal property. That’s when she tried to slap me.”
He just stared at her. He didn’t speak. God knew what Gelly had actually told him about the incident.
“I’ve never known her to get physical with anyone,” he returned. “She was crying.”
“Oh, gee, I’m sorry,” Morie said with cutting sarcasm. “Start a fight and lose it and then go crying to some big, strong man to make it all right. That how it goes?”
His jaw tautened. “I’m the boss.”
“Yes, you are, sir,” she agreed. “So if you want to fire me, go right ahead. There are a few ranches where I haven’t tried to get work yet. I’m willing to give them a try.”
He let out an angry sigh. “You might just admit that you were wrong and apologize to her,” he said curtly.
“Apologize when I was defending myself from an attack?” she asked. “How does that work, exactly?”
“She said you started it.”
“And I say that she did.”
He looked even angrier. “She’s a socialite. You’re a hired hand on my ranch. That’s what makes the difference.”
“I get it.” She nodded, trying to contain her temper. “It’s the class thing, right? She’s rich and I’m poor, so she’s right.”
“You work for me, damn it!” he shot back. “And you’re that close—” he held up his forefinger and thumb a fraction apart “—to not working for me!”
Her small hands balled up at her sides. “Nobody throws a punch at me and gets away with it. I don’t care who she is! If she’d landed that blow, I’d have had her prosecuted and I’d call every damned newspaper and television station in Wyoming to make sure everybody knew what she did!”
His eyes were glittering. “She said you told her that you wanted me and you were going to get me, and she’d be out in the cold!”
She rolled her eyes. “Good grief, you’re almost old enough to be my father,” she burst out. “What in the world was she thinking?”
He had been pacing while they talked, but as she spoke her last sentence, he’d stopped and stared at her. Then he moved like greased lightning toward her.
His mouth came down
