give me that look. I’ve dated. Don’t you be like Dad and try to marry me off to someone with good pasture or grazing land.”
Carson remembered how WT had been about him and Ginny West.
“Why can’t you be interested in one of the Hamilton girls? Now that’s some nice ranch land those girls are going to inherit, a whole section of irrigated pasture along Little Timber Creek.”
Carson laughed now at the memory and shared it with Destry.
She chuckled. “He’s been pushing me to go out with Hitch McCray in hopes of someday getting that strip of land between ours and the forest service land to the north.”
“He’d even marry you off to Hitch?” Carson let out a curse. “I wouldn’t let Hitch have a mean stray dog. Anyway, he’s too old for you.”
She smiled at that. “He’s only forty.”
“Seriously, you’ve put in your time taking care of WT. Isn’t it time for you to have some fun?”
Destry shook her head, smiling. “I haven’t been holed up here. There’s just nowhere I want to be but here or nothing else I want to do with my life. I could never leave Montana, no matter what.” She studied him. “What about you? What do you want to do with your life?”
He shrugged. He truly didn’t know. He’d thought he was happy in Las Vegas working at the casino, had seen himself married to Cherry and living the rest of his life in the desert.
But some bad luck, WT and this new evidence had changed that.
Destry was studying him openly. “Isn’t there someone you’d like to spend your life with?”
“How can you ask that?” Carson said with a laugh. “I’m engaged to be married.”
“Do you love her?”
He sobered. “Not like I loved Ginny.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m like you. I’m fine.” He almost told her everything then, but he couldn’t bring himself to spoil this beautiful morning with her. Soon enough he would be responsible for breaking her heart. Again.
“What if you could clear your name?” Destry asked.
“After all these years?” he asked with a shake of his head. But her words conjured a future he’d thought lost to him. As he looked out across the land, he told himself not to, but for the first time in years, he felt a sense of hope he hadn’t since Ginny was killed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
BETHANY REYNOLDS FINGERED the locket at her neck and tried not to think about her husband as she reached for her hastily discarded clothing.
Her husband, Clete, would have never thought to give her a silver heart-shaped locket. Clete didn’t have a romantic bone in his body. What had the man gotten her for their first Valentine’s Day together? A set of snow tires.
The only reason he’d married her was to get her elk hunting tag. Only a few tags were given out each year in the area he loved to hunt. She’d lucked out and gotten one.
It had taken a moose even to get Clete to notice her. She’d been mooning over him for years. But it wasn’t until she’d come into the Range Rider where he’d worked as a bartender and started showing her moose photos that he finally came around.
She’d drawn a moose tag—and bagged one. That was big news since moose tags were more rare than elk. Of course Clete had been jealous as all get out.
“You got a tag?” Clete had said.
She’d grinned, enjoying his jealousy—until he’d asked, “Who shot it for you?”
Bethany hadn’t even bothered to answer him as she’d turned to show off her moose. It was three times bigger than she was and would feed herself and her family all year.
“What’s moose meat taste like?” one of her “city” friends had asked.
“A little sweet, a darker meat than elk or deer. I’ll get you a package of steaks to try,” Bethany had promised. Behind her, she’d heard Clete banging around behind the bar, louder than usual.
It wasn’t until the bar had cleared out some that he’d called her over. “So you shot it yourself,” he’d said and offered her a drink.
She’d never been one to hold a grudge or turn down a free drink. Not to mention the fact that she’d had a crush on Clete since junior high. He’d been Beartooth’s claim to fame, a football player who’d played for the Grizzlies at the University of Montana. That is until he got hurt.
Bethany had always known she was going to marry him. She even did that silly thing all lovesick girls do, she wrote Mrs. Clete Reynolds and Bethany Reynolds so many times that she believed it.
When he’d gotten injured his sophomore year at U of M, he’d dropped out, come home and gotten a job bartending at the Range Rider.
“Just until the leg heals,” he would say. Everyone knew better. When the bar came up for sale, the owner sold it to Clete and carried the loan.
“So tell me about this moose,” Clete had said that day at the bar as he’d glanced up from one of the photos to look at her. There’d been only one other time that he’d looked at her like that, years ago at the Fall Harvest Festival when she was sixteen. She’d told him that day she was going to marry him and that he’d better wait for her to grow up.
But it had taken the moose to bring them together years later.
“You gutted it yourself?” he’d said.
It was so big that she’d had to crawl inside it.
The moose had gotten them dating. But it had taken the elk permit to get Clete to pop the question. It was almost an accepted thing, women giving up their tags so their men could hunt more, even though it was illegal. If you got caught.
Most things came down to simply that, she’d learned. Like affairs, she thought as she slipped into her Western shirt.
“That was amazing,” said the man on the bed.
She felt warm fingertips brush along the top of her bare butt and smiled to herself. Some men were breast men, others leg men. This one was all about her large, round butt and she loved it.
Clete had never appreciated her backside. Hell, he wasn’t all that wild about her other parts, either. Lovemaking with Clete had become so mechanical that Bethany could just lie there and think about anything else she wanted until it was over. At just barely thirty-two, she was in her prime and was glad at least there was one man around who appreciated that fact. This man had never thought she was too young for him.
“I’m glad you were able to get away today,” he said.
She finished snapping her Western shirt and stood. This was when she usually told him that she couldn’t do this anymore. If they got caught, they both had too much
