it just didn’t suit me anymore.”
“Why not?”
He turned his head to look at her, his eyes glittering red in the firelight like a coyote’s. “Everyone changes,” he said.
He returned his attention to the darkness beyond the fire, but Serenity had the feeling that he was listening intently to every breath she took. Gooseflesh crept up her arms.
“Are you good at what you do, Mr. Constantine?” she asked. “When you’re not being ambushed, I mean?”
“Jacob.”
The suddenness of his reply startled her. She’d deliberately provoked him, but instead of reacting with annoyance or anger, he’d offered her his Christian name.
Once she would have found such informality natural, as it had been among her kinfolk. But she knew she and Constantine could never be friends, let alone intimates. He must know that as well as she did.
And yet to refuse his request would be surrendering to the very fear she rejected. She had no obligation to reciprocate with a similar invitation.
“Jacob,” she said.
He nodded briefly without looking at her. “Yes, Miss Campbell,” he said. “I am good.”
It wasn’t just arrogance on his part. He was confident with good reason. She had seen how supremely competent he was, how at home in his own body, graceful and powerful at the same time. Never a wasted motion, like a wolf in pursuit of its prey.
“How many criminals have you caught?” she asked.
“As a Ranger, or a bounty hunter?”
“Both.”
“Maybe fifty or so.”
It seemed an incredible number, but she didn’t doubt him. “How many did you kill?”
His jaw set. “I don’t kill unless I have no choice.”
“Even when someone tries to kill you?”
“I defend myself like any man.”
“You would have killed Leroy, wouldn’t you?”
He gave her another of those long, flat stares. “If I had to. My aim is to take them in alive.”
“What happens when you deliver a wanted man to the authorities?”
“He’s tried by a judge and jury.”
“Have you ever arrested an innocent man?”
He looked away again. “Not that I know of, ma’am.”
Ma’am. It was a safe word, a respectful word, but suddenly she hated it.
“Serenity,” she said.
Constantine—Jacob—was silent for a time. “It don’t seem right, Miss Campbell.”
“You asked me to call you Jacob.”
“It’s not the same.”
“Because I’m a woman?”
“That’s what you are, Miss Campbell, even if you don’t want to admit it.”
She scrambled to her feet. “Not as far as you’re concerned, Mr. Constantine.”
His mouth twisted in that familiar smile. “Don’t worry. I’ll stick to my side of the bargain.” His smile faded. “Maybe you have good reason to distrust all men and refuse to have any on your place. I just can’t help wondering what that reason is.”
JACOB HADN’T MEANT TO ask such a direct and personal question. He should have discouraged Serenity’s curiosity about him as soon as she started to talk. He’d told himself he didn’t want to know anything more about her, but the longer they were together, the less true that seemed.
He hadn’t lied when he’d said she worked as hard as any two men, and just as well. Her skill wasn’t in question; wherever she’d learned to handle cattle, she’d taken to the lessons like a dog to a bone. And she’d never asked a single favor of him, never expected him to take on dirty work she wouldn’t do herself.
The fact was that she’d been easy to work with, and he’d had more than one assumption about female ranchers proved wrong—which only made his need to understand Serenity that much stronger.
Now she stared at him, her full lower lip caught between her teeth, and he noticed again just how pretty she was. Fresh and clean, like a desert night.
“We have discussed this before,” she said. “Does it really seem so strange to you that women might strike out on their own simply because they have the means and courage to do so?”
Her response was much less defensive than he’d expected, which pleased him for no reason at all. He phrased his answer carefully.
“There are easier ways to strike out on your own than to try running an outfit like this.”
Serenity uncorked her canteen and took a long drink. “We don’t just try, Mr. Constantine. We succeed.”
No easy answers, just as he’d expected. “You were lucky to get a place like this,” he said. “You have a spring here?”
“Coming out of the Organs,” she said. “We also have two good wells.”
“There are some pretty big outfits in the county,” he said. “The owners must envy what you have here.”
“Their envy is no concern of mine,” she said, the ice returning to her voice.
“They never give you trouble?”
“What trouble could they give us?”
“You’ve never been pressured to sell?”
“We are capable of defending ourselves, Jacob. There are plenty of good shots at Avalon. Anyone who comes here looking for trouble will get it.”
“You’ve had no problems with rustlers?”
“None to speak of,” she said.
Only because they’d been lucky, which didn’t make Jacob feel any easier in his mind. Even if the more powerful ranchers in the area didn’t find a way to move them off the land, some gang like Leroy’s was bound to see Avalon as a plump chicken waiting to be plucked, come in force, and then—
He cut off the thought and took another tack. “If you’re having trouble with branding,” he said, “what do you do when you set up a drive?”
“We supply cattle to Fort Selden and Fort Cummings. We manage very well on our own.”
And they must leave the ranch pretty much undefended at such times, which seemed like sure suicide.
Unreasonable
