A Taste of Heaven Read Free Page A

self-conscious how-do
ma’ams.
    “Ben Ross is gone?” Noah asked Nort, with
sidelong glances at her. He spoke in a hushed voice, as though he
were in a museum, and Libby was the exhibit
    “Ben got hitched?” Charlie asked. “Old
Ben?”
    “Yeah, just before the snows commenced. The
winter was pretty hard on their place. Now Mrs. Ross needs a job
for a while and she knows her way around a stove. Ain't that so,
ma’am?”
    Libby smiled uncertainly into their curious,
respectful faces. “Before I came to Montana, I cooked for a family
in Chicago.”
    After a brief exchange of looks among
themselves, the men’s reticence fell away. Apparently this
information elevated her to a professional status. They drew a bit
closer and all began talking at once, relating a confused but
vehement account of lousy cooking, food poisoning, and the fate of
the “potato-head” responsible for sending them all to the bunkhouse
for two days.
    Charlie winced. “Yeah, we was a pitiful
sight, that’s for sure. The only reason someone didn’t shoot that
dadblasted cook is ’cause we was all too puny and weak to get out
of our bunks. It wasn’t much comfort that he got sick, too.”
    “See, Mrs. Ross?” Rory spoke up. “We really
need someone to take his place. We’re not faring too good on our
own.”
    “What about Mrs. Hollins? Can’t she help with
the cooking?”
    The three cowboys shuffled and stammered
before Nort said, “There ain't no Mrs. Hollins, ma’am.”
    “Well, but — ” Libby knew she couldn’t be picky, but neither
was she certain that working for a bunch of cowboys on an isolated
ranch was the best choice she could make. And she hated the idea of
leaving this scrap of civilization to return to the loneliness of
the grasslands.
    “Mr. Bradley, is it far to your ranch?” It
was hard to tell, since he was so weathered, but Libby could have
sworn the lanky man blushed. “Aw, shoot, ma’am, my pa was Mr.
Bradley. You can call me Noah. And the Lodestar’s about five or six
miles that way.” He pointed back over his shoulder toward the
northwest.
    Five or six miles wasn’t nearly as bad as
fifteen. And the job was a means to her eventual escape. “Well . .
.” she wavered.
    “Mr. Hollins is gonna have a flat-out
conniption if he comes back and there’s no cook,” Charlie put in.
Libby could barely see his mouth move for the luxuriant brush on
his upper lip. “Ma’am, we’re powerful sorry to hear about Ben, but
we’d be much obliged if you'd help us out.”
    She looked around at the three expectant
faces, then back at Nort Osmer. The shopkeeper nodded his
approval.
    “I guess we'll be doing each other a favor,”
she pondered, more to herself than to them. “You need someone to
cook for you, and I certainly need the work. I don't know how long
I'll—” But with this implied acceptance, the rest of her words were
drowned in the wild whoops from her new coworkers.
    “Come on, Ma’am, we’ve got to get back to the
Lodestar. We’ve got hungry men to feed. Is that your buckboard over
there?” Not waiting for her answer, Charlie took her by the elbow
with great enthusiasm, practically lifting her feet from the plank
sidewalk with each step. “Rory, you ride on ahead and tell Joe
we're having supper tonight. Noah, tie your horse to the back of
Mrs. Ross's wagon, and climb up there to drive it,” he
directed.
    Before Libby knew it, she was perched on her
wagon seat again, where she'd spent the hardest part of the long
day. Now, though, Noah sat next to her and took her roan's lines.
She had just enough time to wave good-bye to Nort Osmer before the
wagon lurched forward and pulled away from his store.
    She must have lost her mind, she thought, to
be traipsing off into the wilderness again with three men she’d
just met, based on the endorsement of a dry goods clerk whom she’d
also just met. Tyler Hollins—what was he like, the owner of the
Lodestar ranch? And how would he react when he found a