Never the Twain Read Free

soda pop instead of warm, flat
water that had been locked up in a hot truck cab all day.
    Rock found himself uncharacteristically indecisive. Old memories, old hurts, told him to be
as rough on this fair, fragile woman as he could be. Protect himself from potential heartbreaks and
save her from the indifferent harshness of the desert.
    This hothouse flower had no business in Owyhee Country, where she'd wither and die for
lack of human contact and city shops. He had to get rid of her before she wormed her way into his
life--and destroyed him the way his pa had been destroyed.
    At the same time, he found himself wanting to discover what brought a pretty woman out
into some of the most inhospitable country in the world. Surely she hadn't had any idea of what she
was letting herself in for.
    "Aren't you due in Vale pretty quick?" he said, squinting at the sun's angle. He made his
voice harsh and raspy. "Better high-tail it back where you belong, little lady."
    He didn't flinch at the hurt in her doe-brown eyes. Not much, anyhow.
    A little over an hour later, Genny turned her pickup into the parking lot behind the BLM
District Office. She was late again. Everyone else had returned from the field and gone home.
    Not that she cared. She'd never admit it to Dan in a million years, but she'd work for free
just to be able to explore the wide, desolate expanse of southeastern Oregon. This was truly God's
Country.
    Peddling her bike the mile and a half across Vale to her apartment, she had to laugh at
herself. Just this morning she had been wondering if she hadn't made a mistake, coming west.
    Next time she'd remember Dan's--and the cowboy's--advice. Walk the road first. Never
commit yourself to an unknown track unless you know there's a turnaround at the end of it.
    "Hi, Marmalade," she greeted her roommate as she wrestled the mountain bike through the
door. "And how was your day?"
    Marmalade spent the next five minutes complaining of neglect and starvation. Used to the
cat's conversation, Genny sorted through her mail, set Sophie's letter aside, and tossed the bills into
her "to do" basket. She left a trail of dusty work clothes all the way to the bathroom.
    Later, smelling less like a draft horse and more like a lady, Genny curled up on the sofa
with Marmalade to read what her aunt had to say.
    "All right!" she cried a few minutes later. "Marmalade, she's really coming! She says she'll
stay for at least a week." Genny's joyful bouncing disturbed the cat, who growled, jumped down, and
stalked into the kitchen.
    Genny followed. Marmalade was stretching a long paw up to the refrigerator door handle.
"Right, m'dear. It is your dinnertime. Just let me get mine started first."
    She lifted one edge of the plastic bowl cover. The contents, a tuna-noodle casserole,
looked and smelled okay. Genny offered a finger full of the bowl's contents to Marmalade, her
official taster. The cat nosed her hand, his growl indicating strong hunger.
    "Good enough. I won't have to go to the store until after dinner." Setting aside a portion of
the tuna mixture for the cat, she put the bowl into the microwave. "Wait until I tell you what
happened to me today, Marmalade. I had a real adventure."

Chapter Two
    "Don't count on startin' on the waterhole soon," Rock told his foreman that evening. "I
met the Vale District's new archaeologist today."
    "One of those, huh?" Brad said, hanging tack up.
    "I'd say so. Fresh out of school and full of ideals. A person'd think there were artifacts
scattered over the desert like broken glass in a tavern parking lot." With a growl he stripped off his
chaps, hung them over a hook behind the door. "I can just hear it now. 'We have to make sure none
of our priceless historical resources are lost to indiscriminate development, Mr. McConnell,'" he
said, in an affected falsetto. "'Why this little scrap of rock has a tiny fragment of fossilized pine
needle on it, and that makes it more important than your cattle any day.'"
    Oh, yes, he