Wyoming Woman Read Free Page B

haven’t got all day.”
    â€œAll right. Yes, I need your help!” Rachel had lived too long in this country not to know what would happen to anything that remained in the wash. “Please! Hurry! The important things—my paints and canvases—are in the back! And we really need toget the buggy out. Otherwise my father will have to pay Finnegan’s Livery for the loss of it.”
    â€œThere’s a rope on my saddle. I’ll get the horse.” He turned away and strode up the side of the wash, his boots leaving muddy gouges that swiftly filled with water and crumbled away. Rachel watched his tall figure disappear through the gray curtain of rain. Then, with no more time to spare, she turned and raced to gather her scattered, soaking possessions.
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    Luke left her scrambling for her things and strode back through the brush to get the horse. Morgan Tolliver’s daughter. He cursed under his breath. For two cents he would ride away and leave the little hellcat to the storm. He owed no favors to cattle ranchers and their kin, nor did he expect any in return. All he really wanted was to be left alone.
    The buckskin was waiting beside the cedar bush. It nickered and shook its rain-soaked hide as he freed its bridle from the dead branch. A quick glance up the slope confirmed that Mick and Shep, the two collies, were doing their job, herding the sheep into a tight circle where the lambs would be protected from the worst of the storm. The precious animals would be safe enough until he could pull the buggy out of the wash and, he hoped to heaven, get the snooty Miss Tolliver on her way. She was a wild beauty, with those sea-colored eyes, that untamed mop of red-gold curls and a figure that would tempt the devil himself. But a cattleman’s daughter… Luke shook his head andswore as he led the horse toward the wash. Her kind of trouble was the last thing he needed.
    The Tolliver Ranch was the biggest spread in the county, and likely one of the biggest in the state of Wyoming. A remote corner of it butted onto Luke’s modest parcel of land at the foot of the Big Horn Mountains. Luke had only a passing acquaintance with the ranch’s owner. But a cattleman was a cattleman, and if there was anything the cattle ranchers hated more than sheep it was the men who allowed them to graze on public land.
    Had Morgan Tolliver and his twin sons been among the raiders that had nearly burned poor old Miguel alive in his wagon and then beat him sense less? Had a Tolliver gun shot the three purebred ewes that were the best of Luke’s herd—the herd he had labored for five miserable, backbreaking years in the Rock Springs coal mines to buy?
    The answer to those questions made no difference. Luke had nothing that would stand as proof against the Tollivers and their kind. Even if he were to find such proof, there’d be nothing he could do except sell out and run for his life. And he would die, Luke swore, before he let the bastards drive him off his land.
    Through the pelting rain, he could see the edge of the wash and the water-soaked heap that Morgan Tolliver’s daughter had made of her rescued baggage. Hauling the buggy out of the wash would be a tough job. And even if they could salvage it, how was shegoing to get home with no mule to pull it? He would be stuck with her.
    For the space of a breath, Luke hesitated. Why should he be helping the woman at all? Rachel Tolliver had held a gun on him, accused him of thievery and, in general, behaved like the spoiled brat she was. It would serve her right, maybe even teach her a lesson, if he rode off and left her on her own. Surely she would not be alone for long. Her family was bound to miss her and come looking for her.
    But no—the image of Rachel shivering in the rain like a lost puppy was more than his conscience could bear. It had been a long time since he’d considered himself a gentleman, but he had not sunk so far that he