Chapter 2
Amanda had always believed in the adage about the best defense being a good offense. With that in mind she set out bright and early the next morning for the Diamond K proper. Since there was no direct road good enough even for the four-wheeler she’d rented in Jackson Hole, she was forced to take two miles of uncleared gravel track and six miles of mountain road that twisted and turned through stands of pine and aspen, past precipitous drops, and over a couple of one-lane bridges. She eventually reached the old-fashioned wooden entryway proclaiming the Diamond K, where another mile of gravel road led to the main compound.
Horses and a few cattle grazed in the pastures. Well-kept fences stretched for miles. The same stream that sang to her at night meandered along the broad meadows where the grass was beginning to appear beneath the melting snow. The ranch seemed a vast place, with more sky than the entire state of New York and the embrace of mountains for grandeur. Clustered into a fold in the land were a group of long, low barns, corrals, outbuildings and the main house, a long ranch that seemed as much a part of the land as the stream and mountains.
Amanda pulled the car to a stop alongside another vehicle parked by the main house and climbed out. The air was crisp and dry, the early morning mist already burned off. From the barns Amanda could hear human and equine voices raised in some kind of dispute, and from the house she could hear the twang of country-western music. She smiled as she reached for her purse with the ubiquitous tape recorder in it, and headed for the Kendall stronghold itself.
“Heard you were comin’.” The woman who answered the door greeted her with a hint of dry humor.
Amanda grinned in return. “Betty?”
She nodded and held the screen door open.
As Amanda stepped past, she took in the impressions of starch and rosewater. She bet Betty had doilies on her furniture and wore a hat to church. And that she knew exactly what went on all around the Lost Ridge community, but wouldn’t ever say a word about it.
“My name’s Amanda Marlow.”
Betty seemed to know. “Jake’s down at the barn right now,” she said crisply as she led the way into the kitchen. “The vet’s seein’ to one of the stallions.”
“Not with much success, from the sounds of it.”
Betty huffed indignantly. “Bill Nelson’s beast, no doubt. He sent him to Jake too late, ya ask me. Coffee?”
Amanda figured she had only one answer, since they seemed to be headed for the kitchen, anyway. “Thanks.”
She didn’t miss any of the living room as she passed. Some of it she recognized from listening to Lee’s stories. The big front window that looked out over the sunset, the old upright piano Lee had learned to play on, the worn, overstuffed furniture Jake refused to replace. A filled bookshelf took up one entire wall by the stone fireplace, and the hardwood floors were covered in handwoven Indian rugs. All neat, clean and looking unlived in. No pictures, no mementos, no life.
“I heard you were teaching little Lee?” Betty asked, turning into the big, bright room hung with pots and herbs, where the radio seemed to live. It was giving forth Dolly Parton at the moment.
“She took a creative writing seminar I taught,” Amanda allowed, as she scanned the almost surgically clean room, obviously well run and orderly like the rest of the operation.
Betty sighed like a maternal aunt. “I miss her. Hasn’t been any fun in this house to speak of since she left.”
Amanda could well imagine. Jake Kendall hadn’t struck her as the type of man to waste his time on frivolous pursuits. Betty must have made up the difference in affection and attention. Jake Kendall might be an honorable man, and the most respected horseman this side of the Mississippi, but Amanda couldn’t exactly imagine him tying the bow on a little girl’s dress or cushioning the heartbreak of a first lost love.
“Jake says Lee’s coming home in a couple of weeks,” Betty was saying as she poured out two mugs of coffee for them both. “I didn’t figure she’d last very long out among strangers before she had to come home.”
Amanda couldn’t help grinning. The last time she’d seen Lee, the fresh-faced young blonde had been on stage in a very liberated interpretation ofThe Madwoman of Chaillot,and bringing down the house. Lee was doing just fine. “It is pretty far away for her,” Amanda agreed instead.
Betty nodded judiciously. “She’s a bright young thing.”
Amanda paused midsip for a definite nod. “A force to be reckoned with. It was a real pleasure teaching her.”
Betty must have heard the sincerity in Amanda’s voice and judged her by it, because suddenly there was a real smile on those tight, middle-aged features.
“Don’t think badly of Jake for being a little brusque with you yesterday.”
Amanda looked up, surprised. Betty waved her hand.
“He told me he’d found you at the cabin, and I took it from there. He’s real touchy about that place. And he really didn’t know you were coming. I found Lee’s package at the bottom of all the correspondence when I got back this morning. Been out with a bad back.” She shook her head as she tasted her own coffee. “It’s gotten to the point over the years where Jake doesn’t even know the mail’s there if I’m not wavin’ it in his face.”
“He’s that busy?”
Betty laughed, a short, sharp sound. “Sometimes I wonder how he ever got the chance to get to church on Sundays. He’s worked mighty hard for this place.”
Amanda took a symbolic look around. “It really shows. Lee thinks he walks on water.”
“Well, she was only a baby when her mama died. Five or six. Jake’s been everything to her since.”
