“What was that clanging sound, anyway?”Fred asked as they headed toward the kitchen.
Quinn wondered if Emmy Lou would tell on him.Fred could make his life a real hell if he knew about Quinn’s fear of bugs and snakes.
“You must have heard me banging around with my cast iron pans.I got in the mood to rearrange them,” Emmy Lou said.
And with that single statement, Emmy Lou won Quinn’s loyalty forever.
ChapterFifteen
The rain let up that afternoon, and Jo spent the hours between lunch and dinner riding the fence line with Benny, checking for downed wire, while Fred kept watch on the new foal and taught Quinn something about roping.Jo wasn’t pleased to admit it to herself, but she also spent the afternoon missing Quinn.
She wanted to be the one to teach him how to rope, although that would be a disaster in the making, and she knew it.Whatever time she spent with Quinn was filled with danger, and she wanted to be with him twenty-four hours a day.She had a gigantic crush on the guy.
She had plenty of time to analyze why Quinn affected her so deeply, and she nearly had it nailed down.Any woman would be attracted to a guy who looked like Quinn, which explained the physical draw he had for her.But what had really hooked her was his ability to make bold, generous gestures coupled with his very human weaknesses.He’d flown all the way from New York on impulse to return the horse sperm, yet he was so frightened of creepy crawlies he’d wrecked the cab.He’d gallantly decided to move to the bunkhouse to keep a safe distance between them, but when faced with temptation, he’d crumbled, just as she had.Crumbled in a very delicious way.She still tingled at the thought of those moments on the sofa.
“Say, what’s that yonder?”Benny asked, pointing to a far hillside.
Jo squinted into the distance.“It looks like a man running.”
“Then somethin’s wrong,” Benny said.“People don’t run out in the middle of nowhere.Unless they lost their horse or somethin’s after them.”
“I’ll check.”Jo reached to her saddlebag and pulled out a scarred pair of binoculars that had belonged to Aunt Josephine.She focused on the small figure running up the hill and grinned.“It’s Dick.I think he’s jogging.”
“Jogging?I wanna see.”
Jo handed the binoculars to Benny and leaned over to rest her forearms on her saddle horn while she gazed at the tiny figure pumping madly up the hill.In jeans and boots.She loved it.
“I can’t figure out what he’s tryin’ to catch.There ain’t no horse around, or cattle, neither.”Benny seemed totally mystified by the concept of a man running for no visible reason.
“Actually he’s trying to lose something.”
“Ain’t nothin’ chasing him, neither.No bear or nothin’.”Benny continued to stare through the binoculars.“He looks plum possessed.I ain’t never seen him so red in the face.”
“Let me look again.”Jo knew that revenge was a mean-spirited emotion, and she shouldn’t be indulging in it.Well, she’d have to get saintly some other day.Watching Dick jog was too damn much fun to miss.
She adjusted the focus so she could see Dick’s red face.He was panting like a freight engine, too.Unlike Benny, she’d seen him that red in the face before during the divorce proceedings when the judge had upheld her right to fence off Ugly Bug Creek so Dick’s herd couldn’t water here as they had been during the two-year span of Dick and Jo’s marriage.At that point old Dick was back to hauling water, and he hadn’t liked it much.
“Do you reckon we should go over there?”Benny asked.“Somethin’ could be wrong.”
“I think something’s finally right,” Jo said.Her heart lifted at the knowledge that Dick could be bested that easily, and she vowed she’d no longer be his victim.“Thanks to Quinn Monroe.”
“Are you sure that’s his name?”
“Yes.”Jo tucked the binoculars away.“That’s his name.Did Fred explain our plan?”
“He tried, but I got mixed up.You know I get mixed up.”
Jo’s heart squeezed at the forlorn look on Benny’s face.“I know you’re the best wrangler a gal could have.”
“I wish I was smarter.”
“You’re smart where it counts, Benny.Now let me try and explain this situation as best I can.”
All the way home Jo did her best to untangle Benny’s confusion regarding Quinn Monroe and Brian Hastings.She thought she’d succeeded until Benny asked if he could be in the movie.
“There may not be a movie, Benny.”
“But Dick and Mr.Doobie are gonna be in it.”
