She glanced at Tiffany. “To end a feud?”
Tiffany huffed, “That silly old thing should have ended long before I was born, but no one got around to saying enough is enough, so poor Hunter was sacrificed to end it by joining our two families through marriage.”
“I only viewed it as a sacrifice before I met you, Red,” Hunter clarified.
“And that’s what I was getting to, how we met.” Tiffany proceeded to regale Violet with how she’d assumed the identity of the housekeeper her father, a neighboring rancher, had hired, only to get snatched up by the Callahans as a practical joke on her father, though they did actually need a housekeeper, too. “And I’d promised my mother that I would stay in Nashart for at least a month to give Hunter a chance to woo me, so it was a perfect opportunity for me to get to know him while he didn’t know who I really was. Then I could honestly tell my mother that I’d met him and he wouldn’t do. Trouble was, he most certainly did do—he’s a little bit irresistible once you get to know him.”
“Only a little?” Hunter complained.
“You know exactly what you are, darling,” Tiffany said, and blew a kiss to her husband before grinning at Violet. “Now, tell me how you met Morgan.”
“He abducted me out of my hotel room and dragged me into the wilderness.”
There was silence; then the laughter started. Violet would never have said it if she wasn’t sure they would think she was joking, and they did. She smiled to confirm it, then looked at Morgan for help. “You tell them.”
She thought he’d give them a modified version, but she failed to notice his wicked grin. “I thought she was a con artist working for a ruthless mining company owner who was trying to steal my mine.”
There wasn’t any laughter now, and Zachary demanded, “Did you abduct her, Son?”
Appalled, Violet jumped in to rescue them both. “It was just a misunderstanding that we quickly sorted out.” After explaining the strange circumstances she’d confronted when she arrived in Butte and her need for a guide to take her to her father’s mine, she simply said, “So I was pleased that he arranged that trek into the wilderness.”
“Walked right into your trap, didn’t I?” Morgan grinned.
“You wanted information, I wanted information,” she reminded him pertly, then said to Tiffany, “It was a rough few days to begin with, but as I said, we got it all sorted out.”
“All the while he looked like a bear,” Mary added with a disapproving look at Morgan.
“Well—yes,” Violet answered.
Tiffany asked, “A cuddly bear or a grizzly?”
“The latter. Quite frightful, actually.”
“Enough about me,” Morgan growled.
“Not nearly enough,” Mary insisted. “We have a whole year to catch up on, Morgan. You didn’t exactly write very often and shared barely anything of note when you did.”
“Because there was nothing to tell. I mined for a year and nothing else. I was single-minded about it because the sooner I reached my goal, the sooner I could come home.”
“We thought it would’ve been sooner,” Cole put in. “That you would have hired a crew to mine for you.”
“I thought so, too, until I found out how cutthroat it is in that area. One mine owner in particular was willing to kill to get my mine, so I had to keep the location of my camp a secret, which meant no crews, and I had to do the mining myself. That routine only got interrupted when Charley’s daughter showed up. She reminded me of things I was missing—like family. And the threat has been dealt with, so Charley and I will hire a manager to run the mines now and get crews in there to work them.”
“So you’re not going back?” Mary asked.
“I’ll go back every so often to make sure it’s running smoothly and the manager is doing a good job, but it won’t be to stay.”
She gave him a brilliant smile, then called for the maid to bring in dessert. There was more teasing, more laughter, but thankfully, no more personal questions.
When they stood up to leave the table, Morgan came around to take her arm and whisper, “Come with me. I have two things to show you.”
She was surprised when he led her to the back of the house, through the kitchen, and outside toward the cluster of other buildings. She remembered thinking Morgan might be used to gazing at pastures with animals from the front porch of his ranch house, but the only thing out front would be a clear view of the setting sun in another hour or so.
“What are all these buildings for?” she asked.
“There’s a stable, there’s a barn. Ma likes to say we’re half farm, though Pa vehemently objects to that term. But we do keep enough farm animals—chickens, pigs, a few dairy cows—to be self-sufficient when it comes to eating. And, of course, steak is brought in from the range. She even has a vegetable garden that one of our former cooks started a while back. I think the only thing we fetch in town anymore is grain for bread. The long building is the bunkhouse, but there’s also a washhouse and a number of storage sheds.”
He led her into the barn, where she saw bales of hay, a wagon, Mary’s buckboard, and two dairy cows in their own stalls. There were a few other stalls, but they were empty, and it was mostly just a big open space with a loft where more hay was stacked. She didn’t miss seeing the cat up there staring down at them as they continued toward the back of the barn.
Then she saw Bo sitting on his haunches, but he barely glanced at them, and she finally noticed why. He was keeping his distance while he avidly watched another dog curled in the corner. Or rather, he was watching all the babies playing around the other dog.
“Oh,” she cooed, unable to take her eyes off the puppies.
“They aren’t wolves,” Morgan remarked with a chuckle. “Cole said they’re around two months old now and ready to leave their mother. Take your pick. One of them is yours if you want it.”
She couldn’t help throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him, then immediately dropped to her knees before he could return that hug. There were four of them in assorted colors—no, five, the smallest was still nursing. The mother was medium-sized and all golden, but had pointed ears, so Violet couldn’t imagine what mix of breeds she might be. She started picking them up. Only one was all gold like its mother, and one was mostly gold with black patches; another was gold and brown, the fourth brown and white, and the runt appeared to be all black. When the runt moved away from the dam, she saw that its face was actually golden, the black only starting at its forehead. She picked that one up and fell in love.
“Him,” she said.
“Is it?”
She didn’t know and held it up for him. “You check.”
“Not a him,” he said.
She smiled. “Even better. You realize you couldn’t have given me a nicer gift.”
He grinned. “Yeah, I had a feeling.”
“It can come inside the house, correct?” she said on her way out of the barn, the puppy in her arms.
“I’d say it will whether it’s allowed to or not,” he said, following her.
And then she stopped. “Oh my.” She was staring at the beginning of a magnificent sunset.
“That was the other thing I wanted to show you. Let’s head to the front porch where you can get an unobstructed view.”
She nodded. They made their way to the long swing on the porch that she’d noticed when they arrived; it hung from the ceiling and had room for two. She sat down, and Morgan joined her there and pushed a little with his long legs, making the swing rock slowly. At the mining camp, the sky was obscured by all the trees, but here she could appreciate the beauty of Montana’s big sky.
She petted the puppy in her lap. Morgan slipped his arm around her shoulders. He probably thought she didn’t notice because she was so amazed at the flaming colors in the sky. She noticed. She noticed everything about him.
“I bet you never saw a sunset like this in London,” he remarked.