Jericho wanted to let God direct him. And he prayed that if the time came when he took a tumble, the Lord would be right beside him holding him up. But that didn’t mean he was dragging a woman into trouble beside him. His dad had done that, and look where it had led him. When his mom’s body had been found strangled and lifeless, Dad had fallen hard, had been utterly cast down, and hadn’t ever pulled himself back up.

“The best thing I can do for Ivy is make sure she finds happiness, but that won’t happen with me.”

Judd gently closed the Good Book and brushed a hand over its worn cover. “If you take the time to get to know Ivy the way I do, you’ll see it don’t take much to make her happy.”

Before Jericho could think of a response, Judd stood, blew out the lantern, then headed out the door, leaving him alone in darkness.

For the briefest of moments, Jericho entertained the idea of getting to know Ivy better. What would it be like to openly court her, to sit on the bench next to the house, hold her hand, and pass the time doing nothing but talking?

He couldn’t think of a nicer way to spend an evening.

No. An inner protest jolted him upright. He hadn’t ever and wasn’t about to start letting himself become infatuated with Ivy McQuaid. She’d always been off-limits. She still was. And that’s all there was to it.

Chapter
8

The dust blew against Ivy’s face, stinging her eyes. The late June heat combined with the lack of rain over recent weeks had caused the ground to dry up worse than the sun-bleached bones of a cattle carcass.

She tugged the bandana up higher over her nose to keep from breathing the dust particles, and she tipped the brim of her hat lower to shield her face as best she could. But her eyes burned, and her throat was scratchy anyway. The open rangeland, with nothing more than sagebrush, shrubs, and shortgrass, offered little protection from the flying dirt that now coated every inch of her from hat to boots.

Regardless, she loved the wide-open sky, the freedom of the vast prairies, and the view of the mountains no matter which way she rode. And she didn’t want to be anywhere else. Though the hour was growing late and the shadows were lengthening, she wasn’t ready to head home.