“How old were you?”

Her hand stopped brushing Ace and her eyes stared back into the past. “Thirteen. There was never any more music on the ranch. I only sang when I was alone at night in the barn with the horses.”

“Why were you in the barn at night?” He hazarded a guess, but he wanted to hear her say it.

“I slept in a small room on the floor in the back of the barn.” Not in the warm house, in her own room, in a soft bed.

His throat went tight with sadness. “Did you go to school?”

“Why do you care?”

Because it kills me to think of you living in a crap barn, cold and lonely with no music. Those words wouldn’t come out of his mouth. “Because I want to know who you really are.”

Why did you burn the place down?

She stared at him. “I’m not who Margaret described to you.”

“It appears you’re not.”

She pressed her lips together, then answered. “My first three foster families sent me to school, but when I was eight, my uncle showed up and took me to the ranch. He needed me to take care of the horses. I didn’t go back to a real school again until I was eighteen. Senior year at MIT, I met Sean.”

“Where were your parents?”

“My mother drank herself to death when I was four. My father didn’t know I existed until I was sixteen.”

Wow! “That must have been really hard.”

She nodded. “It was.” The way she said it meant he hadn’t even scratched the surface of how she felt about her tragic childhood.

“Did you like living on the ranch?”

“I liked the horses. They were all I had growing up.” Sadness filled those words. Not anger or rage.

It didn’t add up to her setting fire to the ranch.

She set the brush on the nearby workbench. “I’ve got to get back before the kids wake up. Sorry I caused you so much trouble this morning.”

He stepped in front of her before she retreated. “Why did you burn the ranch to the ground?” He had to ask. She’d had a rotten childhood, but that didn’t justify what she did.

She slowly looked up and right into his eyes. “Didn’t Margaret tell you why I did it? Of course, I never even told Sean why, so I can only imagine the explanation she gave you, besides her general opinion of me, which is that I’m evil and therefore I do evil things. Right? I burned down the ranch. I killed her son. I took his business. I keep her grandchildren from her. Everything I do is just for spite and my own selfishness.”

So, she’d never told Sean why she’d done it. It surprised him, and made him want to get the answer all the more.

“It wasn’t some whim. You had a reason. And don’t tell me it was because your uncle sold the horses like the police report says. That’s bullshit.”