He bent his head to pore over the accounts again, while Heather stared at him with dismay and regret. If he hadn’t wed her, he would not have been obliged to shoulder her debts and put his ranch at risk….

She hadn’t known the plight of the ranchers was so dire, or that Sloan might be facing financial ruin. She wished she knew how to help. She wished he would allow her close enough to try. She wished….

What exactly? That she could control the conflicting turmoil Sloan roused in her?

She was finding it more and more difficult to sort out her feelings for him, Heather reflected. He was as hard and untamable as the land he loved, frequently impossible to deal with, even hostile at times, and yet….

Yet she couldn’t explain the yearning Sloan stirred in her. Couldn’t understand the strange, gnawing restlessness that plagued her since becoming his wife. It struck her hardest when she was weary and lonely, yet the need was always there, shimmering beneath the surface of their relationship.

What she felt for him was far more than sympathy or compassion. A big part was attraction. An awareness of Sloan as a man. A keen sexual awareness.

That made sense, perhaps. As her husband, Sloan had initiated her to carnal relations, had awakened her to passion. After such stunning intimacy of the flesh, it was natural that she experience a physical affinity toward him. Especially with his potent masculinity. She understood why her pulse quickened to a drumbeat whenever he was near, why her breath shallowed and her skin flushed. She was responding primally to him, as a woman.

But she was also his wife. And she yearned for something deeper, something softer between them. She longed for the elemental emotions that were missing entirely from their marriage: closeness, tenderness, laughter. Affection.

Yet tragedy had destroyed the laughter in him. Sloan cared for no one but his daughter and the hallowed memory of his late wife.

Heather couldn’t repress a wistful sigh. He intended to keep her shut out of his life.

Still, he had shared something of himself tonight. He had opened up to her in some small measure, more than he ever had in the past.

It gave her reason for hope.

It was the following day when they first quarreled over Janna. Heather’s afternoon began pleasantly enough, for the local schoolmaster came to call. Vernon Whitfield was a handsome bachelor with curling, dark-brown hair and a gentle manner that contrasted sharply with the rough and rugged cowboys of her recent acquaintance. He was also a good friend of Caitlin’s.

Heather liked him from the first. Originally hailing from Chicago, Vernon was obviously well-read. Over tea, they discussed their favorite authors and the peculiar differences between Easterners and Westerners, before Heather broached a subject of prime concern for her: Janna’s education.

Vernon was driving away in his buggy when Sloan returned home early.