She, to the contrary, was filled at last with that incredible sense of coming home that she’d wanted so badly to feel when she’d moved to Los Piños. She considered for a moment whether Lone Wolf’s father might have hunted on this very land. It pleased her somehow to think that he might have.

“That’s why they call it the wide open spaces,” she told her daughter. “Remember all the stories I told you about Lone Wolf?”

“Yeah, but I don’t get it,” Jenny declared flatly. “Maybe I could just get a job in the drugstore or something and pay Mr. Adams back that way.”

“No,” Janet said softly, listening to the early morning sounds of birds singing, insects humming and somewhere in the distance a tractor rumbling. Did he grow his own grain? Or maybe have a nice vegetable garden? On some level, she thought she’d been waiting all her life for a moment just like this.

“I think this will be perfect for you,” she added as hope flowered inside her for the first time in years.

Jenny rolled her eyes. “If he makes me go near a horse or a cow, I’m out of here,” she warned.

Janet grinned. “This is a cattle ranch. I think you can pretty much count on horses and cows.”

“Mo-om!” she wailed. Her gaze narrowed. “I’ll run away. I’ll steal a car and drive all the way home to New York.”

“And then what?” Janet inquired mildly. Jenny knew as well as she did that there was no room for her in her father’s life. Even though at the moment his selfishness suited her purposes, she hated Barry Randall for making his disinterest so abundantly clear to his daughter.

Jenny turned a tearful gaze on her that almost broke Janet’s heart.

“I don’t have a choice, do I?” she asked.

“Afraid not, love. Besides, I think you’ll enjoy this once you’ve gotten used to it. Think of all the stories you’ll have to write to your friends back in New York. How many of them have ever seen a genuine cowboy, much less worked on a ranch?”

“How many of them even wanted to?” Jenny shot back.

“You remember what I always told my clients when they landed in jail?” Janet asked.

Jenny shot her a tolerant look and sighed heavily. “I remember. It’s up to me whether I make my time here hard or easy.”

“Exactly.”

A sudden gleam lit her eyes. “I suppose it’s also up to me whether it’s hard or easy for Mr. Adams, too, huh?”

Janet didn’t much like the sound of that. “Jenny,” she warned. “If you don’t behave, you’ll be in debt to this man until you’re old enough for college.”

“I’ll be good, Mom. Cross my heart.”