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“Besides that,” he said in a chiding tone.
“Believe it or not, that just about sums it up.”
He responded with a doubting shake of his head. “I don’t buy it. Come on. Where did you grow up? How old were you when you lost your parents?”
A tension ran through her, born of a reluctance to talk about her childhood. Yet she sensed Trey would insist on getting answers.
“Six.”
An instant of stillness followed her response. “You were six years old, or you lost them six years ago?”
“I was six years old.” Stiff with pride, she stared straight ahead, avoiding the sharp, stunned look he gave her. “But don’t worry. I wasn’t shuttled off to a bunch of foster homes or anything like that. As their sole beneficiary, I ended up with a very sizable trust that more than took care of my every need. I was old enough to go to a boarding school and summer camps. Actually, I preferred it, because nobody else had parents there, either—except sometimes on the weekends.”
“What about the holidays?” The question was quietly worded, without any demand in it.
Darkness invaded the pickup’s cab, and Sloan welcomed its cover even though her expression never lost its dispassionate quality. “Those first years I usually spent with my father’s business partner and his family. He was the administrator of my trust, and his wife had always wanted a little girl. But after Aunt Barbara died—she wasn’t any relation to me; I just called her that. Anyway, after she died, I didn’t go there much. Sometimes I’d stay at a friend’s house or with one of the teachers.” She paused a beat. “That’s the whole story. And it wasn’t nearly as bad as it sounds. In fact, I’ve had a very good life, regardless of how it looks to anyone else.”
“Life knocks all of us in the teeth, sometimes more than once.” His voice had a smile in it. “My grandfather always says that the strong ones get up afterwards, and the weak lie there and whine.”
Sloan looked at him in amazement. In the past, people had responded to her story with either clucks of sympathy or encouraging platitudes. But never admiration and approval.
“Thank you,” she said in utter sincerity.
“For what?” His head turned, the dashboard lights playing over his questioning look.
“Understanding.”
“You mean, that life can be rough at times, and all you can do is ride it out?”
Sloan laughed softly. “Is that more of your grandfather’s cowboy philosophy?”
“Probably.”
“I’m definitely going to like him.” She rested her head on his shoulder, using it as a pillow.
“I know you will.”
Silence settled between them, the companionable kind that felt no need for words. Just being together was enough. Sloan couldn’t recall ever being that comfortable with anyone before.
Night was on the land when they turned into the ranch’s east entrance. Other than the twinkling of a few stars, the pickup’s twin beams were the only light to be seen, and they were trained on the straight road before them, giving Sloan few glimpses of the terrain that flanked it.
She wasn’t sure when she noticed a faint lightening of the horizon directly in front of them. As the miles went by, the impression of light grew stronger. It reminded Sloan of a city-glow visible at a distance.
Finally she gave in to her curiosity. “It looks like lights up ahead, but I know we aren’t coming to any town. What is it?”
“Triple C headquarters.” An amused smile tugged at his mouth. “Just about everybody who comes here the first time makes some remark about it resembling a small town. In a way, I guess it is. We have our own commissary that doubles as a kind of general store, complete with movie rentals, a gas station, first-aid dispensary, and a central mail area. We even have our own fire station. When you add to that the usual assortment of ranch buildings, housing for the hired men and their families, a cook shack, and a bunkhouse, it is just about the equivalent of a small town. But it’s all there out of necessity. Blue Moon is the closest thing that passes for a town, and it’s roughly fifty miles away. It’s not a drive you want to make every day, so we try to be as self-sufficient as we can.”
“You don’t have any other choice,” she said in realization. This new grasp of the ranch’s isolation raised more questions about such things as education, utilities, and maintenance, and Trey patiently answered all of them, explaining that most families home-schooled their young children, identifying the tradesmen they kept on staff, and telling her about the wells and disposal systems in use. None of which were things she would have normally associated with a cattle ranch, but they spoke to the size and scale of the Triple C.
As the lights ahead grew brighter, Sloan sat forward, eager for her first sight of the ranch’s headquarters. But the moment it came into view, her eyes were drawn to the towering white house that stood apart from the rest of the buildings. Lights blazed from the porch that ran the length of it, illuminating the series of massive columns that marched across its front.
“Is that what you call The Homestead?” she asked Trey.
“It is.” He pointed the pickup at it.
“The name’s a misnomer,” she declared.
He flashed her a grin. “Expecting something a bit more rustic, were you?”
