As if she felt it, too, she rose, somehow taller against him. The tension holding her so tight eased, and there was less wariness in her eyes when he stepped away.

“Guess we’d best get started with the bacon.” He kept his voice steady, calm. To let her know everything was just fine. “I see you found my favorite fry pan. It goes everywhere I go. I’ve cooked a lot of good meals in that pan. And a whole lot of bad ones.”

She quirked one brow at him and didn’t say a thing.

In truth, his favorite pan wasn’t the best topic of conversation. He was no parlor-room conversationalist. On a sigh, he wrestled the bacon from the thick paper and took a knife to it. Cutting through the meat gave him something to do so he wouldn’t have to say anything to embarrass himself further.

Just think before you speak, man.

“What about the stallion?” She shouldered close and peeled a thick slice of meat from the cutting board. “Something bad happened to him and you didn’t want to tell me. Or you forgot about him.”

“If that’s the kind of horseman you think I am, then I’ve got to change your opinion.” His chest tightened, and he put down the knife. “I haven’t said anything because I wanted it to be a surprise.”

“A good surprise?”

He felt her hope, tentative and fragile like a young seedling in a March rain, easily drowned. He chose his words with care. “The one thing you need to learn, beautiful, is that the only surprises in this house will be good ones.”

She smiled, that tentative hope strengthening, and he felt as tall as the sky.

Katelyn peered over the top of her book through the front window to see if she could spot Dillon riding in from the far fields. After making most of the break-fast-she paid careful note so she would know how to do all the cooking tomorrow morning-Dillon had banished her to the couch for the rest of the day.

Not cruelly or by barking orders as Brett would have done. No, the horseman had used his kindness to his advantage. He’d simply taken her hand in his, told her how good it was to see his ring there, kissed the palm of her hand and asked her to do something for him. To lie down and rest, because he worried about her.

How was she so lucky? That night when she’d watched Dillon for the first time trying to lure the wild stallion closer, how could she have known she would end up here in his house as his wife? That he would be the one? The man she didn’t believe existed because he was too good to be true.

She still thought that when he rode into sight through the fallow meadow, sitting straight and proud and mythical on a white spotted horse. He used no saddle or bridle, not even a lead rope snapped to a halter. The proud Appaloosa and rider moved as one being, one entity, cantering across the plains.

If she squinted, blurring the modern clothing of Levi’s and his heavy winter jacket and imagined away the Stetson covering his dark locks, he could have been a native warrior on his Indian pony, hunting the plains for his tribe. Or on a spirit quest. He was regal and noble to the very core.

Something she had never seen in any man before.

She put aside her book and folded the wool blanket he’d covered her with. The one he’d slept beneath last night, she knew, because it smelled faintly of winter wind and leather and him.

“Did you take a nap?” Dillon asked the instant he walked through the door.

“I rested.” She swung her feet off the couch and he was there, his hand taking hers to help her stand. “You’re spoiling me.”

“Good. You may as well get used to it. This is forever, just like I vowed.” His kiss feathered across her brow.

Making her quiver deep down. He almost made her believe as he led her to the door, grabbed her coat and escorted her into the stunning day.

The wind was cool and smelled of snow, although the clouds were moving high and fast. The wind ruffled her coat hem and chilled her face as Dillon tucked her hand into his and led her down the steps and along the fence where a dozen horses gathered. Not mustangs and cayuses, but fine-blooded animals.

“Where did you get these animals?” Katelyn rubbed the nose of a big black Arabian who nudged her mitten.

“Got them in trade, mostly, whenever someone couldn’t find the cash to pay me for my work.” He reached into his pocket. “Hold out your hand flat.”

She did, and he dropped a broken length from a peppermint stick onto her palm. Before she could blink, the black mare lipped the treat from her hand. The others crowded around.

“In trade?” She accepted a piece of candy for each hand and held them out to two of the other mares. “You sometimes choose the horses instead of the ranch owner’s daughter?”

“There was only one woman I ever wanted bad enough that I’d try to talk to her. And that’s you.”

“Try to talk to? What does that mean? You used smoke signals? Wrote notes on a slate?”

“I’m thirty years old and until yesterday, I was a confirmed, lifelong bachelor. And the reasons why? Because I’m too shy to get up my courage to talk to a woman. Courting is one daunting experience. I don’t see how most men live long enough to stand before the altar.”

“You’ve never courted anyone?”

“Just you.” Over the velvet nose of the sorrel mare, Dillon blushed. A slow heat crept up his face from his chin to his hairline.

How did he do that? Make her feel special to him with two simple words?

“This one here, the little gray mare, she’s a delicate thing. See how she stands off? She’s never sure about strangers. I was riding through Omaha of all places, just passing through on my way south to Tucson, and the street was jammed. People riding up onto the boardwalk just to get around. Tempers flaring. It was summer and hot as Hades.

“When I got up to where the problem was, there she was, on her knees with her sister-that mare right there, the white-and this teamster was whipping her. She couldn’t get up. He’d ruined her. Pushed her too far. She couldn’t move and no amount of fear or pain would get her to.”

“You saved her?”

“I gave him everything I had on me for the two of them, unhitched her. I stayed with her until she could move. Brought her water and food. Convinced her there was a reason for living. A nice cool meadow right here where she’d never feel the sting of a whip again.”

Katelyn closed her eyes, willing away the image he’d created in her mind. So, he made a habit of collecting the unwanted and the wounded. And brought them here to heal.

The gray mare nudged Dillon’s arm for attention. When he stroked his big hand down her nose, she leaned into his touch, trusting.

Was that what Dillon saw in her? Katelyn wondered. Someone to pity? Or to save? “You must be gone a lot with your work. Does your brother look after your herd?”

“It keeps him out of trouble. I’ll have to have him over for supper one night soon.” He took her hand. “The stallion is over here. Since he can leap six-foot fences without much trouble, I put him behind eight feet of board so he stays put.”

“It’s sad to pen him up when he’s used to running free.”

“True, but this country isn’t wild, as it used to be. And there’s a price on his head.”

“Cal Willman lives far from here.”

“A day’s journey. A wild mustang and his herd will roam twice that distance. There he is.” Dillon nodded toward the paddock in the shade of the log stable. “He gets two meals a day and he doesn’t need to fight off predators. Hello there, boy.”

The stallion paced the far end of the paddock, constant motion, his mane flying, tail up, ears laid back.

“He doesn’t look happy.”

“No, but he’s better. That wound to his shoulder had begun to fester, so I treated it. He seems to be recovering.”

“I’m glad.” Seeing the majestic creature penned up made her sad.

Dillon climbed through the boards, talking in a low gentle murmur she didn’t realize was a different language, it lulled her so. Tranquil sounding. The horse must have thought so as well because he stopped pacing.

“A few days ago, my brother and I rode out and wrestled him home between the two of us. He broke our best rope. Even injured, he was a tough one to bring in.”

Such an impressive animal. Big for a mustang, brawny but not stocky. A perfect head as black as night with a blaze streaking down the center of his nose. His spots were a flecked blanket draping his shoulders and back and rump. Strong legs, built both for speed and endurance, were rooted in the earth as the stallion waited, ready to flee.

Katelyn held her skirts and climbed through the space in the boards. Before she could straighten, Dillon was there, holding her steady, then guiding her to his side where they faced the nervous stallion together.

“He’s huge.” Being so close to him made her feel small, easily crushed. The stallion’s power radiated from him like heat from a stove, like light from the sun. A wild power that was as unstoppable as the wind. As rare as a new star in the sky.

“It’s a shame to break him.”

“Then we’ll gentle him. There’s a difference, you’ll see.” Dillon dug a peppermint out of his pocket. “Want to feed him?”

“No.” She took one look at the horse, so big now that she was closer. Raw power. Strong muscles rippled beneath his perfect black-and-white coat as he pivoted and ran, pivoted again.

She took another look at the horse as he shot around the rim of the fence. Hooves cutting into the hard-packed earth propelled him forward in a blur of black and white and flying mane. The beat of his step vibrated the earth, moving up through her, through them, leaving her spellbound.

“Watch.” Dillon spoke in that musical, gentle language and the running horse began to calm. The hard line of his elegant neck became softer, arching as the stallion swiveled his big head, keeping one eye and both ears on Dillon as he circled the paddock.