Wildest Dreams - By Rosanne Bittner Page 0,261

I couldn't begin to be as good at this as Pearl is," Alice told them all with a bashful smile, referring to her piano playing. They had gathered together to sing Christmas carols, fifteen of them including Mae. Mae's husband, Bob Franks, had died the past winter from a heart attack, and Mae had stayed on, feeling a part of the family.

Alice had volunteered to play piano for them. It felt good to Lettie to have the house so full again. Outside the wind and snow threatened to keep them all there for days, maybe longer, and she was glad now she had thought of this. If the snow was going to keep them inside, it was certainly not going to be a lonely time for Luke and her. As was a Fontaine tradition, on Christmas Day all the Double L men, and even those with families, were welcome to come to the main house at various times throughout the day and eat, and she always made sure there was some kind of little present for everyone. She could only pray that this year Ty would come, too, and she wished Pearl and Robbie could also be there.

Alice began playing "Silent Night," and Lettie could hardly sing the words because of the lump that formed in her throat. As always, she had had Double L men cut and erect a huge tree in the parlor, and presents spilled out over the floor. She remembered other Christmases, the children all little and at home, the house filled with excitement. She could even remember little Paul's last Christmas. She glanced at Julie, who held a ragged, mended, stuffed horse— Nathan's horse. How could her son be twenty-five years old now? It seemed impossible.

She moved her gaze to Luke. He had set Paul down so he could run off and play, and now Robert sat on his knee. Luke was fifty-one now, but still solid and handsome, although more gray showed in his dark hair. She was forty-one herself, and although Luke still told her she looked hardly different from the eighteen-year-old woman he had brought to this wild land, she knew better. Her hands and face were more wrinkled, her own hair showing some gray; but she was proud that she had kept a slender figure. Their lovemaking had only gotten better with age, sweeter, more fulfilling.

They started the second verse of "Silent Night," when they were interrupted by someone pounding on the door. Mae hurried out to answer it, and they all waited. "I need to see Luke," came a deep voice. Lettie recognized it as Grady Rutledge, a hired hand who had been with them now for three years. He was a big, bearded man, and as with most of the men who worked here, they knew little about his past. They knew only that he was single and thirty years old when they hired him, and that he had worked on ranches in Texas for years. He had turned out to be as valuable as Tex had once been.

Grady came lumbering into the parlor, wearing denim pants and leather winter boots. His fur-lined deerskin coat made him seem even bigger. He removed a fur cap, and his thick hair stood out in messy strands. "I'm sorry, Mr. Fontaine, to interrupt things here, but I thought you should know." The man looked nervous and embarrassed.

Luke grasped hold of Robert and put him down as he got to his feet. "Know what?"

"Ty. A damn bobcat came around the barn and scared the horses. That damn black stallion he likes so well kicked his way right out of his stall and took off. Ty came to the bunkhouse and told us he was going after it."

Luke frowned in concern. "In this weather? For God's sake, he knows better than that! In a storm like this you can get four feet of snow overnight! He could get lost!"

"I know. I told him he shouldn't go, but you know how he's been these last few months. He don't listen to a damn thing anybody says. I told him we can all go look for the horse in the morning, weather permitting, but he just got mad and said he could find it himself."

Luke glanced at Nathan. Both of them knew Ty had never quite gotten over the fact that it was Nathan who had tamed the horse in the first place, after Tyler had been unsuccessful at it. He was not about to let