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whined.
    He grunted in response. Even his dog was nagging at him to go back.
    “Think so, do you?” He lifted his hat from his head and wiped his brow with his sleeve, though the spring evening was crisp. “You would stick up for another female.”
    Lucy whined again and barked, two short yips and a long, well-enunciated growl.
    “Yeah, maybe so,” he agreed, sauntering around to look in the direction from which he came. He leaned his shoulder against a lodgepole pine and hooked his thumb through a belt loop.
    He could go back on her land and hide in the trees, taking the midnight watch, so to speak. But that would be trespassing.
    No, worse. It would be spying. Again. He shook his head, determination to save his own skin winning out over an absurd sense of chivalry. He was nobody’s cowboy but his own.
    “Nah.”
    At the single word, Lucy growled low and barked once. He could swear she was scowling at him.
    “Mother hen,” he complained with a chuckle. “I don’t care if you disagree.”
    He crouched down to wrap an arm around the dog, scratching her ears with his thumb.
    She wriggled out of his grasp and sat down a foot away from him, staring at him through her mismatched eyes.
    “I know, I know. You think I’m a big oaf. And maybe I am. But I can’t spy on her, even if it’s for her own good. You don’t understand what a good-lookin’ woman like her does to a man’s soul.”
    Lucy cocked her head and whined.
    “End of subject!” he said more firmly than he intended.
    Lucy trotted a few steps back the way they’d come, then turned to look back at him. When he didn’t move, she barked sharply.
    “I’m not coming,” he said firmly. “I don’t know when you thought you earned the title of Leader of the Pack, but I’m not budging. Not a chance.”
    To confirm his point, he crossed his arms over his chest with a quiet huff.
    He could have sworn she shrugged as she turned her back on him and padded off down the road toward Dixie. She stopped again just before a bend in the path that would take her out of his sight and implored him with her large collie eyes.
    “No,” he said again, hardly believing he was arguing with his dog, yet finding an odd sort of humor in it. Dixie had only been here for less than a day, and she already changed his life in more ways than one.
    Like turning his own dog against him, for one thing. Suddenly an idea hit him.
    “Well, yeah, of course! I see what you mean.” He chuckled aloud.
    He might be an unwelcome lurker in Dixie’s part of the woods, but she could hardly blame him for having Lucy there. Even if she did see the dog, she’d never know who her owner was.
    And he felt at least as safe with Lucy guarding over Dixie as he would were he to spend the night outside her tent himself. She was well trained—better trained than he was for watchdog duty, he thought, smiling for the second time today.
    Lucy could handle whatever came around—he’d bet his paycheck on it. He was off the hook, and Dixie would be safe.
    More to the point, he’d be safe. No explanations necessary.
    “Go on, girl,” he told his dog, giving her his blessing. “You keep an eye on our Dixie, girl. She’ll be safe and sound with you watching her.”
    Lucy barked and leapt out of sight.
    He knew without a doubt she’d do exactly what needed to be done. Dogs had a sense about them for people in need, and Dixie Sullivan fit into that category whether she knew it or not.
    As the strain and tension drained from his shoulders, he sighed and turned, beginning the long walk back to his suddenly achingly empty house.

Chapter Five

    D ixie awoke with a start. She was certain she’d heard the low, deep growl of some ferocious animal, but as she strained to listen, the sound didn’t repeat itself. She put a hand to her heart to settle its erratic thumping and rolled back into her bag.
    She must have been dreaming. The exhaustion of a hard day was just catching up with her. It wasn’t like a bear