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with Izannah and teach her nine o’clock piano lesson before she went out to the carriage house to hitch up the judge’s surrey. She laid the satchel she’d taken from her grandfather’s safe upon arising on the floorboard, securely against one foot, and took off.
    There were less direct ways to reach Gil’s property than by driving south on Main Street, but Emmeline was not given to deceit. Furthermore, she harbored no illusions that, by taking elaborate precautions, she could stem the flow of gossip. The speculative stares and hesitant waves she received as she passed through town were proof that she was right.
    She had barely put Plentiful behind her when a rider appeared, and she pulled up on the reins as Neal came to a halt beside her. He tipped his hat and smiled, but the look in his eyes was less than cordial.
    “Good morning, Miss Emmeline,” he said.
    Emmeline fidgeted on the hard seat of the surrey while her ancient dapple-gray mare, Lysandra, bent her head to graze at the side of the road. “Good morning, Mr. Montgomery,” Emmeline replied. “Was there something you wanted?”
    Neal leaned, with deceptive indolence, on the pommel of his saddle. “Common decency prevents me from answering that question honestly,” he told her. “I suppose I don’t dare hope that you were on your way to the Circle M just now, to tell me you’ve decided to divorce Hartwell and marry me?”
    Color climbed Emmeline’s neck and throbbed in her cheeks, but she kept her shoulders straight and her chin high. “I have not made a decision one way or the other, where divorce is concerned. I do believe, however, that you and I were both saved from a tragic mistake yesterday.”
    He resettled himself in the saddle, an unnecessary motion, since he, like most men in that part of the country, had been riding so long that he was practically part of the horse. “Do you, now? Well, I happen to disagree completely. I’ll wait, Miss Emmeline, until you come to your senses and accept the fact that you’ve thrown in your lot with a scoundrel.”
    Emmeline bit her lower lip and looked away for a moment. She had made up her mind, once and for all, not to marry Mr. Montgomery, but there was possibly some truth in his implication that she was allowing lesser instincts to guide her. “Please,” she said with cool dignity and absolute sincerity. “Don’t wait for me. You deserve someone better.”
    “There is no one better,” he replied easily, and touched the brim of his hat again. “Good day to you, Miss Emmeline.”
    Emmeline did not answer, but instead reined poor Lysandra away from the lush grass and set the surrey moving again.
    When Emmeline reached Gil’s house, she found him straddling the apex of the roof, bare-chested in the June sunlight, wielding a hammer. Seeing her, he immediately reached for his shirt and pulled it on. He was agile as he moved down the inadequate ladder leaning against the front wall of the cabin, and she could easily imagine him climbing the rigging of a ship.
    Gil was buttoning his shirt as he came toward her. His hair was mussed and his smile was tentative, almost cautious, as though he expected bad news. She supposed he’d had more than his share of that—provided his story was true.
    Emmeline bent and picked up the small satchel that had been resting at her feet while Gil waited to help her down from the surrey. Even the act of placing her hand in his seemed wickedly intimate to her, and roused all the old, treacherous sensations.
    She withdrew her hand quickly and clutched it to the gripof the satchel. “I wasn’t able to care for the cattle and horses after you went away,” she blurted out, “so I sold them. Since the livestock was yours, so is the money. Here it is.”
    Gil took the bag she thrust at him, but his expression revealed puzzlement. “You kept it all this time? But if you believed I was dead—”
    “When it became obvious that you weren’t coming back,” Emmeline said,