Two Alone

“Cattle?”

“Some. Horses mostly.”

“Where?”

“Rogers Gap.”

“Where’s that?”

“In the Sierra Nevada.”

“Never heard of it.”

“I’m not surprised.”

“Can you make a living at just ranching?”

“I do all right.”

“Is Rogers Gap close to Bishop? Do people ski there?”

“We have a few runs. Serious skiers consider them a real challenge. Personally I think they’re some of the most spectacular on the continent.”

“Then why haven’t I ever heard of this place?”

“We’re a carefully guarded secret and want to remain that way. We don’t advertise.”

“Why?” Her interest was piqued. She never passed up an opportunity to locate new and interesting property for her clients to invest in. “With the right developer handling it, you could make something out of Rogers Gap. If it’s as good for skiing as you say, it could become the next Aspen.”

“God forbid,” he said under his breath. “That’s the point. We don’t want to be put on the map. We don’t want our mountains to be littered with concrete condos or the peaceful community to be overrun by a bunch of pushing, shoving, rude skiers from Beverly Hills who are more interested in modeling their Rodeo Drive duds than preserving our landscape.”

“Does everyone in town hold to this philosophy?”

“Fortunately, yes, or they wouldn’t be living there. We don’t have much going for us except the scenery and the tranquility.”

She tossed her denuded bones into the fire. “You sound like a holdover from the sixties.”

“I am.”

Her eyes were teasing. “Were you a flower child, advocating universal harmony? Did you march for peace and participate in war protests?”

“No,” he replied sharply. Rusty’s goading grin collapsed. “I couldn’t wait to join up. I wanted to go to war. I was too ignorant to realize that I would have to kill people or get killed myself. I hadn’t bargained on getting captured and imprisoned. But I did. After seven months in that stinking hole, I escaped and came home a hero.”

He practically snarled the last sentence. “The guys in that POW camp would have killed each other for a meal like the one you just ate.” His gray eyes looked like glittering knife blades as they sliced toward her. “So I’m not overwhelmed by your Beverly Hills glitz and glamour, Miss Carlson.”

He stood up abruptly. “I’m going for more water. Don’t wander off.”

Don’t wander off, she silently mimicked. All right, he had put her in her place, but she wasn’t going to wear sackcloth and ashes for the rest of her life. Lots of men had fought in Vietnam and returned to lead happy, productive lives. It was Cooper’s own fault if he was maladjusted. He thrived on his own bitterness. That’s what fueled him. He nursed it. He cultivated his quarrel with society because he felt it owed him something.

Maybe it did. But it wasn’t her fault. She wasn’t responsible for whatever misfortune had befallen him. Just because he walked around with a chip on his shoulder the size of Mount Everest didn’t make him a worthier human being than she was.

He returned, but they maintained a hostile silence while she drank her fill of water from the thermos. Just as wordlessly, he assisted her as she hobbled out of the clearing for a few minutes of privacy. When he eased her back down onto the thick pallet, which had become the nucleus of their world, he said, “I need to check your leg. Hold the flashlight for me.”

She watched as he unbound the bandages and pulled them back to reveal a jagged, uneven row of stitches. She stared at it in horror, but he seemed pleased with his handiwork. With his hands around her calf muscles, he raised her leg to inspect it closer. “No signs of new infection. Swelling’s gone down.”

“The scar,” she whispered roughly.

He looked up at her. “There wasn’t much I could do about that.” His lower lip thinned until it was hardly visible beneath his mustache. “Just be glad I didn’t have to cauterize it.”