"Do you like it?"

"You look like you should be going to some palace for dinner with a prince, not to Frank's with me."

Anne looked at him, considering. "Come here." She took his hand and pulled him over in front of the mirror on top of the bureau. "Look."

He did stare into the mirror, but at her, not himself. "You look grand, Annie."

"Not me. You. Us."

He looked again and so did Anne. She was more than a little pleased at what she saw.

Her color was still high from his outrageous compliments, and all the work she had done on her dress had been worthwhile. Sometimes she even admitted to herself she saw glimpses of what made some friends insist she had a glow to her these days. And Cord!

No matter what his sister might say about black suit and white shirt, he looked so handsome she was glad the only other women who would see him today were family. His eyes met hers in the mirror. Warm, light brown eyes that reflected nothing but love.

After a quiet moment, he said, "All right, I see it. We kind of fit, don't we?"

"Kind of. Tiger and Tigress."

Anne turned in his arms for a kiss then hid her face against his shoulder. "I was wrong to accept the invitation without asking you, wasn't I? They're all sure there's going to be another terrible scene, and I'm going to ruin Christmas for everyone, aren't they?"

She pulled out of his arms and went and sat on the bed. "Maybe you should go and visit with them a while and I should stay here. You can tell them I don't feel well. They'll believe that."

Cord leaned back against the edge of the bureau, crossed his arms, and gave her a hard look. She'd been fussing over their clothes and everything else to do with this visit for weeks. Now she looked like a child offering a friend her only piece of candy and claiming she didn't like sweets anyway.

He said, "What the h.e.l.l have they been telling you about my sister?"

"Well, you know."

"No, I don't. Tell me."

"That her marriage was unhappy and it made her bitter and that she has a sharp tongue and you're her favorite target."

"Mm. You thought about what they're probably telling her about you?" She stared up at him, the dismay on her face almost comical.

"She had a d.a.m.n good marriage for over twenty years - only the last few were bad.

Maybe Jim Reading wasn't one of the strongest men ever born, but he was one of the nicest. They lived here on the ranch till I was more than half grown, you know."

Anne shook her head.

"She goes at me about the same as Frank, and for about the same reasons. Whatever the whole bunch of them have been telling her ever since she got here will have her wondering, and when Hannah wonders, she comes up with better answers than Frank or Eph.

He walked over and sat next to her on the bed. "Martha wasn't the only one who mothered Marie and me, you know. After my mother died, Hannah did a lot of the comforting. She bandaged cuts and sc.r.a.pes, nursed us through sicknesses and did most of the schooling. Hannah was the one figured out how I felt after the Hatch business - the whole family almost bankrupted themselves to buy me out of that mess. Said when I had children of my own I'd understand - everything wouldn't have been too much."

He rubbed her swollen belly gently. "Took a long time, but I understand now what she meant. There's no reason you shouldn't like each other, Annie. You're both pretty likable."

"You don't mind that she scolds?"

"Doesn't curse as bad as Frank or Eph."

She gave him a real smile then, and he knew he'd accomplished his purpose.

Anne hugged him. "All right, Dr. Bennett, you've fixed me. Let's go meet your sister."

ANNE STILL FELT A LITTLE nervous as Cord drove to the main ranch. He didn't stop near the entrance to the house but in front of the barn. He got out and opened the big doors and closed them again after she drove Willie inside.

Anne wore a hooded gray wool cape. As he helped her down from the buggy, Cord said, "We may never get to the house the way you look in that hood thing."

Seconds later Anne had lost track of where they were and why they were there. The strong December wind made the loose barn doors creak and groan so loudly sounds of the doors actually opening and closing were lost. She might not have caught the slight sound of a cleared throat either, but Cord stiffened and straightened instantly.

Still slightly dazed from the kiss, Anne turned in his arms to see Luke and Pete leaning one on each side of the barn doors, grinning like a matched pair. Luke was as irreverent as ever. "Gosh, Anne, hasn't anybody told him he can stop bothering with that kissing and hugging stuff until after the baby comes?"

The two of them always made Anne feel like laughing, but she tried not to show it.

"No, and if you convince him of any such thing I'm going to stop practicing my shooting on inanimate objects and take up animate ones."

Pete's grin was fading as he eyed his uncle nervously. "We just came to hurry you along because Aunt Hannah's about to chew the front door down she's so eager to meet you. Next time we'll knock or something."

Anne felt Cord relax finally. He let her go and headed for Willie to start unhitching.

"Might not do much good. World kind of narrows down sometimes."

For once his nephews had enough sense to let a subject go.

Luke said, "We'll unhitch and put the horse up. If you don't get in the house soon, she's going to knock Pa and Uncle Eph out for trying to keep her from coming out here to get you herself."

The two got busy without waiting for permission, and with a final glare Cord put an arm around Anne and led her towards the house.

Anne and Cord were only just inside the door when Luke and Pete came in, out of breath from racing across slippery, frozen ground Cord had guided Anne across carefully.

They weren't going to miss anything if they could help it.

Luke said, "Wow, Anne, you look like a Christmas jewel. You look fantastic, really."

Pete added, "Cord you don't look like a rancher, you look like a rich rancher. Where'd you get that buckle? Is the hatband a Christmas present?"

Their boisterous enthusiasm left Anne breathless with laughter by the time she was introduced to Hannah. Hannah Bennett Reading was a strong-looking woman with dark blonde hair barely touched with gray and bright blue eyes. She favored Frank in her looks and greeted Anne with a female version of Frank's best smile.

Martha was the one who had admitted to Anne how much concern there was in the family over Hannah's visit. Anne thought that Martha might even have told her the story in hopes that she would decide to avoid the family Christmas dinner. Martha also confided that Judith was irritating the whole family with her unshakable conviction that everything was going to be just fine. She emphasized the gravity of the situation by reporting that Frank and Judith had quarreled over it. Evidently that was a rare event, although Anne privately thought anyone married to Frank Bennett ought to be in a constant state of war.

After her introduction to Hannah, Anne went along to the kitchen with the other women, noting Martha's worried frown. As she began helping with the last of the dinner preparations, Anne answered Hannah's probing questions with good nature, buoyed by Cord's words before they left home and the kiss in the barn. Soon Hannah finished her rather gentle questioning and left the kitchen, murmuring something about "a chat with Cord."

Martha had a tight look on her face as she watched Hannah disappear through the doorway. She said, "As soon as she realized Judith and I don't agree with Frank and Ephraim about you, she stopped listening to us. She's always said I have no ability to see any of my own except through a mush-minded haze of emotion."

Martha did not often sound cranky. Anne looked at her with surprise. "She must have a way with words all right. But she can't say that about Judith."

Judith turned from the stove and said, "The whole family has been saying that about me lately - since I began to agree with Martha."

Anne asked curiously, "When did you begin to agree with Martha?"

Judith told her. Anne was amazed. "He never told me!"

"He was worried about what I might do when it happened, but later - he's embarra.s.sed that I caught him so we're pretending it never happened."

Anne grinned at her sisters-in-law. "Luke and Pete caught us kissing in the barn, and he wasn't embarra.s.sed. He was angry." She sobered then, feeling almost wistful. "Do you think he'll ever get over that?"

Martha's unhappy look had been replaced by her more usual calm, pleasant expression. "My dear, he's already having trouble hiding how he feels about you. It's only a matter of time until he realizes he doesn't have to hide it." Then she said, "Now tell me why you're here with us instead of off defending him from Hannah."

Anne managed an innocent look and said, "He says he doesn't need defending. His sister is a nice woman and I'm going to like her and she's going to like me, and there isn't going to be any fuss."

Anne didn't miss the look of absolute triumph Judith gave Martha, or Martha's rueful headshake in response. The three of them continued working in friendly silence, Anne refusing to show concern.

After the greetings in the hall, Cord sat on a small sofa in what the family called the "great room." Huge, high ceilinged, with a floor of plain pine boards and pine paneling, the room could have seemed cold and stark. However, brightly colored braided rugs on the floor and wall decorations of cowhide, branding irons, and spurs gave it a casual warmth.

The rest of men in the family stood in a group on the other side of the room, as far from Cord as they could get. The tension was so thick, Cord almost wished he had something at hand he could drop on the floor just to watch them jump. They were all waiting for Hannah, and they all knew it.

What Cord told Anne before they left home was the truth, but it was an incomplete truth. When he returned from New Mexico he didn't see his sister until after the Boggs fight, and until after Frank and Ephraim gave Hannah their version of that fight. The first time he saw his sister after over six years, she walked up to him, slapped him hard, and said, "I never thought I'd live to see the day I'd be ashamed of you, but I am ashamed."

Cord walked out of Ephraim's house that day without a word and in the years since had avoided Hannah with great skill whenever she visited. On the few occasions she caught him, she subjected him to increasingly vituperative attacks in what he recognized was an attempt to provoke a reaction. Occasionally she succeeded.

Once he said, "You're turning into a viper-tongued shrew," before walking out.

Another time he had muttered, "A saint couldn't stand this," and left.

In the past weeks, however, Cord had given his sister some painful thought. Aside from the fact he was not letting Anne get in the middle of another emotional disaster, if he was now getting along with both his brothers fairly well it was more than time to stop being stubborn about Hannah. He was sure Hannah could be jolted out of the destructive pattern of their recent relationship if he wanted to make the effort. Surprisingly, he did want to. So now he waited, and it wasn't long.

Hannah's face was set in grim lines as she approached, and Cord didn't make the mistake of letting her get the first word in. "So, Hannah, how are you? Frank says things are better."

It was a jolt all right. Her face contorted, and she sat quickly on the sofa. After a long pause, she chose to respond to this ordinary conversation in the same way.

"I'm fine. Things are better. The store is doing better than ever now with Caroline's husband managing it."

Jim Reading's feed and implement store had always made a good profit, but he drank up and gambled away so much money those last years Frank had supported Hannah and her children, including Caroline's husband. Caroline was the oldest daughter. Cord let all that pa.s.s.

Hannah's mouth was trembling, but she had never been one to avoid hard truths.

"Cord. Frank told me what you said - about that fight. If there was any way to take back that slap or the words...." She stopped, too emotional to continue.

"Guess you just did."

Hannah was still shaky, but she had her own rigid self-control. "And since you're sitting still for a minute, I've never thanked you for what you did about Carnes and those other gamblers. Ephraim's letter had no effect on them, and I was afraid to tell Frank the truth. Carnes caught Caroline alone one day and frightened her half to death. We never heard another word from any of them after the day you were there. It must have taken you at least a week, what with the ride down and back."

After Reading's death, Frank paid all the debts he considered legitimate. Three gamblers in the southern Colorado town had notes for huge sums, supposedly gambling debts, that didn't look right to Frank, and he refused to pay them. All three men continued to hara.s.s Hannah and her family, and Ephraim wrote each a letter, threatening legal action if they didn't stop.

Cord overheard Frank and Eph discussing it one day and his a.s.sessment of the situation had been correct - gambling men weren't going to back down over a gentle threat like Ephraim's, and if Frank lost his temper and got involved there was liable to be killing. Cord had a quiet talk with Riley and then disappeared for eight days, riding south and spending a few minutes with each of the three men in turn. It never occurred to him that Hannah would find out.

"What makes you think I had anything to do with your gamblers?"

"A friend of mine saw you go into one saloon. You're rather distinctive, you know.

You and that big ugly horse you insist on riding. There was never another threat after that day."

Cord ignored the slight to Keeper. "Your friends know about me?"

"You don't seriously think a woman who has a brother who can throw a knife accurately over a distance most men can't handle with a pistol doesn't boast occasionally, do you?"

He made no response, so Hannah made her last confession of the day. "I don't like admitting I'm wrong any more than anyone else, but I have to tell you after all my a.s.sertions to the contrary, you look very distinguished in that suit."

Cord felt a strong surge of the old affection for this sister. "Yeah, I do, don't I?"

Hannah relaxed too. "Now tell me the truth about this wife of yours. She seems like a rather delightful creature, but Frank and Ephraim have told me some of the strangest stories."

"Mm. They've been telling her stories too. Had her so scared of you I had to talk her out of staying home today." Cord felt nothing but the purest pleasure at the trouble he knew these words would cause his brothers. He basely hoped she raked them over coals for hours.

Hannah stiffened perceptibly. "Well, I'm going to have to have quite a talk with those two, but that can wait. Did she really run them out of the old house with a gun the first time they tried to visit you?"

"Ran them out all right. Sounds like they left out a few details. After dinner why don't you ask her to tell you the whole story of how we got married? She makes a good tale of it. Bet Martha and Judith never heard it all either."

"All right, I will. How about her - a.s.sault - on Ephraim?"

"That. Her father hired some thugs. Supposed to beat me up and drag her home.

When it got down to the last one Frank and Eph got in the usual panic about me beating the fool to death and started talking about stopping me with a gun. Eph was holding Anne to keep her out of it. She'd have been right in the middle trying to help otherwise."

Hannah nodded. Frank and Ephraim had probably told her a fairly accurate version of the story, just put their own twist on things.

"She thought they were going to shoot me. If she'd understood what they were talking about it wouldn't have made any difference. She's not in favor of having my skull split with a rifle b.u.t.t either. So she kneed Eph, ran out, pulled me off. I got mad, grabbed her and drug her over to Eph and reamed him out for letting her go.

"I kind of noticed he was red in the face and hunched over at the time but didn't pay much mind. If you'd been there you'd have been laughing so hard you couldn't stand. Best part was when she apologized. Said she only gave him 'a little tap.'"

Hannah did laugh at this. Enjoying the conversation thoroughly now, she asked about the last incident. "Luke and Pete claim you told them she beat you once. Pounded your back with her fists."

His nephews were overdue for a hard lesson in discretion Cord thought. Then again, there was no harm telling Hannah as much as he'd told Luke and Pete. "Yeah, she did. I turned my back on her once too often."

"So what did you do?"

"Turned around."

She laughed a second time, then leaned forward and kissed his cheek and hugged him. "Well, dear, one thing I know already. That woman has to have something to do with the fact you're sitting there looking like a cat with cream on his whiskers, and I'm going to love her like a daughter even if she pounds on me." She went back to the kitchen then, smiling broadly.

Before any of the incredulous witnesses summoned the courage to approach him, Judith came to announce dinner was ready, and Anne was on her heels. She sat next to him, alight with pleasure.

"You were right. She's very nice. I do like her." She tipped her head at him in the way that begged for a kiss. "Did she yell at you? We didn't hear anything in the kitchen."

"Nope. Got myself some more hugging and kissing."

"Really? Maybe Frank and Ephraim said nice things about us after all."