"No one simply loses Rosario. I may have no liking for him, but I respect his skills."

"I hammered him on the head with my peacemaker," Jarret explained.

"Then I lost him."

"I didn't trust him."

"Because he's an Indian?"

"Because he wanted you too badly. I was afraid for Mary if she got in the middle." He glanced over his shoulder. The sight of Mary still sleeping comfortably in the chair raised a smile.

"And she can't seem to help herself. I used to think it was her habit, now I realize it's just her way."

Ryder nodded, understanding.

"Then, thank you," he said quietly, "for realizing what her father couldn't and acting on it." Jarret took off his hat and ran his fingers through his hair.

"Jay Mac's not thinking straight. You can't blame him. You have his little girl. I suppose you'd have to have a daughter of your own to appreciate what he's going through."

"What makes you think I don't?" Frowning, Jarret pinned Ryder with a hard, cold look.

"What are you saying?"

"I have.. . had a daughter," he said.

It was odd to him that he was telling this to Jarret Sullivan. The words he was speaking he had meant to share with Mary.

"She was murdered in her cradle board My wife .. . her family .. .

they were all killed in the same raid." Jarret's stare could not penetrate the mask that Ryder had drawn over his features. Here was grief so profound, Jarret thought, that it could not be made visible.

"I didn't know," he said.

"Not many do."

"Mary?"

Ryder shook his head. "I haven't-" He broke off as a movement behind Jarret caught his attention. At first he didn't know what had changed.

Mary hadn't shifted in the chair. Her legs were still curled under her. The tilt of her head was exactly the same.

Her shoulder sloped at an identical angle. Ryder's gaze went back to Mary's face and locked on the forest green eyes that were returning his regard. The movement that had anchored his attention was the raising of her eyelids. The emotion he saw in her gaze was more hurt than anger. Jarret followed the drift of Ryder's attention, turning to face Mary. He saw immediately that she had heard. Her expression seemed to confirm that Moira was indeed right about her daughter's feelings for Ryder McKay.

"Hello, Mary," he said gently. He bent and kissed her warm cheek. Mary blinked and the emotion that had been in her eyes for both men to see was shuttered.

"Jarret." She said his name politely, as if he were an unwelcome guest, but good manners forbade her from behaving less than graciously.

To Jarret, her tone was another sign of her hurt and confusion. Mary Francis Dennehy had never been one to stand on ceremony.

"How are you feeling?" She straightened, running one hand through her hair in a negligent fashion. There was a vertical crease between her brows as she frowned, trying to shed the dregs of her heavy sleep.

"What are you doing here?"

Jarret looked back at Ryder.

"Trust her to come straight to the point." Mary wasn't amused. She came to her feet, a little unsteadily at first, but she had no use for Jarret's extended hand.

Brushing past him, she went to the bed.

"Let me see your leg," she said. Although her tone brooked no argument, Ryder tried to object. She stared him down.

"All right," he said, giving in. Over Mary's shoulder, he could see Jarret's interest in the exchange. He pushed back the blanket and let her examine the wound.

"It's better," she pronounced.

"Wishful thinking," Ryder told Jarret.

"It is," she said.

"Look.

Some of the redness is gone. I think the poison is gone.

Jarret, come and look at this."

"He's already seen it," Ryder said, even as Jarret was approaching.

"He knows I'm going to lose my leg." Mary's head swung in Jarret's direction.

"Is he right?" she demanded.

"Is that what you think?" It was what he had thought when he'd first seen the wound. Now he saw Mary's fierce determination and remembered what it was like to fly in the face of that.

"What I think," he said heavily, almost on a sigh, "is that there's something in my saddlebags that might help."

Chapter Eleven.

Once Jarret was gone from the chamber Ryder was left basking in Mary's triumphant smile.

"How do you do it?" he asked.

"How do you get people to move in ways they're not at all inclined to pursue?"

"I'd like to think they respond to superior reasoning," she said primly.

"The truth is, I bully them." The real truth was somewhere in between, Ryder decided. Not that Mary wasn't capable of sound reasoning and bullying tactics, but it was her ability to make people believe in her, and in the things she believed in, that had them stepping lively to her tune.

"Lie down," she said.