"They're bigger, they're stronger. I'd say that makes them boss."

He chuckled, then let out a shout to one of the hands. "Where's Springer?" "Out the east pasture."

"Nice ride out there," Parker said conversationally, and tucked his tongue into his cheek. "Could set you up on a nice, gentle hack."

"I'm going to pretend you didn't just threaten a police officer."

"I like you, city girl." He jerked a thumb. "We'll take a Jeep."

It was probably an exhilarating ride. It certainly seemed to Eve that Roarke enjoyed it. But as far as she was concerned, they were bumping through dangerous terrain full of large bovines, cow shit, and whatever might lurk in the tall grass.

She saw another Jeep. On the flat plain it might have been half a mile away, and closer in, riding along a fence line, a trio of men on horseback. Parker veered toward them, giving his horn a little toot- toot. Cattle lumbered out of the way with a few annoyed moos.

"Need a word with you here, Chuck."

A lean, rawboned man in the ranch uniform of boots, jeans, checked shirt, and hat, gave some signal to his mount. They trotted up, and had Eve easing cautiously toward the far door of the Jeep.

"Boss." He nodded at Roarke, tapped the brim of his hat at Eve.

"Ma'am."

"This lady here's Lieutenant Dallas, city cop from New York. She needs to talk to you."

"Me?" He had a long face, tanned nearly as deep and gold as a deer hide. It registered puzzled shock. "I ain't never been to New York City."

"You're not in any trouble, Mr. Springer, but you might be able to help me in an investigation." And how the hell was she supposed to interview him when he was all the way up there on that horse? "If I could have a few minutes of your time."

"Well." He shifted in the saddle. It creaked. "If the boss says."

He dismounted, with more creaking, yet with a fluidity that made Eve think of water sliding down a sleek rock. He kept the reins in one hand as his mount lowered its head and began to crop grass.

"It's regarding Julianna Dunne," Eve began.

"I heard she got out of prison. They say she killed a man."

"Her counts up to three on this leg," Eve corrected. "You knew her when she lived in this area." "Yep."

"Have you had any contact with her since she left?" "Nope."

"You were friends with her when she lived here." "Not 'xactly."

Eve waited a beat. Texas interview rhythm, she decided, was a whole lot different from New York's. "What exactly were you then, Mr.

Springer?"

"I knew her. She was my daddy's boss's stepdaughter. My boss, too.

Haven't seen hide nor hair of her since she lit out. No reason I should.

Boss, I got fence to ride."

"Chuck, Lieutenant Dallas is trying to do her job. Now if you're thinking I'm going to be peeved over something that went on between you and Julianna when you were a knot-headed teenager, put that aside. You know me well enough, know what happened with me well enough." He paused there as Chuck frowned down at his boots. "I figure you don't hold that against me. The same's gonna go. The lieutenant wants to know if you tumbled Julianna."

The man blushed. Eve watched, fascinated, as dull red crept under the deep gold tan. "Aw, Jake T., I can't talk about that sort of thing with a woman."

Eve pulled out her shield. "Talk to the badge."

"Mr. Parker," Roarke began. "I wonder if we might walk the field a bit. I've a cattle ranch in Montana and some interest in the process."

"Watch your step," Parker advised, and climbed out. "Chuck, you do what's right here."

Because she felt stupid sitting in the Jeep alone, Eve risked getting out. The horse immediately raised its head, butted her shoulder. She didn't punch it with the fist balled at her side, but it was very close.

"He's just seeing if you got anything more interesting to eat than grass on you." Chuck ran a hand down the horse's nose. "This one's always looking for a handout."

"Tell him I'm empty." Eve scooted to the side, put Chuck firmly between herself and the horse. When it whinnied, it sounded like laughter. "Tell me about Julianna, Chuck."

"Jeez. I was sixteen." He pushed his hat back on his head, took out a bandanna to mop sweat from his brow. "Boy's sixteen, he doesn't think with his brain. If you know what I mean."

"You had sex with her."

"She'd come out to the stables. Mucking out was part of my chores.

She'd smell like glory and be wearing some tight shirt and tiny little shorts. God almighty, she was a looker. We started fooling around the way kids do. Then we started fooling around some more." He stared down at his boots again. "We'd sneak out of the house a lot that summer, make love in one of the stalls. I'd always put fresh hay in. Then she started coming up to the house, climbing in through my window. It was exciting at first, but, Jesus, my ma found out, she'd of skinned me alive. And, well damn it, I was sixteen, and there were all these other girls. Guy starts looking around. Julianna, she'd barely give me room to breathe, and it started making me itchy."

"You broke it off with her."

"Tried to once, and she tore into me like a hellcat." He looked up again. "Biting, scratching. Nobody pushed her aside, she said.

Scared me, cause she looked half- crazy. Then she started crying and begging, and well, one thing led to another and we were at it again. And the next day, Julianna marches right into my house, into the kitchen, and tells my mother I've been poking at her. And if she doesn't send me away somewhere, she's going to her step-daddy and have my daddy fired."

He paused, then to Eve's surprise, smiled. "My ma, she never did take shit off anybody. Boss's daughter or not. Tells Julianna she's not to come into her home without an invitation ever again. And she won't tolerate some little tramp-called her that-standing in her kitchen threatening her family. Told her to scat, and if there'd been poking going on, that poking would damn well stop. Said she'd be speaking to Julianna's ma about it."

"Did she?"

"My ma says she's going to do something, she does it, so I gotta figure. Never told me what was said between them, but Julianna didn't come 'round the stables again that summer. Didn't see her around at all.

But I got house arrest for a damn month myself and a lecture that burned my ears off."

"And after that summer?"

"I never really talked with her again. She came up to me once when I was out with a girl, said insulting things about a sensitive part of my anatomy. Said it in a quiet voice, real cold, with a smirk on her face.

And once I found a dead skunk in my bed-had to figure it was her.

And..."

"And?"

"Never told anybody." He shifted, set his jaw. "Night before my wedding, that would be six years ago last month, she called me. Said she wanted to give me her best wishes. But it was the way she said it, like she was, beg pardon, telling me to screw myself. And how she knew I'd be thinking of her on my wedding night, because she'd be thinking of me. How maybe she'd come see me sometime, and we'd talk about old times. I knew she was in prison. It shook me up a little, but I didn't see the point in telling anybody. I was getting married the next day."

"Has she contacted you since?"

"No, but this past Valentine's Day I got a package. There was a dead rat inside. Looked like it'd been poisoned. I didn't tell anybody about that either. Just got rid of it. Ma'am, I was sixteen. We just rolled in the hay for a couple months one summer. I got a wife, a son, a baby on the way. What the hell does she want to mess with me for after all this time?"

"He rejected her," Eve told Roarke when they were back in the car.

"She went after a boy her own age, and he stopped wanting her before she stopped wanting him. Then his mother stood up to her.

Two slaps. Intolerable."

"If she'd been a normal girl, that would have crushed her temporarily. Then she'd have moved on. Instead, she decided to seduce her stepfather. Older men, like her father, were more easily controlled, more inclined to see her as flawless."