"He wouldn't want you to give up living for him." A small, bittersweet smile pulled at her lips, then slid, quivering into a frown. "How did you get to know him so well?"

"He was an easy man to know." This time her watery smile stayed a heartbeat Ion before melting downward. "Yes, he was."

"Talk to him," he said again. "Say good-bye."

"That's dumb."

"So what, you're drunk."

She almost laughed. Then, slowly, she lifted her heavy head and stared at the blank rectangle where no grass yet grew. Just looking at it made her feel sick and queasy.

Her hands started to shake, her mouth curved downward. But she wanted to say good-bye to him, ached to do it. She wanted to say all the things she'd meant to say to him when he was alive, but somehow never had.

"I feel stupid," she said.

"Don't."

She licked her lips, and tried to look away, tried to ignore Mad Dog's seductive words. But her gaze kept coming back to Rass's cold, dark grave.

Sweet God, she missed him. There were so many things she wanted to say to him, so many things she should have already said. Daddy ... I'm so sorry about the way I shut you out of my life. I thought... 7 don't know what I thought. I guess I believed we had forever. The formless, desperate words swirled through her head, brought back a million painful memories.

Tears seared her eyes, turned the grave into a wavering smear. A lump of emotion swelled in her throat. / wish I'd told you how much I loved you . ... and not just when you were dying. I should have told you a long time ago ... after Stephen and Thomas. After Mama.

Mama. The word cut through her like a knife, bringing a steel-sharp stab of pain. A single tear slid down her cheek and splashed on the hand curled in her lap.

Oh, God, I miss you both so much....

She made a choking, gasping sound and started to cry. "Oh, God . .."

Mad Dog curled his arms around her, held her tightly. Her body spasmed. Hot tears ran in rivulets down her cheeks and dampened his' shirt. The salty, poignant smell of them filled her senses and made her cry even harder.

He stroked her tangled hair and the moist sides of her face. "It's okay." He murmured the soothing words over and over again, calming her. "I miss them so much, Matt." She cried and cried and cried, until her throat was parched and dry and a headache pounded behind her eyes. She cried for her parents, for her lost youth, for her baby. For all the things she'd never cried for before. She smelled lavender.

Gasping, she jerked her head up. Overhead, the stars seemed to be shifting, merging into a huge, white-hot ball in the center of the sky.

"The stars are moving," she said, sniffling hard and wiping her eyes.

"Hallucinations. It's the second stage of tequila." Mad Dog dabbed the moisture from her cheek. "It'll go away."

She closed her eyes and then slowly opened them. And saw her mother and father standing behind the iron settee.

She gasped. "Mama . . . Daddy . .." We love you, Mariah.

Mariah heard the words, felt them, as clearly as if they'd been spoken aloud. Her parents said nothing else, but in that instant, that heartbeat, Mariah felt their warm, unconditional love. It seeped through her, filling the dark, lonely spots in her soul.

She knew then, without question, that they understood. That they'd always understood. And they loved her.

Jesus, they loved her. With all her faults and mistakes and stupid silences, they loved her.

She looked up at them. "Thomas?" She whispered his name quietly, hopefully.

Her mother smiled. His soul was reborn.

New tears burned across Mariah's eyes, but this time they were happy, loving tears.

For the first time in her life, she felt filled with hope and light. She brought a hand to her face and swiped the tears away.

And when she pulled her arm away, her parents were gone.

She felt a moment's sadness at their passing, but it lasted no longer than that. She smiled at Mad Dog, blinking through the tears. "Did you see them?"

He frowned. "See who?"

She pushed the hair out of her eyes. "I guess not," she said, laughing easily.

Mad Dog eyed her steadily. "Feel better?"

"Oh, God, you have no idea... ."

"Who's Thomas?"

Almost involuntarily, she glanced back at the small, grown-over patch near her mama's grave. For the first time in years, she looked at it without feeling a crushing, smothering sense of guilt. "He was my son."

Mad Dog made a soft sound of surprise. "Your son?"

She turned to him, looked into his eyes. "Remember my two-minutes loss of virginity?"

"Yeah."

"I got pregnant."

"Oh, Mariah." He touched her cheek, a feather-stroke touch of compassion that made her shiver.

"I wrote to Stephen when I found out—his acting troupe was in Spokane by then.

He said he'd meet me in Walla Walla and marry me." Surprisingly, she felt no bitterness about Stephen now; only a thread of sadness at her own naivete. "I shouldn't have believed him, but I did—I was only .sixteen. Of course, he stood me up at the altar."

"How ... how did Thomas die?" She started to cry again, soft, melting tears that slid down her cheeks and splashed on her skirt. "He never really lived. I had him almost six weeks too early. He was so tiny. . .. There was nothing Doc Sherman could do.

Doc ... said there shouldn't be any more."

Mad Dog touched her cheek. "Shouldn't. Or couldn't?" Mariah tried to smile. "He said I didn't 'carry' well and shouldn't have any more." \

"My mom had four miscarriages before she had me. \ The doctors told her the same thing. And you were sixteen years old. You're stronger now."

Her breath caught, her eyes rounded. A quivering sense of hope, new and more powerful than anything she'd ever imagined, spiraled through her. "Maybe." i, That's all she said, just maybe, but the word freed something inside her, made her, for once, believe. "Why isn't there a marker?"

She glanced back at the small grave, remembering \ the tiny little box that lay beneath the frozen grass. She shook her head, realizing for the first time why she hadn't purchased one. "I couldn't say good-bye."

Still staring at the grave, she pushed to her feet and stumbled over to it. Awkwardly she sank to her knees and leaned forward, pressing her forehead into the prickly blanket of winter grass. The smell of it combined with the fecund fragrance of the dirt and filled her senses. Overhead, the last remaining leaves whickered together; one fell silently downward and landed on Mariah's hair.

"Good-bye, Thomas," she said throatily, letting the cleansing tears fall. "I love you, baby."

She had no idea how long she sat there. It could have been minutes or hours. Then, slowly, she straightened.

Across the row of graves, her eyes met Mad Dog's. At the sight of him, sitting there in the darkness, waiting for her, she felt a surge of blistering emotion.

"Matt." She whispered his name and held out her arms.

He was beside her in an instant, picking her up. She snuggled close to him, burying her face in the crook of his neck. "Thank you," she murmured, tasting the salty, familiar tang of his skin against her lips.

Mariah breathed deeply and lolled her head back, staring up at the sky as Mad Dog walked away from the graves.

At the movement, nausea punched her in the stomach. She groaned in surprise and clutched her writhing midsection. The stars blurred, pulsed. "I don't feel so good all of a sudden."

Mad Dog's soft laughter enfolded her. "I'm not surprised."

She blinked sleepily, tried to focus. "Where are we?" He stopped at a door and kicked it open. "At the bunkhouse. Home sweet home."

His hold on her loosened, and Mariah slithered bonelessly to the floor. "Oops." She giggled and tried to clamp a hand over her mouth, but she missed and smacked herself in the nose.

Mad Dog grabbed her by the forearm and hauled her to her feet. She leaned against him, clutching her stomach. Nausea lurched into her throat and lodged there, throbbing.

"Do you want to lay down?" His voice seemed to come at her from a million miles away. Dully she nodded. The simple action seemed to take forever.

He started to maneuver her toward the bed, but at the movement, something in her stomach gave way. Without warning, she threw up all over his bed. He stared at the bed. "Aw, shit." She was horrified for a second, then she giggled. "S-Sorry."

He laughed and scooped her into his arms again, carrying her into the house. In the bathing room, he helped her brush her teeth, then hauled her up the stairs and put her in bed. Then he started to leave.

She held her hands out, blinked sleepily up at him. "Don't go. I want you...."

He smiled softly, brushed a lock of hair from her face. "You need sleep. And besides, you're drunk as a skunk." He gave her a wolfish, sexy grin. "Tomorrow, when you're sober, we'll talk.. .."

"Then just sleep with me."

Mad Dog paused. "Just sleep?"

"Please ..."

"Why not?" Smiling, he stripped out of his clothes and crawled naked in bed beside her, drawing her close.

She laid a cheek on his bare chest and smiled peacefully. "I'm sorry I threw up on your bed."

He stroked her hair. "Don't worry, you're not the first woman to do so."

"You're not supposed to compare me to other women."

He chuckled. "I didn't think it was important to be the first to throw up on someone."

She snuggled against him, curling her arm possessively around his body. The familiar soap-and-water scent of his skin filled her nostrils. A long, contented sigh escaped her mouth.

"I like tequila...." Before the words had even left her mouth, she was asleep.

Chapter Twenty-four Mariah woke slowly. She had a second of oblivion, then she remembered last night. Pain surged through her at the memory.

She blinked, feeling the warm, wet streak of a single tear as it fell down her cheek.

She knew somehow that she would have many mornings in her life like this, mornings when she woke up and thought of her parents, her son; the loved ones she had lost. And though the pain was still there, still ached in her heart, for the first time in her life, she knew she could go on. Knew someday she could smile again.

She pushed to her elbows, staring down at the man beside her. Sunlight crept through the window and wreathed him in a halo of wavering gold. He lay on his back, one arm flung over the side of the bed, the other scrunched up protectively against his chest.

She loved him.

She didn't need her father to tell her how she felt anymore. His smile, his laughter, his gentleness, his honesty. They were all invisible threads that bound her to him like steels bands.

She thought about last night, about all that he'd given her, and she ached to give something back to him. But she had nothing of value, nothing that he needed.

What about love?

The thought came to her out of nowhere, stunning her with its simple power.

Before she could stop it, hope crept into her soul and seized hold, refusing to be rationalized away.

Maybe beneath that swaggering, smiling exterior, he was as lonely as she, as tired of being alone. Maybe he needed her as much as she needed him. Maybe, someday, he could even learn to love her.