Diamond in the Rough

“And just who is ‘we’?” McGuire wanted to know.

“My brother and I. We’re ranchers.”

“But why would you want to lease a feed store in the middle of nowhere?”

“Because we just bought the Bradbury place. We’re going to rebuild the house, add a stable and a barn, and we’re going to raise purebred young bulls on the place. The feed store is going to do a lot of business when we start adding personnel to the outfit.”

“Old man Bradbury and my father were best friends,” McGuire reminisced. “He was a fine rancher, a nice gentleman. His health failed and the business failed with him. It’s nice to know it will be a working ranch again.”

“It’s good land. We’ll make it pay.”

“What did you say your name was?”

“Callister,” John told him. “My brother and I have a sizable spread over in Medicine Ridge.”

“Those Callisters? My God, your holdings are worth millions!”

“At least.” John chuckled.

There was a soft whistle. “Well, if you’re going to keep me in orders, I suppose I’d be willing to lease the place to you.”

“And the manager?”

“I just moved him there,” McGuire groaned again.

“We’ll pay to move him back to Billings and give him two weeks severance pay,” John said. “I will not agree to let him stay on,” he added firmly.

“He may sue.”

“Let him,” John replied tersely. “If he tries it, I’ll make it my life’s work to see that any skeleton in his past is brought into the light of day. You can tell him that.”

“I’ll tell him.”

“If you’ll give me your attorney’s name and number, I’ll have our legal department contact him,” John said. “I think we’ll get along.”

There was a deep chuckle. “So do I.”

“There’s one other matter.”

“Yes?”

John hesitated. “I’m going to be working on the place myself, but I don’t want anyone local to know who I am. I’ll be known as the ranch foreman—Taggert by name. Got that?”

There was a chuckle. “Keeping it low-key, I see. Sure. I won’t blow your cover.”

“Especially to Tarleton and his employee,” John emphasized.

“No problem. I’ll tell him your boss phoned me.”

“I’m much obliged.”

“Before we settle this deal, do you have someone in mind who can take over the business in two weeks if I put Tarleton on notice?”

“Indeed I do,” John replied. “He’s a retired corporate executive who’s bored stiff with retirement. Mind like a steel trap. He could make money in the desert.”

“Sounds like just the man for the job.”

“I’ll have him up here in two weeks.”

“That’s a deal, then.”

“We’ll talk again when the paperwork goes through.”

“Yes.”

John hung up. He felt better about the girl. Not that he expected Tarleton to quit the job without a fight. He hoped the threat of uncovering any past sins would work the magic. The thought of Sassy being bothered by that would-be Casanova was disturbing.

He phoned the architect and asked him to come over to the ranch the following day to discuss drawing up plans for a stable and a barn. He hired an electrician to rewire the house and do the work in the new construction. He employed six new cowboys and an engineer. He set up payroll for everyone he’d hired through the corporation’s main offices in Medicine Ridge, and went about getting fences repaired and wells drilled. He also phoned Gil and had him send down a team of engineers to start construction on solar panels to help provide electricity for the operation.

Once those plans were underway, he made a trip into Hollister to see how things were going at the feed store. His detective had managed to dig up three other harassment charges against Tarleton from places he’d lived before he moved to Montana in the first place. There were no convictions, sadly. But the charges might be enough. Armed with that information, he wasn’t uncomfortable having words with the man, if it was necessary.

And it seemed that it would be. The minute he walked in the door, he knew there was going to be trouble. Tarleton was talking to a customer, but he gave John a glare that spoke volumes. He finished his business with the customer and waited until he left. Then he walked up to John belligerently.

“What the hell did your employer tell my boss?” he demanded furiously. “He said he was leasing the store, but only on the condition that I didn’t go with the deal!”

“Not my problem,” John said, and his pale eyes glittered. “It was my boss’s decision.”

“Well, he’s got no reason to fire me!” Tarleton said, his round face flushing. “I’ll sue the hell out of him, and your damned boss, too!”

John stepped closer to the man and leaned down, emphasizing his advantage in height. “You’re welcome. My boss will go to the local district attorney in Billings and turn over the court documents from your last sexual harassment charge.”

Tarleton’s face went from red to white in seconds. He froze in place. “He’ll…what?” he asked weakly.

John’s chiseled lips pulled up into a cold smile. “And I’ll encourage your hired girl over there—” he indicated her with a jerk of his head “—to come clean about the way you’ve treated her as well. I think she could be persuaded to bring charges.”

Tarleton’s arrogance vanished. He looked hunted.

“Take my advice,” John said quietly. “Get out while you still have time. My boss won’t hesitate a second. He has two daughters of his own.” His eyes narrowed menacingly. “One of our ranch hands back home tried to wrestle a temporary maid down in the hay out in our barn. He’s serving three to five for sexual assault.” John smiled. “We have a firm of attorneys on retainer.”

“We?” Tarleton stammered.

“I’m a managerial employee of the ranch. The ranch is a corporation,” John replied smoothly.

Tarleton’s teeth clenched. “So I guess I’m fired.”

“I guess you volunteered to resign,” John corrected. “That gets you moved back to Billings at the ranch’s expense, and gives you severance pay. It also spares you lawsuits and other…difficulties.”

The older man weighed his options. John could see his mind working. Tarleton gave John an arrogant look. “What the hell,” he said coldly. “I didn’t want to live in this damned fly trap anyway!”

He turned on his heel and walked away. The girl, Sassy, was watching the byplay with open curiosity. John raised an eyebrow. She flushed and went back to work at once.

CHAPTER TWO

CASSANDRA PEALE told herself that the intense conversation the new foreman of the Bradbury place was having with her boss didn’t concern her. The foreman had made that clear with a lifted eyebrow and a haughty look. But there had been an obvious argument and both men had glanced at her while they were having it. She was worried. She couldn’t afford to lose her job. Not when her mother, dying of lung cancer, and her mother’s ward, Selene, who was only six, depended on what she brought home so desperately.

She gnawed on a fingernail. They were mostly all chewed off. Her mother was sixty-three, Cassandra, who everyone called Sassy, having been born very late in life. They’d had a ranch until her father had become infatuated with a young waitress at the local cafeteria. He’d left his family and run away with the woman, taking most of their savings with him. Without money to pay bills, Sassy’s mother had been forced to sell the cattle and most of the land and let the cowboys go. One of them, little Selene’s father, had gotten drunk out of desperation and ran his truck off into the river. They’d found him the next morning, dead, leaving Selene completely alone in the world.

My life, Sassy thought, is a soap opera. It even has a villain. She glanced covertly at Mr. Tarleton. All he needed was a black mustache and a gun. He’d made her working life hell. He knew she couldn’t afford to quit. He was always bumping into her “accidentally,” trying to handle her. She was sickened by his advances. She’d never even had a boyfriend. The school she’d gone to, in this tiny town, had been a one-room schoolhouse with all ages included and one teacher. There had only been two boys her own age and three girls including Sassy. The other girls were pretty. So Sassy had never been asked out at all. Once, when she was in her senior year of high school, a teacher’s visiting nephew had been kind to her, but her mother had been violently opposed to letting her go on a date with a man she didn’t know well. It hadn’t mattered. Sassy had never felt those things her romance novels spoke of in such enticing and heart-pattering terms. She’d never even been kissed in a grown-up way. Her only sexual experience—if you could call it that—was being physically harassed by that repulsive would-be Romeo standing behind the counter.

She finished dusting the shelves and wished fate would present her with a nice, handsome boss who was single and found her fascinating. She’d have gladly settled for the Bradbury place’s new ramrod. But he didn’t look as if he found anything about her that attracted him. In fact, he was ignoring her. Story of my life, she thought as she put aside the dust cloth. It was just as well. She had two dependents and no spare time. Where would she fit a man into her desperate life?

“Missed a spot.”

She whirled. She flushed as she looked way up into dancing blue eyes. “W…what?”

John chuckled. The women in his world were sophisticated and full of easy wisdom. This little violet was as unaffected by the modern world as the store she worked in. He was entranced by her.

“I said you missed a spot.” He leaned closer. “It was a joke.”

“Oh.” She laughed shyly, glancing at the shelf. “I might have missed several, I guess. I can’t reach high and there’s no ladder.”

He smiled. “There’s always a soapbox.”

“No, no,” she returned with a smile. “If I get on one of those, I have to give a political speech.”

He groaned. “Don’t say those words,” he said. “If I have to hear one more comment about the presidential race, I’m having my ears plugged.”

“It does get a little irritating, doesn’t it?” she asked. “We don’t watch the news as much since the television got hit by lightning. The color’s gone whacky. I have to think it’s a happy benefit of a sad accident.”

His eyebrows arched. “Why don’t you get a new one?”

She glowered at him. “Because the hardware store doesn’t have a fifty-cent one,” she said.

It took a minute for that to sink in. John, who thought nothing of laying down his gold card for the newest plasma wide screened TV, hadn’t realized that even a small set was beyond the means of many lower-income people.

He grimaced. “Sorry,” he said. “I guess I’ve gotten too used to just picking up anything I like in stores.”

“They don’t arrest you for that?” she asked with a straight face, but her twinkling eyes gave her away.

He laughed. “Not so far. I meant,” he added, thinking fast, “that my boss pays me a princely salary for my organizational skills.”

“He must, if you can afford a new TV,” she sighed. “I don’t suppose he needs a professional duster?”

“We could ask him.”

She shook her head. “I’d rather work here, in a job I do know.” She glanced with apprehension at her boss, who was glaring toward the two of them. “I’d better get back to work before he fires me.”

“He can’t.”

She blinked. “He can’t what?”

“Fire you,” he said quietly. “He’s being replaced in two weeks by a new manager.”

Her heart stopped. She felt sick. “Oh, dear.”

“You won’t convince me that you’ll miss him,” John said curtly.

She bit a fingernail that was already almost gone. “It’s not that. A new manager might not want me to work here anymore…”

“He will.”

She frowned. “How can you know that?”

He pursed his lips. “Because the new manager works for my boss, and my boss said not to change employees.”

Her face started to relax. “Really?”

“Really.”

She glanced again at Tarleton and felt uncomfortable at the furious glare he gave her. “Oh, dear, did somebody say something to your boss about him…about him being forward with me?” she asked worriedly.

“They might have,” he said noncommittally.

“He’ll get even,” she said under her breath. “He’s that sort. He told a lie on a customer who was rude to him, about the man’s wife. She almost lost her job over it.”

John felt his blood rise. “All you have to do is get through the next two weeks,” he told her. “If you have a problem with him, any problem, you can call me. I don’t care when or what time.” He started to pull out his wallet and give her his business card, until he realized that she thought he was pretending to be hired help, not the big boss. “Have you got a pen and paper?” he asked instead.

“In fact, I do,” she replied. She moved behind the counter, tore a piece of brown paper off a roll, and picked up a marking pencil. She handed them to him.

He wrote down the number and handed it back to her. “Don’t be afraid of him,” he added curtly. “He’s in enough trouble without making more for himself with you.”

“What sort of trouble is he in?” she wanted to know.

“I can’t tell you. It’s confidential. Let’s just say that he’d better keep his nose clean. Now. I need a few more things.” He brought out a list and handed it to her. She smiled and went off to fill the order for him.

He took the opportunity to have a last word with Tarleton.

“I hear you have a penchant for getting even with people who cross you,” John said. His eyes narrowed and began to glitter. “For the record, if you touch that girl, or if you even try to cause problems for her of any sort, you’ll have to deal with me. I don’t threaten people with lawsuits. I get even.” The way he said it, added to his even, unblinking glare, had backed down braver men than this middle-aged molester.

Tarleton tried to put on a brave front, but the man’s demeanor was unsettling. Taggert was younger than Tarleton and powerfully muscled for all his slimness. He didn’t look like a man who ever walked away from a fight.

“I wouldn’t touch her in a blind fit,” the older man said haughtily. “I just want to work out my notice and get the hell back to Billings, where people are more civilized.”

“Good idea,” John replied. “Follow it.”

He turned on his heel and went back to Sassy.

She looked even more nervous now. “What did you say to him?” she asked uneasily, because Tarleton looked at her as if he’d like her served up on a spit.

“Nothing of any consequence,” he said easily, and he gave her a tender smile. “Got my order ready?”

“Most of it,” she said, obviously trying to get her mind back to business. “But we don’t carry any of this grass seed you want. It would be special order.” She leaned forward. “The hardware store can get it for you at a lower price, but I think we will be faster.”

He grinned. “The price won’t matter to my boss,” he assured her. “But speed will. He’s experimenting with all sorts of forage grasses. He’s looking for better ways to increase weight without resorting to artificial means. He thinks the older grasses have more nutritional benefit than the hybrids being sowed today.”

“He’s likely right,” she replied. “Organic methods are gaining in popularity. You wouldn’t believe how many organic gardeners we have locally.”

“That reminds me. I need some insecticidal soap for the beans we’re planting.”

She hesitated.

He cocked his head. His eyes twinkled. “You want to tell me something, but you’re not sure that you should.”

She laughed. “I guess so. One of our organic gardeners gave up on it for beans. She says it works nicely for tomatoes and cucumbers, but you need something with a little more kick for beans and corn. She learned that the hard way.” She grimaced. “So did I. I lost my first corn planting to corn borers and my beans to bean beetles. I was determined not to go the harsh pesticide route.”

“Okay. Sell me something harsh, then,” he chuckled.

She blushed faintly before she pulled a sack of powerful but environmentally safe insecticide off the shelf and put it on the counter.

Tarleton was watching the byplay with cold, angry eyes. So she liked that interfering cowboy, did she? It made him furious. He was certain that the new foreman of the Bradbury ranch had talked to someone about him and passed the information on to McGuire, who owned this feed store. The cowboy was arrogant for a man who worked for wages, even for a big outfit like the Callisters’s. He was losing his job for the second time in six months and it would look bad on his record. His wife was already sick of the moving. She might leave him. It was a bad day for him when John Taggert walked into his store. He hoped the man fell in a well and drowned, he really did.

His small eyes lingered on Sassy’s trim figure. She really made him hot. She wasn’t the sort to put up much of a fight, and that man Taggert couldn’t watch her day and night. Tarleton smiled coldly to himself. If he was losing his job anyway, he didn’t have much to lose. Might as well get something out of the experience. Something sweet.

Sassy went home worn-out at the end of the week. Tarleton had found more work than ever before for her to do, mostly involving physical labor. He was rearranging all the shelves with the heaviest items like chicken mash and hog feed and horse feed and dog food in twenty-five and fifty-pound bags. Sassy could press fifty pounds, but she was slight and not overly muscular. It was uncomfortable. She wished she could complain to someone, but if she did, it would only make things worse. Tarleton was getting even because he’d been fired. He watched her even more than he had before, and it was in a way that made her very uncomfortable.

Her mother was lying on the sofa watching television when Sassy got home. Little Selene was playing with some cut-outs. Her soft gray eyes lit up and she jumped up and ran to Sassy, to be picked up and kissed.

“How’s my girl?” Sassy asked, kissing the soft little cheek.

“I been playing with Dora the Explorer, Sassy!” the little blond girl told her. “Pippa gave them to me at school!”

Pippa was the daughter of a teacher and her husband, a sweet child who always shared her playthings with Selene. It wasn’t a local secret that Sassy could barely afford to dress the child out of the local thrift shop, much less buy her toys.

“That was sweet of her,” Sassy said with genuine delight.

“She says I can keep these ones,” the child added.

Sassy put her down. “Show them to me.”

Her mother smiled wearily up at her. “Pippa’s mother is a darling.”

Sassy bent and kissed her mother’s brow. “So is mine.”

Mrs. Peale patted her cheek. “Bad day?” she added.

Sassy only smiled. She didn’t trouble her parent with her daily woes. The older woman had enough worries of her own. The cancer was temporarily in remission, but the doctor had warned that it wouldn’t last. Despite all the hype about new treatments and cures, cancer was a formidable adversary. Especially when the victim was Mrs. Peale’s age.

“I’ve had worse,” Sassy told her. “What about pancakes and bacon for supper?” she asked.

“Sassy, we had pancakes last night,” Selene complained as she showed her cut-outs to the woman.

“I know, baby,” Sassy said, bending to kiss her gently. “We have what we can afford. It isn’t much.”

Selene grimaced. “I’m sorry. I like pancakes,” she added apologetically.

“I wish we could have something better,” Sassy said. “If there was a better-paying job going, you can bet I’d be applying for it.”

Mrs. Peale looked sad. “I’d hoped we could send you to college. At least to a vocational school. Instead we’ve caused you to land in a dead-end job.”

Sassy struck a pose. “I’ll have you know I’m expecting a prince any day,” she informed them. “He’ll come riding up on a white horse with an enormous bouquet of orchids, brandishing a wedding ring.”

“If ever a girl deserved one,” Mrs. Peale said softly, “it’s you, my baby.”

Sassy grinned. “When I find him, we’ll get you one of those super hospital beds with a dozen controls so you can sit up properly when you want to. And we’ll get Selene the prettiest dresses and shoes in the world. And then, we’ll buy a new television set, one that doesn’t have green people,” she added, wincing at the color on the old console TV.

Pipe dreams. But dreams were all she had. She looked at her companions, her family, and decided that she’d much rather have them than a lot of money. But a little money, she sighed mentally, certainly would help their situation. Prince Charming existed, sadly, only in fairy tales.

* * *

The architect had his plans ready for the big barn. John approved them and told the man to get to work. Within a few days, building materials started arriving, carried in by enormous trucks: lumber, steel, sand, concrete blocks, bricks, and mortar and other construction equipment. The project was worth several million dollars, and it created a stir locally, because it meant jobs for many people who were having to commute to Billings to get work. They piled onto the old Bradbury place to fill out job applications.

John grinned at the enthusiasm of the new workers. He’d started the job with misgivings, wondering if it was sane to expect to find dozens of laborers in such a small, economically depressed area. But he’d been pleasantly surprised. He had new men from surrounding counties lining up for available jobs, experienced workers at that. He began to be optimistic.

He was doing a lot of business with the local feed store, but his presence was required on site while the construction was in the early stages. He’d learned the hard way that it wasn’t wise to leave someone in charge without making sure they understood what was required during every step.

He felt a little guilty that he hadn’t been back to check that Sassy hadn’t had problems with Tarleton, who only had two days left before he was being replaced. The new manager, Buck Mannheim, was already in town, renting a room from a local widow while he familiarized himself with the business. Tarleton, he told John, wasn’t making it easy for him to do that. The man was resentful, surly, and he was making Sassy do some incredibly hard and unnecessary tasks at the store. Buck would have put a stop to it, but he felt he had no real authority until Tartleton’s two weeks were officially up. He didn’t want them to get sued.

As if that weasel would dare sue them, John thought angrily. But he didn’t feel right putting Buck in the line of fire. The older man had come up here as a favor to Gil to run the business, not to go toe-to-toe with a belligerent soon-to-be-ex-employee.

“I’ll handle this,” John told the older man. “I need to stop by the post office anyway and get some more stamps.”

“I don’t understand why any man would treat a child so brutally,” Buck said. “She’s such a nice girl.”

“She’s not a girl, Buck,” John replied.

“She’s just nineteen,” Buck replied, smiling. “I have a granddaughter that age.”

John felt uncomfortable. “She seems older.”

“She’s got some mileage on her. A lot of responsibility. She needs help. That child her mother adopted goes to school in pitiful clothes. I know that most of the money they have is spent for utilities.” He shook his head. “Hell of a shame. Her mother’s little check is all used up for medicine that she has to take to stay alive.”

John felt guilty that he hadn’t looked into that situation. He hadn’t planned to get himself involved with his employees’ problems, and Sassy wasn’t technically even that, but it seemed there was nobody else in a position to help. He frowned. “You said Sassy’s mother was divorced? Where’s her husband? Couldn’t he help? Even if Sassy’s not young enough for child support, she’s still his child. She shouldn’t have to be the breadwinner.”

“He ran off with a young woman. Just walked out the door and left. He’s never so much as called or written in the years he’s been gone, since the divorce,” Buck said knowledgeably. “From what I hear, he was a good husband and father. He couldn’t fight his infatuation for the waitress.” He shrugged. “That’s life.”