fetch him. Let me just get you and the young’uns inside.” He proceeded to bring them into the entrance hall and then to a grand open living area that stretched up two floors and had a fieldstone fireplace with kindling and logs set out for a fire. The room was freezing, and Alice could see her own breath. If possible, it seemed colder inside than out. The room was filled with the work of a taxidermist, and the furniture was shrouded with white sheets to keep off dust. This was no way for a man to live, even if he was a bachelor.
From the walls, dead animals stared blankly as Roberts labored at the hearth a few moments with hands swollen with rheumatism. Alice worried he was not up to the task. She considered offering assistance but feared insulting the man, so she drew the boys in tight, wrapping them between the coat and her body as they all watched and shivered in the cold. At long last he succeeded in striking a match and the flames caught, curling over the dry wood.
“Should warm up directly.” He tipped his hat and limped off toward the entrance. A moment later the door clicked shut.
“Look at the moose head!” said Cody, pointing at the trophy above the mantel.
Alice frowned. Had Dillen shot that poor creature or paid good money for a stuffed head?
“And there’s a bearskin rug,” said Cody, now dancing from one wonder to another. He petted the mountain-goat hide draped on the sofa and knelt to peek under the sheet at the chair fashioned from brown-and-white cowhide and bull horns. Finally he marveled at the chandelier, which was a rustic combination of elk horns and lanterns.
Dillen had all this and still he felt he could not provide a home for these two orphaned boys? The man should be ashamed. The room heated Alice’s blood. She had not come seeking a fight, merely some explanation. But her purpose had changed.
Dillen appeared a few moments later smelling of horse and sweat. Even disheveled and flushed, his mere appearance caused her pulse to pound and her heart to race as if she were the one who had just run here from the barn. She stood stupefied as his eyes met hers. For just a moment she forgot why she had come and what she was doing here. Then he looked at the boys and his brow furrowed in obvious displeasure. Cody dropped the front paw of the bearskin rug and straightened as Colin inched closer to her. In that instant, she recalled her mission.
Dillen’s generous mouth went tight. He looked less than pleased to see them. It was a new experience for her. Of all the emotions she had secretly hoped her arrival in Blue River Junction would elicit from this man, ire was not among them. In that instant she knew that she should never have come to the ranch. He had made it clear how he felt, and he had explained about the mix-up over the telegrams. He had further asked her to wait and she had, but... Alice’s heart sank. She had every reason to believe that he had forgotten her once more. She knew she was forgettable. Alice was too timid to be memorable. It was only her father’s acclaim and her mother’s money that made her attractive to some. If it were not for Sylvia’s boys, she most certainly would have boarded the very next train and departed, tail between her legs. Still, she had hoped that absence had made the heart grow fonder.
Clearly it had not.
“Alice, what in blue blazes? I asked you to wait in town.”
“Yes, I know. And we have. But you sent no word.”
“So you come all the way out here in the dead of winter? It’s dangerous. Alice, why?”
Because I feared you had forgotten me again. Because I am a fool. She said none of this, of course. Instead she ushered the two boys toward the fireplace with a gentle hand on each one’s small back, and then retreated to the far side of the room. He followed. She slid one arm into each of the opposite sleeves of the mink as she hugged herself and faced him.
When she spoke her voice was low, for she did not want the boys to hear. “I am sorry to interrupt your work. Certainly it must be difficult to run such a large ranch. But you told me that you have no place suitable for the boys and yet...”
He moved closer. He smelled of the horses and she saw the short dark horsehair that clung to his sheepskin jacket and gloves.
“Yet?” he asked.
“I see you have a large house and the means to care for them here.”
Dillen’s brow lowered over his dark eyes and his gaze shifted to take in the room before returning to her. He set his teeth together with a snap and Alice hugged herself more closely. The mink ruff brushed her cheeks.
“Are you seeking a housekeeper, perhaps? Is that the delay? Someone to look after the boys while you work?”
“They can’t stay here,” he said, and glanced to the door as if anxious to see her back.
“It seems a perfectly suitable environment to raise two boys.”
“No,” he said, with no further explanation.
Her stomach roiled now, and she was quite anxious to leave. But she remembered her promise.
“Mr. Roach, I am aware that you have written to a relative of your sister’s husband. I fear that you are, therefore, unwilling to acquiesce to your sister’s wishes. I could help you obtain a housekeeper to see to them so they are not underfoot.”
“No,” he said, glaring now.
She fumed, lowering her chin and matching his cold stare. “Mr. Roach, is it your intention, then, to ignore your sister’s dying request?”
“They can’t stay here.”
“And why not?”
“It’s not my house.”
There. He’d said it. Dillen had told her the truth and then watched the shock take her back a step as her mouth dropped open in surprise.
“Not yours?” Alice echoed.
“I don’t own it. I never said that I did own it. I’m a hired hand working under Bill Roberts for Alan Harvey. Harvey is the owner. He’s a banker. Works in Denver and only comes up here in the summer to enjoy the mountains. All this is a second home. Can you believe that? Calls it his mountain retreat.”
“But I thought...” Her words trailed off.
“No. Not mine. That’s why they can’t stay. I don’t have permission to have children here, and even if I got it, I’ll not have them living in a bunkhouse, eating beans and bacon. No school out here and no other kids, just work—hard work.”
“I see.” Alice slipped her arms from her sleeves and extended one hand to him, clasping his wrist. “I’ve misjudged you.”
Yes, he knew she had. He didn’t know which was worse, having her think he didn’t want his own kin or having her realize he was unable to care for them.
“I’m sorry, Alice. I’m no further ahead than when I left you. I just can’t seem to get a foothold.”
“I’m sure it must be difficult, all on your own.”
Difficult didn’t begin to cover it. But he had his pride and would not detail his various financial failures.
“You know, my father was the son of a brewer. He comes from simple roots.”
What he knew was that her father was one of the most accomplished and sought-after physicians in Omaha.
“When my mother chose my father, my grandfather was less than pleased with her selection. You see, my father didn’t have his license then, just ambitions and intelligence. But she knew what he could become, and she married him against their wishes. It was only after my brother was born that my grandfather relented, paying for my father’s schooling. After my father passed the boards, my mother brought him his first patients. You see?”
Dillen had a hard time thinking when she touched him, but he could not understand what the devil