Page 68 of The Rancher's Wedding

Jacob shook his head. “You’re married to my brother. While he’s gone, I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

She looked at him, feeling a quiver in his voice.

“How?” she asked. “How are you going to keep them from taking me?”

Jacob paused for just long enough for Estelle to realize he had no idea.

“You don’t know,” she said, “do you? If Ethan walked up to this ranch right now and tried taking me away, what would you do?”

She could see the sweat form on Jacob’s face as the reality of the situation became clearer inside his head.

“I’d tell him to get off of my property.”

“Or what, Jacob?”

He shook his head. “Or else I’m going to have to hit him, I guess.” He made a fist with his hand.

Estelle looked at Jacob. It was clear he had an intimidating presence, at least for those who didn’t know him well.

“Have you ever punched anyone in your life, Jacob?”

“No,” he said meekly. “But if it comes down to it, I’ll do it. You make my brother happy. You make me happy. That’s worth protecting, isn’t it?”

His words were convincing, but she wasn’t sure he’d rise to the occasion when she needed him to step up and defend her.

“Can you sleep in the house tonight?” she asked. “It’d make me safer. You can take Michael’s room. I’m sure he’d understand.”

“Yeah, I can do that.”

“Thank you.”

“Come help me on the farm?” she asked.

“Let me get dressed for the day,” he said. He was still in red pajamas. “It’ll probably do me good. Go ahead and get started and I’ll meet you out there.”

“If it’s okay,” Estelle said, “I’d rather just wait out here.”

Jacob nodded. “I understand. I’ll just be a minute.”

He closed the door and Estelle watched the path that led from the town to their ranch. It was empty for now and she hoped it would stay that way, at least until Michael came back.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Michael dropped the cattle off at the butcher in Salt Lake and took the opportunity to look around the city. It was much busier than Grafton, with men and women walking around, not paying much attention to each other, and tall, indistinguishable dark buildings surrounding the narrow roads. It was a soulless place, compared to the ranch, but there was also beauty in its uniformity. Everybody had a plan in Salt Lake and so everything ran efficiently. But nobody had the time to stop to appreciate the day or even pause and offer Michael directions.

He had wanted to come back with a gift for Estelle to let her know that he was thinking about her while he was away. Because the truth of the matter was that he hated being away from her, even for the day or two that he had to head out to handle business.

The majority of the cattle drive, like most cattle drives, wasn’t particularly eventful, and left him alone with his thoughts, which were almost entirely devoted to Estelle.

He wished that she could have joined him. She could have helped — she always helped — but even if she hadn’t, it would have made the trip go by faster. But he needed her to look after the ranch. And, also, going alone allowed him to pick out a gift for her.

With his cash in hand from the sale, he walked into the local jewelers and looked at what they had available. There were necklaces and bracelets and rings of all sorts, but it was difficult to know where to start. Estelle didn’t get much of a chance to wear jewelry when working on the farm, but perhaps he should give her opportunities outside of the daily work when she could wear it. He could always take her into town and make a day of it, now that Jacob was willing to help with everything.

With each piece of jewelry, he imagined what it would look like on Estelle. And, as he went from piece to piece, he couldn’t help but think that none of them held a candle to her beauty.

“Can I help you, sir?”

It was a woman, perhaps in her early 50s, smiling at him as he looked from piece to piece.

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