Page 25 (1/2)

“I guess it isn’t

” He looked at her again, recognizing a maturity in her attitude that he hadn’t suspected

There was a classic purity to her profile: the strong chin, the clean jawline, and the proe of her cheekbone Her hair, the color of spun-dark cara in loose, thick waves to her shoulders Leo Grayson found hiirl he saw Her features contained a strength that seemed a match for the land, and she cae Pretty she wasn’t, but pretty wouldn’t last out here, he realized

“You are a handso looks, yet it didn’t diminish her potential womanliness in Grayson’s eyes

“Me? I’m as plain as a potato” She dismissed the compliment

“No, you’re not”

“Look” She sounded very patient with hi so blind to her faults “I’uys in uise her height “I’et any curves And in the boso—a pair of them”

The few times he’d encountered her frankness, it had always a aloud at this candid assessment of her female attributes

“What are you going to do when you graduate froe the subject

“Stay here and work That’s one of the benefits that go with being born and raised on Calder land All you have to do is go to the boss and ask him for a job On a ranch this size, there’s always a lot of work,” she said

“What will you do?” He frowned

“I don’t know” She shrugged that it was too far in the future to decide “I e work, or help at the day school, or maybe work in the coh she preferred the first

But she also knew that even though soer ones, pitched in during the calving season or on a roundup when they were short of cowboys, no fees There was a silent prejudice against wo had ever been said about her getting paid for a cowboy’s work in the summer

Jessy switched the subject, transferring the focus from herself to his work “What’s the verdict on all the tests you’ve been doing? Are the drilling rigs going to be shifting to our part of the ranch?”

“No It’s going to be my recommendation that it’s too iffy here” Since his decision was a negative one, Leo didn’t regard it as secret information “I think we’ve exhausted all the possibilities of future oil or gas discoveries on the Triple C”