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fetch it, and, to this day, he felt bad about the way his callused hands had snagged the fine fabric.
    He felt himself frowning because he couldn’t figure out why Dinah’s voice just now had reminded him of the soft, silky feel of his ma’s scarf.
    Clearing his throat with the intent of clearing his head, too, he sat up straighter in the saddle. What on earth has gotten into you?
    “I’m an only child, myself,” she said. “My father died when I was only nine, and Mama didn’t waste any time getting herself a new man.”
    Josh didn’t know what to make of the sarcastic tone that punctuated her admission, but she didn’t give him much time to speculate.
    “Ma died, too, before…before she and my stepfather could have more children.”
    He noted her extra emphasis on the word “step,” meaning she hadn’t approved of her substitute father. Josh waited, but Dinah didn’t elaborate on her story.
    The period of quiet tempted him to pull out his pocket watch. Instead, he counted the silent seconds by the steady clip-clop of the horses’ hooves. He couldn’t imagine his sisters allowing this much time to pass without filling the void with chatter, and he had to admire a gal who didn’t need to hear the sound of her own voice every waking moment.
    Then, it hit him like a pebble to the forehead. That bit about her father dying and her mother remarrying had been the only personal information Dinah had shared about her past. What if her ability to stay quiet for more than a minute at a time wasn’t an agreeable character trait, at all? What if, instead, she was harboring a secret, one she couldn’t risk revealing by a slip of her tongue in a moment of mindless chatter?
    When Dinah had told him she couldn’t remember how she’d ended up alone, out there in the middle of nowhere, looking as if she’d just fought off a pack of coyotes, he’d believed her “I don’t remember” story. And why wouldn’t he have, when he’d witnessed dozens of falls or blows to the noggins of ranch hands that had resulted in their missing minutes, hours, and even days once they had come to? Also, what about the time when, at the age of ten, he’d tumbled from the hayloft and lost consciousness? It had been only because of his cousins’ unrelenting taunts that he’d stopped claiming to be nine. To this day, he couldn’t explain what had happened to that entire year of his life.
    Pity had made him believe her story at first, but Josh found himself believing it less and less. Few things riled him more than idle chitchat, but he realized he’d better figure out a way to get her to open up, or he might miss an opportunity to learn crucial information about her.
    “The fella who did that to your face,” he ventured, “was he your husband?”
    She stared straight ahead, toward the unending ripple of flatlands, then cast a worried glance over her shoulder, squeezing the saddle horn so tight Josh heard a quiet squeak.
    “I made a lot of poor decisions in my life, but that one?” She met his eyes. “That one was downright stupid.”
    She paused, and Josh’s suspicion grew, because, doggone it, she seemed intent on making him pull the story out of her, word by word. “Well,” he drawled, “not every man is cut out to be a husband.”
    Her gaze skimmed the horizon again. He was about to ask what she was looking for when she said, “He wasn’t my husband.”
    Well, at least he didn’t have to worry about some deranged madman popping up on the other side of the next rise, looking to drag his woman home, where she belonged. “That’s a relief.” If he’d taken time to think a minute before speaking, he sure as shootin’ wouldn’t have said that. Because, now, she’d figure he had designs on her, and—
    “Why?” Dinah tilted her head and met his gaze, her brow furrowed in befuddlement.
    For as long as Josh could remember, his pa had been fond of saying, “Facts are facts.” The man—whomever and whatever he was to