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hadn’t wanted to tell me what she knew about you and George! She couldn’t bear to see you two-timing me!”
    She pulled away from him with a strength she didn’t know she had. “She deserved to cry!” she said through her teeth.
    He called her a name that made her flush. She only smiled.
    â€œSticks and stones, Powell,” she said in a steady, if husky, tone. “But if you say that again, you’ll get the same thing I gave you the summer after I started college.”
    He remembered very well the feel of her shoe on his shin. Even through his anger, he had to stifle a mental smile at the memory. Antonia had always had spirit. But he remembered other things, too; like her refusal to talk to him after her mother’s death, when he’d offered help. Sally had been long dead by then, but Antonia wouldn’t let him close enough to see if she still felt anything for him. She wouldn’t even now, and it caused him to lose his temper when he’d never meant to. She wouldn’t let go of the past. She wouldn’t give him a chance to find out if there was anything left of what they’d felt for each other. She didn’t care.
    The knowledge infuriated him.
    â€œNow, if you’re quite through insulting me, I have to go home,” she added firmly.
    â€œI could have helped, when your mother died,” he said curtly. “You wouldn’t even see me!”
    He sounded as if her refusal to speak to him had hurt. What a joke that would be. She didn’t look at him again. “I had nothing to say to you, and Dad and I didn’t want your help. One way or another, you had enough help from us to build your fortune.”
    He scowled. “What the hell do you mean by that?”
    She did look up, then, with a mocking little smile. “Have you forgotten already? Now if you’ll excuse me…?”
    He didn’t move. His big fists clenched by his sides as she just walked around him to get into the car.
    She started it, put it into Reverse, and pointedly didn’t look at him again, not even when she was driving off down the street toward the main highway. And if her hands shook, he couldn’t see them.
    Â 
    He stood watching, his boots absorbing the freezing cold of the snow around them, snowflakes touching the wide brim of his creamy Stetson. He had no idea what she’d meant with that last crack. It made him furious that he couldn’t even get her to talk to him. Nine years. He’d smoldered for nine years with seething outrage and anger, and he couldn’t get the chance to air it. He wanted a knock-down, drag-out argument with her, he wanted to get everything in the open. He wanted…second chances.
    â€œDo you want some hot chocolate?” Ben Hayes called from the front door.
    Powell didn’t answer him for a minute. “No,” he said in a subdued tone. “Thanks, but I’ll pass.”
    Ben pulled his housecoat closer around him. “You can damn her until you die,” he remarked quietly. “But it won’t change one thing.”
    Powell turned and faced him with an expressionthat wasn’t easily read. “Sally didn’t lie,” he said stubbornly. “I don’t care what anyone says about it. Innocent people don’t run, and they both did!”
    Ben studied the tormented eyes in that lean face for a long moment. “You have to keep believing that, don’t you,” he asked coldly. “Because if you don’t, you’ve got nothing at all to show for the past nine years. The hatred you’ve saved up for Antonia is all that’s left of your life!”
    Powell didn’t say another word. He strode angrily back to his four-wheel-drive vehicle and climbed in under the wheel.

Chapter Three
    A ntonia made it back to Tucson without a hitch, although there had been one or two places along the snow-covered roads that gave her real problems. She was shaken, but it