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how Zoe had watched him work the horse during those late summer evenings, the setting sun streaking her blonde hair red and gold.
    The image of her shimmered in his memory like a distant mirage. His breath caught in his throat, his heart lunging an extra, painful beat.
    He touched his heels to Pepper’s flanks and forced thoughts of Zoe away. She’d been gone for over a year. A stupid accident, a wrong-way driver hit them while they were on their way to a second honeymoon in Seattle and had nearly killed him, too.
    In those early days, with Zoe in a coma and barelyalive, Kurt had almost wished he had died first. He wouldn’t have had to make the most difficult choice in a man’s life—to let the woman he loved go. He’d prayed. He’d railed at God. Pleaded. Bargained. Cursed. Blamed Him.
    Brain dead. Vegetative state.
    Those words thundered in his skull like a depraved farrier banging a horseshoe into shape around a villainous anvil.
    How could Kurt blame God when he’d been the one who had agreed to remove Zoe’s respirator?
    In the course of a year, he’d gone from that catastrophic moment to having another woman living in his house. A tidy package of spunk whose silly antics with a dummy had made him laugh again. Even now, the memory of the prior evening brought a smile to his lips.
    When they reached the north pasture, Kurt eased away from the herd to let them graze on their own. With the cows stopped, the calves didn’t need a formal invitation to start suckling their moms.
    Past the boundary of the Rocking R, Kurt noticed a surveying crew at work. Curious, he wondered what Ezra Stone, his closest neighbor and owner of Double S Ranch, was up to.
    â€œCan I go back home now, Dad? I told Joey I’d ride over to his place today. He’s got a new Nintendo game.”
    â€œSure, son. Just be sure you’re back for supper.”
    â€œâ€™Kay.” Reining his horse around, Toby touched his heels to the gelding and took off at a gallop.
    Kurt could only hope the horse had enough sense not to step in a prairie dog hole and break his leg.
    Deciding to check on the surveying project before he went back to the barn, he trotted over to the fence. A pickup owned by T&K Engineering of Billings, MT, was parked nearby.
    â€œMorning,” he called to the closest man, who was wearing an orange safety vest and a Seahawks ball cap.
    â€œMorning.” A young guy, he tipped the bill of his cap. His sideburns reached all the way to his jawline.
    â€œWhat’s the survey for?”
    â€œDon’t know. We’re just mapping the elevations and putting corner stakes in.”
    Kurt lifted his Stetson then resettled it on his head. “Ezra didn’t tell you what he’s planning to do?”
    â€œNobody named Ezra hired us.” He checked his clipboard. “Looks like an outfit called Western Region Cattle Feeding hired us. They’re headquartered in, uh, Cheyenne.”
    Dread landed in his chest with the weight of a boulder. Adrenaline surged, readying him for a fight. He tightened his hands on the reins, which made his horse back up a few steps.
    He knew that outfit. There’d been talk of them on the ranchers association website and articles in the Billings newspaper. They ran concentrated animal feed lots and had a reputation of not caring what sort of environmental damage they did as long as they showed a profit.
    â€œAre they going to put in a feed lot here?”
    The surveyor lifted one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “No idea. I just measure and note, that’s all.”
    â€œHave they gotten a permit already?” Kurt pressed. He hadn’t been notified by the authorities or read anything in the newspaper. Maybe it was still pending.
    â€œBeats me.” The guy switched his ball cap so the visor was in the back and sighted his equipment toward his partner, who stood a couple hundred feet away.
    If a feed lot so close to