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shared the grass and even the minerals she provided for the cattle. Sometimes when she was out on the trail, she saw a bear or discovered cougar tracks in the snow.
    The land swayed to its own natural beat, a beat Lucas heard and understood. Like every other living thing on the ranch, he played his role. Without a doubt, he was the man Wolf had wanted to be.
    Maybe he was even more.
    The entire story of Wolf’s brief existence passed through Syd’s mind in the space of a heartbeat.
    Had Wolf been real? She forced herself to ask the same question she’d asked for months and she realized she had no perfect answer.
    Yes, Wolf had been real, as real as any man she’d ever known, the baby was proof of that, but it occurred to her that being real and being human were two very different things.
    Well .
    Syd sat up and tossed the quilts aside. What was the use of asking questions that had no answers? There was work to be done. In her attempts to avoid Lucas she’d also avoided her role. The Triple Creek was her ranch and it was about time she behaved like a ranch owner.
    Syd got to her feet and stopped. She pressed a hand over her abdomen, astounded, thrilled at the tiny fluttering sensation.
    “Oh my god, the baby moved.”
    She rushed to the kitchen, hoping to share the news with Lucas or with anyone for that matter, but the room was dark and empty. Syd turned in a slow circle. The space around her felt hollow. That was the only word that came to mind. Without Lucas the kitchen was a lonely place. She was lonely.
    “And you expected… What? What did you expect? Everyone around here has a job to do so suck it up and do yours.”
    She needed to go over the books, pay the bills and see which cows remained dry. Any cows that had been dry two years in a row would be sold off along with the yearling steers in another month or so.
    She wanted to get a look at the two bull calves, make sure the mother had enough milk. Syd wondered if the cow had accepted the tiny heifer. Oh yes, she could find plenty of ways to fill her day.
    Syd leaned back against a cabinet, feeling that tiny fluttering sensation again. It was odd how the littlest thing could be so earth-shattering. She wanted to tell someone so bad.
    “Lucas, I want to tell Lucas.”

    The account books were balanced, bills paid. Syd reached for the ledger where she kept a record of every birth. She was impressed to see that Lucas had updated it daily. Even though she’d dropped the ball the past month, he hadn’t. He’d made his most recent entry early this morning.
    Five cows still hadn’t delivered. Well, wasn’t worth worrying yet. She’d give the vet a call if they hadn’t dropped their calves in another week.
    She turned on her computer and entered all the data onto her spreadsheet. Her father insisted upon keeping hand-written records, but Syd wanted both. She understood his need to hold the ledger in his hand, but she preferred the clarity of a spreadsheet.
    Finished at last, Syd leaned back in her chair and ventured a glance out the window. She noticed a break in the clouds. It looked like the skies were beginning to clear and she wanted to ride out, see the herd with her own eyes.
    She pulled on her boots and grabbed a rain slicker just in case the weather turned sour again.
    Syd caught Delia and led the horse into the barn, dumped a bucketful of grain into the trough and left the horse to her oats, closing the barn door behind her.
    She walked around the side of the building. Someone, probably Lucas, had moved the cow and the little heifer into the horse pasture behind the house. The skin of the dead calf was gone. The cow grazed placidly, the calf slept in the thick green grass beside her new mother. Lucas must have felt it was safe to remove the pelt. Syd was pleased as punch to see the cow had accepted the calf as her own.
    The two bull calves were doing well also. They lay curled together in the pasture just down the road. Syd studied their mother. The cow