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grew wistful. “Do you know, I’ve treed more bars locally than the town drunk?” “Your sins will come back to haunt you,” Tansy predicted.
    “Not before I get a mother for those kids,” he said. “They’re going to seed.” “You planted them.” “I have to work, don’t I?”
    “I wouldn’t call riding in every rodeo from Texas to Montana necessity. You’re breaking every bone in your body one at a time.”
    “It takes money to keep this place going. The plumbing’s half shot. I’ll have to bone up on my calf-roping.”
    “They’d let you manage old man Ted Regan’s place if you’d ask.”
    “Ted is only five years older than I am. He isn’t even middle-aged.”
    “Everybody calls him old man Regan,” Tansy said. “I don’t know why, except that he’s got prematurely silver hair. Anyway, he’d let you manage his place, but you just won’t.” “I don’t want to move to Houston.” “Jacobsville,” Tansy corrected.
    “Not much difference. And old Ted’s ranch is so close to Houston that it could be called a suburb. I like San Antonio.”
    “It would be the best thing in the world for the kids,” Tansy coaxed. “Plenty of fresh air, piney woods and green meadows, nice people.”
     
    The Case of the Missing Secretary333 “Girls?” he asked, lifting both eyebrows.
    “Nobody is going to marry you until you civilize those children,” Tansy warned.
    ‘That’s why I’ve got to get married. A man can’t do that kind of job alone,” he said plaintively. “I’m only one person, for God’s sake! They outnumber me three to one!”
    Kit had been listening quietly. This man was a cross between Chris and Logan. She liked him, but there seemed to be a lot more to him under the surface than was visible above it. “You could hire a companion,” she began.
    He swept off his white Stetson and held it against his heart, eyes wide and stark. “Lady!” he exclaimed. “I can’t bring that kind of woman into my home!” She burst out laughing. “You’re as incorrigible as Chris!”
    “He taught me everything I know,” he agreed. He perched the Stetson back on his head. “Yes, I suppose I could get a nursemaid for the kids, but they’d torture her to death the first night. She’d find a snake in her bed or a spider in her bath, or something even worse. I can’t do that to some poor unsuspecting woman. I do have a housekeeper, though, who is away on sick leave.” “There are women who have had survival training,” she said. “I don’t want a drill sergeant.”
    “Are you sure? Think of all the fun you’d have, watching her bring them into line,” Tansy suggested.
    He considered that for a minute. “No,” he said finally, shaking his head. “It would break their little hearts.”
    “The way they’re heading, they aren’t going to have hearts for much longer. You’ve got to do something, Emmett!” Tansy said.
    “Not right now. Tell us why you’re here,” Emmett said, turning to Kit. “I’ve come to find Tansy.” Tansy’s eyes widened. “Logan again!” “He worries.”
    “He’s a damned busybody,” Tansy muttered. “My God, I can’t go on a little bitty plane ride without him having me followed and reports filled out on my companions. He’s terrified that I’ll rewrite my will and leave all my money to someone’s terrier.”

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    “That’s not true.” Kit chuckled. “He’s afraid you’ll end up married to some twenty-year-old gigolo and kill him with sheer exhaustion.”
    “How flattering,” the older woman said delightedly. “Emmett, do you know any twenty-year-old gigolos we could try?”
    “Shame on you,” he said shortly. “A nice, decent woman like you ought to be ashamed to say a thing like that to me.”
    “I don’t know why not. Last year, you were running around with that rodeo groupie and she was spending you out of bed and board.”
    “She was pretty,” he argued. “But the kids hated her. First time I