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got it from an Indian woman in the area.” She rattled on, not allowing herself a chance to consider her silly behavior.
    He tasted the soup. “This is very good. Sure beats the beans and biscuits I’ve lived on for the last few days.”
    “I’ll tell Linette you like it. I’m learning to cook, too. Linette says it’s not difficult. She came out west last fall and had to learn the hard way.”
    “The hard way?”
    “By trial and error.” She chuckled as she thought of Linette’s stories. At Seth’s questioning look, she said, “She didn’t know how to bake bread and tried to bury the lump of failed dough in a snowbank but Eddie found her doing it.” Baking bread was another thing to add to her list. “And she didn’t know how to cook beans and served them hard. I don’t know any of those things, either, but I will learn.”
    “Far more practical than shooting guns.”
    “Did your ma know how to shoot?”
    He considered her. “Well, now I suppose she did though I don’t recall her ever doing so. Why would she when there was Pa and I and—”
    She waited for him to finish but he suddenly concentrated on his food. “And?” she prompted.
    He shrugged. “And other people. How did you get to the ranch?”
    His question, so out of context, caught her by surprise and she answered without thinking. “We crossed the ocean on a ship then took a train, a steamboat and then the stagecoach.”
    “You and your two companions?”
    “An older couple escorted us as far as Fort Benton. Why do you ask?”
    “Because you talk like you are helpless yet I think it took a great deal of guts and ability to navigate that trip.”
    She stared at him. No one—not even she—had acknowledged that it had been a challenge. “I learned a lot.”
    “And maybe discovered you could do more than you thought you could.”
    “Maybe.” She handed him his tea. His words echoed in her head. Could she do more than she thought she could? She intended to find out on this visit to the ranch. Funny that it had taken a stranger, a victim of her ineptitude, to point out something she’d overlooked.
    “Thank you.” She ducked her head at the surprised look he shot her way.
    “For what?”
    “For making me see that I’m not a helpless, pampered woman.”
    He grinned. “I don’t know about pampered. I suspect you are a woman of many privileges but no one has to be helpless unless they choose to be.”
    “And I choose otherwise. In the past I have been far too compliant.”
    He put his spoon down and considered her solemnly. She considered him right back. “Miss Gardiner—”
    “Please, call me Jayne.”
    “Jayne, then. There is a vast difference between not being helpless and being foolhardy.”
    Her breath stalled halfway up her lungs. She forced her words past the catch in her throat. “Are you saying I’m the latter?” Her words were spoken softly but surely he heard the note of warning.
    “What do you think?” But he didn’t give her a chance to say. “Shooting a gun willy-nilly without regard for passersby, without knowing proper safety technique sounds just a little foolish to me. Doesn’t it to you?”
    “It sounds to me,” she replied, her tight jaw grinding the words, “like a woman ready and willing to do whatever is required to learn how to take care of herself.” She headed for the door. Then she retraced her steps to face him. “I came here intending to do my best to make your evening pleasant. I meant to bring my friends to visit you.”
    He quirked an eyebrow. “Too big a job for you to do alone?”
    “I think I can handle one lame cowboy.”
    “Just like you can handle a gun.”
    She pressed her hand to her lips. The man had a way of saying all the wrong things and igniting an irritation that burned away reason. “You know I even thought of reading a book to you so you could rest.” She let out a blast of overheated breath. “But now I believe I will leave you to your own devices. After all, you