Sleepless in Montana

Chapter One

Eighteen years later

Hogan watched the headlights coming toward his home, zigzagging and slicing through the Montana night. He held his breath-Jemma Delaney still drove like a kamikaze fighter, soaring over the creek's narrow wooden bridge.

In the silence of his living room, he ran his hand down a large bronze eagle statue; it leaned toward the hunt, wings slightly spread, talons tight on a branch. His creation reflected his emotions at twenty-one-surging into the world and Paris, hungry and ready, inhaling life as if it were sweet cream. Beneath his fingertips, the metal was smooth, cool, and predictable-unlike his thoughts about Jernma Delaney.

Tonight, Hogan had no time for Jemma's offbeat ideas to promote whatever venture she currently favored. A gypsy whirlwind who had been his sister's best friend since they were eight, Jemma had always been a ragged, vivid tear in Hogan's streamlined life. He regretted answering her telephone call and agreeing to her demand that he "stay put until I arrive."

He'd come back to Sweet Grass County. In late March, the sprawling alfalfa, timothy and "needle and thread" grass fields were coming to life. Soon, fed by the snow water from the mountains, the irrigation ditches would fill, be dammed, and overflow onto the fields, a ritual necessary to rich grasslands.

In the night, the jutting, snow-covered Crazy Mountains and their haunting winds called to him. He listened to the ceiling fan, the crackle of box elder fire, and hunted for harmony. It wouldn't come; his elements were not in alignment. Had they ever been? Too restless to create, or to rest, he swirled the finewine in his glass and studied the amber-liquid. His emotions were Re the eagle's, hunting prey.

At thirty-nine, Hogan knew that he couldn't go on until he resolved the unanswered questions in his life and had returned to Montana the previous November. He'd taken time from his growing business before to refresh his creative needs. But this time he wondered, was he burned out, the images and color gone? Or had he sold what was in him and there was nothing left? He'd made a dive into the commercial designs that were certain to sell; he'd packaged himself along the way, developing a persona that drew attention. Now he was bone tired, stretched to the limits, and unhappy with his work. Hogan shrugged; he'd made a fortune. Did that cold hole eating at him really matter?

He was on edge, unable to sleep, prowling through the nights and the brittle memories of Ins home place. He'd bought land that had been Ben Kodiak's. Was it out of revenge? Or the need to hold what was his birthright?

Did a bastard have birthrights?

Hogan opened his free hand on the ceiling-to-floor window overlooking Kodiak land. Nearly ten thousand acres and six hundred head of Hereford cows and their calves—white-face Angus, or "baldies"—from an Angus bull, spread in front of him. He could almost hear the winds whispering to him. Some said an Indian or a white-whichever they preferred—went mad on the prairie and found a haven in the mountains; that madness was protection from Indians, who left him alone. Then those who believed in the Celestial Virgins said they ached for their homeland.

Across the rolling natural grass and alfalfa fields stood the house in which he'd grown up-stark, two-story, weathered, windows like the steel-patched holes in his heart-another monument.

He studied his reflection in the floor-to-ceiling windows, taking in the brutal stamp of the Kodiak familyhis coloring was different from the fair, blue-eyed family, a reminder that he was not really one of diem. He considered his dark, deep-set, haunted eyes, soaring black eyebrows, the blunt Kodiak nose, and harsh cheekbones. His cheeks were in shadow, laying bare the grim line of his mouth, the angular Kodiak jaw. The dark warlord in the glass was a man incapable of softness and joy ... or was he?

He studied his hands-large, long, artistic hands, but with broad flat palms that said he'd dug his share of postholes and shoveled his share of manure. He'd found a refuge in his talent, but who was he?

"You're frozen in time, Hogan," he murmured to himself. "You're as unfeeling as your father." His hand opened near the reflection, the glass as cool and smooth as his emotions.

His cool exterior-sophisticated, classy, charming when necessary, lacked-lacked what? He'd done what he'd set out to do, and yet he wasn't at peace.

An image of a boy, dressed in worn jeans, running freely through the mountain meadows, lying lazily upon the grassy stream banks, fishing for trout, flashed across the glass-or was that a memory of the freedom he wanted in his soul? Undefined need drew him back to Montana, to the clean air and rugged mountains, to the streams and forests he'd known and loved. Hogan frowned; the need was stronger than he'd suspecteddeeper, more troubling. His need concerned him as a man, the essence of man, and it was elusive. Unable to sleep, prowling through his memories and his creative senses blocked, he'd given himself to remodeling the house and to familiar ranch work, hoping to cleanse away whatever drove him

He found his hand in a fist against the glass, a reflection of his turmoil. Or was it because he was his father's son-hardened early, too cold, and too complete. But he wasn't, was he? Complete? What was that aching dark hole within him? When would it fill?

Hogan ran a fingertip down the length of the eagle's head, turned slightly at an angle, his eyes watchful. He hadn't expected or received an invitation to Ben's Christmas dinner table, nor had Carley returned for the holidays. Hogan knew by her guarded telephone conversation at Christmas that his sister was troubled.

She'd never been the same since that night and the attempted rape; once vibrant, she'd become frumpy, quiet, and guarded. Hogan frowned as he thought of his sister, rage swirling deep inside him.