Heart of the wolf (11 page)

"As far as he's concerned, I have been. Wolf, you don't appreciate what I keep telling you—
Summers
runs this town. Those that are against him are too scared to challenge him."

"Except for you?"
Wolf guessed
,
pleased at the way his name rolled off her lips, low and husky.

"There were others," Sarah admitted unhappily, "but they've moved away. They got tired of butting heads with the bastard."

"And you stayed? Why?"

Sarah idly watched Wolf cut up the carrots. Despite the large size of his hands, he was incredibly skillful, handling the knife with ease. "I'm a fourth-generation Thatcher, that's why. All my family is buried up on the hill behind town. Four generations of my family have given their lives to this life, Wolf. I love this place." Her voice grew low with emotion. "I love the mountains and the mining. My dad switched from silver to sapphire mining when things went bust around here. Montana is one of the few places in North America where you can find gem-quality sapphires that rival the best in the world."

Wolf set the table, placing the bowls of salad on it. "I never knew anything about sapphire mining."

With a shrug, Sarah leaned over and picked up a small leaf of lettuce and munched on it. "Montana sapphires have the same
cornflower-blûe
color as the ones in Sri Lanka do." When she saw he didn't understand, she added, "Sapphires come in a lot of colors—bright orange, pink, red, green, blue, white and yellow.
The ones worth the most money
aie
the dark cornflower-blue ones.
The red stones are known as rubies. Corundum is the material they're both made from."

"I didn't realize sapphires came in that many colors."

"Most people don't, because the jewelry industry has pushed blue ones on the public for the last fifty years."

"What do you do with the other colors?" Wolf pulled the baked potatoes out of the microwave and deftly set them on the two plates. Sarah sat at the table, nibbling at her salad and looking as if she belonged there. The sudden thought was heated, filled with promise, but quickly, Wolf pushed the longing away. He wasn't worthy of someone like Sarah.

"You saw all my lapidary equipment when you picked up my faceting machine?"

"Yes."

"My dad taught me how to facet when I was a kid. I facet all the sapphires I find, then sell them to a national gem distributor. He takes the colored sapphires, too. They become background gemstones in individual pieces of jewelry."

"Sounds like you could make a lot of money." Wolf brought the skillet over and transferred the steaks onto
their plates. After setting the skillet in the sink and filling it with water, he joined Sarah at the table.

Sarah hungrily dug into the succulent steak, which Wolf had cooked perfectly. "That's the rub. The miner gets very little money. It's the middleman, the distributor, who really makes a killing on the sapphires. You have to remember, most of the gemstones aren't of the highest quality. A lot of them have inclusions or
fractures, that
lower their value. To make good money, I'd have to find a ten-or fifteen-carat sapphire with very few inclusions." She smiled across the table at her. "That hasn't happened yet."

"It will," Wolf promised her. He was starving.
Starving for Sarah's bright, spontaneous company.
Her enthusiasm was a new side of herself that she was allowing him to see. There was no wariness in her lovely blue eyes now, and for a moment Wolf allowed himself to wonder what Sarah would be like if she let that passionate intensity she held for sapphires to translate into emotions she could share with him.

Chortling, Sarah said, "You're psychic, so I'll believe you."

"But you're able to mine enough gems to pay your bills?"

"That's right. But I have to keep at it, Wolf." She frowned. "Being off my feet for seven days is really going to hurt me. The money I had saved went for that damned hospital bill."

Wolf said nothing, his conscience smarting. "Why has Noonan got it in for you?"

Sarah poured Italian dressing on her salad. "When I was in high school, I got Rickey Noonan, his only son, in big trouble. Rickey was pushing drugs, Wolf.
The sheriff's son.
Can you believe it?"

"Honey, there isn't much in this world I haven't seen in twenty-eight years of living. I believe you."

Every time Wolf used the endearment, a giddy sensation flowed through Sarah. She forced herself not to stare at him. What kind of magic did Wolf have over her? She struggled constantly to resist his powerful, quiet charisma. Dismayed at her inability to control her responses to him, she frowned and said, "Rickey was a bully in high school because of his father's power. He talked my best friend, Jody Collins, into taking drugs. Jody tried to commit suicide and I found her just in time. After that,
I
was so cotton-picking mad that
I
swore I'd get all drug pushers out of our school. I called the FBI and told them what was going on."

Wolf's eyes widened. "You went to the FBI?"

Indignantly, Sarah said, "Sure! Wouldn't you, if you knew the whole town's legal system was rotten to the core?" Sarah saw his mouth twitch with amusement. "Wolf, it wasn't funny at the time. I was seventeen and scared to death. I didn't even tell my parents what I was doing because I was afraid Noonan would get even. The FBI came and caught Rickey and his gang dead to rights. But when it was all over and done with, my name accidentally got dragged in to it. From that moment on, Noonan had it in for me.”

"Did he hassle your parents?" Wolf watched her lick her buttery fingers after wrestling with the baked potato. There was something beautifully sensual and basic about Sarah, and the thought sent an ache surging through him.

"Noonan went after me first. I'd just gotten my driver's license, and his deputies pulled me over so many times for supposedly speeding that I just quit driving."

"What did he do to your dad?"

Sarah sighed and pushed her plate away. She'd lost her appetite. "Noonan conspired with
Summers
, and they went into cahoots," she said grimly. "Summers wanted our claim because the majority of our sapphires are the cornflower blue variety. You can take a clear or very light-colored sapphire and heat-treat it to turn it cornflower blue."

"Heat-treat it?"

"Yes, there's a special thermal oven. You put the rough,
unfaceted
stones in and literally bake them, like a cake, at a certain temperature for a certain length of time to improve and deepen their color."

Wolf shook his head. "Obviously there's a lot to gemstones that I didn't know."

Sarah nodded. "I grew up with it, so I take it for granted. I'm sure if the public knew how many gemstones were heat-treated, they'd be shocked."

"What does heat-treating do to them beside make them a darker blue?"

She gave him a smile. "You ask the right questions."

"In my line of work, my life depended on it," he murmured. Now where did that come from, Wolf wondered. Sarah's mere presence had him revealing pieces of himself. He saw her eyes widen—saw that curiosity burning in them. Before she could ask, he added, "So what does baking do to the sapphires?"

Sarah desperately wanted to pursue his statement. What line of work? But she saw the warning in his eyes and swallowed her curiosity. "It makes them far more brittle than their untreated cousins. For instance, if a woman accidentally banged her sapphire ring on something, it could crack or possibly shatter."

"So an untreated sapphire is tougher?
Less likely to crack?"

"Exactly," Sarah said, pleased with Wolf's quick grasp of her business. "If a gem distributor doesn't have high principles, he'll often pass on heat-treated sapphires along with untreated ones and not tell the jeweler."

She opened her hands. "There's a lot of difference between jewelers, based on their gem knowledge and experience. They're only as good as their training, Wolf. I've taken courses with the Gemological Institute of America over the years and caught up with what the unscrupulous gem dealers do to gemstones. A lot of jewelers can't afford to get that kind of schooling. It takes money and time to educate and keep up with the guys who would sell you red glass and make you think it was a ruby. Some jewelers can afford the expensive equipment it takes to examine each stone—if you look at it under a microscope, you can see whether a stone's been heat-treated."

"Fascinating," Wolf murmured.

With a mirthful laugh, Sarah nodded. "If only people who bought gemstones realized some of the things that went on, they'd be a lot more inclined to educate themselves before they bought a stone, believe me. That and question their jeweler about his or her experience and training."

"So your mine produces more of the industry-standard color, and that's why
Summers
wants it?"

"Exactly.
For some reason, our land had the right chemistry conditions when the sapphires were forming, millions of years ago, and so they tended to clump on that side of the mountain in that deep blue color. Summers
is
smart enough to know that he can't pass heat-treated stones on to his distributors without telling them."

"So he's looking at your mine as a source of the higher-paying sapphires?"

"Yes. I get more money per point on the facets of my stones than he does. Heat-treated sapphires are worth less—at least from miner to distributor. Once they hit the retail market, unsuspecting customers could be charged the same amount of money, regardless. Although a good jeweler will use heat-treated stones in a setting like a brooch, pendant or necklace, instead of in a ring, where it's likely to get struck or hit, and will charge less, accordingly."

"Fascinating."
Wolf saw her worrying the flesh of her lower lip. "So when did
Summers
start wanting your land?"

"About ten years ago. He had some of his hired guns come over and break up our mining equipment. When Dad refused to sell or back down, they beat him up—and again a couple of times after that."

Wolf saw the fear lurking in Sarah's eyes. "What else happened?" he probed softly.

Nervously Sarah muttered, "They ran my dad off the road, trying to make him wreck. When that didn't work, they broke into our cabin and scared the hell out of my mom. She's a real gentle soul, Wolf, nothing like me. I have my dad's genes. I'm a fighter, and I don't back down when trouble's staring me in the face. Over the years,
Summers
continued to hassle us. Once he had his men steal all our lapidary equipment. It cost thousands of dollars, money we didn't have, to replace it."

Wolf set his plate aside. "What did
Summers
do to you?"

Squirming in her chair, Sarah whispered, "After Dad died, six months ago, they started putting real pressure on me. A couple of his men showed up dressed up like forest rangers. They knew I carried a rifle with me everywhere I went. I've been known to fire over their heads if I catch them around our property. They disguised themselves so I'd trust them."