“I’ll be nice to him.” At first, anyway.

“But you won’t run off and marry him.”

“Dad!”

She rolled her eyes just as the boy came out on the porch. Lil studied him as she might any new specimen.

He was taller than she’d expected, and his hair was the color of pine bark. He looked… mad or sad, she couldn’t decide which. But neither was promising. His clothes said city to her, dark jeans that hadn’t been worn or washed enough and a stiff white shirt. He took the glass of lemonade her mother offered and watched Lil as warily as she watched him.

He jolted at the cry of a hawk, and Lil caught herself before she sneered. Her mother wouldn’t like it if she sneered at company.

“Sam.” Grinning broadly, Joe stuck out a hand. “How are things?”

“Can’t complain.”

“And Lucy, don’t you look pretty?”

“We do what we can with what we’ve got. This is our grandson, Cooper.”

“Glad to meet you, Cooper. Welcome to the Black Hills. This is my Lil.”

“Hello.” She cocked her head. He had blue eyes-ice-on-the-mountain blue. He didn’t smile, nor did his eyes.

“Joe, you and Lil go clean up. We’re going to eat outside,” Jenna added. “We’ve got a fine day for it. Cooper, sit down here by me, and tell me what you like to do in New York. I’ve never been there.”

In Lil’s experience, her mother could get anybody to talk, make anybody smile. But Cooper Sullivan from New York City seemed to be the exception. He spoke when spoken to, minded his manners, but little more. They sat out at the picnic table, one of Lil’s favorite things, and feasted on fried chicken and biscuits, on potato salad and snap beans her mother had put up last harvest.

Conversation ranged from horses and cattle and crops, to weather and books and the status of other neighbors. All the things, in Lil’s world, that mattered.