The Kidnapped Bride

Drew Wallin’s youngest brother is determined to see him married—so he kidnaps Drew a prospective bride. Not only is Catherine Stanway beautiful, but she’s a nurse who can help their ailing mother. Drew doesn’t have time for distractions—he’s too busy watching over his fatherless siblings. Yet he’s drawn to this woman who carries loss and pain equal to his own.

Catherine has traveled West to use her nursing skills to save lives, not to find a husband. She knows if she gives in to Drew’s matchmaking family, she’ll be risking her already bruised heart. But maybe it’s time she takes the ultimate risk to win the groom she didn’t know she wanted!

Frontier Bachelors: Bold, rugged—and bound to be grooms

“I think I’ve made myself clear. I’m not planning on marrying. I have a calling, a vocation, and certainly one Seattle sorely needs. I intended to stay another day, but if you all can’t understand my position, then perhaps I should leave now.”

Drew met her gaze, and this time she had no doubt the emotion flickering in that expanse of blue-green was regret. She felt it, too, just as she felt herself leaning toward him, as if her body vied with her mind as to where she belonged.

Beth spoke before he did. “No, you can’t go, Miss Stanway. Not until Ma’s well.”

“Your mother is on the mend, Beth,” Catherine said. “There’s nothing more for me to do here.”

Catherine waited for Drew to argue. She wasn’t sure why she expected it. Some part of her believed him when he said he didn’t wish to wed, either. If he truly did intend to court her or marry her to one of his brothers, he ought to protest her leaving. And if he actually cared about her…

She shut that thought away. She didn’t want Drew to care about her.

Because that meant she’d have to care about him more than she already did.

REGINA SCOTT has always wanted to be a writer. Since her first book was published in 1998, her stories have traveled the globe, with translations in many languages. Fascinated by history, she learned to fence and sail a tall ship. She and her husband reside in Washington state with their overactive Irish terrier. You can find her online blogging at nineteenteen.com. Learn more about her at reginascott.com or connect with her on Facebook at facebook.com/authorreginascott.

Would-Be Wilderness Wife

Regina Scott

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and they will become one flesh.

—Genesis 2:24

To Joe Mullins and Angela Rush, real estate agents extraordinaire, who helped us find a house on the new frontier, and to the Lord, who makes a house a home

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Praise

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Dear Reader

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Seattle, Washington Territory May 1866

“I need a doctor.”

The commanding male voice echoed through the dispensary of Doc Maynard’s hospital like a trumpet call. Catherine Stanway straightened from where she’d been bending over a patient, fully prepared to offer assistance. But one look at the man in the doorway, lit from behind by the rare Seattle sun, and words failed her.

He carried himself as proudly as a knight from the tales of King Arthur her father had read to her as a child. His rough-cut light brown hair brushed the top of the doorjamb; his shoulders in the wrinkled blue cotton shirt reached either side. He took a step into the room, and she was certain she felt the floor tremble.

Finding her voice, she raised her chin. “I can help you.”

He walked down the narrow room toward her, the thud of his worn leather boots like the sound of a hammer on the planks of the floor. The blue apothecary bottles lined up on the shelves behind the counter chimed against one another as he passed. He was like a warrior approaching his leader, a soldier his commanding officer. Mrs. Witherspoon, waiting on a chair for the doctor to reset her shoulder, clutched her arm close, wide-eyed. Others stared at him or quickly looked away.

He stopped beside Catherine and laid his fingers on the curved back of the chair where the elderly Mr. Jenkins snoozed while he waited for his monthly dose of medicine. Scars crossed the skin of the massive hand, white against the bronze.

Up close, Catherine could see that his face was more heart-shaped than oval, his unkempt hair drawing down in a peak over his forehead. His liberally lashed eyes were a mixture of clear green and blue, like the waves that lapped the Puget Sound shores. The gold of his skin said he worked outdoors; the wear on this clothes said he made little income from it.

He was easily the most healthy male she’d ever seen, so why did he need medical assistance?

“Are you a doctor?” he asked. Everything from the way he cocked his head to the slow cadence of the question spoke of his doubt.

Her spine stiffened, lifting her blue skirts off the floor and bringing her head level with his breastbone. She was used to the surprise, the doubts about her vocation here in Seattle. Even where she’d been raised, a few had questioned that the prominent physician George Stanway had trained his daughter to be a nurse. More had wondered why their beloved doctor and his promising son had felt it necessary to get themselves killed serving in the Union Army. At times, Catherine wondered the same thing.

“I’m a nurse,” she told their visitor, keeping her voice calm, professional. “I was trained by my father, a practicing physician, and served for a year at the New England Hospital for Women and Children. I came West with the Mercer expedition. Doctor Maynard was sufficiently pleased with my credentials to hire me to assist him and his wife.”

“So you’re a Mercer belle.” He straightened, towering over her. “I didn’t come looking for a bride. I need a doctor.”

A Mercer belle. That, she knew from the newspapers back East, was synonymous with husband hunter. Obviously her credentials as a medical practitioner meant nothing to him.

Well, he might not have come to the hospital seeking a bride, but she hadn’t come to Seattle after a husband, either. She’d already refused three offers of marriage since arriving two weeks ago. Her friend Madeleine O’Rourke had turned away six. Even her friend Allegra had had to argue with two would-be suitors before she’d wed her childhood sweetheart, Clay Howard, a successful local businessman, only two days after landing.

None of them had left the East Coast expecting such attentions. When Seattle’s self-proclaimed emigration agent, Asa Mercer, had recruited her and nearly seventy other women to settle in Washington Territory, he’d talked of the jobs that needed filling, the culture they could bring to the fledging community. Already some of her traveling companions were teaching schools in far-flung settlements. Others had taken jobs they had never dreamed of back home, including tending a lighthouse. They were innovative and industrious, just as Catherine had hoped she’d be when she’d journeyed West.

“I’m not interested in marriage either, sir,” she told him. “And I assure you, I am perfectly suited to deal with medical emergencies. Now, what’s the trouble?”

He glanced around as if determined to locate her employer. Doctor Maynard had converted the bottom floor of his house for his patients. This room was his dispensary, the medicines and curatives lined up in tall bottles on the triple row of shelves along one wall, with a dozen chairs, frequently all filled, opposite them. The other room held beds along either wall, with an area at the end curtained off and outfitted for surgeries. That room was used primarily as a laying-in ward for women about to give birth.

After conversations aboard ship about the dismal state of Seattle’s medical establishment, Catherine hadn’t been sure what to expect of Doctor Maynard and his hospital. She’d been greatly relieved to find the wood floors sanded clean, beds nicely made and light streaming through tall windows. The doctor shared her father’s view that fresh water, healthy food and natural light went a long way to curing any ill.

“I appreciate your offer,” the man said, returning his gaze to hers. “But I would prefer a doctor.”

She could see herself reflected in his eyes, her pale blond hair neat and tidy, her face set. She refused to be the first one to look away. In the silence, she heard Mr. Jenkins mumble as he dozed.

“Well, greetings, Drew!” The call from her employer caused their visitor to raise his head, breaking his gaze from Catherine’s. She suddenly found it easier to breathe.

Doctor Maynard didn’t appear the least concerned to find a mountain of a man in his dispensary. He strolled toward them with his usual grin. A tall man, he had a broad face and dark hair that persisted in curling in the middle of his forehead as if it laughed at the world like he did. After helping her organized father, Catherine had found Seattle’s famous founding father undisciplined, impractical and irrepressible. He was also endlessly cheerful and generous. In the two weeks she’d been working at his side, he’d never turned anyone down, regardless of gender, race or ability to pay.

“And what can we do for you today?” he asked their visitor as he approached. “Are all the Wallins healthy? No more bumps, bruises or broken bones among your logging crew, I trust?”

The man hesitated a moment, then nodded. “My brothers are well enough. I’m here about another matter.”

“I told Mr. Wallin I could assist him,” Catherine assured her employer.

“O-ho!” Maynard elbowed the man’s side and didn’t so much as cause their visitor to raise an eyebrow. “Are you after my nurse, Drew? Can’t say I blame you. Allow me to introduce Miss Catherine Stanway. She’s as pretty as a picture and twice as talented.”

Catherine didn’t blush at the praise. She’d heard it and far more in her hometown of Sudbury, while she’d worked as a nurse in Boston and while aboard the ship to Seattle. Much of the time it came from no sincere motive, she’d learned. She was more interested to see how this Drew fellow would answer. Would he continue to argue with her in the face of her employer’s endorsement?

He did not look at her as he transferred his grip to the doctor’s arm. “May I speak to you a moment in private?”

Maynard nodded, and the two withdrew to the end of the dispensary nearest the door. Fine. Lord knew she had plenty of work to do. She had only determined the needs of about half those currently filling the chairs, and two women were expected any day in the laying-in ward. If Mr. Wallin couldn’t be bothered to make use of her services, the fault lay with him, not her. She was fully prepared to do her duty.

Yet Catherine could hear the low rumble of his voice as she spoke to the woman next to Mr. Jenkins to determine her complaint, then went to reposition the pillow that had slipped out from where it had been cushioning Mrs. Witherspoon’s shoulder. But though she tried to focus on the needs around her, she couldn’t help glancing up at Drew Wallin again.

Whatever he and Doctor Maynard had discussed seemed to have touched his heart at last. His mouth dipped; his broad shoulders sagged. She could almost see the weight he carried, bowing him lower. What worries forced a knight to bend his knee? Her hand lifted of its own accord, as if some part of her longed to help him shoulder his burden.

She dropped her hand. How silly. She had work to do, a purpose in coming to Seattle that didn’t involve any emotional entanglements. She was a trained nurse in an area that badly needed medical assistance. And that was a great blessing.

Every time she eased the pain of another, she forgot the pain inside her. Every time she helped fight off death, she felt as if she’d somehow made up for the deaths of her brother and father on those bloody battlefields. Surely God did not intend her to leave her profession to serve as any man’s bride.

Besides, she liked nursing. Medicine was clinical, precise, measured. It kept her from remembering all she had lost. And each time someone passed beyond her help, she watched their grieving loved ones and knew she could not allow herself to hurt like that again.

No, whatever way she looked at it, she had no business mooning over a wild mountain logger like Drew Wallin. He was a knight with no shining armor, no crusade worthier than her own. The sooner she forgot him, the better.

* * *

Andrew Wallin stepped out onto the stone steps of Doc Maynard’s hospital and pulled in a deep breath of the late-afternoon air. It never ceased to amaze him how Seattle changed between his visits to town. Another new building was going up across the street, and wagons slogged by in the mud, carrying supplies to camps farther out. The sun beamed down on the planed-wood buildings, the boardwalks stretching between them, anointing the treetops in the distance.

Yet he could not enjoy the sight, thinking about what lay waiting for him back at the Landing. If only he’d been able to counter Maynard’s logic. But how could he argue one life against many?

He glanced back at the hospital. Something blue flashed past the tall windows, and he couldn’t help thinking about Catherine Stanway. For a moment there, when he’d first spied her in the dispensary, he’d wondered whether his mother had been right to encourage him to find a bride among the ladies Asa Mercer had brought to the territory.

He hadn’t been interested. The last thing he needed was a wife to look after when he already had the lives of six people to consider. Besides, he doubted that a lady brought from the big cities back East would know how to handle herself on a backwoods farm without more tutoring than he had time to give.

Catherine Stanway seemed a perfect example of a lady more suited to civilization. She was obviously well educated, her skills suited to a city. Her manners had been polished, her voice cultured and calm. Of course, he much preferred that attitude to the coy smiles and giggles that had marked his interaction with the few unmarried ladies of the Territory.

Then there was the fact that she was so pretty. Her hair was like sunlight shafting through the forest, her eyes resembled a pale winter’s sky and the outline of her curves looked lovely behind the apron covering her crisp cotton gown. He knew exactly what would happen if his brothers ever laid eyes on her. Either he’d be standing up as best man in a wedding, or his brothers would hog-tie him and wrestle him to the altar. They seemed determined to see him settled with a wife. They couldn’t understand that he already had enough on his hands taking care of them, Ma and Beth. There was nothing left of him to give to a wife.

With a sigh, he started down the steps toward where his team stood waiting farther along the block. The two youths arguing at the side of the wagon gave him as much concern as what was happening at home. As he approached, his youngest brother shoved his friend back. Scout Rankin, scrawnier than Levi despite being the same age, took one look at Drew and loped away. Drew grabbed his brother’s shoulders and spun him around.

“What?” Levi snapped, fists raised protectively in front of his lean frame. “I was watching the wagon, just like you asked.”

“You’d do better to watch the horses than fight,” Drew told him with a shake of his head. He went to check that the sturdy brown farm horses were munching from their feed sacks. “What was Scout doing here?”

“Seeing some people for his father,” Levi said, lowering his fists as Drew patted their horses down. “And I thought you were more worried about Ma than the horses. Isn’t that why we came to town?”

It was, but he didn’t like admitting his fears to Levi any more than he liked having to remind his brother why they didn’t associate much with their nearest neighbor. The Wallin family had chosen homesteads at the northern end of Lake Union for the timber. Benjamin Rankin had other reasons entirely to avoid town. He’d turned his cabin into a high-stakes gambling den, and the smells issuing from the place told Drew he was likely making his own liquor, as well. Ma had tried befriending Scout, teaching him to read and write beside Levi, but the son’s sullen behavior said he was turning out no better than the father. Drew didn’t want any of Scout’s bad habits rubbing off on Levi.

He removed the feed sacks and tossed them up to his brother. “Stow these.”

“Why? Are we leaving?” his brother asked, clutching the dusty burlap close. “Where’s Doc?”

“He’s not coming,” Drew reported. “Too many patients in town right now.”

Levi frowned, dropping the sacks into the wagon. He glanced in the windows of the hospital as he tugged at the hem of his plaid cotton shirt. “I saw you jawin’ at that gal. She’s pretty enough. Maybe she could convince him to come.”

Drew leaned against the rough wood of the wagon. “In the first place, it would take more than a pretty face to get Doc to abandon his patients. In the second place, the less we have to do with Nurse Stanway, the better.”

Levi threw up his hands. “She’s a nurse? That tears it, Drew. You know how bad Ma needs help. You get back in there and tell that gal she has to come with us!”

Frustration pushed him back from the wagon. “I asked Doc, Levi. He says he needs her here right now. Some women are expected in to give birth.”

Levi shook his head, curly blond hair creating a halo he didn’t deserve. “Women give birth all the time without someone standing over them. Leastways, that’s how Ma did it.”

“Ma didn’t have a choice,” Drew pointed out. “And if you recall, that’s how we lost Mary, her giving birth without a doctor there to help. Now simmer down. I still need to check for mail and load the supplies we ordered before heading back.”

Levi narrowed his dark blue eyes, a sure sign rebellion was brewing. Drew couldn’t blame him. His brother had just turned eighteen and was feeling his oats. Drew had been the same way at that age. Then his father had died and left the responsibility for their mother and five siblings on Drew’s shoulders. He’d settled down fast. He was glad Levi didn’t have to face the same fate.

Drew slipped a two-bit coin from the pocket of his work trousers and flipped it to his brother, who caught it with one hand. “Tell you what. Take the wagon down to the mercantile and get yourself a sarsaparilla. Ask Mr. Quentin to load up the supplies we bought. I’ll meet you there.”

Levi was still boy enough that he grinned over the treat as he climbed over the backboard for the bench.

Drew continued on to the post office, but he found nothing waiting for him. He wasn’t surprised. Most of his mother’s and father’s relatives didn’t write often. They couldn’t understand why his father had left Wisconsin for the far West. They thought themselves pioneers already. But his father had wanted more than the lakes and hills.

He’d wanted a town of his own.

So instead of settling in the hamlet that had been early Seattle, he’d claimed a parcel along Lake Union’s shores for himself and his wife. As each Wallin son had come of age, he, too, had laid claim to an adjoining parcel. Drew and his next brother, Simon, had put in the five years of hard work necessary to prove up their own claims, building cabins, tapping springs and clearing land for crops they had yet to plant. John and James were a few years from doing the same. Someday, they all might even have the town his father had dreamed of building.

If Drew could see them all safely raised first.

He headed back toward the mercantile his mother favored. Several wagons were crowded in front, but none of them were his. Where had Levi gotten to now? With a rattle of tack and the rumble of hooves, the wagon pulled up beside him in the street, his brother at the reins, eyes wild. “Come on! Jump in!”

Drew slung himself up on the bench, but he hadn’t even settled in the seat before Levi whipped the reins and whistled to the team. Drew grabbed the sideboard to steady himself as the wagon careened out of town.

“At least tell me you loaded the supplies,” he called over the thunder as the two horses galloped up the track that lead north.

“All squared away,” Levi shouted back. “Yee-haw! Go!”

Drew was afraid to ask, but he had to know. “You tick off the sheriff again?”

“Naw,” Levi yelled. “Just in a hurry to get back to Ma.”

Drew felt a twinge of guilt that he wasn’t as eager. In truth, he dreaded what he’d find at Wallin Landing, about a two-hour ride from Seattle.

He’d watched, helpless, the past two weeks as his mother had sunk beneath a virulent fever. At first he’d kept his brothers and sister away to prevent the disease from spreading and neglected his work to tend her. The past few days, Levi and Beth had served beside him. Only the combined insistence of his family that they needed help had driven him from Ma’s side today.

He hated having to relay the news that Doc Maynard wasn’t coming. But he hated more the thought that his mother might not be alive to find out.

So Drew let Levi drive the team more than four miles, until the road petered out to a narrow track near the south of the lake, before he insisted on stopping and giving them a rest. Only when the horses had quieted did he hear the muffled cries from the back of the wagon.

“Now, don’t get angry, Drew,” Levi said, edging away from him on the bench as Drew frowned toward the sound. “You know we have to have help.”

Drew felt as if one of the firs he felled had toppled into his stomach. He stared at his brother. “What have you done?”

“Ma needs a nurse, and you need a bride,” Levi insisted. “So I got you one.”

Drew jerked around and yanked the canvas tarp off what he’d thought were only supplies in the bed of the wagon.

Rag stuffed in her mouth, hands trussed before her, Catherine Stanway lay on her back, her bun askew and hair framing her face. She had every right to be terrified, to cry, to swoon.

But the blue eyes glaring back at him were hot as lightning, and her look was nothing short of furious.

He’d have to do a lot of talking if he hoped to calm her down and keep Levi from ending up in jail for his behavior. But he feared no amount of talking was going to keep his brothers from interfering in his life, especially when Levi had just gone and kidnapped Drew a bride.

Chapter Two

“What do you think you’re doing?” Catherine demanded the moment Drew Wallin set her on her feet and pulled the rag away. Her mouth felt as dry as dust, every inch of her body bruised by bouncing around on the wagon bed. “I am a citizen of the United States. I have rights! Untie me and return me to Seattle immediately, or I shall report you to the sheriff!”

“Bit on the spiteful side, ain’t she?” the young man who had grabbed her said, sitting on the wagon’s tongue, safely out of reach of both her and Mr. Wallin.

“Release her, Levi,” Mr. Wallin said to him, jaw tight. “And apologize. Now.”

The youth jumped down and hurried to Catherine’s side. He didn’t look the least bit contrite about snatching her out of the hospital, treating her as if she were no more than a bag of threshed wheat. She held out her hands toward him, and his fingers worked the knot he’d made in the rope that bound her wrists.

He’d looked so innocent when he’d appeared in the dispensary—a mop of curly blond hair, eyes turned down like a sad puppy’s, cotton shirt and trousers worn but clean. He’d bounded up to her and seized her hands.

“Please,” he’d said, lips trembling. “My ma’s real sick. You have to come and help her.”

She’d thought he’d had an ill woman in a wagon outside. He wouldn’t have been the first to pull up to the hospital begging for help. It seemed Doctor Maynard tended to at least one logger a day with a broken arm or leg or a crushed skull. As soon as Mr. Wallin had left, her employer had gone into surgery with his wife, Susanna, assisting him. Catherine had known she couldn’t call him away from that until she knew the severity of this young man’s mother’s illness.

“Show me,” she’d said to the youth, taking only a moment to dry her hands before following him out the back of the hospital.

But instead of an older woman huddled on a bench, she’d found a long-bed wagon partially filled with supplies and tools and no other person in sight.

“Where’s your mother?” she’d asked.

“About eight miles north,” he’d said, wrapping one arm around her and pinioning her arms against her. “But don’t you worry none. I’ll get you there safe and sound.”

She’d opened her mouth to call for help, and he’d shoved in that hideous rag. Though she’d twisted and lashed out with her arms and feet, his whip-cord-thin body was surprisingly strong. He’d tied her up, tossed her in the wagon and covered her with a tarp.

She supposed she should have been afraid, being abducted from her place of work with neither her employer nor any of her new friends to know what had become of her. In truth, she’d been furious that anyone would treat her like this. What, did he think her friendless, an easy victim? When Doctor Maynard realized she was gone, he would likely ask after her at the boardinghouse where she and some of the women who had come West with her were living.

That would concern her friend Madeleine. The feisty redhead would have no trouble enlisting the aid of the sheriff and his young deputy to find Catherine. A posse could be on its way even now.

If the men had any idea which way to go.

That thought gave her pause. As her young kidnapper worked on the rope and Mr. Wallin stood sentinel, arms crossed over his broad chest, she glanced around. The wagon was pulled over among the brush at the edge of the road, two horses waiting. A muddy track stretched in either direction, firs crowding close on both sides. In places she could still see the low stumps of trees that had been cut to carve out the road. She could make out blue sky above, but the forest blocked the view of any landmark that might tell her where she was.

Levi stepped back with a frustrated puff. “She went and pulled the rope too tight. We’ve going to have to cut it.” His voice was nearly a whine at the loss of the cord.

“If you value your material so highly,” Catherine said, “next time think before using it to kidnap someone.”

“No one is kidnapping anyone,” Mr. Wallin said, his firm voice brooking no argument.

She argued anyway. “I believe that is the correct term when one has been abducted and held against her will, sir.”

He grimaced. “It may be the right term, but I refuse to allow it to be the right circumstance. We’ll return you home as soon as possible.”

He pulled out a long knife from the sheath at his waist, the blade honed to a point that gleamed in the sunlight. Though he towered over her as he reached for her, she felt no fear as he sawed through the rope and freed her.

“I haven’t heard that apology, Levi,” he reminded the boy with a look that would have blistered paint.

Levi shrugged. “Sorry to inconvenience you, but my mother is sick. Now, will you just get back in the wagon so we can go home?”

Catherine took a step away from them both. “I am going no farther. Return me to Seattle.”

“Can’t,” Levi said, hopping back up onto the wagon’s tongue. “Too far.”

“He’s right,” Drew Wallin said before Catherine could argue with his brother, as well. He nodded to what must be the west, for she could see the light slanting low through the trees from that direction. “The horses are spent. We’ll never make it back to Seattle before dark, and it isn’t safe for the horses or us to be out here at night.”

She could believe that. Since coming to the town, she’d rarely ventured beyond it. Those forests were dark, the underbrush dense in places. Allegra’s husband, Clay Howard, who had accompanied them on their journey from New York, had explained all about the dangers of getting lost—bears, wolves and cougars; unfriendly natives; crumbling cliffs and rushing rivers. She certainly didn’t want to blunder about in the dark.

She crossed her arms over her chest. “So where do you propose to take shelter tonight?”

“We’ll make for the Landing,” he assured her, “but I promise you I’ll return you to Seattle tomorrow.”

“But tomorrow we’re supposed to fell that fir for Captain Collings,” Levi protested before Catherine could answer. “We can’t do that without you!”

Mr. Wallin turned away from them both. “As Miss Stanway said, there are consequences for your decision,” he tossed back over his shoulder as he walked along the wagon to the team. “You should have thought before acting. Now get in the back. Miss Stanway will be riding with me.”

Grumbling, the youth clambered deeper into the bed of the wagon and set his back to the sideboard, long legs stretching out over the supplies.

Catherine couldn’t make herself follow the elder Mr. Wallin. She still wasn’t sure where they were taking her.

“This landing,” she said, “how far is it?”

“Another few miles,” he replied, running his hands over the nearest horse as if checking for signs of strain. “On Lake Union.”

Lake Union was north of Seattle’s platted streets, she knew. The Seattle Gazette, the weekly newspaper, had been full of stories recently about how the lake could serve as Seattle’s chief water source as the town grew. There’d been talk of building a navigable canal between Lake Washington to the east and Lake Union, perhaps even to Puget Sound for transporting logs.

But right now, all those were nothing but dreams. The only people she knew about who lived on Lake Union were Indians.

And, apparently, Drew Wallin.

“Are there any women at this landing?” she asked.

He had been frowning at her. Now his brow cleared as if he understood her concerns at last.

“My mother and my sister,” he said. “Beth is only fourteen, but I think most of the gossips in Seattle would count her as a chaperone. Your reputation is safe, ma’am.”

Still she couldn’t make herself move. Was he telling the truth? Was Seattle really so far behind them? She glanced back the way they had come and saw only the mud of the track stretching into the distance—no sign of smoke from a campfire or cabin, no other travelers. A gull swooped low with a mournful call. They were close to water, then, but she could say that of any location near Seattle.

She was tempted to simply walk away, but if a wagon and team couldn’t reach Seattle by dark, what chance did she have on foot?

She nodded. “Very well, Mr. Wallin.”

She followed him back to the box of the wagon, passing Levi’s narrowed look. He acted as if she should feel guilty for inconveniencing him! A shame she was entirely too mature to stick out her tongue at him, however highly satisfactory that would have been. A shame Maddie wasn’t here with her. Her friend would have given him an earful.

They reached the front of the wagon, and she put out her hand to climb in. Before she knew what he was about, Drew Wallin put both hands on her waist and lifted her onto the bench as if she weighed nothing. For the first time since this adventure had started, her heart stuttered. She took a deep breath to steady herself and busied herself arranging her skirts as he jumped up beside her and took the reins.

“Give her your hat,” he ordered Levi without so much as looking back.

The youth, who had been lounging against the side of the wagon, jerked upright. “Give her your own. You’re the oldest.”

“I don’t require a hat,” Catherine assured them both, but Mr. Wallin reached one arm over the back of the box and rapped his brother on the head. In answer, Levi tossed up a brown wool hat with a battered brim, which Mr. Wallin caught with one hand. He offered it to Catherine as if it were a jeweled ring on a velvet pillow.

“We still have a ways to go,” he explained when she hesitated. “And I need to walk the horses, so it may take us a bit. I know my sister is always talking about how a lady needs to protect her complexion from the sun.”

He was trying to be considerate, and though the hat had clearly seen better days, she knew it for a peace offering.

“Thank you,” she said, accepting it and setting it on her hair. But one touch to her head, and she realized how disheveled she must appear. The bun she normally wore had come partially undone while she’d struggled. Strands clung to one ear; others hung down her back. As Drew clucked to the horses, setting them plodding up the track, she pulled out the last of her pins and let the tresses fall.

She had piled up the pins in the lap of her apron when something brushed the back of her hair. She jerked around to find Levi on his knees behind her, staring at her as he pulled back his hand.

“It’s like moonlight on the lake,” he said, voice hushed and eyes wide.

“Sit down,” his brother grit out. He whipped the reins, and the horses darted forward. Levi fell with a thud onto the wagon bed.

Catherine faced front, mouth compressed to keep from laughing.

“I apologize for my brother,” Drew said, slowing the horses once more. Catherine could see that his ruddy cheeks were darkening. “He’s spent too much time in the woods.”

“So have you,” Levi grumbled, but Catherine could hear him settling himself against the wood.

Better not to encourage him. She twisted up her hair and pinned it carefully in place at the back of her head as the horses continued north. The track dwindled until the trees crowded on either side and the ruts evened out to ground covered by low bushes and broad-leafed vines. She sighted something long and dark hanging from a blackberry bramble, as if it had reached out to snag the last horse or human who had ventured this way.

Both Wallin men fell silent. The clatter of the wagon wasn’t so loud that she could miss the scree of the hawk that crossed the opening between the trees. The breeze was coming in off the Sound, bringing the scent of brine like fingers combing through the bushes.

He leadeth me beside still waters. He restoreth my soul.

That chance for peace was what had brought her here so very far from what she’d planned for her life. She should not let the misguided actions of an impetuous boy change that.

Nor the fluttering of a heart she had sworn to keep safely cocooned from further pain.

* * *

How could his brother have been so boneheaded? Drew glanced over his shoulder at the youth. Levi had curled himself around the supplies on the wagon bed like a hound before the fire, and it wouldn’t surprise Drew if his brother started snoring. The boy had absolutely no remorse for what he’d done. Where had Drew gone wrong?

“I’m really very sorry,” he apologized again to Catherine as he faced front. “I don’t know what got into him. He was raised better.”

“Out in the woods, you said,” she replied, gaze toward the front, as well. Her hair was once more confined behind her head, and he knew a moment of regret at its disappearance. Levi might have been the one to cry out at the sight of it, but the satiny tresses had held him nearly as captive.

“On the lake,” he told her. “My father brought us to Seattle about fifteen years ago from Wisconsin and chose a spot far out. He said a man needed something to gaze out on in the morning besides his livestock or his neighbors.”

She smiled as if the idea pleased her. “And your mother?” she asked, shifting on the wooden bench, her wide blue skirts filling the space at her feet. “Is she truly ill?”

It was difficult to even acknowledge the fact. He nodded, turning his gaze out over the horses. “She came down with a fever nearly a fortnight ago.”

He could feel her watching him. “A fever that lasts that long is never good,” she informed him in a pleasant voice he was sure must calm many a patient. “Do you open the windows daily to air her room?”

He’d fetched gallons of water from the spring, even trudged down to the lakeshore to draw it cold from the depths. He’d stoked up the fire, wrapped Ma tight in covers. But he hadn’t considered opening the windows.

“No,” he answered. “Doesn’t cold air just make you sicker?”

She shook her head, Levi’s hat sliding on the silk of her hair. “No, indeed. The fear of it is a common belief I have had to fight repeatedly. Fresh air, clean water, healthy food—those are what cure a body, sir. That is what my father taught. That is what I practice.”

She was so sure of the facts that he couldn’t argue. He knew from conversations with Doc Maynard that Seattle was woefully behind on recent medical advancements. As one of the few physicians, Doc was overwhelmed with the number of people ill or injured. He must have been overjoyed to have Catherine join his staff.

“I hope you’ll be able to help her, then, ma’am,” he told her. “Before we return you to Seattle tomorrow.”

He glanced her way in time to see her gaze drift out over the horses. “You did not seem so sure of my skills earlier, sir.”

With Levi right behind him, he wasn’t about to admit that his initial concern had been for his brother’s matchmaking, not the lack of her skills. “We’ve known Doc for years,” he hedged.

He thought her shoulders relaxed a little. She sat so prim and proper it was hard to tell. “My father’s patients felt the same way. There is nothing like the trusted relationship of your family doctor. But I will do whatever I can to help your mother.”

Levi’s smug voice floated up from behind. “I knew she’d come around.”

Though Drew was relieved at the thought of Catherine’s help, he wanted nothing more than to turn and thump Levi again.

“As you can see,” he said instead to Catherine, “my brother has a bad habit of acting or talking without thinking.” He glanced back into the wagon in time to see Levi making a face at him.

“My brother was the same way,” she assured him as he turned to the front again with a shake of his head. “He borrowed my father’s carriage more than once, drove it all over the county. He joined the Union Army on his eighteenth birthday before he’d even received a draft notice.”

“Sounds like my kind of fellow,” Levi said, kneeling so that his head came between them. “Did he journey West with you?”

Though her smile didn’t waver, her voice came out flat. “No. He was killed at the Battle of Five Forks in Virginia.”

Levi looked stricken as he glanced between her and Drew. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t know.”

“Of course you didn’t,” she replied, but Drew saw that her hands were clasped tightly in her lap as if she were fighting with herself not to say more.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Drew said. “That must have been hard on you and your parents.”

“My mother died when I was nine,” she said, as if commenting on the weather. “My father served as a doctor in the army. He died within days of Nathan. It was a very bloody war.”

How could she sit so calmly? If he’d lost so much he would have been railing at the sky.

Levi was obviously of a similar mind. “That’s awful!” He threw himself back into the bed. “Pa died when I was eight, but I think I would have gone plumb crazy if I’d lost Drew and Simon and James and John, too.”

Her brows went up as she glanced at Drew. “You have four brothers?”

He chuckled. “Yes, and most days I’m glad of it.”

“We had another sister, too, besides Beth,” Levi said, popping up again. “She died when she was a baby. Simon says it about broke Ma’s heart.”

It had almost broken Drew’s heart, as well. His parents had been grieving so hard that he’d had to be the one to fashion the tiny coffin and dig the little grave at the edge of the family land. He’d never dreamed his father would be dead just five years later.

Please, Lord, don’t make me bury another member of my family!

The prayer came quickly, and just as quickly he regretted it. It was selfish. If a man prayed, he should ask the Almighty for wisdom to lead, strength to safeguard those he loved. The Lord had blessed him with strength. Some days he wasn’t too sure about the wisdom.

Beside him, Miss Stanway’s face softened, as if his pain had touched her.

“I’m sorry for your loss, as well,” she said. They were the expected words; he’d just used them on her. He’d heard them countless times at his father’s passing and his sister’s. Yet the look she cast him, the tears pooling in her blue eyes, told him she understood more than most.

He wanted to reach out, clasp her hand, promise her the future would be brighter. But that was nonsense! He couldn’t control the future, and she was his to protect only until he returned her to Seattle. He had enough on his hands without taking on a woman new to the frontier.

Besides, every settlement within a hundred miles needed her help. Catherine Stanway might not have realized it yet, but a nurse was a valuable commodity, even if she wasn’t so pretty or one of a few unmarried women in the Territory.

Which made him wonder how far his brothers might go to keep her at Wallin Landing.

Chapter Three

Twilight wrapped around the forest by the time Catherine’s host guided the team into a grassy clearing crossed by moss-crusted split-rail fences. A large cabin and a barn made from logs and planed timber hugged the edges, with trees standing guard behind them as if honoring their fallen brothers and sisters. Another light through the trees told her at least one more cabin was nearby. The glow through the windows of the closest cabin beckoned to her.

“Where’s the lake?” she asked as Drew hopped down and came around the wagon.

He nodded toward the cabin, a two-story affair with a pitched roof and a porch at one end. It was encircled by a walk of planed boards.

“Through the trees there,” he said. “We’re on a bench fifty feet or so above the waterline. Keeps us out of any flooding in the spring.”

His father had obviously planned ahead. She wouldn’t have thought about spring flooding when choosing a plot for a house. Of course, she’d never had to choose a homesite in the wilderness!

She turned to climb down, and once again Drew reached out and lifted her from the wagon to set her on her feet. For a moment it was as if she stood in his embrace. His eyes were a smoky blue in the dim light. She couldn’t seem to remember why she was here, what she was supposed to do next.

The sound of Levi scrambling out of the wagon bed woke her, and she pulled away. As the youth started past, his brother put out an arm to stop him.

“See to the horses and bring in the supplies. I’ll take our guest inside.”

Levi’s face tightened, but then he glanced at Catherine. As if he finally realized it was his fault she was here, he shrugged and went to do as he had been bid.

“This way,” Drew said with another nod toward the cabin.

The Wallin home might have been made from peeled logs, but it appeared the family had taken pains to make the place attractive as well as functional. Stained glass panels decorated the top of each window on the two floors. Boxes filled with plants underpinned the two larger downstairs windows; she recognized several kinds of flowering herbs. Someone had plaited a wreath from fir branches and hung it from the thick front door. The resinous smell greeted Catherine as she approached.

Drew reached for the latch, but the panel swung open without his aid. Catherine only had time to register blond hair darker and a good foot lower than hers before a young lady launched herself into her arms.

“Thank you, oh, thank you!” The girl drew back to grin at Catherine. “I know this was a terrible long way to come, but we need a nurse badly. Simon and James and John will be so glad to see you! They’ll be by later, my brothers, all of them. They thought you or Doc or whoever was coming should have some time to yourself before they came stampeding in, but I couldn’t wait to get to know you better.”

“Beth,” Drew rumbled beside Catherine.

The girl didn’t even pause for breath as she seized Catherine’s hand and pulled her across the colorful braided rag rug into the wide, warm room, which was lit by a glowing fire. “I’ll make an apron for you to wear. Godey’s Lady’s Book says they’re all the rage for the fashionable lady of industry.”

“Beth,” Drew said a little more firmly as he followed them.

“I have stew ready for dinner,” his sister continued, and Catherine could smell the tangy scent drifting through the cabin as Beth tugged her past a long table with ladder-back chairs at each end and benches along the sides. Similar chairs rested against the walls, cane seats partially covered by small quilts, and a bentwood rocker stood near the rounded stone fireplace. Through the openings on either side of the hearth she caught sight of a step stove with kettles simmering. A massive iron tub leaned against the outside wall.

“I know it’s not much,” Beth said, “but I wasn’t sure when you’d get here and I was afraid I’d dry out the venison if I kept it on the stove too long. Do you like stew?”

“Yes,” Catherine assured her, pulling herself to a stop in the middle of the room, “but...”

Beth didn’t wait for more. “Oh, good! This time of year we only have early carrots, of course, but I still had potatoes and turnips left from the fall. We have our own garden behind the house. Drew cleared the land. In a few weeks, we’ll have peas and beans and cabbage and...”

“Beth!”

Drew’s thundering voice made Catherine cringe, but it finally stopped his sister, in word and in action. She turned to frown at him, firelight rippling across her straight golden hair. “What?”

“Doc Maynard couldn’t come,” he said without a hint of apology in his voice. “This is Miss Stanway. She’s a nurse, but she’ll only be staying the night with us. I’ll return her to Seattle tomorrow.”

“Oh.” The single word seemed to echo in the room. She dropped her gaze and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Now that she was still, Catherine could see that she had a heart-shaped face like her brother, wide-spaced eyes and the beginnings of a figure. Her cheeks were turning as pink as the narrow-skirted gingham gown she wore.

“It was a natural mistake,” Catherine assured her with a smile. “And I’ll be happy to help your mother while I’m here.”

Beth glanced up and brightened. Her eyes were darker than her older brother’s, closer to the midnight blue of Levi’s. Catherine had a feeling that one day a large number of suitors would be calling.

“Thank you,” Beth said, good humor apparently restored. “And I truly am happy to make your acquaintance. Would you like to see Ma now?”

Before Catherine could answer, Drew stepped forward, gaze all for his sister, his brows drawn down heavily over his deep-set eyes. “How is she?”

Beth’s light dimmed, and she seemed to shrink in on herself. “Still the same. I’m not sure she knows me.”

Catherine felt as if her spine had lengthened, her shoulders strengthened. Her father had always said it was a powerful thing to have a purpose. She felt it now, wiping away her weariness and soothing her frustrations. Thank You, Lord. Help me do what You fitted me to do.

“Take me to her,” she ordered them.

Beth clasped her hands in obvious relief. Drew merely motioned Catherine to where a set of open stairs, half logs driven into the wall, rose to the second story.

Upstairs were two more rooms, divided by the fireplace and the walls that supported it. One room held several straw ticks on the floor, but only one seemed to be in use; the others were piled with rumpled clothing, tools and chunks of wood. The other room contained two wooden beds—a smaller one in the corner with a carved chest beside it and a larger bedstead in the center with a side table holding a brass lamp. Both beds were covered with multicolored quilts that brightened the room.

A woman lay on the wider bed. She had hair that was more red than gold, plastered to her oval face. She’d been handsome once, but now pain had drawn lines about her eyes, nose and mouth. By the way the collar of her flannel nightgown bagged, Catherine guessed she’d lost some weight, as well. Her skin looked like parchment in the candlelight.

Catherine sat in the high-backed chair that had been placed next to the bed and reached for Mrs. Wallin’s hand. Setting her fingers to the woman’s wrist, she counted the heartbeats as her father had taught her. She could feel Drew and his sister watching her. She’d been watched by family members before, some doubting her, some worried. This time felt different somehow. Her shoulders tensed, and she forced them to relax.

“Her pulse is good,” she reported, keeping her voice calm and her face composed. She had to remain objective. It was so much easier to do her job when she viewed the person before her as a patient in need of healing rather than someone’s mother or wife. She leaned closer, listening to the shallow, panting breaths.

“Mrs. Wallin,” she said, “can you hear me?”

The woman’s eyelids fluttered. Drew and Beth leaned closer as well, crowding around Catherine. Their mother’s eyes opened, as clear as her eldest son’s but greener. She blinked as if surprised to find herself in bed, then focused on Catherine.

“Mary?” she asked.

Beth sucked in a breath, drawing back and hugging herself. Drew didn’t move, but Catherine felt as if he also had distanced himself. Who was this Mary his mother had been expecting? Did Drew Wallin have a wife he’d neglected to mention?

* * *

Drew watched as Catherine tended to his mother. Ma had changed so much in the past two weeks that he hardly knew her. As Beth had said, he wasn’t sure she knew them, either. It was as if the fire that had warmed them all their lives was growing dim.

He had feared Catherine might confirm the fact, tell them in her cool manner to prepare for the worst. Instead, she was all confidence. She opened the window beside the bed and ordered the one opposite it opened as well, drawing in the cool evening air and the scent of the Sound. She directed Drew to smother the fire and helped Beth pull off some of the covers they had piled on their mother in an attempt to sweat the fever from her. She even removed Ma’s favorite feather pillow and requested a straw one. It was testimony to how ill their mother was that she protested none of this.

“Do you have a milk cow?” Catherine asked Drew as Beth dug through the chest their father had carved for Ma to find the clean nightgown Catherine had suggested.

Drew shook his head. “Four goats. But they produce enough milk for our purposes.”

Catherine accepted the flannel gown from Beth with a nod of thanks. “What about lemons?”

“Simon brought some back from town last week,” Beth said, tucking her hair behind her ear and hugging herself with her free hand. “I used some for lemonade.”

“Fetch the lemonade,” Catherine advised. “We’ll start with that and see if she can tolerate it. Later, I’ll show you how to make lemon whey. Mrs. Child recommends it for high fevers.”

“Mrs. Child?” Drew asked, but his sister nodded eagerly.

“I know Mrs. Child! Ma has her book on being a good housewife. She’s very clever.”

Beth might have gone on as she often did, but Catherine directed her toward the stairs, then turned to Drew. “I’ll need warm water, as well.”

Drew frowned. “To drink?”

Pink crept across her cheekbones, as delicate as the porcelain cups his mother had safeguarded over the Rockies on their way West. “No,” she said, gaze darting away from his. “To bathe your mother. Can you see that it’s warmed properly? Not too hot.”

“Coming right up,” Drew promised, and left to find some help.

He managed to locate the rest of his family at Simon’s cabin, which was a little ways into the woods. His brothers were cleaning up before dinner, but they all stopped what they were doing to listen to his explanation of what had happened in town. He thought at least one of them might agree with him that Levi’s actions were rash. But to a man they were too concerned about Ma to consider how Catherine Stanway must feel.

“So this nurse,” Simon said, draping the cloth he’d been using to dry his freshly shaven face over the porcelain basin in a corner of his cabin. “What do we know about her? What are her credentials?”

Figure on Simon, his next closest brother in age at about two years behind Drew’s twenty-nine, to ask. He was the only one tall enough to look him in the eye, for all they rarely saw eye to eye. With his pale blond hair and angled features, Simon was too cool. Even looked different from Drew. Every movement of his lean body, word from his lips and look from his light green eyes seemed calculated.

The middle brother, James, leaned back where he sat near the fire, effortlessly balancing the stool on one of its three legs. “Does it really matter, Simon? She’s here, and she’s helping. Be grateful.” He turned to Drew. His long face was a close match for Simon’s in its seriousness, his short blond hair a shade darker, but there was a twinkle in his dark blue eyes. “Now, I have a more pressing question. Is she pretty?”

“That’s not important,” Drew started, but his second-youngest brother, John, slapped his hands down on his knees where he sat at a bench by the table.

“She must be! He’s blushing!” He shook his head, red-gold hair straighter than his mother’s like a flame in the light.

Drew took a deep breath to hold back a retort. Of all his brothers, John was the most sensible, the most studious. If he’d seen a change in Drew, it must be there.

But he wasn’t about to admit it.

He started for the door. “Pretty or not, she has work for us to do. She wants lots of water warmed. You bring it in. I’ll heat it up.” He glanced back over his shoulder. “And John, find Levi. He should have finished in the barn by now. I don’t want him wandering off.”

“Where would he go?” James teased, letting the stool clatter back to the floor as he climbed to his feet. “It’s not as if he has tickets to the theatre.”

“Or one to attend within a hundred miles,” John agreed, but he headed for the barn as Drew had requested.

For the next couple of hours everyone was too busy to joke. His brothers took turns bringing in the water to Drew, who heated it in his mother’s largest pot on the step stove. Then they formed a line up the stairs and passed the warm water in buckets up to Beth and Miss Stanway.

“She washed Ma with a soft cloth, then rubbed her down with another,” Beth marveled to Drew at the head of the stairs when he ventured up to check on them after he and his brothers had eaten. “And she changed the sheets on the bed without even making Ma get up. She’s amazing!”

Drew had to agree, for when Catherine beckoned him closer, he found his mother much improved. No longer did she look like a wax figure on the bed, and she smiled at each of her sons as they clustered around to speak with her.

“I think it’s time to rest,” Catherine said to them all after a while. “I’ll come talk to you after I’ve settled her.”

Drew herded everyone down the stairs. They all found seats in the front room, Simon and James on opposite ends of the table, John on a bench alongside, Beth in Ma’s rocking chair and Levi sprawled on the braided rug with Drew standing behind him leaning against the stairs. He caught himself counting heads, even though he knew everyone was present. Habit. He’d been watching over them for the past ten years, ever since the day his father had died.

It had been a widow-maker that had claimed their father. Drew had been eighteen then, and only Simon at sixteen and James at fourteen had been old enough and strong enough to help clear the timber for their family’s original claim. None of them had seen the broken limb high on the massive fir before it came crashing down.

“Take care of them,” his father had said when his brothers had pulled the limb off him and Drew had cradled him in his arms. Already his father’s voice had started wheezing from punctured lungs, and blood had tinged his lips. “Take care of them all, Andrew. This family is your responsibility.”

He had never forgotten. He hadn’t lost another member of the family, though his brothers had made the job challenging. They’d broken arms and legs, cut themselves on saws and knives, fought off diseases he was afraid to name. Even sweet Beth had given him a scare a few months ago when she’d nearly succumbed to a fever much like their mother’s.

He’d kept them safe, nursed them through any illness or injury. His had been the shoulders they’d cried on, the arms that had held them through the night. He’d been the one to ride for medicine, to cut cloths into bandages. He’d been the one to sit up with them night after night. Having someone help felt odd, as if he’d put on the wrong pair of boots.

That odd feeling didn’t ease as Catherine came down the stairs to join them. As if she were a schoolmarm prepared to instruct, she took up her place by the fire. The crackling flames set her figure in silhouette.

“I thought you would all want to hear what I believe about your mother’s condition,” she said, and Drew knew he wasn’t the only Wallin leaning forward to catch every word.

“Two culprits cause this type of fever,” she continued, gaze moving from one brother to another until it met Drew’s. “Typhus and typhoid fever.”

Neither sounded good, and his stomach knotted.

“Aren’t they the same thing?” John asked.

She shook her head. “Many people think so, and some doctors treat them the same, but they are very different beasts. With typhus, the fever never leaves, and the patient simply burns up.”

Beth shivered and rubbed a hand up her arm.

“Typhoid fever, on the other hand,” Catherine said as if she hadn’t noticed, “is generally worse for the first two or three weeks and then starts to subside. Given how long you said she’s suffered, I’m leaning toward typhoid fever, but we should know for sure within the week.”

Simon seized on the word. “A week. Then, you’ll stay with us for that long.” It was a statement, not a question.

“I promised to return Miss Stanway to Seattle tomorrow,” Drew said.

Simon scowled at him.

“We need her more than Seattle does,” Levi complained.

His other brothers murmured their agreement.

“That isn’t our decision to make,” Drew argued.

“No,” Catherine put in. “It’s mine.”

That silenced them. She clasped her hands in front of her blue gown. “Doctors take an oath to care for their patients. My father believed that nurses should take one, as well. It is my duty to care for your mother and for you, should you sicken.”

A duty she took seriously, he could see. Her color was high, her face set with determination as she glanced around at them all. “I will stay until your mother is out of danger.”

Simon stood. “It’s settled, then. Drew, clear out your cabin and let her have it. You can bunk with me. I snore less than Levi or James.”

John rolled his eyes. “That’s what you think.”

“Oh, I couldn’t take anyone’s cabin,” Catherine started.

Drew held up his hand. “No, Simon’s right. Not about his snoring. He’s louder than Yesler’s sawmill.” As his other brothers laughed and Simon shook his head, Drew continued, “You need a place of your own. I’ll clear out my cabin tonight so you can sleep when you finish with Ma.”

“I intend to stay up with her tonight,” Catherine warned him.

“Then the cabin will be waiting for you in the morning,” Drew assured her.

She smiled at them. “Well, then, gentlemen, I will leave you for the night. I understand the youngest Mr. Wallin sleeps upstairs. I’ll send him if we need anything.”

Again Levi looked as if he were going to protest, but one glance at Drew and he shrugged and settled back on the rug. Drew watched her climb the stairs, Beth right behind her.

“That’s quite a woman,” Simon mused, stretching his feet over Levi’s prone form toward the fire.

“Never met one so determined,” James mused.

“You never met one with that kind of education, either,” John reminded him. “I like the fact that she isn’t afraid to speak her mind.”

“Bit on the bossy side,” Levi said with a yawn. “But she’ll do.”

“That she will,” Simon agreed. “The only question is, which one of us is going to marry her?”

Just what he’d feared. Drew stiffened. “No one said anything about marriage.”

Simon glanced around at his brothers. “I believe I just did.”

John nodded, brightening. “Inspired. She’s smart, and she has a skill we sorely need.”

“And she’s not bad to look at,” James added.

“You could do a lot worse, Drew,” Levi agreed.

Drew shook his head. “You’re mad, the lot of you. I’m not getting married.”

“Suit yourself.” Simon rose and went to the fireplace to scoop up a handful of kindling. “We’ll draw straws. Short straw proposes.”

Drew stared as his other brothers, except Levi, rose to their feet. “Don’t be ridiculous. She wouldn’t have any of you.”

James shrugged. “Doesn’t hurt to try.”

Simon squared up the sticks and hid all but the tops in his hand, then held them out to his brothers. “Who wants to go first?”

Drew strode into their group. “Enough, I said. No one is proposing to Miss Stanway, and that’s final.”

His brothers exchanged glances. Simon lowered the sticks. “Very well, Drew. For now. But you have to marry someday if you want kin to inherit your land. You’ll never build that town for Pa unless you do. I think you better ask yourself why you’re so dead set against her.”

“And why you’re even more set against us courting her,” John added.

Chapter Four

So one of the Wallin brothers was going to marry her. Catherine shook her head as she crossed the floor to the big bed. Either they didn’t know voices carried in the log cabin or they didn’t care that she realized their intentions. It truly didn’t matter which was the truth. She wasn’t getting married.

“Do you think bonnets or hats are more fetching on a lady?” Beth asked, following her. “I’m of a mind for bonnets. They cover more of your face from the sun, and they have extra room for decorations. Feathers are ever so flattering.”

She was chattering again, voice quick and forceful, but it seemed a bit more strained than usual, and Catherine couldn’t help noticing that Beth’s color was high as she joined Catherine. Was she trying to pretend she wasn’t aware of her brothers’ intentions?

Her patient was awake, green eyes watchful. “You mustn’t mind Simon,” Mrs. Wallin murmured, proving that she, too, had heard at least part of the conversation downstairs. The ribbon ties on her nightcap brushed the skin of her cheek. “Being the second son after Drew has never been easy. He tends to assert himself even when there’s no need.”

As Beth tidied up the room, Catherine raised her patient’s wrist to check her pulse. It seemed just a little stronger, but perhaps that was because Mrs. Wallin was embarrassed by her sons’ behavior.

“And there is no need to assert himself in this situation,” Catherine told her as she lowered Mrs. Wallin’s hand. “I’m here to help you. Nothing more.”

Mrs. Wallin shivered, and Catherine touched the woman’s forehead. Still too hot, but did she perhaps feel a little cooler than earlier? Was Catherine so desperate to see hope that she had lost her ability to be objective?

“Am I going to die?” Mrs. Wallin whispered.

Beth gasped. Catherine pulled back her hand. “Not if I can help it.”

As Beth hurried closer, Mrs. Wallin reached out and took Catherine’s hand, for all the world as if Catherine was the one needing comfort. “I’m not afraid.” Her eyes were bright, and Catherine told herself it was the fever. “I know in Whom I’ve put my trust. But my boys and Beth, oh, I hate the idea of leaving them!”

Beth threw herself onto the bed, wrapping her mother in a fierce hug. “You’re not leaving us, Ma. I won’t let you!”

The room seemed to be growing smaller, the air thinner. Catherine pulled out of the woman’s grip.

“Now, then,” she made herself say with brisk efficiency. “I see nothing to indicate your mother must leave you anytime soon. The best thing now would be for her to rest. I’ll be right here if she needs me.”

Beth straightened and wiped a tear from her face. “Yes, of course. I’ll just go help Drew.” She hurried from the loft.

“She’s a dear child,” her mother murmured, settling in the bed. “She’ll need someone besides me, another lady, to help guide her.”

Someone besides Catherine. “Rest now,” she urged, and Mrs. Wallin nodded and dutifully closed her eyes, head sinking deeper into the pillow, face at peace.

A shame Catherine couldn’t find such peace. She perched on the chair beside the bed and tried to steady her breathing. Still, the woman’s fears and Beth’s reaction clung to her like cobwebs. Who was Catherine to promise Mrs. Wallin’s return to health? Only the Lord knew what the future held. Her earthly father had drummed that into her.

We may be His hands for healing, he’d say as he washed his hands after surgery. But He will determine the outcome of our work.

And the outcome of a life.

Did he have to go, Lord? Did You need another physician in heaven? But why take Nathan, too? Did You have to leave me alone?

The tears were starting again, and she blinked them fiercely away. She’d had her fill of them months ago. She couldn’t look at the sunny yellow rooms of their home in Sudbury without seeing the book her father had left before going to war, the galoshes her brother had forgotten to pack. The polished wood pew in their community church had felt empty even though another family had joined her in it. Every time she’d walked down the street, she’d seem nothing but stares of pity from her neighbors.

Still, her father had taught her well.

You cannot let sorrow touch you, Catherine, he’d admonished. You are here to tend to their bodies. Let the Lord heal other hurts. Remember your calling.

That was what she’d done in those dark days after her father and brother had died. None of the other physicians in the area had wanted to attach themselves professionally to an unmarried nurse. Even the big cities like Boston and New York had been loath to let an unmarried woman practice. Widowed men who had known her father well offered marriage, the opportunity to mother their motherless children. Even her minister had counseled her to find a good man to wed.

When she’d seen the notice advertising Asa Mercer’s expedition to help settle Washington Territory, she’d known what to do. She’d put the house up for sale and donated their things to those in need. Then she’d packed her bags and sailed to the opposite side of the country.

All her experiences had taught her how to wall off her emotions. It did no good to question her past. She must look to her future, to the health of the community she could improve, the lives she could save. She had no intention of entering into marriage, with anyone.

For once she opened the door to feeling, she was very much afraid she’d never be able to close it again.

* * *

At the far edge of the clearing in his own cabin, Drew yanked a pair of suspenders off the ladder to the loft. As he tidied the place so Catherine could sleep there that night, all he could think about was Simon’s ridiculous demand that one of them must marry the pretty nurse.

He ought to be immune to such antics by now. But after years of proximity, his brothers knew just how to get under his skin like a tick digging for blood.

Oh, he’d heard ministers preach on the subject. A man had a duty to marry, to raise children that would help him subdue the wilderness, make a home in this far land. Children were one way a man left a legacy. To him, the fact that his brothers had reached their manhood alive and ready to take on the world was enough of a legacy.

He knew the general course of things was for a man to find his own land, build a house, start a profession and marry. He had this house and was top in his profession, but he couldn’t simply leave his mother, Beth or his brothers to fend for themselves. They were his responsibility, his to protect. That was what any man did who was worthy of the name. That was what his father had done.

How could he call himself a man and leave his family to tend to a wife? In his mind, a wife took time, attention. She’d have requirements, needs and expectations. He already felt stretched to the breaking point. How could he add more?

Oh, he had no doubt Simon and James were looking to marry one day, and John and Levi would eventually follow. But to stake a claim on a lady after a few hours of acquaintance? That was the stuff of madness.

Or legend.

He snorted as he gathered up the dishes he hadn’t bothered to return to the main house. Their father had claimed he’d fallen in love with their mother at first sight when he’d met her at a barn raising. Her hair was like a fire on a winter’s night, calling me home, he’d told his sons more than once.

Before his father had died, Drew had dreamed it would happen that way for him. Though there were few unmarried ladies in Seattle, he’d thought someday he might turn a corner, walk into church and there she’d be. But at twenty-nine, he knew better. Love was a choice built from prolonged presence. And with six lives already depending on him, he had chosen not to participate in adding more.

“Hello, brother Drew!” Beth sang out as she opened the door of his cabin, basket under one arm. She stepped inside, glanced around and wrinkled her nose. “Oh, you haven’t gotten far, have you?”

Drew looked around as well, trying to see the place through Beth’s eyes. He’d built the cabin himself, his brothers lending a hand with planing and notching the logs and chinking them with dried moss and rock. He’d crafted the fireplace in the center of one wall from rounded stones gathered along the lake. As his father had taught him from what he’d learned in his homeland of Sweden, Drew had built a cabinet for his bed tick, setting it next to the hearth for warmth. A table and chairs of lumber cut from trees he’d felled rested on the rag rug his mother had woven for him. A plain wood chest sat against the far wall, waiting for him to start carving. All in all, his cabin was a solid, practical place to sleep between long hours of working. Very likely, Beth considered it far too plain.

But it didn’t matter what his sister thought. It mattered what Catherine Stanway thought, and he had no doubt she’d find it lacking.

He pointed his sister to the corn-tassel broom leaning against one wall. “If you think the cabin needs more work, feel free to lend a hand.”

He busied himself with shaking out the quilt his mother had made for him.

Beth hummed to herself as she set down the basket and began sweeping dried mud off the floor. “I like her,” she announced, and Drew knew she had to be talking about Catherine. “She knows a lot. And did you see that dress? There was one just like it in Godey’s.”

His sister devoured the ladies’ magazine, which generally arrived in Seattle months after its publication back East. The editor of Godey’s, Drew was convinced, had never laid eyes on a frontier settlement, or she’d never have suggested some of the outlandish fashions. What woman needed skirts so wide they couldn’t fit through the door of a cabin or allow her to climb to the loft of her bed?

“I’m sure Miss Stanway was all the rage back home,” Drew said, hauling the table back into place in the center of the room from where James and John had shoved it during a friendly wrestling match a few days ago.

“Here, too.” Beth giggled as she paused. “I think Simon is smitten.”

“Simon can go soak his head in the lake.” The vehemence of his words surprised him, and so did the emotions riding on them. The first thought that had popped into his head at his sister’s teasing was the word mine.

Beth must have noticed the change in his tone as well, for she turned to regard him wide-eyed. “You like her!”

Drew shoved the chairs into place with enough force to set the table to rocking on its wooden legs. “I like the fact that she can help Ma. That’s what’s important—not the rest of this tomfoolery.”

“I suppose you’re right.” She resumed her sweeping, angling the pile of dust toward the doorway. “Still, I hope she’ll let me talk to her about how they’re wearing their hair back East. Every time I try the curling iron, I get it so hot I can hardly touch it. I bet she’ll know how to do it right.”

Hand on the wooden bucket to fill it with fresh water from the pump outside, Drew paused. “You think she curls her hair?”

“And irons her dresses.” Beth nodded with great confidence. “She might even use rouge to get that glow in her cheeks.”

What was he doing? This wasn’t the sort of thing a man discussed, even with his little sister. He hefted the bucket and headed for the door. “You’re too young to rouge your cheeks or curl your hair, Beth. And Miss Stanway is here to help Ma, not teach you things you don’t need to know.”

Beth made a face at him as he opened the door. “You don’t get to decide what I need to know. You couldn’t possibly understand. You’re a man.” When he turned to argue, she swept the dirt up into the air in a cloud of dust that nearly choked him.

Drew waved his hand, backing away. “I’m your brother, and the last time I checked, I’m responsible for your upbringing. If you can’t leave Miss Stanway be on such matters, I’ll make sure you have other things to do elsewhere.”

“You would, too,” Beth declared, lowering the broom. “But you’re right. We should be thinking about Ma.” Her face crumpled. “Oh, I sure hope Miss Stanway knows what’s she’s doing. I just can’t lose Ma!”

Cold pierced him. Drew went to enfold his sister in his arms, getting a broom handle on the chin for his trouble. “We won’t lose her, Beth. We won’t let her go.”

Beth nodded against his chest, and he heard her sniff. When she pushed back, she wiped her face with her fingers, leaving two tracks of mud across her cheeks. This from the girl who admired rouge, of all things.

As Drew smiled, she turned to glance back into the cabin. “The place is looking better already. You go check on Ma, and I’ll add a few finishing touches.”

Drew cocked his head. “Like what? I’ll have none of those doilies you’re so fond of.”

Beth turned to him, eyes wide. “Who could hate an innocent doily? They’re so dainty and cultured.”

Everything he was not, he realized, and trying to pretend otherwise served no one. “Just remember, this is a man’s house,” he told his sister as he stepped out onto the porch. “Miss Stanway may be staying awhile, but I’m the one who lives here.”

With a feeling he was talking to the air, he left Beth humming to herself.

Rouge. He shook his head again. His mother had complained about the stuff from time to time.

A lady makes the most of what the good Lord gave her, she’d said after they’d visited Seattle a few weeks ago. She doesn’t need to paint herself or squeeze herself into a shape she wasn’t born with.

He had never considered the matter, but the thought of his sister prettying herself up made his stomach churn.

A few strides across the clearing brought him to their parents’ house. Once, they had all lived there, his brothers curled up on beds on one side of the upstairs room, and Beth with their parents on the other. When he’d laid claim to the land next to his father’s, he’d built his own house. Simon had done the same on the opposite side, clearing the land there. Now James was in the process of outfitting his cabin on the next set of acreage he had claimed. Tracts were already platted for John and Levi, as well. When they managed a town site, their father’s name would go on even if he hadn’t.

Simon, James and John had retired for the night, and Levi was still spread in front of the fire, rereading one of the adventure novels their father had brought with him across the plains. Drew could barely make out the words The Last of the Mohicans on the worn leather spine. Why his father and brothers wanted to read about the frontier when they lived on it Drew had never understood. He climbed the stairs to his mother’s room.

At the top, he paused, almost afraid of what he might find. His mother lay asleep on the bed, her chest rising and falling under the quilt. He had not seen her so peaceful in days, and something inside him thawed at the sight. Beside her on the chair, Catherine Stanway put a finger to her lips before rising to join him at the stairwell.

His first thought on seeing her up close was that she was tired. A few tendrils of her pale hair had come undone and hung in soft curls about her face. Her blue eyes seemed to sag at the corners. But the smile she gave him was encouraging.

“Her fever appears to be coming down,” she whispered. “But it’s still higher than I’d like. The next two days will be very important in determining her recovery. Someone must be with her every moment.”

Drew nodded. “We can take turns.”

She gazed up at him, and he wondered what she was thinking. “I was under the impression you and your brothers had an important task to undertake tomorrow.”

“Captain Collings’s spar,” Drew confirmed. “His ship, the Merry Maid, was damaged in a storm crossing the mouth of the Columbia River. She managed to limp into Puget Sound, but she can’t continue her journey to China without a new mast.”

She stuck out her lower lip as if impressed, but the movement made his gaze stop at the soft pink of her mouth. Drew swallowed and looked away.

“I thought all trees felled around Seattle were destined for Mr. Yesler’s mill,” he heard her say.

“Most,” Drew agreed, mentally counting the number of logs that made up the top story of the house. “My brothers and I specialize in filling orders for masts and yard arms for sailing ships. Simon’s located the perfect tree not too far from the water, so it will be easy to transport, but it will take all of us to bring it down safely and haul it to the bay.”

“If you should be working, sir, your sister and I can take care of things here.”

He could hear the frown in her voice. She was probably used to being self-sufficient. Yet Drew had a hard time imagining her standing by to protect a frontier farm. She’d come on the bride ship, which meant she’d lived in Seattle for less than a month. By her own admission, she’d lived in larger towns back East. What could she know about surviving in the wilderness?

“Can you shoot?” he asked, gaze coming back to her.

She was indeed frowning, golden brows drawn over her nose. He had a strange urge to feather his fingers across her brow. “No,” she said. “Do you expect me to need to shoot?”

“Very likely,” Drew assured her, trying to master his feelings. “Pa made sure all of us knew how to protect each other and the farm. Ma can pick a heart from an ace at thirty paces, and Beth can hold her own. But if Beth is helping Ma, there will be no one left to protect you.”

Her lips quirked as if she found it annoying that she needed such protection. And of course, his gaze latched on to the movement. He forced his eyes up.

“Is it truly so dangerous?” she asked. “You aren’t living among the natives. You have homes, a garden, stock.”

She needed to understand that the veneer of civilization was only as thick as the walls of the house. “James spotted a cougar while he was working on his cabin last week. We surprised a bear at the spring only yesterday.”

She raised her head. “Well, then, we’ll simply stay in the house until you return.”

The silk of her hair tickled his chin, and he caught the scent of lemon and lavender, tart and clean. He needed to end this conversation and leave before he did or said something they’d both regret.

“You can’t promise to remain indoors,” he told her. “Even if we lay in a stock of wood and water, it might run out. Like it or not, Miss Stanway, you need me.”

And she didn’t like it. He could tell by the way her blue eyes narrowed, her chin firmed. This was a woman used to getting her own way.

And that could be trouble. He could only wonder: Over the next two days, which would prevail, her will or his determination?

Chapter Five

Two days. Surely she could survive two days. She’d sat longer vigils in the wards in Boston, taking breaks only for short naps, determined to cheat death. Two days was child’s play.

Of course, normally, when she sat with a patient, she was either alone in the ward or a doctor or other nurse was nearby. This was the first time she’d served as a nurse in someone’s home.

She found it decidedly unnerving.

For one thing, the Wallin house was anything but quiet. Levi had pounded up the stairs and thrown himself in bed on the other side of the loft. The buzz a short while later confirmed that Simon wasn’t the only brother who snored. Beth crept up the stairs more quietly before slipping into a darker corner and emerging in her nightgown, then climbing into her own bed. The logs popped as the house cooled with the night. Wood settled in the small fire she’d had Drew rekindle. Something with tiny claws scampered across the roof over Catherine’s head. Mournful calls echoed from the woods, as if all nature worried with the Wallins.

But worse was her awareness of Drew. He had agreed to take turns with her during the night, then left to finish some chores. She felt as if the entire house breathed a sigh of relief when he entered it again. His boots were soft on the stairs, and the boards whispered a welcome as he crossed to her side. He laid a hand on her shoulder, the pressure assuring, supportive. Then he turned and disappeared downstairs again.

Her pulse was too fast. She took a breath and leaned forward to adjust the covers over her patient again.

She had barely managed to restore her calm when he returned carrying a wooden platter and a large steaming pink-and-white china bowl with a spoon sticking from it.

“You’ve had nothing to eat,” he reminded her. “You’ll need your strength.” He set the platter across her lap. On it rested a bowl of stew, a crusty loaf of bread, a bone-handled knife and a pat of creamy butter.

Catherine’s stomach growled its answer. “Thank you,” she said. She bowed her head and asked a blessing, then scooped up a spoonful of Beth’s stew. The thick sauce warmed her almost as much as his gesture.

As she ate, he reached down, sliced off a hunk of the bread and set about eating it. Crumbs sprinkled the front of his cotton shirt, and he brushed them away, fingers long and quick. She wondered how they’d feel cradling her hand.

A hunk of venison must have gone down wrong, for she found herself coughing. He hurried to pour water from the jug by the bed into a tin cup, but she waved him back.

“I’m fine,” she managed. Swallowing the last of the stew, she set the bowl on the platter. “Thank you. That was very good. Beth is a talented cook.”

“Ma taught her.” He went to lean against the fireplace, the only spot in the room where he could stand completely upright. His gaze rested on the woman on the bed, who seemed to be sleeping blissfully through their quiet conversation. “She taught us all, saying a man should know how to care for himself.”

Catherine couldn’t argue with that. “My father had a similar philosophy. He said a woman should be able to fend for herself if needed.”

“Yet he never taught you to shoot?”

He seemed generally puzzled by that. Catherine smiled. “There’s not much call for hunting near Boston, at least not for food. I suppose parents try to teach their children what they need to survive in their own environment. I wouldn’t expect your mother to teach you how to dance.”

“There you would be wrong.” Even in the dim light she could see his smile. “Pa used to play the fiddle, and Ma said if she didn’t teach us boys to dance, she’d never have a partner.” His smile faded. “Not that she needs one now.”

Catherine had never been one to offer false hope, yet she couldn’t help rushing to assure him. “We’ll make sure she gets well.”

Her words must have sounded as baseless to him as they did to her, for he said nothing as he pushed off from the hearth. He gathered up the dishes and disappeared down the stairs once more.

Catherine sighed. That exchange was simply a reminder of why it was better to stay focused on her task of nursing the patient, not on the emotional needs of the patient’s family. She had found ways to comfort grieving loved ones before her father and brother had been killed. Now she felt hurts too keenly.

She tried to listen to Mrs. Wallin’s breathing, which seemed far more regular than her own, but from downstairs came the sounds of dishes clanking, the chink of wood on metal, the splash of water. It seemed Mrs. Wallin had taught her sons to wash up, as well. Their future wives would be pleasantly surprised.

She expected him to return when he was finished, but the house fell quiet again. She added another log to the fire, then checked her patient once more. All was as it should be. The wooden chair didn’t seem so hard; her body sank into it. The warmth of the room wrapped about her like a blanket. She closed her weary eyes.

Only to snap them open as someone picked her up and held her close.

“What are you doing?” she demanded as Drew’s face came into focus.

He was already starting for the stairs, head ducked so that it was only a few inches from hers. “You fell asleep.”

Catherine shifted in his arms. “I’m fine. Put me down. I have work to do.”

Beth had sat up in bed and was regarding them wide-eyed as he started down the stairs. “Let Beth watch Ma for a while. I’ll spell her shortly. We’ll send for you if anything changes.”

He reached the bottom of the stairs and started across the room as if she were no more than a basket of laundry destined for the line. “I can walk, sir,” she informed him.

He twisted to open the door. “That you can. I’ve seen you do it.” He paused on the porch to nod out into the darkness, where the only light was the glow from a few stars peeking through the clouds. “But our clearing isn’t a city street. There are tree roots and rocks that can trip you up in broad daylight. I know the hazards. Best you let me do the walking.”

She hadn’t noticed that the space was so bumpy when they’d arrived. Indeed, it had seemed surprisingly level; the grass neat and trim. Very likely the goats cropped it. Still, she didn’t relish tripping over a rock and twisting her ankle. She hardly wanted to stay at Wallin Landing a moment more than necessary, and certainly not long enough to heal a sprain.

So she remained where she was, warm against his chest, cradled in his arms, as Drew ferried her across the clearing to another cabin hidden among the trees. Her legs were decidedly unsteady as he set her down on the wide front porch and swung open the door to enter ahead of her. She heard the scrape of flint as he lit a lantern.

The golden light chased the darkness to the far corners of the room, and she could see a round planked table in the center, set over a braided rug and flanked by two tall solid-backed chairs. A little small for a knight of the round table, but cozy. As if he thought so, too, Drew’s cheeks were darkening again, and he seemed to be stuffing something white and lacy into the pocket of his trousers.

“There’s a washstand and water jug in the corner,” he said, voice gruff. “The necessity’s between the two cabins.”

In a moment, he’d leave her. Perhaps it was the strange surroundings or the lateness of the day, but she found herself unwilling to see him go. Catherine moved into the room, glanced at the fire simmering in the grate of the stone hearth. As if he was watching her, expecting her to find things wanting, he hurried to lay on another piece of wood.

“Should be enough to see you through the night,” he said, straightening. “But I can fetch more from the woodpile if you’d like.”

Was he so eager to leave her? “No need,” Catherine said. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. You could answer one question, though.”

She thought he stiffened. “Oh? What would that be?”

“Who’s Mary?”

Now she waited, some part of her fearing to hear the answer. His face sagged. “My little sister. The one who died. Ever since Ma took ill, she’s been asking after her. We think maybe she’s forgotten Mary’s gone.”

His pain cut into her. She wanted to gather him close, caress the sadness from his face.

What was she thinking?

“She’s delirious,” Catherine told him. “It’s not uncommon with high fevers.

He nodded as if he understood, but she could see the explanation hadn’t eased his mind. She should think of something else to say, something else for him to consider, if only for a moment. She glanced around the room again. Her gaze lit on the ladder rising into the loft. Oh, dear. Her hand gripped her wide blue skirts.

“Is that how you reach the sleeping area?” she asked, hoping for another answer.

“There’s a loft upstairs,” he said, “but the main bed’s there.” He pointed toward the fire.

What she’d taken for a large cupboard turned out to be a box bed set deep in one wall. The weathered wood encircled it like the rings of a tree. Catherine wandered over and fingered the thick flannel quilt that covered the tick. Blues and reds and greens were sprinkled in different-size blocks, fitted together like a child’s puzzle and stitched with yellow embroidery as carefully as her father’s sutures.

“Ma made that when I turned eighteen,” he explained, a solid presence behind her. “Those are pieces of every shirt she ever sewed for me. Waste not, want not.”

How could she possibly sleep under something so personal? Catherine pulled back her hand and turned. “Perhaps I should stay with my patient.”

He took a step away from her as if to block the door. “Beth and I can handle things. You deserve your rest.” He nodded toward the bed. “She left you one of Ma’s clean nightgowns, I see. If you need anything else, just holler.”

Yell, and have nearly a half dozen men appear to help her? Some women would have been delighted by the prospect. She could imagine her friend Maddie crying out and then sitting back with a grin to watch the fireworks. But Catherine felt as if fine threads were weaving about her like her father’s surgery silk, binding her to this place, these people.

Was she really ready to be that close to anyone again?

* * *

Drew left Catherine and returned to the main cabin so he could help Beth, bringing with him the lacy doily his sister had left on his table and depositing it on her bed. He dozed for a while on one of the beds he used to share with his brothers, rousing twice to poke Levi into silence. Beth woke him before dawn and stumbled off to bed herself. Drew leaned against the hard rocks of the hearth and watched his mother.

She was a proud woman, sure of her skills and her faith. Unlike Catherine, she’d never followed any calling but the keeping of hearth and home and the running of the family farm while his father was logging. She’d been the steadying presence behind Drew the past ten years, always ready to provide advice and comfort, a loaf of bread and a warm quilt. Sometimes he felt as if each stitch formed the word love.

More than one man over the years had attempted to court her. But his mother had refused to leave her claim, even after most of her sons had land of their own. He remembered the day not long after his father had died when men had come from town to try to persuade her to move in closer.

“A widowed woman with five boys and a girl?” one of them had scoffed. “You can’t manage this property alone.”

“I’m not alone,” his mother had said, putting one arm around Drew and the other around Simon as their siblings gathered close. “If this is what the Lord wants for us, He’ll make a way.”

The Lord must have wanted them at Wallin Landing, for they’d been here ever since.

His mother was still sleeping when his brothers left for their work and Beth started about her chores of feeding the chickens, checking for eggs and letting the goats, horses and pigs out to pasture. Simon came upstairs long enough to assure Drew that everything else had been taken care of.

“We’ll have the oxen,” he murmured, glancing around Drew as if to make sure their mother was sleeping peacefully. “And I wanted to let you know that John figured the costs for the plow. We should have enough from that spar for Captain Collings to make a good down payment. Then we can put James’s field in corn and make better use of those horses he was so set on.”

Drew nodded. James had convinced them to invest in the strong horses when another local farmer had given up his claim and needed to sell out. Drew had hoped to put the beasts to good use expanding the fields. Their family had run perilously short of corn and wheat the past two winters, and any profit they might have made logging had been eaten up by purchasing cornmeal and flour from town. He and his brothers were determined to lay in a greater store this year.

“Do what you can today,” he told Simon. “If Ma feels better, I can come finish the job tomorrow.”

Simon’s face tightened, and he took another look at their mother before heading down the stairs. Though he hadn’t spoken the words aloud, Drew could feel his doubts.

If Ma ever felt better.

Please, Lord, make her well!

Sometimes it seemed as if he’d been fighting off illness and injury his whole life. What he hated most was the feeling that there was nothing he could do but wait.

The house settled back into quiet. The sun rose over the lake, golden rays spearing through the windows and leaving a patchwork of color as bright as his mother’s quilts across the worn wood floor. Still Drew waited. When his mother finally stirred, he straightened and strode to her side. Her gaze was more alert than he’d seen it in weeks.

“What did you do with my pretty nurse?” she asked.

Drew took her hand and clasped it in his. The skin felt warm from the covers but not as dry and hot as it had been.

“We wore her out,” he said, giving his mother’s hand a squeeze. “But I’ll fetch her back for you shortly. In the meantime, are you hungry? Thirsty?”

She cocked her head as if considering the matter, and Drew noticed that her hair was stuck to her forehead like a row of ginger-colored lace. He put his hand to her cheek and found it cool and moist. Was it possible? Had the fever broke during the night?

“Now, why are you staring at me like that?” she asked, pulling back her hand and touching her hair. “Oh, but I must look a fright!”

Drew smiled, relief making the air sweet. “You never looked more beautiful to me, Ma. Shall I make you biscuits?”

She started to yawn and hurriedly covered her mouth with her hand. “Ask Levi. That boy makes better biscuits than the rest of you combined—light as a feather.”

“He’s out working,” Drew told her. “You’ll have to settle for my cooking instead.”

She was regarding him out of the corners of her eyes, as if she knew she was about to ask something she suspected he wouldn’t like. “You might ask Miss Stanway to join us for breakfast.”

Not her, too! “Don’t you go getting any ideas about Miss Stanway, Ma,” Drew said. “She’s here to nurse you.”

She coughed into her hand, but the noise still sounded healthy to Drew. “Yes, of course she is. And I expect I’ll need a great deal of nursing yet, probably for days.” She lowered her hand and heaved a great sigh.

“I have a feeling you’ll be up and about in no time,” Drew said. On impulse, he bent and pressed a kiss against her cheek. Her face was a rosy pink as he started for the stairs.

Thank You, Lord! The thanksgiving was instant and nearly overwhelming. Catherine had been right. His mother was going to live. Their family was whole awhile longer.

Oh, he would have to watch Ma and his brothers while Catherine was at the Landing if he wanted to remain single, but Catherine probably wouldn’t be in their lives much longer if his mother’s recovery was as rapid as he hoped.

His spirits didn’t rise as high as they should have at the thought.

He was halfway to his cabin when he heard the noise—the drum of horses’ hooves rapidly approaching. As he pulled up, the sheriff’s deputy, Hart McCormick, and several other men from Seattle galloped into the clearing, faces set and bodies tensed.

“Deputy,” Drew said with a nod as they reined in around him. “Something wrong?”

McCormick tipped back his broad-brimmed black hat and narrowed his sharp gray eyes at Drew. “Could be. One of Mercer’s belles went missing yesterday, and Scout Rankin tells me you might have had something to do with it.”

Drew held up his hands. “There’s no need for concern. Miss Stanway is here and perfectly safe.”

Still Deputy McCormick glared at him, as if sizing up Drew’s strength, taking note that he was unarmed. McCormick was tall and lean, with close-cropped black hair and eyes the color of a worn gun barrel. He’d earned the reputation of being one tough character, having thrown off a rough beginning before riding down a number of outlaws in the two years he’d served as deputy. Drew didn’t like his chances if the lawman decided to take him on.

Just then, one of the horses pushed forward, and Drew realized the rider was a redheaded woman. Though she wore a divided skirt so she could sit astride, the way she clutched the reins told Drew she didn’t have much experience with horses.

“Then you won’t mind bringing her out, now, will you?” she challenged, sharp words softened by an Irish accent.

Deputy McCormick relaxed in his seat. “Miss O’Rourke is particularly concerned about her friend.”

Drew lowered his hands. “She’s staying in that cabin over there. If you’ll give me a moment...”

“Hold these,” the redhead commanded, tossing the reins at Drew. As he caught them, she threw one leg over the horse and slid to the ground. “I’ll just be fetching her myself.” She stalked across the clearing, gait stiff.

“Bit of a spitfire,” McCormick commented, watching her. His mouth hitched up as if he liked what he saw. “Still, there’s something to be said for a woman who speaks her mind.”

“Yeah,” one of his posse members threw out. “Spinster.”

The others laughed.

“Being uppity seems to be a pretty common failing among those Mercer gals,” another commented, scratching his grizzled chin. “Doc Maynard said this Miss Stanway gave him an earful for some of his practices.”

“She gave us an earful, too,” Drew said, watching as Miss O’Rourke hopped up on the porch and rapped at the door. “And Ma is alive because of it.”

That sobered them. McCormick touched his brim again in obvious respect. “I’m sorry to hear your mother was ailing, Wallin, but I’m glad to know she’s on the mend.”

The door to the cabin opened. Catherine stood in the shadows, hair tumbled about her shoulders, his quilt bundled around her. Stocking feet peeped out from below. The sight hit him square in the chest, and breathing seemed impossible. One look at her friend, and she gave a glad cry and a quick hug before pulling Miss O’Rourke inside and shutting the door.

Air found its way into Drew’s lungs. What was it about Catherine that made him react this way? He’d seen pretty girls before—not many and not often it was true, but still.

“I thought you said she was stuck-up,” one of the men commented with a frown to his friend. “She looks mighty nice to me.”

“I heard they started calling her the Ice Queen,” another agreed. “Looks as though the Wallins managed to thaw her out.”

“Maybe that’s why she needs a quilt,” the deputy said with a warning look to his posse. “Either that or she’s trying to shield herself from the criticism of people who came West themselves to escape it.”

His men had the good sense to look abashed.

McCormick returned his gaze to Drew, shifting on the horse so that his gun belt brushed the saddle horn. “The way I figure it, what you do with the gal is between you and her, so long as she’s in agreement. If she has no complaints, we’ll be on our way.”

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