An Unexpected Partnership

Quaker Rachel Woolsey dreams of having her own bakery and her own homestead. But the odds are stacked against her—until the handsome ex-soldier she nurses back to health offers to help her. Like Rachel, Brennan Merriday is an outsider. But he’ll be the temporary ally she needs, and her foolish attraction will fade once he’s gone.

At first, the only thing Brennan wants to know about Pepin, Wisconsin, is how fast he can leave it. Perhaps in Canada he’ll find peace after a bloody war. Yet repaying his debt to the pretty baker offers unexpected solace. She saved him once. Now he longs to rescue dreams of family—for both of them.

Wilderness Brides: Finding love—and a fresh start—on the frontier

“What’d you come here for? To find a husband?”

If looks could slap, his face would have been stinging.

“No, I am not looking for a husband. I could have had one back in Pennsylvania. That is, if I didn’t mind being a workhorse, raising six stepchildren under the age of twelve.” Her tone was uncharacteristically biting.

She reddened. “I didn’t resent the children, honestly, but if I’d felt any love for their father… Or sensed that he might ever…” Her jaw tensed. “I like to do business, but marriage should be a matter of the heart, not something akin to a business contract. Doesn’t thee agree?”

A matter of the heart. His jaw clenched and his unruly mind brought up Lorena’s face. Miss Rachel wanted to be loved, not just needed. And he’d found out that his beloved one could let him down, turn her back and walk away.

Wrenching his mind back to the present, he held up both hands. “I get it. I ain’t looking for a wife.”

“That suits me.”

LYN COTE

and her husband, her real-life hero, acquired a new daughter recently when their son married his true love. Lyn already loves her daughter-in-law and enjoys this new adventure in family stretching. Lyn and her husband still live on the lake in the north woods, where they watch a bald eagle and its young soar and swoop overhead throughout the year. She wishes the best to all her readers. You may email Lyn at l.cote@juno.com or write her at P.O. Box 864, Woodruff, WI 54548. And drop by her blog, www.strongwomenbravestories.blogspot.com, to read stories of strong women in real life and in true-to-life fiction. “Every woman has a story. Share yours.”

Heartland Courtship

Lyn Cote

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

—Isaiah 55:8–9

Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.

—Matthew 10:29–31

To my PA and dear friend, Sara Scholten

Contents

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

Epilogue

Dear Reader

Questions for Discussion

Excerpt

Chapter One

Pepin, Wisconsin

June 2, 1871

In the dazzling sunshine, Rachel Woolsey stood on the deck of the riverboat, gazing at her new home, its wharf and huddle of rustic buildings. After all the lonely miles, she’d accomplished her journey. Relief flooded her when she recognized her cousin Noah standing near the dock, his wife and children at his side.

But she stiffened herself against this warm, weakening rush. She didn’t want to dissolve in tears at the sight of family. She would make a life for herself here, fulfill her ambition of independence, start her own business, own a home—no matter what anyone said.

Her empty stomach churning, she smoothed her skirt, calming herself outwardly, and prayed silently for the strength to accomplish all she hoped. With God’s help, I will. Otherwise why did I leave my father’s house in Pennsylvania?

Finally, at the rear, the paddle wheel stilled, dripping and running with water. Porters carried her luggage onto shore where she tipped them and turned to her cousin. When she told him all her unusual—for a woman—plans, would he be a help or hindrance?

Holding his daughter, Noah enveloped her in a one-armed embrace. “Cousin Rachel!”

The intensity in his joyful welcome wrapped itself around her like a warm blanket and went straight to her lonesome heart. “Cousin!” She could say no more without tears.

Then he released her and his pretty blonde wife handed their little son to him and hugged her close. “We’re so happy you have come. It’s good to have family near.”

Rachel sensed a breath of hesitation in Sunny’s welcome. And Rachel guessed it must be because she knew of Sunny’s unhappy past. How could she let Sunny know she would never, never reveal what she knew? She wouldn’t tell anyone here that before marrying Noah, Sunny had borne a child out of wedlock.

“I’m so happy, Cousin Sunny,” she said with heartfelt sincerity. “I’m so happy thee and Noah look...good together.”

And they did. The two children looked happy and well fed. Noah looked healed, content and Sunny touched his arm with obvious affection. Then tears did come.

Maybe this place would be good for her, too. She realized that she did feel welcome, more than in her stepmother’s home where she’d been an unpaid servant instead of a beloved daughter. She tried to shake off the bittering thought.

At sounds behind Rachel, Noah looked up and frowned. Speaking past her, he asked sharply, “What are you men doing?”

“The captain say bring this man on shore to the doctor,” the black porter said.

Rachel swung around and saw that two porters were carrying an unconscious man, one holding his shoulders and one his ankles. A third porter followed with what looked like a bulging soldier’s knapsack.

“We don’t have a doctor here,” Sunny said, sounding worried.

“Well, then we suppose to leave him anyway,” the porter said, appearing abashed. “We got no one to nurse or doctor him and his fare run out two stops south.”

Rachel’s sense of right balked. “So thee’s just going to abandon him?”

The porters looked ashamed, helpless. “That’s what the captain order us to do.”

Rachel struggled with herself. She couldn’t take out her umbrage on these innocent men. She would tell the captain what she thought—

The boat whistle squealed. The porters gently laid down the shabby man and his travel-worn knapsack and then hustled onto the boat, which was already being cast free.

Within moments the boat was far from shore, heading north, the paddle wheel turning again. Rachel fumed at the departing craft as she dropped to her knees beside the man.

Thin, with a new beard and shaggy chestnut hair, he appeared around Noah’s age, in his thirties, and would have been handsome if not so haggard looking. Drawn to help him, Rachel touched his perspiring forehead. Anxiety prodded her. “He’s burning up, Noah.”

Her cousin knelt on the man’s other side. “We can’t leave him.”

“Of course we can’t,” Sunny agreed, holding her little girl back from going to her father.

Rachel rose with new purpose. “I’ll help thee carry him, Noah.” She bent and lifted the man’s ankles and Noah quickly grasped his shoulders. They carried him to the wagon and managed to arrange him on a blanket Sunny kept under the wagon seat. Rachel should have had a harder time carrying a man’s weight, but he must have lost pounds already, not a good sign.

Some of the shopkeepers and customers had come out to watch and a few helped wedge Rachel’s luggage on the other side of the wagon bed along with the man’s knapsack. They kept a safe distance from the feverish, unconscious man, evidently fearing contagion.

A man whom Sunny addressed as Mr. Ashford said, “He doesn’t look good. Be sure you don’t catch this from him.”

Rachel understood this sentiment, but didn’t let it sway her. Her father hadn’t raised a coward.

Noah voiced what she was thinking, “We’ll do what we can for him. It’s shameful to just drop a man off to die.”

“Irresponsible,” Ashford agreed, though he backed away. “But not every river man is to be trusted.”

Rachel couldn’t decide if the man was speaking of the captain who’d abandoned the man or warning them that this man might do them harm—if he lived. Indignation stirred within her.

Noah helped Rachel up onto the wagon bench to sit beside Sunny. Rachel accepted Sunny’s sweet little girl to sit on her lap. Noah turned the wagon and headed them home.

Rachel’s attention was torn between the beautiful thick forest they drove into and the man moaning softly behind her. As they rolled into and over each rut and bump, she hurt for him. After traveling alone for weeks, she was moved by the man’s plight. If she had become sick, would this have happened to her? “What does thee think he might be ill with?” she asked Sunny.

“I don’t know. I have some skill in nursing the sick, but he might be...” Sunny’s voice faltered.

Beyond our help, Rachel finished silently. A pall hung over them and the miles to Noah’s homestead crawled by. Rachel mentally went over the medicines she’d brought with her and where they were packed. She questioned Sunny and found that her stock of medicines was meager, too.

Rachel closed her eyes, praying for this stranger, for all traveling strangers. The man’s dire situation overlaid her joy at arriving here. Pepin was her new beginning. Would it be this man’s ending?

* * *

Brennan Merriday groaned and the sound wakened him. He heard footsteps. Someone knelt beside him. A cool hand touched his brow. “I have broth and medicine. Open thy mouth, please.” A woman’s voice.

His every joint ached, excruciating. His body burned with fever. He couldn’t speak, didn’t have the strength to shake his head no. A spoon touched his lips. The only act he could manage was letting his mouth fall open. Warm, salty broth moistened his dry throat. Then something bitter. And then more broth. He let it flow into his mouth and swallowed.

He moaned, trying to lift his eyelids. Couldn’t. Swallowed. He began to drift again. A face flickered in his mind—Lorena’s oval face, beautiful as ever with black ringlets around it, a painful memory that lanced his heart. He groaned again.

The same firm voice summoned him back. “A few more mouthfuls, that’s all I ask.”

The gentle words fell soft on his ears. He made the effort to swallow again. Again. And then he felt himself slipping away.

* * *

Half asleep, Rachel sat in the rocking chair, the fire very low on the hearth, keeping a small pot of chicken broth warm. Every time the stranger surfaced, she spooned as much into him as she could, along with willow bark tea for his fever. She was trying to keep him alive till his fever broke.

Still he looked emaciated and beneath his eyes dark patches showed signs of his decline. Would she succeed? Or would they bury him without a name? The thought lowered her spirits.

She had cared for him around the clock for nearly a week. Weariness had seeped in as deep as her bones, but her overall worry, that they might bury this man never knowing his name, pressed in on her more. Noah had gone through the man’s knapsack but had found nothing marked with a name.

Even sick, the stranger beckoned. Something about him drew her—more than merely the handsome face obscured by a wild, newly grown beard and mustache and the ravages of the fever. He looked lost somehow. Would he remain a mystery? Who was he? Why had he boarded the same riverboat as she? Was some woman pacing, worrying about him?

She’d thought she would quickly put her plans for her business into motion. But once again the needs of others took precedence. Just a little longer. I don’t begrudge helping this man, Father. Her chin lowered and she slipped into that fuzzy world of half sleep.

A loud groan woke her fully. Pushing away the dregs of a dream about home, she sat up straighter and looked down. In the light from the hearth, she saw that the stranger was awake. And this time he opened his eyes. She quickly moved into her routine. She knelt by his pallet and felt his forehead. She pressed her hand there again. Was she imagining that he seemed cooler?

With the top of her wrist, she touched her own forehead and then his. She stared down into his dull eyes. “The fever has finally broken.” Cold relief coursed through her.

The man tried to talk, his dry lips stuck together.

She held up a hand. “I’ll get the broth.” Soon she spooned more into his mouth. This time he didn’t fall asleep while she was feeding him. His dark eyes followed her and for the first time she knew he was seeing her. This made her uncomfortable, being so close to a man, a stranger, performing an intimate task for him. Finally, the bowl was empty. “More?”

His head shook yes fractionally.

She quickly fetched more and fed him a second bowl, very aware of her disheveled appearance—though in his state he wouldn’t have noticed even crossed eyes. And their being very much alone, even though Noah and Sunny slept in the next room, affected her oddly, too.

When done drinking, he closed his eyes and drew in a long breath. “How long have I been delirious?” A Southern accent slurred the words.

“Nearly a week.”

“Where am I?” His voice sounded rusty, forced. His I sounded like Ah.

“In the home of my cousin Noah Whitmore in Pepin, Wisconsin.”

His face screwed up as if the news were unwelcome. Then it relaxed as if he’d given up some struggle.

He might still die. She must know who he was. She couldn’t explain the urgency, but she couldn’t deny it. “What is thy name?”

His eyelids fluttered open. He had the thickest dark lashes she’d ever seen on a man. She held back a finger that errantly wanted to stroke their lush upward curve. “I’m Brennan Merriday.”

She smiled down at him, relieved.

“What’s your name, miss?”

“I am Rachel Woolsey,” she said.

“Rachel,” he murmured, rolling her name around his tongue. “You’re a good woman, Miss Rachel.”

Words of praise, so rare, warmed her with satisfaction.

She thought again of a woman, looking for him, a hitch in her breath. “Does thee have family we can contact?”

“No.”

The way he said the word saddened her. She’d been without family since her mother died and her father had remarried.

She touched his forehead again, more to connect with him than out of necessity. Was her compassion carrying her off to more than it should?

“Miss Rachel,” he repeated. Then he closed his eyes.

She didn’t think he had fallen back to sleep. He’d closed his eyes to shut her out. Was it her question that prompted this or was he too weak to talk further? Though his fever had broken, he would need careful nursing before he recovered fully. She sighed long, not letting herself dwell on her own plans, already much delayed.

A man’s life was worth more than her business. And this man hadn’t chosen to be sick. She pulled the blanket up around his neck and smoothed it. Why had this desire to touch him come?

Finally she pushed herself up onto her feet before she gave in to temptation and did something like touch those thick lashes and embarrassed herself.

She settled back into the rocking chair with her feet on a three-legged stool. She pulled the shawl up onto her shoulders like a blanket and almost fell asleep. One thought lingered—the man did not seem very happy to wake from a fever. That could be due to his weakness. But from his few words, she didn’t think so. The lonely recognized the lonely.

* * *

Brennan lay on the pallet, still aching, feeling as flat as a blank sheet of foolscap. For the first time, he was aware of what was going on around him. The family who lived in this roomy log cabin had just risen and was getting ready to start its day. He hadn’t been this close to such a family for a long time—by choice. Too painful for him.

A tall husband sat at the table, bouncing a little girl on one knee and a baby on the other, saying nursery rhymes and teasing them. The children giggled; the sound made him feel forlorn. A pretty wife in a fresh white apron was tending the fire and making breakfast. Bacon sizzled in a pan, whetting Brennan’s once-dormant appetite. How long before he could get away from this homey place that reminded him too much of what he’d lost a decade ago? When he reached Canada, maybe then he could forget. When would he be able to travel again?

The woman who’d nursed him...what was her name? His wooly mind groped around, seeking it. Miss Rachel, that was it. She still slept in a rocking chair near him. He could see only the side of her face since her head had fallen against the high back of the chair. Light golden freckles dotted her nose. Straight, light brown hair had slipped from a bun, unfurling around her cheek and nape. From what he could see, she was not blatantly pretty but not homely either. There was something about her, an innocence that frightened him for her.

The smell of bacon insisted on his full attention. He opened his eyes wider and turned his head. His stomach rumbled loudly.

As they heard it, both the husband and wife turned to him. Miss Rachel’s eyes popped open. “Thee is awake?”

He nodded, his mouth too dry to speak. Thee? Quakers to boot?

“I’ll get you a cup of coffee,” the wife said.

Miss Rachel stretched gracefully and fully like a cat awakening from a nap and rose from the rocking chair, throwing off a shawl, revealing a trim figure in a plain dark dress. She knelt beside him and tested his forehead. “No fever.” She beamed.

He gazed up into the largest gray eyes he’d ever seen. They were serene, making him feel his disreputable appearance. Yet her gaze wouldn’t release him. He resisted. I’m just weak, that’s all.

The husband walked over and looked down. “Thank God. You had us worried.”

At the mention of God, Brennan felt the familiar tightening. God’s notice was not something he wanted. The wife handed Miss Rachel a steaming mug of what smelled like fresh-brewed coffee. She lifted his head and shoulders. Lilac scent floated in the air.

“I can sit up,” he protested, forcing out the words in a burst through cracked lips. Yet when he tried, he found that he could not sit up, his bones as soft as boiled noodles.

“Thy strength will return,” Miss Rachel said, nudging his lips with the mug rim.

He opened his mouth to insist that he’d be up before the day was out. But instead he let the strong, hot, creamy coffee flow in. His thirst sprang to life and he drank till the mug was empty. Then he inhaled, exhausted by the act and hating that. Everyone stared down at him, pity in their eyes.

The old bitterness reared. Enjoyin’ the show? he nearly snarled. His heart beat fast at the inappropriate fury that coursed through him. These innocent people didn’t deserve the sharp edge of his rough tongue.

“You’ll feel better,” the wife said, “when you’ve been able to eat more and get your strength back.”

“How did I end up here?” he asked, the thought suddenly occurring to him. Hadn’t he been on a riverboat?

“The captain put you off the same boat I arrived on,” Miss Rachel replied, sounding indignant.

Brennan couldn’t summon up any outrage. What had the captain owed him? But now he owed these good people, the kind who usually avoided him. The debt rankled.

“You’re from the South?” the husband asked.

There it came again. Most Northerners commented about his Southern drawl. Brennan caught his tongue just before his usual biting answer came out. “Yes.” He clenched his teeth.

The husband nodded. “We’re not still fighting the war here. I’m Noah Whitmore. This is my wife, Sunny, and our children, Dawn and Adam. And Rachel is my first cousin.”

Brennan tried to fix the names to the faces and drew in air. “My brain is mush,” he admitted, giving up the struggle.

Noah chuckled. “We’ll get you back on your feet. Never fear.”

The immense, unasked-for debt that he owed this couple and this Miss Rachel rolled over Brennan. Words seemed paltry, but they must be spoken. “You have my thanks.”

“We were glad to help,” the wife, Sunny, said. “We all need help sometime.”

Her last phrase should have eased him but his reaction was the opposite. Her last phrase raised his all-too-easy-to-rile hackles, increasing his discomfort. How could he ever pay what he owed these people? And he’d be forced to linger here to do that. Canada was still a long ways away. This stung like bitter gall.

* * *

Three days had inched past since Brennan had surfaced from the fever that had almost killed him. Noah had bathed him. And humming to herself, Miss Rachel had washed, pressed and ironed his clothing. The way she hummed when she worked, as if she was enjoying herself, made him ’specially fractious. Each day he lay at ease under their roof added another notch to his debt.

From his pallet now, he saw the sun barely lighting the window, and today he’d planned to get up and walk or know the reason why. He made himself roll onto his knees and then, bracing his hands against the wall, he pushed up onto his feet.

For a moment the world whirled around. He bent his head and waited out the vertigo. Then he sat in the chair and pulled on his battered boots. His heart pounded and that scared him. Had this fever affected his heart? Visions of old men sitting on steps in the shade shook him, moved him.

He straightened up and waited out a momentary wooziness. He shuffled toward the door and opened it. The family’s dog lay just outside. Brennan held a finger up to his mouth and the dog didn’t bark, gave just a little yip of greeting. Brennan stepped outside and began shuffling slowly down the track toward the trail that he knew must lead to town. The dog walked beside him companionably.

Brennan tried not to think, just to put one foot in front of the other. A notion of walking to the road played through his mind. But each step announced clearly that this would not be possible.

About twenty feet down the track, his legs began to wobble. He turned, suddenly wishing he’d never tried this stunt.

“Brennan Merriday!” The petite spinster was running toward him, a long housecoat nearly tangling around her ankles.

He tried to stand straight, but his spine began to soften.

She reached him just as he began to crumple and caught him, her arm over his chest, her hand under his arm. “Oof!”

Slowly she also crumpled. They fell together onto the barely bedewed grass, he facedown, she faceup. She was breathing hard from running.

“Brennan Merriday,” the little Quaker scolded, “what was thee thinking?”

“Why do you always use both my names?” he snapped, breathing hard too and saying the first thing that came to mind that didn’t smack of rudeness.

“That is the Quaker way, our plain speech. Titles such as mister and sir are used to give distinction, and all are equal before God.”

She lay beside him, her arm lodged under his chest, much too close to suit him.

“God and Quakers may think that but hardly anybody else does,” he panted. He rolled away to stand but halted when he’d gained his knees. He had to get his breath before trying to stand to his feet, get away from this soft, sweet-smelling woman.

The Quaker sprang up with—he grumbled silently—a disgusting show of energy. “I’ll help thee.”

“I prefer to get up by my lonesome, thank you,” he retorted, his temper at his own weakness leaking out. He glanced at her from the corner of his eye.

Her hair had come loose from a single braid and flared around her shoulders. Her skin glowed like a ripe peach in the dawn light. He took a deep breath and tried to turn his thoughts from her womanliness.

“Why did thee do this without discussing it first, Brennan Merriday?”

“I reckon,” he drawled, “I overestimated my strength, Miss Rachel.”

“I don’t think thee understands just how ill...” She pursed her lips. “A little patience is what is needed now. I had planned to help thee take a short walk today. It is exactly what is needed.”

“Well, I saved you the trouble and took my own walk.” He couldn’t stop the ridiculous words.

She gave him a look that mimicked ones his sour aunt Martha had used often when he was little.

“I’m not a child,” he muttered.

A moment of silence. Miss Rachel pressed her lips together, staring at him. Then she glanced away. “I know that,” she murmured.

Slowly he made it onto one foot and then he rose, woozy but standing.

She waited nearby, both arms outstretched as if to catch him. “Should I call Noah to help?”

“I can do it myself. Just let me take my time.”

The family dog stayed nearby, watching as if trying to figure out what they were doing.

“You can go on in,” he said, waving one hand.

She studied him. “Very well, but since thee has so much energy, thee can help me today. I am going to try a new recipe and I need the walnuts I bought in Saint Louis shelled and chopped.”

“I’ll look forward to it, Miss Rachel,” he said with a sardonic twist and bow of his head.

She walked away and he had to close his eyes in order not to watch her womanly sway. Even a shapeless housecoat couldn’t completely hide her feminine curves. Why hadn’t some man in Pennsylvania married her? She wasn’t ugly or anything. And why was he, Brennan Merriday, drifter, thinking such thoughts?

He was the last one to speak about getting married. His wife had betrayed him, but perhaps from her point of view he’d betrayed her. Either way, Lorena was dead and he had no business wondering why someone was or wasn’t married.

* * *

After breakfast, Noah went outside to work on some wood project. Brennan watched him leave, wishing he had the strength to do man’s work. The pretty wife and children were off to visit friends and that left him alone with the spinster.

Miss Rachel began setting out bowls, eggs, flour, sugar and such. “I am baking rolled walnut yeast logs today. I recalled that it’s one of Noah’s favorites and I want to thank him for his kindness to me.”

Her remark caught Brennan’s attention. So she felt beholden to the Whitmores, too? And then he recalled that she had said she’d arrived on the same riverboat as he had. “What’d you come here for? To find a husband?”

If looks could slap, his face would have been stinging.

“No, I am not looking for a husband. I could have had one back in Pennsylvania. That is, if I didn’t mind being a workhorse, raising six stepchildren under the age of twelve.” Her tone was uncharacteristically biting.

She reddened. “I didn’t resent the children, honestly, but if I’d felt any love for their father...or sensed that he might ever...” Her jaw tensed. “I like to do business but marriage should be a matter of the heart, not something akin to a business contract. Doesn’t thee agree?”

A matter of the heart. His jaw clenched and his unruly mind brought up Lorena’s face. Miss Rachel wanted to be loved, not just needed. And he’d found out that his beloved one could let him down, turn her back and walk away.

Wrenching his mind back to the present, he held up both hands. “I get it. I ain’t looking for a wife.”

“That suits me.” She lifted her chin. “I’ve come to set up in business here.”

He couldn’t mask his shock. “You plan to have your own business?”

“I intend to open a bakery and sweet shop. And Pepin is just the kind of town that can support one.”

“Are you out of your mind?” he blurted. “A bakery in this little half-horse town?”

“No,” she said, dismissing his opinion. “I am not out of my mind. Pepin’s a river town. Boats stop daily, dropping off and picking up passengers and goods. I will sell my confections to the river boatmen and passengers. Candies and baked goods. I’ve rarely met a man without a sweet tooth.”

He glanced directly at her for the first time. “You good at makin’ candy and such?”

He glimpsed a flash of pleased pride in her eyes. “People have said I have a gift for creating sweet things.”

“Well, when am I gonna taste some?” he asked with a sly glance.

He’d made her smile. “Well, if you start shelling these walnuts, that would be today.”

She set a cloth bag of nuts, a small hammer and a slender, pointed nutpick in front of him. “Take thy time. I must mix the dough and it must rise once before I’ll need to roll it out, then spread the filling of honey, cinnamon and crushed walnuts and roll it back up to rise again.”

He usually spent his days sweeping out liveries or saloons or lifting and carrying at docks. It had been a very long time since he’d sat in a kitchen with a woman while she baked. There was something cozy about it. Then memories of shelling pecans for his aunt Martha came back to him. He shook out a few walnuts from the bag and stared at them.

Many minutes passed as Miss Rachel measured and mixed.

“I’ve been thinking about a proposition for you, Brennan Merriday.” She took a deep breath and plunged on, “I also intend to stake a claim for myself here.”

The few words shocked Brennan again. He’d never conceived of a woman doing something like this. “A single woman homesteadin’? Is that allowed?”

“It is. I am determined to have my own place.”

Unheard of. “You couldn’t do it. You wouldn’t have the strength to prove up, to do all the work.”

Proving up meant fulfilling the government requirements of building and clearing the land within the five year time limit. She went on, “That is where my proposition comes in. I was wondering if I could hire thee to help me out for a few weeks.” She wouldn’t meet his eyes, concentrating on her mixing and measuring.

He gaped at her. Work for a woman?

“Around here, men only work for others upon need or when their own chores are done,” she explained what he could already guess. “And this is the growing season. Men are plowing and planting...” Her voice faded away.

Work for a woman, he repeated silently. When he’d been without funds in the past, he’d done chores for women in payment for meals. But work for one like a hired hand? The idea sent prickles through him. He swallowed down the mortification.

“So?” she prompted.

“Even if I accepted this employment, I can’t build a cabin all by myself, not even with Noah’s help,” he pointed out.

“Noah says there is an abandoned homestead near town.” Her voice had brightened. “There is already a cabin. So that would mean just fixing it up. But I’ll also need someone to dig me a garden and so on.” She looked him in the eye, her expression beseeching. “Is thee interested in such employment?”

Brennan’s mind struggled to take this in. A woman stake a claim? A woman run her own business? Preposterous. And him work for a woman? An outlandish idea. Men didn’t do that. He could hear the kind of comments he’d get from other men about working for this spinster.

And Miss Rachel was just the kind of woman—respectable and straightlaced—he generally steered clear of. And he never stayed in one place long and this suggestion would interfere with that—mightily. Canada was calling him.

But then he recalled his debt to her and picking up the little hammer, he whacked the nearest walnut so hard it cannonaded off the table and hit the wall.

Miss Rachel’s finely arched eyebrows rose toward her hairline. She walked over and picked up the walnut. “Try it again, Brennan Merriday. If thee doesn’t wish to work for a woman, I will understand.” She turned her head away.

He could tell from the mifftiness of her tone that he’d insulted her. He hadn’t meant to. But Miss Rachel was going against the flow and probably knew what was in store for her, probably knew what people would say to him for working for her.

Why would she do this? He looked down at the returned walnut. He remembered Aunt Martha, his father’s unmarried sister, who’d lived with them. He’d just accepted that unmarried women spent their days looking after other women’s children and washing other people’s clothes. Had that made his aunt so crusty? Had she hidden blighted dreams of her own?

He couldn’t actually work for a woman, could he? He looked up. Did he have a choice? He owed this Quakeress his life. “I can’t take the job formal-like, Miss Rachel. But I will help you get set up.”

“Thank thee, Brennan Merriday. I’d shake thy hand but...” She nodded to her hands, already kneading the large bowl of dough. Her face was rosy from the oven and from their talk no doubt. He wondered why this woman kept catching him by surprise, causing him to want to shield her. She was not like any other woman he’d ever met.

He expertly tapped another walnut and it opened in two clean-cut halves. He felt a glimmer of satisfaction and began digging out the nuts, breathing in the scent of yeast and walnut oil.

He’d help this woman get started and then he could leave, his conscience clear. He’d start north to Canada again—Canada, where no one had fought in the war and held no grudge nor memory. Where he might finally forget.

Chapter Two

A week later, Rachel climbed up on the bench of the wagon with Brennan’s help. He had insisted that if he was accompanying her, he would do the driving. She’d given in. Men hated being thought weak and this man had been forced to swallow that for over a fortnight now.

Finally she’d be able to get started doing what she’d come to do, create her new life. A fear niggled at her. What if someone had gotten the jump on her and already claimed the property? Well, she’d deal with it if she had to, not before.

Another worry pinched her. The homestead might need a lot of work, more than Noah and Brennan could do. “Did Noah tell thee where to find the abandoned homestead?” she asked, keyed up.

“Yes, Miss Rachel, you know Noah explained where it was. What you’re asking me is, do I remember how to drive there.”

She grinned at him, ignoring the barely disguised aggravation in his tone. “Thee must be feeling better if thee can joke.”

He looked disgruntled at her levity but said nothing, just slapped the reins and started the horses moving. They rode in silence for the first mile. Against her own will, she studied his profile, a strong one.

Freshly shaven and with his face no longer drawn with fever, he was an exceptionally handsome man. She brushed a fly away from her face. She turned her gaze forward. Handsome men never looked at her. Why should she look at this one?

Brennan spoke to the horses as he slowed them over a deep rut. His Southern accent made her wonder once more. The horrible war had ended slavery, yet tensions between the North and South had not eased one bit. And after four years of war, the South was devastated. What had brought this Southerner north?

She watched his jaw work. She wondered what he was getting up the nerve to say to her. She hoped he wasn’t about to repeat the usual words of discouragement.

“Are you sure you’re ready to set up a place all by yourself?” he asked finally.

Rachel did not sigh as loudly as she felt like doing. Her stepmother’s voice played in her mind. An unmarried woman doesn’t live alone. Or run a business on her own. It’s unnatural. What will people say?

“Brennan Merriday,” Rachel said, “if thee only knew how many times that has been asked of me. I am quite certain that I can homestead on my own land.” Her tone was wry, trying to pass his concern off lightly—even though it chafed her. She had become accustomed to being an oddity—a woman who didn’t marry and who wanted to do things no woman should want.

“Why do you say thee and thy and your cousin doesn’t?”

This question took her by surprise. “I don’t really know except there isn’t a Quaker meeting here.”

“I take it that Noah’s the preacher hereabout, but not a Quaker.”

She barely listened to his words, still surveying him. His body still needed feeding, but he had broad shoulders and long limbs. Most of all, the sense of his deep inner pain drew her even though she knew he didn’t want that. She turned her wayward eyes forward again. “Yes, he seems to have reconnected with God.”

“Don’t it bother you that he’s not a Quaker no more?”

“We were both raised Quaker but I don’t consider other Christians to be less than we are. Each Christian has a right to go his own path to God.”

“And what about those who don’t want to have nothin’ to do with any church?”

She heard the edge in the man’s voice and wondered how to reply. She decided frankness should be continued. “When he enlisted in the Union Army, Noah was put out of meeting.”

The man beside her said nothing but she felt that he absorbed this like a blow to himself. She recalled praying for God to keep her cousin safe and reading the lists of the wounded and fallen after every battle, hoping not to see his name listed. The horrible war had made a dreadful impact on all their lives. Still did.

She brushed away another fly as if sweeping away the sadness of the war, sweeping away her desire to hold him close and soothe him as she would a wounded bird.

Brennan remained silent. His hands were large and showed that he had worked hard all his life.

Just as she had. “I know that people will think me odd when I stake a homestead,” she said briskly, bypassing his digression. “But I intend to make my own way. I’ve worked for others and saved money enough to start out on my own.”

Any money a woman earned belonged to her husband or father. Still, in the face of her stepmother’s disapproval, her father had decided that Rachel should keep what she earned. No doubt he thought she might never marry. His wife would inherit everything and leave Rachel with nothing. This had been her father’s one demonstration of concern for her. How was it that when she’d lost her mother, she’d also in effect lost her father?

Except for Brennan murmuring to the team, silence again greeted her comment. Finally he admitted, “I see you got your mind made up.”

They rode in silence then. The homestead Noah had told her about lay north of town within a mile and had been abandoned just before deep winter the previous year. Rachel gazed at the thick forest and listened to the birdsong, trying to identify the different calls.

Her mother had taught her bird lore. She heard a bobwhite and then a robin and smiled. A pair of eagles swooped and soared overhead. She realized she already loved this place, the wildness of it, the newness.

Another mile or so and Brennan drove through town and then turned the horses onto a faint track and into an overgrown clearing. A small log cabin and a shed sat in the middle of it. Stumps poked out of tall grass, dried from weeks without rain. Only deer had grazed here earlier this spring. The sight of the almost cozy clearing wound warmly around her heart. Would this be her home?

Brennan halted the team with a word and set the brake.

She started to climb down.

“Miss Rachel,” he ordered, “ya’ll will wait till I get there to help you down. I may be riffraff but I know enough to do that.”

She froze. “Thee is not riffraff.”

He made no reply but helped her down without meeting her eyes. Again, she longed to touch him, offer comfort, but could not.

So this man had also been weighed by society and found wanting. She recalled all the times people had baldly pointed out her lack of beauty or wondered why she wasn’t married yet—as if either was any of their business. And of course, she couldn’t answer back without being as rude as they.

Lifting her skirts a few inches, she waded through the tall, dry grass, which flattened under her feet. Noah had been praying for rain. The cabin’s door was shut tight. A good sign. She stepped back and bumped into Brennan, nearly losing her balance. He steadied her. She was shocked at the rampant and unusual sensations that flooded her. She pulled away. “My thanks.”

He reached around her and tried to push open the door. It stuck. With his shoulder, he had to force it. Looking down, he said, “Mud washed up against the door and under it and grass grew on it.”

She stepped into the dim interior and let her eyes adjust. Brennan entered and waited behind her. Finally she could see a hearth on the back wall, cobwebs high up in the corners and a broken chair lying on its side. Otherwise only dust covered the floor. “It just needs cleaning.”

“Look up.”

She obeyed. “What am I looking for?”

“I see stains from a few roof leaks.”

She turned to him. “Is that hard to make right?”

“No, I just need to bring a ladder to get up there and see where the shingles have blown loose or cracked.”

She considered this. “Thee can do that?”

“Sure.” He looked disgruntled at her question.

“Let’s look at the shed then.”

They did. Just an empty building but in good order. Excellent. Mentally she began listing the new structures she’d need. She noted how Brennan looked around as if tallying something, too. Finally she asked, “What’s thy opinion? Will this be a good homestead for me to claim?”

“Well, it’s fortunate to already have a cabin and shed on it.”

She pointed to a mound between the cabin and the shed. “Could that be a well covered over?”

“Might be.” He strode over to it and stooped down. “You’re right. They were good enough to cover the well and mud got washed onto the boards and then grass sprouted.” He rose. “Do you know why the family left the claim?”

“Sunny said the wife died.”

The bleak reply silenced them for a moment.

“Life is so fragile,” she murmured. Then she took herself in hand. “But we are alive and I need a home.”

“I do, too.”

She took this to mean that he’d decided to accept her position, but couldn’t bring himself to say so. And he would know he couldn’t live anywhere on the property of a single woman.

Tactfully she said, “I’m glad making this livable will not take long. It’s important I get my business up soon because the prime season for making a reputation for my sweets up and down the river is summer, when the boat traffic will be at its peak. This far north the Mississippi freezes, according to Noah.”

“You make good sense,” he allowed grudgingly.

She moved to look directly into his eyes. After a mental calculation she said, “I could afford to pay you two dollars a week. That would include meals.”

“I won’t take anythin’ for my work, but I’ll need to pay for a room.” He left it open that he’d need her to cover that.

“Where will you live?” she asked finally.

“I thought I’d ask in town who has room for me.”

She offered him her hand. “It’s a deal then. Let’s go to town and stake this claim.”

“Yes, Miss Rachel.” His words were polite but she caught just the slight edge of irony under them. What had made this man so mocking of himself and others? She would just take him as he was. Until he moved on.

And she ignored the sensitive currents that raced up her arm when he gripped her hand and shook it as if she were another man. Were foolish schoolgirl feelings going to pop up now when she least needed them? And when to show them would embarrass both her and this complex man?

* * *

Brennan halted the team outside the narrow storefront. In the window, a small white placard read simply Government Office and beneath that a smaller placard—Agent Present. He went around and helped Miss Rachel down. She looked sturdier than she felt as he assisted her. She was such a little bit of a woman—with such big ideas.

He seriously doubted she would be allowed to register for a homestead. The idea was crazy. Still, he asked, “Do you want me to come in with you?”

She looked up at him with a determined expression, her large gray eyes flashing and direct. “No, I can handle this myself.”

He listened for any sign she might want him to accompany her. But he caught only a shade of tartness in her tone. He accepted her decision. He didn’t like people hovering over him either. “Then I’ll be going to find me a room.”

“Very well. If I am not here when you need me, look for me at the General Store.” Without waiting for his reply, she marched to the door and went inside. He wondered idly why she never wore any lace or pretty geegaws. And she skimmed her hair back so severely. Didn’t she want to look pretty?

He stood a moment, staring after her. Northern women were different all right and up to now, Miss Rachel stood out as the most different he’d met. Lorena’s biddable face flickered in his mind, stinging as it always did. He walked resolutely away from the starchy Yankee and his own taunting memories.

He paused, scanning the lone dusty street for a likely place to ask for a room. This little dot on the shore of the Mississippi hadn’t progressed to having a boardinghouse yet.

Whom could he ask? Then he noticed the saloon at the end of the street, the kind of place where he always found an easy welcome—as long as he had money in his pocket.

No doubt it would irritate Miss Rachel if he went in there. So he strode toward it, reveling in the ability to walk down a street healthy once again. He pushed through swinging doors into the saloon, almost empty in the late morning. A pudgy older man leaned back behind the bar.

“Mornin’,” Brennan greeted him.

“What can I do for you?” the man replied genially.

Brennan approached the bar. “I’m new in town, need a room. You know any place that’d be good for me to ask at?”

They exchanged names and shook hands.

“You’re from the South?” Sam, the barkeep, commented.

“Yeah.” Though bristling, Brennan swallowed a snide reply.

After eyeing him for a few moments, Sam rubbed his chin. “Most shopkeepers have family above their place or build a cabin behind their business. Got a blacksmith-farrier in town. Single. Think he’s got a loft empty. Can’t think of anybody else that has room.”

“Don’t have many businesses in this bump in the road,” Brennan drawled, leaning against the bar, suddenly glad to have someone more like him to talk to. The Whitmores were good folk, but he had to watch his errant tongue around them.

Sam smirked. “You got that right.”

A look of understanding passed between them. Brennan drew in a deep breath. “Thanks for your advice about the room.”

“Glad to help. Drop in some evening and we’ll have a tongue wag.”

After nodding, Brennan headed outside. Miss Rachel probably hadn’t finished in the government office yet. So under the hot sun, he ambled toward the log-constructed blacksmith shop. The clang of metal on metal announced a smithy hard at work. Would the blacksmith be anti-Southerner, too?

He entered the shady interior and fierce heat rushed into his face. A broad-shouldered man in a leather apron pounded an oblong of iron, shaping it into some long-handled tool, sparks flying. Finally, after plunging the tool into a barrel of water, the sweating blacksmith stepped back from his forge. Over the sizzling of the molten iron meeting cold water, he asked, “What can I do for you, stranger?”

Brennan moved forward and offered his hand. “Name’s Merriday. Ah’m lookin’ to rent a room.”

Pulling off leather gloves, the blacksmith gripped his hand briefly. Brennan felt the power of the man in that grip.

“You sound like you’re from the South,” the man observed.

“I am.” Brennan said no more, though smoldering.

“Comstock’s my name. Levi Comstock,” the tall man said. “How long you staying here?”

“A few months maybe.” These few words cost him. He never spent a month in any place anymore. The disorienting flashes of memory and restlessness always hit him after a few weeks. He hoped in Canada he could finally settle down. But I owe Miss Rachel. “You got room for me?”

The blacksmith studied Brennan.

Brennan didn’t like it and pressed his lips together to keep back a nervy comment that itched to be said.

The man finally nodded toward a ladder. “I built me a lean-to to sleep in for the summer. Get the breeze off the river. Not using my loft now. It’ll be hot up there. I’ve been meaning to cut out two small windows for some air. Maybe you could do that.”

“How much do you want a week?”

“Four bits?” Comstock asked.

“That’s all?”

The man’s blackened face split into a grin. “You ain’t seen the loft yet. No bed. Just a dusty floor.”

“And two windows when we cut them.” Brennan knew he’d just taken a liking to this practical man and dampened down the lift it sparked in him. He’d be here only as long as Miss Rachel needed him. Then he’d move north and get settled before winter. The two men shook hands.

“When you moving in?”

Brennan considered this. “Soon. Maybe tomorrow.”

“See you then.” The smith turned back to his forge.

Brennan stepped outside and gazed around at the nearly vacant main street and sighed. What would he do in this little berg for a few weeks? And how was Miss Rachel faring with the land agent? He headed toward the office. Maybe Miss Rachel needed some backup by now.

* * *

Just inside the door of the government office, Rachel paused to gird herself for battle, quelling her dislike of contention. She knew she faced one of the the biggest battles of her life, here and now.

The small, middle-aged man in a nondescript suit behind a small desk rose politely. “Miss?”

She smiled her sweetest smile and went swiftly forward. “Good day, sir. I am Miss Rachel Woolsey.” She never used sir. Quakers didn’t use titles. But she couldn’t afford to be Quaker today. After she told him what she’d come for, she was going to brand herself odd enough as it was. Their hands clasped briefly.

“Please take a seat and tell me what I can do for you, Miss Woolsey.”

She sat primly on the chair he had set for her and braced herself. “I’m here to stake a claim.”

Shock widened the man’s pinched face. “I beg your pardon.”

“I am here to stake a claim,” she repeated, stubborn determination rearing up inside.

“Your husband is ill?” he asked after a pause.

Hadn’t she introduced herself as Miss? “No, I am unmarried.”

“Then you can’t stake a homestead claim.” Each of his words stabbed at her. “It isn’t done.”

She’d expected this reaction and she had come prepared. “Excuse me, please, but it can be done.” She tried to keep triumph from her smile. “And quite legally. My father consulted our state representative to the U.S. Congress before I left Pennsylvania.” She pulled out the creased envelope. “Here is the letter.”

The man did not reach for the envelope. “I know the law, miss. But a single woman homesteading, while legal, is ridiculous. You will never prove up your claim. Why put yourself through that?” His last sentence oozed condescension.

Her irritation simmered. So many sharp replies frothed on her tongue, but she swallowed them. “I have already hired a workman and the claim I want is the one that the Ryersons left last winter. May I please begin the paperwork?” She gazed at him, giving the impression that she would sit here all day if need be. And she would.

He glared at her.

Seconds, minutes passed.

She cleared her throat and pinned the man with her gaze. “Is there a problem?”

“I think it’s shameful that your father would let you leave home and homestead on your own. What will people think of you—a single woman without a male protector? Have you thought of that?”

Rachel shook off this measly objection. “Sir, I cannot think that anyone here would take me for a woman of easy virtue. And—” she didn’t let him interject the retort that must be reddening his face “—my cousin Noah Whitmore is here to watch over me.”

“You’re Noah Whitmore’s cousin?”

“Our mothers were sisters.”

He stared at her again, chewing the inside of his cheek—no doubt trying to come up with another objection.

She kept her steady gaze on him. The door behind her opened. Glancing over her shoulder, she glimpsed Brennan enter. She lifted one eyebrow.

“Miss Rachel, aren’t you about done here?” he asked, hat in hand, but the willingness to dispute with the agent plain on his face.

“I still need to fill out the claim form,” she replied evenly and then turned to face the government official who should be earning his money by doing his job and not wasting her time.

With a glance at Mr. Merriday, the man whipped out a form and jumped to his feet. “I need to walk a bit.”

She didn’t reply. Outside sea gulls squawked; the sound mimicked her reaction to this officious little man.

After he exited with a huff in each step, she moved to his side of the desk and, using his pen and ink, neatly and precisely filled out the form. All the things she wished she could say to the agent streamed through her mind. She wore skirts—why did that make her incompetent, inferior?

She knew all the various restrictions society placed on women and knew that many quoted scripture as their justification. But she never knew why submitting to a husband or not speaking in the church had anything to do with regard to a woman without one. And the Quakers didn’t believe in either anyway.

Soon she finished filling out the form and read it over carefully to make sure she hadn’t omitted anything. When satisfied, she rose.

“Miss Rachel, why don’t you go on to the store and I’ll find that government agent and give him your claim?”

She paused to study Brennan’s face. Then she understood him. Oh, she hadn’t thought of that. Papers could go astray so easily. Though this goaded her, she said nothing, merely handed him the paper and walked out the door, thanking him for his help. Brennan might not approve of her intentions but he wasn’t treating her like a female who couldn’t know her own mind. A definite point in his favor. And no doubt why he’d begun popping into her mind at odd moments. She must be wary of that. He would be gone soon. She tried to ignore the shaft of startling loneliness this brought her.

* * *

Brennan accepted the paper, accepted that once again he was going against the grain by backing the unpopular horse, his curse it seemed. He let the lady go, determined to get her what she wanted. As little as Brennan approved of Miss Rachel’s filing for her homestead, he wasn’t going to let some scrawny government weasel gyp this fine lady. Not on his watch.

Outside the office, he scanned the street for the man. When he didn’t see him, he headed for the saloon. Maybe the barkeep would know where the agent stayed when in town.

He stepped inside and found the man he was looking for, pouring out the affront he’d just suffered in his office. “I don’t know what this country is coming to. Giving black men the vote and now a woman thinks she can stake a claim like a man. Next they’ll want the vote, too! A woman homesteading—I ask you!”

“I know it’s not the usual,” Brennan drawled. “But it’s a free country. For women, too.” He didn’t like meddlesome little squirts like this man who liked to throw around their half ounce of power.

The land agent glared at him. “Who are you?”

Brennan eyed the man with distaste. Suddenly he felt proud to say, “I’m the one who’s workin’ for the lady.”

“Then you’re as crazy as she is,” the agent declared.

Sam moved back and leaned against the wall behind the bar as if enjoying a show.

“I been called worse than crazy.” Leaning against the bar, Brennan began enjoying this rumpus. He didn’t cotton to the fact that he had to stay in this little town. So why did this man think he could have everything his way?

The agent turned away from him, venting his spleen by muttering to himself.

“I brought Miss Rachel’s paper.” Brennan said the words with a barely concealed challenge in his voice. “I want to make sure it gets into the mail today and marked in your records nice and legal.” Brennan had never staked a claim or done anything else with any government except enlist in the army. But he figured the agent should keep a record of the transaction and send one to Washington. That sounded right to him.

The man swung around, glaring at him. “Nobody tells me how to do my job. Least of all some Johnny Reb.”

Sam’s amused gaze swiveled back and forth from one to the other.

Brennan did not respond to the derogatory Yankee nickname for Confederate soldiers. “I’m not tellin’ you how to do your job. Just...helpin’ you do it. After you.” Emphasizing the final two words, Brennan swept one hand, gesturing toward the door. Brennan itched to grab the man’s collar and drag him out.

The man glared at him.

So Brennan waited him out—not changing anything in his expression or stance, barely blinking.

The land agent finally caved in, growled something under his breath about stinking Southerners, and stalked past Brennan out the door.

Hiding a grin, Brennan nodded politely to the barkeep and followed the man to his office. Lounging against the doorjamb, he said nothing as the man sat at his desk, filled out a ledger. Brennan moved to look over his shoulder.

The agent then slapped Miss Rachel’s application into a mailing pouch. “There! Are you satisfied?” the man snapped.

“Anything else need doin’?” Brennan asked in a mild tone.

“No!”

“Then after you write me out one of those receipts—” Brennan gestured toward a pad of receipts on the desk “—I’ll just help you by taking this mailbag to Ashford’s store. I seen the notice in the window that he’s the postmaster hereabout.”

The agent resembled a volcano about to blow, but he merely chewed viciously the inside of his cheek. Then he dashed off the receipt, ripped it from the pad and shoved the mail pouch at Brennan.

“I’ll bid you good day then,” Brennan said drolly and strolled outside.

A stream of epithets followed him, including “Confederate cur.”

He ignored them and crossed the street, his boots sending up puffs of dust with each step. The drought filled his nose with dust, too. His destination in sight, he moved forward. He’d been inside Ashford’s store only once before on a trip to town with Noah. But he nodded politely at Ashford’s hesitant greeting and handed him the leather pouch, which read Official U.S. Documents. “I brought this over for the land agent. Do you think the mail will go out today?”

Ashford, middle-aged with thinning hair, consulted a notice on the wall. “Yes, if the Delta Queen arrives on schedule.” The storekeeper cocked an eyebrow at Brennan. “It’s odd that the agent let you bring this over.”

“Oh, I just told him I was on my way here. Now you watch over the mail pouches, don’t you? You don’t let anybody mess with the letters, right?” Brennan asked.

“I certainly do not let anybody interfere with the mail. I took an oath.” Ashford starched up.

“Excellent. Glad to hear it.” Brennan turned to Miss Rachel. “Here is your receipt for the land transaction.”

“Thank thee, Mr. Merriday.” She accepted the paper and slid it into her pocket, then dazzled Brennan with a smile that cast her as, well, pretty.

At this realization, Brennan stepped backward. Whoa, he had no business thinking that. Why had he thought her plain? Was it the way she hid behind that plain Quaker bonnet?

“I just staked my claim, Mr. Ashford,” Miss Rachel explained, “on the Ryersons’ abandoned claim.”

Ashford goggled at her. “Indeed?” he finally said.

“Yes, Miss Rachel’s makin’ her own way in the world.” Brennan regained his aplomb. “An independent woman.” Brennan relished setting another pillar of society on edge.

“And Mr. Merriday will help me as my hired hand,” Miss Rachel agreed. “Mr. Ashford, I will be back next week to pick up the flour, sugar and other items I’ve ordered. And please let it be known that I want to buy a cow and chickens from anyone who has any to spare. I’ll pay what’s fair.”

“Yes, Miss, but I still think you should have ordered much less flour to begin with,” the storekeeper said.

“I appreciate thy concern,” she replied, but this didn’t show in her tone. “Mr. Merriday, I think our town business is done now.”

He was back to himself. So he did find the lady pretty—what did that have to do with the likes of him? “Yes, Miss Rachel,” Brennan said, grinning with sass as he followed her to the door, opened it for her and let her step outside. He glanced over his shoulder to catch Ashford frowning. And mocked the man with a grin.

Back on the wagon bench beside Miss Rachel, Brennan slapped the reins and piloted the team toward home. A rare feeling of satisfaction suffused him. And he was beginning to like Miss Rachel. That was all. “You called me Mr. Merriday,” he teased. “Thrice.”

“Yes, I thought if I called thee by thy first name as Quakers do, the storekeeper might misunderstand our relationship. I think it will be best if I use Mr. Merriday so everyone understands....” Her voice faltered.

“I take your meaning, Miss Rachel.” He couldn’t stop his grin from widening. Working for Miss Rachel would certainly bring zest into his life for a time.

From the corner of his eye, he gazed at her profile. She sat so prim and proper, her back straight and her gloved hands folded in her lap. What would she do if he turned and kissed her? A startling, disturbing thought.

Then she glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “My thanks, Mr. Merriday, for thy support today.”

“Just part of my job, miss,” he said, taking control of his unruly mind. He owed this lady a debt, that was all.

And then the two of them rode in outward silence toward the Whitmore claim. But one sentence ran through Brennan’s mind—What have I gotten myself into this time?

Chapter Three

On the dusty drive home, Rachel felt unsettled again. She tried not to think of those first few days on the journey here when nothing had seemed right and she hadn’t been able to eat. And sitting beside this handsome man who’d stood up for her added more confusion.

“How soon could I move into my cabin?” she asked, forcing herself to stop musing.

“Just need a day or two to get it cleaned out and fix the roof.”

“I will do the cleaning so thee can concentrate on the fixing.” She had succeeded in staking her homestead claim. She should be experiencing relief but she wasn’t. Her stomach churned. What’s wrong with me?

The ride home passed much more quickly than the ride to the homestead and then to town. The hot sun beat down on Rachel’s shoulders and bonnet. But she found herself more aware of Mr. Merriday with every mile. She hadn’t expected him to abet her in town. Also she’d seen in Mr. Ashford’s expression that having the Southerner work for her would be frowned on. Well, so be it.

When Noah’s cabin came into view, Rachel’s heart started jumping oddly. She stiffened her self-control and tried to remain unmoved as Brennan helped her down from the wagon with his usual courtesy, which was not usual to her.

Noah hailed them from outside his woodshop. With their little boy in her arms, Sunny opened the door and greeted her warmly.

Rachel burst into tears.

Everyone rushed forward as if she’d fallen, which shamed her. She turned away, trying to hide her face.

Sunny came to her and grasped her elbow. “Come. I’ll make you some tea.”

When Rachel looked up, the two men had disappeared with little Dawn and only she and Sunny went to the bench outside the cabin. Rachel sat while Sunny went inside. The toddler in his dress rolled in the grass, playing with his toes. Tears dripping down her face, Rachel watched him, envying his innocence.

Soon Sunny handed her a cup of tea and sat beside her. “Was the land agent very rude?” Sunny asked conversationally.

“Of course he was.” Wiping her eyes with her hankie, Rachel tried to keep bitterness from her tone, but failed. “Why are men so...?” Words failed her.

Sunny made a sound of agreement. “They certainly can be.”

Rachel sipped the sweet, tangy tea. “Life would be easier if I just went along with what’s expected of me,” she finally admitted.

More tea. “Yes, but would that be easier on you?”

“No!” Rachel’s reply flew from her lips.

“Then you will just have to thicken your skin.”

Rachel sighed. “I thought I had.”

“It’s just this starting out part. Everyone here will get to know you, begin to see that you’re a good person. You’ll become part of the town and then they’ll resent anybody who disparages you.”

Rachel turned to Sunny. “Really?”

“Yes, that’s how it happened with us.”

“Really?”

Sunny beamed at her. “Noah’s the preacher now.”

For some reason, Rachel couldn’t swallow a chuckle. Then the two of them were laughing out loud.

In a while, no doubt drawn by the sounds of mirth, the men approached, looking as if the women’s behavior mystified them. And that only caused Rachel and Sunny to shake with more laughter.

* * *

The next day Brennan climbed the ladder onto the roof of Rachel’s cabin, no clouds masking the hot sun. He crawled across the rough surface till he reached the spot where he thought the leak was. Three wooden shakes or shingles had blown loose.

His lady boss was humming below, sweeping out her cabin. And soon Noah would arrive to start work on the large oven Miss Rachel needed for her business. The question over whether to add a kitchen to the cabin had been debated completely. Finally a summer kitchen connected by a covered walkway to the cabin had been deemed best.

Thinking of Noah, Brennan found himself filled with potent envy. Noah Whitmore had it all—a place of his own, a pretty wife and two great kids.

Reminiscence of a time when he’d thought Noah’s kind of life would always be his life goaded him. Lorena’s slender arms slipped around his neck and her soft voice—

Then the worst happened—one of his infrequent spells hit him. The past flooded him. Waves of darkness engulfed him. That awful day before the war? Or all the awful days of war after it rolled into one? He was surrounded. Fists pounding him, the stench of stale sweat, curses bombarded him. He tried to keep his eyes open, tried to keep in touch with his surroundings—which way was up and which was down. He lost.

He felt himself sliding, the rough shingles hitting his spine as he slid. He wrenched his eyes open and at the last minute jammed his heels into another space where shingles had been blown away. His hands scrabbled for something to cling to. He stopped and then he lay back, gasping for air.

“Is thee all right?” Miss Rachel called up.

Brennan couldn’t answer. The world still tilted and swayed around him. Then he heard Miss Rachel climbing up the ladder.

He had to stop her, couldn’t let her see him like this. Brennan wanted to send her away with a flea in her ear, anything to prevent her from asking what the matter was. Upon the rare occasion when he had one of these spells, he just left town.

But I can’t leave this town. And Noah saved my life as much as the little spinster. Brennan waited for the inevitable questions.

But Miss Rachel asked none.

Brennan finally could sit up. His slide had taken him within a foot of the ladder and there stood Miss Rachel near his boots. Still she didn’t speak. Brennan’s heartbeat and breathing slowed to normal. He didn’t know what to say. Better to let her think he just slid. “Sorry to give you a scare, Miss Rachel.”

She tilted her head like one of the robins nesting in the tree nearby. She reached out her hand to him.

And surprising himself, he took it.

“Please be careful, Brennan Merriday. I wouldn’t want to see thee laid low again.”

He tried to ignore the softness of the hand in his. Tried to ignore the fact that the sun glinted off the threads of gold in her hair and that her expression drew him like bees to honey. In any other woman, he would have interpreted her comment as selfish, as indicating that she wanted him to keep well and in working condition. But did this woman have a selfish bone in her body?

The moment was broken when they heard Noah’s whistling.

Their hands pulled apart. She blushed and he looked away.

“Morning, Rachel. Brennan, I was thinking,” Noah called out as he approached them, “it makes more sense for us to work together. I think we’ll get more done. Why don’t I hand you the shakes we cut? You can be nailing new ones in place and I’ll go over the roof, checking every shake to make sure none are loose. I don’t think Ryerson did a very good job on his roof. Then you can help me with the oven.”

“Sounds good to me,” Brennan said, forcing out the words.

Miss Rachel slowly disappeared from view as she climbed back down the ladder. Brennan felt the loss of her and hardened himself. What had they been thinking? Holding hands in broad daylight?

* * *

About two weeks later Rachel tried to calm her fluttering nerves. Tonight she’d stay alone in her cabin for the first time. As the shadows darkened, Noah’s family, who had helped her move in today with her new table and chairs and bed Noah had made her, was leaving. Sunny had helped her prepare the first meal in her new home. The day had been busy and happy. A nearby farmer had delivered her young cow, chickens and a rooster. Now she would have cream and eggs for her baking. But Brennan’s distant behavior had pruned her enjoyment of the occasion.

Noah’s wagon had just turned the bend out of sight when Brennan ambled over to help her carry the last of the chairs inside.

“Thee didn’t join in much today,” she said.

“Didn’t feel sociable.”

She sensed that he was about to lay out the last chores he would be doing for her and then announce he’d be leaving. His restlessness over the past few days had not gone unnoticed. She didn’t like the gloom that realization opened inside her. Yet she’d wanted to be on her own and now she would be.

Three strangers appeared on the track to her cabin. This was an odd occurrence. “Hello, may I help thee?” Rachel called out, though as they came closer she recognized that the three looked disreputable.

“We’re looking for the lousy Confederate you got here!” one declared, slurring his words from drink, no doubt.

“Yeah, we don’t want any scurvy dogs like that hanging around,” another added belligerently.

To her dismay, Brennan picked up a tree limb lying on the ground and moved to confront the men.

“The war is over,” Rachel said, trying to stem the confrontation.

Brennan ignored her. “There is a lady present here. From your voices, I’d say you men have been imbibing today. Too liberally.”

The men glowered at her. Even in their inebriated state, Brennan saw, they realized that fighting with a proper lady present would be roundly condemned.

Rachel stepped forward, hoping her presence would send the strangers away.

Instead, a fist shot past her.

Brennan dodged it easily. Then he slammed his fist into his attacker’s nose. Blood spurted.

Rachel cried out. Brennan pushed her out of the fray. She stumbled and fell to the grass.

The other stranger rushed Brennan. He dealt with him. The third one turned and bolted. The two who had been bested followed suit, cursing as they ran.

Rachel put her hands to her ears, shocked to silence. “Oh!”

Just as they disappeared from view, the first one, his hand pressed over his bleeding nose, shouted, “This isn’t over!”

“Yes, it is,” Brennan muttered, rubbing his knuckles.

Rachel began to weep, trembling.

Brennan gripped her hands and pulled her up and into his arms. “There, there,” he said, holding her against him. “You’re safe now. I wouldn’t let anyone hurt you.”

The temptation proved too great to resist. She let herself lean against him, feeling the strength of him supporting her. She tried to stop her tears. “I’m sorry to be so weak.”

“I’m sorry you had to witness such behavior.” As he said this, his lips actually touched her ear. “You’re not weak.”

The last of the weeping swept through her like a wind gust and left her gasping against him. “I’ve never been near violence before.”

“Then you’re a lucky woman.” He patted her back clumsily.

She wiped her face with her fingertips and looked up into Brennan’s face. His expression of concern moved her and she reached up and stroked his cheek.

What am I doing?

Rachel straightened and stepped back. She must break contact before he did. An unwelcome thought lowered her mood more. Tonight would be her first night sleeping alone in her own house. She’d never spent a night alone in her life. And these violent men had come tonight.

“Maybe I should sleep in the shed tonight,” Brennan said, his gaze going to the trail to town.

The idea had appeal. But she would be here alone every night, perhaps for the rest of her life.

In the clearing, Rachel and Brennan faced each other. “Thee doesn’t think I am really in danger of them coming here again tonight?”

Brennan bumped the toe of his boot into a tussock of wild, dry grass. “No, not because the three show any sense, but they’re probably all passed out from drink by now.”

Rachel stared at the ground, listening to the frogs in the nearby creek.

“I’ll bar my door,” she said with a lift of her chin, which belied her inner trembling.

“Maybe you’d be better off if I didn’t hang around any longer.”

“Brennan Merriday, in case thee has not noticed by now, I am not a woman who gives way to pressure from others. I have hired thee and I expect thee will show up for breakfast tomorrow and continue the work that still needs doing here.”

He looked up.

And suddenly she was very aware of how alone they were here just outside her door. Funny sensations jiggled in her stomach. “You were very brave,” she murmured.

He started digging at the tussock of grass again with the toe of his boot.

Her mind flashed back to her schoolgirl days. She’d watched boys do this when they talked to girls they liked but didn’t want to show it. Did he like her that way?

She turned abruptly. “I bid thee good night.”

“Okay, Miss Rachel, I’ll head to my place then. See you in the mornin’.”

She didn’t trust herself to reply. The desire to hold him here and the residual fear had worsened and she was afraid her voice would give her away. She entered, shut the door and lifted the bar into place. Few cabins had such. But Noah had insisted on this and now she understood why.

Once inside, she scanned the inside of her new home. Sunny had helped her wash the dishes so there was nothing to do. Noah had made her a rocking chair as a gift. She sat in it now and tried not to feel her lonely state. She picked up the socks she’d started to knit for Brennan as a going away thank-you. The thought hit her as unwelcome.

For just a second, she imagined Brennan Merriday sitting on a chair across from her, whittling the way he always did. She was knitting and the two of them enjoyed that companionable quiet that happily married couples sometimes shared.

Where did that come from?

She shook off this foolishness, put down her knitting and lifted her small portable desk. She began working again on a recipe she’d thought of, something with chocolate and nuts no man could resist. Except Brennan Merriday in one of his touchy moods.

She would have to be very careful around him—he was too handsome for his own good—and hers—and he was staying to help her. She thought of his courtesies. Brennan Merriday treated her like an attractive woman, not a spinster. This alone must be working on her, drawing her to him.

But he carried some deep wound and would be leaving very soon. Even if he was momentarily attracted to her, nothing would come of it. Nothing ever had. And she’d accepted being alone, hadn’t she?

* * *

Brennan marched to town, boiling for a fight. Cold reason halted him a few yards from the saloon. Only a fool barged into to a three-to-one fight. He planned his strategy and sidled to a side window. What he saw flummoxed him.

He entered the saloon and Sam was alone, wiping down the bar. “What’s wrong? Customers find out you were watering the whiskey?”

Sam gave him the eye. “That’s an unfounded accusation. It might have been better if I had tonight. Some people just don’t know when to stop.”

Brennan leaned against the bar. “What happened?”

“Had to kick out a bunch earlier. They drank too much too fast and wanted to pick a fight with anybody who came near.”

“I know the type.” He described the three and Sam nodded. Brennan continued, “Someone must have told them that a Southerner lived around here. And they wanted to run me out of town. They actually started a fight in front of the lady I work for.”

The barkeep rubbed his face with his big hands. “That’s not right, fighting in front of a decent woman. Had to show my rifle to get rid of them. Most locals left. Tame crowd lives around here. The troublemakers are probably on the boat that brought them by now.”

Brennan chewed on this. “Okay. Thanks.” He offered his hand to the man.

“When you coming in just for that tongue wag?”

“Soon.” Brennan left with a wave, not satisfied. What if after he left town, rowdies came looking for him and bothered Miss Rachel? He felt her again in his arms, so petite and slight. A fierce protectiveness reared inside him. He couldn’t leave her unprotected. How could he make sure no one would bother her?

* * *

The next morning, Rachel hadn’t experienced such quaking since the morning she’d left her father’s home in Pennsylvania. Under the clear, late-June sky, she drew in a deep breath and let Mr. Merriday help her down from the two-wheeled pony cart she’d borrowed from Noah’s neighbors. The blue sky did not sport even one cloud. When would the rain come?

Brennan’s strong, steady hand contrasted with her shakiness. After he’d held her close last night, now she had trouble looking him in the eye. She felt herself blush and turned her face away.

She’d filled several large trays with baked goods and Brennan had set them in the back of the cart. Today she would launch Rachel’s Sweets, what she’d come here to do, what her future hinged upon.

“I still think you should call it Miss Rachel’s Sweets,” Brennan grumbled.

She realized then that she still held his strong, calloused hand, not for aid but for comfort. This jolted her. Was she going to start having foolish ideas? No.

Scolding herself for this lapse, she quickly smoothed her skirts. “But Miss might imply to some that I cannot cook since no man married me.” She repeated her objection with an attempt at humor. Why was she so nervous? No one was going to arrest her for selling sweets.

“The name of your business needs some swank. That’s all I’m sayin’.”

She had to admit that having this man with her bolstered her and she didn’t like that, couldn’t let herself depend on him. Brennan Merriday had made it clear he was staying just so long and then heading north.

She turned from him. “Well, I’m a Quaker and we don’t go for ‘swank.’ And my baked goods don’t need that to sell. Just a lot of creamy butter and sweet sugar.” She walked briskly toward the rear of the cart.

There her products lay on tin trays, covered with spotless, crisply starched white dishcloths. Yesterday Brennan had rigged up a sling that would support the tray and then go around her neck to help her carry it.

Now as he arranged the sling on her, his nearness flooded her senses. She could smell the soap she’d given him. He’d also shaved this morning and his clean chin beckoned her to stroke it. She jerked herself back into her right mind.

Then she wished he wouldn’t frown so. His negativity prompted her stomach to flip up and down. And she noticed he’d worn a hole in one elbow of his blue shirt. She’d need to mend that before it dissected the sleeve completely. It was a wifely thought that she resisted. He was her hired hand, not her responsibility.

When he finished, she smiled bravely to boost her resolve and strode toward a boat that had just docked. She had sold her baked goods before, but never to strangers and all by herself. Brennan had come only because he was paid to, not because he was part of her venture. But I’ve always been by myself. And I’ll likely always be so. She shook her head as if sending the thought away. I like being alone.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Brennan asked from behind her.

“Quite sure,” she said, denying that what she really wanted to do was run home, denying that she’d like him to come along for support. Speaking to strangers always tested her.

She lifted her mouth into a firmer smile. She marched toward the dock, repeating silently, I will not run from my future. My plan will succeed.

She expected Mr. Merriday to stay and watch her. However, when she glanced over her shoulder, she saw that he’d walked away from the wagon and was heading toward the saloon. This nearly halted her in her tracks. What? Did the man drink? And in daylight?

The fact that she had reached the pier, her goal, shut down this line of thought. She reinforced her thinning smile. “Good day!” she called out to the men standing or working on the boat, tied to the pier. “I’m Miss Rachel.” She had intended to say her full name but Brennan’s voice had somehow seeped into her mind. “I have baked goods for sale.”

She had expected smiles. People always smiled when she offered them her treats. The men merely looked wary.

Finally one man asked, “What kind of baked goods?”

“I have apple fastnachts and sugar cookies.” Fastnachts, yeast doughnuts filled with fruit jam or creamy custard and sprinkled with sugar, were popular in Pennsylvania.

“Got any bear claws?” one man asked.

“No, I don’t.”

The faint hope in many faces looking toward her fell. And so did her own hope. Then a thought bobbed up in her mind. She walked past the workmen on the pier and stepped onto the moored boat. “May I speak to the captain, please?”

* * *

Soon Rachel smiled up into the captain’s face. “I’m offering a sample of my baked goods.”

The tall, trim man with dark sideburns and harsh features did not look friendly. But then he glanced down. “Fastnachts?” His voice echoed with surprise.

“Yes, with apple jam and cinnamon. Please help thyself.” And he did. And with his first bite, a powerful smile transformed his unwelcoming expression. “Just like my grandma used to make. You must be from Pennsylvania.”

She nodded, her heart calming. “Yes, I’m homesteading here and plan to sell baked goods and sweets to the river trade. I’m Miss Rachel Woolsey.”

“Pleased to meet you, miss. Do you have more of these? I know they won’t keep for more than a day, but I’d love to have one with my coffee later.”

“I fried three dozen this morning.” Then she turned to the crew hovering nearby. Her spirits were rising like dough on a warm, humid day. “I’d like each of thee to have a sample, too. Please.” She motioned toward them.

The men lined up and cleaned off her tray in seconds. One black porter gushed, “Best I eat since I was in New Orleans and had beignets, miss. And I thank you.”

“Beignets?” Rachel echoed. “Are they similar?”

“Yes, miss, but with powdered sugar.”

“Was it the same dough?”

“I’m no cook, miss.” The man shook his head and then grinned. “But you certainly are!”

The other men agreed heartily. And her spirit soared.

“Miss Rachel, thank you for letting us sample your wares. I’d like to buy another two dozen for me and my crew,” the captain announced.

Rachel thrilled with pleasure. “Wonderful. Thee is my first customer.”

“But not your last,” the captain said, smiling down at her.

Elated, she scurried back to her cart and Brennan met her there. “We need to bag up two dozen for this boat.” She busied herself wrapping each doughnut in waxed paper and filled two paper sacks. She delivered them to the captain.

He bowed. “Thank you, miss. You brought me sweet memories I had long forgotten.”

“My pleasure, captain. Please, I’d appreciate thy letting others know I’ll be here with fresh baked goods daily. I also plan on making fudge and other candy.”

A happy murmur from the crew greeted this.

Grinning and promising to see her the next time they docked in Pepin, the captain bowed again and then called cheerfully to his crew to get busy or they wouldn’t get another doughnut.

Buoyant with her success, Rachel walked back to the cart. Brennan lounged against it.

“We goin’ home now? That’s the only boat here today,” he asked.

She sensed now he was worried about something. What? “Let’s fill up the tray with the remaining goods.” Rachel glanced up the street. “And please help me with the strap again.”

He did so, arranging it around her neck once more. Their nearness once again distracted her, stirred odd sensations. She brushed aside their brief embrace the night before.

“What are you up to, Miss Rachel?”

“I need to make the mouths of my neighbors water, too.” She grinned at him. She’d learned today that while generosity should be its own reward, it also made good business sense.

Soon she entered Ashford’s store, jingling the bell. Brennan followed her in as if curious. Near the chairs by the cold stove sat only an older man in a wheelchair. He nodded to her politely. Had she met him?

Rachel nodded to him in case she had, then turned. “Good day, Mr. Ashford,” she greeted brightly.

The storekeeper looked dubious. “How may I help you, Miss Woolsey?”

“I am here to offer samples of my baked goods.” She stopped right across the counter from him.

He looked at her and then at the tray. He reached for one just as his wife walked down the stairs into the store. His hand halted in midair.

“Miss Woolsey,” Mrs. Ashford said disapprovingly, “I saw you just now talking to men on that boat.”

“Yes, I am starting my business. Today I’m giving away samples of my baked goods.”

Mrs. Ashford studied the tray of cookies and doughnuts. “I wonder that your cousin will abet you in this. You will find yourself in the company of all sorts of vulgar men.” Then the woman glanced pointedly past her and frowned deeply at Mr. Merriday.

Rachel guessed that she was suggesting Mr. Merriday was one of these low men. That goaded Rachel. She bit her lower lip to keep back a quick defense of the man. She must not insult so prominent a wife and perhaps start gossip.

And after a moment’s reflection, Rachel realized that Mrs. Ashford was the kind of woman who wanted to be consulted, to be the arbiter of others’ conduct. She’d met her ilk before.

This too grated on Rachel’s nerves. But nothing would be gained by telling the woman to mind her own business. “No doubt thee is right,” Rachel said demurely. “But even vulgar men will not insult a woman offering sweets.”

Brennan chuckled softly.

Discreetly enjoying his humor, she masked this with her most endearing smile. “Please, Mrs. Ashford, taste one of my wares and tell me thy opinion. I hear that thy baked goods are notable.” She did not like to be less than genuine, but the old dictum, that one attracted more flies with honey than vinegar, held true even in Wisconsin.

Mrs. Ashford picked up a fastnacht and tore it in two, the fragrance of apple and cinnamon filling permeated the air. The storekeeper’s wife handed half to her husband. They both chewed thoughtfully as if weighing and measuring with each chew. They looked at each other and then her.

“Very tasty,” the woman said, dusting the sugar from her fingers. Her husband nodded in agreement, almost grinning. “But most women here do their own baking,” Mrs. Ashford pointed out discouragingly.

“That’s why I’m courting the river trade,” Rachel assented. “And single men hereabout. And occasionally a woman might want to purchase something for a special occasion like a wedding.”

Mrs. Ashford listened seriously as if she were a senator engaging in a debate in Congress. “True.”

“Then I’ll be going on. Good day—”

“I’d like a sample too, miss,” the older man by the cold stove piped up.

Rachel turned and offered him her tray. He scooped up one sugar cookie and chewed it with ceremony. After swallowing his first bite, the older man announced, “I’m Old Saul, Miss Rachel. I heard from Noah you would be arriving this month. Much obliged for the cookie. I foresee success in your endeavor.”

His puckish style of speaking made Rachel chuckle. It was as if he had enjoyed her parrying Mrs. Ashford, too. “My thanks, Old Saul. Nice to meet thee.” She walked outside, feeling another lift in her spirits. She could do this. She walked toward the blacksmith shop, ready to offer another free sample.

Mr. Merriday walked a step behind her. She felt his brooding presence hanging over her spurt of victory. Why did people always have to make rude comments to him? Or stare at him with unfriendly expressions? The war had been over for better than six years. Wasn’t it time to let the old animosity go? And once again, the unwise attraction that drew her to him surged within.

He helped her restore the tray to the rear of the cart and then helped her up onto the seat. She had never been shown these politenesses before. Her father of course performed them for her stepmother, but Rachel was left to help her smaller stepbrothers and sisters. That must be why it touched her so every time he did this for her.

But I mustn’t become accustomed to his courtesies. I will be on my own soon enough. Too soon.

* * *

Brennan rolled over, half asleep, in the dark loft. Something had wakened him. What? Fire? The grass was tinder-dry and that had been a worry for the past few days. He listened, alert, to the sounds in the warm, humid summer night. More times than he wanted to recall, his acute hearing had saved his life. Then he heard the faintest tinkle of breaking glass.

Probably high spirits at the saloon. He rolled over. Still, sleep didn’t come. Why would there be a fight at the saloon? That usually happened only when several riverboats moored at the same time for a night.

He rolled away from his pallet. Since he couldn’t stand up in the low attic loft, he crawled to the open window draped with cheesecloth to keep out the mosquitoes. From his high vantage point, he scanned the street. The half-moon radiated little light.

Just as he was about to go back to lie on his pallet, he glimpsed movement down on the street. Three men were creeping around the stores. One had a large, full sack thrown over one shoulder. A man didn’t have to have much imagination to come to a quick conclusion.

Thieves.

The three men were slinking toward the front of Ashford’s. Better to access the store on the side away from where the storekeeper slept.

The uppity face of the owner’s wife came to Brennan’s mind. Her expression a few days ago—as she’d weighed and measured him and pronounced him wanting—had been burned into him. If she’d had the power, she would have caused him to vanish from her prissy sight that day. It rankled. Yet that he cared what she thought of him rankled more.

He watched as the shadowy men paused as if waiting for something.

Their plan unfolded in his mind. These river “rats” were using the saloon’s loud voices to mask the sounds of the thievery. He let out a breath. These little river towns were without any presence of the law and were easy pickings for thieves.

The thought suddenly rolled like thunder in his mind. He didn’t want this little bump on the river to become a target for unlawful types. Not with Miss Rachel living just outside town. The memory of the ruffians who’d come to her place to find him goaded him. The thought of the innocent Miss Rachel being accosted sent icy shivers through him. Never. He had to make sure the reputation of this town stayed strong—for her sake.

He crawled over to his knapsack, retrieved his two Colt 45s and checked to be sure both were loaded and ready. He scooted to the ladder and slipped down to the blacksmith shop. He paused, thinking of who could provide him backup. He crept to the lean-to and roused the blacksmith. Seeing Brennan’s index finger to his lips, Levi swallowed a waking exclamation.

Brennan leaned close to the man’s ear. “Thieves.” He motioned toward the rifle hung on the wall and then for the blacksmith to get up.

Soon, the two men stood side by side in the lean-to. Brennan outlined a plan and the smith nodded. They crept along in the shadows and took their places— Brennan across from the front of the General Store, closest to the river, and the smith slipped along another store behind Ashford’s. The familiar sensations of preparing for battle prickled through Brennan, keenly heightening his awareness of every sound and sight.

Laughter echoed from the saloon and then one of the thieves raised his hand to break the glass next to Ashford’s door.

“Hold!” Brennan roared, hidden in the shadows.

The three men started and glanced around frantically.

“Hold!” Brennan repeated.

The three scampered toward the rear as if to hide themselves.

Brennan let loose a warning shot over their heads. The smith let his rifle roar from the rear. The three men stopped, not knowing which way to run. Two had drawn pistols.

“Drop that bag and empty your pockets!” Brennan ordered.

The three started to run toward the river. One shot toward Brennan, but the bullet went wide. Idiots!

Brennan shot into the dirt in front of them, halting them in the middle of the street. “Drop your guns and that bag, then empty your pockets! Do it! Or this time I’ll shoot one of you!”

The man with the bag put it down and raised his hands. The other two put their pistols on the ground, yanked out their pockets and raised their hands, too.

“All your pockets!” Brennan commanded.

The bagman pulled out his pockets.

“Run!” Brennan bellowed.

The three obeyed, racing toward the river.

Just then Ashford ran out the front door, dressed hastily and holding a rifle. “What’s happening?”

Before Brennan could reply, more men armed with rifles bounded into the street. Brennan wondered if they had any sense. It was crazy to show themselves so plainly before they knew who was shooting whom. Some, he noted, did cling to the shadows, probably veterans like him.

Not wanting to be the center of attention or suffer being thanked, he slipped away, back to the blacksmith shop and up to his loft. Still his heart pounded with the excitement. He listened to the buzz of voices below. Levi explained, loud enough for him to hear, what had happened.

The town men shouted and ran toward the river. Brennan looked out his riverside window and saw a rude boat sliding out into the current. The town men shouted and shot toward the craft, their bullets sizzling as they hit the water. But the night had only half-moon light and soon the craft became invisible, lost in the dark.

Brennan lay down on his blanket, his heart still racing. The thieves had gotten away, which was best. What would the town have done with them if they’d been caught? Pepin didn’t have a jail and somebody might have gotten hurt trying to corral them. Better they escaped. They wouldn’t come back anytime soon. But what about others like them?

This staying in one place was costing him. He lay listening to the men talking, and hoped no one would disturb him. He hadn’t done this for any of them. He’d done it for Miss Rachel, but if he said that, they would think something was going on between them. Better to lay low.

How long would they have to hash over this minor dustup? People here didn’t cotton to him. And he generally didn’t cotton to people so they were even. That suited him. But what else could he do to keep Miss Rachel safe after he left town?

* * *

Just after dawn the next morning, Brennan freshened up down at the river as usual, glad to wash away last night’s sweat. He then set out toward Miss Rachel’s place, his stomach rumbling for the breakfast she’d provide. The heat was already climbing high and not a hint of a cloud showed on the horizon.

As he passed Ashford’s store, the proprietor burst out and ran toward him. Brennan halted. What did the man want?

Mr. Ashford panted. “I just came out to thank you.” The man’s face looked tired from lack of sleep. “For last night. All the storekeepers are grateful. The smithy told us you woke him up and were the one who ran off the thieves.”

Brennan hadn’t expected appreciation. And didn’t want their gratitude. He looked at the man, giving nothing of himself away. “Didn’t do it for your thanks.”

“We owe you.”

Brennan shrugged. “Don’t mention it,” he said with finality and tucked in an edge that promised unpleasantness if the man went on thanking him.

The man’s wife came running out of the store and offered him a folded new shirt and trousers. “Just a token of our thanks.”

Brennan didn’t take the clothing. “Thank you, ma’am, but I’m expected at Miss Rachel’s for breakfast.” He hurried on.

* * *

Brennan spent the morning building a chicken coop strong and high enough to outfox any fox or other varmint. To start with, he’d logged the needed wood and dug postholes. This afternoon he’d set posts.

With a rumbling stomach and sharp anticipation of another tasty meal, at noon he sat down at Miss Rachel’s table. When she carried in the steaming crock from the outdoor kitchen, he noted she did not look happy. What was the bee in her Quaker bonnet?

“Mr. Merriday, why didn’t thee tell me what happened last night?” She made it sound like a scold.

He bristled. Why did she sound mad? After all, he’d done it for her. “Because I didn’t think it was worth mentionin’. That’s why,” he replied, eyeing the bowls of stew she was dishing up.

She set the crock on the table and sat down.

He waited quietly for her to finish silently blessing the meal as she always did. When the amen came, he picked up his fork and dug into her stew. The woman could cook as well as she could bake.

“The Ashfords told me all about it. And about thy graceless behavior this morning.” She motioned toward the chair by the cold hearth. The dratted new clothing the storekeeper’s wife had offered him sat there, evidently drying after being washed. This aggravated him but he kept eating.

“We have something in common,” she said, also beginning to eat. “We are different from everyone else here. I’m the pitiful and eccentric Quaker spinster.”

Brennan suddenly felt ashamed of thinking of her with this less than flattering term. But he hadn’t meant it in a bad way. And Miss Rachel was unusual, who could argue that?

“And Mr. Merriday is thought of as a shiftless wanderer. And ex-Confederate,” she finished.

He chewed, trying to focus on the rich taste of the wild onions in the stew. After all, she wasn’t saying anything he didn’t already know.

“Last night thy quick action saved the town from thievery. They wish to show their thanks. Why refuse it?”

Annoyed suddenly, he barked, “Because I don’t care what they think of me!”

She gazed up at him, unperturbed. “Everyone, even we, put labels on people. No doubt thee thinks Mr. Ashford is a prosy storekeeper and his wife, a know-it-all busybody.”

Her apt descriptions of the two hit his funny bone. His heat turned to laughter. Chuckling, he picked up his fork once more.

“But we all have worth to God.”

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.