Bidding on his convenient bride!

There’s no room in James Fast Elk Blackburn’s dangerous life for a wife, but the gentle beauty on offer in the town’s bridal auction would make the perfect caregiver for his orphaned niece.

Miranda Fairfax is trying to reach her sister in Arizona. Being arrested then forcibly wed to a bounty hunter is not part of her plan! Yet Jamie’s rough exterior conceals a compassionate, sensual man, and Miranda soon wishes their marriage could be for real...

The Fairfax Brides

Three sisters find rugged husbands

in the wild Wild West

Beautiful heiresses Charlotte, Miranda and Annabel Fairfax have only ever known a life of luxury in Boston. Now orphaned and in danger, they are forced to flee, penniless and alone, into the lawless West. There they discover that people will risk all for gold and land—but when the sisters make three very different marriages to three enigmatic men they will find the most precious treasure of all!

Read Charlotte and Thomas’s story in

His Mail-Order Bride

Already available

Miranda and James’s story in

The Bride Lottery

Available now

and

Annabel and Clay’s story

coming soon!

Author Note

When I wrote His Mail-Order Bride—the story of Charlotte Fairfax, who assumes another woman’s identity and ends up married to an Arizona Territory homesteader—I did not intend to write three books. However, it seemed natural to follow with the stories of Charlotte’s sisters, Miranda and Annabel, and it became a trilogy: The Fairfax Brides.

I wanted my heroines to have distinct personalities, and I wanted to write about three different heroes, yet there are common elements throughout the books. All three sisters have to flee from their embittered cousin Gareth, who seeks to control the Fairfax fortune. All three heroes are loners, but each in his own way each of them longs for a woman to love—someone to call his own, someone who will make him complete.

The Bride Lottery is the story of the middle sister, Miranda, and Jamie Blackburn, a part-Cheyenne bounty hunter. Brave and bold, Miranda thirsts for adventure and meets new challenges head-on. Jamie has lost everyone he has ever loved, and lives in a dark world of death and danger. When fate throws them together Jamie finds a chance for redemption in Miranda, but the violence of his profession stands in their way.

I hope you’ll enjoy reading about Miranda and Jamie.

Annabel’s story will complete the trilogy. The youngest, clever but emotionally volatile, Annabel has some growing up to do before she can stand up to her older sisters and find her place in the world.

The Bride Lottery

Tatiana March

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Before becoming a novelist, TATIANA MARCH tried out various occupations—including being an accountant. Now she loves writing Western historical romance. In the course of her research Tatiana has been detained by the US border guards, had a skirmish with the Mexican army, and stumbled upon a rattlesnake. This has not diminished her determination to create authentic settings for her stories.

Books by Tatiana March

Mills & Boon Historical Romance

The Fairfax Brides

His Mail-Order Bride

The Bride Lottery

Mills & Boon Historical Undone! eBooks

The Virgin’s Debt

Submit to the Warrior

Surrender to the Knight

The Drifter’s Bride

Visit the Author Profile page at www.millsandboon.co.uk

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

The Fairfax Brides

Author Note

Title Page

About the Author

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Boston, Massachusetts, July 1889

The night had fallen. In the darkness of her bedroom at Merlin’s Leap, Miranda Fairfax held up a single candle. The flickering light fell on the pale features of her younger sister, Annabel. “I don’t like leaving you behind, Scrappy.” Miranda used the childhood nickname reserved for moments of tenderness. “Cousin Gareth could set his sights on you next.”

“No.” Annabel spoke calmly, even though fear lurked in her amber eyes. “He might have gotten away with declaring Charlotte dead but to do the same with you would raise suspicion. One dead sister is feasible. Two dead sisters would trigger an alarm. I’ll be safe, even after you’ve gone.”

Miranda agreed, and yet the thought of leaving Annabel alone at Merlin’s Leap filled her with dread. The gray stone mansion by the ocean just north of Boston had been a happy home, until four years ago, when their parents died in a boating accident. Since then, the sisters had been at the mercy of their Cousin Gareth, who had come to live with them and was determined to get his hands on the Fairfax fortune.

Charlotte had been the heiress, and Cousin Gareth had attempted to force her into marriage. After Charlotte ran away two months ago, Cousin Gareth had claimed the body of some unknown woman as her. With Charlotte officially dead, Miranda stood to inherit, and now Gareth’s efforts to bring about a marriage were focused on her, forcing her to flee.

“Write to Charlotte and post the letter as soon as you can,” Miranda reminded Annabel. “She needs to understand what Gareth has done. When she turns twenty-five next May and gains access to Papa’s money, she’ll need to prove she is alive before she can claim her inheritance.”

“I’ll write and find some way to mail the letter.” Annabel’s voice quivered. “Just think...if we hadn’t agreed on a code word for Charlotte to get a message to us, we might believe she is dead, instead of hiding in the Arizona Territory, pretending to be some homesteader’s mail-order bride.”

Miranda lifted the candle higher. “We would have known she’s alive from the telegram you retrieved after Cousin Gareth tossed it in the fireplace. The way the constables described the dead woman found on the train made it clear it couldn’t be Charlotte.”

“But without Charlotte’s message we would have feared the worst,” Annabel suggested.

“I know.” Miranda’s tone was bleak. “We’ll keep the same code word. Once I’m safe, I’ll write to Merlin’s Leap as Emily Bickerstaff. Cousin Gareth will intercept the letter, but with any luck he’ll share the contents with you.”

“Make it a letter of condolence,” Annabel suggested. “Emily was Charlotte’s friend. One could assume she might have heard about Charlotte’s passing and would write to the surviving sisters, to express her sympathies.”

Miranda forced a smile. “Good idea.”

Despite being sensitive and prone to weeping, Annabel was the cleverest of them. The best way to calm her nerves was to get her focused on some practical dilemma. The middle sister at twenty-two, Miranda knew she was considered the brave one. She suspected the others had no idea how much her feisty front was bravado.

In the parlor, the clock chimed midnight.

“It’s time.” Miranda blew out the candle and set it down on the rosewood bureau. Solid darkness fell over the room. She would have to make her way downstairs without the benefit of light, for even at this hour the servants might be spying on them.

“Good luck.” Annabel’s tearful voice rose in the darkness. Slim arms closed around Miranda in a trembling hug. Miranda returned the embrace. One more gesture of sisterly love. One more moment of comfort before she faced the unknown. She wanted to cry but suppressed the need. She was the strong one. She had to be.

Gently, Miranda eased away from her sister’s clinging hold. “Check the escape route.”

Annabel fumbled over to the window, parted the thick velvet drapes. A thin ray of silvery light spilled into the room. Craning her neck, Annabel studied the sky through the glass. “The clouds are thinning. There’ll be moonlight.”

“Damn,” Miranda muttered. Normally she avoided swearwords, but tonight she’d employ any means to bolster her courage. Anger might hasten her footsteps as she raced down the gravel path and across the lawns into the shelter of the forest.

She wore a black gown and bonnet, a mourning outfit from when their parents died. The dark clothes would blend into the shadows. And if she pretended to be a widow, it might make things easier during the journey. Men might be less likely to bother a woman grieving for a recently departed husband.

For men would bother her, Miranda knew. She had beauty that attracted them. Her sisters had complained about it often enough, saying it was unfair how she had inherited the best features in the family—their father’s fair hair and blue eyes, their mother’s slender height and patrician elegance.

Miranda had never cared about her looks before. But now she did. They would be a nuisance for a lone female traveling out to the lawless West. To rebuff unwanted advances, she would have to rely on the rest of her heritage, for she had also inherited Papa’s fiery temper that flared up like a firecracker and fizzled out again just as quickly, leaving her to regret things said or done in a moment of anger.

“Hold the curtains ajar to let in the moonlight,” Miranda instructed her sister.

“Promise you’ll write the instant you get there,” Annabel pleaded. “And send money.”

“I’ll write.” Miranda sighed in the shadows. “And I’ll try to send money.”

Promises were cheap, and that’s all she could afford right now. To help Charlotte escape, she’d been able to steal a gold coin, but twenty dollars could not have taken Charlotte very far. To have ended up in the Arizona Territory she must have traveled without a ticket on the train.

After discovering the theft, Cousin Gareth had taken care not to leave money lying around in his pockets. Miranda only had two dollars and a quarter, and their mother’s ruby-and-diamond brooch she’d managed to stash away. Like Charlotte, she would have to take her chances, travel on the train without paying her fare.

Annabel claimed to be too timid for such brazen acts and had chosen to stay behind. When Miranda reached Gold Crossing, she’d find Charlotte, and together they would come up with a way to send money for their youngest sister to join them.

One more time, Miranda went over the plan with Annabel. “Keep a lookout as I go downstairs. Remember, if lights come on in the house, you’ll need to create a diversion. Start screaming. Pretend there is an intruder. Get the servants to search the rooms. Keep them indoors, to minimize the chances they might spot me as I make my dash for freedom.”

Annabel nodded, long dark hair gleaming in the moonlight. “I’m not totally useless.” Irritation sharpened her tone. “Screaming is my specialty.”

“That’s the spirit, Scrappy,” Miranda said and took a deep breath. “Here I go.”

She pulled the door open, slipped out without a sound. Like a silent wraith, she moved through the house. She’d been practicing, taking the stairs with her eyes closed while the servants were busy with their chores. Now her diligence paid rewards. One, two, three...

Miranda counted out the twenty-seven steps down to the hall, sliding her hand along the polished mahogany balustrade. She kept her eyes open, letting them become adjusted to the lack of light. It would be impossible to see anything in the house, but it might help her when she stepped out into the moonlight.

In the hall, Miranda dragged her feet, in case there was a boot or an umbrella carelessly flung about. She fumbled at the air until her fingers tangled in the fronds of the big potted palm. Three steps to the right. Her outreached hand met the carved timber panel of the front door, homed in on the iron lock.

Slowly, slowly, she twisted it open. Click.

The sound broke the silence, as loud as a gunshot in her ears. Miranda flinched, waited a few seconds. When the house remained quiet, she eased the door open, stepped across the threshold, pushed the door shut behind her and leaned back against it, applying pressure until the lock clicked again.

Ahead of her, the arrow-straight gravel drive and the lawns flanking it loomed dark in the moonlight, the colors flattened to black and gray. Night air enveloped her, soft and warm. It was a small consolation she was making her escape in July instead of the winter.

Gravel crunched beneath her feet as she set off at a cautious run along the drive. After a dozen paces, she turned left, across the lawn. Scents of lavender and roses drifted over from the flowerbeds. Beyond the gardens, Miranda could hear the dull roar of the ocean. Nothing else disturbed the quiet. No sounds of alarm from the house.

But what was that? Another crunch of gravel? Was someone following her?

Like a hunted animal, Miranda froze on the lawn, halfway between the drive and the shelter of the forest. Listen! Listen! She swallowed, a labored movement of her fear-dry throat. For a few seconds, she waited, poised in utter stillness.

Nothing but the steady crashing of the ocean against the cliffs. She must have been mistaken about the sound of footsteps. Bursting back into motion, Miranda darted into the cover of the trees. She had hidden a bag there, smuggling out the contents bit by bit, pretending to be coming out to admire a goldfinch that nested in the big maple by the edge of the forest.

First step completed. She was clear of the house. Next, she’d have to walk four miles to the railroad station in Boston, where she’d sell her mother’s ruby-and-diamond brooch and use the proceeds to buy a train ticket to New York City. From there on she would have to find her way to Gold Crossing, Arizona Territory. Without money. Without the protection of an escort.

But Charlotte had managed it, and so could she.

Her bag was a soft canvas pouch, sewn in secret from a piece of sailcloth. Miranda hoisted it from its hiding place, dusted off the moss and dried leaves and flung the bag over her shoulder.

The thick forest canopy blocked out the moonlight, and she fumbled her way through the oaks and maples, arms held out, feeling her way forward like a blind man. Branches swiped across her face. Twigs snapped beneath her feet.

Her footsteps seemed to have an echo. Twice, Miranda paused, suspecting she might have heard the stealthy sounds of someone following. Both times, the crashing and thudding and the snapping of twigs ceased as soon as she stopped moving.

It must be her imagination, Miranda decided. She had made her escape. She was on her way to join Charlotte in the rough, uncivilized West.

To her surprise, new sensations stirred inside her. A wildness. A sense of adventure. All her life, she’d felt stifled by the constraints that fell upon a young woman in polite society. Now those constraints were gone. She could be whatever she wanted to be.

* * *

Dawn came. Woken by birdsong, Miranda got up from the grassy knoll where she had settled for a few hours of sleep, so she could walk to Boston in daylight. By now, her escape might have been noticed. The footmen and grooms might be looking for her, and it remained imperative to avoid capture.

She brushed twigs and bits of grass from her hair and clothing, then set off walking along the forest path, her body stiff from the rough night, her stomach growling with hunger, her skin itchy beneath the dew-damp gown of black bombazine. As the sun climbed higher, the air grew cloying with heat.

A loud crash sounded ahead, followed by alarmed voices. A public road skirted the edge of the forest. Miranda crept closer and peered between the trees.

A fine carriage, drawn by a matching team of four, had come to a halt. Silver gleamed on the harnesses. A burly coachman in green livery sat high up on the bench. Miranda craned forward for a better view. The coach was listing to one side, a wheel loose from its bearings.

The coachman climbed down from his perch. “Mrs. Summerton?” he bellowed. “Are ye all right?”

“I am fine, Atkins.” The reply came in a calm, refined voice.

Miranda waited. Atkins went to the coach door, yanked it open. He held out not one hand, but both. Puzzled by the boldness of the gesture, Miranda watched, got an explanation as the coachman lifted out a little girl with blond ringlets and a frilly dress.

He repeated the action. Again. And again. Four little girls, as alike as peas in a pod. Next, a beautiful woman emerged. She was fair-haired, dressed in an elegant blue gown tailored to accommodate her rounded belly. She looked no more than twenty-five.

“Thank you, Atkins.” The woman glanced around. “Where is Jason?”

“The footman ran ahead for help.”

Frowning, the woman surveyed the listing conveyance. “How long before we can get going again?”

“Depends on how long it takes to round up help. Once we have enough men to lift up the carriage, it will only take a moment to secure the wheel.”

One of the little girls tugged at the woman’s skirts. “Can we play, Mama?” The little imp, perhaps seven or eight, gestured at the mud on the roadside.

“But darling, you’ll get dirty, and we are going to a birthday party in Boston.” The woman glanced up at the rising sun and wiped her brow with a lace handkerchief.

The four little girls swarmed around her. “Can we play, Mama? Can we play?”

Atkins lifted a wooden stool out of the carriage and propped it on the ground. Mrs. Summerton sank gratefully onto it and gave her forehead another pat with the cloth. Miranda could feel exhaustion coming off the woman in waves.

The little girls darted around their mother, giggling and shoving, as bouncy as rubber balls. The woman closed her eyes. Her body swooned on the stool. The coachman put out a hand to steady her.

Taking pity on the pregnant mother, Miranda stepped out from the cover of the forest. She picked up a smooth pebble from the ground, wiped it clean against her canvas bag and walked up to the group.

“I’m a magician,” she said. “The fairies in the forest sent me to amuse you.”

Miranda held out both palms, tossed the pebble between them and fluttered her hands about, the way Cousin Gareth had taught her long ago, before he went to seed and became an enemy. She closed both fists and held them out. “Which hand is the stone in?”

“That one! That one!”

Mrs. Summerton opened her eyes and observed the scene in silence. Glancing over to Atkins, she appeared reassured by the man’s presence. Big and burly, he had the means to restrain any threat from a lunatic.

Miranda spoke, allowing her education to show. “My name is...” her eyes strayed toward the trees from which she had emerged “...Mrs. Woods.” She disliked lying, but it made no sense to leave a trail for Cousin Gareth to follow.

“I was taking a stroll in the forest,” she went on. “I needed a moment of privacy after my husband’s funeral. I am on my way to back to New York City, but the train can wait. I thought you might benefit from assistance to entertain your young ones.”

Miranda opened her right fist. Empty. The left fist. Empty. She tugged at the nearest blond pigtail, shook the pebble out of it. The little girls jumped up and down, screaming in delight.

Mrs. Summerton broke into a smile of relief. “Thank you. If there ever was an angel sent from heaven, you must be it.” She pointed at the little girls. “Two sets of twins. Can you believe it?” She rubbed her belly. “This one will be a boy. My husband is convinced.”

While they waited for help to arrive, Miranda kept the four little girls occupied, allowing their mother a moment of peace. Soon a young freckle-faced footman brought a crowd from the public house down the road and they hoisted up the carriage for the coachman to secure the wheel.

“Would you like to ride to Boston with us?” Mrs. Summerton asked.

It would save time and keep her out of sight. And she could hear the plea in the woman’s voice. Miranda accepted the offer. By the time they reached the city, Miranda had adjusted her ideas about the joys of motherhood. She alighted at the railroad station, with another four dollars in her pocket and an offer of a position as a governess if she ever needed one. The mere thought made Miranda shudder. She hurried away, the voices of the four little hoydens ringing in her ears.

Chapter Two

The money Miranda had earned entertaining the boisterous Summerton children allowed her to buy a ticket on the train to New York City, which avoided having to sell Mama’s brooch in Boston where someone might have recognized her.

On the train, she kept her face averted, her bonnet pulled low. An express service covered the journey in six hours, but to save money Miranda took a slow train that made frequent stops. By the time they arrived in New York City, darkness had fallen.

Once the passengers had dispersed in their carriages and hansom cabs, only creatures of the night remained—gaudily dressed women past their prime, accosted by men willing to benefit from their favors. The evening cool did little to clear the sultry air thick with coal smoke.

Appalled at the squalor, Miranda found a hidden corner behind an empty newspaper stand and huddled there for the night. All thoughts of finding a jeweler to sell Mama’s brooch vanished. She hated the city and could not wait to leave. In the morning, as the station grew busy again, she snuck on board the first westbound train.

Traveling without a ticket proved easier than Miranda had expected. Days turned into nights and nights into days. The train made frequent stops, in small towns and at water towers, and she used them to move from car to car, to minimize the chances of getting caught.

Twice, she charmed a conductor into believing she’d misplaced her ticket. Another conductor proved immune to feminine allure, and Miranda burst into tears, pretending to be too distraught by the loss of her husband to produce her documents.

Despite her success in evading exposure, an uneasy feeling prickled at the back of her neck. A sensation of being watched. Miranda told herself it was only natural. She had become a lawbreaker, and the guilty conscience put her nerves on edge.

Through the window, fields and meadows gave way to run-down tenements and warehouses. The glass-paneled door at the end of the car swung open. The conductor—the small, potbellied man who had been immune to her charms—strutted up the aisle.

“Chicago!” he yelled. “Next stop Chicago. Everyone change. Southern Pacific Railroad to St. Louis and all towns south. Union Pacific Railroad to all towns west.”

Miranda gathered up her sailcloth bag. To economize, she’d avoided the dining car, instead taking the opportunity to buy bread and cheese and stuffed pies from platform vendors. Even then, she had less than a dollar left.

She followed the stream of passengers down the metal steps. The platform teemed with life. Between a farmer with a pushcart full of potatoes and a donkey with two heaped panniers, Miranda glimpsed a man—and felt a blow in her gut.

Her frantic eyes took in the fawn trousers, the peacock blue coat. The tall hat, the silver-topped walking stick. Light brown hair and long sideburns. Pale skin and the sullen features of a man who drank too much, gambled too much and seemed to harbor a bitter grudge against life.

It couldn’t be. But it was. Cousin Gareth.

He must be following her. And whatever she did, she must not lead him to Charlotte. Miranda spun around and set off running in the opposite direction. She knocked into the pushcart, sent a flurry of potatoes rolling over the platform. The farmer burst into an angry bellow. Passengers tripped over the spill, crying out complaints. Miranda dipped and darted through the throng, bumping into people as she hurtled along.

A train was pulling away. With an extra spurt of speed, Miranda raced after it, her boot heels clicking a frantic beat against the concrete platform. The whistle blew. A cloud of steam billowed from the engine. The train left the station but Miranda kept up her chase, leaping down to the tracks. Her canvas pouch fell off her shoulder. Not pausing to pick it up, she forced her legs to move faster.

Lungs bursting, arms pumping at her sides, skirts flapping around her feet, she hurtled along. She was gaining on the train, the gap shrinking. Five yards. Four. Three. Another merry whistle, and the train clattered onto another set of rails, slowing down for an instant while the wheels negotiated the junction.

With a desperate burst of effort, Miranda threw herself forward and grabbed the handrail around the small platform at the end of the last car. Her feet lost contact with the ground. Grimly, she hung on, the toes of her button-up boots bouncing against the timber sleepers, her fingers locked in a death grip around the iron handrail.

The train increased its speed. Pain tore at Miranda’s arms. Inch by inch, she dragged herself upward, her body like a coiled spring, her muscles vibrating with the effort. A violent shaking seized her. She almost lost her grip but managed to swing one foot up on the iron steps. Another foot. With a final jerk of her arms and shoulders, Miranda flung herself onto the platform and collapsed there, panting for breath, exhaustion and relief coursing through her.

When finally her senses sprang back to life, Miranda looked up. She could see the Chicago skyline disappearing off into the distance. Beneath her, the train rocked with a steady motion. The sun baked down on her black clothing, adding to the perspiration that coated her skin. She reached up one hand, found her bonnet dangling by its ribbons.

Slowly, she scrambled to her feet, her fingers clutching the handrail. She tried the handle on the door at the end of the car. Unlocked. Miranda went through. It was the mail car, with boxes and parcels stacked on both sides of the narrow passageway. A thin man in a white shirt with sleeve garters was sorting letters into slots on a wooden rack.

He stared at her. “Where did you come from?”

Miranda gave him a shaky smile. “I almost missed the train.”

He puffed out his narrow chest with an air of authority common to petty bureaucrats all over the world. “You can’t stay here,” he said. “This car is for authorized personnel only.”

Miranda sank onto a wooden crate. She could see the man wanted to tell her sitting on mail items was against the rules. She peered up at him from between her lashes. “May I rest here for a moment?” she pleaded. “I promise to move into another car at the first stop.”

The man bristled but appeared mollified. He resumed sorting letters into the wooden pigeonholes mounted on the wall. “How far are you going?” he asked. “Are you going all the way to San Francisco?”

“No. I’m going to the Arizona Territory.”

The man grinned with the smug satisfaction of someone who possesses superior knowledge and intends to gloat with it. “In that case, you’re on the wrong train,” he replied with thinly disguised glee. “This is a Union Pacific Railroad express service to San Francisco and all towns west.”

* * *

Miranda had never known hunger could cause such pain, as if tiny teeth were gnawing at her insides. She had lost the last of her money with her bag, and for three days she had eaten nothing but leftovers from meal trays waiting for collection outside the compartments in the first-class Pullman car.

At least she was safe from Cousin Gareth, for it would be impossible for him to catch up the express service. If she continued to San Francisco, she could take a southbound train to the Arizona Territory. The roundabout journey added to the distance, but she would eventually get to Gold Crossing—if she didn’t die of starvation first.

Already, the train had chugged through Iowa and Nebraska, where the endless prairie landscape could almost make one believe the world might be flat after all. So far, Miranda had been successful in dodging conductors, but the most recent one—a big, rawboned man with a bushy moustache—had his eye on her, she could tell.

At the next stop, Miranda switched to a second-class car and spent a moment inside the convenience, unstitching the ruby-and-diamond brooch sewn into her petticoats. Then she walked up and down the aisle, assessing the female passengers.

She chose a buxom woman who sat by herself, dressed in tight corsets and a gaudy purple gown. No respectable woman would buy anything from a stranger on a train, but this female possessed the right mix of expensive clothing and a common touch.

Miranda slipped into the empty seat on the padded bench beside her quarry. She clamped down on her scruples and opened her fist to display the lure of the jewel. “Excuse me for approaching you so boldly, but I am in urgent need of funds. I have a family heirloom I wish to sell. I thought perhaps you might be interested.” She gestured at the woman’s purple gown. “The rubies would match your dress.”

The woman peered down at the brooch, then returned her attention to Miranda. There was no mistaking the greed that flashed in her eyes. “What’s your name, darling?” The words came in a coarse accent, the voice raspy with whiskey and tobacco. The heavy scent of perfume failed to mask the stale, unwashed smell.

“I am Miss Fai—Mrs. Woods.”

Plump fingers fumbled at Miranda’s palm as the woman picked up the brooch. She inspected the jewel carefully. “It is real gold,” Miranda hurried to reassure her. “And the stones are genuine diamonds and rubies.”

“It says Fairfax here. I thought you said your name’s Woods.” The woman pointed at the engraving. To my darling wife. H. Fairfax.

Miranda swallowed. She was leaving a trail, but it could not be helped. “The brooch belonged to my mother,” she explained. “Woods is my married name.”

“I see.” The woman spent another moment examining the brooch. Then, as if losing interest, she dropped the jewel back in Miranda’s palm. “No, thank you.” She made a flapping motion with her hand, ushering the intrusion away.

Baffled, Miranda rose to her feet. She could see the shine of covetousness in the woman’s eyes, could see all her chins wobble with the eagerness to possess, and yet the matron had not even asked for the price.

“Thirty dollars,” Miranda said. “It’s worth three times as much.”

Ignoring her, the woman turned to look out the window. Miranda walked away, blinking back tears of defeat. She settled on an empty bench and rested her head against the wall, in the hope that sleep might offer a moment of respite from the gnawing hunger.

It seemed only seconds later the conductor was shaking her awake. It was the big, rawboned man with a bushy moustache, and he was scowling down at her. Behind him, the woman in a purple gown was standing in the aisle, gripping the seatbacks for support, her ample frame wobbling with the motion of the train.

“Search her,” the matron demanded. “She stole my brooch.”

The conductor’s large hand clamped around Miranda’s arm. “Stand up.”

“She came and sat beside me,” the woman went on. “All friendly like. Just plopped down next to me and started talking. I knew something was wrong right away. A respectable person does not approach strangers like that. It took me no time to realize she’d walked off with my ruby-and-diamond brooch.”

“Empty your pockets,” the conductor told her.

Not a request, with a polite miss or ma’am at the end of it. An order, harshly spoken, the sharp tone already classifying her as a criminal.

Anger flared in Miranda, fizzled out again. Hunger, fatigue, the hopelessness of her situation, all succeeded in curbing an outburst of temper where common sense might have failed in the past. She could see the lecherous glint in the man’s eyes. With a shudder Miranda realized that if she resisted the order, he might use her refusal as an opportunity to insist on a bodily search.

Not voicing a single word of protest, Miranda reached into the pocket on her gown, pulled out her mother’s brooch and displayed it in her palm.

“It has an engraving,” the matron said. “‘To my darling wife. H. Fairfax.’ Fairfax was my mother’s name. Nearly a hundred dollars it is worth. Real diamonds and rubies.”

The conductor put his hand out. “Let’s see your ticket.”

Miranda could hear the note of triumph in his voice. The man knew she didn’t have a ticket. Instinct told her he’d been harboring his own plans to benefit from her plight. If the woman hadn’t come up with her brazen scheme to acquire the brooch without paying for it, the conductor would have cornered her into an empty compartment, demanding intimate favors in exchange for a free passage.

The flare of anger finally won. “Here,” Miranda said. “Take it.”

She flung the brooch at the matron, hitting her squarely on the nose. The woman screamed, pretended to collapse into a swoon, but the real purpose of her fainting fit was to duck down and snatch up the brooch. She managed the motion with surprising agility for someone so amply built. The jewel safely clasped in her fist, she scurried back down the aisle to her own seat.

The conductor pulled out a pair of handcuffs from a pocket on his uniform. Forcing Miranda’s wrists together, he slapped the irons on her. “Next stop is Fort Rock, Wyoming. I’ll hand you over to the town marshal. He’ll hold you until you’ve paid the fine. One hundred dollars.”

One hundred dollars. Miranda closed her eyes as she felt the cold steel bite into her skin. There was no way she could raise such a sum. The man might as well be asking her for the Crown Jewels of the British monarchy, and the treasure of the Spanish Crown on top of it.

Chapter Three

The marshal’s office was in the small concrete jailhouse next to the station. Miranda didn’t resist when the conductor escorted her over during the fifteen-minute stop. She could feel people staring at her, on the platform, from the train windows. She didn’t care. She was too hungry. Too tired. Too defeated. Let them lock her up. At least they’d have to feed her, unless they wanted a dead woman in their jail.

“Marshal! Bringing in a prisoner!” the conductor bellowed, relishing his role as a lawman. He was holding on to the chain that linked the cuffs, leading her behind him like a dog.

Her temper rising once more, Miranda jerked free from his grasp. The conductor grinned. He fell back a step and gave her a shove on the buttocks, nothing but a poorly disguised grope. Miranda tried to kick him on the shins but almost stumbled and ended up lurching headlong across the jailhouse threshold.

Cool air greeted her. Built like a square block with thick concrete walls, the jail only had one tiny window high up in the rear of the single cell. The front office contained a desk and two chairs, both of them occupied. The cell behind the iron bars was twice as big and empty. Miranda eyed the narrow cot with longing.

“What is this?” The marshal straightened in the wooden chair behind the desk. He was young, barely in his thirties. Dressed in a dark suit, with neatly cut sandy hair and even features, he looked more like a merchant than a man who spent his life fighting crime. If it hadn’t been for the tin star on his chest and a gun in a holster at his hip, Miranda would never have guessed his profession.

“Caught her stealing on the train and traveling without a ticket.”

Miranda listened in silence as the conductor enumerated her transgressions. She didn’t even try to argue her case. She was guilty of traveling without a ticket, and no one would believe her if she protested her innocence to the theft of the brooch.

The marshal pulled open a desk drawer, counted out a hundred dollars and demanded a receipt. The conductor pocketed the money and removed the handcuffs. He raked one more lascivious look over Miranda before hurrying back to the train.

Miranda rubbed her wrists. Her ears perked up when the marshal turned to his teenage deputy, who was loitering in the second chair, balancing on two legs against the unpainted cement wall.

“Fetch Lucille,” the marshal said. “Tell her I have one for her.”

The chair crashed down to four legs. The innocent blue eyes of the fresh-faced deputy snapped wide. “Lucille?” His gaze shuttled to Miranda. “But this one looks like a lady...”

“She’s a lawbreaker who owes the town a hundred dollars.” The marshal made a shooing motion with one hand while using his other hand to lock the receipt in the desk drawer.

The young deputy—in Miranda’s opinion his posterior should still be wearing out a school desk—loped off. The marshal turned to face her. He eyed her up and down. Now that she thought of it, his short, straight nose and wide mouth resembled those of his teenage deputy. Father and son, Miranda guessed, which made the lawman older than she’d assumed at first glance.

The marshal lifted his brows at her. “Hungry?”

Miranda nodded. He gestured for her to sit down in the chair his son had vacated and reached for a parcel in a linen napkin on the desk. Unwrapping a slice of crusty pie, he dumped it on a tin plate and carried the plate over to her. Perched on the edge of the chair, Miranda closed her eyes and took a deep inhale. Oh, the heavenly smell of it!

“My wife bakes the best pies in town,” the marshal said.

Miranda blinked her eyes open and gave the food one more appraising glance before she took a big bite. Remembering her manners, she muttered a thank-you through the mouthful. She crammed in another bite. The marshal reached over and tried to take the plate away from her. Miranda craned forward in the seat and nearly toppled over, her fingers clinging to the plate, as if glued to it. The marshal tore the plate free from her grasp.

“If you’ve been starving, you got to eat slowly.”

He stood in front of her and waited for her to chew and swallow before he allowed her another bite. Miranda had barely finished devouring every morsel when two sets of footsteps rang outside. A shadow blocked the sunlight through the open doorway.

Miranda squinted. Lucille—for it could be none other—evidently shared the fashion sense of the lady who had stolen her brooch. Scarlet gown, tight corset, rouged cheeks, red hair in an elaborate twist, all topped with a frilly pink parasol.

Lucille moved inside, taking up most of the space. She snapped her parasol shut, ran an assessing gaze over Miranda, then glanced over her shoulder at the marshal.

“How much?”

“A hundred.”

“I can do that.” Lucille pointed with her parasol, almost poking Miranda in the gut. “Let’s go, sweetheart.”

Miranda shrank back in the hard wooden seat. “I can’t—”

The marshal cut her short with an ushering motion. “Go,” he told her. “I have a bounty hunter with four bank robbers arriving before nightfall. If you stay, you’ll have to share the cell with them. Wouldn’t wager much for your chances.”

Lucille smiled and pointed to the open doorway with her parasol.

“I’m not a prostitute,” Miranda said through gritted teeth, but she followed the woman, blinking when they emerged into the bright sunlight.

The train was just leaving, the whistle blowing, steam rising in the air. In the window, the matron in purple was watching. Miranda’s hands fisted. The cow! She was wearing Mama’s brooch on her bulky chest! Miranda looked about for something to throw, but there was nothing suitable in sight. A cart full of potatoes would have served her well now.

The tip of the parasol poked into her ribs. “Come along, darling.”

Miranda turned back to Lucille. “I am not going to work for you.”

Lucille’s eyes narrowed. “Until I’ve made a hundred dollars from you, you’ll do exactly what I tell you. If I tell you to jump, you ask how high. If I tell you to run, you ask how fast. If I tell you to take your clothes off, you ask if I want it quick or slow. Do you understand?”

The parasol plunged into Miranda’s ribs, hard enough to bruise. Miranda nodded. She was getting the impression that Lucille’s parasol had no more to do with blocking out the sun than Cousin Gareth’s silver-topped cane had to do with assisting walking. They were weapons, pure and simple.

She followed Lucille down the street. Fort Rock was a decent-size town, with a central row of timber buildings with false fronts that made them look taller. There were two side streets, both flanked with unpainted log cabins. They were in Wyoming now, Miranda recalled. A cool breeze stirred the air and a line of snowcapped mountains rose on the horizon.

They entered a saloon through the swinging doors. Four young women in various stages of undress lolled about on padded chairs. Two were smoking and playing cards. A petite blonde was knitting what appeared to be an endless scarf, and a dark-skinned girl was reading aloud from a book that sounded like a penny dreadful.

The sting of smoke sent Miranda into a coughing fit. She flapped a hand in front of her face to disperse the thick cloud that saturated the air.

“Oh, we have a delicate one here,” one of the smoking girls said. Tall and thin, with dark hair and a sullen expression, she blew out another plume of smoke.

“Not fresh meat again,” another one drawled. “Business is slow as it is.”

“She’s not competition.” Lucille used her parasol to prod Miranda into the center of the room. “Girls, what do we do when business is slack?”

The black girl who’d been reading grinned. “We run a promotion.”

Lucille nodded, pointed at Miranda with her parasol. “This one owes me a hundred dollars. But with business so slow, it’s not worth the effort to break in a new girl. We’ll do something to bring in the decent men. The ones who might drink and gamble but won’t pay for a woman unless they get to keep her.”

Two of the girls burst into a loud cheer. A shiver ran over Miranda. It sounded like they were talking about selling her into slavery. She gathered her courage. Papa had defeated a mutiny on one of his ships and he’d drilled it into his daughters never to show fear.

She feigned a bored tone. “May I ask, what is this promotion you’re planning?”

“Well, a bride lottery, of course,” Lucille replied.

“And you’ll be the prize,” added the knitting blonde.

* * *

Miranda had to admit Lucille was an astute businesswoman. The madam instructed the girls to set up a low platform by the window near the entrance. A hooked rug and a rocking chair went on the platform, and Miranda’s task was to sit in the rocking chair.

All day. All evening.

Instead of her black mourning gown, she wore a soft wool dress in pale blue, modest in cut, with lace ruffles at the collar and cuffs. Her hair was twisted into an elegant upsweep, the formal look softened by a few strands left loose to flutter around her face.

During the day, sunshine through the window gilded her, like an impressionist painting. In the evenings, an oil lamp burned on the small table beside her. She was allowed to pass the time sewing or reading. Sometimes, the tabby cat that lived on kitchen scraps would come in and sit on her lap, and she’d stroke the animal, drawing comfort from the gentle vibration of its contented purring.

Next to this scene of domestic harmony, separated with a hemp rope from the saloon floor, the way a valuable exhibit might be guarded in a museum, stood a sign.

Bride Lottery

Tickets $10

One ticket per person only

The rule to limit the number of entries had been subject to much debate among Lucille’s girls. In the end they had agreed that the banker, Stuart Hooperman, was known to be eager to acquire a wife. If he bought a dozen tickets, it would reduce the odds for anyone else, which might dampen wider interest.

During the day, most of the men who came into the saloon were polite enough not to stare. Instead, they stole covert glances at her while they sipped their drinks or ate their meals. At night, when the whiskey flowed, some grew bolder and crowded by the rope, ogling at her, whispering comments to each other.

Miranda blocked them all out of her mind. Growing up with servants, she had developed the skill of ignoring their obtrusive presence, and now she put that skill to use. Mostly, her thoughts dwelled on her sisters, and on Cousin Gareth.

Was he still pursuing her, or had he given up and returned to Merlin’s Leap? Or had he figured out the message in Charlotte’s letter and was on his way to Gold Crossing? How was Annabel faring alone at Merlin’s Leap? Had she managed to write to Charlotte, alerting their eldest sister that she was presumed dead?

“Who do you want to win?” asked Shanna, the black girl, as she drained whiskey from the barrels behind the counter, getting ready for the evening. She was the most talkative of the girls, the most eager to find out about Miranda’s past.

Miranda lowered the canvas fabric she was sewing. In truth, she had not allowed her thoughts to dwell on the prospect of marriage. When she was not thinking of her sisters, her mind was occupied with escape plans. Lucille, of course, had seen right through her, had pointed out the marshal kept an eye on the trains, Miranda would die in the wilderness if she tried to flee on foot, and anyone who stole a horse was hanged, female or not.

“Makes no difference to me who wins,” Miranda replied.

Shanna straightened behind the counter. She was solidly built, with big breasts and wide hips, yet she moved with grace. Her face was a perfect oval, her eyes large and almond shaped. She would have been a beauty, had it not been for the jagged scar at the corner of her mouth and two missing front teeth.

“Trust me, it makes a difference.” Shanna touched her scar. “Some husbands are worse than others.” For a second, she stilled, in the grip of some unpleasant memories. Then, with a brusque, efficient gesture, she slammed the bottles of watered-down whiskey on the counter and hurried off into the kitchen.

Miranda stared after her. For a moment, the cloak of numbness she’d wrapped around herself flared open, allowing fear to flood in. Quickly, Miranda emptied her mind and filled it with thoughts of her sisters. If Charlotte was managing to survive pretending to be some man’s wife, so would she.

Chapter Four

Today she’d know her fate. Miranda sat in the rocking chair, reading the Psalms. Her choice of reading matter was limited to the Bible and a stack of penny dreadfuls. Her feet pushed in a frantic rhythm against the platform beneath her, sending the rocker into a wild swing. She kept reading the same lines over and over again, not taking in the words.

“Watch out,” Nellie cried. “You’ll do a cartwheel in that chair.”

Nellie was the petite blonde with a passion for knitting. She didn’t know how to make shapes, only straight to and fro, so she knitted long woolen scarves with brightly colored stripes. The girls already had at least two each. Nellie tried to give them away to her customers, but some had a wife at home which created a problem.

There were four girls in the saloon. Nellie and Shanna, and two brunettes—the quiet, brooding Trixie and the plump, good-humored Desiree. To Miranda, the girls did not seem unhappy, except perhaps Trixie, who was the plainest and the least popular with customers.

Many of the men who paid for their services were regulars, and the girls saw them as friends. Fort Rock was a mining town, and sometimes, when a prospector had a lucky strike, he would take on a girl as his exclusive sweetheart.

And all the girls dreamed.

They dreamed that one day some man would love them enough to give them the shiny badge of respectability. Take them away from the saloon life, to someplace where no one knew of their past and they could become one of the women who greeted each other on the boardwalk outside the mercantile and went to church on Sundays.

“Showtime, girls!” Lucille called from the top of the stairs.

She announced her entrance with the same words every night and she always wore shades of red. Scarlet, purple, magenta, pink—gowns decorated with ruffles and bows and teamed up with elaborate headdresses. Tonight, ostrich feathers bobbed over her auburn upsweep as she made her regal descent.

Downstairs, Lucille picked up a big glass jar from the end of the bar counter and walked over to the rocking chair where Miranda was seated. She banged the jar down on the small table beside Miranda. “You can do the honors tonight.”

Inside the jar were folded tickets. The men who wanted to participate in the lottery handed over their money and Lucille wrote down their names on bits of paper torn from a receipt pad. Each ticket was folded into a square and dropped into the jar.

Nellie shook her head in dismay. “Only ten suitors.”

“It’s enough,” Lucille replied. “I’m breaking even on the bride. And I’ve sold an extra fifty dollars’ worth of whiskey to the men who came in to inspect her.” She made an airy gesture toward the working girls. “And have you not been twice as busy as usual?”

Desiree tittered. “Staring at the bride put the men in the mood.”

The batwing doors clattered. Miranda glanced over. Oh, no. Not him.

Slater, a huge, swarthy man with a drooping moustache, had been the first to lay his money down for the lottery. Miranda had been on display for six days, but only in the last two days, after Shanna’s grim warning that not all husbands would be the same, had the carefully built barrier around her emotions cracked. From that moment on, she had felt the men’s eyes on her, like insects crawling on her skin.

Some were reverent and worshipful, some greedy and lecherous, and after tonight she would become the property of one of them. He might be gentle, he might be rough, he might be cruel, and there was nothing she could do about it.

The terror Miranda had kept at bay broke free, making her hands damp and her heartbeat swift. She kept her eyes on the Bible that lay open in her lap and pretended to read. She was the brave one. She refused to let anyone see her fear.

Slater sat down, big and bony, the long duster like a tent around him, spurs jangling on his boots. He ordered a steak, as he did every night. He had a narrow, hollow-cheeked face and long yellowing teeth, which he liked to pick clean with the tip of his knife after he finished eating.

Little by little, customers drifted into the saloon. It was Saturday night, the busiest in the week. Lucille would have liked to keep the lottery going for a month, but she knew the men lacked patience and would start wrecking the place if they had to wait any longer.

Saturday had been chosen, partly because it was the payday at the mine, and partly because the preacher came over on Sundays and could conduct the wedding.

By eight o’clock, a sweaty, unkempt crowd filled the saloon. The piano plinked, the whiskey flowed and the greasy smells of frying onions and meat floated in the air. Thick clouds of cigar smoke hung over the tables where men gambled away their weekly pay. Shrieks of feminine laughter mingled with rowdy, masculine voices.

Two more miners bought a ticket and stood transfixed by the rope barrier, staring at Miranda as if she were about to sprout wings and fly. And yet she understood their reverence would do her no good at all. They lived in a tent, survived hand to mouth, and the way they pushed and shoved at each other hinted at a violent nature. She’d starve, she’d freeze, and she’d very likely be beaten once the novelty of a having an educated wife wore off.

The marshal walked in accompanied by a man Miranda had not seen before. Lean, medium height, in his late twenties, he had straight black hair that fell to his shoulders, and sharply angled cheekbones. His skin was smooth and bronzed. From the dark coloring and the long hair, Miranda assumed he might have some native heritage, but when he got closer, she could see that his eyes were pale gray, almost like chips of ice, and just as cold.

The two newcomers settled side by side at the bar, both with one boot propped on the brass rail. The stranger jerked his chin in her direction and said something to the marshal. The marshal replied, grinning. Lucille ducked beneath the counter, poured whiskey into two glasses—the good stuff, not the watered-down swill—and smiled at the men.

The stranger listened to the marshal, knocked back his drink, slammed down the empty glass and ambled over to Miranda. He stepped over the rope and came to a halt in front of her. Miranda’s kid slippers hit the floor. The chair stilled its rocking. The man might only be medium height, but it made his presence no less threatening.

“Read,” he ordered.

“Wh-what?” she stammered.

He leaned forward. With him came the scent of soap and leather and the aroma of good coffee and expensive whiskey. His eyebrows were straight, his pale eyes deep set, and they seemed to glitter, as if a flame flickered somewhere deep within. He tapped one lean finger on the book she was clutching in her trembling hands.

“Read,” he said. “Aloud.”

She opened a page at random. Psalms. Number eighty-eight.

Her eyes strayed to a verse in the middle, and she read: “‘I am confined and cannot escape; my eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, Lord, every day...’”

The man held up one hand. “Enough.”

Miranda fell silent. She noticed a scar on his palm, a star-shaped, puckered mark. Without another word, the man turned away and walked back to the bar. Miranda watched as he reached into his pocket and tossed a gold coin on the counter.

Lucille tore a page from the receipt pad, printed down a name, folded the ticket and came to drop it into the glass jar on the small table beside Miranda. The dark man with the icy eyes picked up his refilled whiskey glass and resumed his conversation with the marshal. He never once glanced in Miranda’s direction again, unlike the other ticket holders, who were jostling by the rope, craning forward and staring at her with the eagerness of thirsty men denied access to a spring.

Lucille banged a pewter mug against the counter. “Silence,” she yelled. “Bride lottery will begin. Marshal Holm will officiate. His decision will be final. Anyone who complains will spend the night in jail with the four bank robbers brought in today.”

Four bank robbers. Miranda recalled the marshal saying something about them a week ago. A bounty hunter was supposed to bring them in. They must have been delayed, and the dark man with the marshal must be the bounty hunter. Why on earth would a man like that, a transient without a permanent home, be interested in a wife?

Marshal Holm walked up to the rope and smiled. Miranda’s temper flared. She was being offered up like a sacrificial lamb and he behaved as if a smile would smooth things over. She cleared her throat and put her plan in motion—not as good as escaping but better than accepting the vagaries of luck.

“A dying man is usually granted a final request,” she announced tartly. “May I have one?”

“You ain’t dying if I win you, sweetheart,” one of the drunken miners yelled. “You’ll learn your life has only just begun.” Swaying on his feet, he waved at the prostitutes. “These ladies can vouch for me.”

Nellie and Desiree shouted back obscenities that made Miranda’s ears burn.

“Your last wish as a single woman?” the marshal prompted.

Miranda picked up the glass jar and shook it, making the tickets rustle inside. “Not a random draw,” she explained. “I’d like a chance to ensure that I end up with a man who possesses the qualities required for a successful marriage. I want to ask these men questions. Set conditions. Those who fail to give satisfactory replies to my questions or refuse to meet my conditions will be eliminated, until we have a winner. Does that suit you?”

“That’s a splendid idea,” Lucille called out.

Of course Lucille would think it a splendid idea, Miranda thought with a trace of bitterness. It would stretch out the suspense, keep the whiskey flowing and the cash register ringing.

Marshal Holm nodded. “I guess I can go along with that.”

Miranda closed her eyes and fought the wave of gratitude. She didn’t really care, had formed scant impression of the men who had entered the draw, but she was desperate to avoid Slater, the big hulk who picked his teeth clean with the tip of his knife.

She rose from the rocking chair and turned toward the room, like an actress on the stage. “Only clean shaven men. No beards, no moustaches. Day-old stubble is acceptable.”

Right there, in front of her horrified eyes, Slater took out his knife. He held it in his right hand and picked up the whiskey bottle from the table with his left hand and poured a stream of whiskey over the blade to clean it.

He set the bottle down again, raised the knife, pinched his nose with his thumb and forefinger and sliced off one side of his moustache. Then the other side. The sandy wedges fell on the tabletop and lay there like a pair of dead baby squirrels.

Nausea churned in Miranda’s belly. Slater was determined, she granted him that. She suspected that if he won her, he’d be just as determined to make the most of having a wife. He’d have no mercy. She’d cook and clean and carry and fetch all day, and continue her toil in bed at night. Even though Miranda’s isolated spot in the bridal display had prevented her from engaging in many conversations with Lucille’s girls, she had been able to listen and observe. Any romantic notions about a wedding night had vanished.

“Only men who can read and write,” she called out.

“How will you verify the skill?” asked Hooperman, the trim, neat banker in his early forties. He was a widower, with two children. He would have been the obvious choice, if it hadn’t been for Miranda’s experience with the boisterous Summerton girls in Boston. In two hours, the little monsters had driven her to the brink of insanity.

“Easy to check,” Lucille declared. She tore off pages from the receipt pad and handed them out to the lottery participants. “Read something aloud,” she told Miranda. “These gentlemen will write it down.”

Miranda leafed through her Bible, picked the trickiest passage she could find. After the men had found pencils, she dictated a sentence and the candidates scratched down the words. Lucille collected the pages and inspected them. Once those with too many spelling mistakes had been disqualified, only three candidates remained.

Hooperman the banker.

The dark bounty hunter.

And, horror of horrors, Slater, who was grinning with victory. Blood beaded on his upper lip where he’d sliced too deep while shaving off his moustache. His tongue kept poking out to lick away the droplets.

Miranda could feel her legs shaking. A knot tightened in her belly. She sank on the rocking chair. It would have to be the banker. An educated, well-bred man. Maybe his children would be nice, and there were only two of them.

“The next question is to test a man’s education,” she announced. Her brain went blank as she tried to come up with the right task to eliminate Slater. She could remember the Lord’s Prayer, but Slater might have been brought up in a devout home, or in a church orphanage, and there was a possibility he might know the words.

In a flash of inspiration, Miranda recalled her father’s favorite poem. She took a deep breath and called out, “‘Yet all things must die.’” Blank stares met her. Good. That’s exactly what she wanted. “It’s from a poem, by Alfred Tennyson,” she added. “What is the next verse?”

The banker put up his hand. “What happens if no one knows?”

The marshal considered. “The lady can make her choice.”

The banker broke into a smile of triumph. “I have to confess I don’t recall the words, even though I greatly admire the romantic poets. Tennyson. Keats. Shelley.”

Slater did not give up so easily. His narrow features puckered into a frown. “‘Because we were all born to die?’” he ventured.

Miranda exhaled a sigh of relief. “No.”

Slater got to his feet, as big as a mountain in his grimy duster. He scowled at her. “How do I know it’s not right? You could say that about anything.”

“Because it goes, ‘The stream will cease to flow, the wind will cease to blow, the clouds will cease to fleet.’”

The verses came in a deep, husky voice. It was the first time Miranda had heard the bounty hunter speak more than one word at a time. A shiver rippled along her skin as his eyes swept over her, cool and indifferent, unlike the hot, hungry glare of Slater, or the admiring glances of Hooperman.

Miranda swallowed. Honesty remained her only choice. “Yes,” she said. “That’s how it goes.”

The bounty hunter got to his feet. He raked a glance over the girls, nodded at Nellie and headed toward the staircase. Appearing confused, Nellie hovered on her toes, then trotted after the man. A paying customer was a paying customer.

At the top of the stairs, the bounty hunter paused to let Nellie pass. He turned back to survey the crowded room below. His eyes settled on Miranda. “Be ready to ride out in the morning.” He spoke in a deep, emotionless tone that made even everyday words sound threatening. “We’ll leave right after breakfast.”

Chapter Five

Miranda tossed and turned on the narrow cot in the storeroom where she slept at night. She could hear the music booming downstairs, could feel the walls vibrating with the merriment. The stairs creaked with footsteps as the girls brought their clients upstairs. A few doors down the hall, her bridegroom was busy enjoying the favors of Nellie.

Did the man have no shame? It was the eve of their wedding. Miranda groaned into the darkness at her misplaced indignation. Surely, for all she cared, the bounty hunter could line up every one of Lucille’s girls and take his turn with each of them.

How had she let it happen?

How had she ended up as a lottery prize?

For a week, she had sat on display, spinning her empty dreams of an escape. She had done nothing to help her situation. She could have tried to send a telegram to Charlotte in Gold Crossing. She could have asked the marshal to track down Cousin Gareth. Anything would be better than an unknown future with an icy-eyed bounty hunter.

But no, she’d been like one of those big birds Papa had seen on his travels. Ostriches, he’d called them. When some danger threatened, they dipped down their long necks and dug their heads into the sand, pretending the enemy didn’t exist. That’s what she had done.

Pretended her problem didn’t exist.

Hoping it would go away.

But it had not.

It was down the hall with Nellie.

* * *

When morning came, Miranda awoke bleary-eyed. The storeroom had no windows, but she could hear the wind howling outside, could feel the gusts that buffeted the timber building. Summer weather in Wyoming seemed as unpredictable as the ocean storms that crashed and roared at Merlin’s Leap.

She got up and considered her dress choices. Surely, the bounty hunter would respect a widow’s grief? No, Miranda decided. The black mourning gown would remind him she was supposed to be experienced with men. She’d wear the pale blue.

Hastily, Miranda washed, dressed and packed her things into a canvas pouch she’d sewn while sitting on display. She surveyed the shelves of the storeroom, added candles, matches, canned meats, dried vegetables to her bag. After starving on the train, she wouldn’t risk having to flee without supplies again.

Even as her mind dwelled on an escape, Miranda knew it would be the last resort. She had no money, no means of transport. The frontier region offered few opportunities for a woman to earn her living. Unless the bounty hunter turned out cruel, a position as his wife had to be better than entertaining an endless stream of strangers in a saloon.

On the landing, Miranda peeked down over the balustrade. Lucille and the girls sat around one of the gambling tables, dressed in their most conservative gowns. It surprised Miranda to see them up so early, for they rarely rose before midday.

When they spotted her, Shanna started belting out the notes of Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March.” Miranda walked down the stairs. The bounty hunter pushed away from the counter where he’d been hunched over a cup of coffee. He was wearing his tall boots and a long duster. His hat lay by his elbow and his saddlebags by his feet, ready for riding.

“Stop that noise,” he ordered.

Shanna ceased her singing. Silence settled over the room, as heavy and sudden as the fall of an ax. The bounty hunter strode up to meet Miranda at the bottom of the stairs. He curled one hand around her elbow and ushered her across the floor to a compact, brown-haired man who sat at a table, eating porridge from a china bowl.

By the look of him, he was the circuit preacher—black suit, pious expression and a prayer book open on the table in front of him.

“I want no ceremony,” the bounty hunter said. “Just a piece of paper to sign.”

The preacher lifted the napkin tucked into his collar and touched a corner to his lips. “Before I am able to issue a marriage certificate, you have to express your consent to the union.”

“I do.” The bounty hunter tightened his grip on Miranda’s arm and turned to glare at her. His head dipped in a single, sharp nod. When Miranda didn’t respond, he gave her a light rattle, as if to shake the words out of her, the way one might shake apples from a tree. “Let’s hear it,” he said.

“I do not,” she muttered.

His chin jerked. The twin slashes of his black eyebrows edged upward. His inscrutable expression cracked a little. It appeared to Miranda that the corners of his mouth were fighting not to curl up in a smile.

“Yes, you do,” he told her. Turning to the preacher, he said, “She does. Where do we sign?”

“I need to hear the lady give her consent.”

“And hear it you shall,” the bounty hunter replied. He bent closer to Miranda and whispered into her ear. “It’s me, or a jail cell with four bank robbers who don’t care about adding rape to their sins. Which do you prefer?”

Miranda pursed her lips. Always stubborn, she hated to give in to blackmail. But on this occasion resistance might be ill-advised.

“I do.” She spoke through gritted teeth.

“Good,” the bounty hunter said. “She does. Where do we sign?”

The preacher looked pained. Behind Miranda, Lucille and her girls were muttering complaints about the lack of romance. The bounty hunter turned his head and scowled at them over Miranda’s shoulder. “You worry about your own weddings and leave this one alone.”

Before Miranda could think, one of her booted feet rose and slammed down on the man’s instep. He flinched. Although no sound passed his lips, Miranda knew she’d caused him pain. Good. He deserved it. It had been a cruel comment. He must be aware of how little chance the saloon girls had of ever getting a wedding of their own.

“That was nasty and uncalled for and lacking in chivalry,” she lectured.

The bounty hunter’s mouth fell open. For a second, he stared at her, speechless. Miranda could see something flicker in his eyes. Anger. Perhaps even respect. Then it changed to a flash of amusement, and his mouth curved into a rueful smile.

“If you expect chivalry from me, you’re sorely mistaken.” He turned back to the preacher, one hand still clutching her arm. His other hand settled over one of the big revolvers in the twin holsters at his hips.

“Now, where do we sign?”

“Name?” the preacher asked, looking at her.

“Miranda Fairfax.” She had thought about it carefully. Cousin Gareth was less dangerous than the bounty hunter. She was not afraid of leaving a trail. She wanted to leave a trail.

The bounty hunter’s eyes narrowed. “I heard your name is Woods.”

She gave him a strained smile, cherishing the tiny triumph of telling him a lie, one he might suspect but had no way of proving. “That was my married name.”

“Name?” the preacher said, addressing the question to the bounty hunter. It was clear to Miranda the brown-haired pastor had chosen to cut his losses over the ceremony and wanted to get back to his cooling porridge.

“James Fast Elk Blackburn,” the bounty hunter replied.

The preacher frowned. “You sure you want the Fast Elk in there?”

The bounty hunter hesitated a moment. “You can leave it out.”

They took turns signing the marriage certificate. The preacher copied the details into his record book and handed the certificate to Miranda. The bounty hunter leaned over her, snatched the document from her fingers and slipped it into a pocket on the buckskin coat he wore beneath his long duster. “I paid good money for you and I’ll keep this for now.”

“Ten dollars,” Miranda muttered tartly. “A fortune indeed.”

“Maybe that’s all you’re worth.”

Miranda bit her lip to stop an angry retort. You walked right into that one, she told herself. And now, shut up, before you’ll make it even worse. She had her provisions. Now was the time to gather her wits and start making plans for an escape.

* * *

This is a mistake, Jamie thought as he ushered the blonde beauty out of the saloon. He’d acted on impulse. He should have known better. In his profession a man needed cool judgment to stay alive. He had a premonition that hauling the little Eastern princess along with him for four days, until he could get rid of her, would not inspire cool judgment.

He’d have to get her a horse of her own. Last night, he had tried to bury his lust in the saloon tart, but his mind had given the girl beneath him the flawless features and the proud carriage of the woman he was now towing in his wake.

If he rode four days with her arms around his waist, her breasts pressing to his back, he might start thinking with the wrong parts of his anatomy and end up hitched to her for good—an idea that did not suit his plans.

“Can you ride?” he asked.

“Yes. Faster than you, I’ll bet.”

Jamie smirked. “That depends on the horse, not you.”

Although she was tall, the girl had to break into a run to keep up with him as he strode down the street. Clouds whipped about in the sky overhead, but it wouldn’t rain today. The weather was clearing, and tomorrow it would be sunny. He could tell.

He could always tell. Sensing the weather and reading signs were what he got from the quarter of his blood that was Cheyenne. The rest of the Indian mumbo jumbo he could do without. All of that mysticism junk his sister, Louise, had embraced with such fervor before her untimely death.

Jamie paused to let his wife catch up. “I thought you said you’re faster than me.”

“On four legs. Not on two.”

Smart mouth she had, his little Eastern princess. Four days in her company would be filled with temptation. Jamie led her past the storefronts, mostly closed for Sunday. A few men loitered on the boardwalk, smoking, talking, watching them with envy in their eyes.

Maybe he could auction the little princess when he was done with her, Jamie thought. He suppressed a smile. No, he’d be a good boy, cut her loose and give her enough money for the train fare to wherever she’d been trying to get, with no ticket and no money to buy food.

Before parting with his ten dollars, Jamie had got the facts from Marshal Holm. According to the railroad conductor who’d arrested the girl, she’d been caught stealing. Jamie suspected the accusation might be false. She seemed too proud to steal, but Jamie knew from personal experience that sometimes an empty belly ruled stronger than pride.

They came to a halt by the pole corral where the four horses of the bank robbers stood idle, tails flicking at flies. “Take your pick,” Jamie said and gestured at the horses. “Don’t go for the paint. He’s going lame.”

She spent a moment studying the animals and spoke with her gaze intent on them. “The buckskin has sores on his flanks from the cruel use of spurs. The bay has mean, shifty eyes. The black is a stallion. I don’t like to ride stallions. They start to misbehave the minute there’s a mare within a mile.”

“Aren’t you a picky one?” Jamie grumbled. “Good thing you had to take a husband in a draw. If you were left to choose, no one would have been good enough for you.”

“How astute,” she replied, and pursed her mouth into a prim circle of disdain. Her eyes raked him up and down in a look that plainly dismissed his worth. Then she turned back to the four horses in the corral and said, “Can you take the bank robbers’ horses before they’ve even been convicted? Is it part of the bounty?”

“It is, if you bring them in dead.”

“Dead?” Her pretty blue eyes snapped wide, then narrowed into angry slits. “You said... You threatened me with them...”

“I never said they weren’t dead. I merely said they didn’t care about adding rape to their sins. Considering they are dead, I’m sure that’s correct.”

“You...you...oaf...”

“Oaf?” He smirked at the little princess. “Is that the best you can do?”

“I’ll work on it,” she said tartly. “I’m sure that a few weeks in your company will expand my vocabulary.”

Not weeks, sweetheart, Jamie thought. Four days, and that’s four too many.

“Which will it be?” he asked. “The buckskin that’s been mistreated and is looking to take his revenge, or the shifty-eyed bay, or the uncontrollable black stallion?”

“How about one of those?” She pointed to the next corral where half a dozen horses from the livery stable jostled at the water trough “Can’t you sell these four and buy me something better? A horse suitable for a lady?”

Jamie sighed in resignation. “Let’s go and take a look.”

He hung back as his little Eastern princess, Miranda—what a fitting name for a woman who was bound to drive him crazy with complaints during the next four days—leaned over the corral fence and inspected the horses.

A gust of breeze molded her skirts against her legs. Strands of golden hair fluttered around her face. She wedged one boot on the lowest rung and climbed up for a better look, agile and slender. Like a blonde version of an Indian princess. Jamie hurried to quash the thought.

“That one.” Her arm shot out to point at a gray Appaloosa with an evenly spotted coat.

Jamie groaned. Indian princess indeed. He should have guessed she’d pick the most expensive horse at the stable.

Ten minutes later, he had traded all four of the bank robbers’ horses against the Appaloosa, and had been forced to haggle not to owe a balance. He’d been crazy to think marrying her was going to save him money.

He ushered the little princess into the cool, shady interior of the livery stable. Once they were inside, he nudged the toe of his boot at the bank robbers’ saddles and bridles that lay in a heap on the floor.

“Pick your saddle and tack.”

“My saddle?” She looked down at the pile by their feet, then back up at him. “But I can’t... I’ve never ridden astride... I’ll need a side saddle...”

The moment of payback had arrived. Jamie felt a twinge of shame, but he brushed it aside. It was best to make the little princess hate him, in case he wasn’t as good at resisting temptation as he ought to be.

He lowered his voice, bent to speak into her ear. “Considering you’re female, it shouldn’t be too difficult to learn to spread your legs.”

Chapter Six

It took a few seconds for the bounty hunter’s lewd comment to penetrate Miranda’s brain. How dare he speak to her like that? Her hands fisted in impotent range. The...the...oaf! She longed for stronger words—ones she hoped to add to her vocabulary very soon.

In an effort to overcome her fury, she focused her attention on the equipment carelessly stacked on the floor. It was clear which set held the most appeal. Saddle and bridle in black leather, shiny and supple, carefully maintained. She could see a pair of matching saddlebags, too. The metal studs that decorated each piece might be silver.

Miranda was about to point out her choice when her gaze strayed to the bounty hunter. The oaf—James Fast Elk Blackburn. He was leaning against the timber wall, arms crossed over his chest, watching her from under the brim of his hat. She might not be able to match him in dirty talk, but she could gain some measure of petty revenge by vexing him.

“I want to try out the saddles,” she declared.

He pushed away from the wall. “All of them?”

“That will be the only way to know which one fits the best.”

The long canvas duster flared wide as Blackburn moved toward her. Halting toe-to-toe with her, he pointed at the gray Appaloosa tied to the hitching post outside the livery stable. “There’s your horse.” He gestured at the heap of equipment by their feet. “There’s your saddles and bridles. Try them out to your little heart’s content.”

Oh, yes, Miranda thought. This is going to be very satisfactory indeed.

She turned to survey her new horse. The black saddle with silver studs would look beautiful on the gray. She pointed at a worn saddle in cracked tan leather. “Let’s start with that one. It looks a bit smaller than the others.”

When Blackburn didn’t move, she directed an impatient frown at him. “Well, what are you waiting for?”

“I’m waiting for you to get on with it.”

“Do you expect me to know how to saddle a horse?”

A worried notch appeared between Blackburn’s straight dark brows. “You told me you can ride. If I recall right, you boasted that you’ll ride faster than me.”

“And I’m sure I do. However, I never told you that I know how to saddle a horse, or brush one down, or feed one, or clean up after one. I’ve always had grooms for that.”

She ran her eyes over the bounty hunter, making it clear that she expected him to take on the duties of a groom. “Well?” she said, mirroring his brusque command a moment earlier. “I’m waiting for you to get on with it.”

Blackburn jerked his head in the gesture she’d noticed before, a bit like a stubborn mule tossing its mane. It made the thick strands of black hair swing about his shoulders. He had an expressive face, when he forgot to hide his thoughts, but the range of his expressions seemed mostly limited to anger, irritation and disbelief.

The bounty hunter heaved out a sigh but sprang into action. A secret thrill of victory rippled over Miranda as she watched him crouch down, pick up the worn saddle, walk out to the hitching post, lift the saddle onto the Appaloosa, adjust the position and tighten the cinch.

She hurried after him and came to an abrupt halt beside the horse. The animal’s gray flanks rose in front of her, like the brow of an ocean liner. How was she going to get up there, without the aid of a mounting block, or a groom to give her a boost? And she’d rather die than admit to her failure and ask Blackburn for help.

“Well,” the deep, husky voice said behind her. “The saddle is on the horse. I’m waiting for you to get on with trying it out.”

Miranda circled to the horse’s head. They had already made friends while the bounty hunter went inside to negotiate the purchase with the livery stable owner. She held out her hand. The horse nuzzled her palm, its nose cool and damp against her skin.

“I have a name for you,” she whispered to the Appaloosa. “Alfie. For Alfred Tennyson. A very famous poet, and a nobleman. That is what I’ll expect from you. Noble behavior. Please don’t let me down. See that man behind me? He is a rogue, with no manners. He is just waiting for me to fall flat on my face.”

After stroking Alfie’s long nose to emphasize her plea, Miranda circled back to his side. She grabbed hold of a stirrup, kicked up one foot. Her skirts got in the way and she almost toppled over backward. Determined, Miranda yanked her skirts up over her knees and tried again. She managed to wedge the toe of her button-up boot into the stirrup. With tiny hops, she moved closer to the horse and grabbed the saddle horn with one hand, the cantle of the saddle with the other, and bounced up.

And bounced back down again.

Peering backward beneath her arm, Miranda stole a glance at the bounty hunter. He was standing still, watching her, his long duster blowing in the breeze. The repertoire of his facial expressions seemed to be growing, but instead of the smug smile she had expected, he was staring at her, spellbound, as if witnessing a complicated circus act.

She’d show him! Miranda pushed the toe of her left foot deeper into the stirrup, bent her right knee, tensed every muscle and bounced up again. Her hands clung to the saddle. Her left foot wobbled in the stirrup as she hung poised in the air. Little by little, she managed to shift her center of gravity forward, until she found her balance and could fling her right leg over the horse’s back.

She was up! She was sitting astride the horse. Alfie beat one hoof against the ground and craned his head backward, as if to look at her and say, How is that for noble behavior? Miranda sank deeper into the saddle. She’d done it. She’d mounted on her own. She gave a tiny whoop of victory and flashed a smile at Blackburn, forgetting his arrogance, even forgetting his crude comment about her riding position.

“How’s the saddle?” he asked.

She wiggled her rump to test the fit. “It’s not comfortable.”

Dismounting was a lot easier, Miranda discovered, with gravity helping instead of hindering. She tried all four saddles, and then she claimed she couldn’t be certain of her choice and insisted on trying two of them again.

The bounty hunter kept swapping over the saddles. She could see a muscle tugging at the side of his jaw. His shoulders were rigid, his face set in stone. His gaze remained locked somewhere on the horse’s flanks, refusing to rise up to her as she sat up on Alfie and gloated over her success, both in mounting without aid and in vexing him.

“The black saddle,” Miranda said in the end, when Alfie started to get bored with the constant fussing. “I like that one best. Take off this one and put that one back on.”

* * *

Jamie gritted his teeth. He had to get her some new clothes. Did the little blonde princess not understand what she was doing? Blithely, she’d yanked up her skirts, exposing dainty leather half boots and a pair of shapely legs.

Then, when she’d hopped around on one foot, the other foot stuck in the stirrup, knee pointing skyward, her skirts had bunched up in her lap, giving him a tantalizing glimpse all the way up to a bare, milky-white thigh and the garter that held up her stocking.

Things had gotten a little easier when she swung astride and the skirts settled around her, but even then he could see a part of her leg. He was covered in sweat, and it wasn’t just from the effort of heaving the saddles on and off the horse. He’d barely had the presence of mind to keep an eye on the entrance to the livery stable, to make sure the owner wasn’t lurking in the shadows, enjoying the spectacle.

“You’ll need a pair of trousers for riding astride,” he informed his wife.

She was crouching on the ground, admiring the black saddlebags with a fascination that made Jamie suspect she had wanted the silver-studded set all along.

She frowned at him. “Surely I can’t wear trousers. It’s not decent.”

Not decent. He made a strangled sound, something between a groan and a laugh. “It will be a damn sight more decent than the way you need to pull up your skirts when you climb into the saddle.”

She stared at him. Her blue eyes kept widening until he could see rims of white all around the irises. Hot color washed up to her cheeks. “Heavens,” she breathed. “I didn’t realize.” She peered into the saddlebag, as if wanting to crawl into it. “I didn’t mean to...”

“It’s all right,” Blackburn said grudgingly. “No one was watching.”

“No one but you.”

“I don’t count, do I?”

She pursed her lips. “I guess you don’t. We are married, after all.”

The answer took him by surprise. He’d meant he didn’t count because she had made it clear he was so far beneath her in social status he barely qualified as a member of the human race. Moreover, her embarrassment confirmed she hadn’t been tormenting him on purpose. Mollified, Jamie squatted beside his little Eastern princess and joined her in examining the saddlebags.

“These are Mexican,” he said. “Silver-studded. They’ll look good on the gray.”

She glanced up from beneath her lashes and flashed him a smile that made his breath catch. “That’s what I thought when I first saw them.” She met his gaze, earnest and eager now, and spoke without a trace of hostility. “I do want to learn how to look after a horse. I always did, but it upset the grooms when I asked. They feared for their jobs.”

“That’s good.” Jamie pushed up to his feet. “Let’s put the bridle and the saddlebags on the horse. Then we’ll go over to the mercantile. We’ll get them to open up even though it’s Sunday, and we’ll kit you out.”

* * *

“These are wonderful. Can I try them on for size?” Jamie watched his little Eastern princess clutch a pair of denim trousers in her hands, as if they were a gown made by a Paris fashion house. He was starting to suspect he might have been too harsh in judging her. The thought gave him pause. It would be better to remain enemies.

The shopkeeper, a small dark man with clipped speech and an oddly precise way of moving, pressed his fingertips into a steeple, as if praying for a sale. “Let me show you some boots and coats. And you’ll need a couple of shirts, and a hat, and a rain slicker.”

An hour later, Jamie was sitting on a wooden stool by the counter, drinking coffee while Miranda kept darting in and out of the small fitting booth at the back of the store. He shook his head as he watched her parade up and down the aisle. How did she do it? She never once looked at the price tags, but she unerringly selected the most expensive of everything.

“I like this hat best,” she informed him.

“Of course you do,” Jamie muttered.

“What?” She stilled, hands raised to adjust the tilt of the brim as she admired her reflection in the mirror. She frowned at him through the glass. “Is it wrong?”

“It’s about ten dollars wrong.”

“Ten dollars?” Her face fell with comprehension. She took down the black leather hat, fingered the band of silver beads around the crown. Her voice was very small. “I thought it would go nicely with the saddle.”

She turned toward him. Her eyes seemed very bright. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I wasn’t thinking... My parents died four years ago, and I haven’t had anything new since, and I’ve never bought any ready-made clothing before. It’s been so much fun, I got carried away.” Putting on a brave smile, she turned to the storekeeper. “Let’s start again. Point me to the cheapest hats and coats.”

Jamie let his eyes drift over her. She’d picked a pair of black knee-high boots and a short coat in black deerskin, cropped at the waist, Mexican style. The hat had straight sides and a short, flat-topped crown. She looked as if she had ridden up from south of the border. If it hadn’t been for the fair hair, everyone who saw her would expect her to talk in Spanish.

“Ring it up,” Jamie said to the storekeeper.

“But...” Miranda studied the price tag on the hat. “You can’t...”

“We’ve spent enough time in here. I’m not going to sit through you picking out something else,” Jamie said gruffly, even though he knew it was a bad idea to let her keep the clothes. The whole idea of marrying her had been to save money. And now his little Eastern princess had become a little bandit princess, a transformation that made her even harder to resist.

Jamie closed his mind to the misgivings and turned to the counter. He pulled up his shirt to reach his money belt and handed over his hard-earned cash. He almost jumped when he felt the light touch of fingertips on the back of his hand.

“Thank you,” the girl said. “It is very kind of you.”

If you expect chivalry from me, you’re sorely mistaken, he’d told her a few hours ago. A nasty suspicion niggled in Jamie’s mind that Miranda Fairfax—his wife—had the ability to turn everything in his life upside down before he could get rid of her.

Chapter Seven

This marriage business might not be such a bad idea after all, Miranda thought as she rode out of town behind James Fast Elk Blackburn. She had acquired an excellent horse, a fancy saddle with silver studs and a lovely set of new clothes.

It appeared a husband had a duty to look after his wife, and the bounty hunter took that duty seriously. She doubted he’d ever let her go hungry. If only she knew what price he would extract for his protection, her nerves might not be quite so jumpy.

Overhead, the sky was clearing. Swallows dipped and soared over the grassy meadows, the way seagulls swooped over the ocean waves at Merlin’s Leap. The air smelled clean and fresh. In the distance, sunlight glittered on the mountaintops.

For an hour, Miranda rode in meek silence, and then she could no longer tolerate the uncertainty. She had to know what he wanted from her. She urged Alfie forward, until she was riding alongside the bounty hunter’s bay gelding.

“Where are we going?” she called out to him.

He kept his eyes straight ahead. “You’ll find out.”

“Why can’t you tell me now?”

He shot her a sharp glance. “Shut up and ride.”

“I can ride and talk at the same time. Can’t you?”

“Be quiet. You’re annoying me.”

It was not a playful retort. It was a surly, brooding complaint. Perhaps he regretted spending all that money on her. Ten dollars might have seemed cheap for a wife, but she had quickly turned into a bottomless pit of additional expense.

The path narrowed and Miranda fell back behind the bounty hunter’s horse. For the rest of the day, they rode across the grassy plateau at a steady lope, pausing frequently to stretch their legs and to let their mounts rest. The bounty hunter ignored her, except to issue an order or to warn her to keep out of the way. Tension ratcheted up inside Miranda. When they stopped for the night, the bounty hunter set a soot-covered coffeepot to boil on a fire he had built from dead branches in a circle of stones on the ground.

Miranda gathered her courage and perched beside him on the fallen log where he had sat down. “Why won’t you talk to me?”

“I don’t like to talk.”

“Why did you marry me?”

“You’ll find out.”

“You’ll find out, you’ll find out,” she mimicked. “You sound like a parrot in a cage.”

“And you talk too much.” He shot her a frowning glance. “Can’t you do something useful? Like cook supper, or groom the horses, or build a fire, or clear a place on the ground to sleep, instead of hovering around and annoying me?”

Miranda spoke quietly. “It is not my fault that I’m gently bred. Unlike you, I’m not nasty and surly by nature. I’m asking because I want to know. If I prepare myself for whatever it is you want from me, I might be able to perform the task better.”

She had never heard anyone heave out such a loud sigh. It made the air vibrate with frustration and irritation and exasperation and aggravation and impatience. James Fast Elk Blackburn might not like to talk, but it seemed he had no trouble communicating his bad temper without words.

Miranda walked away, but she was not giving up.

She was merely regrouping for another attack.

* * *

A fire crackled in a circle of stones, casting shadows in the darkness. The soft night breeze whispered in the trees. The horses, hobbled to stop them from straying, grazed on the long grass by the brook. The aroma of roast turkey, already eaten, lingered in the air.

Jamie drank the last of his coffee and studied his little bandit princess. She sat beside him, staring into the flames. He could sense her fear. During the evening, she had drawn tighter and tighter into a ball, shoulders hunched, knees pressed together, as if she wanted to disappear into herself.

He should have been gentler with her, but the emotions she stirred up in him had made him morose. It grated that she looked down on him, the way his mother’s family had looked down on his father. The physical reactions she sparked in him didn’t help, either. It was best to keep his distance. Healthier for them both. The worst of his feelings was guilt, though. It was clear she was on the run, perhaps from being tied to a man twice her age, and now she had ended up married to a savage who killed people for a living.

The right thing would be to explain what he wanted from her, but Jamie couldn’t talk about it. Death might be his trade, but when it came to the death of his mother and his sister and his niece, his mind locked up. He didn’t know if it was because they were women, or because they were family, or because they were the only people he had ever loved.

“Who is Woods?” he asked. When the girl didn’t reply, he added, “Your husband. Are you a widow or not? Is he still living?”

As Jamie considered the question, it occurred to him that if Woods still lived, it would simplify things. The marriage would be bigamous, invalid as such, and he would avoid the trouble of seeking an annulment when the time came.

The little princess kept picking bits of bark loose from the log they sat upon, her eyes intent on the task, the way a hungry sparrow might concentrate on the search for a worm.

“He doesn’t exist,” she muttered.

“He doesn’t exist?”

“That’s right. He is a figment of my imagination.” She shot him a glance. “I thought it might make it easier for a woman traveling alone to be assumed a widow.”

“Where are you from?”

“I thought you didn’t like to talk.”

“I changed my mind.”

“Boston.”

The flickering flames sent shadows dancing over her face and hair. She looked frightened, but also fierce, strangely untamed. She’d probably fight back if he tried to bed her. Scratch and claw and bite. The thought reassured Jamie.

“I was out East once,” he told her. “Baltimore. It was a long way there and an even longer way back.”

She contemplated him and gave a slow nod. Jamie got an odd feeling she understood what he meant—that the journey back had felt longer because it had been without hope.

Her gaze returned to the fire. “I live in a place called Merlin’s Leap. It’s a big old house by the ocean. I have two sisters. I’m the middle one.”

Jamie knew he needed to put her fears to rest. On purpose, he had waited for nightfall to have the conversation. He talked better in the darkness. “I’m not going to hurt you. There’s something I need you to do for me. A job. It will only take a few months. When it’s done, you can go.”

“Will anyone else hurt me?”

Right to the point. She was smart. Perceptive.

“No,” he said. “It’s not that kind of job.”

“Will I have to harm anyone?”

“No.”

“Will I have to break the law?”

“No.”

“What will I have to do?”

“Clean in a saloon. Just sweep and scrub and dust.”

“Sweep and scrub and dust for a few months? And then I can go?”

“That’s about it. There’s a bit more to it. You’ll find out.” He got up, tossed another branch into the fire, pointed at a big rock a few yards away. “Sleep next to the stone. It’s better not to leave your back exposed. I’ve put a bedroll and a blanket down for you.”

“You didn’t buy a bedroll for me.”

“I gave you mine. I’ll sleep with a blanket.”

“Thank you,” she said. “That is kind of you.”

That is kind of you. Jamie suppressed another twinge of guilt. If he were kind, he’d put her on the next train back to Boston and take care of his problems without her help.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he told her. “If you need to wake me up at night, call out from a distance. Whatever you do, don’t creep up on me and touch me. I’ll most likely slit your throat.”

He saw her shrink into that tight ball again. Idiot, Jamie berated himself. He’d planned to reassure her, not to scare her out of her wits. He’d best shut up before he made things even worse.

He walked off into the darkness and stretched out beside another rock. After setting his pair of guns and the knife he carried in his belt down on the ground within easy reach, he wrapped up in a blanket and closed his eyes.

Years ago, he’d learned to go to sleep at will, or at least fall into the half-awake doze that served him for sleep. But tonight the restful slumber didn’t come. His ears attuned to a soft feminine voice singing some kind of a song in the darkness, so faintly it sounded almost like the wind whispering. When he finally dozed off, he dreamed of an angel choir, complete with halos and wings and shimmering robes.

* * *

It had been unwise to boast about her skills as a rider, Miranda thought as she cantered behind James Fast Elk Blackburn, following the course of a wide, shallow river. He had decided to make the journey in three days instead of four, and after bragging about her horsemanship she felt unable to complain about fatigue and sore muscles.

So far, the weather had favored them. Dry, crisp days, with dewy mornings and starlit nights. They had crossed hills and valleys, followed creeks and streams, but however far they rode, the snowcapped mountains on the horizon never seemed to get any closer.

Since their talk by the firelight on the first night, they had barely exchanged a word. The bounty hunter didn’t expect her to help with the chores, so she didn’t even try. She ate what he put in front of her, rode when he told her to ride and slept the minute she’d finished chewing and swallowing whatever he had shot and cooked each night.

Ahead of her, Blackburn lifted his arm in a signal and halted his horse. His bay gelding was called Sirius. If Miranda had known, she might have called the gray Appaloosa Orion instead of Alfie, but she’d gotten used to the name and didn’t wish to change it now.

“It’s over the next hill,” Blackburn told her when she caught up.

“What’s the town called?”

“Devil’s Hall.”

Devil’s Hall. Miranda hoped the place didn’t live up to the name but she decided not to ask. Blackburn probably would ignore her question anyway. As they set off again, at a slower pace now, to allow the horses to catch their breaths, a sudden boom shook the ground, followed by a muffled rumble, like the sound of distant thunder.

“What’s that noise?” Miranda asked.

“They’re blasting at the mine.”

A second later, the acrid odors of an explosion blotted out the smells of parched grass and drying buffalo chips. Unlike the eastern end of the prairie, where the buffalo had been hunted to extinction, in Wyoming the herds still roamed. Miranda had seen several groups of the huge, bulky beasts in the distance.

When they crested the ridge, a long valley spread before them. A river flowed through the middle. The town seemed quite a big place. There was a main street, with two-story buildings on both sides. The rest of the houses were scattered about in random clusters. On the opposite slope of the valley, the mine workings cut an ugly black crater in the earth.

As they drew closer, Miranda could pick out at least two saloons. “Carousel” boasted a brightly colored banner with the name on it in big letters and a balcony over the porch. “Purgatory” had no porch or balcony, and the name was daubed directly onto the timber wall. Miranda said a silent prayer that she’d end up at the Carousel instead of the Purgatory.

They had made good time, and it was only the afternoon. Miranda saw several people in the street, all men, dressed in drab clothing and bowler hats. She’d discovered that the kind of wide-brimmed hat she had chosen was useful in the south to keep out the sun, but this far north the winds were fierce, and people preferred hats not so easily blown off their heads.

Blackburn drew up outside a small, two-story, timber-frame house. He dismounted, tied Sirius to a post, far enough from the flowerbeds that decorated the front yard to protect them from the appetite of the horse, and then he turned around to hold Alfie by the bit.

“Get down,” he ordered.

“I thought you said the saloon.”

“We’ll stop here first.”

His manner was terse. Instinct told Miranda she was about to find out what Blackburn had meant when he told her there would be “a bit more” to her task than cleaning. Whatever it was, it was bad enough for him to have refused to talk about it.

She jumped down. Blackburn tied Alfie to the hitching post, marched to the front door and pounded the iron knocker. A woman opened. Tall and thin, with graying hair pulled back into a tight bun, she had the kind of pinched, sour expression that reminded Miranda of Mrs. Matheson, the least favorite of their governesses at Merlin’s Leap.

“Afternoon, Mrs. Van Cleef,” Blackburn said. “I’ve come for Nora.”

The woman dried her hands on her apron and gave a nod. “I’ll get her.”

Who is Nora? Miranda wanted to ask, but something in Blackburn’s manner warned her into silence. They waited. She heard the clip of Mrs. Van Cleef’s footsteps and a lighter tapping sound, and then a little girl shot forward from the woman’s shadow. She was perhaps eight or nine, fragile of build, with sallow skin, dark eyes and shoulder-length black hair in a blunt cut, with a straight fringe across her forehead.

“Uncle Jamie,” the child cried and ran out, skirts flapping around her feet.

So intent had Miranda been on staring into the hallway that she had failed to notice Blackburn had dropped to his knees. He spread his arms wide and the little girl barreled into him, babbling in a voice that rang with joy.

“Uncle Jamie, I missed you so much. I missed you more than the moon and the sun. I missed you more than all the planets and the stars.”

Bittersweet memories flooded into Miranda’s mind. She and her sisters had played that game with their parents, too, competing over who loved whom the most, but it had been the sea for Papa and arts and music for Mama. I love you more than the ocean. I love you more than the east wind. I love you more than Mozart, more than Michelangelo.

“Easy, Skylark,” Blackburn said. “You mustn’t run. You’ll wear yourself out.” He pushed up to his feet, took the little girl’s hand in his and turned toward Miranda. “Look what I got for you, Skylark. A new mama. What do you think of her?”

Chapter Eight

A new mama? The words went off like a gunpowder explosion in Miranda’s head, destroying all rational thought. She stared down at the little girl, who was staring back at her.

Slowly, the joy in the little girl’s face faded. She darted a glance at Blackburn and whispered, “She doesn’t like me...” Then the child twisted around to glance back at Mrs. Van Cleef with a nervous expression that spelled Any more than this one does.

Without releasing the little girl’s hand, Blackburn lifted his other hand. His fingers closed around Miranda’s arm. He applied the same silent warning he’d used when they stood in front of the preacher and he’d dragged the consent of marriage out of her.

“Of course she does.” Steely fingers bit into Miranda’s arm. “She’s always wanted a little girl of her own to look after. Haven’t you, Miranda?”

Miranda studied the child. She seemed a timid little thing. And there was only one of her. Not four, like the boisterous Summerton girls who had worn her nerves into a tangle in five minutes. When Miranda didn’t say anything, the little girl blinked. A solitary tear spilled out from beneath her thick dark lashes and rolled down her cheek.

Seeing that tear, sensing the loneliness and grief the child so valiantly tried to hide, jolted Miranda out of her stunned reticence. A new mama. That implied Nora must have lost her mother, and most likely also her father.