Carrying her rescuer’s baby!

Annabel Fairfax fled West in disguise to find her sisters. But on her way a threat catches up with her—and she’s forced to turn to a ruggedly handsome stranger on horseback!

Clay Collier, her reluctant protector, tries to keep his distance from the beautiful runaway—but neither can resist one stolen night! Honor demands he marry her, but discovering Annabel’s affluent background convinces Clay she doesn’t belong in his dangerous world. Except his forbidden bride is already secretly pregnant...

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

Miranda and James’s story in

The Bride Lottery

Annabel and Clay’s story in

From Runaway to Pregnant Bride

All available now!

Author Note

From Runaway to Pregnant Bride completes The Fairfax Brides trilogy.

His Mail-Order Bride tells the story of the oldest sister, Charlotte, who finds happiness with Thomas Greenwood, a strong, steady farmer. The Bride Lottery is about the middle sister, Miranda, who ends up married to Jamie Blackburn, a part Cheyenne bounty hunter.

From Runaway to Pregnant Bride is the story of Annabel, the youngest sister, who longs to prove her independence. Disguised as a boy, she sets out to join her sisters in the West, but robbery and bad luck see her stranded in a New Mexico mining camp.

Clay Collier, orphaned son of tricksters and thieves, grew up with poverty and neglect, and now scratches out a living from the earth. Not fooled by Annabel’s disguise, he gives in to the attraction between them, but his fear for her safety and welfare drives them apart.

When writing this book I worried about repeating myself, because there are so many parallels in the stories of the three sisters—they all flee from their Boston home to the West and end up penniless, in forced proximity with an attractive though reticent man. I worked hard to make each character and relationship different, and I hope you’ll enjoy Annabel’s story.

In the final chapters the sisters face their enemy, Cousin Gareth, and learn that everything is not always as it seems. Perhaps one day I’ll get to write the story of Gareth Fairfax, and give him the love and happiness he deserves.

From Runaway to Pregnant Bride

Tatiana March

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Before becoming a novelist TATIANA MARCH tried out various occupations—including being a chambermaid and 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

From Runaway to Pregnant Bride

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 millsandboon.co.uk.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

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

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Boston, Massachusetts, August 1889

Annabel Fairfax tore open the envelope the post office messenger had delivered and peeked at the document inside. A money order! A money order for two hundred dollars! Glancing around the shadowed hallway to make sure the servants were not spying on her, Annabel slipped the envelope into her skirt pocket and hurried upstairs to her bedroom.

Two hundred dollars meant freedom.

Four years ago, after their parents died in a boating accident and their greedy Cousin Gareth came to live with them, the three Fairfax sisters had become prisoners in their own home—Merlin’s Leap, a gray stone mansion perched on a rocky headland just north of Boston.

Charlotte, the eldest, was the heiress, and Cousin Gareth had attempted to force her into marriage. Three months ago, Charlotte had escaped and was now living under an assumed name in Gold Crossing, Arizona Territory.

With Charlotte out of his clutches, Gareth had contrived to have her declared dead and Miranda, the middle sister, had been named as the heiress. Rather than fight Gareth’s advances, Miranda also had chosen to flee from Merlin’s Leap, and was now on her way to join Charlotte in the Arizona Territory.

Cousin Gareth had set off in pursuit, leaving Annabel alone with the servants, and their laxness had allowed her to receive the money order. With Gareth gone, the household staff no longer bothered to intercept the mail, or to keep her locked up in the house, which had allowed Annabel to walk into the village and post a letter to Charlotte, alerting the eldest sister that she was officially dead and buried in a grave at Merlin’s Leap.

Up in her bedroom, Annabel inspected the money order. The sender was Thomas Greenwood, the man whose mail-order bride Charlotte was pretending to be. The beneficiary was Miranda Fairfax, but Annabel was certain the local postmaster would let her cash in the document.

She grinned into the empty room. Gold Crossing, here I come. Not brazen enough to travel without a ticket, as her older sisters had done, she now had the funds to pay for her passage. And, with Cousin Gareth gone, she didn’t even have to plot for an escape. She could simply walk out of the house, as bold as a captain on a ship.

* * *

The adventure of it! Annabel sat on the train, trying to take in everything at once—the scenery flashing by, the passengers sitting in their seats, the uniformed conductor strolling up and down the corridor.

The constant craning was making her hair unravel from beneath the flat cap she wore, and she hurried to shove the long, dark tresses out of sight. A threadbare wool coat and trousers completed her outfit. On her feet she wore leather boots, much too large, but two pairs of thick socks improved the fit.

Would she pass for a boy? Her skin was too smooth and her features too feminine, and the rough garments swamped her slender frame, but she hoped the disguise would make the journey safer for a young girl traveling alone.

In truth, she wasn’t frightened, merely apprehensive. Her sisters liked to call her highly strung, but she was brave in her own way, almost as brave as Miranda, and no less determined than Charlotte. And everyone agreed she was the cleverest. It was merely that her emotions ran a bit closer to the surface, sometimes gushing out like water from a fountain.

On the bench beside her she had a canvas haversack, the kind sailors used. Annabel gave the bulky shape a pat with her hand, and in return she heard the reassuring clink of gold coins, hidden away in a secret compartment.

To start with, the postmaster had refused to let her cash in the money order, but she’d persuaded him by telling him that Miranda had suffered a mental collapse and the funds were required to pay for her care at a sanatorium.

Feeling the need to stretch her legs, Annabel slung the haversack over her shoulder and set off to visit the convenience at the far end of the car. Clumsy in her big boots, she trundled along the corridor.

The lock on the cubicle door showed red, indicating the convenience was occupied. Annabel waited, trying to look masculine. She dipped her chin, seeking to lower her voice in case someone addressed her and she would have to reply.

A minute passed, then another. Perhaps the cubicle was empty, the lock merely stuck on red. Annabel curled her fingers around the brass handle and twisted. The lock gave with a rattling sound, and the door sprang open.

Inside the cramped convenience stood a voluptuous young woman. Her gown was unlaced, the bodice folded out of the way. A plump baby suckled at her naked breast. Fascinated at the vision of motherhood, Annabel stared. The woman stared back, a stunned expression on her face.

Without warning, the iron wheels bounced over a junction in the tracks. The woman gave a shriek of alarm. She teetered on her feet, nearly dropping the baby as she struggled to maintain her balance against the rocking of the train.

Darting into the convenience, Annabel gripped the woman by the front of her gown. “I’ve got you!” A few stitches ripped, but Annabel succeeded in holding the young mother upright until she had recovered her footing and could hold the baby securely to her breast.

Vaguely, Annabel noticed the train was slowing for a stop. The woman, a blonde with arched eyebrows, glowered at her rescuer. “Young man, unhand me this very instant.”

Startled, Annabel released her grip. “I was only trying to—”

“Conductor!” the woman shouted. “Conductor!”

The conductor, a burly man with a moustache, sweat shining on his face, hurried over to them. By now, the woman had regained her composure and was using one hand to cover herself with the shawl she wore draped around her shoulders.

She gestured at Annabel with her chin. “This young man, this...urchin...forced the door on the convenience while I was inside, tending to my baby. He stared at my breasts and laid his hands on me, tearing my gown.” The woman lowered her voice. “Pervert, and just a boy. What’s the world coming to?”

Annabel shrank back a step. “I was only—”

“Is it true, young man?” the conductor boomed.

“I’m not...” Annabel glanced down at her clothing. I’m not a boy.

“Are you questioning me?” The woman’s voice grew shrill. She glowered at the pair of them. “Are you suggesting that I invited this perverted young man to ogle at me and damage my gown?”

Annabel fisted her hands at her sides. Her eyes stung with the threat of tears. She’d been so proud of how well the journey was going...she’d only been trying to help...but how could she explain without giving her disguise away?

“I’m sorry,” she muttered, only now remembering to lower the pitch of her voice. “I thought the convenience was vacant.”

“Sorry is not good enough.” The woman lifted her nose in the air and addressed the conductor. “I demand that you remove this young man from the train. He is a menace to the female passengers.”

Not bothering to investigate the accusation, nor giving Annabel a chance to defend her actions, the conductor merely caught her by the scruff of her neck and shoved her along. “Let’s be off with you, then.”

Stiffening her legs, Annabel braced her boots against the floor to halt their progress. The conductor swore and jerked her up in the air. Annabel kicked with her feet and flailed with her fists, but the burly man dangled her at a distance and her blows failed to connect.

By now, the train had rolled to a stop. Behind them, passengers were crowding to the end of the car, waiting to alight. A man carrying a suitcase pushed past them and swung the door open. The conductor stepped forward and without ceremony flung Annabel down to the station platform.

She landed on all fours. The impact jarred her bones, nearly tearing her shoulders from their sockets. The skin on her palms scraped raw against the rough concrete surface. Gritting her teeth, blinking back tears, Annabel fought the pain. Only vaguely was she aware of the stream of passengers filing past her.

Behind her, the train doors slammed shut. Her knees and hands throbbed, but the shock of the impact was slowly fading away. Annabel lifted her head. At least her flat cap remained securely in place, protecting her disguise.

Carefully, she rolled over to a sitting position and inspected the abrasions on her palms. Through the holes in her ripped trousers, she could see her skinned knees. Around her, people bustled about, boots thudding, skirts swishing, voices calling out greetings.

As her senses sharpened, Annabel could feel the hot afternoon sun baking down on her, could smell the scents of smoke and steam from the train. Gradually it dawned on her that something was missing...the weight that should be dangling from her shoulder. Her haversack, with all her possessions! With her money!

Panic seized her, making her forget the aches and pains. Frantic, Annabel scrambled to her feet and rushed over to the train and climbed up the iron steps and jerked the door open. The burly conductor stood waiting inside. Annabel tried to dart past him, but he lifted one booted foot and placed it against her chest and pushed, sending her toppling back down to the platform.

“Didn’t I tell you to get off?” he roared.

Sprawled on her rump, ignoring another wave of throbbing from the hard slam against the concrete platform, Annabel gave him an imploring look. “My bag... I must have dropped it when you threw me out...please...it is all I have...”

The conductor’s angry scowl eased. “What kind of bag?”

“A canvas haversack. Brown. This big.” She spread her hands wide.

“I’ll look.” He turned on his polished boots and strode out of sight into the corridor. Annabel waited. It was only a few steps back to where he had grabbed her. He’d find her haversack...unless one of the alighting passengers had taken it!

Alarmed by the idea, Annabel surveyed the platform. The crowd had thinned. She could see three disreputable-looking men—probably pickpockets—loitering against the wall of the station building. A shoeshine boy sat on a wooden box, and a woman in a gray dress was tidying up a display of fruit laid out on a trestle table.

The conductor reappeared at the door. “There’s no bag.”

“Please. Look again. Maybe it fell when I tried to help the lady. Maybe it is inside the convenience.”

Once more, the door to the railroad car flung shut. Annabel waited, too petrified to move, too petrified to do anything but stare at the closed door, her mind frozen in denial. The engine blew its whistle. A plume of steam rose in the air. The iron wheels screeched, and the train jerked into motion.

Desperation jolted Annabel back into life. She jumped to her feet and rushed over to the edge of the platform. She tried to grip the handrail by the steps, but the train was accelerating too fast for her to attempt boarding.

“My bag! My bag! Help!” Shouting, she ran alongside the train as it pulled away, leaving the station behind. Something appeared in an open window. A bundle of brown canvas. Her bag! She could see a pair of big hands clutching it in the air, the brass buttons at the end of the conductor’s sleeves glinting in the sun.

Relief poured through Annabel. She halted at the edge of the platform and watched as the conductor tossed her haversack out of the window. The bag fell onto the tracks, but the shoulder strap became tangled in the iron wheels. With each revolution, the bag flung up into the air and smashed down to the rails again.

Aghast, Annabel stared as the sturdy fabric tore into shreds. Clothing spilled out onto the tracks. Her food parcel unraveled, sending a loaf of bread rolling along. And then there was a flash of gold as a coin spun out...and another...and another...

Behind her, Annabel could hear the clatter of running feet. A man hurried past her and jumped down to the tracks. A second man followed, and then a third. The three ruffians who had been loitering by the station wall!

Annabel held her breath, hope and fear fighting within her as she watched the men race along the tracks, jumping from sleeper to sleeper. When they reached the remains of her scattered belongings they halted and began dipping down, in a rootling motion that resembled chickens pecking at the ground.

“Thank you,” Annabel shouted and waved her arms.

One of the men straightened to look at her. “How many?”

“Nineteen!” she called back.

The men resumed their search and then conferred, counting the coins in their open palms. Satisfied, they glanced back at her once more and waved a casual farewell before cutting across the tracks and running off into the fields. Annabel watched them shrink in her sights and finally vanish between the farm buildings in the distance.

“You was a fool to tell them how many.”

“What?” Stifling a sob, Annabel whirled toward the voice.

It was the shoeshine boy. Around twelve, thin and pale, he had wispy brown hair and alert gray eyes. He lifted his arm and brushed a lock of hair out of his eyes. In his other hand he carried a wooden box filled with brushes and polishes.

“You was stupid to tell them how many. If you said seventeen, they might have left a couple of coins behind. Now they kept looking until they had them all.”

Annabel sniffled and gave a forlorn nod, unable to fault the logic.

“Where was you going?” the boy asked.

“The Arizona Territory.”

“Blimey. That’s a fair piece away.” Curious, he studied her. “You got any money left?”

“Three dollars and change. It’s all I have left. I bought a ticket to New York City. And I bought some food.” A sob broke free. “The rest of the money was in my bag.”

“It was a fool thing to carry the money in your bag.”

“The gold eagles were heavy. I feared my pocket would tear.”

“Ain’t you got a poke?”

“A poke?”

“Like this.” The boy swept a glance up and down the platform to check for privacy, then pulled out a leather tube hanging on a cord around his neck. Quickly, he dropped the leather tube back inside his faded shirt.

“I only had a purse,” Annabel said. “And I couldn’t take it because—”

The boy snorted. “You’ll not fool no one. You walk like a girl, and you were yelling like a girl, and your hair is about to tumble down from beneath your cap.” He gave her another assessing look. “How old are you anyway?”

“Eighteen.”

The boy grinned. “A bit skinny for eighteen, ain’t you?”

“I’ve bound...” Color flared up to Annabel’s cheeks. She made a vague gesture at her chest, to indicate where she had bound her breasts with a strip of linen cloth to flatten her feminine curves.

“What’s your name?” the boy asked.

“An...drew.”

The boy shook his head. “There you go again. You almost came up with a girl’s name. What is it anyway? Ann? Amanda? Amy?”

“Annabel.”

“Annabel. That’s a fancy name. I guess you’ll be gentry, the way you talk and that milky-white skin of yours.”

Annabel nodded. “Papa was a sea captain. I grew up in a mansion, but I am an orphan now, and I have no money, in case you are planning to swindle me.”

The boy grinned again. “Hardly worth it for three dollars and change.” He jerked his head toward the station house. “Let’s get out of the sun for a bit. There’s another train due in an hour. I’ll take you home with me. My sister likes nobs.”

Chapter Two

The home where Colin took Annabel was a lean-to shack in a New York City freight yard. Twilight was falling when they got there. Annabel plodded along in her heavy boots, grateful for the evening cool that eased the sultry August heat.

A stray dog growled at them from behind a pile of empty packing crates and then scurried away again. Unfamiliar smells floated in the air—rotting vegetables, engine grease, acrid chemical odors, all against the backdrop of coal smoke.

Colin pulled the door to the shack open without knocking. “Hi, Liza,” he called out. “Brought you a visitor. A lady.”

Caution in her step, Annabel followed Colin inside. He’d not said much about his sister, except that she was sixteen and worked in a tavern because her full figure no longer allowed her to masquerade as a shoeshine boy.

While they’d been waiting for the train, Colin had dozed off, and once they’d boarded the express service to New York City, he’d introduced Annabel to the conductor as his apprentice, and they’d become too busy for conversation.

Normally reserved, Annabel had found a new boldness in the anonymity of her disguise as a street urchin. It seemed as if the social constraints that applied to gently bred young ladies had suddenly ceased to apply.

In the first-class car, Colin had demonstrated how to tout for business by quietly moving up and down the corridor and offering his services. Shouting was not allowed. When they got a customer, Annabel knelt between the benches. After spreading polish on the shoes or boots, she used a pair of stiff boar brushes, one in each hand, to buff the leather into a mirror shine while Colin supervised.

By the time they reached New York City, her hands, already tender from the fall, were stained with polish, and her arms ached from the effort of wielding the brushes, but she had earned her first dollar as a shoeshine boy.

There were no windows in the shack, but the low evening sunshine filtered in between the planks that formed the walls. In the muted light, Annabel saw a tall, shapely girl bent over a pot simmering on an ancient metal stove.

The girl turned around. “Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

She moved forward, one hand held out. Annabel took it. The palm was work roughened and the girl’s blue gown was a mended hand-me-down, but her fair hair was arranged in a neat upsweep and her clothing freshly laundered.

“The pleasure is all mine,” Annabel replied.

She released the girl’s hand and surveyed the cabin. Everything was painstakingly clean and tidy. A sleeping platform, decorated with a few embroidered cushions, took up half the space. On the other side, a packing crate with a cloth spread over it served as a table, with two smaller packing crates as seats.

“Is it true, what Colin said?” the girl asked. “Are you a lady?”

“Yes.” Annabel felt oddly ill at ease.

“You are welcome to share everything we have, as long as you like, but I have one condition. You must correct my speech and manner. I want to learn how to behave like a lady.”

“Why should that be important?” Annabel said gently. “Is it not more important to be a good person? And it is clear to me that both you and your brother are.”

The girl’s gray eyes met hers with a disquietingly direct gaze. “You’d be surprised. Some people...some men...believe that if you sound like a streetwalker, then you must be one.”

Compassion brought the sting of tears to Annabel’s eyes. Her sisters worried about her sentimental nature, but sometimes emotions simply welled up inside her. And now, the understanding of how she had taken for granted her privileged life, how someone might so fervently aspire to what she had received as a birthright, tore at her tender heart.

“Of course,” she replied. “I’ll teach you all I can.”

Liza smiled. “In return, I’ll teach you how to look like a boy.”

* * *

“Shoeshine! Shoeshine!”

Annabel made her way down the corridor in the second-class car on the train along the Southern Pacific Railroad. Her hair was pinned out of sight beneath a bowler hat. A touch of boot black shadowed her cheeks and her upper lip. She walked with a swagger, shoulders hunched, chin thrust forward. She did not smile.

As she strode along, she studied the clothing and the footwear of the passengers, to identify the most likely customers. When she spotted a man in a neatly pressed broadcloth suit with dust on his boots, she halted at the end of the row.

“Sir,” she said, holding up her wooden box. “Polish your boots for two bits.”

The man, around forty, clean-shaven, contemplated her for a moment, then glanced down at his boots. Looking up again, he nodded at her and shuffled his feet forward. Annabel knelt in front of him. Swiftly, she applied a coat of polish and wielded the brushes. A final buff with a linen cloth added to the shine.

She got to her feet and put out her hand. The man dropped a quarter in her palm. Annabel studied the coin, then leveled her gaze at the client. “If a gentleman is pleased with the result, he usually gives me four bits.”

The man’s eyebrows went up, but he dug in his pocket again and passed her another quarter. Annabel thanked him and hurried off on her way. Bitter experience had taught her not to ask for the extra money until the initial payment was safely in her hand.

“Shoeshine. Shoeshine.”

For two weeks, she had stayed with Colin and Liza in their freight yard shack, becoming skilled in her new trade. It had been a revelation to learn that if she boarded a train and introduced herself to the conductor—Andrew Fairfield, was her name—they allowed her to travel without a ticket, as long as she obeyed their rules and offered to polish their shoes for free.

By the end of the second week, she had earned enough money to buy her own brushes and polishes, and had taken an emotional farewell from Liza and Colin. One day, she hoped to reward them for their kindness, but she did not wish to raise any false hopes by telling them that she came from wealth.

“Shoeshine! Shoeshine!”

The train was slowing for a stop. Annabel used the lack of speed to cross over the coupling to the next car. Sometimes men had their boots polished just to break the tedium of the journey, but she enjoyed the traveling, even the endless monotony of the prairie they had left behind two days ago. As the scenery changed, it pleased Annabel to think that not long ago her sisters had looked upon the same grass-covered plateau, the same rolling hills, the same high-peaked mountains.

“Shoeshine. Shoe—”

The word died on her lips as her gaze fell on a suntanned man in his early thirties. Dressed like a dandy, he had a lean, muscled body. He looked just like Cousin Gareth had once been, before drinking and gambling ruined him, turning him from a laughing boy who did magic tricks into a bitter, brooding man.

As she stared, spellbound, the man gestured with his hand and leaned back in his seat, stretching out his feet. Annabel edged over and sank to her knees. Her heart was beating in a wild cadence, her hands shaking so hard she struggled to unclip the lid on a tin of polish.

It’s a coincidence, she told herself. Everyone has a double.

She spread the wax over the man’s hand-tooled Montana boots and started brushing. Anyway, she reminded herself, Cousin Gareth had gone off to chase after Miranda, who’d left Merlin’s Leap almost two months ago. It would make no sense for him only now to be on his way to Gold Crossing.

“There is something exceedingly familiar about you,” the man said. “I get an image in my head, but it is of a girl with your features.”

Annabel lowered the pitch of her voice. “Girl, huh? If I was the gun-carrying kind, I might call you out on that.”

“I meant no offense.”

Head bent low, Annabel moved from the right foot to the left. Her mouth felt dry. The man had spoken with Gareth’s voice. She kept silent, working as fast as she could. The train had come to a stop now, but from her kneeling position Annabel couldn’t see if it was for a town, or just a water tower in the middle of nowhere.

“What is your name, young man?”

Ignoring the question, Annabel flung her brushes back into the wooden box with a clatter and straightened, omitting the final polish with a linen cloth. She put out her hand. “That’ll be two bits.”

The man grabbed the walking stick that had been leaning against the end of the bench. A chill ran through Annabel. It was Cousin Gareth’s walking stick, with a silver handle shaped like the head of a wolf. She nearly swooned. It had to be him. Somehow, Cousin Gareth had transformed into this fit, healthy stranger, but he had not recognized her...yet.

The man banged the walking stick against the floor of the railroad car, making a hollow booming sound. “Your name, young man,” he demanded to know.

Deepening her voice, hiding beneath her bowler hat, Annabel muttered, “Andrew Fairfield.”

“Andrew?” The man frowned and shook his head, as if to clear the veil of mist inside his mind. “Andrew... Andrew... Ann...” His blue eyes widened. “Annabel! I have a memory of a girl called Annabel who looks just like you.”

Panic took hold of Annabel and she bolted. Behind her, she could hear the clatter of the expensive boots as Cousin Gareth surged to his feet and set off in chase.

“Wait,” he shouted. “I have questions for you.”

Clutching her box, for it was her ticket for transport, Annabel hurtled along the corridor. People turned to stare at her, startled out of their books and magazines, but they were no more than a blur in her sights. She careened into a man who had risen from his seat. Barely slowing, she dodged past him. Beneath her feet she could feel the train jerking into motion and knew they were about to set off again.

Cousin Gareth was yelling something, but Annabel couldn’t make out the words. With one hand, she touched the small lump of the leather poke of coins beneath her shirt. She had only twelve dollars—most of what she made shining shoes went on food—but at least her meager funds were secure.

With a final dash, Annabel burst out through the door at the rear of the car, onto the small platform at the end of the train. They were gathering speed now. What should she do? She had no way of telling if Cousin Gareth knew about Gold Crossing, had figured out Charlotte was hiding there. If Miranda had shaken him from her trail, how far into the journey had that been?

Annabel stared at the flat desert dotted with knee-high scrub. She had three days of traveling left, but she couldn’t risk leading Cousin Gareth to her sisters—could not take the chance that he would follow her if she stayed on the train.

With a swing of her arm, Annabel threw her wooden box down to the side of the tracks. The ground was hurtling past now. She said a quick prayer and jumped. On the impact her legs gave and she rolled along the hard desert floor.

There was no crunch of breaking bones, only a dull ache down her side. She scrambled to her feet and dusted her cotton shirt and mended wool trousers. The train was shrinking in the distance. Cousin Gareth emerged onto the platform at the end, but by now the speed of the train was too great for him to jump down after her.

“Who am I?” he yelled. “I have no memory.”

No memory? Annabel’s brows drew into a puzzled frown.

“Do you know me?” Cousin Gareth shouted. The wind tossed his words around the desert, and then the train vanished into the horizon, with only a puff of steam in the air and the slight vibration of the iron rails to mark its passing.

Annabel did a quick survey of her surroundings. She could see for miles around, and the only construction was the water tower fifty yards back. She caught a flash of movement and strained her eyes. In the shade of the water tower stood a mule, with parcels loaded on its back. And beside the mule stood a big buckskin saddle horse. She caught another flash of movement. A man had vaulted into the saddle.

“Wait!” Annabel yelled and set off running.

The desert gravel that had appeared so flat was full of holes to trip her up. The sun beat down on her. The horse and mule stood still, but she dared not slow down her pace, in case the stranger wouldn’t wait. By the time she reached him, her lungs were straining and perspiration ran in rivulets down her skin beneath her clothing.

It was cooler in the shade of the water tower, the air humid from spills evaporating in the heat. Annabel looked up at the man on the horse. Against the bright sunlight, he was little more than a silhouette, but she could tell he was young, perhaps in his late twenties.

He wore a fringed leather coat and faded denim pants and tall boots and a black, flat-crowned hat and a gun belt strapped around his hips. He had brown hair that curled over his collar, beard stubble several days old, and narrow eyes that measured her without a hint of warmth in them.

“What is this place?” she asked.

“It’s nowhere.” He had a rough, gravelly voice.

“Where is the nearest town?”

“Dona Ana. Thirty miles thataway.” He pointed to the south.

“Phoenix? Which way is Phoenix?”

“Four hundred miles thataway.” He pointed to the west.

“When will the next train be?”

“Don’t rightly know. Same time tomorrow, I guess.”

“But you must know. You came to meet the train.”

The man shook his head. “I came to collect the freight a conductor had unloaded here. Could have been yesterday. The day before. A week ago. I don’t know.”

“Is there anything closer than Dona Ana? An army post?”

He shook his head again. “Fort Selden closed years ago. And if you want the train, Dona Ana is no good. The train goes through Las Cruces. That’s another seven miles south.” He raked a glance over her. “Ain’t got no water?”

“No,” Annabel replied, her panic escalating. The stranger was the only one who could help her, but he seemed wholly unconcerned with her plight.

The man untied a canteen hanging from his saddle and leaned down to hold it out to her. “Leave it in the mailbox.”

Clutching the canteen with both hands, Annabel turned to look where he was pointing. By one of the timber posts holding up the water tank she could see a long wooden box with a chain and padlock anchoring it to the structure.

“It’s a coffin!” she blurted out.

“It will be one day,” the man replied. “Now it’s a mailbox.” He swept another glance up and down her. “Got no food?”

“No!” Desperation edged her tone.

He bent to dig in a saddlebag, handed down a small parcel. Annabel could smell the pungent odor of jerked meat.

“Got no gun?” the man asked.

She replied through a tightened throat. “No.”

The man shifted his wide shoulders. “Sorry. Got no spare. Watch out for the rattlers.” He wheeled the buckskin around. “Stay out of the sun.”

And then he tugged at the lead rope of the pack mule and kicked his horse into a trot and headed out toward the west, not sparing her another look. A sense of utter loneliness engulfed Annabel, bringing back stark memories of the despair and confusion she’d felt after her parents died.

“Wait!” she yelled and ran after him. “Don’t leave me here!”

But the man rode on without looking back.

Chapter Three

Clay Collier made it a mile before he turned around. Reining to a halt, he stepped down from the saddle to picket the pack mule next to a clump of coarse grass, and then he remounted and pointed the buckskin to retrace his steps.

As he rode back to the railroad, Clay cursed himself for a fool. He had a poor record in looking after scrawny kids, and he had no wish to add to it. He’d been minding his own business—he always did—but a man didn’t live long in the West if he failed to pay attention to his surroundings.

He’d seen the kid tumble down from the train as it pulled away. And then he’d seen the man in fancy duds chasing after the kid, yelling something. The wind had tossed away the words, but most likely the kid had been caught stealing.

Clay slowed his pace as he approached the water tower. The kid was sitting on the ground, hugging his knees, head bent. When the thud of hooves alerted him, the kid bounced up to his feet and waited for the horse and rider to get closer.

Clay shook his head in dismay at the forlorn sight. As scrawny kids went, this one was scrawnier than most. The threadbare shirt hung limp over a pair of narrow shoulders. The trousers, patched at the knee, stayed up only with a leather belt drawn tight. Beneath the battered bowler hat, the kid had a white, innocent face and the biggest amber eyes Clay had ever seen on a scrawny kid.

Fourteen, he guessed, and still wet behind the ears. At fourteen, Clay himself had been a man, capable of doing a man’s job.

He brought the buckskin to a halt in a cloud of dust, adjusted the brim of his hat and looked down at the kid. The hope and relief and gratitude stamped on that innocent face made something twist inside Clay. Damn that soft streak of his. Life would be simpler without it.

“Here’s the choice,” he told the kid. “You can stay here and wait for the train. Likely as not there’ll be one tomorrow, or the day after. You have water and food and shade. You’ll be fine. If coyotes bother you at night, you can hide in the coffin.”

Clay paused, fought one final battle with himself and lost.

“Or you can come with me. In a month or so I’ll pick up another delivery and I’ll bring you back and wait with you until the train comes. If you come with me, you gotta work, mind you. Mr. Hicks, who owns the mine, hates slackers.”

One more time, Clay raked an assessing glance over the slender frame hidden beneath the baggy clothing. “In a mine, the only use for scrawny kids like you is to crawl into narrow passages. If you panic about feeling trapped, don’t come.”

The kid said nothing, merely passed back the canteen and the parcel of jerky and waited for Clay to put them away. Then he held up both arms, as though asking for salvation. The sensitive mouth was quivering. Clay reached down a hand and kicked one foot out of a stirrup. In another second the kid would burst into tears, and he did not want to watch.

“I assume you can ride,” he said.

“Only side—” Panic flared in those big amber eyes. The kid made a visible effort to pull himself together and spoke in a deeper voice. “I mean, I am used to mounting on the other side.”

Clay assessed the situation, nodded his understanding and wheeled the buckskin around. Most men preferred mounting with their left foot in the stirrup. At least there was something normal about the kid.

“Climb aboard.” Clay moved the bridle reins to his right hand so he could use his left to swing the kid behind him. A tiny hand slotted into his. Clay noticed the smooth skin, unused to hard work. He boosted up the kid. He was so light Clay nearly flung him all the way over the horse’s back and down the other side.

“Ready?” he said when the kid had settled down.

“Ready,” the kid replied.

Clay could hear a hint of weeping in the muttered word. It gave him an odd, uneasy feeling when the kid wriggled to get comfortable against him, cramming into the saddle instead of sitting behind the cantle, so that their bodies pressed close together.

He kicked the buckskin into a gallop, taking his frustration out with speed. The kid wrapped his arms around his waist and clung tight. The tension inside Clay ratcheted up another notch.

A bad idea, he told himself. It was always a bad idea to give in to the soft streak inside him. A wiser man would have learned from experience to leave scrawny kids to their fate, instead of picking them up and trying to protect them.

* * *

He’d come back for her!

Annabel clung to the taciturn stranger, tears of relief running down her face. She’d been so afraid. She’d been sitting in the shade of the water tower, blaming herself for everything that had gone wrong.

When the money was stolen, she ought to have telegraphed Charlotte in Gold Crossing, but she’d been ashamed for her carelessness. And she knew nothing about the man to whom Charlotte was pretending to be married. Two hundred dollars might be a fortune to Thomas Greenwood, and she didn’t want to add to his burden by confessing she’d lost it.

And it hadn’t seemed to matter if she earned her passage as a shoeshine boy instead of buying a ticket. If anything, after two weeks of instruction from Colin and Liza, she was better equipped to take care of herself during the journey.

But it had been a mistake to run from Cousin Gareth. She should have brazened it out, pretended not to know what he was talking about. He’d appeared confused, unsure of himself. His wind-whipped cry echoed in her mind.

Who am I? I have no memory! Do you know me?

Now that she thought of it, there’d been a scar on his forehead. Cousin Gareth must have received a blow to his head and be suffering from amnesia. He’d not truly recognized her. He’d merely been fumbling in his mind for fragments of recollection. By fleeing, she had alerted him to the truth.

And now, he might come after her. He could get off in Las Cruces, less than forty miles away, and take a train coming the other way. He might even have a horse in the freight car and persuade the train to stop. He could be back before the day was out, and she’d been like a sitting duck beneath the water tower.

But the stranger had come back for her. Annabel pressed her face to the buckskin coat that covered the man’s back. She could smell leather and dust and wood smoke on him, could feel the rock-hard muscles on his belly beneath her clinging arms,

A tension sparked inside her. Never before had she felt a man’s body so close to hers. Before their parents died, she’d been too young to attend social engagements, and for the past four years Cousin Gareth had kept her imprisoned at Merlin’s Leap.

Despite his reticent manner, her rescuer was young and handsome, the kind of man a girl might dream about. Annabel let his features form in her mind. Curly brown hair, hollowed cheeks, straight nose, sharply angled jaw, eyes narrowed in suspicion.

His surliness reminded her of the sailors she’d met from Papa’s ships, but on many occasions she’d discovered a streak of kindness beneath their gruff exterior. She hoped the stranger might be the same, however why was it that men felt compelled to hide their compassion, as if it eroded their masculinity instead of emphasizing it?

The thudding of the horse’s hooves beneath them altered rhythm. They were slowing down. Annabel eased her hold around the stranger’s waist and peeked past his shoulder. Ahead, the pack mule was grazing on stunted vegetation.

They came to an abrupt halt. The man twisted around in the saddle, curled one powerful arm about her and swept her down to her feet. “You’ll ride the mule.”

For an instant, Annabel stood still, staring up at the rugged features of her rescuer. Regret filled her at the loss of his warmth and strength and the sense of safety she’d felt huddled up against him.

“We ain’t got all day,” he said. “Get on the mule.”

“The mule?” Jolted out of her thoughts, Annabel took a cautious step toward the animal. The mule lifted its head and bared its teeth. Parcels and bundles filled the pack saddle, leaving no room for a rider. She turned to the stranger. “Can’t we ride double on the horse? I don’t weigh much.”

If anything, his expression grew even starker. “You cling like a flea.”

“I...” Her mouth pursed at the cutting remark, but she fought back. “And you’re no softer than a rock.”

“Good,” he said. “Then we’ll both be more comfortable if you ride the mule.”

He vaulted down from the saddle, went to the mule and rearranged the load to create a space for her. Turning to face her again, he studied her in that disconcerting manner he had. His gaze lingered on her features a moment longer. He started to say something, then shrugged his shoulders as if deciding it didn’t matter.

“I’ll boost you up,” he told her. Annabel stood and waited. At Merlin’s Leap, if there was no mounting block for her to use, the grooms laced their hands together to create a step.

The stranger made no effort to link his hands to form a step. He merely stood in silence, then gave a huff of frustration. Bending at the waist, he placed one hand against her midriff, the other hand beneath her rump and shoved, tossing her up like a sack of grain. The mule bucked. Annabel flung up in the air, but somehow, as if by miracle, she landed astride between the packages.

“Let’s go,” the man said.

In a blur, he was up on the buckskin and on his way. Alarmed at the prospect of being left behind, Annabel kicked her heels into the flanks of the mule and started bouncing along.

They rode at a steady lope through the dusty desert plateau, stopping only to let the animals rest and drink every now and then. When they came to a river crossing, they refilled their canteens. At another rest stop, the stranger retreated a few paces. Turning his back, he unbuckled his belt and set to work with the buttons on his fly.

“I’ve got to go, too,” Annabel mumbled and darted off in the other direction.

The man glanced over his shoulder. “Mind the rattlers.”

Annabel’s heart was pounding while she took care of her needs behind a creosote bush. Pretending to be a boy would turn out to be a lot more complicated if she had to share close living quarters with a man, especially with a young, attractive one.

* * *

The kid had been crying. Probably had no idea the tear tracks on his dusty face gave him away. When Clay had first noticed the evidence of weeping, he’d tried to think of something reassuring to say, but words had failed him, just like they always did. He didn’t like lying, and in most cases reassurances were nothing but lies, or at best overoptimistic guesses.

The kid found a rock to stand on and mounted on the mule. It seemed to be a point of pride for the kid to climb into the saddle unassisted. Clay vaulted on the buckskin, but instead of setting off he idled closer to the mule.

“What’s your name, kid?”

“Andrew Fairfield.”

“I’m Clay Collier. The man who owns the claim is Mr. Hicks. He can be a bad-tempered devil, but he is generally fair, and he doesn’t go in for beatings.”

“How many men does he employ?”

His brows went up. “How many men?” he said with a hint of mockery. “What do you think he owns, the Vulture Mining Company?”

From the blank look on the kid’s face, Clay surmised the kid had never heard of the richest gold and silver deposit in the southwestern territories.

“You said it’s a mine.” The kid gave him a belligerent scowl.

“Out here, any shovel hole in the ground is called a mine. Where’re you from, kid?”

“Bos—New York City.”

“Well, kid from New York City, this mine employs me, and now you.”

The kid lifted his chin and spoke with a grave earnestness. “I will work for my keep. I am grateful for the opportunity.”

“Ain’t those fancy words. You must have some schooling, kid.” Clay gave him an encouraging nod. “Forget what I said about crawling into holes. Swinging a shovel and a pickaxe is just what you need. Get some meat on your bones.”

Clay took another second to make sure the kid was safely mounted on the mule before he sent the buckskin into an easy trot, satisfied that the kid didn’t seem quite so scared anymore. The familiar feelings of protectiveness surged inside him, mixed with memories of grief and guilt. He quashed the flash of regret. It would be for only a month. Surely, he’d manage to keep the kid safe that long, and could send him off along his way in better shape than he’d arrived.

* * *

The sun sank behind the hills. Twilight fell. As they gained altitude, the sagebrush gave way to pine forests. Gradually, the scenery grew rugged, with deep ravines cutting across outcroppings of gray rock.

Annabel concentrated on staying on the mule while her rescuer led the animal by the rope. Her buttocks hurt from bouncing on the pack saddle. Her stomach growled with hunger. Dust clogged her throat. But she dared not suggest that they stop for a rest, for Clay Collier might have little sympathy for weakness.

When they finally pulled to a halt, darkness blanketed the landscape. The air had turned chilly, making Annabel shiver in her thin cotton shirt and threadbare wool trousers.

Wearily, she observed her surroundings. They were in a clearing of some sort. Ahead, she could see a big, burly man looming in the light of a storm lantern he held high in the air.

Behind the man, shadows played on a solid wall of gray rock. A wooden canopy with a primitive kitchen beneath it huddled against the cliffs. To the left of the canopy, a bonfire burned, illuminating what looked like a cavernous stone overhang.

“I was worried,” the big man said. “Thought you might not make it before the storm breaks.”

“Pushed it hard,” Clay replied. “Brought you another worker. A kid from New York City. Got off the train at the water tower and was left stranded. I’ll take him back next month.”

The man stepped closer, lifting the storm lantern higher. The light fell on his features. Between the brim of his hat and the thick black beard Annabel could see a hooked nose and a pair of shrewd dark eyes.

“I’m a good worker, sir.” She deepened her voice. “I’ll earn my keep.”

The man studied her in the light of the lantern. “Polite, too,” he said. “I have nothing against a kid. It’s women I can’t abide.”

He turned his attention to Clay and questioned him about the delivery. Annabel slid down from the pack mule, alarmed by the man’s blunt words. In silence, she waited while the burly mine owner went to hang the storm lantern on a hook beneath the kitchen canopy. He returned to take the mule by the rope and led the animal to the open cavern, where he began to strip away the load.

Clay had dismounted and was moving about in the darkness. Annabel could hear water sloshing and the clang of metal, perhaps a bucket being set down on the ground, and then slurping sounds as the buckskin lowered its head and drank.

In the yellow glow of the storm lantern and the flickering flames of the bonfire, the men and animals formed eerie shadows, appearing as insubstantial as ghosts as they went about their business, appearing to have forgotten all about her.

Driven by hunger pangs, Annabel edged toward the kitchen canopy. There was a table, with four log stumps as stools, a work counter with shelves above, and a sheet metal stove, similar to the one she’d learned to use while staying with Liza and Colin in their freight yard shack.

On the stove stood a cast-iron pot. Annabel touched one soot-covered side. Still warm. She leaned closer and inhaled the succulent smells. Rummaging on the table, she found a spoon and ran her fingers over the surface to make sure it was reasonably clean before she dipped the spoon into the thick stew and ate in greedy mouthfuls.

Behind her came the thud of footsteps. Annabel spun around, feeling like a child caught at the cookie jar. Clay said nothing, merely reached over to a shelf for a tin plate and filled it with a wooden ladle he took down from a peg.

He picked out a metal spoon from a box on the counter and sat down at the table to eat. “There’s cold water to wash.” He jerked his chin toward a wooden barrel on the ground outside the kitchen canopy. “We sleep under the rock overhang,” he added. “I’ll find you a blanket.”

Shivering with cold, Annabel hugged her body with her arms. She could feel the humidity in the air, could hear the wind gathering force. “Mr. Hicks said something about a storm,” she commented. “Will it rain?”

“Like the angels are tipping buckets over us.”

Clay took another mouthful, gestured with his spoon. “Go wash your face. I’ll fix you a bed.” His eyes lingered on her. “Got no coat?”

Annabel shook her head. “I left it on the train.”

She resisted the urge to touch the money poke hanging around her neck. Instead, she pulled out the tails of her shirt and unfastened the canvas pouch tied around her waist and swung it from her fingers. “I have my own soap.”

“Your own soap, huh? Ain’t you a real gent?” Clay lowered his gaze and focused on his meal.

Annabel went to the water barrel, found an enamel bowl and a ladle propped against the side and scooped water into the bowl. A mirror fragment hung on a piece of rawhide string from a nail hammered into the canopy post. In the dim light Annabel caught her reflection. Embarrassment broke through her fatigue as she noticed the tear tracks on her dusty skin and knew Clay Collier must have noticed them, too.

She scrubbed her face clean, dried her skin with the tails of her shirt. By the time she’d finished, Clay was waiting beside her with the storm lantern. He guided her to the overhang, where a blanket had been spread out on the hard-baked earth.

“You can use your boots for a pillow.”

Annabel glanced around while Clay put away the lantern. Another blanket lay next to hers, and farther away Mr. Hicks was already stretched out and snoring, a hat covering his face. The fire had burned down to coals. The mule and packhorse filled the other end of the cavernous overhang.

“Will someone stand guard?” she asked.

“No need.” Clay stretched out, unbuckled his gun belt but kept his boots on. “The buckskin will hear if anything comes. Wolves don’t stray this far south, and we’ve had no trouble from bears. Go to sleep.” He rolled over, turning his back on her. A minute later, Annabel could hear the sound of his even breathing.

Chapter Four

Clay woke to a crack of thunder. Lightning flared, throwing the pine forest higher up on the hillside into a stark relief that made him think of fingers pointing toward the sky. An instant later, darkness closed around him again, but his mind clung to the image of a small shape sitting on the ground near the edge of the overhang.

He waited for another flare of lighting. When it came, he knew his eyes hadn’t deceived him. He tossed his blanket aside and rolled to his feet, as agile as a mountain cat. Instead of strapping on his gun belt, he pushed the heavy Walker Colt into his waistband and eased over to the kid.

He dropped down to his haunches. “There’s no need to be scared, kid. It’s just a storm, and the ground slopes away. When the rain comes, the cavern will stay dry.”

“I’m not scared.” The kid’s voice was dreamy. “I love thunderstorms. It is different here. At home, you can hear the fury of the ocean and smell the salt spray. The seagulls screech in warning. A storm can mean death to a sailor.”

Clay listened, fascinated. Years ago, he used to carry around a book of poetry he liked to read from, but he had never heard anyone talk like that.

The kid went on, “Here the entire nature participates in the storm, like an orchestra playing a symphony. Thunder roars. Lightning cracks. The wind wails in the trees and the cliffs echo it back, multiplying the sound.”

Clay nodded in the darkness and spoke softly. “When the rain comes, it will add a drumbeat. Sometimes the water cascades down the cliffs so hard you can hear the rattle of pebbles as they roll along.”

Lightning was almost constant now. He could see the kid’s face, in quick snatches as the darkness broke. The delicate features drew his eyes. He liked looking at the kid, although he struggled to understand why. Maybe it reminded him of Lee and Billy, the other two kids he had tried to rescue in the past. Those memories were painful, but he found that looking at the kid gave him pleasure.

“I shouldn’t really like storms,” the kid said. “A storm took my parents. They drowned when their boat capsized. My father was a seaman.”

Clay nodded. His eyes searched the darkness, waiting for another flare of lightning, waiting for another glimpse of the kid. “I know what you mean,” he said quietly. “Sometimes a man can like something without understanding why.”

* * *

The storm passed overnight, and Annabel awoke to a bright dawn. With caution, she surveyed the cavern. The men were gone, their bedrolls and blankets neatly folded on a natural rock shelf by the entrance. At the opposite end, where the animals had sheltered, the stone roof sloped down, and in the far corner she could see a stack of equipment partly covered by an oilcloth tarpaulin.

Satisfied no one was watching, Annabel scrambled to her feet. The aches and pains from the tumble from the train made her wince. She patted her bowler hat, to make sure it remained securely in place, then ran her fingers beneath the brim, to tuck back out of sight any strands of hair that might have escaped. Next, she stamped her feet into the big boots, folded away her blanket and walked over to stack it with the others.

Voices came from the kitchen. Taking a deep breath, Annabel emerged out into the sunshine and set off along the path. The ground steamed in the morning heat, but the air felt cool and fresh after the storm. Mixed in with the scents of mud and wet leaves she detected the tempting aroma of coffee.

Under the timber canopy, Mr. Hicks was bustling by the stove and Clay was seated at the table, eating breakfast. His head was bent, his attention on the food. Annabel slowed her pace to study him. He was wearing a hat, but she could see curly brown hair peeking out beneath the brim, and lean, stubble-covered cheeks. His wide mouth pursed as he chewed each mouthful.

He must have heard her footsteps, for he looked up. Their eyes met, and her breath caught with the sudden jolt. She’d seen handsome men on the train—men who cared about their looks were more likely to have their shoes or boots polished—but none of them had affected her in the same way as Clay did.

A recollection flooded her mind of how it had felt to ride double with him, her body pressed against his. She’d worried about being stranded in the mining camp because it would postpone her reunion with her sisters, but now she welcomed the delay, for it would allow her an opportunity to get to know her rescuer.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” she called out from a distance.

“Ain’t that polite,” Mr. Hicks replied. “You got breeding, kid.”

Pausing to wash at the water barrel, Annabel inspected her appearance in the mirror fragment, not out of vanity but to make sure her disguise remained undisturbed. She continued into the kitchen and settled on one of the log stumps.

Mr. Hicks clattered a tin mug onto the table, poured in the thickest and blackest coffee Annabel had ever seen. He pushed the mug in front of her. “What do they call you, kid? Andy?”

Annabel took a sip of the bitter brew and shook her head. There was safety in the familiar. “My friends call me Scrappy.”

“Scrappy, huh?” Clay reached over and pinched his forefinger and thumb over the slender muscle on her upper arm. “We’ll soon fix that. Get some meat on your bones.”

When he withdrew his touch, the edge of his thumb brushed against the side of her bound breast. Annabel flushed. A strange tingle skittered along her skin, and she covered up her agitation by adjusting her weight on the log stump seat.

Mr. Hicks banged the pots and pans at the stove, came over to set a plate of ham and beans in front of her and settled at the table. She thanked him and ate in silence, observing the men, listening as they discussed the mining.

Mr. Hicks was more bark than bite, she decided, and Clay was one of those people who held his emotions tightly bottled up inside. Last night, during the storm, she had sensed a melancholy in him, but in the daylight he presented a front as closed and forbidding as the cliffs that soared behind the kitchen canopy.

When Clay got up to rinse his plate in the bucket that stood on the floor in the corner, Annabel took the opportunity to speak. “If you tell me what you like to eat and where everything is, I can help in the kitchen. I am accustomed to a stove like that.”

“Tomorrow,” Clay said. “Today I have another job for you.”

He gestured for her to follow. Annabel leaped to her feet and hurried after him, clumsy in her big boots. Clay paused to collect a sledgehammer from the low end of the cavern, and then he led her to the other side of the clearing where four huge timber spokes jutted out from a central hub, like a horizontal wheel set into a circular stone pit. Annabel could see two large rocks hanging on iron chains from the spokes.

Clay halted by the edge of the stone pit and studied the smaller rocks that filled the bottom. He picked up one, discarded it, selected another and straightened with the stone in his hand. “Do you know anything about mining, kid?”

“I thought it is done with pans in creeks.”

“That’s placer mining. We’re lode mining.” He gestured at the rocks covering the base of the stone pit. “That’s the ore. We dig it up in the mine and bring it here. This device is called an arrastre. The mule gets harnessed to one of the spokes and turns the arrastre around. The big rocks chained to the spokes crush the ore. That frees up the gold to be separated with water, just like in placer mining.”

He smiled at her. The low morning sun caught his eyes beneath the brim of his hat. Annabel felt a sudden tug in her chest. Green. His eyes were green, like the ocean by Merlin’s Leap. Oceans were mostly blue, Papa had told her, but the Atlantic by the Eastern Seaboard was usually green.

“Today,” Clay continued in a solemn tone, “the mule is tired from carrying you, so you’ll have to do his job for him.”

“I couldn’t...” Annabel stared at the arrastre, imagined herself harnessed to one of the spokes. She frowned at Clay. “You’re making fun of me.”

“Not at all. But you’ll crush the ore one piece at a time.”

He carried the small rock he had selected a few yards away and placed it on a big flat stone that stood inside a timber circle. He hefted up the sledgehammer and smashed it down on the piece of ore, breaking it into fragments. With a few more blows, Clay ground the fragments into rubble and swept them down to the ground within the timber circle.

“Watch your eyes, in case any stone chips fly up,” he instructed. “And try to make sure the pulverized ore stays inside the fence, so we don’t lose any gold.”

He handed the sledgehammer to her. The weight made her drop it.

Clay grinned. “You are meant to hit the ore, not your toes.”

He fetched another small rock from the arrastre, placed it on the stone slab. Annabel heaved up the sledgehammer and smashed it down. The piece of ore glanced off and landed on the ground outside the timber circle.

“Let’s try again.” Clay bent down, replaced the ore on the slab.

Annabel swung the hammer. Again. Again. Every blow jarred her arms and shoulders, but the rock resisted her efforts.

“Like this.” Clay took the sledgehammer from her.

At the fleeting touch of their hands, Annabel could feel the strength in him, could feel the roughness of his palm against the back of her fingers. Acutely aware of his nearness, almost as if he was touching her even when he wasn’t, she watched Clay lift the sledgehammer with one hand, then casually swing it down again. The rock crumbled into rubble, and he swept the remains down into the timber circle.

“Try a smaller rock,” he suggested.

This time Annabel chose a piece of ore the size of a grapefruit. She swung the sledgehammer. The rock merely bounced up and down. She turned to Clay. “I understand the task. You can go now.” She gestured at the arrastre. “It is not as if I am in danger of damaging the equipment. I think I can work without supervision.”

Clay contemplated her, shifted his shoulders and walked off. Annabel waited while he spoke to Mr. Hicks and then vanished out of sight behind a dried-up oak that leaned against the cliffs, presumably hiding the entrance to the mine.

The instant he was out of sight, Annabel attacked the piece of ore, using the physical task as a means to ease the mental agitation that had taken hold of her. She searched her mind for a suitable sea shanty from the repertoire Papa had taught her and her sisters and sang as she pounded, determination in every blow. A rock would not get the better of her. Not as long as there was a spark of life left in her.

* * *

Clay stepped into the harness and jerked the ore-filled cart into motion. The arrastre was already full from the labors of Mr. Hicks the day before, so he left the cart at the mouth of the mine tunnel and returned inside to collect the storm lanterns that eased the darkness and made the seam of gold glitter in the rock face.

Curious to see how the kid was getting on, Clay mopped his sweaty brow with his shirtsleeve, adjusted the brim of his hat and stepped out into the sunlight. As he sauntered toward the arrastre, he could hear the steady pounding and a grim, breathless voice singing some kind of a tune.

He never kissed his girl goodbye...pang

He left her and he told her why...pang

She drank and boozed his pay away...pang

With her greedy eye on his next payday...pang

She’d robbed him blind and left him broke...pang

He’d had enough, gave her the hove...pang

Clay halted, mesmerized by the sight. The kid was flinging the big hammer high, nearly leaping into the air to increase the arc of his swing, and then he brought the hammer down, his whole body driving the motion.

Clay’s gaze fell on the rounded posterior. With each blow, the kid bent over, and the baggy pants pulled tight over his rear end. Clay felt his gut clench. Aghast, he closed his eyes. What the hell was wrong with him?

Gritting his teeth, he marched over, fighting the confusion and panic that surged within him. “That’s enough.” His tone was brusque. “You are scaring every living creature for miles around with that hollering.”

The kid whirled around and smiled at him. “It’s a sea shanty. Sailors sing them to accompany their work. I told you, my father was a seaman.”

There was such warmth in the kid’s smile, such joy of life, Clay felt his breath catch. Proud as a peacock, the kid pointed at the pulverized ore inside the timber circle. “See? I told you I’d earn my keep.”

Clay peered down. He’d crushed that quantity of ore in ten minutes.

“Good,” he said. “That’s enough for today. Go help in the kitchen.”

As he reached to take the hammer from the kid, his eyes refused to lift from the kid’s radiant features. Sweat beaded on the smooth skin and the innocent face shone red from the effort, but the sense of achievement emanating from the kid was almost thick enough to put into a bottle.

The hammer, slick with sweat, slipped from Clay’s clasp. He waved the kid on his way, then wiped his hands on the front of his shirt and bent to pick up the hammer from the ground. His attention fell on the dark smears his hands had left on his shirt. He lifted the hammer, studied the handle, spotted a trace of blood.

“Kid,” he roared. “Come back here.”

The kid edged back, hands hidden behind his back.

“What did you do?” Clay asked, gently now. “Did you cut your skin on a sharp stone?”

“No.”

He made a beckoning motion. “Kid... Scrappy... let’s take a look.” When the kid refused to obey, Clay inserted a touch of steel into his tone. “Put out your hands.”

The soft mouth pursed in mutiny, but the kid put out his hands, palms up. On each hand, a line of blisters marred the delicate skin.

“You fool,” Clay said, but not without kindness. “You’ll be no good to anyone if you injure yourself. Haven’t you heard of gloves?”

“I tried them. They were too big.” The narrow shoulders rose and fell in a careless shrug. “It’s nothing. Because I’m small and young, I’m used to having to work extra hard to prove myself.”

“Let’s patch you up.” Clay led the kid into the kitchen. Mr. Hicks had gone to inspect the ore in the mine tunnel, leaving dinner bubbling on the stove.

Clay poured hot water into a bowl and located a jar of ointment and bandages on the shelf. Every time a cotton shirt wore out, it was torn into strips, in preparedness for the accidents and mishaps that were inevitable in mining.

He settled the kid on a log stump. Finding it awkward to bend to the task, Clay sat down himself and perched the kid on his knee. One at a time, he washed the kid’s hands in warm water.

The kid had small, fine bones. Clay rubbed ointment on the damaged skin, his fingers sliding gently over the blisters, and then he wrapped a bandage around each hand and secured it with a knot.

He tried to ignore the sudden pounding of his heart. The kid smelled unlike any other scrawny kid he’d ever known, fresh and clean, like a spring meadow. Clay felt his body quicken. Appalled, he realized that holding the kid was stirring up the masculine needs he’d learned to ignore. Roughly, he pushed the kid off his knee.

“That should do.” His voice came out strained. “Leave the dressings on for a couple of hours, until the blisters stop weeping. Then take them off. It’s better to let the air to the skin.” He jolted up to his feet. “I’ll go and check on the horse and mule.”

Not pausing to wait for a reply, Clay hurried down the path that led to a small meadow where the animals stood grazing. Out of sight, he leaned his back against the rough trunk of a pine and inhaled deep breaths, the unwanted waves of lust and protectiveness surging through him.

In the orphanage he’d seen it—boys desperate for the comfort of love formed a bond with another boy, treating each other like a sweetheart. He didn’t condemn the practice, each man to his own, but he’d always dreamed of girls, had even paid for the company of a few, but perhaps in the face of loneliness a man could change his preferences? Could he? Could he?

Chapter Five

Annabel watched Clay walk away and felt a pang of regret. Why had he suddenly turned so morose? Why was he so unfriendly? While she’d been sitting on his knee, his attention on her hands, she’d taken the opportunity to study his face. She’d seen concern in his eyes, concern and protectiveness, but he’d covered them up with a brusque, efficient manner, as if resenting his kindness.

How could anyone keep such a tight rein on his emotions? Her own feelings ran close to the surface, impossible to hide. A moment ago, sitting on Clay’s lap, cocooned in the heat of his body and his fingers gently sliding over her palms, the physical proximity had made her tremble with strange new yearnings.

She longed for his company, his companionship. She’d never been to a dance, had never had a chance to learn about flirting, test her powers of attraction on a man, and now those feminine instincts were surging inside her with a force she found difficult to control.

Annabel sighed in frustration. Of course, Clay thought she was a boy. A scrawny kid. She’d be a fool to endanger her disguise by acting on those new and untested feminine impulses that were suddenly buffeting her, as if she were a boat adrift in the ocean.

A few minutes later, Mr. Hicks banged a wooden spoon against a saucepan lid to announce the midday meal, and Clay strode back up the slope. He must be angry at her for some reason, Annabel decided, for he avoided looking at her while the three of them sat down to steaming plates and ate in silence.

Clay finished first. He dropped the spoon with a clatter on his empty plate and got up without a word and marched off to his task of hacking ore at the mine. A few minutes later, Annabel could hear the dull reverberations in the mountainside.

She remained seated at the table, idly spooning the thick stew of stringy meat and tough, tasteless vegetables. Mr. Hicks was leaning back on his log stump, tamping tobacco into his pipe. Annabel speeded up her eating. A gentleman would wait for her to finish her meal, but it was clear to her that the big, burly, bearded Mr. Hicks was no gentleman.

“Where are you from, Mr. Hicks?”

He took the unlit pipe from his mouth. “In the West, you don’t ask a man such questions, kid.”

Annabel lowered her gaze, chewed and swallowed another unpalatable mouthful. She heard the rasp of a match, heard puffing sounds and smelled the smoke. It was not the usual smell of tobacco, but the pleasant scent of fragrant herbs.

“I’m from Kansas,” Mr. Hicks said, contradicting his command not to pry. “My ma was from a good family, but my pa was a good-for-nothing wastrel. She ran off with him and lived to regret it.”

Annabel had no idea how to reply to such a blunt revelation, so she kept eating. Sometimes silence worked better as a prompt than bombarding someone with questions.

“Kid, sometimes you might think I’m two different people,” Mr. Hicks went on. “When the mood strikes, I can talk like my ma, all educated, with fancy turns of phrase. At other times, I hit the bottle and curse like a trooper.

“You’ll find men like that all around the West. They might be a college professor, or a duke’s son, but they all try to sound like a cowboy, for a man feels more comfortable if he blends in with his surroundings. It’s no good being a tiger in the desert, or a camel in the jungle.”

“How long have you known Clay?”

“Clay?” Mr. Hicks puffed on his pipe. “Five years ago he rode up on a flea-bit pony to my claim in northern Californy. I was just about to pack up and leave that worthless ditch in the mud. There was something stark about Clay, but he was a good, strong lad, so I let him tag along.

“For a while, we worked for a big outfit in Nevada. Clay seemed to have some kind of a death wish. When there was blasting to be done, he volunteered for the job. When a mine tunnel was unsound, he chose to work there. Then he settled down, became more sensible. I never figured out what had been eating him up. He never talks much about his past. All I knew is that he grew up in an orphanage.”

Empathy tugged at Annabel. He was an orphan, too! She recalled the grief, the emptiness, the terrible sense of being alone after Mama and Papa died. At what age had Clay lost his parents? Or could it be that he’d never known them, had been abandoned at birth. She longed to find out more, but Mr. Hicks had already declared he’d shared the sum of his knowledge, so she chose another line of questioning.

“How long have you been at this claim?”

“Since April. If we want to stay on when the winter comes, we’ll have to build a cabin, or at least a wall to enclose the front of the cavern. Winters are fierce this high up in the mountains.”

“Is there much gold in the mine?”

“Some. Might be more, but we ain’t found it yet.”

“Are there other claims nearby? Is the area rich with strikes?”

“This here country is called the Mimbres Mountains, after an Apache tribe with the same name. There’re still a few Indians around, but they haven’t bothered us none.” Mr. Hicks paused to inspect his pipe. “There was a big strike in Hillsboro some years back. That’s ten miles north of here. They have a town there, with stores and everything.”

“Why don’t you get your provisions there?”

“Don’t get on with the storekeepers in Hillsboro.”

Mr. Hicks spoke in a tone of bitterness. Annabel suspected there were lots of people in the world with whom the gruff old man did not get on. She pushed her empty plate aside. “Can I help with anything?”

“Give your hands a rest, kid. Take a walk around. There’s a creek over yonder.” Mr. Hicks took the pipe out of his mouth and used the stem to point. “And the horse and mule graze in a small meadow a mite down the hill. If you learn your bearings today, you can carry and fetch when your blisters heal.”

He took a few more puffs in silence, then resumed talking. “I have a friend in Valverde, fifty miles north up the rail track. He puts provisions on the train and the conductor leaves the parcels in the mailbox by the water tower. If we run out, we hunt for food, or we go hungry.”

For another ten minutes, they lingered at the table. Annabel learned the mine tunnel was narrow and the men took turns to work in the cramped space. When it was Clay’s turn, Mr. Hicks took care of the chores around the camp. When Mr. Hicks went down the mine, Clay harnessed the mule to the arrastre and crushed the ore. Mr. Hicks did not like the task, for he did not get on with the mule.

“We had another saddle horse and two more pack mules when we came out prospecting,” Mr. Hicks explained. “But we had to sell them to pay for supplies. As soon as we have money to spare, we’ll replace them, or at least the saddle horse. It’s no good for a man to be without transport of his own.”

“What are the horse and mule called?” Annabel asked.

Mr. Hicks frowned. “The horse is called a horse, or the buckskin. The mule is called the mule.” His expression grew bleak. “Better not to treat them as pets. Makes it easier to shoot them if you have to.”

Clay’s warnings about the old man’s temper rang in Annabel’s mind, but she steeled herself against an outburst and asked the question that had been playing on her mind. “Mr. Hicks, what do you have against women?”

He gave her a long look, then fastened his gaze on the line of trees beyond the clearing. “They promise you paradise, but they give you hell. You’re too young, kid, but when you grow up you’ll figure that a woman can be all sweetness on the outside and poison on the inside. They lure a man with honeyed talk but stick the knife of betrayal between your shoulder blades when you turn your back. Mark my words, kid. One day you’ll find out.”

Annabel hung her head, ashamed. What she was doing now, interrogating him about his past while dressed as a boy, was a betrayal, in a way. Uneasy, she got to her feet. “I’ll go and see if I can find my way to the creek.” Casually, she added, “Do you ever bathe in the stream?” Her scalp was starting to itch, from the way her hair was coiled tight inside the bowler hat.

“Sure, kid. There’s a good spot for bathing.” Benign again, Mr. Hicks gestured at her bandaged hands. “Take your time, kid. If you peel off the dressings, the cold water will soothe your skin. I have some mending to do. There’s a hole in my boots the size of Alaska. When you get back, you can help me prepare supper.”

* * *

Clay lowered the pickaxe and blinked against the dust in his eyes. A lantern hanging from an iron peg hammered into the rock cast a dull sphere of light. Normally, Clay didn’t mind the sense of being trapped inside the earth. There was peace in being underground, surrounded by silence, and the hard physical labor of a miner cleared a man’s troubles from his mind.

But today his mind found no comfort in the steady clink of the pickaxe against the seam of ore. Clay told himself it was because the thin vein of gold was petering away, threatening the future of the mine, but he knew it was a lie.

The cause of his unease was the kid. The scrawny kid who filled his thoughts in the way no scrawny kid should be allowed to do. With a grunt of frustration, Clay lowered the pickaxe and bent to pick up the canteen by his feet. He uncapped the lid, tipped his head back to drink. Not a drop of water left inside. Clay sighed, reached to the rock ceiling to take down the lantern and used it to guide his way out. At the mouth of the tunnel, the bright sunshine made him squint.

As he waited for his eyes to adjust, Clay spotted the kid emerging from the cavern. There was something stealthy about the kid’s movements, the way he glanced all around, as if to make sure no one was watching. Curious, Clay drew back against the sunbaked cliff, hiding behind the dried-up oak that shielded the mine entrance.

He watched as the kid set down the path, heading toward the creek. The kid was not carrying a bucket, so he was not fetching water. An empty flour sack hung draped over one skinny forearm, like a towel. In his other hand, the kid carried the bar of soap he’d been so proud about.

Clay hesitated. The kid seemed to relax, sauntering along. He was humming one of those sea shanties, not taking the time to study his surroundings. There could be anything out there in the forest. A bear. A mountain lion. Rattlers liked to coil up on rocks that reflected the heat of the sun.

Clay set off to follow the kid, but he kept his footsteps quiet and hung back, remaining out of sight. His gut seemed all tied up in knots. Guilt and shame and a terrible sense of confusion filled his mind, like a headache pounding at his temples.

The kid came to a halt by the creek. Bright rays of sunshine cut through the canopy of trees, like rich seams of gold. The water made a merry gurgle as it rippled over a boulder, gathering into the tiny pond they had dammed for bathing.

The kid hopped onto a flat rock and ducked to set the flour sack and the cake of soap by his feet. Then he removed the bandages from his hands and took a moment to study his palms. Next, he lifted his hands to the buttons on the front of his threadbare shirt. Peeking between the trees, Clay held his breath.

What was wrong with him?

Why did he want to watch the kid strip down?

Curious. He was curious. And concerned. There had been something odd in the way the kid had glanced about him before setting off to bathe. And those baggy clothes the kid wore, and the way he never took off his hat. Maybe he was covering up some injury—scars from an accident, or some defect he was born with.

Clay kept watching, the turmoil of emotions anchoring his feet to the ground. The kid pushed the cotton shirt down his narrow shoulders. Clay’s brows drew into a frown. He’d guessed right. A wide bandage circled the kid’s torso, covering him from armpit to waist.

With nimble hands, the kid undid the clasps that held the bandage secure and began unraveling it. Loop after loop, the fabric fell away, revealing an expanse of smooth, white skin. His shoulder blades protruded slightly on either side of the narrow groove of the spine. Angel’s wings, Clay had once heard someone describe such a feature, but that had been on a woman.

He could see nothing wrong with the kid, no deformity, if you didn’t count the lack of muscle and the oddly tiny waist. The final loop of the bandage fell away and the kid bent to set the bundle of fabric down on the stone. When he turned to pick up the soap, the curve of a small, rounded breast peeked into view.

Clay’s mind seized up with the shock. He took a step back and sank on the ground, elbows propped on his knees, head cradled in his hands. The vegetation formed a barrier between them, but the sight remained burned in his memory.

The kid was a girl.

A huge wave of relief crashed over Clay. There was nothing wrong with him, no sudden change in his mental makeup. He didn’t think of boys in such a way. It was simply that his body had figured out the truth before his mind knew.

Of course. Of course.

Fragments of recollection ricocheted around his brain. The voice. Mostly, the kid spoke in a low voice, but sometimes he forgot and the pitch climbed high. And that soft skin...those big eyes...the slender shape...and sometimes, when the kid prattled on, there was something downright feminine and coquettish about his manner.

Her manner.

A girl.

As the shock of the discovery faded, Clay’s senses began to function again. He could hear the girl singing, could hear the splashing of water. He felt his body tighten. She was bathing.

Temptation tugged at him like a physical pull. He shouldn’t look. It was not the gentlemanly thing to do. But he was powerless to resist the masculine inclination. Easing up onto his feet, he peered between the leaves of a scrub oak.

She was kneeling on the stone, bending forward, washing her hair. Long and black, it cascaded down in a sleek curtain. Now Clay understood why the kid never took her hat off in front of others. She couldn’t have been pretending to be a boy for very long, for if she had, she would have been forced to cut her hair.

Turn around, Clay urged in his mind. Turn around.

But she did not. His eyes lingered on what he could see—the nape of a slender neck, the narrow span of those angel wing shoulders, an impossibly slender waist and the feminine curve of hips, hidden inside the mended wool pants.

Would she strip completely? Would she take off her pants? Would she turn around, giving him another glimpse of those small, rosy-tipped breasts? Clay felt his heart hammering away in his chest as he watched the girl. She was singing again, in breathless snatches while she soaped and rinsed her hair.

Cape Cod girls ain’t got no combs,

They brush their hair with codfish bones...

Cape Cod kids ain’t got no sleds,

They slide down the hills on codfish heads...

Cape Cod girls ain’t got no frills,

They tie their hair with codfish gills...

As the afternoon sun burned in the sky, the girl straightened in her kneeling position. She canted her head to one side and wrung the water from her hair, taking care not to hurt her blistered hands. And then, turning a little, she reached for the flour sack on the stone, and Clay got the peek he’d been waiting for. The sight of those firm, tip-tilted breasts made his gut clench.

After patting her skin dry, the girl rose to her feet and picked up the long strip of linen and used it to disguise her feminine shape again. Hurrying now, she pulled her cotton shirt back on and leaned down to gather up her soap and the makeshift towel and the bowler hat propped beside her feet.

Without a sound, Clay retreated up the path to the small meadow where the horse and mule stood grazing. While he took a moment to allow the storm of agitation inside him to ease, he stroked the floppy ears of the mule and mulled over the situation.

How long could the girl protect her secret? Should he let her know he’d stumbled upon the truth? And what about Mr. Hicks? The gruff old man hated women. What would happen when he found out? And he would find out, for there was no way the girl could keep up the pretense for a month. No way on earth.

Chapter Six

As they sat down to supper, Clay stole curious glances at the girl in the fading twilight. The loose shirt and trousers swamped her slender frame, and the bowler hat was pulled low, but even then, how could he have failed to notice it before?

In his mind, he tried to recall their conversations. He’d never really talked to a woman before. Had he said things that might have offended her delicate sensibilities? He could not think of anything.

After they finished eating, Mr. Hicks lit his pipe, as was his custom. Using a mix of tobacco and herbs, he puffed out fragrant clouds of smoke that helped to disperse the insects swarming in the air.

Clay got to his feet. “I’ll crush a bit of ore. The arrastre is too full.”

Mr. Hicks spoke around the stem of his pipe. “Daylight’s almost gone.”

“I’ll light another lantern.”

Clay fetched a storm lantern from the cavern, topped up the coal oil, lit the flame and turned the wick high. Then he walked over to the stone slab, set the lantern on the ground and picked up the big hammer. Putting all his worry and troubled thoughts into the blows, he pulverized piece after piece of the gold-bearing ore.

Mr. Hicks tapped out his pipe, called out his good-night and took himself off to the cavern. Clay did not cease his pounding. From the periphery of his vision, he kept an eye on the girl. She’d finished clearing up and was standing on the edge of the kitchen, silhouetted in the glow of the lantern behind her as she watched him.

“Shall I leave the light on for you?” she called out.

“Take it with you,” he called back. “I have mine.”

The girl took the lantern down from the hook in the kitchen ceiling and used it to illuminate the short walk over to the cavern. It was a warm night, and they hadn’t lit a bonfire under the overhang.

Clay saw her settle under a blanket, with the rounded bowler hat still covering her head. The lantern light went out. Up to now, he’d been puzzled why anyone might prefer to sleep with their hat on, the brim squashed against the ground, but now he understood she needed to hide her long, glossy hair from prying eyes.

For another hour, Clay labored, grappling with his thoughts, trying to decide on the right course of action, as well as attempting to drive his body into exhaustion, so he could overcome the needs that the sight of the half-naked girl had jolted into life.

Only when he felt certain she would be asleep did Clay cease his pounding. He stopped for a quick wash at the water barrel. Seeing his reflection in the mirror, he ran his palm over the stubble on his jaw.

Not pausing to consider the merits of the idea, he scooped fresh water into the enamel bowl and spread a thick layer of soap over the lower half of his face. He pulled out the knife tucked into his boot and scraped away the week-old beard.

By now, the moon had risen. He put out the flame in the lantern and waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. When he could make out the layout within the cavern, he eased over, keeping his footsteps silent.

He sat down, pulled out the gun tucked into his waistband, checked the load and laid the weapon down within an easy reach. Without a sound, he took off his hat and wrapped into a blanket. Then he rolled onto his side and let his gaze rest on the small shape next to him.

A man like him had little chance to meet decent girls. Up to now, those encounters had been limited to exchanging a few words with a girl working in a store or serving food in an eating house. And he’d never slept with a woman before. His only experience of closeness had been a few tumbles in a whore’s bed. And now a girl lay beside him. A beautiful girl, with milky-white skin and hair as black as midnight and sleeker than an otter’s pelt.

If he reached out, he could touch her. And he wanted to, so much it hurt. If nothing else, he wanted to simply rest his fingertips on her shoulder, to prove that she really existed, that there really was a lovely girl sleeping right beside him.

The willpower Clay had to exert to resist the longing told him what he had to do: he must take the girl back to the railroad. As soon as he could, he had to find some means to help her continue on her journey.

If he let her stay, not only would there be trouble when Mr. Hicks found out, but a month was long enough to start caring about another person. He didn’t want to let her crack his emotions wide open and wriggle her way into his heart, only to rip it out and take it with her when she left.

It had been bad enough when Lee and Billy died. If he became attached to this girl, it would be a thousand times worse when he found himself alone again. There was only one solution. The scrawny kid who was a girl had to go.

* * *

Despite the bright morning sun, Annabel woke up shivering with cold. Beneath her hat her coiled hair covered her scalp like a damp cap. Next time, she would have to wash her hair in the morning, to allow it time to dry. At least the blisters on her palms no longer hurt and her muscles ached only when she made a sudden move.

She looked around the cavern. The men and animals were gone. She lifted her arms in a lazy stretch, then stilled as the world outside exploded into a cacophony of noises—crashing and grating and the clanking of iron chains.

Startled, even a little frightened, Annabel lowered her arms. Making haste, she pulled on her boots and went outside, driven by curiosity and alarm as much as by hunger and thirst and other physical needs.

On the far side of the clearing, she could see the mule, harnessed to the arrastre, plodding round and round in a slow circle. The pair of huge rocks hanging from the spokes of the arrastre smashed against the smaller rocks in the confines of the stone pit, grinding up the ore.

The noise boomed in her ears. A cloud of dust floated over the arrastre pit. On the other side of the arrastre, Clay was walking up the path, carrying a bucket of water. When he noticed her, his gaze lingered on her with an intensity that banished the last of the early-morning chills.

Halting in her approach, Annabel watched Clay as he set the bucket on the ground and then ran around the arrastre pit to catch up with the mule. Taking hold of the harness, he brought the animal to a stop beside the water bucket.

The grinding noises ceased, leaving a sudden silence. The mule buried its long nose in the bucket and drank, with eager blowing and splashing that filled the quiet. Clay stroked the animal’s lathered flank and tugged at the harness, inspecting the hide to make sure the leather straps were not causing sores.

Annabel loitered over. She could tell Clay’s touch on the mule was gentle, just as it had been when he bandaged her hands. A rebellion stirred in her mind. It seemed to her that kindness and warmth simmered behind Clay’s cool facade, but he hoarded those emotions like a miser might hoard a bag of coins.

Something in her demanded that she force him to reveal those emotions, like her own emotions always flowed freely for others to see. She wanted to strike against the hard surface he presented to the world and make it crack, for no man could be made of stone the way he pretended to be.

She ambled closer. “You’re very kind to that mule. You must love the creature.”

Clay shot her a surly glance from beneath the brim of his hat. “No love to it. An injured animal is no good. It was the same with your blistered skin. You’ll be no good as a laborer if you can’t use your hands.”

“Are you comparing me with the mule?”

“The mule is a darn sight more valuable than a scrawny kid.”

His voice was deadpan, but Annabel could see a shadow of a smile tugging at his mouth. She edged closer and peeked into the circle of stones. “How can I convince you of my value?” she asked, glancing at him over her shoulder. “Will you teach me how to separate the gold from the gravel?”

She could feel Clay’s attention on her, saw him shift uneasily on his feet. Again, Annabel could sense his sudden withdrawal. “No,” he said curtly. “Not today. I need to crush the ore. There’s another cartful waiting at the mine. You can work in the kitchen. See what you can put together for a noonday meal.”

His rebuff ought to have offended her, but instead it triggered a frisson of excitement. She had little experience of young men, apart from the footmen and grooms at Merlin’s Leap, and they had treated her with a formal respect. She had never had a chance to banter with a young man, and now the challenge filled her with a heady fascination.

Leaving Clay to tend to the mule, Annabel went into the kitchen. A pot of coffee, still warm, stood on the table, with a plate of biscuits. And next to them, a jar of honey! She sat down, poured coffee into a cup and spread honey on two biscuits and devoured them, not touching the rest, in case they were intended as a midmorning snack for the men.

Finished, she dusted the crumbs from her fingers and examined the skin on her palms. There was no sign of infection, just some ragged edges of burst blisters that were beginning to harden into calluses.

Satisfied with the signs of healing, Annabel got up to survey the kitchen contents, starting with the row of grain bins beneath the work counter. Flour. Evaporated vegetables. Rice. Beans. More beans. Jerked meat, perhaps venison.

Her inspection progressed to the shelves. Canned goods. Tins of evaporated milk. Another jar of honey. A crock of cooking oil. Kerosene for lamps. Matches in a waterproof tin. A bag of salt and small pouches of spices, not imported ones, such as saffron or pepper, but some kind of native herbs.

There was plenty of flour, and Liza had taught her how to bake bread. Dinner would be beans and rice, with bread and honey for dessert. Annabel rolled up her sleeves and set to work.

The mule had resumed its plodding circle. The grinding noise boomed over the clearing. Dust floated in the air. Annabel stirred dough in a bowl, gripping the wooden spoon with her fingertips to ease the pressure on her blisters.

She took to singing a sea shanty, altering the words to suit the occasion. After a few verses, she raised her voice to compete with the crashing and banging and the clatter of the mule’s hooves.

They say, old Clay, your mule will bolt,

Oh, poor old Clay, your mule will bolt,

Oh, poor old Clay!

For thirty days you’ve ridden him,

And when he bolts I’ll tan his skin,

Oh, poor old Clay!

And if he stays you’ll ride him again,

You’ll ride him with a tighter rein,

Oh, poor old Clay!

When she got to the end, she started again, increasing the volume until she was bellowing out the words. So engrossed was she in the competition to produce the most noise that when the mule stopped, she went on, her voice preventing her from hearing the sound of footsteps as they thudded over.

“There you go again, scaring every living creature in the forest.”

Instead of pausing in the middle of a verse, Annabel put extra force in the final “poor old Clay” before she turned to face him.

The bowl nearly slipped from her fingers. He’d taken off his shirt! Standing on the edge of the kitchen, one arm lazily dangling from a timber post, Clay leaned forward and studied the evidence of her efforts.

“What are you making?” he asked.

Annabel tried to look away, but her eyes refused to obey. A strange new sensation clenched low in her belly. Her head spun, as if she’d been holding her breath for too long.

She gave up the attempt to avert her eyes and let her gaze roam over him. She could not recall ever seeing a man’s naked chest before, not even Papa’s, for a gentleman did not remove his shirt in the presence of his daughters.

Clay’s body was lean, his arms roped with muscle, and beneath the sheen of perspiration Annabel could see a ridged pattern on his abdomen. Higher up, his torso broadened, and hidden in the sprinkling of dark hair on his chest, Annabel noticed two flat brown nipples, different from the pink tips of her own breasts and yet somehow the same.

“What are you staring at?” Clay stepped closer. “Your eyes are like dinner plates. Haven’t you ever seen a man peeled to his belt before?” Reaching out, he pinched a dollop of dough from the bowl and popped it into his mouth.

Lips pursed, cheeks hollowed, he considered the flavor. Annabel studied the rugged features, now clean-shaven instead of covered with a thick coat of beard stubble.

Her attention settled on his mouth, and all of a sudden a wave of heat rolled over her. She knew she was blushing scarlet. Clay stiffened. The change she was learning to recognize in him came over again, as if a storm cloud had rolled in from the ocean, obliterating the sun.

“Better get back to work.” His voice was gruff.

Annabel watched him go. And something tempted her to go after him. Curiosity. Devilment. Playfulness. The strange new tugging in the pit of her belly. Perhaps even the challenge she had set for herself earlier, to jolt him out of his carefully constructed coolness and indifference.

Quickly, she finished her kitchen chores. When the bread was baking in the oven and a pot of beans simmering on the stovetop, she left the shelter of the kitchen canopy and strolled over to the arrastre. The mule was going round and round again, the stones crashing and grinding, dust rising in the air.

Clay was bent over a bucket to splash water over his face and arms. When he straightened, their eyes met. For a moment, they looked upon each other. Annabel held her breath. She could feel all those pent-up emotions seething within Clay, creating pressure, a force as powerful as the head of steam that drove the engine on the train.

Like a door closing, Clay’s features hardened. Using the flat of his palm, he flicked away the droplets from his face, and then he turned to look the other way. Pointedly ignoring her, he went to coax the mule to a greater speed.

Bolder now, not even trying to hide her interest, Annabel watched him. She could feel his irritation rising, as if the storm clouds in his mind were about to burst into thunder and lightning.

When the mule needed a break, the noise ceased. At first, the world appeared silent in contrast, but an instant later Annabel could pick out the mocking call of a blue jay and the rustling in the trees as a squirrel leaped from branch to branch.

“Your skin is nicely bronzed,” she called out to Clay. “You ought to always stay clean-shaven. Otherwise the top half of your face will tan but the lower half will remain pale. It will look funny. Girls won’t like it.”

“Girls?” Clay drawled. “What might you know about it?”

“Plenty. I have two older sisters.”

“How old?” Clay stole a glance toward his shirt hanging on a juniper on the edge of the clearing, but he made no move to retrieve the garment.

“Twenty-four and twenty-two.”

His shoulders shifted in a careless shrug. “Just right for me, then.”

The jolt of jealousy at the imaginary prospect took Annabel by surprise. She brushed the feeling aside and went on with her probing. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-three.”

“Twenty-three?” Her voice rose in surprise. “I thought you were older. Close to thirty.”

“Everyone grows older at the same rate but some grow up faster.”

“Mr. Hicks says you have been with him for five years. That means you were eighteen when he employed you. Are you an orphan as he says?”

“Yes.”

“How old were you when your parents died?”

Clay took down his hat, raked one hand through his thick brown curls and replaced the hat on his head. For a moment, Annabel thought he might not reply. When he spoke, his tone indicated his patience was wearing thin.

“Six.”

Six years old. So, he hadn’t been abandoned at birth. He’d have memories. He’d have suffered the grief of loss, something they had in common. “Do you remember your parents?” she asked softly.

“I remember a woman’s voice singing.” He gave her a sly look from beneath the brim of his hat. “And a man’s voice telling her to shut up.”

For an instant, the cutting reply silenced Annabel. Then she launched into another attempt to get a peek into his mind. “What happened to you when they died?”

“Aren’t you full of questions today?” Clay glanced up into the clear blue dome of the sky. “Could it be that the sun is frying up your brain?”

Annabel gave him an innocent smile. “Just passing the time.”

Clay walked over to the mule, squatted on his heels to inspect the hooves and spoke without looking up. “Someone took me to the nuns. The nuns only looked after girl orphans, so they sent me to an orphanage that was little more than a workhouse. Boys as young as three were hired out to chimney sweeps and farmers and storekeepers—anyone who would pay.”

Annabel could see the tension in Clay’s naked back and shoulders, could hear the bitter note in his voice. Pity welled up inside her. They were both orphans, but the similarity ended there. Unlike her, Clay had no happy memories of loving parents to draw upon. He’d grown up with cruelty and neglect.

Had he ever felt love? Did he even understand such emotion? Did those hidden feelings of kindness and caring she had credited him with really exist, or had she merely imagined them, fooled by her own sentimental nature?

“How old were you when you left the orphanage?” she asked, aware that any moment now he might decide she was pushing too hard and react with anger.

Clay rose to his feet. Although his voice remained calm, there was no mistaking the warning in his manner. “I was fourteen, and I was not a scrawny kid like you. I was capable of doing a man’s job, instead of loafing about in the sun and bothering other people who have better things to do.”

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