Blackstone's Bride. Bronwyn Williams

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      The runty redheaded man appeared at the door, eyes narrowed against the bright morning sun. “’Mon in, Heck. Set a spell.” Digger was a flatlander who’d married a Miller and produced two children—a daughter, Varnelle, and a son, Alaska, the latter named for the dream he’d always had of heading north in search of gold.

      When he’d heard about Dexter’s Cut, he’d figured he’d save time and money by filing a claim on Miller land. Couldn’t be done. So he’d filed a claim on one of the Miller women instead, which was less trouble in the long run. He’d never found more than a few grains of gold, hardly enough to be worth his time digging. But then, his luck might not have been any better in Alaska, and he was too old now to start over.

      It was common knowledge that Heck had never had much use for Alaska, so Digger said, “I reckon you come to see Varnelle. She’s over to Miss Lucy’s. Gone to get something for my wife’s bellyache. Right useful girl, my Varnelle. Pretty, too, if I do say so as shouldn’t.”

      Fortunately, Varnelle took after her mother. Digger was a homely man.

      “Nope, I come to see you.” Heck sat on the room’s only chair while his host settled onto one of two wooden benches. “Nice weather,” he added. An educated man, Heck knew when to haul out his company manners.

      “Tol’able,” the old man responded.

      Heck had thought long and hard before approaching Digger, but the buck-nekked truth was, he loved his daughter. “Hear tell you been panning some,” he ventured. Most of the locals panned the creek on days when it was too hot to work the fields. That way they didn’t have to feel guilty for laying out while their women were firing up a hot stove to cook their dinner.

      “Panned some last week. Didn’t do no good. Wore m’knees out, but that there gold’s done washed all the way down to the river and gone by now. Ever’body knows that.”

      “Then how come you wasted time pannin’?” This was going to be tricky as a tote sack full of rattlers. Digger wasn’t mean like Alaska. What he was, was crafty. It took a right smart man to get around him, and third-grade education or not, Heck wasn’t sure he was up to the task.

      For Varnelle, though, he was bound to try. “About your daughter,” he began when the old man cut him off.

      “I seen the way you been lookin’ at her, boy. You ain’t foolin’ me, nosiree.”

      “Well now, she’s a right pretty woman for a redhead.” He thought he’d add the qualifier so as not to appear too eager.

      “Tell you what I’ll do, boy. You ain’t the onliest man that’s come a-sniffin’ at her heels, but you show up with Dev’s share of the mine and I’ll set you right up there at the top of the list. Can’t say fairer’n that.”

      Heck pursed his lips, laced his fingers across his flat belly and looked thoughtful. “Well now, much as I’d like to oblige, I don’t reckon I can do that.” He’d expected some kind of a clinker. Old Digger was a greedy man, always had been. “On the other hand, don’t reckon any of the others can, either, so that makes us even.”

      They passed the time of day for a few more minutes, and Heck made a point of mentioning what a blessing an unmarried daughter was to an old man and his woman. “’Course, lacking a husband to keep ’em sweet, a woman’ll turn real sour as she gets older. Some of ’em gets downright mean. I don’t reckon you’ll mind that none, though, seein’s she’s kin.” He paused to let the words sink in. “Have to support her, too, but at least she’ll be around to see you laid out all nice and proper when the time comes.”

      He left a few minutes later, the question he’d come to ask still unanswered. Digger Hooten was not only crafty, he was smart as a whipsnake.

      If there was any way in the world Heck could get his hands on Dev’s share, he would do it in a minute, yessir, that he would. Trouble was, those shares weren’t like pieces of paper a man could slip in and steal. What they were was twenty-five solid acres of the most promising land in the entire settlement, the very same hill where old Dexter had struck pay dirt sixty years ago. The land had been passed down to his grandson, who had died and left it to his widow. The only way a man could lay claim to it now would be to marry Elly Nora.

      Heck didn’t want to do that on account of he loved Varnelle. Besides, if he married Elly Nora, the property would be his, but he’d have to kill her before he could marry Varnelle. And while he’d done his share of killing, he drew the line at killing a woman.

      So he figured he’d just study on it some more. That old hill weren’t going nowhere, he told himself, and neither was Elly Nora.

      Time passed. Hearing a slight sound, Jed opened one eye and there she was again. The light was different now. More time had passed. How much time? He didn’t have time to waste. George was counting on him.

      His thoughts came in batches between painful breaths. He could see her face more clearly now. She was older than he’d first thought…if he’d thought at all. Mostly, he’d just felt and wished he could stop feeling. He studied her some more as she gathered up things from the washstand—a hairbrush that had seen its best days. An ivory comb and a towel. It occurred to him that she resembled a picture of a woman he’d seen in one of the big churches in Raleigh. Hair like a lumpy halo, face like a saint.

      She came over to the bedside then, and he saw the shadows under her eyes. He wanted to offer to give her her bed back—it was obviously the only bed in the house—but he lacked the strength to speak. Lacked the strength to move if she took him up on the offer.

      So he watched her through aching eyes and wondered who she was, what the devil she was doing here, and which was the best way out of here without running afoul of those gun-toting, hell-raising pig-swills that had jumped him down by the creek.

      Her shadowy eyelids were fringed with thick, colorless lashes. With the angle of the light, it was impossible to tell what color her eyes were. Curiously enough, it mattered. He was right partial to blue-eyed women, always had been.

      Hers weren’t blue. But then, they weren’t black, either.

      He tried to turn over onto his side for a better view. Jesus, that hurt! Those bastards had kicked his ribs in, laughing all the while.

      At his gasp, the woman leaned closer. “What hurts?”

      “Everything,” he managed to whisper. He said it with a grin. At least he grinned on the inside—didn’t know if it made it all the way to the surface. Never let it be said that Jed Blackstone wasn’t a good sport, even when he was cashing in his chips.

      Could those goons that had jumped him have been hired by Stanfield? Why else would they try to kill a stranger who’d done nothing more than stop for a drink of water?

      He needed answers and he needed them right damn now.

      That wasn’t all he needed, he suddenly realized. Moving restlessly, he tried to sit up.

      A pair of gentle hands pressed him back down. “Shh, you just lie still and rest. Would you like a drink of water?”

      “No, dammit, I need to p—”

      “Tell me what you need and I’ll get it for you. Don’t even try to get up yet, I think you might’ve hurt your ribs.”

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