Gold Rush Bride. Debra Lee Brown

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СКАЧАТЬ Alaska…now she was something a man could build a life around. Untamed, unspoiled. The adventure of a lifetime. His gaze focused again, and he realized with a start it was fixed on Kate Dennington’s blue eyes.

      That damned miniature must have jumped out of his pocket and into his hand! He gripped it until the silvered edges cut into his palm.

      It was no kind of life for a wife, or children. Not his, or anyone’s. Something dark and bitter balled in his gut as an image of Sherrilyn, her face white in death, her lips blue, crashed into his consciousness.

      Will jammed the miniature back into his pocket and eyed the restless crowd. Where in hell was that livery hand? It was an hour past the appointed time the man said he’d meet him. He’d offered a fair price for Dennington’s gelding, and Will needed every cent he could get his hands on to buy that working passage and make a new start.

      The steamer headed north sailed day after tomorrow from San Francisco, right on schedule, so a riverboat stevedore had told him. The Golden Eagle was boarding passengers now for the day-and-a-half trip downriver to the port.

      Will was out of time. “Damn.” He turned and calmed Dennington’s horse, who grew more agitated as the crowd on the levee began to board.

      He’d bribed that same stevedore to sneak him on the second before the riverboat pushed off. He could be caught, but that was a chance he was willing to take. The bribe had been less than the fare by half.

      Will scanned the faces of the men crowded around him, desperate to find that livery hand. It was a damned fair price, so where the hell—

      “Leon told him once the husband was gone—some trapper or other—they was gonna burn her out.”

      Will froze as his gaze fixed on the rough-looking miner who’d spoken.

      “No kiddin’?” The greasy-haired man beside him laughed. “Well, hell, wouldn’t be hard to do. They don’t call it Tinderbox for nothin’. One match and the whole town’d go up.”

      Will dropped the gelding’s reins and put a gloved hand on the miner’s shoulder.

      “Hey, mister, wait yer turn.”

      Will spun him around to face him, and the miner went for his knife. “We’re all in line, here.”

      Will reached for his gun. Son of a—he’d forgotten he’d lost it to Landerfelt. “Burn who out?” he said, and locked gazes with the man.

      The miner frowned but stayed his hand.

      “Leon Packett told you this?” Will didn’t think Packett was capable of saying anything, for at least a day or two after Matt had launched him through that store window. “Burn who out?” he said again.

      “That Irish gal.” The miner turned to his greasy friend. “What’s her name, you know it? That wagon driver we seen up Horseshoe Bar last night was the one told us.”

      “That’s right. Said some Leon character told him his boss don’t take kindly to no furreigners puttin’ him outta business.”

      “You heard this last night from Dan Dunnett?” He’d give that wagon driver more than a broken nose the next time he saw him.

      “Dunnett. That’s right.” The miner narrowed his eyes. “What’s it to you? You know the lady or somethin’?”

      Will shot them both a dark look. “Yeah, I know her.”

      Perhaps there were rats, after all.

      Kate sat up in bed and strained her eyes to see in the dark. There was no window in the small living quarters of the cabin-turned-store. She’d left the door propped open between the two rooms, and a thin sliver of moonlight played across the rough-hewn floorboards.

      Wait! There it was again. A kind of scraping sound. She narrowed her eyes and listened, but all she heard were the crickets outside. Still, if she did have rats, she’d best take care of them now. They could clean out an entire month’s worth of grain in one night if you let them go unchecked.

      She swiveled quietly out of bed and touched a toe to the floor. Lord, it was cold as ice! She groped in the dark for the chair on which she’d draped her dress and shawl but couldn’t find it. And if she lit the lamp she’d scare the vermin back into hiding.

      Something creaked from the next room, and Kate froze in place. All the hairs on her nape prickled. She held her breath and listened harder. If it was a rat, it was an awfully big one.

      As quietly as she could, she slipped a hand between the bed’s straw mattress and ropes. Her fist closed over the cool steel of the percussion cap pepperbox that had been her father’s pistol since she was just a sprite. Vickery had given it to her along with a single-barrel flintlock rifle and what few other valuables her father had in his possession when he died.

      When she’d left Ireland she hadn’t known a pistol from a dead bolt, but six months at sea with a shipload of strangers, some of them military men, had taught her much. She’d cleaned and loaded the small, six-barrel pistol last night, just in case, never imagining she’d have to use it so soon. Brandishing it in front of her, she inched on tiptoe toward the open door.

      She’d be all right as long as she didn’t trip over anything. Her eyes adjusted slowly to the dark. But the cold! She shivered almost uncontrollably. Her feet were like ice, and the thin wool of her shift provided little protection against the chill air.

      Well, if it were rats she’d feel awfully stupid. Sliding up beside the open door, Kate peeked slowly into the moonlit store. All was quiet. She could swear that something, or someone, was in there. Or had been a moment ago.

      She scanned the floor and countertop, and the half-empty shelves for scurrying rodents. Nothing. Perhaps she’d been mistaken, after all. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d dreamed of vermin or insects creeping up on her. The Dublin tenement had been full of them.

      Her nose wrinkled as she caught a whiff of kerosene. How strange. She’d filled the lanterns that afternoon but could swear she’d sealed the fuel tin. She stepped into the store, squinting toward the corner where her father had housed his tinned goods.

      Two distinctly human footfalls sounded to her left. Without a second thought Kate whirled, leveled the pistol at the sound and fired. The blast shattered the silence.

      A second later the intruder was on her. A scream rose up in her throat as he wrestled her to the floor, fighting for possession of the gun. His knees dug into her spread thighs and pinned her to the splintery floor.

      “Let me go, you bleedin’ bastard!” The pistol jammed as she tried to fire again. No other choice left to her, she hit him with it—a sideways swipe in the dark that grazed his head.

      “Son of a bitch!”

      That voice! She could swear it belonged to—

      He grabbed her wrist and squeezed so tight tears came to her eyes. She dropped the pistol, and in one quick move he pinioned both her arms above her head.

      “Sweet Jesus!”

      “Wrong. Guess again.”

      His face was inches from hers. She could СКАЧАТЬ