CHAPTER ONE
LAUREL
I'd never been so cold in my life. My fingers had gone from cold to painful and now they were numb. My legs were warmer where they squeezed the horse's sides. I'd thrown my scarf over my head and tied it beneath my chin an hour ago, but it offered no real protection from the snow. It had only been light flurries when I left the stable, but now the flakes were thick and came down so heavily I could see nothing in front of me. The wind had picked up and it blew the snow sideways, the chill biting into my very marrow.
I was lost. Completely and absolutely lost, which meant I was going to die. Virginia City had been my destination when I'd set off, the town only two hours on horseback from home, but I'd been out for so much longer, and the town was nowhere in sight. Of course, nothing was in sight. My eyelashes were coated with snow and it was getting harder and harder to remain awake. Falling asleep would be bliss, especially with warm, thick blankets, a roaring fire and hot tea. Dreaming as I was did nothing to change my predicament. I was going to die. Foolishly.
But what had I been expected to do? Stay at the house and let Father barter me off as part of a business transaction? Mr. Palmer had dangled the sale of his land, along with several thousand head of cattle, for me. Yes, I was the price. Perhaps not all of it, but the man had made the financial amount reasonable enough for Father to be hooked like a fish with a nice fat worm. Then, once he had my father eager, he'd given him the true price. His daughter. I'd lived at a school in Denver since I was seven, shipped away and forgotten for fourteen years. Then, two months ago, a letter requested my return. I'd thought, after all that time, my father had wanted me and I'd foolishly grasped onto that hope. My illusions were shattered yesterday when Mr. Palmer had arrived to meet me and the men had told me their plan.
It was then I realized my true value for Father. I wasn't his daughter, but a prized mare he'd sold to the highest bidder. He'd sent for me only to marry me off to Mr. Palmer and finalize his deal. I was to be traded for a swath of land, cattle and water rights. I'd been nothing to him all along, for I was the one who'd killed his wife. She'd died birthing me so it had been my fault.
Marriages of convenience happened all the time in the Montana Territory. A woman couldn't survive on her own without a man; that was a given. But I hadn't even been in Simms, let alone Montana Territory. I'd been a ward of the school in Colorado. Regardless, my life was not my own; I would not be a pawn in Father's land negotiations. Especially not when the price, for me at least, was so high.
My prospective groom was at least fifty. He had three grown children, two who were married and lived in Simms, the third in Seattle. It might have been tolerable to be the man's wife while being younger than his children, but the man was shorter than I, had a belly that reminded me of a whiskey cask and had more hair on the back of his hands than on his head. Worst of all, he was missing teeth, and the ones that remained were yellow from chewing tobacco. And he smelled. The man was repulsive. If he’d been tall and handsome and virile, making my heart race and my cheeks flush in his presence, that would have been something else altogether. Father had said the deal was done, the contracts signed. The only legal work left was acquiring a marriage license—and with tomorrow being Sunday, would be resolved at the morning church service.
So instead of marrying Mr. Palmer, I was going to die. I, Laurel Turner, chose to freeze to death over marrying an unattractive, unappealing, overweight geriatric. My anger toward the man, and my father’s lack of consideration for what I wanted, had me spurring the horse harder.. Perhaps I could see a light, a house, a building, anything in this frozen squall where I could seek shelter. Numbly, I wiped my hand over my eyes in disbelief. Was that a light? A yellow glow, muted and soft, appeared briefly through the snow, and then disappeared.#p#分页标题#e#
Hope shot through me and I turned the horse in that direction.
MASON
"I'll get more wood for morning," I told Brody, who was working at his desk. We were in the parlor, the fire in the hearth heating the room and the house beyond against the bitter cold night. Wind and snow rattled the windows. I went to one and pulled back the thick curtain. All I could see was my own reflection and snow blowing sideways. "I imagine the wood pile will be buried by then."
Brody looked up from some papers he'd been studying. "Is the box in the kitchen full?"
"I'll check and stoke the stove before bed."
My friend just nodded and returned to his work. There wasn't much ranching to be done in the dead of winter beyond making sure the cows didn't drop dead out in weather such as this, and tending to the horses. The days were short, the nights long. Only the heartiest of men survived in the Montana Territory, but for me, for Brody and the rest of the men from our regiment who built the Bridgewater Ranch, it was home.