Captain Hayes blocked the stable door.
“No.”
Martha stood in front of him wearing Jeb’s coat over her dress.
The coat barely closed over her stomach.
“I’m not requesting permission.”
“You are carrying a child.”
“Yes.”
“You nearly went into early labor.”
“Yes.”
“You cannot chase armed criminals into the mountains.”
Martha tightened the strap around her rifle.
“Then stop me.”
Hayes stared at her.
Behind him, three soldiers suddenly found interesting things to examine elsewhere.
“Martha Bell.”
She froze.
She had never told him her last name.
Hayes saw her reaction.
“Your husband was Jeb Bell?”
“Yes.”
“From Missouri?”
“Yes.”
Captain Hayes sighed.
“I knew his brother.”
Martha blinked.
“Thomas?”
“Served with him before the war ended.”
The frontier had a strange habit of making the world feel both endless and tiny.
Hayes continued.
“If I let Jeb Bell’s pregnant widow ride into Crowe’s camp, his brother will climb out of whatever respectable office he sits in and hunt me.”
“Thomas is afraid of chickens.”
Hayes almost smiled.
“Still.”
Martha stepped closer.
“Boon saved my life.”
“We are going after him.”
“When?”
“First light.”
“That’s six hours.”
“We can’t track safely in darkness.”
“Crowe can move twenty miles in six hours.”
Hayes said nothing.
Martha knew she had him.
Then a quiet voice came from behind them.
“I know where Crowe is going.”
The rescued teenage boy stood in the courtyard.
He looked perhaps fifteen.
Thin.
Dirty.
One eye bruised.
Hayes turned.
“What?”
The boy swallowed.
“He kept talking about an old trapping cabin west of Devil’s Ridge.”
Hayes’s expression changed.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes, sir.”
Martha looked at Hayes.
He cursed quietly.
“Mercer has a cabin near Devil’s Ridge.”
Of course.
Crowe was not merely fleeing.
He was taking Boon home.
Why?
Martha’s stomach tightened.
Revenge.
Hayes immediately called for horses.
Suddenly first light no longer mattered.
They left within thirty minutes.
Martha went too.
Hayes hated it.
But he finally compromised.
She rode inside a light supply wagon driven by Corporal Reed, a quiet young soldier with red hair and an expression suggesting he feared Martha more than Crowe.
“You don’t need to keep looking at me,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You’re still looking.”
“Captain ordered me to make sure you don’t do anything dangerous.”
Martha stared.
“You understand where we’re going?”
Reed considered.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“So that instruction seems poorly thought out.”
He smiled.
They traveled beneath moonlight.
The terrain changed as they moved toward the ridge.
Plains became broken hills.
Pines appeared.
The air cooled.
Martha held herself steady as the wagon bounced over rocky ground.
She felt no contractions.
Only fear.
Boon had become important too quickly.
She hated that.
It would have been easier if he were merely the stranger who rescued her.
But somewhere between the burnt bacon, the storm, and the gunfire outside Fort Laramie, Boon Mercer had become someone she could not imagine losing.
That frightened her because she knew exactly what losing felt like.
She whispered into the darkness, “Jeb, I don’t know what I’m doing.”
The baby moved.
Martha smiled through tears.
“Apparently you don’t either.”
At dawn they reached a narrow valley.
Hayes raised a hand.
Everyone stopped.
Smoke rose through trees ahead.
Boon’s cabin.
Martha’s heart jumped.
Soldiers dismounted.
Hayes approached the wagon.
“You stay here.”
Martha opened her mouth.
He held up a finger.
“I have already lost this argument once. Humor me.”
“Fine.”
He looked suspicious.
“Again, too easy.”
She smiled.
Hayes walked away.
Martha waited exactly two minutes.
Then climbed down.
Corporal Reed stared.
“Ma’am.”
“Quiet.”
“Captain—”
“Is busy.”
“You said you’d stay.”
“No, I said fine.”
“That usually means agreement.”
“Not where I’m from.”
She moved through the trees.
Reed followed because he had no better option.
The cabin appeared below them.
Simple.
Strong.
Boon’s home.
Martha saw a woodshed.
A stable.
A small fenced garden gone partly wild.
Then men.
Four outside.
More inside.
Silas Crowe stood near the porch.
Boon sat tied to a chair.
Blood darkened one side of his face.
Martha stopped breathing.
Alive.
He was alive.
Silas paced around him.
“You should have stayed out of it, Mercer.”
Boon said something Martha could not hear.
Silas struck him.
Her hands tightened around the rifle.
Reed whispered, “Don’t.”
“I know.”
She hated knowing.
Silas leaned close.
“You know what always bothered me?”
Boon raised his head.
“That you survived.”
Martha’s skin prickled.
Silas continued.
“Clara. Samuel. All those people from the fever year.”
He shrugged.
“You decided you were the only one entitled to grief.”
Boon spat blood into the dirt.
“You stole medicine from dying children.”
“I stole property from the Army.”
“You knew.”
Silas smiled.
“Everybody knows somebody’s dying.”
Boon strained against the rope.
Silas stepped back.
“And now you brought another widow into it.”
Martha froze.
Silas knew she had come.
How?
Then she heard movement behind her.
Corporal Reed turned.
Too late.
A revolver pressed against his head.
One of Crowe’s men.
“Drop it.”
Martha slowly lowered the rifle.
The man grinned.
“Knew Mercer’s woman would come.”
“I’m not his woman.”
“Sure.”
Reed looked sick with guilt.
The gunman marched them downhill.
Boon saw Martha.
His face changed from shock to fury.
“No.”
Silas turned.
Then smiled.
“Well.”
“Martha,” Boon growled.
She lifted her chin.
“Good morning.”
“What are you doing?”
“Rescuing you.”
Boon stared at the armed man behind her.
“Going excellent.”
“I’ve had setbacks.”
Silas laughed.
“I like her.”
Boon’s voice became dangerous.
“Touch her and I kill you.”
“You’re tied to a chair.”
“Won’t stay that way.”
Silas walked toward Martha.
He looked at her stomach.
“Well, that complicates things.”
Martha stared directly into his eyes.
“If you’re thinking of threatening my baby, I advise you to reconsider.”
Silas smiled.
“Why?”
“Because Boon is tied to the chair.”
She tilted her head.
“I’m not.”
Silas laughed.
Then Martha heard it.
A birdcall.
Three short notes.
From the ridge.
Captain Hayes.
Silas’s men did not react.
Martha understood.
The soldiers were in position.
She needed distraction.
Silas reached toward her.
Martha slapped him.
Hard.
The sound cracked across the clearing.
Everyone froze.
Silas slowly turned his face back toward her.
Martha smiled.
“That was for the medicine.”
Silas’s expression transformed.
He grabbed her arm.
Gunfire exploded from the ridge.
Chaos.
Martha drove her knee upward.
Silas doubled over.
Reed tackled the man behind them.
Boon threw himself sideways, chair and all.
Soldiers rushed from the trees.
Bullets struck the cabin wall.
Martha dropped behind a trough.
Silas scrambled toward his horse.
Boon, still tied, shouted, “Martha!”
“I’m fine!”
A gunman appeared beside the stable.
Martha grabbed a dropped revolver and fired.
The bullet struck the dirt at his feet.
He fled.
Boon rolled onto his side.
Martha crawled toward him.
“You look terrible.”
“Untie me!”
“Hello to you too.”
She cut the rope using the knife at his belt.
His hands came free.
Immediately he touched her shoulders.
“You hurt?”
“No.”
“The baby?”
“Still kicking.”
Boon closed his eyes briefly.
Relief.
Then Silas fired from horseback.
The bullet struck the porch post inches from them.
Boon pulled Martha behind him.
Silas rode toward the ridge.
Boon reached for the revolver.
Martha caught his arm.
“No.”
“He gets away again—”
“Hayes has riders behind him.”
Boon’s breathing was hard.
His eyes followed Silas.
For six years he had imagined this moment.
Martha knew it.
A chance to kill the man responsible for the worst day of his life.
Boon slowly lowered the gun.
Seconds later, shots came from the ridge.
Then shouting.
Silas’s horse appeared without him.
Captain Hayes rode into the clearing ten minutes later.
“He’s alive.”
Boon’s expression was unreadable.
“Where?”
“Shot through the shoulder. He’ll live.”
Hayes looked at him carefully.
“You all right with that?”
Boon stared toward the ridge.
“For today.”
Martha touched his hand.
Boon looked at her.
Then he pulled her into his arms.
Not carefully.
Not politely.
He held her like a man who had expected never to see her again.
Martha buried her face against his chest.
“You came,” he whispered.
“Of course.”
“You shouldn’t have.”
“I know.”
“You could’ve died.”
“So could you.”
His arms tightened.
“You are the most impossible woman I’ve ever met.”
“You keep saying sweet things.”
He pulled back.
For one moment their faces were inches apart.
Martha thought he might kiss her.
She wanted him to.
That realization carried guilt with it.
Jeb.
Boon must have seen something in her expression because he stepped back.
Not offended.
Understanding.
That hurt more.
Later, while soldiers secured Crowe’s men, Martha walked inside Boon’s cabin.
It was exactly what she expected.
Simple furniture.
A stone fireplace.
Tools.
A bed.
A second small room.
She opened the door.
A child’s room.
Dust lay over everything.
A tiny bed.
Wooden animals.
A faded drawing pinned to the wall.
Samuel’s room.
Boon stood behind her.
“I never changed it.”
Martha turned.
“You don’t have to explain.”
“I kept thinking someday I would.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
Martha looked around.
“Maybe you weren’t ready.”
Boon leaned against the doorframe.
“And now?”
She looked at him.
“Are you asking me?”
“I don’t know.”
Outside, Captain Hayes called for Boon.
The moment ended.
But something had shifted.
Because Martha had seen the empty child’s room.
And Boon had seen her standing inside it with one hand over the life moving beneath her heart.
Neither dared say what the image meant.
Not yet.