Chapter One

      Stagecoach relay station

      Pyrite, Nebraska, 1869

      Nolan West couldn’t shake the feeling he was being watched.

      He flipped open the cover of his timepiece and checked the hour. Twenty minutes before the next stagecoach arrived.

      For the past year, he’d been manning the Pioneer Stagecoach relay station out of the abandoned town of Pyrite. Three years before his arrival, an overly optimistic prospector had discovered gold in the nearby Niobrara River. A town had sprung up practically overnight. Within a year, the claim had dried up, and the town was abandoned. Only the relay station remained occupied.

      Prairie grass nudged through the slats in the derelict boardwalk, and a wet spring had fed the wild brush reclaiming the spaces between the empty buildings. A cacophony of crickets, frogs and birds called from the shelter of the lush buttress.

      Nolan’s sense of unease lingered, raising the fine hairs on the nape of his neck. He searched the shadows, catching only the rustle of the cottonwood leaves. He was alone. Yet the sensation lingered.

      A bugle call sounded, startling him from his reverie, and Nolan replied in kind. He replaced his instrument on the peg just inside the livery door, ensuring the bell tube was directly vertical and the mouthpiece rigidly horizontal.

      He slapped the reins against the rumps of the hitched horses. There was no time to waste. Because he worked the station alone, when he finished here, he’d have to hightail it back to the kitchen and serve the passengers dinner.

      The rumble of hoofbeats sounded, and the distinctive orange Concord, with its gold trim, rumbled down Main Street. Harnesses jingled, echoing off the block-long stretch of deserted and dilapidated buildings. The driver swayed in time beside an outrider who cradled a shotgun in his arms. Reflections of the passing stagecoach appeared in the few windows that hadn’t yet been broken or boarded over.

      As the driver slowed the Concord parallel to where Nolan’s hitched team waited before the town livery, the wheels kicked up dust. His horses surged forward.

      The outrider stowed his gun and leaped from his seat. Bill Golden was a perpetually rumpled, stocky man in his midforties with a grizzled face and a mop of graying hair beneath his tattered hat. Considering he was usually drunk by this point in the journey, he appeared remarkably steady on his feet.

      Bill lifted his hand in greeting. “Top of the day to you, West.”

      “You’re early.”

      “We’re traveling light.”

      The stocky outrider pulled down the collapsible stairs and swung open the door.

      A little girl, no more than three years old, appeared in the opening. A passenger inside the traveling carriage held the child suspended with her legs dangling. Bill grasped the child around the waist and set her on the ground. Two more girls appeared—chestnut-haired, brown-eyed, identical replicas of each other, probably around five or six years of age respectively.

      Nolan tilted his head. This route served Virginia City, Montana, and catered almost exclusively to prospectors seeking their fortune.

      Bill extended his hand, and a woman grasped his fingers. Her bonnet concealed her face and hair, and Nolan allowed himself only one brief, admiring glimpse of her figure, which was encased in a lively green calico dress. Though he’d come to appreciate his solitude, he couldn’t help but notice her. The last woman he’d seen had been the sixty-year-old wife of the traveling doctor.

      “Thank you, Mr. Golden,” she said, her voice at once crisp and soothing. “How are you feeling?”

      Bill doffed his hat. “I feel all right, I guess, ma’am. I mean, Miss Hargreaves. Thank you for asking.”

      She fixed her gaze on the outrider as though she was peering into his very heart. The intensity of the moment raised Nolan’s guard, but there was nowhere to hide while he held the horses. Shifting on his feet, he glanced away and back again.

      “I know the change hasn’t been easy.” Her attention didn’t flicker toward her new surroundings. She kept her interest directed solely on the outrider. “But you’re doing well. I’m proud of you. Whenever you find yourself straying from the path, remember what we talked about.”

      “Yes, ma’am.” A flush spread across the outrider’s face. “I will, ma’am. I surely do appreciate your kind words and all. I’ll try and do my best.”

      She patted his arm. “That’s all any of us can do.”

      Her words were gentle and sincere, and a pulse throbbed in Nolan’s throat. He made a mental note to avoid the woman at all costs. Since returning from the war, he kept to himself. He didn’t want anyone looking at him the way she was studying Bill. He didn’t want anyone peering close enough to see the troubling battles he fought each day.

      “I’d best see to the horses, Miss Hargreaves.” The mottled blush on Bill’s face deepened. “This here is the dinner stop. You can stretch your legs and enjoy some solid ground. If you need anything, let me know.”

      “You’re too kind,” she said. “Solid ground sounds marvelous. When I agreed to assist my sister, this was not at all what I imagined.”

      While Nolan pondered the odd change in the normally taciturn outrider, the second-oldest girl clutched her stomach and pitched forward.

      “I don’t feel so good, Aunt Tilly.” The girl groaned.

      “Are you certain, Caroline?” Miss Hargreaves was by the child’s side in an instant. “Do you not feel good a little or a lot?”

      “I’m certain,” the girl replied with a gulp. “I don’t feel good a lot.”

      “Oh, dear.”

      The woman glanced around and Nolan caught his first glimpse of her face. His curiosity deepened. She was younger than he’d expected. On first impression, her looks hovered somewhere between plain and pretty. On second glance he placed her nearer to pretty. She had eyes the color of a Virginia bluebell, a complexion bronzed by the sun and a pert nose. Though none of those features was particularly remarkable on its own, taken together they were uniquely pleasing.

      She caught his interested gaze. “What should I do?”

      Nolan placed a hand against his chest. “Are you asking me?”

      Miss Hargreaves nodded.

      Passengers rarely paid him any mind. Nolan frowned. He preferred it that way.

      “Well, uh,” he stuttered. “There’s a privy out back.”

      “Excellent suggestion, thank you.” She draped an arm around the girl’s shoulders. “Mr. Golden, will you kindly look after Victoria and Elizabeth for a few minutes?”

      “Absolutely,” Bill said. “Take as much time as you need.”

      Nolan’s frown deepened. The outrider rarely showed even the barest consideration to any of the passengers. Bill also loathed delays of any kind; he was scrupulous about the schedule.

      Once