Yukon Wedding. Allie Pleiter
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Here was her husband-to-be.
Lana grabbed the rail for support as she nearly tripped down the last stair.
It seemed as if the entire hotel staff and guests had turned out for the occasion—the parlor was filled with peering eyes. Lana felt very much on display, even here among strangers. Mack was right—she’d never have survived this charade in the middle of Treasure Creek.
“You’re a fine sight,” he said as she stepped onto the parlor rug. His voice was tight and unsteady.
“You cut a fine figure yourself,” she managed, then gulped at how foolish the words sounded. He really had surprised her, however. In all the muddy making-do of Treasure Creek, she’d completely forgotten the way he could command a room when formally dressed. Half her bridesmaids had swooned over him at her wedding. Her first wedding.
Stop that. You can’t think about that now. This is a new life.
ALASKAN BRIDES: Women of the Gold Rush find that love is the greatest treasure of all.
Yukon Wedding—Allie Pleiter, April 2011
ALLIE PLEITER
Enthusiastic but slightly untidy mother of two, RITA® Award finalist Allie Pleiter writes both fiction and nonfiction. An avid knitter and unreformed chocoholic, she spends her days writing books, drinking coffee and finding new ways to avoid housework. Allie grew up in Connecticut, holds a B.S. in Speech from Northwestern University and spent fifteen years in the field of professional fundraising. She lives with her husband, children and a Havanese dog named Bella in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois.
Yukon Wedding
Allie Pleiter
MILLS & BOON
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Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
—Matthew 6:18–21
To everyone—and I mean everyone—at Comer Children’s Hospital at the University of Chicago
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Letter to Reader
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Chapter One
Treasure Creek, Alaska, June 1898
Mack Tanner looked up to see a raging storm coming toward him.
“Good morning,” said the storm, otherwise known as Lana Bristow. Each syllable of her greeting was sharp and steely. She stood in that particular way he called her “speechifying” stance, which heralded an oncoming verbal assault. Mack spread his own feet, not particularly eager to endure whatever was coming in front of the half dozen gold rush stampeders he’d managed to hire off the Chilkoot Trail to build his new General Store.
Lana’s blond hair was a nest of frayed locks, strands sticking wildly out of the careful twist she usually wore. Her apron hung diagonally across that impossibly tiny waist of hers, with a wide smear of something dark that matched the smudge currently gracing her son Georgie’s chin. The brooch she always wore at her neck—that silly, frilly flower thing with all the golden swirls on it—was gone. It was held bent and misshapen, he noticed with a gulp, in her left hand, while she clamped two-yearold Georgie to one hip with her right. One side of her hem was soaked and the boy sported only one shoe.
More was amiss than the argument he’d had with her last night, that was certain. They’d gone at it again regarding Lana’s accounts. Her mounting debts had been a constant sore spot between them since her husband, Jed—Mack’s best friend—had died in the Palm Sunday avalanche. She’d caught him monkeying with her store credit again, giving her more than what she paid for and “misplacing” numerous bills. And yes, Mack had taken it upon himself to slash her debt so that no one in Treasure Creek would guess the sorry state of her finances.
He owed her that much.
She didn’t see it that way.
Instead, his “generosity” made her furious. Why that confounding woman wouldn’t let him settle things up for her—when she needed it and he had the resources to easily do so—never ceased to amaze him.
Lana stood stiff and tall. “I have something to say.”
Mack could have been blind, deaf, half asleep and still have picked up on that. Every inch of her body broadcast “I have something to say.” A low commentary grumble to that effect rippled through the men around him until Mack raised his hand—the one with the large hammer still in it—to silence them.
Not taking his eyes off her, Mack shifted his weight and nodded slowly. For a moment he considered motioning her toward a less public place, seeing as this was no doubt going to be a long “something to say,” but the flash of fire in her blue eyes told him to stay put. He had the odd sensation of facing a firing squad.
“Yes.” That single syllable loudly declared, Lana spun on her heels, hoisted her son farther up on one hip, and started back down the way she came.
Mack’s mouth fell open, letting the nails tumble out to jingle on the ground at his feet. Yes? What kind of riddle thing was that to say? Glory, but the Widow Bristow would be the death of him.
The men found this hilarious, sputtering into laughter and less-than-polite commentary until he threw down the hammer and strode off after her. Once away from the crowd, Mack expected Lana to turn and explain herself. It’s what rational people did, after all. When after twenty paces she failed to either