Chapter 6
Enoch rode into the ranch yard as the sun dipped behind the mountains, casting long shadows across the valley. His muscles ached from a day spent tending cattle in the farthest pastures, and dust clung to his clothes and skin, gritty against the dried sweat.
The familiar scent of woodsmoke drifted from the cookstove chimney, curling into the evening air.
But something felt off.
His gelding nickered, and a horse in the barn answered. Did they have a visitor?
The thought stirred a quiet warning he couldn’t shake.
Before he could swing down from his saddle, the front door opened and James and Thomas emerged from the house. He couldn’t read their expressions, but something was up.
“You’re back.” James’s voice sounded tight. “You’ll never guess.”
“What’s wrong?” Enoch dismounted, his boots hitting the ground with a thud that echoed in his bones. He straightened, brushing a hand across his dust-streaked trousers.
Thomas glanced at James, hesitating, then met Enoch’s gaze. “William’s bride arrived today. Two Stones and his new wife brought her. But the woman’s injured—took a fall on her way here.”
The words hit Enoch like a punch to the gut. William’s bride. Had she not received the telegram then?
Dread rose in his throat, bitter and thick, but he swallowed it down. “Is she all right?”
“She’s resting now.” James shifted his weight. “Mrs. Wang is with her. But she’s confused—doesn’t remember much about why she’s here.”
Enoch frowned. That didn’t bode well. Was she usually of a fragile mind? “Take me to her.”
He tied his horse at the porch, then followed his brothers up the stairs and in the door.
The scent of something savory wrapped around him like a blanket, though it did nothing to ease the tension coiling in his gut.
Beneath the welcome smells lingered something else, a heaviness that made his pulse quicken.
His brothers started down the hallway, and a new uneasiness crept through him. The only bed chambers that direction were his room and William’s. Had they placed her in…?
Sure enough, James and Thomas stopped in front of their eldest brother’s room, moving to one side of the doorway so he could enter.
He halted in the opening. Mrs. Wang sat in a chair beside the bed holding a damp cloth.
The figure in the bed…blankets covered all but her pale cheek and dark hair. Her face turned away from him, so he couldn’t make out many features. But just the bit he could see looked far too dainty to survive in the wilderness.
Mrs. Wang rose and came to meet him. “She’s been drifting in and out of sleep.” She kept her voice hushed. “The poor dear is exhausted and confused.”
Enoch’s jaw tightened. He didn’t want to think of this stranger as a poor dear. Not when her presence might upend his world.
He stepped closer to the bed where he could study the woman’s face. High cheekbones, a delicate nose, lips that looked soft, even in sleep. She was lovely, he had to admit. But beauty alone wouldn’t be enough out here.
He turned back to take in Mrs. Wang and his brothers, keeping his voice low. “Have you told her about William?”
James shook his head. “She didn’t seem to know what she was doing here. When we mentioned his name, she acted like she’d never heard it.”
Mrs. Wang touched his arm. “She needs rest now. There will be time to sort everything later.”
He nodded. He could view this as a reprieve. He had all night to stew on what to do with her.
He raised his brows at Mrs. Wang. “James said Two Stones brought her?” He’d met the man several times in town. Sold him a donkey once. The kind of fellow you could tell was trustworthy after just a short conversation.
Mrs. Wang slipped her hand around his waist, guiding him toward the door. “I showed him and his new bride to the extra chamber upstairs. They’ll be down to eat in a quarter hour, so you’d best be cleaned up and ready. Robert is tending the meat pies for me.”
He let her lead him into the hallway, resting his arm around her shoulders.
Mrs. Wang was a good two heads shorter than him, but she felt so much like a mother.
And yet his own mother had been tall and fine-boned with no extra curves that often came as women aged.
The exact opposite of Mrs. Wang’s shape.
He’d only been eight when Mother passed from a lingering fever, so he didn’t remember as much about her as he wished. But Mrs. Wang had been a quiet stand-in. A steady presence through all the years they’d grown up in these mountains.
When they reached the main room, she gave his waist a final squeeze, then pulled back. “You boys see that you’re respectable and prompt for dinner. I’m going to sit with Mrs. Beaumont.”
Mrs. Beaumont. The name sounded like she would be older, perhaps frumpy or at least wizened. Not this young, angelic creature.
Will had told them the woman had been widowed long enough to be out of mourning, though she was still young. Yet that fact hadn’t formed into any kind of picture in Enoch’s mind.
As his brothers left to obey their orders, Enoch headed out to put his horse away. A quarter hour didn’t leave him time to linger in the barn as he’d like to—far from the people who’d invaded their privacy.
But he was the man of the house now. He no longer had the liberty to hide away when he wasn’t ready to face the changes others forced on him.
When the time came for the evening meal, he stood behind his chair at the dining table and waited for Heidi to sit.
She’d insisted they call her by her given name.
She wasn’t at all what he’d expected in Two Stones’s wife, but a sort of connection hummed between the pair, strong enough even he could see it.
The little glances they slid each other.
The way Heidi’s cheeks pinkened when she met her husband’s gaze.
Two Stones’s eyes were usually hard to read, but when he looked at his wife, his admiration shimmered without restraint.
Would he and Charlotte have had such an affection if…if her life hadn’t been cut so very short?
He pushed aside the pain that twisted in his chest and sat when the other men did.
Robert cleared his throat, his gaze darting to their visitors. “Shall we say a blessing?”
Heidi graced him with a smile as she and Two Stones bowed their heads. Enoch did the same, but keeping his mind on his brother’s prayer proved more than he could manage.
At last, they’d all filled their plates and began eating, which meant he could ask questions. He fixed his gaze on Two Stones. “Tell me about the woman you brought. How did she come to travel with you?”
Two Stones regarded him. “We met her in Fort Benton. Irish brought her to me for passage to Walnut Springs. She said she was to meet William Balfour there.”
Heidi leaned forward. “She was surprised William hadn’t sent word or arranged for her travel from Fort Benton. But she wouldn’t turn back—said she’d get here on her own if she had to.”
The knot in his gut twisted tighter. “She never got the telegram I sent about William’s death.” He’d not really thought about it from the woman’s perspective. She’d crossed the country alone, expecting a husband to greet her at her destination. A husband who could never be.
Enoch should have tried harder to reach her. Should have done more than send a single telegram.
And now, she was here, bruised and broken, lying in William’s bed with no idea of the truth.
He forced his voice to keep steady, though it rasped against the dryness in his throat. “What happened to her on the way?”
Two Stones chewed a bite of meat pie, his dark eyes studying Enoch. “We stopped to wait out a thunderstorm. After the rain, she slipped on a rock. Hit her head.”
Heidi’s soft voice chimed in. “She has several bruises and a gash near the base of her skull. It took a minute for her to wake up, but then her words seemed addled. Before the rain, she asked us to take her to Walnut Springs so she could have time to rest before your brother came for her, but given the situation, we decided it might be best to bring her straight to your ranch so she wouldn’t need to be moved again. ”
Enoch’s chest tightened, a sharp pang he couldn’t name.
Sympathy, maybe. He knew the kind of headache she must be suffering.
Perhaps a bit of admiration stirred somewhere in him too.
She didn’t belong here. And yet, she’d come anyway.
Alone. That took a kind of courage. Foolishness too, which wouldn’t do her any favors out here.
Maybe this first injury was a harbinger of what would come.
He pushed a piece of crust around his plate. “She could’ve died from a fall like that.”
Two Stones nodded, his gaze flicking to Heidi with a flash of protectiveness. “We kept her safe. Brought her straight here once we patched her up.”
Enoch clenched his jaw. Safe. She might be safe now, but for how long?
This territory didn’t care about grit or good intentions—it chewed up the strong and the weak alike. He’d seen it too many times—homesteaders broken by blizzards, travelers lost to rivers or bears.
Charlotte’s face flashed again—her bright smile dimmed forever by the storm that took her and her parents. He should’ve protected her.
Should’ve protected William, too. Should have been there in case that horse gave him trouble.
And now Mrs. Beaumont, another life entrusted to his care. Another life he might very well fail to protect.
James’s voice cut through the haze of his thoughts. “What’s your plan now, Enoch? Will you marry her as Father asked?”
The question hung heavy, suffocating.
Marry.
Maybe that was his duty. Marry her in William’s place, give her a home, a name. It was the honorable thing, especially with her injured and stranded so far from her home. Would she want to live in England? Will must have told her he and his new wife would be moving there.
The thought of tying himself to a stranger, of risking his heart again, made his skin crawl. He didn’t want this.
Maybe marrying her didn’t have to mean love. Maybe it could just be a roof over her head, a name to keep her safe. A partnership. The idea felt thin, brittle even, but it was something he could hold onto.
Except….he had to produce an heir. A son to carry on the title. His father wouldn’t rest until Enoch accomplished his duty. Could he keep his heart out of fathering a child?
James still waited for an answer, so he forced the words out. “I’ll talk to her when she’s stronger. I’ll see if she wants to stay. To…marry me, since William can’t.”
Thomas leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “And if she says no?”
Enoch stared past him, out the window, where the last streaks of daylight bled into the mountains. “Then I’ll get her back to Savannah. Or wherever she wants to go. She won’t be left with nothing.”
The table went quiet, the clink of forks the only sound. He felt their eyes on him—Robert’s steady gaze, James’s skepticism, Thomas’s smirk, Heidi’s gentle pity. Even Two Stones’s perceptive stare.
Not only would he have to eventually leave this home he loved and go to England—the land he hadn’t seen since he was six years old—now he would have to take a wife.
Duty had him cornered, and there was no running from it. Not this time.
The remainder of dinner blurred past, the talk turning to safer things—the cattle, the weather, Two Stones’s plans for the winter.
When the meal ended and the others drifted off—Two Stones and Heidi upstairs, his brothers to their chores—Enoch stepped outside. The night air hit him like a slap—chilly, cutting through the fog in his head.
He tilted his face to the sky, where stars burned bright and indifferent, scattered across the expanse like spilled salt. They dwarfed him, made him feel small, a speck in a world too big to care about his struggles.
Was his father staring up at these same stars, somewhere across the Atlantic? That world had always seemed so far away. He barely had any memories of England. And yet he was expected to call it home.
These mountains were home. At least, he wanted them to be. If only what he wanted mattered in this situation.
Grant me peace, Lord. Help me find the right way forward in all this.
Back inside, he couldn’t stop himself from checking on her. William’s room glowed faintly, the lamp Mrs. Wang had left casting soft shadows across the walls. Their housekeeper must be in the kitchen. Or seeing to Heidi and Two Stones’s comfort.
Having guests was always a special treat for Mrs. Wang. So many people to dote on.
He stepped just inside the room where Mrs. Beaumont lay, the rug keeping his boots silent.
The woman slept, her chest rising and falling, slow and even, her face peaceful in the flickering light.
A bandage wrapped around her head, which hadn’t been there before.
Was there bleeding that wouldn’t stop? Mrs. Wang was an excellent nurse, so she would have known all the steps to take.
The white cloth stood stark against the woman’s pale skin, a mark of how close she’d come to disaster. She looked fragile, too delicate for this land. But there was a peace in her stillness, a quiet resilience he couldn’t ignore.
He stepped closer, studying her. High cheekbones, a small nose, lips parted slightly in sleep—she was beautiful, no denying it.
But beauty didn’t mean she’d survive here.
What had driven her to answer William’s ad?
What had she left behind in Savannah to chase a stranger’s promise?
A spark of curiosity flickered in him, unbidden.
Unwanted.
He shouldn’t care, couldn’t let her in.
Her lashes fluttered, and he froze. If she woke, she would catch him staring.
She sighed, then shifted under the blankets. He eased out a breath and turned to the door.
Before slipping out, he glanced back for a final look.
Tomorrow, he’d tell her the truth, offer her his name, and let her choose. Ready or not, he’d step into the path ahead.