Chapter 1
Wyoming Territory, March, 1883
Cora placed the cup of coffee in front of their visitor and took a seat on the bench that lined one side of the wooden table, trying not to begrudge him some of their dwindling stores. They were neighbors, after all, and hospitality was important.
Craig MacLeod, seated beside her on the bench, was a burly Scottish immigrant, somewhere around forty-five years old, with carroty red hair streaked with silver. His face was lined from years of hard work in all rough conditions, but his brown eyes were friendly. Cora’s parents had always gotten on well with the MacLeods, so when he drove up unexpectedly this morning asking to speak with her, she’d welcomed him in.
Spring was barely underway, the snow only just thawing enough to follow the unmarked road between homesteads. A week ago, he couldn’t have made the trip at all.
Cora’s brother, Carter, sat in his customary chair at the head of the table, leaning back, arms crossed over his chest. His expression was stoic, unreadable, but that was standard for Carter. He was never emotional, but she wished for a brief moment that she could tell what he was thinking about their unexpected guest.
“I won’t lie to you, Miss Hewitt,” Mr. MacLeod said, twisting the coffee cup between his big, calloused hands. “We’re in a right state over at our place now that Mary’s gone. Made it through the winter alright since she’d set us up well before she passed, but it’s been a challenge keeping up with chores and the wee ones. And my cooking’s nothing to write home about. I kept us alive, but…”
He shrugged and glanced toward the door. Beyond it, his four children, all under the age of ten, were playing in the muddy yard under the supervision of Cora’s younger sister, Maisie. He studied his coffee for a minute then sighed and met Cora’s eyes.
“We need a woman in the house. I can’t manage it all alone, and the cooking and preserving and whatnot—it’s more’n I know how to do. So I’m here to ask you to marry me.”
Cora blinked at him. She sure hadn’t expected that when he’d arrived. His wife had been gone six months, and she believed every word of how difficult those months had been. She’d noticed that the children’s clothing was wearing thin at the elbows and knees, and the older girls’ hair looked like it had been brushed through with someone’s fingers rather than an actual comb before being tied haphazardly with scraps of cotton. She didn’t doubt that his family needed a woman to fill the roles of wife, mother, housekeeper, cook, and general caretaker. But much as she respected Mr. MacLeod as a neighbor, she had no interest in filling that role herself.
“I’m honored you thought of me,” she said slowly, darting another glance at her still-impassive brother. “Mary’s shoes are not easy ones to fill. But I’m afraid I’m not looking to marry at the moment. My family needs me here. Perhaps you’d consider a mail-order bride?” she offered. “I’ve heard that several men in town are happy with theirs.”
MacLeod frowned and rubbed his stubbled chin. “I’ve heard that too, but you never know what you’ll get with one of those. Last thing I need’s a city girl who knows nothing of bairns. You’re a good woman, and you’d make a man a good wife. Sure you won’t reconsider?”
Cora nodded. “I’m sure. But thank you.”
MacLeod nodded, drained his coffee, and got to his feet. “We’d best be off then. There’s bound to be at least one more storm coming before spring’s here for good.”
Cora took his cup to the sink and washed it while Carter walked the man out. She peeked through the window as her siblings helped the young children climb into the back of the wagon. This wasn’t the first proposal of marriage she’d received in the last few years, and it wasn’t likely to be the last. Craig MacLeod wasn’t a bad man, and he’d have treated her well. But while his pragmatic approach to marriage might work for some, it wasn’t enough to convince Cora to give up the life she had.
She couldn’t imagine him lovingly rubbing her tired feet after a long day or stealing kisses in the barn during chores like she’d seen her parents do. A marriage between them wouldn’t include his arm around her waist, snugging her into his side, or her head resting contentedly on his shoulder. They wouldn’t have that bottomless affection or playful teasing that her parents had modeled. And while no one had ever told Cora what to look for in a relationship, she’d seen it daily for most of her life.
She leaned her hip against the edge of the sink, absently drying her hands on the towel as she watched out the window. The poor, motherless MacLeod children did tug at her heart. But as much as she liked being needed, she already had her own siblings to look after. When Ma and Pa had died of a fever five years ago, her last promise to Ma had been to take care of Carter and Maisie.
Carter, then twenty-one and already working hard around the farm, would work himself into the ground and forget to eat or sleep if someone didn’t remind him, especially if he knew that his younger sisters’ wellbeing depended on the homestead’s success, and by default, on him. And he’d never give a hint that he was struggling.
Maisie had been only fifteen at the time. Cora, seventeen and barely a woman herself, had stepped into the role of mother for both of them. She made sure that everyone was fed and clothed, that the house was clean, that food was grown and stored for winter. Mr. MacLeod had been right that she was capable of what he was asking, but she’d never break her word to Ma and leave her family while they still needed her.
And maybe, a small part of her whispered, it would be nice to be wanted by her husband, rather than merely needed.
***
Cora had heard Sunday called a day of rest before, but she supposed that whoever had refused to work hadn’t been living on a homestead. Or maybe they didn’t count feeding the animals, milking, or gathering eggs as “work.” It was true that there were other chores they wouldn’t do on a Sunday, but it was also true that they were up at first light just like every other day.
Maisie threw on her work dress from the day before, shoving her feet into boots without bothering to tie the laces. She grabbed a leftover biscuit from dinner and followed Carter silently out to do barn chores. Cora watched the door close behind them with a wry smile. Her sister was cheerful and talkative most of the time, but before breakfast she could be as ornery as their older brother.
Cora pulled on her work clothes, too, but didn’t bother with shoes, liking the feel of the worn wooden planks beneath her bare feet as she shaped the dough she’d left rising overnight, even when spring still felt an awful lot like winter. She tossed her head to throw her braid back over her shoulder and out of the way. She set the loaf aside to proof on the warming oven while she opened the last jar of preserved pears from last season and mixed flour, sugar, and oats with a bit of butter into a crumble topping. This all went into Ma’s favorite pie plate with the scalloped edging. Then the two pans went into the oven.
Cora shoved her feet into boots and darted across the yard, the mud frozen into hard ruts and ridges overnight, to get the basket of eggs Maisie left waiting for her at the door of the barn. She was grateful that it was Maisie’s turn to collect the eggs. She’d never complain to her siblings, but she secretly hated Bernice, the ornery alpha hen of the flock, and longed for the day it was her turn for the frying pan.
Scooping up the basket, she took a minute to pause and enjoy the crisp, early morning air chilling her lungs, the sun just peeking over the horizon. A disgruntled moo from inside the barn reminded her that chores were afoot, so she hurried back to the house to fry the eggs for breakfast. By the time they were ready, and she’d cleared off the mess she’d made of the table, her brother and sister were washing up to eat.
They sat together at the table, Carter at the head where Pa used to sit, and Maisie in Ma’s old chair. Cora placed the eggs and the rest of the leftover biscuits on the table along with a pat of butter and three cups of steaming coffee—little more than bitter water to try to make the rest of the grounds last until they could get to town for supplies. Then she slid onto the bench that she and her siblings used to sit on together.
Everything in this house reminded her of what life used to be like, and sometimes it made her breath catch and her eyes burn, but sometimes, like this morning, it wrapped her up like a warm quilt, all the years of joy and all the people who’d loved her. Carter muttered a short prayer of thanks, and they began to eat. Breakfast was always a silent meal, as Maisie wasn’t fully herself yet, and Carter spoke mostly in grunts and grumbles at any time of day. She missed the way he used to be—never as bubbly as Maisie, but… more alive. Happier.
After breakfast, Cora took the bread and pear crumble from the oven and set them on a folded towel on the table to cool while they changed into their Sunday best. Their best wasn’t anything fancy, just their newest clothes without the holes or the worn-thin areas. Maisie’s was a peach calico that brought out the golden highlights in her hair and made her cheeks glow. Cora’s was a deep blue patterned with tiny pink flowers and green leaves. She didn’t know what kind of magic was in the pink flowers, but they made her feel feminine and graceful, not sturdy and practical like she was most of the week. She twisted her hair up and secured it with a tortoiseshell comb of Ma’s.
“How do I look?” she asked Maisie. The only looking glass they had was Ma’s little handheld mirror, and Cora never trusted it to tell the whole story.
“It’s only the Brooks, Cor,” Maisie said without looking up from where she sat on the edge of the bed, tying her boots. “It’s not like they haven’t seen you looking your worst. Like that time you fell in mud trying to catch old Helen.”
Cora cringed at the memory of the milk cow who’d gotten out and decided to make a run for it. It had been after a full day of rain, and Cora had returned sodden, filthy, and in tears, pleading with Carter and the Brooks boys to come help her catch the wretched creature.
“Not helpful, Mais. I’d rather not be remembered like that.”
“I’m pretty certain none of us could forget it,” Maisie said with a grin, straightening.
Cora huffed and debated asking Carter instead, not that he’d be any more help.
“You look lovely,” her sister said, standing and coming to hug her. “Stop fussing. That dress brings out the green in your eyes, and I only wish I could get my hair to stay like that.”
“Would you like me to help with your hair?”
Maisie shook her head. She’d done her long brown hair into two braids and coiled them around her head like a crown. Her hair was so fine and silky that braiding it was the only way to keep it from sliding out of hairpins, and even then it was usually wisping everywhere and half fallen down by the end of the day. “No point in wasting time on a style that won’t last the morning.”
When they emerged from their shared bedroom, Carter was already outside preparing the horses. Cora carefully wrapped the bread and crumble in towels. She laid them neatly in a basket, tucking a jar of dill-pickled green beans alongside them. Then she and Maisie grabbed their hats and coats, and they hurried out the door. In the yard, both horses—Butter and Daffy, short for Daffodil, both named by Maisie for their golden coats—stood saddled and waiting with Carter at their heads. Maisie mounted Daffy and waited while Cora handed her brother the basket and mounted behind her. She’d rather walk than ride, especially since the saddle wasn’t made for two, but not until spring had fully arrived. Their Sunday best wouldn’t be their best for long with all that mud. Carter mounted Butter, holding the basket in front of him as they rode the well-worn path to their nearest neighbors.
The sun was well up on its morning climb when they reached the Brooks’ house. Eighteen-year-old Jilly opened the door and welcomed them all in, greeting the girls with hugs and Carter with a special smile. The sunlight caught her just right, making her blue eyes glitter and her strawberry-blonde hair glow pink. Carter barely acknowledged her, following Maisie into the kitchen with the basket of food. Cora gave Jilly an extra smile in apology for her brother.
Once everyone was inside, they all piled into the living room. The three girls took their customary spots on the sofa, with petite Ma Brooks in her rocker and lanky Pa Brooks in a chair brought in from the kitchen. Jilly’s older brothers, Jack and Grant, sat on the floor against the far wall, and Carter stood leaning against the kitchen doorframe, arms crossed.
Pa Brooks started by saying a prayer, then he read a chapter from Matthew, a psalm, and a chapter from Proverbs. They’d been doing Sunday service this way with their two families every week for as long as Cora could remember, even back when her father used to take turns being the one to read from the Bible. It wasn’t feasible to attend the nearest church five hours away, so they met here in the Brooks house, which had more space for everyone to fit in the same room.
The reading was followed by another prayer, and then they sang a few familiar hymns. Maisie’s voice was the strongest, though Cora and Jilly weren’t bad. Carter could carry a tune, but he never sang. Grant was always a bit off pitch, and Jack mostly hummed along, eyes half closed like he was listening to the words. Cora loved the way their voices all blended. It filled her with a sense of family that not much else had given her in the past few years. Yes, she had her siblings, but this, all of them, they belonged together.
After the little service, they moved to the kitchen, and Cora helped Ma Brooks lay out food on the table. Once the weather warmed enough, they’d take their meal outside on a blanket where they’d have a bit more space. For now, the table was crowded with fried chicken, mashed potatoes, bread and butter, and pickles. There were only enough chairs for half of them, and barely room for plates. Carter and the two Brooks boys ate standing up.
Most of the talk through the meal was about spring chores. Both homesteads had extensive vegetable gardens to plant, and the Brooks family had a growing flock of sheep that needed to be sheared before lambing.
“Before we all get too busy,” Cora put in, “I need to make a trip to town for supplies.”
“We,” Carter corrected.
Cora wrinkled her nose at him but didn’t argue. Haven River Falls was the nearest town with a mercantile, but it was a five-hour drive from their homesteads. Add in the fact that, despite the recent growth of the town and the influx of new families and mail-order brides, men still outnumbered women by more than three to one…. Carter would never let Cora or Maisie near the town without him to protect them.
“We’ve run out of sugar and tea. I used the last of the salt this morning, and we have maybe one week’s supply of weak coffee left. And Carter’s even grumpier without it.” Her arched brows dared her brother to argue.
He merely grunted, and Ma Brooks laughed. “Grant doesn’t do well without his morning coffee either. We ran out a month ago.”
“I avoid him until about noon,” Jilly said in a loud whisper that she clearly meant for her brother to hear.
“We can’t all be sunshine in the morning,” Grant grumbled as Jack elbowed him in the side.
As the conversation devolved into good-natured ribbing, Cora got up and started serving the pear crumble. Jack’s plate was the last to appear in front of her, and after she’d dished his serving, he mumbled, “Could I have the, um, extra crumbs, please?”
Cora glanced up at him, noticing the pink tinge to his cheeks. She’d never quite understood how Jack could have ended up as shy as he was with outgoing siblings like Grant and Jilly. He was always polite to her, but he didn’t speak much. In truth, she hadn’t had many interactions with him besides Sunday mornings since they were children and both still doing lessons for part of the day under the instruction of one of their mothers. But he was three years older than she was, so he’d moved from indoor lessons to working with Pa Brooks and the sheep long before she’d left the schoolroom.
She scraped the last few bits of crumble from the pie plate and onto Jack’s serving.
“Thanks,” he said quietly, retreating to his spot against the wall to eat it.
Cora moved to the dry sink to start washing the used dishes, pouring cool water from the bucket by the door and steaming water from the kettle on the stove into the basin. The splash of water couldn’t quite drown out Maisie’s next words.
“Guess what happened to Cora yesterday.”
Cora half turned, her hands already wet and soapy. As expected, Maisie and Jilly had their heads together. The two had been thick as thieves for years, being the youngest of the group and in the schoolroom together the longest.
“Mais—” Cora protested, but it was no use.
“Mr. MacLeod proposed.”
Jilly gasped. “When? Where? How?”
A quick glance around the room showed that everyone was listening to the girls’ conversation. Cora cringed. She hated to be the center of attention, even though Maisie was the one telling the story, and she didn’t want poor Mr. MacLeod’s disappointment to be the subject of amusement. As there was no stopping her sister now, she purposely turned her back on the room and got to washing dishes.
“He drove out to the house, bringing all his kids along in the wagon.”
“He drove to the house?” Jilly sounded incredulous. Even Ma Brooks made a surprised humming sound. “That’s… new,” Jilly continued. “I mean, you get offers every time you walk down the street in Haven River Falls, but for someone to make a trip out here on purpose just to ask…”
“I reckon he’s finding it hard now without his wife,” Pa Brooks said calmly.
“Yep,” Carter acknowledged.
Cora was surprised that her brother contributed to the conversation at all. He hadn’t said anything to MacLeod himself.
“Gotta check Bandit,” Jack said abruptly. A second later he’d dropped his scraped-clean plate into the sink with a slight wet plop and vanished out the door. Cora frowned, confused, but then she heard what Jack must have heard first—faint barking from the barn. She returned to washing up and wishing she could ignore the talk behind her.
Chapter 2
Jack jogged to the barn. He was sure Bandit was barking at nothing, but it was a convenient excuse to get out of there. The situation felt uncomfortably familiar, and he didn’t like it one bit.
As he slid the barn door open, he flashed back five years. He’d just turned twenty; Cora had been seventeen. They’d been going about their lives, both working with their families on their respective homesteads. Ever since he’d quit schooling at fourteen, he hadn’t spent much time with her, but she was always there, always around.
And then the day Maisie had spoken up, much like today, announcing in a sing-song voice that Cora had a beau. Cora’s face had gone bright red, and Jack had the startling thought that she looked perfectly adorable flustered like that.
While Cora tried to shush her sister, Maisie and Mrs. Hewitt had spilled the news: Luke Opelski had come calling. The Opelski spread was one of the largest cattle ranches in the area, and Luke was the second son. He was older than Jack and Carter, in his mid-twenties, and ready to settle down with a good woman.
Apparently, a woman like Cora.
It had been an eye-opening moment for Jack. The fact that Cora was a woman shouldn’t have caught him so totally off guard, but it had. She was Carter’s little sister. She was friends with Jilly, who was still a kid herself. And yet, somehow, without him realizing, she’d grown up.
Once he’d noticed, he couldn’t stop noticing. The way her hazel eyes looked browner or greener depending on what she wore. The way a blush would turn her cheeks the color of strawberries. How her dresses hugged the curves he’d somehow missed seeing. How she worked hard, smiled often, and was always ready to help. Qualities he’d seen and absently admired without recognizing their impact.
Suddenly, Jack saw Cora—the real, entire, beautiful, grown-up Cora. And to see her was to love her. He was tumbling head over heels… silently and from a distance because she was courting Luke Opelski.
He’d been too late, too slow to recognize the incredible young woman who lived right next door. To have his heart fall and break simultaneously was more than he could handle on his own. Oddly, it was Jilly who’d helped him pull himself together.
Despite their seven-year age difference, they’d always been close. Maybe he’d treated her more like a doll or a plaything than he ought to when they were children, but it meant that he’d let her tag along and be his tiny, chatty shadow. And it meant that she often confided her bright, little secrets to him.
In the face of his despair, she’d confessed to having a crush on Carter, one that had already lasted several years. Somehow, knowing that he wasn’t the only one in unrequited love with one of the Hewitts made Jack’s load easier to bear.
It still wasn’t easy. Jack had always intended to continue working the homestead with Pa, eventually taking it over and having his own family there, maybe building another cabin on the property to give them a bit more room. But if Cora married Luke… Jack was looking at a future as the quiet, lonely, perpetually grumpy bachelor uncle to Grant’s and Jilly’s kids because he’d never be able to get Cora out of his heart enough to let someone else into it.
It was a bleak prospect, but nothing to the pain of watching the girls giggle together over Cora’s romance as they did their chores around the homesteads and seeing Cora blush over another man.
After a few months of torment, however, worse happened: Mr. and Mrs. Hewitt both died of a fever within weeks of each other.
Soon it came out that Cora’s relationship with Luke Opelski had fallen apart as well, though Jack never heard the details of why or how. Jack’s heart had ached—with sadness for his friends, with his own grief over their parents who had been like an aunt and uncle, and with guilt over his relief that Cora was free again.
In the first weeks and months after their loss, Jack hadn’t said anything to Cora out of respect. By the time he thought she might be open to a new courtship, he’d noticed a change. Her spark had dimmed. She smiled a little less and worked a lot harder. She ran their homestead like a general, keeping everything in impressive order.
But she was closed off in a way she hadn’t been. Sometimes Maisie, Jilly, and Ma could still bring out her softness, her brightness, but she was businesslike with everyone else. It was a painful irony to Jack that after he’d failed to notice her for years, now she was the one to not notice him.
He’d tried to talk to her, tried to start just a simple conversation. But she was so pretty he got nervous, and when he got nervous, he forgot words even more frequently than he usually did. Stammering made him feel like an idiot, sweeping him back to his perpetual failures in the schoolroom. He’d gotten sick of feeling stupid for struggling to read when the younger children were miles ahead of him already, so he’d quit. Trying to talk to Cora had made him feel just as stupid, so he’d quit that too.
And now, after five years of pining over her from a distance and hoping for a way to win her over that didn’t involve humiliating himself, he was right back where he started.
Too late. Again.
Jack found Bandit curled up on his blanket in the barn, panting happily, nothing alarming in sight. Jack leaned his arms against the railing of the main sheep pen. Half the flock was here inside, but the rest seemed to have braved the early spring chill and wandered out into the fenced pasture. The muddy ground in the pasture had been churned by dozens of hooves, and any grass attempting to grow had long since been ripped up or trampled.
But with the volatile weather of retreating winter and the grass needing to grow before it could support grazing, they’d keep the sheep close to the barn where they could feed them the last of the hay until May, when they’d turn them loose on the open range.
Jack ran through the projected schedule for the next few months to distract himself. Shearing in a couple of weeks. Lambing soon after that. Planting the garden and the alfalfa fields. Letting the sheep out on the range. Taking the shorn fleeces to town to ship to the woolen mill in St. Louis. Cutting hay. Harvesting. Taking the sheep who’d be sold for meat to market.
There was always work to be done, and Jack would keep busy this year, like always. But his attempted distraction failed horribly when he mentally added finding a way to avoid Cora’s wedding onto his list.
He leaned over, resting his head on his arms still folded on the railing, willing the nausea to subside.
“She said no.”
The soft voice startled him, but he didn’t raise his head. Leave it to Jilly to know that he was a wreck and had come here to hide it.
“You can come back now.” Her voice was closer but still soft. “They’ve gone.” She stopped right beside him, resting her arms on the railing, her elbow pressed against his. He took another deep breath and raised his head. She bumped him with her shoulder. “Did you hear me, though? She said no. She refused MacLeod.”
“You sure?”
“Yep. Cora said she suggested he get himself a mail-order bride.”
“Why…?”
“Why didn’t she accept a man twice her age with four children?” Jilly made a face. “That’s a job, not a marriage.”
“Unless they love each other.”
Jilly shrugged. “But she doesn’t love him, and he doesn’t love her. His were practical reasons, and she’s happy where she is.”
Jack thought of how Cora’s smile had become a faint copy of what it had once been, and he wondered how happy she really was. He didn’t think happiness with her life was why she’d turned down MacLeod.
“But Jack…” Jilly began, hesitating. Jack knew this meant that she was going to say something he wouldn’t like to hear. Jilly was all sunshine, so she never liked to say the hard things. “There will be somebody else.”
And there it was. The gut punch delivered in the quietest, gentlest way by the sweetest of sisters. He looked away.
“Nobody thinks much of the proposals we all get in town every year. They’re opportunistic. She’s had plenty of those, and she’ll get plenty more. But sometime, someone is going to make the effort. They’ll see what you see, and they’ll change her mind.”
Jack’s jaw clenched. Jilly laid a hand on his forearm.
“If you want her, you’ve got to step up. You be the one to change her mind.”
“I can’t talk to her,” Jack muttered. “I get tongue-tied. Even if I plan out what I want to say, I forget half the words and sound like an idiot.”
“Then find a way to show her.”
She gently squeezed his arm and let go, stepping toward the barn door.
“And she doesn’t think you’re an idiot. No one does.”
Jack gripped the railing, his knuckles going white. Jilly had been too young to notice how badly his lessons had gone, but Cora had been witness to all of it. Besides, Jilly always saw the best in everyone.
“That’s only because she doesn’t think of me at all,” Jack said.
Jilly made a little noise of disagreement, but let his comment go. At the door, she paused. “Show her,” she repeated. Then she was gone.
Jack stayed where he was, letting the conversation roll through his head, over and over. Cora wasn’t marrying MacLeod. Jack wasn’t too late. Yet. He still had a chance to woo her, if he could just come up with a plan and the courage to implement it.
The residual nausea still churning in his gut said he’d have to find the courage somewhere, because he couldn’t just watch Cora love someone else again. Without Cora, his life… well, his life would look pretty much exactly the same as it did right now, but the regret and loneliness would eat him alive until he went entirely hollow.
He had to do what Jilly said. He had to be the one to change Cora’s mind. He just needed a plan.
Words were out. He was too shy to talk to her. If shyness were the only problem, he’d write her a letter, but his vocabulary, spelling, and handwriting were all equally terrible. It would not leave a good impression.
Show her, Jilly had said.
He could do that. He could gladly do acts of service that didn’t require speaking, things above and beyond the usual polite gestures he aimed for in general. Cora was always working hard and doing things for others. He could be the one who lightened her load, who did things for her.
The idea warmed his anxious heart. He wanted to be that for her.
But that could only be step one. He would have to talk to her eventually if he wanted to have a life with her. He wanted to talk to her. He just might need some time to work up a little extra courage. Hopefully, helping her with things would give him more opportunities to try.
So step one: acts of service.
Step two: speak up.
But would it be enough? Would any of those things truly show her his heart? Would she notice him in time before someone else stole her attention?
Show her.
An idea came to him, an idea that left him feeling almost as vulnerable as confessing his feelings aloud would. It would reveal a side of himself that she hadn’t seen, and it would shine a light on his innermost thoughts and dreams. But that was the point, right? He wanted her to see him, the flawed man who was madly in love with her.
As he thought through his plan for the rest of the day, he reluctantly acknowledged that vulnerability was his only option. He added another step to his plan, to enact before and between his acts of service. A step that would show her his heart.
If you want her, you’ve got to step up.
Jilly was right. It was time to act.
***
