Chapter 2 - Footsteps Above the Ceiling
Jonas raised one finger to his lips and pointed Ellie toward the stone fireplace.
She moved quietly.
His rifle remained aimed at the staircase.
Another creak sounded overhead.
Slow.
Measured.
Not the settling of timber.
A person.
Jonas crossed the room.
Ellie stayed behind him despite the silent instruction to remain near the fireplace.
He glanced back.
She shook her head.
He mouthed, Stay.
She mouthed, No.
Under different circumstances, Jonas might have admired the nerve.
At that moment, it irritated him tremendously.
He climbed the first stair.
Then the second.
Halfway up, he heard movement.
Fast.
A door slammed.
Jonas ran.
At the top of the staircase, he reached the guest bedroom as the window burst outward.
A man dropped onto the porch roof.
“Stop!”
The intruder jumped.
Jonas reached the window in time to see him roll into the snow, rise, and sprint toward the trees.
Jonas fired into the air.
The man never turned.
Within seconds, darkness swallowed him.
Ellie appeared behind Jonas.
“You weren’t aiming at him.”
“No.”
“You could have.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because I want to know why he’s here.”
She looked at the broken window.
“He might have known.”
“Dead men rarely explain themselves.”
They searched the house.
Nothing else was missing.
Jonas’s cash remained beneath a loose floorboard.
His father’s rifle still hung in the study.
Food remained in the pantry.
The intruder had come for one purpose.
Ellie.
Or something connected to her.
Downstairs, Jonas spread the contents of her trunk across the table.
Dresses.
Undergarments.
Letters.
Books.
The silver brush.
No money.
Ellie noticed immediately.
“The envelope beneath the lining is gone.”
“How much?”
“Two hundred dollars.”
Jonas looked at her.
“That was everything?”
“Nearly.”
“You said in your letters that you had savings.”
“I did.”
“What happened?”
She looked away.
Jonas waited.
Ellie folded one of her dresses slowly.
“My father died owing more than anyone knew. There were lawsuits. Taxes. People who had smiled at us for years suddenly remembered every dollar they claimed he owed them.”
“And you?”
“I sold what I could.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because your advertisement asked whether I could support myself until I reached Colorado.”
“You couldn’t.”
“I did reach Colorado.”
Jonas stared.
Ellie met his gaze.
“So technically—”
“Don’t.”
Her mouth twitched.
He should have been angry.
Instead, he found himself fighting a smile.
That irritated him even more.
Jonas walked to the stove and added wood.
“You’re sleeping downstairs tonight.”
“Why?”
“Broken upstairs window.”
“I can sleep in another room.”
“You’re sleeping downstairs.”
“Is that a request?”
“No.”
“Then I’ll consider it.”
Jonas turned.
Ellie was already arranging blankets on the sofa.
He sighed.
“Do you always argue?”
“Only when men issue orders without explanation.”
“That must keep you busy.”
“It has.”
The cabin warmed.
Jonas repaired the front latch and wedged a heavy chair under it.
Then he boarded the upstairs window temporarily.
When he returned, Ellie was holding the photograph taken from the trees.
“You look different.”
“From what?”
“Your letters.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“In your letters you sounded older.”
Jonas poured coffee.
“I am older.”
“You sounded sixty.”
He handed her a cup.
“I’m thirty-five.”
“I know. Your advertisement said so.”
“Then what are we discussing?”
“Your complete lack of charm.”
Jonas drank his coffee.
“Also in the advertisement.”
Ellie laughed.
It was the first unguarded sound she had made since arriving.
The cabin seemed to change around it.
Jonas didn’t like noticing.
He sat opposite her.
“Tell me about Pembroke.”
The laughter vanished.
Ellie slowly lowered the cup.
“How do you know that name?”
Jonas reached into the pile of letters and pulled one free.
It was not one of his.
The envelope had been hidden between two dresses.
CHARLES PEMBROKE, PHILADELPHIA was printed in the corner.
Ellie went pale.
“I didn’t pack that.”
Jonas opened it.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
“Why?”
“Because I know what it says.”
“Then tell me.”
Ellie stared into the fire.
“He wanted to marry me.”
“You didn’t?”
“No.”
“He disagreed?”
“That would be a polite way to describe it.”
Jonas waited.
Her fingers tightened around the coffee cup.
“Charles’s father did business with mine. After Father died, Charles offered to solve the estate problems. At first I thought he was helping. Then I learned he had purchased several of Father’s debts.”
Jonas understood immediately.
“He owned you financially.”
“He tried.”
“And marriage would erase the debt.”
“For him. Not for me.”
Jonas leaned back.
“Did he threaten you?”
“Yes.”
“What kind?”
Ellie’s eyes met his.
“The kind that made Colorado seem reasonable.”
Something hard formed in Jonas’s chest.
He opened the letter.
Ellie didn’t stop him this time.
It contained five lines.
Eleanor,
You have mistaken distance for freedom.
Colorado changes nothing.
Come home before Hargrave learns what you really are.
You know what happens if you refuse.
C.P.
Jonas read the last line twice.
“What are you?”
Ellie gave him a tired smile.
“Disappointing, apparently.”
“Ellie.”
“I don’t know what he means.”
Jonas studied her.
She looked frightened.
But not surprised.
That distinction mattered.
“You’re hiding something.”
“So are you.”
His eyes narrowed.
“That photograph wasn’t taken because of Charles Pembroke.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You recognized the handwriting on the warning at the depot.”
Jonas became still.
Ellie had watched him read the message.
He had tried to hide his reaction.
Apparently not well enough.
“Whose handwriting?”
He said nothing.
Ellie leaned forward.
“If we’re going to survive people shooting at us, I think we should upgrade our marriage arrangement to include inconvenient truths.”
“We aren’t married yet.”
“Excellent. Then this is your final opportunity to scare me away.”
Jonas looked toward the window.
Snow struck the glass.
Finally he said, “My brother.”
Ellie waited.
“His name was Caleb.”
“You said you had no siblings.”
“I said I had no living siblings.”
“What happened?”
“Mining collapse twelve years ago.”
“You found him?”
“No.”
His voice changed on the word.
“We found three bodies. Caleb wasn’t one of them.”
“So he might have survived.”
“The tunnel was sealed by six hundred tons of rock.”
“But you never found him.”
“No.”
Ellie looked at the warning note.
“You think he wrote it.”
“I know his hand.”
“But if Caleb survived, why threaten me?”
“That’s what I don’t understand.”
Jonas stood.
“Tomorrow we go to town.”
“To report this?”
“To talk to Sheriff Cole.”
“And get married?”
Jonas stopped.
They had been scheduled to marry at noon.
He had forgotten.
Ellie noticed.
“Comforting.”
“We can postpone.”
“Do you want to?”
Jonas looked at her.
It should have been easy to say yes.
A threatened bride.
A stolen trunk.
An intruder.
A brother who might not be dead.
Everything in Jonas’s life told him to stop.
Yet Ellie stood in his kitchen wrapped in his scarf, surrounded by her scattered belongings, refusing to run.
“No,” he said.
Her expression softened.
“Neither do I.”
That answer changed something between them.
Not love.
Not yet.
But commitment.
Perhaps that was more dangerous.
Morning came pale and bitter.
Jonas saddled two horses because the wagon road remained blocked.
Ellie emerged wearing layers from her trunk beneath the velvet coat.
Jonas looked her over.
“You still look like you’re attending an opera.”
“It’s all I have.”
He went to the barn and returned with an enormous brown wool coat.
“My mother’s.”
Ellie hesitated.
“You kept it?”
“Yes.”
She put it on.
It was too large.
Warm.
Jonas adjusted the collar.
His hands paused near her throat.
Ellie looked up.
For one suspended second, neither moved.
Jonas stepped back first.
“Better.”
Ellie smiled faintly.
“Thank you.”
They rode toward Silver Plume.
Sheriff Nathan Cole listened without interruption.
He was fifty, broad-shouldered, with a mustache that seemed permanently skeptical.
When Jonas mentioned Caleb, the sheriff removed his hat.
“You certain?”
“Yes.”
“Could be someone copying his hand.”
“Possible.”
Cole looked at Ellie.
“And Pembroke?”
“Possible too,” Jonas said.
Ellie objected.
“Charles doesn’t know Caleb’s handwriting.”
“Someone else does.”
The sheriff tapped the desk.
“Your brother worked the Evernight Mine before the collapse.”
“So?”
“So did half the men in this valley.”
“And?”
Cole hesitated.
“That mine has new owners.”
Jonas frowned.
“Since when?”
“Three months.”
“Who?”
The sheriff opened a drawer.
He removed a property ledger.
Jonas read the name.
PEMBROKE CONSOLIDATED HOLDINGS.
Ellie’s face drained of color.
“Charles?”
“Company traces back east,” Cole said. “Philadelphia.”
Jonas looked at Ellie.
Pembroke had not merely followed her.
He had arrived first.
The marriage proceeded anyway.
At noon, in a small chapel overlooking the valley, Jonas Hargrave and Eleanor Whitmore stood before Reverend Bell.
There were no flowers.
No guests except Sheriff Cole and his wife.
Ellie wore her cream traveling dress.
Jonas wore a clean black coat.
When Reverend Bell asked whether Jonas took Eleanor as his lawful wife, Jonas looked directly into her eyes.
“I do.”
Ellie’s voice trembled only slightly when her turn came.
“I do.”
Jonas placed a simple silver ring on her finger.
It had belonged to his mother.
Ellie noticed the worn engraving inside.
Always home.
She looked up sharply.
Jonas said nothing.
Outside, snow had stopped.
The valley opened beneath a pale blue sky.
For the first time, Ellie wondered whether she might actually be safe.
Then Sheriff Cole emerged from the chapel.
His face was grim.
“Jonas.”
Something in his tone made Jonas turn immediately.
Cole handed him a folded telegram.
It had arrived during the ceremony.
Jonas opened it.
Ellie watched his face change.
“What?”
Jonas gave her the telegram.
It contained eight words.
ELEANOR WHITMORE IS ALREADY LEGALLY MARRIED.
Ellie stared at the name beneath the message.
Charles Pembroke.
May you like
Then Reverend Bell quietly closed the chapel door behind them.
Someone inside had begun knocking.
