Chapter 1 - Get in My Wagon
Martha's knees buckled beside the shattered wheel as she whispered, "Please... don't let my baby die."
The mountain man caught her and spotted a leather document case beneath the broken wagon.
Three letters had been scratched into its brass clasp.
E.V.C.
His face changed.
This was no ordinary breakdown.
Martha barely noticed.
The world had narrowed to heat, pain, and the powerful arm around her shoulders keeping her from striking the ground.
"Easy."
The stranger's voice was deep and rough.
Not cruel.
Just unused to softness.
Martha tried to push herself upright.
"I can stand."
"No, you can't."
"I have to."
"You don't."
Her eyes lifted to his face.
He was somewhere in his thirties, she guessed, though the wilderness had carved harder years into him. Dark hair curled beneath a battered brown hat. Dust covered his coat. A revolver rode low against his thigh.
The sight of the gun frightened her.
The fact that she needed the armed stranger frightened her more.
Behind him waited a second wagon, smaller than hers but sturdier, with two strong horses shifting impatiently in their harness.
Martha swallowed.
"Who are you?"
"Elias Cole."
She had never heard the name.
That should have comforted her.
It didn't.
She had been warned about men on the trail.
Deserters.
Thieves.
Men who found lonely travelers and left nothing but wheel tracks and graves.
Elias glanced at her swollen belly.
"How far along?"
"Seven months."
"How long since you had a proper drink?"
Martha said nothing.
His eyes moved toward the small wooden keg tied beneath her wagon.
He crossed to it, lifted it, and heard almost nothing.
"That's what I thought."
"I was rationing it."
"You were dying politely."
Her mouth tightened.
"I didn't ask for your judgment."
"No."
He looked at the broken axle.
"You need my wagon, not my judgment."
Martha braced one hand against the wagon bed.
"My husband built this wagon."
Elias looked at her.
The word husband had done something to his expression.
"Where is he?"
Martha's fingers tightened around the wood.
"Dead."
The answer hung between them.
"How long?"
"Four months."
Elias removed his hat.
For one quiet second, the hard mountain man became simply a man hearing about another man's death.
"Sorry."
Martha nodded.
That was all she could manage.
She had discovered that grief became harder when strangers were kind about it.
Elias put his hat back on.
"Fort Laramie's several days from here at your pace."
"I know."
"Axle can't be repaired."
"I know."
"Your animals are near done."
"I know."
"And you're carrying a child."
"I know!"
The shout cost her.
Pain tightened across her abdomen.
Martha gasped.
Elias moved immediately.
"What happened?"
"Nothing."
"That wasn't nothing."
"It happens sometimes."
"Since when?"
She wouldn't answer.
"Martha."
She froze.
"I never told you my name."
Elias pointed toward the wagon.
Her husband's old painted lettering remained on the side:
DANIEL & MARTHA WHITCOMB
"Oh."
She felt foolish.
That irritated her too.
"Sit."
"I don't take orders."
"Then consider it a suggestion from a man who doesn't want to deliver a baby in the dirt."
Despite everything, Martha almost laughed.
Almost.
Instead another dizzy spell rolled through her.
Elias caught her.
This time she didn't fight him.
He lifted her into his arms.
Martha grabbed his coat.
"What are you doing?"
"Saving time."
"Put me down."
"No."
"My things—"
"Can be moved."
"My wagon—"
"Can't."
"My husband's rifle is inside."
"I'll get it."
"The chest too."
"I'll get it."
"My blankets—"
"Martha."
She stared at him.
"Get in my wagon."
It was not a request.
Something in her finally surrendered.
Not to him.
To reality.
She had spent four months believing stubbornness was the same thing as strength.
Daniel had died of fever near Independence Rock, and Martha had buried him beneath a cottonwood with stones over the grave because she was terrified wolves would disturb him.
Then she had continued west alone.
She had promised him she would.
She had promised their unborn child would have land.
A home.
A future.
She had sold almost everything back in Missouri to join the wagon road.
Turning around had never been possible.
Stopping hadn't seemed possible either.
Until the axle split.
Elias carried her to his wagon.
He settled her beneath the canvas shade and handed her a canteen.
"Slow."
Martha drank greedily.
He pulled it away.
She glared.
"Slow means slow."
"I'm thirsty."
"Which is exactly why."
He let her take another mouthful.
Then another.
The water felt like life itself.
Martha closed her eyes.
When she opened them, Elias was watching her.
"Why are you alone?" she asked.
"Same reason you are."
Her expression changed.
He looked away.
Martha understood.
"Your wife?"
"And son."
She regretted asking.
"I'm sorry."
"Long time ago."
But his voice said otherwise.
Elias walked back toward her broken wagon.
Martha watched him through the opening.
He examined the axle first.
Then the wheel.
He crouched.
His hand touched the split timber.
Something about his posture changed.
He leaned closer.
Martha called, "What is it?"
"Nothing."
That answer came too quickly.
Elias reached beneath the wagon.
His fingers found a groove.
The axle had not merely cracked.
There was a clean cut through part of the timber.
A saw cut.
Someone had weakened it.
Elias stood slowly.
He scanned the empty country.
No movement.
No riders.
Nothing except sagebrush trembling in the wind.
He said nothing to Martha.
Not yet.
He climbed inside her wagon.
A small trunk contained women's clothing and baby linens.
Daniel's rifle hung from hooks.
A wooden cradle, unfinished, had been tied against the wall.
Elias stopped.
One side remained unpolished.
Tiny pencil marks crossed the wood where Daniel had apparently measured pieces before his death.
Elias touched it once.
Then he continued.
Food.
Tools.
A Bible.
A coffee mill.
Blankets.
A tin plate.
Nothing valuable enough to kill for.
Then he noticed a floorboard sitting slightly higher than the others.
Elias knelt.
He wedged his knife under it.
The board lifted.
Beneath it was the leather document case.
E.V.C.
He knew those initials.
Everybody who had trapped, freighted, or ridden between Fort Laramie and South Pass knew them.
Everett Vance Coyle.
Coyle controlled freight contracts, cattle routes, and more than a few men who were officially supposed to enforce the law.
Elias opened the case.
Inside were folded papers.
He read the first page.
His jaw hardened.
Land deeds.
Not one.
Six.
Then a handwritten ledger.
Dates.
Payments.
Names.
Beside several names appeared a single word.
CLEARED.
Elias knew what that meant.
He had seen abandoned homesteads.
Burned cabins.
Missing settlers.
Daniel Whitcomb had been carrying evidence.
And Martha had no idea.
A sound came from outside.
Elias dropped the papers into the case and drew his revolver.
Hoofbeats.
Distant.
But approaching.
He stepped out.
Martha was already sitting upright.
"What is it?"
"Stay down."
Her face paled.
"Elias?"
"Stay inside."
He walked toward the trail.
Three riders appeared on a distant rise.
They stopped.
Even from hundreds of yards away, Elias knew they had seen the broken wagon.
One rider lifted binoculars.
Elias returned quickly.
"We're leaving."
"But my things."
"Taking what matters."
"What happened?"
"Nothing you need to worry about yet."
"I am not a child."
"No. You're a pregnant woman who can barely stand, and three men are riding toward a wagon somebody deliberately sabotaged."
Martha went still.
"What?"
Elias regretted saying it so plainly.
"My axle broke."
"Partly."
"What does partly mean?"
"It was weakened with a saw."
All the color left her face.
"No."
"Did your husband have enemies?"
"Daniel?"
"Think."
"He was a schoolteacher before we came west."
"That doesn't answer me."
"He didn't have enemies."
Elias held up the leather case.
"Ever seen this?"
Martha stared.
"No."
"Found it under your floor."
"That's impossible."
"Apparently not."
She reached for it.
Elias hesitated, then handed it over.
Martha saw the initials.
E.V.C.
Her confusion deepened.
"Who is E.V.C.?"
"We can discuss that while moving."
The riders were closer.
Elias loaded what he could.
Daniel's rifle.
Martha's trunk.
Food.
Blankets.
The unfinished cradle.
When Martha saw him carrying it, tears filled her eyes.
"You found it."
"Wasn't leaving that."
Daniel had started the cradle three days before the fever took him.
Martha pressed her lips together.
"Thank you."
Elias secured it.
Then he climbed to the driver's bench.
Martha sat beside him.
"Where are we going?"
"Not Fort Laramie."
Her head snapped toward him.
"You said—"
"I said you wouldn't die out here."
"I need to reach the fort."
"Those men know you were headed there."
"You don't know that."
"No."
Elias gathered the reins.
"But I'm not wagering two lives on being wrong."
The wagon started.
Behind them, the three riders reached Martha's wreck.
One dismounted.
Even at a distance, Elias recognized the man's long gray coat.
His stomach tightened.
Martha followed his gaze.
"You know him."
Elias didn't answer.
The gray-coated rider climbed inside the abandoned wagon.
Seconds later, he emerged.
He shouted something to the others.
All three mounted.
Then they turned toward Elias's wagon.
"They're following us," Martha whispered.
Elias snapped the reins.
The horses broke into a harder run.
"Hold on."
Martha gripped the seat.
"Who are they?"
Dust rose behind the riders.
Elias glanced once at the leather case in Martha's lap.
Then at the man in gray gaining on them.
"Men who expected you to die beside that wagon."
A rifle shot cracked across the valley.
The bullet struck the rear of Elias's wagon.
And Martha suddenly understood.
May you like
Her broken axle had never been an accident.
Someone had been waiting for her to stop.
