Montana Sky: Anson's Mail-Order Bride (Kindle Worlds) (The Jones's of Morgan's Crossing Book 1)

by Kit Morgan

  … Might I mention too, that my husband Anson is one of the most aggravating, stubborn and unyielding men I have ever met! Something is clearly wrong, but he won’t tell me what! Instead, he avoids me – twice I swear he pretended I wasn’t even in the house with him! (No easy task in a one-room shack.)

  Zadie stared at her last words with a heavy heart. She’d wasted paper, something she shouldn’t be doing. Then again, rather than scratch out her last paragraph, maybe she ought to leave it in. Such was the plight of a mail-order bride. Maybe after the bloom was off a woman, a man thought he could just toss her to the side. Hmmm … she must not have had much bloom – they’d only been married a few weeks.

  She dipped the pen into the ink again.

  Until my new husband starts speaking to me and acting his old self, I shall endeavor to burn all his meals. If that doesn’t get his attention and get him talking, I don’t know what will.

  Yours truly,

  Zadie Jones

  P.S. Say hello to Monsieur Pickles for me.

  Zadie stabbed the paper with the pen on her last punctuation mark but didn’t care. She had a mind to send Mrs. Pettigrew her letter as it was. In fact, putting it into the envelope she’d already addressed might make her feel better.

  She set the pen down, folded the letter and did just that. “There,” she said with a sigh and placed the letter on the table. She sat a moment and stared at the missive in silence before realization struck. “Well, how about that – I do feel better!” She giggled, her hands to her mouth, then stood. “I’ll have to write Mrs. Pettigrew more often.”

  She never was one to write in a journal. Her father did every day, telling her it was his way of dealing with himself. He must have had to deal with himself a lot – she’d found an entire box of his journals after he died.

  Zadie glanced at her trunks against the far wall. She’d brought the journals with her instead of her mother’s china. They weren’t pretty to look at, but they did contain a record of happier times. After his death she’d peeked at one, dated several years before her mother passed, but it was too much for her to bear. Maybe next winter she’d organize them and read his private thoughts. Maybe by then she wouldn’t miss him so much.

  She set the thought aside and went outside. Anson had fashioned a clothesline for her between the tree behind the house and a post he pounded into the ground. She hung up the clothes she’d washed (her first ever) and stood back to admire the fruits of her labor. Two pairs of denim trousers, two shirts and her blue day dress that she’d painstakingly tried not to tear in the process.

  She had no idea what she was going to do with her other frocks. The ready-made dresses Anson purchased for her in Sweetwater Springs could be dealt with easily enough by hot water and a scrub board. But her green velvet traveling dress … well, she shuddered at the thought of treating it the same. Her mother had sent their finer clothes out to be cleaned, while the maid did the rest. She had no such luxury and was going to have to figure something else out. Perhaps she should ask Mrs. Morgan what she did with her finer gowns …

  A loud squawk drew her attention. All three hens came running out of the barn and straight to her. They reached the safety of her skirts and began to cluck and scratch at the ground.

  “What’s gotten into you?” she cooed, hands on hips. “Oh dear, I forgot to feed you this morning! I’m so sorry!” She glanced at the barn. They must have heard her hanging up the laundry and decided they wanted food. Anson was right – they knew she was the hand that fed them. Of course, they hadn’t been because of him – the man had her so upset and puzzled, the task had slipped her mind completely.

  “All right, girls – follow me if you want a snack.” She headed for the barn, went inside and went straight to the small barrel where Anson stored the chicken feed to keep the mice out of it. Of course, she’d rather discover a mouse in a sack of feed than a snake, thank you very much …

  “Hello, Zadie.”

  Zadie gasped at the voice, straightened and spun toward the source. “Oh my goodness!”

  A man came out of the shadowed corner, the same one the rattler had been hiding in. He stood before her and looked her up and down. “It’s been a long time.”

  She was almost too shocked to speak. “Y-yes, it has.”

  “My apologies for that, Zadie. What do you say to you and I having ourselves a little chat? Catching up?”

  * * *

  Anson rode home in defeat. The only good news he’d received was from Freddy Chance – he was free tomorrow and could help him plan the addition he wanted for the cabin, maybe even start on the fence line. At least that was something. Anson wasn’t sure about the addition, but he was very sure about the fencing.

  He continued the ride home, loneliness and King Lear his only companions. He realized he hadn’t been separated from Zadie for this long before. He’d stayed near the ranch for the most part and had only been away the times he rode to the river to bathe. He’d have to take Zadie there – it was well into May and she could wade in parts of it …

  What am I thinking? He shook his head, as if to rid his mind of the thought. Stay away from her, you don’t know yet what kind of person she really is …

  Didn’t he? He knew she melted against him the moment he took her in his arms, that her lips tasted like honey, that he’d never felt so alive as he did when he was with her. But was that the real Zadie Jones? A good con man – or woman – could make a man fall in love with her, and then rob him blind when the moment was right.

  Anson brought his horse to a stop. He was still several miles from home and had spent most of his ride going over details from the time Reginald Van Cleet and his little band started to embezzle money from his brother Cyrus to the time he received the tip about Penworthy. Someone had helped Penworthy, and it had to be either Zadie or her father, or both.

  “Both?” Anson mused. Zadie’s father, he recalled, died shortly before she became a mail-order bride. From what she’d shared with him since their nuptials, she’d buried him, sold off what she could and left Denver as soon as she was able. Had she been that destitute? Did her father leave her nothing?

  “No … something,” he whispered. What if her father had hid the money for her uncle, but hadn’t told him exactly where before he died, due either to distrust or lack of time? Then her father might have told her to leave to keep her safe. Maybe that’s all he managed before death took him.

  And Anson was from Oregon, for Pete’s sake! There was no way she could know he’d end up in Morgan’s Crossing – he hadn’t even known he would be until weeks before he arrived!

  He smacked himself in the forehead. That would mean Zadie had nothing to do with it. She really was here because of Monsieur Pickles!

  “Anson, you crack-brained idiot!” he said with a roll of his eyes. “Of all the dumb, stupid …” He continued to berate himself and kicked his horse into a canter. Now more than ever he wanted to get home to his wife. He had a lot of apologizing to do, not to mention a lot of time to make up. But the first thing he planned to do was to tell his wife he loved her.

  And then, as soon as he could, he’d make her pack her bags and send her to Clear Creek on the first train she could get out of Sweetwater Springs. He had been right in the first place – it was too dangerous for her to be here!

  * * *

  “Uncle Mort, what do you think you’re doing?” Zadie screeched. He’d come out of the shadows, babbling about some map her father had given her. She knew nothing about any map, and said as much. In response, he’d shoved her onto his horse and tied her hands to the saddle horn!

  Putting his foot in the stirrup, he mounted up behind her. ‘You’re going to take me to where the money is, right now. You’ve probably just been waiting for a chance to get your hands on it!”

  “I don’t know about any money! What is this about? Did you rob a bank?”

  “Might as well have.”

  “So you confess that you stole some money?” she pre
ssed, her voice a strangled squeak. Maybe not the wisest thing to do, but she was hopping mad at this point – her uncle’s indignities piling on top of her husband’s. How dare he treat her in such a manner!

  “Nosy, aren’t you? But let me tell you something else – your dear sweet papa helped me tuck it away.”

  “What? He would never!”

  “He’d do anything to see that you were taken care of. How do you think he could afford to rent that nice house in Denver, hmm?”

  “By making an honest living and saving his money,” she shot back.

  “Oh you dear lamb – so naïve. He lost his job months before the two of you left Boston.”

  Zadie froze. “What?”

  Uncle Mort snickered behind her, took up the reins and kicked the horse into motion. They rode out of the barn and away from the ranch. But instead of the road to Morgan’s Crossing, he headed out to the prairie. “He never told you, did he? They’d fired him. When he got sick, he was nothing more than a name on paper to them. Big men with big companies forget that we suffer and struggle for every penny while they sit on their self-made thrones and spit on us. They deserve to be bled dry!”

  “What are you talking about?” she asked, more alarmed than ever. She’d never seen him like this, never heard him like this except for that argument with her father on his last visit. “You stole money and asked him to hide it, didn’t you?”

  “Maybe you’re not so naïve after all. And now you’re going to tell me where it is.”

  “I don’t know where this money you’re talking about is located. Now will you kindly untie me so we can have a rational conversation?”

  “Afraid I can’t – you see, I know you’re lying. Your dear papa would never take the information to his grave, because he wanted part of it to go to you. He’d have told somebody – and you’re the most likely one he’d tell.”

  She was still putting the pieces together. “You paid him to hide it for you?”

  “That’s right. He kept that he’d been fired from you, didn’t he? Well, they didn’t get rid of him right away, mind you – he begged them for one last chance, so they sent him to St. Louis.”

  “So what? He’s made that trip plenty of times.”

  “But the other times, it didn’t take him three weeks to go there and back, did it?” he sneered.

  Zadie’s eyes widened as comprehension dawned. “Oh no …”

  “Oh yes.”

  A chill gripped her. “He really did help you.”

  “Yes, he did. Now, where is the map he drew for you?”

  “I told you, I have not seen a map!” she said, punctuating every word in her panic.

  “You’re a very poor liar, Zadie. You can’t fool your Uncle Mort. Why else would you be out here in the middle of nowhere? Why else would a woman like you go to such lengths? Becoming a mail-order bride … really, I could have thought up something better than that.”

  “Will you stop?!” she yelled. “I’ve had enough of this! Untie me this instant!”

  He sighed behind her and fumbled with something in his jacket. “I’m afraid I can’t do that … but I can do this.” He brought out a cloth and quickly gagged her.

  Furious, she tried to kick at his horse.

  “Stop that you little fool, you want to get us both bucked off?”

  He had a point. She settled down, but was still angry to be treated so by a relative. She was his niece, for crying out loud! More importantly, how she was going to get out of this? Her uncle had definitely gone “round the bend” and couldn’t be reasoned with. Which meant she was in grave danger.

  Oh Anson, she thought. Where are you?

  * * *

  “Zadie, where are you?” Anson called. He spun a full circle and scanned the barnyard. She wasn’t in the house or the barn – he’d already checked. So where could she be? “Zadie!”

  Still no answer. “Where the devil is that woman?” he asked, hands on hips. Of course after the way he treated her, maybe she … “No,” he said. “She wouldn’t. She couldn’t!” Literally – Hamlet was in the barn. She had to be on foot. Maybe she just went for a walk?

  He hurried to the cabin, burst through the door and did a quick inventory. All of her things were there. She must be out walking. “Foolish woman!” He turned on his heel, returned to his horse and mounted.

  “Now if I was a woman and I was mad at me,” he mused aloud, “where would I stomp off to?” The river? No – he’d never taken her there, so how would she know which direction to go? “She may be mad at me, but she’s not stupid,” he stated to himself.

  Then again … she wouldn’t leave the ranch and start striding across the prairie just because she needed to walk off her anger, would she? He studied his surroundings again, his eyes settling on the barn. He rode as far as the barn door, dismounted and went inside a second time. Everything seemed in order … except that the lid wasn’t on the feed barrel.

  Anson replaced it then noticed that the hens had followed him into the barn. They began clucking and making a fuss. “Did you girls get fed?” They eyed him expectantly. “Apparently not.” He reached into the barrel and scooped up a handful of grain. “Come on, then, follow me,” he said, leading them outside where he spread the feed for them.

  Then it hit him. “Penworthy?”

  He grabbed King Lear’s reins and scanned the area again. What if that snake had shown up and taken her? He immediately studied the ground around him, looking for hoof prints. His father and uncle were both excellent trackers and had taught him a thing or two growing up, though he was nowhere near their level of expertise.

  But he knew that when he left the ranch he only ever rode in one of three directions: toward the main road, toward the river or along the fence lines. He began to follow the most recent tracks he saw. Other than the ones King Lear had just made, another set followed the drive to the main road for about fifty yards, then branched off onto the prairie. And he could tell that the horse was carrying more than one person …

  “Dear God, no,” Anson whispered. He mounted his horse and took off after them.

  Nineteen

  If Zadie didn’t know better, she’d say Uncle Mort was heading for Morgan’s Crossing. Yes, they were on the prairie, but she’d made the trip to town enough times to know where the road was – and that they were more or less riding parallel with it. Thank heavens! Maybe someone would see them.

  If she hadn’t been gagged, she’d give him a good piece of her mind. The man had gone out of his … which made her think it might be in her best interest that she couldn’t speak. For all she knew, he’d do her an injury in his madness. She knew he wouldn’t kill her, though – despite her protests, he still thought she knew where this stolen money was hidden.

  Oh father, why didn’t you tell me? She thought. Together we would have made it just fine. She was perfectly capable of finding some sort of job so she could help out. Unfortunately, everything Uncle Mort had told her made sense. If her father had been reduced to working only sparingly, their funds would have dwindled soon enough. John Barrett knew he was dying and wanted to spend his last days with his daughter in comfort instead of struggle. In essence, he was trying to leave her with happy memories.

  She shook her head. Papa, you still should have told me. Maybe if he had, she wouldn’t be in this predicament. But maybe he hadn’t had the opportunity to do so. No – her father’s heart was failing, his strength leaving him, but it wasn’t something that happened overnight. The man had had ample time to …

  That’s it! she thought. What if he wrote it in his journal? That would have spared him his pride, his dignity while he was still alive. He wanted to die with her respect, not her anger over what he’d done.

  Zadie closed her eyes against the thought. Of course, she could be wrong and her father took the location of the stolen money to his grave so Uncle Mort could never get his hands on it, or get caught during his attempt to find it. But she was pretty sure she wasn’t wrong – it was e
xactly the sort of way Father would have acted.

  That gave her an idea. If Uncle Mort got too demanding – no, make that crazy – she could use the journals to trap him. They’d have to return to the ranch to retrieve them, and by then Anson would be home. And Anson was armed, resourceful, and far younger and stronger than her uncle.

  Come to think of it, why hadn’t Uncle Mort mentioned him … oh. Because he knew Anson had gone to town, you dolt! Would her uncle risk going back to the ranch if he knew what she knew? Maybe he’d been watching the place and seen Anson leave. And if that were the case, then how long had her uncle been in the area? Could he have figured out she’d gone to Mrs. Pettigrew’s, gotten the woman to tell him where she went, then concluded that she had to know where the money was?

  But she was here because of a fluke, not because she knew anything. She was supposed to go to Oregon! The only reason she came to the Montana Territory was because …

  Wait a minute … how much coincidence was involved in Anson coming to Morgan’s Crossing? He could have picked lots of places to start a horse-breeding concern. Did he know about the stolen money?

  This whole mess was getting stranger and stranger by the minute.

  A tree line came into view and Zadie knew there was a river nearby – Anson had told her about it. The river flowed through Morgan’s Crossing and was the same one Anson said he bathed in now and then. Anson … would she ever see him again?

  Uncle Mort steered his horse toward the trees. Within half an hour they reached them, and Zadie’s heart sank. It was one thing to be out on the open prairie where everyone could see you – not that anyone had – quite another to be in the trees where she would be harder to spot. How would anyone find her? Anson had to have come home by now – was he already searching? And if so, did he have any idea which direction her uncle had taken her?

  Uncle Mort brought his horse to a stop near the remains of a fire. From the look of it, he’d been camping there for several days. A bedroll was spread beneath a small lean-to, a coffee pot sat on a rock near the fire and a canteen hung from a tree branch. How long had he been watching the ranch?