"She's a woman of fortitude."
Wyatt didn't like Carson's tone. Didn't like the gleam of interest in his beady little eyes. "She is leaving town in a few weeks if the weather holds. She is not looking for marriage."
"A woman can always be tempted."
Wyatt resisted the urge to punch the smug grin off the shopkeeper's mouth. He knew beyond a doubt Garnet could not be tempted. She didn't care about a man's money. She was more than happy to stay with him, more than willing to share a kiss and friendship beneath a moonlit sky. She wasn't going to run off on a man to enjoy the company of another who could give her more in the way of material possessions. Garnet was loyal and honest, he'd learned this by watching her.
And she was his.
He had vowed never to become involved with another woman again. Only a woman could break his heart the way Amelia had. Only a woman could hold all of a man's fragile trust, love, and hope in her hand. And when they were broken, how could they ever be repaired?
Now he knew. He'd been lonely for so long. Lonely by choice, because he never met one woman who could be what he needed. Until now. Until Garnet.
He grabbed his box of supplies. Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing, deciding to try again. Then again, maybe it was. Garnet had a life and a home. And he had an investigation and a job waiting for him far from here.
"That's quite a nugget, Tanner. You must have a good claim."
"Won it in a poker game." Wyatt considered Barrett Carson again. He was a wealthy man's youngest son, proving his worth to his father by working in this store. Educated, articulate, and high society, Wyatt figured. He'd learned at his late-night poker games that Carson was unhappy working for his father, didn't like Stinking Creek, wanted out of Montana.
"You win all your gold in poker games," Carson observed, but didn't take a step. As if he were hiding a possible limp.
"I win it the easy way. Why does it matter to you where I get my gold?"
"No reason." Carson's hat could hide a bandage.
Wyatt wasn't fooled. Whoever killed his brother had known Ben had panned a lot of gold, for robbery had been the real reason behind the murder. He'd started his footwork in the same saloons where his brother had spent lonely nights playing cards. And betting those fifty-dollar nuggets. It was the primary place Ben had spent his gold.
Now, looking at the panning supplies in the corner of the store, and then at the guns behind glass against the back wall, Wyatt had to move Carson up on his list of suspects. "You carry a good selection."
Carson grabbed his key to the case. "Are you looking for a new rifle?"
"I found one just like this on the road one night. Wondered how much it was worth."
Carson bowed his head. He fumbled with the key-chain. "You wouldn't get as much second-hand."
"Probably not." Wyatt wondered about the shopkeep. "Is this the only place in town that sells guns like these?"
"Well, there's the gunsmith down the street."
"Right. I'd forgotten." Wyatt hadn't forgotten. He knew how much a rifle was worth. "Sell many of these?" He pointed at a gleaming Winchester.
"None in at least a month."
"Is that right? Figured the man who lost the rifle might have replaced it."
"Not from this store."
"I appreciate your time, Carson." Wyatt headed toward the door, his instincts unsettled.
"Do you want your change in gold or coin?" the merchant asked, stepping behind the safety of the counter.
"Credit. Put it on Garnet's account."
"Whatever you say. With all the lonely men in town, is Miss Garnet getting a lot of suitors?"
Wyatt considered that question, too. "Yes, Carson. She sure is."
"Do you know what kind of candy she likes?"
"Expensive." Wyatt turned to the door. With any luck Garnet would hate whatever candy Carson brought. He headed down the street to pay a visit to the gunsmith.
* * *
Garnet picked her way along the trail that followed the muddy banks of Stinking Creek. A rabbit darted out of the low bushes and across the path. A puff of cold wind rattled the alders overhead. Birds scurried about their work, and the crackling expectation in the air signaled a storm was coming.
There he was, just up ahead. Her heart gave a jump at the sight of him. Wyatt knelt at the creek's bank, his hat tipped over his eyes, his wide shoulders braced as he shook a broad shallow pan.
"You shouldn't sneak up on an armed man." He didn't look up as he worked.
She picked her way across the uneven ground. "I didn't know you were armed."
"Aside from the intruder you wounded, now and then someone decides it's easier to steal the gold than it is to work for it."
"I didn't know panning for gold was work."
"Well, maybe it's time you learned." Humor flashed in his eyes. "Come sit down by me."
"No, I have laundry hanging on the line that needs ironing and–"
"Sit down." Firmer this time, brooking no argument. He held out his big hand, wet and muddy.
Her foolish feet carried her forward. She placed her hand in his. "Do you actually find any gold?"
"Sometimes." Wyatt tugged her down to kneel beside his big steely body.
She felt his heat, his strong hard presence in tune with the wilderness surrounding them. His voice rumbled through her as if it were her own.
"What amazes me is the earth." How reverent he sounded. "Something of great value is hidden beneath all this dirt and rock. Plain ordinary dirt. You can't tell where it is by looking. But a patient man can brush away the ordinary, bit by bit, and find the treasure beneath."
"You make it sound almost noble, but I'm not fooled." But she was captivated by this man wearing plain, ordinary clothes, living a plain, ordinary life.
"Here. Put your hand on this." His fingers wrapped around hers and set them on the edge of his pan. The metal was wet from the creek water and warm from his touch. "And your other hand here."
"You're trying to convert me into being a prospector."
"I'm trying to prove you wrong." His eyes sparkled with amusement and warmth and caring. "Now, shake it like this, back and forth."
"It's like flouring a cake pan."
He laughed. "Watch. See how the water is moving the dirt. Look, right there. You've found gold."
"This is your gold."
"Isn't it fun?"
"You're not going to get me to change my opinion." But she laughed, in spite of herself. The dull glint of gold amid the tiny rocks and bits of earth was fascinating. "All right, I admit it. It's fun."
"Keep going. Look at that. You've panned yourself a good-sized nugget."
She stilled the pan while he reached for the dull, muddy gold rock. "That couldn't be worth much."
"About fifty dollars is my guess." His smile broadened and etched dimples into his cheeks, dimples she'd never seen before.
She knew so little about him, only that he was everything she should never want in a man, and she wanted him. How she wanted him.
"Fifty dollars?"
"It's yours. That will buy your stage passage to the Montana border."
"Only one ticket."
"Maybe you could sell that sister of yours."
She felt lighter than she'd ever been before. "I pity the poor man who would pay good money for her. She doesn't cook so well."
"Don't talk about leaving. This place isn't going to be the same when you go. It will be pretty quiet around here without your humming and chatter."
"You would miss me?"
"Sure." His gaze roamed across her face. Then he took the gold nugget and bent to rinse it in the creek water. "Without all those suitors and clients coming around to call on you, I'm going to be mighty lonely."
"So it's the visitors and not me you'll miss."
"That's right."
This time she could tell for certain he was only teasing her, saying words that were not true to hide the things that were. Did he care for her? Did he feel as she did, confused but attracted?
All the more reason to resist her physical desire for him. They were friends, nothing more. They could never be anything more. She could never trust a man that much, not enough to hand over her heart.
He dried the nugget on his shirtfront, then pressed it into her hand. The metal held his heat, special to her because he had touched it. "Want to pan for more?"
She swallowed. If she found more gold, then she would have more money to go home with. She would have to leave sooner, maybe as soon as tomorrow, when the stage was due. Maybe she could find enough to see her home in time to start her term of teaching. She would be back where she belonged, where she was safe.
Her heart sank. Maybe that wasn't what she wanted now, after all. She'd sort of gotten used to the idea of staying in Montana for a little while and experiencing some of the things that she'd never had the chance to do before she returned home.
Thunder crashed overhead, a deafening crack that seemed to rend the world in two. Wyatt jumped up, cursing. Lightning tore across the sky, streaking toward the earth. Fire lit up the forest not ten yards from them. The earth shook, wood splintered, and a treetop, struck by the dangerous lightning bolt, tumbled to the ground, flames and smoke rising.
"Stay right there," Wyatt ordered. "Keep away from the trees."
"Where are you going?"
Any moment that lightning could return, closer this time. It could strike him, but did that stop Wyatt? No, he had a bucket of water in hand. He began dousing the flaming branches, trying to stop the spread of fire to the tinder-dry grasses.
Well, she wasn't going to stand around like this. She slipped the nugget into her skirt pocket for safekeeping and submerged the gold pan into the creek. Water dripping, she hurried to the flames and put out an ignited limb all on her own.
"Get down," he shouted above the thunder.
"The faster this fire is out, the faster we can both be safe."
He growled, racing the few feet to the river. Of course he wouldn't see it that way. He probably thought he could save the day while she sat around complimenting him for it. She filled her pan and after a few trips, the flames were out and the lightning strikes were moving southward across the creek.
"You're a crazy woman, do you know that?"
She laughed, breathless. Was it from running? Or from watching the broad span of his chest rise and fall with each breath? "I guess it depends on whether or not you like crazy women."
"Then I'm in luck." He held out his hand, reaching for hers.
Pleasant tingles danced from her fingers all the way up her arm. The contact of his skin against hers reminded her of their differences. He was rough and callused, hard and powerful, but flesh and bone, just as she was.
Something cold struck her face. "No, it can't be."
"It's just rain. It won't hurt you."
"No, but it could ruin the clothes I left out on the line. Hurry!" She started off at a run and raced along the narrow path.
"Rain can't hurt a pair of trousers." Wyatt kept up with her, one step behind.
"Yes, but I'll have to rewash them and lose all of today's hard work." Her foot slid on a patch of mud. Wyatt's hand cupped her elbow, catching her. Together they broke out of the forest and dashed across the yard.
The huge raindrops had already soaked them and turned the inches-thick dust to mud.
"You run pretty fast for a woman," he taunted as he passed her.
"You're kind of slow for a man." She made him laugh and by the time she turned the corner of the cabin, just three paces behind, he was already tugging shirts and trousers off the line. She joined him and in no time at all they had the garments laid out in the fresh dry straw in the stable. Perhaps they could be salvaged.
"You know what I could use?"
The lure in his voice made her think he might want to kiss her again. Rain dripped off his hat brim and plastered his cotton shirt to his chest like a second skin. She saw every delineated, well-defined muscle, every curve and plane and dip.
Her throat constricted. Every part of her ached to lay her hand there, on his breastbone, over his rapidly beating heart.
"I'm afraid to ask," she confessed.
His chuckle brushed over her like rain. "I noticed we ran out of coffee beans. I picked up another pound at Carson's store."
"Wyatt, that would make you the hero of my dreams."
"Gee, if I had known that, I would have got the more expensive beans."
The mare whinnied in her stall, lifting her nose high to scent the wind.
"Someone's coming." Wyatt took her arm and moved past her. "Wait. I can see him from here. It's Carson.
And it looks like he's carrying a box of candy. Do you like candy better than coffee beans?"
"No, why?" And she didn't like Barrett Carson.
"Then I'm in luck. Come on, go send that dandy home and I'll brew you a cup of real coffee, Montana style."
"Is that a promise or a threat?"
His gaze flickered with mystery. "You'll have to live dangerously and find out."
* * *
Wyatt watched while Garnet tried her first sip of his best coffee. "What do you think?"
