A Mail-Order Bride Arrives to Find Her Groom Dead, Until a Half-Apache Rancher Offers Protection

Chapter 4

They rode through darkness, following a creek bed that hid their tracks. Abigail had never ridden at night before—every shadow looked like a threat, every sound like pursuit. But Blackwood moved with absolute confidence, and gradually she found herself trusting his lead.

After two hours, he stopped on a ridge and pointed down.

“Wheeler’s ranch.”

The valley below held a house, barn, and scattered outbuildings, all silvered by moonlight. It looked peaceful. It looked like the home Thomas had described in his letters.

It looked like a trap.

“How do we know Jenkins doesn’t have men watching it?” Abigail asked.

“We don’t. But Jenkins is predictable—he’ll watch my ranch, assuming that’s where you’re hiding. By the time he realizes you’re gone, we’ll have what we need.”

They descended slowly, Blackwood stopping frequently to listen. The house was dark when they arrived, the door unlocked. Inside, it smelled like dust and absence.

Blackwood lit a single lamp, keeping the flame low. “Wheeler’s bedroom is upstairs. Office is through there. You look for anything that mentions the east pasture—maps, letters, surveys. I’ll check the outbuildings.”

“You’re leaving me alone?”

“I’ll be twenty feet away. And Miss Montgomery?” He handed her the small revolver Mrs. Red Feather had given her. “If anyone comes through that door who isn’t me, shoot first. Apologize later if necessary.”

Then he was gone, leaving Abigail alone in a dead man’s house.

She forced herself to breathe, to think. The office was small but organized—ledgers on the shelves, correspondence neatly filed. She started with the desk, working methodically through each drawer.

Bills of sale for cattle. Letters from suppliers. A deed to water rights. Nothing about the east pasture.

She moved to the filing cabinet. More of the same—business records, legal documents, a few personal letters from someone named Sarah in Denver.

Then, in the bottom drawer beneath a stack of old newspapers, she found it: a leather journal, unmarked.

Abigail opened it.

March 1, 1883

Met with assayer from Tucson. His assessment confirms it—there’s silver under the east pasture. High-grade ore, enough to make this ranch worth ten times what I paid for it. Enough to clear my debts and build the life I promised Abigail.

But if Burke finds out, he’ll find a way to take it. He’s been sniffing around for months, offering to buy me out. Now I know why.

I’ve filed a mining claim under Abigail’s name—she doesn’t know it yet, but once we’re married, it will protect us both. The claim is registered in Prescott, safe from Burke’s reach. All I need to do is survive until she arrives.

Abigail’s hands trembled. Silver. Thomas had discovered silver on his land, and it had killed him.

She kept reading.

March 5

Jenkins confronted me today. He knows something—not about the silver, but he senses I’m hiding something valuable. Offered to “protect” me from Burke in exchange for half the ranch. I refused. I’ve made too many enemies, and I’m running out of time.

Sent word to Ethan Blackwood. If I’m right about Burke, I won’t live to see Abigail arrive. Blackwood’s the only man who can keep her safe. I have to trust him.

March 7

Saw Doc Miller in town. He looked away when I passed. That’s when I knew—Burke’s made his move. The doctor’s in on it. Whatever’s coming, it’s coming soon.

Abigail, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry. I thought I could give you everything. Instead, I’ve left you a fortune and a war. Choose wisely. The silver is worth fighting for, but your life is worth more.

Forgive me.

The journal ended there. Abigail closed it, her heart pounding.

Silver. A mining claim in her name. Burke didn’t just want the land—he wanted the wealth beneath it.

And now she had proof.

Footsteps on the porch made her freeze. She grabbed the revolver, thumb finding the hammer.

The door opened.

Blackwood stepped inside, carrying a lantern. “Find something?”

Abigail lowered the gun, exhaling. “Thomas discovered silver. Filed a mining claim in my name before he died.”

Blackwood went very still. “In your name?”

“The claim is registered in Prescott. Legal and binding.” She handed him the journal. “Burke can’t touch it unless I’m dead or I sell it to him.”

“Which means he’ll try to make one of those things happen.” Blackwood read quickly, his expression darkening. “This changes everything.”

“How?”

“A land dispute, the marshal might ignore. Banks foreclose on ranches all the time out here. But murder over a mining claim? That’s federal jurisdiction. Wallace will have to investigate.”

Hope flared in Abigail’s chest. “Then we take this to him. Show him the journal, the deed, everything. Burke will be arrested—”

“Burke will vanish the moment he hears Wallace is asking questions. We need him to incriminate himself first. Make a move he can’t take back.”

“What kind of move?”

Blackwood’s smile was sharp. “We let him think he’s won.”

They were halfway back to Blackwood’s ranch when the riders appeared—six of them, torches burning, cutting off the trail ahead.

Farley Jenkins sat at the center, shotgun across his saddle.

“Well, well,” he called. “Look what we have here. Miss Montgomery and her half-breed protector, sneaking around in the dark.”

Blackwood’s hand moved to his rifle. “Let us pass, Jenkins. You don’t want this fight.”

“Oh, I think I do.” Jenkins urged his horse forward. “See, I had a feeling you’d take the lady to Wheeler’s place. So I left a couple boys watching, just in case. They sent word when you showed up.”

Abigail’s mouth went dry. They were outnumbered, outgunned, and miles from help.

“What do you want?” she asked, keeping her voice steady.

“What’s mine, Miss Montgomery. Wheeler’s land. And whatever you found in his house just now.” Jenkins gestured with the shotgun. “Hand over any papers you’re carrying, and maybe we let you ride on.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then we take them off your body.” Jenkins’s smile was a predator’s. “Your choice.”

Blackwood leaned close, his voice barely audible. “When I move, you run. Follow the creek bed east. Don’t look back.”

“I’m not leaving you—”

“You don’t have a choice.”

Then everything happened at once.

Blackwood spurred his horse forward, rifle coming up. The crack of gunfire split the night. Jenkins’s men scattered, shouting, torches dropping.

Abigail yanked her horse’s reins, kicking hard. The animal bolted toward the creek bed, stones flying under its hooves. Behind her, more shots—she couldn’t tell who was firing, couldn’t think about anything except the journal tucked inside her coat and the darkness swallowing her whole.

A rider broke from the group, chasing her. Abigail heard hooves pounding closer, heard a man’s voice shouting for her to stop.

She pulled the revolver from her belt, twisted in the saddle, and fired.

The shot went wild, but the horse stumbled. The rider cursed, falling back.

Abigail kept running.

The creek bed opened before her—a dark slash through pale stone. She urged her horse down the steep bank, branches whipping past, water splashing under hooves.

For ten minutes she rode blind, trusting the horse’s instincts. Then, finally, she stopped in a shallow cave cut into the creek wall, lungs burning, hands shaking so hard she could barely hold the reins.

Silence settled around her. No pursuit. No gunfire.

Just the sound of water and her own ragged breathing.

Blackwood found her an hour later, emerging from the darkness like a ghost. Blood stained his shoulder, but he was upright, moving steadily.

“You’re hurt,” Abigail said, sliding down from her horse.

“It’s nothing. Graze.” He dismounted, wincing. “You did well. Most people panic.”

“I was terrified.”

“Terror and panic aren’t the same thing.” He sat heavily on a rock. “Did you keep the journal?”

She pulled it from her coat. “What happened to Jenkins?”

“He and his men scattered when I dropped two of them. They’ll regroup, but we bought time.” Blackwood looked at her, and in the moonlight his expression was unreadable. “You could have kept running. Left me behind.”

“So could you. Back in Copper Ridge.”

“That’s different.”

“Why?”

“Because Thomas asked me to protect you.”

“And I’m asking you to let me help protect us both.” Abigail knelt beside him, examining the wound. “We’re in this together now, Mr. Blackwood.”

For a long moment he said nothing. Then: “Ethan. If we’re going to survive this, you should probably call me Ethan.”

“Ethan,” she repeated. The name felt strange on her tongue. Intimate.

He stood, offering his hand. “Come on. We need to move before they pick up our trail.”

Abigail took his hand—calloused, steady, warm—and let him pull her to her feet.

Behind them, somewhere in the darkness, Jenkins and his men were hunting. Ahead, the federal marshal was coming. And beneath a ranch she now owned, silver waited in the ground like a promise or a curse.

She had come West looking for safety. Instead, she’d found a war.

But standing there in the desert night, Thomas’s ring on her finger and Ethan Blackwood’s blood on her hands from checking his wound, Abigail Montgomery realized something surprising:

She wasn’t running anymore.

She was fighting back.