Caleb lifted the hatch.

A wounded man lay in the narrow space beneath the cabin, his coat dark with blood and melting snow.

He was perhaps fifty, with gray whiskers and a face Eleanor vaguely recognized.

Caleb helped him climb into the room.

“Silas?”

The man collapsed beside the stove.

“Didn’t think I’d make it.”

Eleanor hurried for clean towels.

“He’s bleeding badly.”

Caleb pressed his hands against the wound.

“Who did this?”

Silas looked toward Eleanor.

“Ask your wife.”

The words froze her.

“I’ve never seen this man.”

Silas gave a bitter laugh.

“Maybe not. But I’ve seen you.”

He reached inside his coat and pulled out a small silver object.

A woman’s pocket watch.

Eleanor recognized it immediately.

Her mother’s watch.

She had last seen it in Baltimore, locked inside Henry’s private desk.

“Where did you get that?”

Silas gripped her wrist.

“Your husband wasn’t the man you thought he was.”

Eleanor felt the room tilt.

“My husband is dead.”

“That’s what they told you.”

Caleb looked sharply at Silas.

“Enough.”

But Eleanor had already heard.

“What does that mean?”

Silas tried to answer.

Instead, he coughed violently.

Caleb caught him before he fell.

For the next hour, Eleanor worked beside her new husband.

She boiled water, prepared bandages, and held a lantern while Caleb removed a piece of metal from Silas’s shoulder.

The man survived.

Barely.

When he finally slept, Eleanor confronted Caleb.

“Tell me everything.”

Caleb stared into the fire.

“I can’t.”

“Then you’ve made a terrible mistake marrying me.”

He flinched.

She hated herself for noticing.

But she would not spend another marriage living among lies.

“Did you know my husband?”

Caleb said nothing.

“Did you know why he died?”

Still nothing.

Eleanor moved toward her trunk.

Caleb stood.

“Where are you going?”

“Anywhere I can find the truth.”

“There’s a blizzard outside.”

“Then I’ll wait until morning.”

She began folding her clothes.

Caleb watched helplessly.

Finally he spoke.

“Henry Whitmore came to these mountains three years ago.”

Eleanor stopped.

Henry had told her he had never traveled farther west than Ohio.

“He came looking for something,” Caleb continued. “Something my father spent his life protecting.”

“What?”

Caleb reached beneath his shirt and withdrew a small brass key suspended on a cord.

“An old survey chest.”

Eleanor stared at it.

“What’s inside?”

“I don’t know. My father made me promise never to open it unless a certain person came here.”

“Who?”

Caleb looked at her.

“Someone carrying your mother’s name.”

Eleanor felt a chill unrelated to the weather.

“My mother’s name was Margaret Bellamy.”

Caleb closed his eyes.

“That’s the name.”

Silas suddenly stirred beside the stove.

“Don’t tell her about the chest.”

Both turned.

The wounded man struggled upright.

“If she knows, she’ll become a target.”

Eleanor stepped closer.

“A target for whom?”

Silas opened his mouth.

A gunshot shattered the window.

Glass exploded across the floor.

Caleb threw himself between Eleanor and the opening.

A second bullet struck the wall.

“Down!”

He dragged her behind the heavy kitchen table.

Outside, horses screamed.

Someone shouted through the storm.

“Mercer! Send out the widow!”

Caleb loaded his rifle.

Eleanor grabbed his arm.

“Why do they want me?”

The voice outside answered before he could.

“Because she belongs to the Whitmore estate!”

Eleanor went completely still.

Her late husband’s estate had supposedly been swallowed by debt.

There was nothing left to claim.

Unless someone had lied.

Caleb fired once through the broken window.

A man cried out.

Then the attackers retreated into the trees.

For several minutes, nobody moved.

Finally Caleb turned toward Eleanor.

“I wanted to tell you.”

“When?”

“When I knew you could trust me.”

Her eyes filled.

“You should have trusted me first.”

Before Caleb could answer, Silas spoke from the floor.

“There’s something worse.”

He looked directly at Eleanor.

“The men outside aren’t working for your husband’s creditors.”

“Then who sent them?”

Silas swallowed.

“Henry Whitmore himself.”

And somewhere beyond the snow-covered trees, a man Eleanor had buried eleven months earlier was riding toward the cabin.