Griffin Tucker was dragged through Laramie in chains while half the town watched.

By noon, everyone believed he was a murderer.

By evening, they believed his enormous mail-order bride had brought disaster upon him.

And by the following morning, Martha Tucker was standing outside the jail with a basket of biscuits and a plan that could get them both killed.

The dead man was Edwin Pike, Harrison Caldwell’s longtime foreman.

He had been found beside the northern ridge with Griffin’s knife buried in his coat.

The evidence appeared overwhelming.

Pike had threatened Griffin over unpaid debts.

Several witnesses claimed they had argued.

And Deputy Boone insisted the murder weapon had been recovered from the scene.

Griffin sat behind iron bars, his face hollow with exhaustion.

“I didn’t kill him, Mattie.”

“I know.”

“How?”

“Because whoever killed him made a mistake.”

She reached through the bars and took his hand.

“The knife was too clean.”

Griffin frowned.

“What?”

“A man supposedly killed beside a muddy creek, yet the knife handle had no dirt beneath the carved letters. Someone cleaned it before planting it.”

Griffin stared.

“How would you know that?”

Mattie smiled faintly.

“I notice things.”

She left before he could ask more.

Her first stop was the livery stable.

There, she paid a stable boy twenty cents to tell her who had ridden toward the northern ridge the previous evening.

The boy hesitated.

Then he whispered two names.

Deputy Boone.

And Harrison Caldwell.

Her second stop was the newspaper office.

Editor Thomas Bell was a thin, nervous man whose spectacles were held together with wire.

He looked startled when Mattie entered.

“Mrs. Tucker, this is hardly a good time.”

“It’s an excellent time.”

She placed three documents on his desk.

Bank receipts.

Cattle sale records.

And a copied loan agreement.

“Your newspaper has been printing Caldwell’s advertisements for twenty years,” she said. “Perhaps it is time you printed his arithmetic.”

Bell read the documents.

His expression changed.

“Where did you get these?”

“From a man Caldwell intends to hang.”

Bell swallowed.

“Mrs. Tucker, accusing Caldwell could destroy this newspaper.”

“Then print the truth before he destroys the town.”

That night, Mattie returned to the Broken Spur.

The cabin was empty.

Griffin’s boots remained beside the stove.

His unfinished supper sat on the table.

For the first time since arriving in Wyoming, Mattie cried.

Not because she was frightened.

Because she had begun to love the stubborn man who had wanted nothing more than a woman to feed his chickens.

She loved the way he always saved the last biscuit for her.

The way he repaired the porch step after noticing it troubled her knees.

The way he had begun asking her opinion before making decisions.

And now he might hang because she had brought Caldwell’s attention back to the ranch.

At midnight, someone knocked.

Mattie lifted the shotgun.

“Who’s there?”

A trembling voice answered.

“Please, ma’am. I knew your father.”

She opened the door cautiously.

An elderly woman stood outside in a patched wool coat.

Her name was Ruth Bellamy.

She had once worked as a cook for the Caldwell family.

“I’ve been waiting twenty-two years for someone to ask the right questions,” Ruth whispered.

Mattie brought her inside.

Over tea, Ruth revealed that Samuel Tucker and Nathaniel Cole had not quarreled over money.

They had discovered that Caldwell was secretly diverting water toward land he had purchased under false names.

When they confronted him, Caldwell arranged a disastrous explosion at the northern gate.

Nathaniel was injured.

Samuel was threatened.

And the records disappeared.

“Your father survived,” Ruth told Mattie, “but he never stopped searching for proof.”

Mattie nodded.

“I know.”

Ruth gripped her wrist.

“Then you know about the second gate?”

Mattie froze.

“What second gate?”

Ruth’s eyes widened.

“Oh, child.”

She leaned forward.

“The survey you found is only half the design.”

Mattie’s heart pounded.

“Where is the other half?”

Ruth looked toward the dark window.

“In Caldwell’s bank vault.”

A floorboard creaked outside.

Mattie turned.

The window shattered.

Ruth screamed as a stone crashed through the glass.

Wrapped around it was a note.

THE WOMAN GOES NEXT.

By dawn, Mattie had made a decision.

She would enter Caldwell’s bank.

Not as a thief.

As a customer.

She dressed in her finest traveling gown, pinned her hair neatly, and walked through Laramie carrying the velvet ledger.

Caldwell stood behind his polished desk when she arrived.

He looked amused.

“Mrs. Tucker. Have you come to beg for your husband’s life?”

“No.”

Mattie placed a folded document before him.

“I’ve come to settle his debt.”

Caldwell unfolded it.

His face changed.

It was a bank draft for ten thousand dollars.

More money than Griffin’s entire ranch had ever been worth.

Caldwell stared at the signature.

Then at Mattie.

“Where did you get this?”

She smiled.

“From my own account.”

His voice dropped.

“Who exactly are you?”

Mattie leaned forward.

“Martha Eleanor Cole. Former chief bookkeeper of the St. Louis Agricultural Trust.”

Caldwell’s hand trembled.

He recognized the institution.

Mattie continued.

“And I know precisely what you did with the missing irrigation bonds.”

For the first time in twenty years, Harrison Caldwell looked afraid.

But his fear lasted only a moment.

He reached beneath his desk and pressed a hidden bell.

Two armed guards entered.

Caldwell smiled coldly.

“Then, Mrs. Tucker, I’m afraid you’ve just confessed to knowing far too much.”

The guards seized her arms.

And Caldwell ordered the vault door opened.