“Nora Mallory! I know you’re inside!”

The voice outside the ranch house was sharp, impatient, and horribly familiar.

Nora’s blood turned cold.

It was not Wade.

It was Sheriff Amos Pike.

The same sheriff who had shaken Wade’s hand in Cheyenne two weeks earlier.

The same man who had told Nora that her husband was an honest businessman.

Silas stood beside the window with his rifle.

Ruth hurried to extinguish the lamp.

“Don’t make a sound,” Silas whispered.

Outside, Pike called again.

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“I’m looking for a woman traveling with an infant. She’s wanted for questioning in the First Territorial Bank robbery.”

Nora stared at Silas.

“What?”

Pike continued.

“Her husband reported that she stole eighteen thousand dollars and attempted to murder him.”

Nora’s breath caught.

Wade was alive.

And he had already turned the law against her.

Silas opened the door just far enough to step onto the porch.

“Evening, Sheriff.”

“Mercer.”

Pike’s voice hardened.

“Didn’t expect to find you out here.”

“Then you haven’t been paying attention. I own the place.”

“I have reason to believe you’re hiding a fugitive.”

“I’ve got cattle, two horses, and a woman who makes terrible coffee.”

From inside, Ruth muttered, “Keep talking, cowboy.”

Pike did not laugh.

“Mind if I look around?”

“Got a warrant?”

“I can get one.”

“Then I’ll put the coffee on.”

For several seconds, neither man spoke.

Then Pike said something that made Nora’s skin crawl.

“That woman is dangerous, Silas. Her husband says she’s unstable. Claims she tried to kill their child.”

Nora covered her mouth.

Wade had not simply abandoned her.

He was erasing her.

Silas answered evenly.

“Sounds like a story worth investigating.”

Pike stepped closer.

“Be careful whose side you choose.”

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Then the sheriff rode away.

Silas waited until the hoofbeats disappeared before returning inside.

Nora was shaking.

“He knows.”

“Maybe.”

“He knows I’m here.”

Silas looked at the silver locket on the table.

“Then we don’t have much time.”

Nora pointed to the photograph.

“You said that woman was your wife.”

Silas sat opposite her.

For a long moment, he seemed unable to speak.

“Her name was Abigail.”

He touched the faded photograph.

“We married thirteen years ago. She was carrying our first child when she disappeared.”

Nora frowned.

“Disappeared?”

“Abigail worked as a bookkeeper for a freight company. She discovered someone was using company shipments to move stolen money.”

“Thomas Bell?”

Silas nodded.

“My brother Samuel helped her gather evidence. A week later, Samuel was found dead beside a burned stagecoach.”

“And Abigail?”

“Everyone told me she’d run away.”

His jaw tightened.

“I never believed them.”

Nora looked down at the photograph.

The woman had dark hair, gentle eyes, and a small crescent-shaped birthmark near her collarbone.

Then Nora noticed something else.

The newborn in Abigail’s arms wore a blanket embroidered with a tiny blue bird.

The same bird stitched into the corner of Elsie’s blanket.

Nora’s stomach twisted.

“Wade told me his mother made this blanket.”

Silas slowly lifted his head.

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“His mother?”

“He said she’d died years ago.”

Ruth leaned forward.

“Let me see that stitching.”

She examined the blanket under the lamplight.

Then she whispered, “Abigail made this.”

Silas closed his eyes.

But Nora was already thinking.

If Abigail had disappeared thirteen years ago, why would Wade possess her baby’s blanket?

And why had he given it to Elsie?

Ruth carefully unfolded the paper from the locket.

It contained a list of numbers, freight routes, and three initials.

A.P.

T.B.

H.C.

Silas recognized the first two.

“Amos Pike. Thomas Bell.”

“And H.C.?” Nora asked.

Silas shook his head.

Then he noticed a line at the bottom.

A date.

September 19.

Tomorrow.

Beside it were four words.

THE LAST TRANSFER. NORTH PASS.

Nora felt something settle inside her.

Wade had stolen eighteen thousand dollars.

But this paper suggested the robbery was only one piece of something much larger.

“Why would he leave this with me?”

Silas studied the locket.

“Maybe he didn’t know it was there.”

Nora remembered their wedding night.

Wade had insisted she wear the locket beneath her dress.

He told her never to open it because the clasp was broken.

He had even laughed when she asked why.

A terrible possibility emerged.

Wade had used her to carry something.

Something dangerous enough to kill for.

And when she discovered the bank money, he had decided she was no longer useful.

That night, Silas made a decision.

He would ride to North Pass before dawn and discover what the final transfer meant.

Nora refused to stay behind.

“That man tried to kill me.”

“You’re barely standing.”

“He’ll come for Elsie.”

Silas looked at the sleeping child.

Then he said, “Not while I’m breathing.”

Nora studied his face.

For the first time since the gunshot, she felt something other than fear.

She felt safe.

It frightened her almost as much.

They left before sunrise.

Ruth stayed behind with Elsie and two ranch hands.

Silas and Nora traveled in a covered wagon toward North Pass, where the mountains rose like black teeth against the morning sky.

By noon, they found an abandoned freight station.

The door hung crooked.

Fresh wagon tracks cut through the mud.

Silas drew his revolver.

“Stay behind me.”

Inside, the station smelled of damp wood and cold ashes.

There were crates stacked against the wall.

Every crate carried the same mark.

H.C.

Nora approached one.

Silas pried it open.

Inside were bundles of banknotes.

Hundreds of them.

Far more than eighteen thousand dollars.

Then Nora heard something.

A soft metallic tapping.

Three taps.

A pause.

Three more.

It came from beneath the floor.

Silas pulled back a loose plank.

A narrow staircase descended into darkness.

At the bottom stood a locked iron door.

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Someone was on the other side.

Nora knelt and whispered, “Who’s there?”

The tapping stopped.

Then a woman’s voice answered.

“Is the baby safe?”

Nora froze.

“What baby?”

The woman began to cry.

“The little girl Wade Mallory took from Cheyenne.”

Silas went pale.

Nora felt the entire world shift beneath her.

Because the woman behind the door spoke again.

And this time she said:

“Tell Silas Mercer his wife is still alive.”