Prologue

Western San Luis Valley, Colorado

1880

“Running a ranch is one of the most difficult things you could ever hope to do, my girl, and when I’m gone, it’s all up to you,” Meghan Lyon’s mother’s voice drifted into her thoughts as she finished hammering a fence post and paused before looking at the pile of posts she still had to get to.

“You really weren’t fooling,” she mumbled as she leaned down on aching knees to get to the next one.

“You really ought to slow down, you know,” Shayla Thompson’s voice called out, jolting Meghan from her daze.

She turned to look at her smiling friend, pushed a loose strand of auburn hair from her green eyes, and leaned against the fence she had just been nailing. Her hair was tied back in a messy bun that was constantly coming undone, and she was dressed in dusty work clothes.

Meghan’s hands ached in her gloves, and the constant sting of new blisters and scars forming over the old, healed ones became like the background noise of a pesky buzzing insect.

“I didn’t even know you were here,” Meghan said as Shayla sauntered over, swinging her arms like a carefree child.

At twenty-eight, Shayla was four years older than Meghan, but their friends and family often remarked that Meghan seemed like the big sister of the two. Shayla was tall and very thin, with lively brown eyes and a head of bushy blonde curls that she couldn’t tame no matter how hard she tried.

Meghan lifted up the wooden fence pole with arms that shook from exhaustion, and her throat burned with thirst. Every section of fence that was replaced or fixed only gave way to ten more that needed repairing, and it sometimes felt like laying train tracks while the locomotive was already on them and approaching fast.

Even though the ranch hands were helping out further down the fence, it would be a task that took weeks at this rate.

“I’m always here, watching over you, disapproving,” Shayla crooned, moving her face close to Meghan’s.

Meghan swatted at her like a fly, but couldn’t help but smile.

“Well, Shayla. I don’t know how I could ever live with myself if I were to disappoint you,” she said with a smirk as she wiped at her sweaty brow.

Shayla gasped dramatically and pushed at Meghan’s arm.

“I’d be offended, but you’re probably daft from all this sun beating down on you all day long.”

It was true in a sense; sweat streamed down Meghan’s face, and her head throbbed just as much as her aching hands.

“I stopped here,” Shayla continued, “as I was passing by and knew you would need someone with sense to tell you to take a break.”

Meghan scoffed and wiped her forehead before taking off her work gloves. Her hands were shaking from the exertion, but she put her arms behind her back so that Shayla wouldn’t see.

“There isn’t any such thing as a break when you need to run a ranch, my friend. For every second you relax, five more tasks join the list. More likely, you had a hankering for some fresh cream,” Meghan countered.

“That may be true, I must confess,” Shayla replied with a shrug. “But you won’t be able to run the ranch if you drop from exhaustion. Come now, it’s time to rest a while and be a good host!”

Shayla added some brisk claps to show she meant business, and Meghan rolled her eyes as she sighed.

“Fine, I’ll take a break, you twisted my arm well enough,” she said with feigned annoyance.

In truth, her body was pushing its limits. The ranch had ten workers, not including her, and yet there was work enough for fifty men every day, it seemed. Every problem solved created three more to think about, and being at the head of it all hung over her constantly.

They walked beside each other from the cattle enclosure and toward her log cabin in the distance.

To the west, the San Juan Mountains jutted into the sky, piercing the clouds above. Their dull blue peaks were veined with stark white snow snaking downward, and the mountains always struck Meghan with how starkly they rose above the otherwise flat landscape of the San Luis Valley.

On nights when the moon was full, the mountains loomed like a dark tidal wave, their awesome, terrifying beauty something Meghan never tired of beholding.

Her throat still burned from thirst as they approached the log cabin she lived in alone, and the thought of some cool cream sounded rather appealing.

Soon, Shayla was in the small living room, which had two rustic wooden sofas and a table in front of the fireplace, while Meghan was in the adjoining small kitchen, pouring the cream from a jug. Everything was sparsely decorated, and the rich aroma of the logs always helped to calm Meghan’s troubled mind. There were a few of her late mother’s floral paintings on the walls, and sometimes a vase of fresh lupine or Indian paintbrush flowers on display.

Shayla was going on about the carpenter in town again, but Meghan’s mind was elsewhere. She wondered how she was going to pay the workers at the end of the month in two weeks, let alone how she would pay the bills and loans that loomed higher than the mountains.

“Meghan! Hello?” Shayla called sharply from the entrance of the kitchen, startling Meghan from her thoughts.

“Oh! Yes?” Meghan replied in a shaky voice.

“Nothing, it’s just I’ve had livelier conversations with the stump out back. Did you hear a word I said?”

Meghan brought the mugs of cream to the living room and set them down as both she and her friend sat on the sofa.

“Sorry, Shayla. My mind is all over the place these days,” she said before taking a deep swig of the cream.

It felt marvelous gliding down her parched throat, and she drank deeply.

“Listen,” Shayla said in a gentler tone. “You’ve given it a good go, better than most would! Maybe it’s time to… Well… To move on.”

Meghan grunted and rubbed the bridge of her nose with two fingers.

“I can’t do that,” she said softly. “You know that.”

Meghan sank into her chair and blinked slowly as the memories floated back.

A bit more than one year prior, her mother had become ill with a terrible fever that weakened her more and more each day. Shortly before she passed, Meghan had been by her bedside, wiping the sweat from her mother’s forehead as her breath rattled in her chest.

“Oh, Meghan,” her mother whispered.

“Save your strength, it’s alright,” Meghan replied, feeling no strength of her own as she said it.

“I’ve not much longer for this world,” her mother said softly, stabbing at Meghan’s heart.

“Don’t speak like that! You’ll be well soon, I’m sure of it.”

Meghan tightened her grip on her mother’s hand as her voice grew shriller.

Her mother held her hand weakly and smiled.

“This ranch meant everything to your father, you know. You were too young to know it when he passed, but you were the only thing more precious to him in this world. I’ve done my best to keep it going all these years, but now… Listen, Meghan. I want to ask you something.”

Meghan squeezed her mother’s hand and fought the tears stinging her eyes.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“When I’m not here anymore, I want you to keep his dream alive. I did my best, no matter how hard it got, but now it’s your turn. Keep it alive and find happiness here, as we did. Will you promise me that?”

“I promise,” Meghan said, and her grip shook as she held her mother’s weak hand.

“I can’t promise it will be easy. Lord knows it’s been the greatest trial of my life, but I know you can do it. Promise me you’ll try, my love,” she said before another coughing fit.

“I promise,” Meghan whispered in the present day.

“What’s that?” Shayla asked.

Meghan shook her head.

“Never mind. I was just thinking about one of the last conversations I had with my ma before… Well…” her voice trailed off, and she cleared her throat. “But I made a promise to my ma that I would keep this ranch going, as she had. I don’t intend to break that promise just because things are hard.”

“Is that what you truly want? To run this whole place on your own?” Shayla asked as she put a gentle hand on Meghan’s knee. “Look at you! You have cuts and bruises all over, you’re shaking from exhaustion, and you look as if you’ve not slept in days. Your parents would understand, I know it. It’s not worth killing yourself over.”

Meghan looked ahead blankly before standing up to gather the mugs.

Life was rarely about getting what you wanted, at least in her experience.

“It was lovely to see you, but I really should get back to work,” she said in a tight voice.

***

After Shayla left, Meghan lay down on her sofa, meaning to rest her eyes for a few moments, but instead fell into a deep slumber. She dreamed of an immense thunderstorm that tore away at the cabin.

“Ma!” Meghan gasped as she awoke with a jolt.

She panted from the memory of the dream and caught her breath as she put her face in her hands.

It was already getting dark out, and she cursed herself for falling asleep for so long when there was so much work to be done.

Meghan wondered, far from the first time that day, how her mother had managed to not just raise her but also keep the ranch going all those years. After Meghan’s father died from being bucked from a horse when she was just seven years old, the monumental task fell to her mother. No matter how hard she tried, the ranch always seemed one bad month away from falling apart, but somehow, her mother always made it work.

She sighed as she rubbed her aching temples.

“If only I could do it as well,” she mumbled to herself.

A strange noise broke the silence of the evening, and she raised her head and cocked it. It was difficult to place it, but then it clicked.

It was the sound of a baby’s muffled cries.

Meghan stood and pinched herself to make sure she wasn’t still in a dream, but the pain was real enough. There was definitely a baby crying.

Her heart thumped in her chest as she followed the sound to the front door.

She walked with heavy feet toward it and drew a deep breath before grasping the door handle. The door opened, and Meghan’s breath caught in her throat as she knelt down to find a tiny, practically newborn baby swaddled in cloth lying in a woven basket.

Its tiny face was red from crying, and its little hands grasped at the air, as if reaching for someone to help.

“What in the world?” Meghan said breathlessly as she gently took the baby from the basket with her shaking hands.

She stood and looked out toward the entrance of the ranch, only to see a figure on a horse galloping away.

“Hey! Wait!” she called out, taking a few steps forward.

The rider was already disappearing into the darkness, and the baby cried harder in her arms. Cold panic took over her, and she still wasn’t completely convinced that this wasn’t a strange dream.

“Calm now, little one,” she crooned as she rocked the baby helplessly in her arms. “It’s alright, I’m here… I have you…”

The baby cried as the mournful call of an owl pierced the air from nearby. There was an inescapable sense within Meghan that fate had just changed her life forever.

Chapter One

Eight months later

Nearly eight months to the day that she had found the baby on her doorstep, Meghan’s life had changed beyond recognition.

It was late afternoon when she laid the little one, finally asleep, into a new crib that Theodore the carpenter had made for her a few months prior. It had been an act of kindness that Meghan didn’t doubt, but she was also sure it was at least partly done to impress Shayla. The attraction between her friend and Theodore was the worst-kept secret in the San Luis Valley, after all. She did appreciate how he had burned the name “Paul” into the side of the crib, though. The name had just come to her after the first few days, and he had given a little smile when she said it out loud, cementing it as the right choice.

It had taken a while for Paul to settle down, but he was finally on the precipice of sleep. Meghan stroked his forehead with her fingertips, and she hummed a sweet tune. Her tired heart warmed at the sight of his little smile as he drifted to sleep. Even though each day was a struggle to understand why she had been given this task, little moments like that made it slightly better.

The first night that the baby had arrived had been chaotic as she tried to calm the crying baby, get him warm, and find some milk for him to drink, all while feeling like she was in a nightmare.

She had tried going into Del Norte, the largest town in the area, to speak to Reverend Maguire at the church. Not only did he have no idea whose baby it could be, but he told her that there was no way that the church could look after him.

The next few hours were frantic as she went to everyone she could find to ask if they knew anything about a baby, but she was met with the same negative response each time.

She had cried the whole ride home, as it didn’t seem right that life could be this unfair for one person. Someone had to look after the baby, and she was the only one who could.

Then followed eight months of caring for Paul, all while desperately trying to keep the ranch afloat. Shayla helped as best she could, but Meghan started to doubt that she would ever sleep properly again.

Her days were spent toiling on the ranch in the hot sun, then coming home with an aching body to relieve Shayla from babysitting duties and care for the baby into the night. Then, it would begin the next day anew, never changing.

A harsh wind battered the cabin outside, making the wood of the roof creak and moan.

“Sweet dreams, little one,” she whispered.

She lay her head down and was just drifting into sleep when she was jolted from her rest by a gunshot and raucous laughter from outside.

Her heart pounded painfully in her chest as she leaped out of bed and ran to the window. Luckily, the moon was bright enough that she could make out men on horseback approaching, torches in hand.

Her breath came out in a sharp gasp, and her every thought went to protecting Paul.

He stirred and started crying as she took him out of his crib and held him in her arms.

“Quiet now, quiet,” she whispered as she moved quickly out of her bedroom, through the living room, and to the kitchen.

She pushed the kitchen table aside with her thigh, and the scraping sound just made Paul cry even more. Her movements were erratic and clumsy as her limbs shook and her head pounded with fear.

Ignoring it, she leaned down and pulled aside a small rug that hid a trapdoor leading to the root cellar.

She opened it as the sounds of the commotion grew stronger outside, and it was a struggle to suppress the panic flowing through her.

Paul was still crying as she carefully made her way down the little ladder and into the cool interior of the cellar.

With how common bandit attacks had become, she had prepared for just such an occasion by hauling the old crib down into the cellar with some blankets once Theodore had made the new one.

She placed Paul into the crib and then moved back to the entrance, where she arranged the rug so that it was on the trapdoor and would cover it when she lowered it.

Slowly, she closed the trapdoor, plunging the cellar into total darkness.

Paul was crying even more now, and she had to find him just from the sound alone. She fumbled her way to the crib and reached down to lift the crying baby. She had to push down the fear that threatened to overwhelm her, and the thought of keeping Paul safe rose above any other panicked thoughts that raced through her mind.

There was a crash as the front door was kicked open, and Meghan held Paul close to her chest, rocking him briskly as she hushed him gently.

Miraculously, his cries faded to mere whimpers as footsteps pounded the floorboards above her, sending dust to coat her and Paul like light snowfall.

Her heart was beating so fast that she worried it would be audible to the attackers, but she drew a deep breath and reminded herself that it was a ridiculous thought.

She closed her eyes and kept rocking Paul, occasionally leaning down to kiss his forehead as her heart thumped so hard that she feared it would burst from her chest.

“Shh, shhh, it’s all right, I’m here,” she whispered softly close to his ear.

“The house is empty,” came a gruff, deep voice from above, muffled by the wooden floor. The sound of the voice made it clear that the speaker was directly above her, but she tried not to think about that.

“Empty? Well, shoot! Didn’t you say there was a fine-looking woman here?” asked another voice.

“Supposed to be.”

“Real shame. I’d have loved to meet her.”

The voice was thin and cold, and a shiver went down Meghan’s spine.

“Anyhow. She may not be here, but that don’t mean we can’t have a little fun, right?”

Meghan slumped down so she was sitting on the cool cellar floor as crashing and smashing came from the house. A sharp gasp escaped her lips before she could stop it, and she instinctively jumped and held Paul closer to her. Glasses and crockery were shattered on the floor, and furniture was kicked around as she simply sat and kept rocking.

She thought back to going mountain climbing with her father when she was a little girl and learning to paint with her mother at the kitchen table, but the memories would be jolted away by another crash or a loud bang.

At one point, Paul cried for a few moments, but the racket from the house was so loud that Meghan could barely hear him.

She closed her eyes and whispered, “Please just leave,” repeatedly under her breath.

After what seemed like an eternity, the noise died down.

Heavy footsteps moved slowly until they were directly over the trapdoor again, and Meghan held her breath.

“That ought to do it. Give our pretty little lady a nice surprise when she comes home,” a voice said with a cruel cackle.

“Come, fellas, let’s get out of here.”

“Hold on,” the deeper voice said. It was also the voice directly above Meghan and Paul.

She let her breath out slowly and drew another in the same way.

“What have we here?” the voice said.

The wood beneath his boots creaked as he leaned down, and Meghan said a small prayer under her breath as terror constricted her chest.

After a few moments, the wood creaked again.

“There you are,” the voice said.

Meghan braced herself for the trapdoor to open, and wondered how she could possibly get up the ladder and away with Paul.

“You coming, Jeb?” the thinner voice called from further away.

“Yeah, keep your boots on. I just dropped my lucky coin, found it though.”

“Come on, stop fooling around!”

The footsteps finally retreated, and there was silence.

Tears stung Meghan’s eyes as Paul started to cry again, and sweet relief came over her in a great wave. Her breathing turned to hitching gasps, and her whole body shook as the panic escaped her. She didn’t know what to expect as she pushed against the trap door.

For a moment, it resisted her push, and she realized that the table was lying on it. It wouldn’t budge at first, and that sharp panic returned as she feared that they might be trapped. After putting Paul back into the crib, she got back up and shoved it as hard as she could, gritting her teeth with the effort. Finally, the table tumbled to the side. After retrieving Paul from the old crib, she climbed out into a complete mess, and her heart sank at how her beautiful crockery, glasses, and furniture had been smashed to pieces.

It was an almost impossible challenge to make her way through the wreckage on the floor and get to the living room, which was also smashed up.

Meghan was silent as she went to her bedroom. The bed was covered with broken wood and other objects, and one of her pillows had been slashed open, sending feathers everywhere, but the bed and the crib were still standing at least.

She got Paul settled, and he only cried and resisted for around fifteen minutes before falling asleep. Sleep would be impossible for Meghan that night, as every creak of the house would sound like a footstep, and the fear still pounded in her mind. Instead, she quietly cleaned up the house as best she could and took frequent breaks to peek out of the window, looking for shadows in the night.

When morning finally broke, Meghan was sitting at the table with her eyes stinging from exhaustion as she sipped at her coffee. Running a ranch and caring for a baby were things she always knew would be difficult, but it was starting to seem impossible for one person to take on.

The enormity of her responsibility weighed down on her, and she put her face on her arms as Paul started to cry again.

***

Two of the ranch hands, twin brothers named Ted and Morris Kroger—both identically tall and gangly with matching heads of messy blond hair—were jogging up to the house when Meghan stepped out into the cool morning air.

“Miss Lyon! Miss Lyon!” Morris cried as they stopped, panting as they both tried to speak.

“The horses, they’re gone!” said Ted.

“Must have been bandits,” Morris added.

“They came in the night, into the house,” Meghan said flatly.

The nightmare was dragging on and on, and she had no more strength left for grief. She looked at the men steadily as they gaped at her.

“They were inside the house?” Morris asked.

“Is the little one alright? Are you alright?” said Ted.

“Yes, thank you, but I must get to town to see the sheriff.”

She cast her eyes down to the dirt.

“Although that may be difficult, what with the horses gone,” she mumbled.

The brothers shared a look and nodded.

“Fear not, Miss! We rode here on our horse; I’ll ride to Miss Shayla’s ranch, fetch her to watch the little one, and then you can ride to town.”

Meghan looked up and smiled weakly at the twenty-year-old man’s earnest expression.

“Thank you, Ted. That would be so helpful.”

She tended to Paul as Ted rode to Shayla’s ranch, and Meghan tried not to think about just how much trouble the theft of the horses would cause.

Finally, the shrill call of her friend’s voice came from outside, and it brought a smile to Meghan’s face.

“Meghan! Meghan! Where are you?” Shayla called out.

She burst through the door, and her eyes were wide.

“Oh, Meghan! I was so worried about you!”

She ran over and enveloped Meghan in a hug. She swayed and rocked Meghan from side to side as she hugged her, and the breath was squeezed from Meghan’s lungs.

“Wait! Paul! Is he alright?” she asked.