The moon was gone. No stars, either.
“Come on, Maddie,” Lucky coaxed. “I promise you’re safe with me. You’ll be safe all the way to Seattle.”
There were no others mingling around, no one to hear if she shouted, unless perhaps Mad Dog or his men—if they had followed. She wanted to believe Lucky, climb down and escape this town and all the dangers it held, yet caution had been her constant companion for years. “How do you know I don’t have family here?” she asked. “Someone looking for me. Right now, even. Who’ll hunt you down, along with Ridge.”
His smile made those eyes twinkle brighter. “If you had family, you wouldn’t have been fetching water for Hester.”
A splattering of hope rose inside her. “You know Hester?” The older woman had assisted Maddie in escaping Mad Dog’s clutches once before and had promised a permanent escape would happen soon.
“That’s why I was at the saloon,” he said.
The air left her lungs in a gush. “It is?”
“Yes. I’m the rescue Hester promised.”
Relief filled Maddie. That explained why Hester had sent her out to fetch water tonight. This was her chance, and she had to take it. “Why didn’t you say so?”
He made some kind of reply, but already swinging around, Maddie didn’t hear exactly what. She was too busy willing her heart to stay in her chest as she lowered closer to the water. Wet and slippery, the ladder wasn’t easy to navigate. A wave of reprieve rushed over her when a firm hold took her by the waist, lifting her the last few feet.
The boat rocked as Lucky guided Maddie to sit on one of the wide boards. Then he flipped a blanket over her head and shoulders before he sat down opposite her and grasped the handles of the oars.
Though already damp, the blanket didn’t offer warmth, but did block the wind, and Maddie repositioned it, grasping both corners beneath her chin. Her thoughts went to the two younger girls that Hester had ushered into the attic late last night. When Lucky started to row, she asked, “What about the others?”
“I was just sent after you, but don’t worry, if Hester promised them an escape, it’ll happen.” He made several more big circles with both arms at the same time, moving the boat through the water, before asking, “Are they friends?”
“No,” Maddie admitted. “I don’t even know their names.” Just as she hadn’t known the names of the other girls that had come and gone within hours the past few days. Hester had said it would take time to get her out of town, considering her previous encounters with Ridge’s men. They hadn’t been just run-ins, they’d been escapes. Maddie escaping, that was. Three times, in three different towns. She still didn’t know how Hester had learned about her or knew to meet her at the edge of town, but the woman had, and she’d done exactly as promised.
Maddie’s happiness faltered. As badly as she wanted to escape Mad Dog, she didn’t want to go as far as Seattle. There was no gold there. It was here. In California. That was what Maddie wanted. Gold. Enough so she’d never be hungry again. Never be cold or scared or homeless or penniless. And with enough gold, she could go someplace Mad Dog would never find her.
“Where are you from?”
Maddie lifted her head and questioned answering. The less anyone knew the better. “East of here.”
His laugh was quick. “Everything is east of California. Where were you born?”
Her memories didn’t start until Wyoming, then Montana, Texas, Arizona. She even remembered a hut down in Mexico. Thus was the life of an outlaw. Until Colorado, where they’d run across Smitty, prospecting high in the hills. Her father had left her with him instead of dragging her along to the next train, stagecoach or bank that Bass thought he needed to rob. That had been five years ago. “Kansas,” she said. At least that was what she’d been told.
Cole couldn’t say she was lying, and he couldn’t blame her for being evasive. She wasn’t the first girl he’d been assigned to collect from Hester. She was the last, though. He’d helped with several escapes and liked the adventure of it, but Ridge had caught sight of him last year, and that could jeopardize future rescues. The loss of this woman would bother the outlaw. Her black hair and mature figure, which Cole had tried to ignore since pulling her up behind the saddle, would bring a high price. That was what Ridge counted on. The lovelier, the more expensive.
It was a good thing this would be the last trip for the Mary Jane this far south for a while. Ridge had too many eyes on the shore to not put two and two together.
“How old are you?” Cole asked.
“Nineteen.”
She was certainly older than the thirteen-and fourteen-year-old ones he was used to moving north, but he’d guess her no more than sixteen. “There’s no need to lie to me.”
Pulling the corners of the blanket tighter beneath her chin, her blue eyes glistened as she snapped, “I’m not lying.”
It didn’t matter one way or the other, and Cole decided to let it go. “What brought you to California?”
“Gold.”
She hadn’t hesitated in her answer, but it was the gleam that instantly appeared in her eyes that he recognized. Knew exactly what it was like. There wasn’t another word that affected him like that one did. Gold. Just thinking about it got his blood racing, his heart pounding. He had the fever. Caught it last year, but he didn’t let it rule him. Instead, he let it drive him. And it had. All winter. He was now set, had everything lined up, and before long he’d be gathering up more gold than most men only dreamed about. He knew where to find it. Maybe that was why he told her, “There’s no gold in California, darling.”
“Yes, there is,” she argued.
“None a man can freely claim.” He wasn’t trying to disillusion her. It was something he knew for a fact. The money being made in California was off the miners, not by mining. It was that way other places, too. He just knew where the odds were better.
Her lips were pinched tight and her chin had jutted up a notch.
“Alaska,” he said, thinking of his destination. “That’s where the gold is.”
“That,” she said sternly, “is a wives’ tale. Alaska’s nothing but frozen tundra.”
“Now, who told you that?”
“No one in particular.”
“Well, go right on believing that, darling. You and the rest of the world.” It would leave more for him to find. Tales of discovering gold in Alaska had spread along the coast for years, and prospectors made their way there only to return saying the same thing she did—mainly because they didn’t know where to look. He, on the other hand, did. Those thoughts had him slowing the speed of which he rowed. The Mary Jane had to be close, and in this fog he might row smack-dab into her side.
“You’ve seen it?” she asked. “Alaska? Gold?”
“Yes, darling, I’ve seen it.” Something blocked the wind, and he had no doubt it was Uncle Trig’s ship. Paddling slow until he could make out the ropes hanging down, he said, “We’re
