as a matter of course, hold a whispered conversation out of her hearing, trying desperately to figure out a way to keep her here. Whatever plan they hatched would come to naught. She was getting stronger. She had to do what she thought was best.
“God might not hold me accountable,” she whispered into the empty room. “But I do.”
Autumn, 1879
The Kansas Pacific train blew its whistle, announcing its arrival into Oak Grove. Cassandra Stewart gripped her reticule tightly against her chest, her nerves on edge. The squeal of brakes and the sudden hiss of steam as the engine slowed did not help to ease her anxiety.
It had taken all her courage to remain on the train at the last station in Salina. All she’d wanted to do was disembark and wait for the next train back to Alexandria. Nothing here was as she imagined. There were no trees, no beautiful parks or lovely brick buildings, no rolling hills or quiet waters. Only prairie on one side of the train and stockyards—empty at the moment—on the other side.
What have you brought me to? she asked silently, thinking of her late husband. She didn’t expect him to answer her from across the chasm; it was just that she felt so very alone now. If he had accompanied her as they’d first planned, this journey would have been a great adventure. Without him, she could no longer view it as such. It was only a duty.
Thus far, regard for his memory had kept her on the train and steady to her course. It hadn’t been so long ago that she was the bold one in her family and among her friends. What other woman at twenty-one years of age did she know who skipped the traditional year of waiting and married a man after only five weeks? Tongues had wagged. The gossips in town had had their day, and she hadn’t cared. In her mind, love had its own calendar and could not be denied.
Her father viewed her penchant for adventure differently. To him, she was simply impulsive and willful. Or—as her dearest friend, Chloe, had been quick to point out—foolish. Cassandra had scoffed at her words then, but after all that had happened, maybe her friend was right and her great-aunts too. Maybe, as Aunt Tilly had said when she was little, she was being punished.
She remembered the day. She had scrambled through the fence after a cat, tearing her dress on a nail and muddying her stockings and shoes. She had crossed two streets and become lost by the time she finally caught the frightened animal. The cat had clawed her neck and tore her pinafore in an effort to get away from her. After wandering the streets for what seemed like hours, the grocer’s wife had helped her find her way back to the house.
A hellion—that’s what you have on your hands, Aunt Tilly had told her mother. You must curb her penchant for constant adventure and excitement. It is unbecoming in a woman.
If her great-aunts were right, and it was her willful choices that had brought on all her heartache, then maybe doing this would fix it in some small way. The loss of Douglas and their baby had been retribution almost more than she could bear. When her month was completed, she would return home and bow to the wishes of her family. Perhaps then life would go on.
Doug’s death had tamed her right down. Now all that remained was to keep the promise she’d made to him. There were so many other things in their short life together that she had been unable to control. This, his last request, was something she could do. She would keep her promise, and then perhaps once it was accomplished and she was released from it, she would be able to move on with her life.
“Ma’am?” The conductor walked down the aisle toward her. “This is your stop. It’s as far as your ticket takes you.”
She glanced out the window once more at the rustic wooden buildings and the dirt street. “It may as well be the ends of the earth.”
He gave his short beard a thoughtful stroke. “Now, Oak Grove ain’t all that. It must have a few good points or people wouldn’t stay.” He brought her hatbox and parasol down from the overhead compartment, and handed them to her and then headed back to the door.
She squared her shoulders. She could do this. Moving to the doorway, she let the conductor help her down to a box he’d placed for the purpose of disembarking, and then down again to the wide planks of the platform. The harsh wind whipped the black ribbons of her bonnet and blew a small tumbleweed across her path. No one else on the train got off. Her trunk and carpetbag were the only luggage sitting there—a forlorn statement in her mind.
The conductor released her arm and tipped the brim of his cap. “Good day, ma’am.” He swung a leather satchel over his shoulder that contained mail for Oak Grove residents and strode toward the station office, disappearing through the doorway.
Cassandra took a deep breath and turned to survey the small town. From her vantage point on the platform, she could look straight down the main street. To her left stood a large livery stable. To her right stood a two-story building with a sign—Wet Your Whistle Saloon—above the batwing doors. Tinny piano music filtered out from somewhere inside. Farther down the street, past the laundry and bathhouse, there appeared to be a hotel and restaurant.
Fourteen days ago, she’d written two letters. One to Mr. Barker, the foreman in charge of the Stewart property, and the other to a Mr. Wolf, a friend her late husband had mentioned a time or two. Mr. Wolf’s address had been in town. Between the two men, she thought that at least one would have been here to meet the train...and her.
She sighed. All right then. She would figure this out. It wasn’t as if the entire process was an insurmountable obstacle. She would get there on her own. Traveling to the property shouldn’t be all that difficult. All it required was to hire a wagon from the livery and a guide.
* * *
Wolf stood unmoving on the shaded boardwalk in front of his parents’ dry goods shop and watched the woman on the platform. The sun slanted just above the horizon, casting her in silhouette and stretching her shadow like a sharp-angled ghost down Main Street. The black netting on her expensive-looking hat covered her face. The black feathers on top were arranged artfully and yet tall enough to brush the underside of her opened parasol—a parasol fancied up with black lace and satin trim. Quite the sight for a simple town like Oak Grove.
He had a good idea who she was. Cassandra Stewart—the woman Doug had fallen so hard for. She was the reason Doug had dug his heels in about returning to the ranch. The way Wolf saw it, because of that she was also the woman who had had a hand in his death.
What was she really doing here? Her short note had only mentioned seeing the ranch and checking on Douglas’s grave site. There had to be more to it. Nobody traveled halfway across the continent just to see a piece of land. Especially some rich woman who looked to be more used to Sunday socials and carriage rides in a manicured park than a wild prairie.
“All aboard!” the conductor called out from the train steps. The engine rumbled and the wheels creaked as they forced the massive metal beast to move. A whistle blew—a loud, sharp sound—startling the woman and making her grasp her parasol tighter.
Sanders, standing at the doors to the saloon, noticed her too. He started toward her, doffing his hat as he approached. “Daniel Sanders, ma’am. Help you with your bags?”
“I thought there would be someone here,” she said, her voice wavering with uncertainty. She glanced once more down the main street. The action gave away her apprehension.
Did she expect to be
