Edwin Price was captured three days later.
A freight driver recognized him twenty miles west of Bitter Creek.
Sheriff Cole and two deputies brought him back in irons.
Clara did not go to see him.
She had no need.
The federal investigator arrived from Denver eleven days later.
His name was Samuel Porter, a tired-looking man with wire spectacles and the patient expression of someone accustomed to complicated lies.
He spent two days examining the ledgers.
On the third morning he found Clara and Amos in Duffy’s upstairs room.
“These records are genuine.”
Clara released a breath.
Porter continued.
“They connect several members of the Whitmore company to fraudulent insurance claims, stolen freight, bribery, and falsified invoices.”
“What happens now?” Amos asked.
“Price will face charges here for arson and attempted murder. He’ll also answer questions regarding the company.”
“And Charles?” Clara asked quietly.
Porter looked at her.
“Your late husband appears to have been involved.”
She had expected it.
Still, hearing the words hurt.
“Did he hide the records to protect himself?”
“We don’t know.”
“Then why put them in my trunk?”
Porter considered.
“He may have intended to move them later. Or perhaps he feared his partners and hid evidence where they would not look.”
Clara stared toward the window.
A final possibility occurred to her.
“Perhaps he wanted someone to find them after he died.”
Amos said nothing.
Porter nodded.
“Possible.”
Clara never received a perfect answer.
Eventually, she accepted that some questions belonged to the dead.
She had spent too many years allowing Charles to control her life while alive.
She would not let uncertainty do it now.
The investigation also revealed something unexpected.
The money Price claimed Clara had stolen had indeed been left to her under Charles’s will.
Nearly seven hundred dollars.
The Whitmore family had withheld it.
After federal authorities froze the company’s assets, Clara’s claim was recognized.
When Porter explained this, Amos whistled.
“You’re rich.”
Clara laughed.
“Hardly.”
“Seven hundred dollars sounds rich to a man whose house just burned.”
That brought them to the next problem.
The cabin.
The morning Clara’s ankle allowed her to travel, Amos took her back to the mountain.
They rode slowly.
When they reached the ridge, Clara stopped.
The cabin was blackened.
Part of one wall remained.
The stone chimney stood alone like a monument.
Snow covered the ashes.
Clara swallowed.
Amos dismounted.
“We can rebuild.”
She looked at him.
“You want to?”
“Do you?”
The question surprised her.
“This is your land.”
“Our land.”
She was still getting used to that word.
Our.
Amos walked toward the ruins.
“I could build closer to town.”
Clara followed carefully.
“You hate town.”
“I tolerate it.”
“You hate it.”
“Maybe.”
She smiled.
He looked across the valley.
“Could sell.”
“No.”
Amos turned.
Clara stood beside the old chimney.
“This is where you taught me to split wood.”
“That’s your reason?”
“This is where I learned your terrible coffee could be improved.”
“Insulting.”
“This is where you slept on the floor because I was afraid.”
His expression softened.
Clara touched the stone chimney.
“This is where I stopped being afraid.”
Wind moved through the pines.
“I want to stay.”
Amos nodded once.
“Then we rebuild.”
Bitter Creek surprised them.
The first wagon arrived the following morning.
Duffy sent lumber.
Sheriff Cole brought nails.
Three miners Amos barely knew came with axes.
Mrs. Talbot from the boardinghouse brought food.
By noon, twelve people were clearing burned timber.
Amos stood staring.
Duffy shrugged.
“Folks heard what happened.”
“You charging me for that lumber?”
“Eventually.”
“How much?”
“We’ll argue when you have walls.”
The miners laughed.
Clara stood beside Amos.
“You have friends.”
“No.”
“You do.”
“I know these people.”
“That is generally how friendship begins.”
Rebuilding took six weeks.
Winter slowed everything.
But the new cabin rose larger than the old one.
Two rooms.
A proper bedroom.
A kitchen.
A small porch.
Glass windows purchased using part of Clara’s settlement.
Amos resisted the windows.
“Too expensive.”
Clara folded her arms.
“I spent six years staring through velvet curtains I hated. I intend to see these mountains clearly.”
They bought the windows.
She won.
Often.
Amos secretly liked that.
Clara designed shelves beside the kitchen.
Amos built them.
She wanted a larger table.
He made one from pine.
He carved a small pattern beneath the edge, copied from an old furniture design Clara sketched from memory.
When she saw it, she cried.
Amos panicked.
“You hate it.”
“No.”
“Then why are you crying?”
“Because my father used that pattern.”
Amos looked at the carving.
“You drew it.”
“I didn’t think you noticed.”
“I notice things.”
Clara kissed him.
“Yes,” she whispered. “You do.”
Their marriage changed after the cabin was rebuilt.
Not because of the house.
Because neither was waiting for disaster anymore.
The bed was no longer a threat.
The first night inside their new bedroom, Amos stood awkwardly near the door.
Clara sat on the edge of the mattress.
“You look terrified.”
“I’m thinking.”
“That always appears painful.”
He almost smiled.
“I don’t want—”
“I know.”
Clara stood.
She crossed the room.
For once there was no fear in her face.
She took his hand.
“I’m asking without looking frightened afterward.”
Amos remembered his own words.
He swallowed.
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
This time when they kissed, there was no question left between them.
Only patience.
And trust.
And the quiet understanding that love did not have to resemble possession.
Spring came late.
Snow retreated from the southern slopes.
Clara planted vegetable seeds beside the cabin.
Amos built a fence.
She bought chickens.
He objected.
“They’re noisy.”
“So are you when splitting wood.”
“I’m working.”
“So are they.”
He lost that argument too.
One April morning Clara was kneading bread when nausea struck.
She barely reached the basin.
Amos looked up from the table.
“You sick?”
“No.”
She wiped her mouth.
“Perhaps.”
He stood immediately.
“Doctor.”
“Amos.”
“We’re going to town.”
“I do not need—”
“You just threw up.”
“That happens.”
“When?”
Clara stared at him.
He stared back.
Understanding arrived slowly.
“No.”
She whispered it.
Amos became still.
Neither allowed themselves to hope.
Not yet.
Clara had believed for years that she could not have children.
Charles had made certain she believed it was her failing.
The possibility frightened her more than she expected.
They waited a week.
Then another.
Finally they rode into Bitter Creek.
Dr. Everett examined her.
He emerged from the small room smiling.
Amos stood so quickly he knocked over a chair.
“Well?”
The doctor looked at Clara.
“You’re going to have a baby.”
Silence.
Amos did not move.
Clara’s eyes filled instantly.
“No.”
Dr. Everett’s smile faded.
“I’m quite certain.”
“I mean—”
She covered her mouth.
Amos crossed the room.
“Clara?”
She looked up at him.
For one terrifying second he thought she was unhappy.
Then she began laughing through tears.
Amos dropped to his knees in front of her.
“A baby?”
She nodded.
“A baby.”
He placed both hands gently over hers.
His face changed.
The rugged mountain man who had faced fire, gunshots, and winter storms without trembling suddenly looked completely overwhelmed.
“What do we do?”
Clara laughed harder.
Dr. Everett coughed.
“Most people start by breathing.”
Amos ignored him.
“You all right?”
“Yes.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“Need water?”
“No.”
“Food?”
“No.”
“Blanket?”
“Amos.”
He stopped.
“I am happy.”
That silenced him.
Then Clara’s expression changed.
Fear returned.
Small but unmistakable.
“What?”
“What if something goes wrong?”
Amos took her face gently between his hands.
“Then we face it.”
“What if—”
“Together.”
She closed her eyes.
Together.
The word steadied her.
On the ride home, Amos was unusually quiet.
Clara finally asked, “Are you worried?”
“Yeah.”
“About the baby?”
“Everything.”
She smiled.
“Good.”
He frowned.
“Good?”
“It means you’re human.”
“Don’t spread that around.”
That night they sat on the porch of their rebuilt cabin.
The mountains glowed beneath the setting sun.
Amos rested one hand over Clara’s stomach, though there was nothing to feel yet.
“Boy or girl?” she asked.
“Healthy.”
“That was not one of the choices.”
“Don’t care.”
“Neither do I.”
A few moments passed.
Amos looked toward her.
“I was wrong.”
“About what?”
“That first day.”
Clara smiled.
“You will need to be considerably more specific.”
“I thought the agency sent the wrong woman.”
Her expression softened.
“And now?”
Amos looked at the house.
The garden.
The chickens he pretended to hate.
The woman beside him.
“No.”
His thumb brushed over her fingers.
“They sent exactly the right one.”