Last Chance Wife Read online

  “Where do you work, sir?” She placed a roll on his plate and another on the plate of the miner beside him.

  “Inside the mine.”

  “Well, now, that’s probably why I didn’t meet you. I’m not allowed to enter the mine by myself.” The pan’s heat seeped through the layers of fabric into her fingers. Switching the pan to her left hand, she stuck out her right. “But that won’t stop me from meeting you now. Miss Winnie Sattler.”

  The man’s eyes twinkled. He couldn’t have been more than nineteen, maybe younger. “Pleased to meet you, Miss Sattler. I’m Adrian Birkeland. This here’s my partner, Roger Holloway. And these two blokes are my friends, Rogan Scott and Walter Martin. They’re partners, too.”

  Winifred shook each hand in turn. Rough were their palms, but shining were their eyes, and each one wore a cheerful smile. “Lovely meeting all of you. Now, what do you mean by partners?”

  “We work together in the mine,” Rogan explained, raking a hand through the gray hair salting his temples. “One of us holds the stake while the other hammers it into the wall.”

  “We create holes for the black powder,” Adrian added. “Then we light a fuse and...”

  Laughter died around him, so his explanation trailed off. Winifred looked up with the others to find Mr. Burke in the doorway.

  For the past few days, since their walk through the forest, he’d taken his meals in his office. Granna Cass ran the food upstairs after the rest of the company was served and eating. So to see him here, albeit late, with everyone...

  “Good evening, all.” He stared over the group with his usual stern expression before stepping in farther and accepting a plate from Granna Cass. “Thank you, Cassandra.”

  The awkward, uncomfortable hush continued to cloud the air as he took a seat on the end. Winifred placed the baking sheet on the stove top and collected a couple of rolls. She crossed to Mr. Burke and placed them on his plate. He sent her a glance of gratitude with a silent nod before lifting his fork. Soon, the miners finished their meals and moved out of the kitchen, some on their way home for the evening, and others to grab their night-shift supplies before coming back for their lunch pails.

  After every miner left, Mr. Burke remained, buttering his bread and eating in silence. A stab of pity rushed through Winifred, so she made up a plate of her own and took a seat opposite him.

  “I’m probably the last person you want to sit near,” she said quietly, “but all the same, no one should eat alone.”

  Mr. Burke made a wry smile. “I eat alone quite often. It’s not so bad, once you grow accustomed to it.”

  She smiled, but before she could answer, a sudden pounding at the back door made her jump. Winifred looked to Granna Cass, then to Mr. Burke. The pounding came again, this time for a longer stretch. Mr. Burke crossed to open the door, revealing a slight woman in a large coat.

  “Please, sir.” Her voice came strained. “Please, let me in.”

  He immediately ushered her inside and shut the door behind her. “Is anyone following you, ma’am?”

  “I don’t know.” She gasped the words out as Granna Cass took one of her arms and helped her into a chair at the table. “I... I just don’t know.”

  Mr. Burke locked the back door and rushed for the one leading to the hallway. “Just the same, I’ll ask Gerald to watch the grounds extra closely tonight. Cassandra,” he said over his shoulder on his way out, “clean her up.”

  The door shut behind him, and a chill filled the room in his absence, the untouched portion of his dinner sitting across from Winifred.

  “Winnie?” Granna Cass’s voice made Winifred jump. The older woman was seated beside the visitor, a hand protectively resting on the woman’s shoulder. “Fetch me the washbasin?”

  Realizing she sat at the table dumbly, Winifred sprang up, lifting the heavy water bowl from its stand in the corner and shuffling to the table, careful not to spill over the bowl’s porcelain lip. Once she placed the bowl on the table between the two women, she finally got a good look at the newcomer’s face.

  Young—younger than Winifred’s twenty-six years. Dark eyes, blond hair. Physically beautiful but with a haunted deprivation in her gaze that made sympathy clench in Winifred’s gut. She sank to a chair as Granna Cass dipped a rag into the water and held it to the young woman’s cheek, where a bruise had begun to form.

  “Hold this here and try to calm down, missy,” the older woman murmured. “You’re safe now.”

  What was she safe from? Or whom? Gooseflesh ran over her arms as Winifred glanced at the outside door, imagining someone barreling in. Would he be armed? What would he do to them? What had he already done to this poor girl?

  Mr. Burke reentered the kitchen from the hallway. “Gerald is patrolling the grounds. You’ll be safe here tonight.” He made his way back to the table and took a seat beside Winifred so he could look the young woman in the eye. He folded his hands on the table. “Ma’am, I am Ewan Burke, and I own the Golden Star Mine. This is Cassandra Washington and Winifred Sattler. We’ll make up a bed for you right here, with them, and you can stay as long as you need.”

  As long as she needed? Winifred had expected him to give the woman the same warning he’d given Winifred when she arrived—that there wouldn’t be room for her to stay on a long-term basis.

  “What establishment are you running from, ma’am?”

  “Bella Union.” The woman barely looked up, her chin beginning to tremble. “I started at the Gem, then tried to leave and couldn’t find work, so I ended up at Bella Union, and—”

  Mr. Burke slid his hand across the table to stop the woman’s explanation. She lurched away as if he were a snake, so he drew back. “It’s all right. I won’t hurt you.”

  Winifred’s heart fell to the pit of her stomach. The Gem. Mr. Burke had explained to her what that place was, and now she looked at one of its former employees who wanted out and clearly had nowhere else to turn.

  “You will work here,” Mr. Burke was saying. “We have plenty of things for you to do, and we will explain them all in the morning after you’ve had a chance to calm down and take in your surroundings.” He stood and scooped an empty bowl from the cupboard before crossing to the pot of soup still warm on the stove. “Here, you will learn skills to support yourself. You can stay as long as needed. This is a safe place.”

  His movements were sure and confident, yet gentle enough not to scare the woman again. Sitting down, Mr. Burke placed the bowl and a spoon in front of the woman as if he were setting out food for a frightened animal. “We have everything you need. You won’t need to worry anymore. What is your name?”

  The young woman’s chin trembled. “They called me Trixie, but my real name is Delia Richardson.”

  “Miss Delia Richardson,” he said, his voice calm and soothing, “welcome to the Golden Star Mine.”

  Delia’s eyes flickered gratitude, and soon she ate. Slowly at first but picking up speed and interest as she went. The poor dear. While Winifred watched, still trying to fathom the emptiness of such a life, Mr. Burke’s hand clasped hers beneath the table.

  Startled, she looked up at him. He offered her a small smile. “Why don’t you accompany me to the store, Miss Sattler? Cassandra will stay with Miss Richardson and help her settle in.”

  Unable to find her voice, Winifred nodded and followed him out of the kitchen. Colors from the low sun glowed through the hallway windows as they made their way around the twists and turns that now felt so familiar to her.

  “I thought this might be a bit overwhelming for you.” His voice still sounded hushed, the same soft tones he’d used with Delia. “Perhaps an explanation is in order.”

  Before tonight, she’d never quite heard that tone from him, nor seen the gentleness in his actions toward another person, and her heart filled with warmth. Whatever explanation he thought he owed her, she could assure him he
did not.

  He unlocked the store and stepped in first. Odd—usually he stepped aside like a gentleman.

  “Just a minute.” Then he swept through the store and checked the front door to make sure it was locked to the outside, and with a rush of appreciation, she realized he had stepped in first to protect her from any threat that might be lying in wait. He came back to where she stood in the doorway and ushered her in. “All clear. I wanted to make certain.”

  Entering, Winifred took in the shop with new eyes. “Are we in some sort of danger?”

  “No, probably not. But one can never be too careful.”

  He moved to the counter to light the lamp waiting there. Winifred ambled to the window and stared out at the golden sun, bursting into a sunset. She touched the pane with her fingertip. “Is Delia in danger?”

  Mr. Burke released a heavy sigh. “I never know. We haven’t had any problems in the past, but I don’t want us to be caught unawares.”

  “In the past?” Winifred turned. “You mean there have been others?”

  “A few.” He leaned a hip against the counter. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” Low light from the lamp cast those shadows across his face again, and he crossed his arms over his broad chest. “The Golden Star has a reputation in town. When people need a place to turn, they know they’re welcomed here.”

  Winifred turned her body to face him fully. “You mean people like Delia.”

  “Sometimes, yes. And also people like George and Lars.” Mr. Burke shook his head. “It all started so suddenly. I met a woman named Lucinda, who had run away from the Gem and had nowhere to turn. I’d recently completed my office building, so she moved in with Cassandra and began managing my store after that. She actually quit the day I hired you. Others have come and gone, doing office work or helping Cassandra in the kitchen.” He smiled faintly for an instant before his face grew serious. “I only tell you this so you’re not confused about what’s going on. People come here to find a new start, Miss Sattler. When they have learned skills and are confident in using them, they have the chance to move on with their lives somewhere else, where no one knows them and they can begin again.”

  Her already-warmed heart melted into a pool, and her throat thickened. “So, you save their lives?”

  Mr. Burke waved off her question. “They save themselves by choosing to turn toward a new path. Cassandra helps out tremendously. I only supply the building.”

  One of her brows arched. “You’re being modest. I saw the way you took charge in there. You’ll help Delia more than either of us will.”

  He shrugged a shoulder, obviously unprepared for how to respond to her compliment. Not that she really knew where to go from there, either. Even after all the stern comments he’d said to her since she first came, she had a strong desire despite it all to cross the floor and kiss him for his good deeds tonight.

  The thought brought a blush to her cheeks, and she whirled to face the window. Winnie Sattler, get a hold of yourself. You can’t go kissing Mr. Burke just because he did something that moved you. Have you gone mad?

  Or worse, was she that desperate for a solid, good-willed man in her life?

  “I admire your courage and servitude.” She drew a line along the windowsill. “Most people would be like the characters in the story of the Good Samaritan and walk on by, but you stop to help. More than that, you hang a light in your window so that people in need know they can come to you.” She swallowed, fortifying her thoughts. “My father was a man like you. He and my mother owned an orphanage in Kansas. A small one, with maybe ten or twelve children. But they loved their work—loved building a home full of care for children who needed it so badly. Then one night, there was a fire. He managed to get me and the other children out, but my mother—” Pausing, Winifred blinked back the emotion pressing down on her. “My mother was sick. After rounds and rounds of entering that building, in and among flames and smoke, my father still went in for Mother.” The golden light outside took on an orange hue above the evergreen trees. “My parents’ relationship was like nothing I’d ever seen before or since. A sacrificial love that covered everything.”

  It was a love she had fervently prayed to have for her own. And every time a mail-order agreement didn’t work, she clung to that picture of her parents and set her shoulders, telling herself the next one would be it. The next one would be that sacrificial love she wanted so desperately. But it never was, and she always ended up alone.

  “They died together.” Tears clogged her words. “Some say in each other’s arms.”

  Two hands touched her shoulders from behind. Turning, she allowed Mr. Burke to put his arms around her as she pushed her face into his chest. Oh, how desperately she wanted not to cry, to be strong, but in the warmth of someone’s comfort, she couldn’t hold back her tears.

  She had been alone for so long. “Aunt and Uncle did their best, but—”

  “Shh...” He placed his chin on her head and gathered her closer. “We don’t always understand why life happens the way it does. My mother died when I was a child, too. But know you’re safe here, that the Golden Star is a second family for you.”

  He had no idea how true his words were. No matter what had brought her here, Winifred knew she needed this place and these people. And God had orchestrated it all.

  But there was still the matter of it not being permanent. They might be her family now, but what would happen when she earned enough money to leave Deadwood and go home? The Golden Star had become more like home to her than anywhere else had since losing her parents.

  And what would happen if the mine failed, if Mr. Burke couldn’t secure an investor? What if this place was not just gone to her, but soon disappeared completely for everyone who needed it?

  Chapter Six

  Ewan slipped his folded response into an envelope and sealed it. Flipping it over, he wrote the return address across the front before tossing it into the growing pile of envelopes on the corner of his office desk.

  One more rejection for a potential bride. Hopefully the woman wouldn’t be too upset.

  He stared at his correspondence from the last couple of days. Three rejection letters and one in the “maybe” pile. Actually, he was surprised his advertisement had interested anyone at all, much less four applicants. But their responses had been lacking, enough to drop them from his list of possibilities.

  One had assured him she didn’t look the slight bit beautiful, quite ugly in fact, and that others could verify it. Even though he’d partially asked for it in the ad, her response left a bad taste in his mouth. He’d politely declined her offer. Another had several children. He loved children, of course, and wanted his own someday, but with his business so precarious right now, exposing so many children to that kind of uncertainty wouldn’t be right. This last one, the one he’d just added to the pile, actually came from a cousin of someone in town, looking for an excuse to leave the life of teaching and a handful of other responsibilities she’d apparently acquired in a town east of here. But shirking responsibilities wasn’t an enticing quality, either. He wanted his wife to be his full partner in life—someone who would help with the mining business in whatever means necessary.

  The fourth prospect had mining experience. So she’d gone in the “maybe” pile.

  Sighing, Ewan rubbed his fingers along the bridge of his nose. He’d expected there to be maybe one letter in the bunch that didn’t meet his qualifications, but he hadn’t expected three-fourths of them to be that way. Finding a wife proved harder than he’d hoped—and more tedious than he’d anticipated.

  With a sideways glance toward his right-hand drawer, he imagined the flowery stationery and penciled envelopes that lay inside. Including a new one he hadn’t read. The heart of that woman easily outshone all the rest.

  Having saved it for last, he opened her latest letter now.

  Dear Mr.
Businessman,

  I suppose if we are both lonely, then corresponding might be a good solution for a while. You can keep me company while I’m getting over a disappointing period in my life, and I can do the same for you. Or help you sift through all those letters you are sure to receive. The right woman is out there. I know you’ll find her soon...

  A knock at the door interrupted him.

  “Mr. Burke?” came the muffled voice behind the door.

  Miss Sattler. Another spot of confusion in his life. If only he could figure out what he felt toward her—irritation or attraction. He would prefer indifference. That would be much easier to handle.

  “Come in.” Ewan dropped the envelope and stationery in his drawer as the door opened wide and Miss Sattler entered. More like bounced, as was her usual way, he’d come to realize.

  “You wanted to see me?” She sank into a seat opposite his desk, her smile permanently fixed in place.

  “I did.” He shifted in his chair. “I spoke with Miss Richardson this morning, and she said she wants to stay with us for quite some time.” He folded his hands, waiting for the implication of what he would say to sink in. “So, I’m—”

  “You’ll be giving her my job?”

  Before he responded, he watched for her reaction. She only smiled. “I’d hoped you’d understand,” he continued, “since I informed you at the very beginning this might happen. The store clerk is the highest-paying job I have for someone like Miss Richardson, who has no other training, so I’d prefer she have it.”

  “Certainly.” She shook her head as if to tell him not to worry. “I expected as much.”

  A smile tugged at Ewan’s mouth. He admired her generosity—she clearly had no qualms about giving up her position to someone in greater need. “Excellent. Now, as for your position, Miss Sattler, I’ve decided to hire you as a clerk in my office.” Before she could react, he held up his hands. “It’s temporary work, too, and I’d only need you a couple hours a day, at most. It pays less than the store, so unfortunately, it’ll take you longer to earn that fare.”