After years of close calls and long nights, he’s looking forward to settling down with Sadie Adams, an enchanting young woman searching for the same serene stability as he is.
Unfortunately, Sadie barely has the chance to unpack before reality starts to interrupt their idyllic union. A group of bandits begins a startling raid on the town in search of a diamond worth more than all of the gold in California, and Samuel isn’t optimistic about their chances—until Sadie proves she’s just as cunning and daring as her husband-to-be.
Once again, Samuel has to put his life on the line to defend the town he loves—but this time, he has the unexpected help of the woman he’s come to love even more.
“And with that, we move on to our final business: Sutter Creek Defense League new members’ initiation, to be witnessed by our retiring members.”
Walter Jones stood behind his crumbling podium, his hands gripping the sides as he addressed the crowd of sixteen men. Three of them were young enough to be some of the League member’s grandchildren, but all of them were far more skilled than they appeared. Nearly all of them had come close to Samuel’s marks in moving target practice, and every one of them was faster than him, and likely in better health. Samuel wasn’t ashamed to admit that the young men made him feel older than his years; he took it as a good sign, and trusted the fact to help him sleep soundly when they took up their badges for good.
“Caleb, Martin, James—please, receive the badges from Samuel Barnes and David Lee Wright, your sponsoring members, and pin them to your hearts.”
The crowd parted so that Samuel and David Lee stood at the center of the room, directly over the sturdy cellar door that took up most of the floor space. The motion looked rehearsed, but this was the first time in their history something like this had taken place—Sutter Creek’s Defense League was so young that it never changed members, just taken on new ones as the years went on. Walter had read the words aloud to them only once before the ceremony itself and had given them no direction; Samuel thought they looked as though they were under a spell.
David handed a badge to Martin, and Samuel handed his old badge to Caleb and a newly made one to James. The young men looked into his eyes with a flash of something like fear, but that apprehension was replaced with resolution by the time their wooden badges were pinned to their shirts.
“Now that your hearts have been fashioned with the crest of the Defense League, let the emblem be your life until your duty ends. With this oath, you swear to uphold justice and embody mercy, only wielding power in defense of your land. What say ye?”
“Aye,” intoned the men in unison. A ripple of energy moved through the crowd, and Samuel smiled as each of the new members widened their eyes and shivered. It may just be a wooden badge, but the job came with a pride and nobility that he knew they were only just beginning to understand. David caught Samuel’s eye and winked, apparently thinking the same thing. These men are still green, but they’ll be weathered soon enough.
One by one, the existing members shook hands with the new members, and then the retiring members shook hands with their former recruits. Walter lingered by the podium, watching everyone mingle with a strangely misty expression. Samuel walked over to the old speaker while Caleb asked David about gun maintenance, tapping him on the shoulder and startling him from his reverie.
“You alright, Walter?”
Walter nodded, his jowls moving as his head bobbed. “Yes, I think so, Samuel. Just remembering when we started this league.”
Samuel nodded. “I was a guy of only fifteen years myself, but I remember my dad going to the meeting after you got rid of the last sheriff.” He crossed his arms and regarded his old friend, taking in his pallid skin and reddened eyes. “Walter, Sutter Creek got cleaned up when you threw out those garbage lawmen—you made sure of that. What’s wrong? Are you worried about your new men?”
Walter laughed, and some of the tension drained from his rotund figure. “No, no, no! I’m just being silly, I suppose. You know how I am—I hear things on the wire, or around the depot…I just let some gossip go to my head.”
Samuel chuckled and clapped Walter’s shoulder. “You know what they say about gossip. Better shared than shuttered.”
Walter grinned and shoved Samuel’s shoulder—though Samuel was a foot taller than him, so it made for quite a sight. “You made that up to get me to tell you what I heard.”
“Did it work?”
Walter sighed. “Yes, it did. It’s just more of the same—a few bits about who’s coming on the train, who’s bringing big jewels with them, mostly harmless. But I’ve heard some other things that make me worry; con men coming to target widows, for instance.” He paused and narrowed his eyes at Samuel. “And widowers, too. I’ve heard of con ladies, and I know how you younger men can get around a pretty face.”
Samuel smiled. “I’m only fifteen years younger than you, Walt! And I won’t be vulnerable for long; Sadie’s coming later today.”
A joyful smile spread across Walter’s face. “Today? I thought it wasn’t until next week, son! Well, what are you doing hanging around here then?”
“I have a few more hours,” Samuel answered. “Plus, I wanted to make sure I said goodbye to everyone properly,” he looked over his shoulder and frowned, “although it looks like almost everyone has decided to duck out. I wonder where they went off to?”
“The saloon,” Walter answered immediately. “Give a boy a badge and he’ll want to parade it around town.”
Samuel sighed. “I can’t say I blame them.”
“No, I bet you can’t,” Walter answered, his eyes twinkling. He was silent for a while, and Samuel felt the hesitance before he spoke. “So, you really love this girl?”
“I do,” Samuel said. “Really.”
He knew what had caused him to ask. Samuel had only been married to Jennifer for three years before she died, but he swore after he laid her to rest that he wouldn’t ever marry again. After a few years, his friends saw his loneliness and begged him to reconsider, so he amended his oath: he would only marry if he fell in love with the next woman he met as quickly as he’d fallen for Jennifer.
“What, three months?” his friend Jeremiah had balked. “Nobody falls in love in three months.”
“You will if you meet the right person,” Samuel countered. “I fell in love with Jennifer in three months. I’ll give it three months with anyone else, but no more.”
So, Jeremiah relented until a few years later, when it was nearing the fifth anniversary of Jennifer’s death. He pressured Samuel to put an ad out in the paper, and after a few months, Samuel obliged; he took care to describe the least exciting life he could possibly stand to avoid drawing in anyone wild or unstable—or perhaps, as Jeremiah pointed out, anyone at all. His friend accused him of trying to fail at love, claiming no one would fall in love with the meek version that Samuel had portrayed of himself.
Funnily enough, Jeremiah was right. When Sadie answered his ad, Samuel found himself curiously unable to withhold himself from her, and he was ecstatic to find that she was immediately taken with the real version of him. Within three months, Samuel was arranging his retirement from the League and asking for Sadie’s hand in marriage, earning a hearty “I told you so” from Jeremiah and all of his friends. He didn’t mind, though—his renewed faith in love was well worth the ribbing.
Walter pulled his watch from his pocket and rubbed his whiskers. “Something tells me Millie is going to be upset if I miss our lunch date again,” he intoned. He glanced back up at Samuel and smiled kindly, “No matter how much you give up for them, it’s certainly nice to have a woman to love.”
“I’ll say,” Samuel agreed. He walked out of the barn with Walter, steering himself around the edges of garden behind the guest house and down the hill toward town. The League used the barn up on Sutter Hill for two reasons: first, its owners, the Raymond family, had more material goods to protect than nearly anyone in town; and second, the hill gave the best vantage p
oint for miles in case of attack. Sutter Creek rarely saw crime that wasn’t domestic, but it was nice to be ready when the odd bandit crossed through from the bigger cities—or even a handful of bandits, as the case may be.
The Defense League had come into being after Walter discovered the last sheriff’s corruption. The town couldn’t afford to pay enough sheriffs and deputies to protect its 1,500 people, so the wealthy Raymond family on Sutter Hill offered a solution: they would provide guns, ammo, and a meeting place as long as there were men willing to defend the town from riff raff. Walter had been 18 years old when he founded the four-man group, and he served with the League as an active member for twenty years, until a back injury forced him to settle for organizational duties.
Samuel watched him climb into his carriage now, his stomach nearly brushing the sides of entryway as he got in. Walter would hurry home to his loving wife, but the rest of the men were filtering down the main street as Samuel moved south toward home. He started to call out to them, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to relax with them if he tried; he was far too excited to sit in one place, let alone swap familiar stories as he drank warm ale.
Sadie was all he could think about these days, and it surprised him more than it surprised anyone else. Not only was she nothing like Jennifer, she wasn’t like any woman he’d ever met, period. Her father had taught her to hunt before she knew how to properly ride a horse—though she could hunt from a horse, too, if need be. She was a substitute school teacher, but she also tutored privately; she said her eclectic mix of knowledge made her perfectly suited for teaching sheltered children and young people with neuroses. She had spent two years as a maid, but she made it clear that she wasn’t interested in serving him so he could go out all night with his pals. Samuel was shocked when she’d written him those words exactly, but her tendency toward bluntness only endeared her to him. She was intensely loving as well—and that was the only quality Samuel considered as a requirement for his new wife to have.
As he opened the front door to his house, a gust of cool air hit his unshaven face, and he stopped dead in his tracks. Samuel blinked, startled to see his back door standing wide open to the small garden beyond. The roses looked undisturbed, but the sunflowers just behind them were swaying too quickly to have been stirred by mere wind.
“Hello?”
He took the hat from his head of mousy brown hair and moved to the small coat closet, plucking his rifle from its hiding place and hurrying to ease around the threshold of the back door. Samuel leaned out and looked first left, then right, then left again—but his brown eyes fell on nothing. He took another step out into the garden, then another, walking in a slow circle around his flowers until he was satisfied that there had been no intruder. Must have left it open just enough to let the wind blow through it, and a dang squirrel got in again. Wish they could close doors on their way out.
He’d thought about laying traps for them, but the thought of hurting the poor squirrels bothered him more than it did to come home to an open door and a couple of missing apples. Samuel didn’t used to be that way, but something in him had changed over the years, and now he was softer in a way he couldn’t explain. It was probably a good thing, but he couldn’t help but wonder if he could have been a better League member if only he were willing to be a little more tough. They’d lost some livestock a while back because of him. A stronger man might have shot the thieves, but he let them flee with their prizes; they ended up coming back to raid the town again a few weeks later. That time, Walter was able to get a sheriff from Coloma to take him to jail, but who knew if they’d always be that lucky?
A sharp knock at the front door nearly startled Samuel out of his skin. He hurried over to open it and was surprised to find a ten-year-old boy doubled over and out of breath. It took a moment before he recognized him as one of the Raymond’s adopted children—Kenny? Benny?
“Carriage is comin’,” he panted. “Saw it over the bend.”
He stuck out his hand and stared at Samuel expectantly, his eyes unwavering as the man dug in his pocket for a coin to drop into his palm.
The little boy turned on his heel and jogged back down the street, most likely going to spend his money on sweets or a toy at the General Store. He didn’t even give him time to say thank you, though it may not have occurred to him; the miner was clueless when it came to children.
Samuel had forgotten all about the ten minute warning he’d requested; that only gave him enough time to shave and change before Sadie arrived. He ran a razor across his face and shrugged his shoulders into a dark blue shirt, noticing the wrinkles before it was too late. His slacks were fine, and he smoothed his hair nervously as he regarded himself in the mirror. With his shirt tucked in, his broad shoulders were more apparent, and the brilliance of his light brown eyes highlighted the sharpness of his cheekbones. Not bad for thirty, he thought, and then: I hope it’s enough for Sadie.
Another knock at the door startled him, and he nearly toppled the basin sitting in front of him. Samuel strode down the hall to open the front door, expecting to see another child, or even his neighbor. Instead, he found a red-faced young man holding a trunk that likely weighed more than him, straining to stay upright as another man unloaded the enormous carriage at his front door. People gawked as the driver set a long duffel bag on top of an even larger trunk and lifted both, trotting toward his companions as though they weighed nothing.
“Mr. Barnes?” squeaked the younger man, sweat dampening his reddish hair.
Samuel stepped back to allow them to pass and set his gaze on the woman now descending from the carriage. She wore a plain cotton dress, and a parasol in the exact same shade dangled from one of her hands. Her honey-blonde hair was piled atop her head, but in a way that looked almost careless in its elegance. Her oval-shaped face sat atop a long, graceful neck, and she shaded her eyes with one hand as she closed the carriage door behind her. Samuel had the strangest feeling as he watched her turn and finally set her eyes on him; her gaze stopped his heart, and it felt like he was living the last moments of his life— everything that came after this moment would be some altogether new existence.
Then she smiled, and his heart started beating again. Samuel felt himself move forward, and they were meeting at the sidewalk before he knew what to say.
“Hello,” the woman said. “Samuel Barnes? I’m Sadie.” She blushed. “I suppose you knew that, though, since those are my things going into your house.”
Samuel laughed. “I was beginning to wonder who those belonged to.”
The smile on Sadie’s face broadened, and a flush colored her cheeks a light pink. Her lashes were dark around her eyes, which were as warm as melting chocolate, and the fullness of her lips made Samuel want to pull her into an embrace and press them to his. Instead, he offered her his arm and steered her into the living room, handing each of the men another fistful of coins for their trouble. Samuel saw the older man nod at him, but the redhead didn’t even glance at him before sprinting back to their carriage.
Once they were in, the house fell into a thick silence, and Samuel willed himself into action to keep his panic from taking hold. Don’t embarrass yourself.
“I have some things for sandwiches, if you’re hungry,” he said, hurrying to the kitchen. His mind was reeling, and he was thankful that he still knew how to be hospitable. “I have chicken, but none of that fancy imported cheese you like so much.”
“That’s alright!” Sadie called from the dining room. “I am quite hungry. That train ride was nearly as bad as the one to New York I told you about a couple of months ago.”
Samuel whistled as he stacked food on a wide plate. “The one that got stopped by the sheriffs? Sorry to hear that.”
“I’m certainly happy to be here now,” she said as he returned to the dining room with a plate and a loaf of bread. She smiled at him again, and Samuel noticed a gap between her two front teeth that he hadn’t seen before. As he sat opposite her at the table, she turned her eyes arou
nd the room, paying special attention to the hearth he’d cleared only a few days before her arrival. “A fireplace! How cozy.”
Samuel smiled at the joy in her tone. “Did your old home not have one?”
She shook her head and faced him as he assembled his sandwich. “Just a big furnace. I really love the idea of sitting before an open flame—though I always worry I might fall asleep and tumble in.”
“I won’t let you,” Samuel promised, reaching across the table and taking one of her hands in his. “I’ll protect you from fire and flame…and spiders.”
Sadie giggled. “You’ll never let me live that down, will you?”
“You shouldn’t have told me!” Samuel replied, smiling impishly. “Besides, who’s afraid of such little spiders? I think you deserve to be teased.”
“Little spiders can be poisonous, you rake!” she retorted, but her grin was holding fast. “Besides, you’re afraid of odd things, too—like babies.”
“I’m not afraid of babies!” Samuel said, laughing. “I take offense at that accusation.”
“Then why do you refuse to hold them?”
“I told you, they don’t like me,” he said before taking a bite of his food. He gazed at Sadie as she did the same, a sense of peace finally starting to settle over his jittery nerves. He remembered gazing at her penmanship when they first began writing to each other, completely in awe of how precise her lettering was. She assembled her sandwich the same way, not letting a single scrap fall out of line as she took another bite over her plate. She caught his eye a moment later and blushed.
“What is it?”
Samuel shrugged. “I guess I’m still in disbelief. And—I don’t mean to be too forward, but—you’re so incredibly lovely. I don’t think that photo did you justice.”
The blush on Sadie’s cheeks deepened, but she held his gaze as she responded. “I don’t think yours did you justice, either. And I know what you mean, Samuel; this still feels like a dream. We have so much ahead of us, and I already feel so comfortable with you. I hope that’s not strange of me.”
Annie: A Bride For The Farmhand - A Clean Historical Western Romance (Stewart House Brides Book 3) Page 66
