THE TELEGRAM WAS dated several days earlier than the day it reached Henrietta Wentworth Norwood in the Bitterroot Valley, about as far west as you could get and still be in the Montana Territory. “Karl,” she said, clutching the missive to her chest, as she closed the door on the messenger who’d delivered it. “Miranda sent me a telegram.”
Karl, who was serving breakfast to their eighteen-month-old twin girls, Charlene and Caroline, handed two bowls of oatmeal to his twelve-year-old stepson, Griffin, who set the food in front of two brown-haired, brown-eyed little girls, while Karl crossed to take his wife in his arms.
He still couldn’t believe a man as plain-featured as he was could be married to a woman as stunningly beautiful as his wife. Even more amazing was the fact that she loved him as dearly as he loved her.
“I guess Miranda finally has some news about Josie,” he said.
“Maybe they found her.” Hetty’s blue eyes were filled with both anxiety and hope.
“Why don’t you read the telegram and find out?” Griffin suggested with a laugh.
Hetty shot Karl a terrified look that spoke volumes. Her greatest fear was that word would come that Josie had been found all right—found planted six feet under. The longer Josie was missing, the worse Hetty’s foreboding had grown.
Karl caught his wife’s stricken face between his two large hands and pressed a comforting kiss on her lips. “Read it, before you weep.”
Hetty laughed nervously and pressed her forehead against Karl’s chest. “You know me too well.”
Karl knew the unendurable guilt Hetty had suffered, as a result of the disaster that had befallen her and her two sisters on the trail. His wife blamed herself for every bad thing that had happened to the three of them since.
Against Hannah’s advice, Hetty had flirted with two men at the same time, not realizing that in the West, jealous battles were settled in ways far more deadly than she could have imagined. In the confrontation she’d caused, both men had ended up dead. Even worse, she and Hannah and Josie, and Hannah’s husband, Mr. McMurtry, had been forced to leave the safety of the wagon train and travel on alone.
Shortly thereafter, Mr. McMurtry had died of cholera, Josie had been stolen away by the Sioux, and Hetty had been left behind at the wagon, while Hannah went for help. It was only by the grace of God, and the ministrations of a Chinese man named Lin Bao, that Hetty had survived the arrow wound in her shoulder.
Bao had come across Hetty’s wagon while returning to the Bitterroot Valley from Cheyenne, after picking up Karl Norwood’s mail-order bride and her two children, Grace and Griffin. When Karl’s mail-order bride was accidentally killed, Hetty discovered that Grace and Griffin weren’t really the woman’s children. In fact, it was Grace who’d written all the letters from his intended bride to Karl. The young girl been looking for a way out of the terrible life she and her brother had led in Cheyenne.
With Bao’s help and encouragement, seventeen-year-old Hetty had stepped into the shoes of Karl’s much-older mail-order bride. They’d decided to tell Karl the children were several years younger than the thirteen and ten years old they actually were, while she would pretend to be their mother.
Karl hadn’t been fooled. He’d known his bride wasn’t twenty-eight any more than he was a cornstalk, and the children had looked too old for their ages and neither like each other nor their supposed mother. But he’d never seen a woman as breathtakingly lovely as Henrietta Wentworth when she smiled and twin dimples appeared on her cheeks. And he liked children enough to take on the two she’d brought with her.
So he’d married Hetty. And—except for the brief period when an endless spate of lies had come to light—never been sorry. In fact, they’d all been amazingly happy, especially after Grace met one of Karl’s loggers, Andy Peterson. His stepdaughter and the Texan had married last summer and were living in a house he and Andy had built not far down the road. Everything would have been picture perfect, except for the shadow of guilt that hung over his wife, keeping their life under the wide-open Montana skies from being absolutely cloudless. He hoped the telegram contained good news. He wanted his wife to be as wholly happy as he was himself.
Hetty was still holding the telegram clutched against her breasts, her eyes closed as though in prayer.
“Why don’t you read it, Mom?” Griffin said.
She opened her blue eyes, which looked bleak. “What if it’s bad news?”
Karl tsked and countered, “What if the news is good?”
At that moment, the door opened with a bang and Grace stood there with the spring breeze ruffling her red curls. Andy was only a step behind her. “I saw the messenger leaving,” she said breathlessly. “What’s happened? Has Josie been found?”
“That’s what we’re all trying to find out,” Griffin said. “Mom hasn’t opened the telegram yet.”
“Open it, Mom!” Grace said. “I know it’s good news. It just has to be!”
Hetty shot another desperate look at Karl, who gave her an encouraging smile, revealing the overlapping front tooth that she’d said was one of the reasons she’d fallen in love with him.
“All right,” she said almost angrily, tearing the telegram open and quickly perusing the contents.
Karl felt his heart stop when he saw her face scrunch up and heard her sob. “Hetty?”
She looked at him through eyes shiny with tears, but the wobbly smile—and the enchanting dimples that suddenly appeared in her cheeks—told a different story. “Josie’s been found! She’s on her way from England to Charleston right now. Miranda wants all of us to be there when Josie arrives at Jake’s ranch. We’re going to be together again at last!” She scanned the telegram and frowned. “This is days old! We need to leave right away, if we’re going to be there in time.”
“Are we really going to visit Aunt Miranda?” Griffin asked.
Hetty’s heart was in her eyes as she asked, “Karl? Can we go?”
Karl loved his wife for salving his pride by asking, but the truth was she had a fortune of her own to cover the cost, if she wanted to make the trip. The logging business Karl had come to the valley to start had faltered, and he and Andy had been making plans to buy a herd of cattle and drive it north, to provide beef for the valley’s growing population.
“I wouldn’t miss a chance to see the infamous Josephine Wentworth in person,” he said, pulling Hetty into his arms and hugging her tight. “Besides, a trip to Texas will give me and Andy the perfect opportunity to get our cattle business started.”
“Then we’re all going?” Grace asked, glancing at her husband over her shoulder.
“Why not?” Andy replied.
Grace threw herself into his arms. “I can’t wait to meet Mom’s family and see where you grew up.”
Griffin hooted and said, “We’re going to Texas!”
Caroline banged her spoon on the table and said, “Tex-as!”
Charlene mimicked her twin, and the two ended up chanting, “Tex-as! Tex-as! Tex-as!”
Karl laughed and said, “I guess it’s unanimous. How soon can everyone be packed?”