He Offered Her a Home Before the Snow Could Take Her. By Spring, Mary Learned Why He Had Been Waiting for Her All Along.
The first thing Mary Whitfield noticed about Ethan Cole was that he looked at her daughter as though he had seen a ghost.
It lasted no more than a heartbeat.
A flicker in his gray eyes.
A tightening in his jaw.
Then the expression vanished beneath the hard, weather-beaten calm of a man accustomed to hiding whatever hurt him.
But Mary saw it.
And when he said, “Your daughter needs a home. And my bed needs a wife,” every instinct inside her screamed that the stranger standing before her knew something he was not telling her.
The wind tore through Cedar Ridge, lifting dust from the street and throwing it against the storefronts. Clara pressed closer to Mary beneath their thin wool shawl.
Mary rose so quickly that the blood rushed from her head.
“What did you say?”
Ethan did not smile.
That almost made it worse.
Nearby, the man sweeping the saloon porch stopped sweeping. Two women outside the general store stared openly. Even old Mr. Miller appeared behind his dusty window.
Ethan removed his hat.
“I said it poorly.”
“You think?”
His mouth twitched, though his eyes remained serious.
“I’m offering marriage.”
Mary felt Clara’s fingers tighten around hers.
“I don’t know you.”
“No.”
“You don’t know me.”
His gaze briefly settled on Clara again.
Then he looked Mary directly in the eyes.
“Not as well as I’d like to.”
Something about the answer unsettled her.
“My wife died two years ago,” he continued. “I’ve got a nine-year-old daughter named Sarah. I’ve got a house that hasn’t felt like one since my wife passed. You need security. I need someone willing to help me build a household again.”
“That is not a reason to marry a stranger.”
“No.”
“At least we agree on something.”
Ethan looked toward the northern hills.
“Winter’s coming.”
Mary hated that he said it softly.
She hated it because she had spent the previous night awake beside Clara in a stable loft, listening to the wind scratch at the boards while wondering how much colder it would become in a week.
She hated it because Clara had eaten half a biscuit that morning and insisted she was full.
Most of all, Mary hated it because desperation had transformed an insane proposal into something she could not simply dismiss.
Ethan reached inside his coat.
Mary stiffened.
He withdrew three coins.
“Take these.”
“I don’t take charity.”
“Good. Neither do I.”
He extended his hand.
“Consider it payment for your time. Buy yourself and your girl supper. Then come see the Double C. If you hate the place, keep the money and never speak to me again.”
Mary stared at the coins.
“You do this often?”
His brows drew together.
“Propose to starving women outside Miller’s store?”
One of the women nearby coughed to hide a laugh.
Mary flushed.
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Then why me?”
There it was again.
That nearly invisible shadow.
Ethan closed her fingers around the coins.
