“I won’t be Anna,” Lydia whispered.

His eyes met hers.

“You don’t know that.”

“No.”

She reached across the table.

Her fingers rested lightly over his scarred hand.

“But neither do you.”

Silas stared at their hands.

For several seconds, neither moved.

Then he turned his palm upward and very gently closed his fingers around hers.

The next morning, he began clearing a second trail toward the valley.

“For spring?”

Lydia asked.

“For sooner if needed.”

“You can’t cut a road through four feet of snow.”

“Watch me.”

And she did.

It happened eleven days later.

Lydia was cleaning beneath Silas’s bunk when she found the envelope.

She hadn’t meant to search.

A tin cup had rolled under the bed.

She bent awkwardly, reached beneath the frame, and her fingers touched paper.

The envelope was yellowed but not old.

Across the front, written in unmistakable handwriting, were three words.

For Lydia Marsh.

Her blood went cold.

She knew that handwriting.

She had stared at it on grocery lists.

Love notes.

Loan notices.

Apologies.

Daniel.

Lydia sat down hard.

When Silas returned at sunset, she was waiting at the table.

The envelope lay between them.

He stopped.

Everything in his face changed.

“Where did you get that?”

“Under your bed.”

Silas removed his gloves slowly.

“Lydia—”

“Don’t.”

She stood.

“You knew him.”

Silas said nothing.

“You knew my husband.”

“Yes.”

Her breath hitched.

“Before he died?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

Silas looked toward the envelope.

“That ain’t simple.”

“Make it simple.”

“Daniel came here.”

Lydia felt the room tilt.

“When?”

Silas didn’t answer.

She stepped closer.

“When?”

Finally he said—

“Eight days after they buried him.”

Lydia stared at him.

“No.”

“He was hurt.”

“No.”

“Shot through the side.”

“You’re lying.”

“I ain’t.”

“I watched them lower his coffin!”

“Did you see his body?”

Lydia froze.

Of course she hadn’t.

They had told her the accident had crushed him beneath a wagon.

The undertaker had insisted the coffin remain closed.

She had accepted it because she had been grieving.

Because she was pregnant.

Because nobody gave a widow permission to question men in black coats.

“No,” she whispered.

Silas continued quietly.

“He came here near midnight.

Barely stayed on his horse.”

Lydia gripped the table.

“What did he say?”

“He asked about you.”

A tear slid down her cheek.

“Did he?”

“Yes.”

“Funny.

He could have asked me himself.”

“He said he couldn’t.”

“Why?”

“He wouldn’t tell me everything.”

“Then what did he tell you?”

Silas looked at the envelope.

“He told me he had done something terrible.”

Lydia laughed bitterly.

“That doesn’t narrow it down.”

“He said men would come after you because of it.”

Her anger faltered.

“He told me to place the advertisement.”

Silence swallowed the cabin.

“What?”

“He said you wouldn’t accept money.

Said you’d rather starve than take charity from a stranger.”