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He had enough money to help Gran. More than enough. They’d already mined more gold than DuMont Shipping had made in several years. Maddie wanted to hire a tribe of men to mine all of the gold beneath the outhouse, and he’d do it. Hire the men. There wasn’t much he wouldn’t do for her, and he might as well accept that.
Aw, hell. Life would be a whole lot easier right now if she’d stuck to mining gold and left his heart alone. But she hadn’t. She might as well put it in one of her little bags, for it no longer belonged to him. However, Cole wasn’t ready to turn everything over to her. Not all of him. He was not going to spend the winter here.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he said after a bit more thoughtful consideration.
Her brows furrowed and she tugged the opening of her coat tighter across her chest. “What kind of deal?”
The wind was bitter today. Whitecaps rolled down the river. Cole turned to the hill where their camp sat. Leave it to Maddie to find gold beneath an outhouse. The one place no one would attempt to look. His grandparents had built a dynasty by taking advantage of the opportunities set before them. The pay dirt beneath that outhouse was an opportunity. One he couldn’t ignore. “Thirty days,” he said with finality.
“What happens in thirty days?”
He turned back to where she stood next to the tub. He’d just dropped in the blanket and furs out of the sluice box so they could rinse out the gold. All day yesterday and again this morning she’d talked nonstop about hiring men to work their claim. Jack had put the notion in her head. She told him all about that, too. It would work. With the right amount of good workers, decent weather and a bit more equipment, they could have a fortune that would last a lifetime and still head south.
“I’ll hire the men needed to mine the gold,” he said, “but only if you agree to leave with me in thirty days.”
The excitement that momentarily flashed on her face turned to bewilderment. “What if we still have gold to mine?”
“It doesn’t matter. We still leave. You and me.”
“And go where?”
“South,” he answered. “Leave Alaska. Take a boat from Bittersweet to the coast.” That route was longer than going to Dabbler to catch a ship, but taking the overland trail so late in the year could be a death trap.
“Forever?”
Biting the inside of his cheek at how thunderstruck she sounded, he nodded. “Yes, forever.”
Cole held his breath as her blue eyes bounced between him and the cleanout barrel, and willed his tongue to stay put. He’d made his ultimatum. If she chose the gold, so be it. At least he’d know. He’d know, too, what it had been like. Not being lucky for the first time in his life.
She folded her arms and tilted her head slightly to the left, looking at him thoughtfully. “I could stay here while you go south, and—”
“Yes, you could,” he interrupted. There were several things he could point out, yet he simply stated, “But that’s not the deal.” His insides churned. He was making her give up her dream, just like his mother and Rachel had tried to make him, but this was for her own safety. That was different.
She sighed heavily and her gaze went back to the barrel. When she lifted her chin again, a grin had formed. “All right.”
His apprehension collapsed, yet he asked, “All right? Thirty days?”
She nodded. “It doesn’t give us much time, but thirty days it is. Then I’ll leave with you.”
Gold had little to do with the thrill that shot through him, and it ignited a burst of energy. Reaching forward, he grasped her waist with both hands, then lifted her into the air and spun around. Laughing. She laughed, too, and after a good, long and thorough kiss, he set her on the ground.
“You’ll have all the gold your little heart desires, Maddie, girl,” he said. “Enough to buy that soft bed, build that big house and hire those servants. I promise.”
The smile slipped off her lips slowly as a dark and unhappy thought entered her mind. Her grin reappeared a moment later, as if she’d realized it had disappeared and caught it, but it wasn’t as bright as before. “Well,” she said, taking her hands off his shoulders and swiping them across her thighs, “if we only have thirty days, we best get started.”
“We’ll start by hiring the Fenstermacher brothers,” he said.
“Yes,” she answered, kneeling down next to the barrel, “and Sylvester Whitehouse, and Jack of course. It was his idea.”
