Accidental Sweetheart. Lisa Bingham

lips. She really hadn’t meant to slam the door quite so hard...

      But she’d needed to signal to her friends that Gideon Gault was no longer being distracted.

      Within seconds, Stefania and Marie joined her, and the three of them walked down the boardwalk, heading out of town toward the Dovecote.

      “Any progress?” Lydia asked.

      “We were able to get five more men.”

      Lydia shot a glance at the other girls, catching their barely submerged glee. “Five? How?”

      “We threw a blanket over each of them and hauled them into the cook shack. From there, we explained the nature of our protest and how they could help.”

      “And they all agreed to join our cause?”

      “Klute Ingraham is still thinking about it. But Iona started plying him with pie, so I think his stomach will declare its allegiance soon enough. If that doesn’t work, Iona is prepared to mourn the fact that the stuffed ferrets he provided for decoration in the Dovecote need a new set of clothes for spring.”

      Since Klute had a passion for taxidermy and dressing his creations in fanciful clothes, Lydia supposed that would keep him from comprehending the true nature of his situation. In essence, he was a prisoner to the mail-order brides. He and the other men they’d taken hostage would remain in their control until their demand was met: an end to the “no women” clause in the mine’s rule book.

      “Well done! Where are you keeping this batch?”

      “At the infirmary for now. Since Sumner has been forced to remain home with Jonah during his quarantine, we figured that no one would bother to look there.”

      “And who do you have guarding them?”

      “Greta and Hannah.”

      Lydia laughed. Greta was a plump Bavarian woman who knew very little English. What words she knew, she offered in a big booming voice. Even if she bellowed her orders in German, she more than captured a man’s attention. Hannah was a sturdy farm girl from Ohio. The pair of them should be more than capable of guarding their captives.

      “That brings our total to...”

      “Thirty-seven!” Stefania offered proudly.

      Lydia chuckled. “See what you can do this afternoon to bring that number even higher. I have an appointment to meet Mr. Gault to examine the pass. We should be gone at least an hour, but I’ll do my best to keep him out of the town proper for two.”

      Marie and Stefania both offered her mock salutes. Then, they turned to retrace their steps so that they could relay their “orders” to the women who would lie in wait for the next batch of men who foolishly sought a meal, a haircut or a game of checkers in the company store.

      Lydia knew that the ladies’ efforts wouldn’t remain undetected for much longer—she hadn’t thought that they would last this long. Indeed, she was surprised that the dip in the mine’s workforce hadn’t already become a problem. But with more and more snow disappearing every day, the brides had been desperate to find a way to get Ezra Batchwell and Phineas Bottoms to revise the company’s strict rules for employment.

      In order to work at the prestigious and profitable Batchwell Bottoms Silver Mine, the men had to sign an oath that they would abstain from drinking, smoking, gambling and cussing. And most egregious of all, in her opinion, women were forbidden on company property. That meant that married men were forced to live apart from their wives and families. And if a man happened to fall in love once he came to the territories, he was in big trouble.

      Unfortunately, the owners of the mine hadn’t counted on a trainload of mail-order brides being stranded in their community. Despite the Pinkertons, who had been ordered to guard them night and day, many of the men had begun to form attachments with the ladies. Two of their own—Sumner Ramsey and Willow Wanlass—had even managed to marry a couple of the men. But those relationships—as well as so many others that had begun in secret—were already in jeopardy. If something wasn’t done—soon—these men would be faced with the loss of employment or separation from their families.

      Such a situation was untenable, even to someone like Lydia, who had sworn off matrimony or any other forms of romantic entanglements. Therefore, she’d been assigned the task of keeping Gideon Gault in the dark about their efforts for as long as possible. She was to distract him, waylay him, monopolize his time, no matter what it took to do so.

      Casting her eyes skyward, she offered up a quick prayer.

       Dear Lord, please bless us in our efforts to keep these families together.

       And please, please, don’t let me lose my temper with that insufferable man.

       Chapter Two

      Well before the appointed time, Lydia stood next to a docile gray mare, the reins held loosely in her hands. She was glad that she’d made the effort to arrive early. As she’d suspected, a quarter hour before they were meant to meet, Gideon Gault burst out of the Pinkerton offices and ran in the direction of the livery.

      She wasn’t sure if he was considered off-duty or if he’d merely hoped to arrive at the livery incognito, but he’d changed his clothes, donning a pair of worn boots, brown wool pants, a brown leather vest and a brown shearling coat.

      Perhaps the choice of so much brown was an attempt at camouflage, given the mud in Bachelor Bottoms. If that was the case, it didn’t work. In all that well-worn gear, there was no disguising the man’s musculature. Gideon Gault had long legs and broad shoulders—making Lydia wonder what sorts of activities were entailed with becoming a Pinkerton. A man didn’t get that kind of physique by trailing a bunch of women around Aspen Valley in order to keep the miners at bay.

      “Good afternoon, Mr. Gault.”

      He’d been so mindful about missing the puddles in his dash across the street that her greeting brought him up short and he skidded to a halt, nearly plowing into her headfirst.

      Automatically, he reached to lift his hat, but the action merely emphasized the montage of emotions that raced across his features: surprise, dismay, then utter resignation.

      “Miss Tomlinson.”

      “I see you were hoping that I would forget our errand.”

      “No, ma’am, I—”

      Even he must have realized the halfhearted objection because his lips twitched at the corners. “I had expected you to take a little longer.”

      At least he had the grace to admit that much.

      “And why would you think that?”

      “Experience.”

      “Oh. So, you’re one of the men at Bachelor Bottoms who’s been forced to live apart from a loved one?”

      He shook his head. “No, ma’am. I grew up with sisters. Five of them.”

      Her brows rose. “It’s a wonder you survived, Mr. Gault.”

      He didn’t miss her sarcasm. If anything, it made his smile even wider. “I’ve got battle scars, Miss Tomlinson. But, yes, I survived.”

      The livery door opened and Willoughby Smalls walked out, leading a strawberry roan gelding.

      “Thanks, Willoughby.”

      Smalls grinned, his gaze bouncing from Gideon to Lydia. An accident at the mine had crushed the gentle giant’s throat years ago, robbing him of his ability to speak. But he still managed to communicate his thoughts by waving a finger between the two of them.

      “Yes, we’ll be riding out together.”

      “Despite the fact that Mr. Gault worked so hard to leave me behind,” Lydia muttered under her breath.