Rescued by the Mountain Man (Mountain Men of Montana Book 1)

  RESCUED BY THE MOUNTAIN MAN

  DANA ALDEN

  Copyright © 2018 by Dana Alden.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Amanda Hildreth jumped at the chance to start life anew in the booming town of Virginia City in Montana Territory. She heads West to work at her stepbrother’s mercantile and maybe find love one day. But, her mule train is attacked before she even gets there.

  Mountain Man Cal Ayers agrees to lead Amanda safely across the mountains. It’s not long, though, before they realize the attack was aimed at Amanda – and that living with her stepbrother might not be the safest plan.

  Amanda can’t establish a new life when someone is trying to kill her. And she can’t imagine a new life without Cal, who she’s falling for. But Cal is fighting his feelings as he is already engaged. Can Cal save Amanda’s life, and their burgeoning love, in time?

  Dedicated to my husband, Chuck

  "Everything To Me"

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek, Mining For Love

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  August 1865

  Amanda hurried toward the large spruce trees and the downed branches and bushes surrounding them at the edge of the forest. She glanced back over her shoulder. She could still see the men in camp, but they were not paying her any mind. They were packing up, though, and would soon notice her absence. She turned back and quickly climbed over a log, pulling her long skirts free from the catching brush.

  Two months on the road had led her farther and farther from civilization. She’d ventured from the cobbled streets of Lowell, Massachusetts, rumbling with the sounds of the many mills churning out goods and smoke, across the whole country, to this: Montana Territory. From her women’s boarding house with its two decent meals a day, a chamber pot, and a lovely settee in the parlor, to this: hiding in the bushes to do her business. What she wouldn’t do for an outhouse.

  On the plains, when the wagon train had still contained families and women, and, indeed, actual wagons, she’d had the privacy of a chamber pot inside the wagon. It hadn’t been terribly private, what with Geraldine on her sick bed inside, but it had been safe. Now, Amanda was the only woman member of a pack mule train, and though she could find privacy in the trees of the mountain foothills, she couldn’t help but think of the stories she’d heard about the many wild animals roaming there.

  Amanda chose a secluded spot behind the tree. She hitched her skirts up around her knees and squatted to do her business. She chose a leaf that she hoped would not cause her skin to rash.

  Finished, she shook out her skirt and scurried back to the camp. Ahead she could see the pack mules were loaded and the riding horses almost so.

  “Nearly time, Miss Amanda,” said Mr. Smith, the pack master. He was an older man, probably forty-five years in her estimation, with wiry arms and a long scraggly beard, half gray. Smith had not seen his own daughter in many years, and Amanda thought that was why the pack master had allowed a lone woman to join the group.

  She saw that he had taken her packed bag and already loaded it, along with the breakfast box of pans and dishes. She was grateful to him for taking her on, giving her a horse to ride in exchange for cooking and mending on the journey. Grateful, because she’d needed to leave the wagon train she had been on but didn’t have the money or supplies to travel on her own. So, she’d tried to earn her place.

  “Look there, Smitty,” called Scamp, the young man who worked with Mr. Smith crossing back and forth from Fort Laramie in Nebraska Territory to Virginia City in Montana Territory. They led would-be miners and all sorts of supplies in and took the failed miners—and occasionally a successful one—back to civilization and on to spend their fortunes back East.

  Amanda looked up to see Scamp, all angles and elbows, pointing past her in the direction from which she had just come. She looked over her shoulder to see a genuine Mountain Man—just as described in the penny dreadfuls she’d read—walking toward them… from the copse of trees where she had been just moments before.

  He wore a chambray shirt under a coat of tanned skins. His leather breeches were worn to a dull shine in many places. He had brown hair pulled back in a queue, brown brows, a short, scruffy beard, and weather-tanned skin with creases at his eyes. His arm was raised in greeting to the calls from Mr. Smith and Scamp, showing off the leather fringe decorating his sleeve. He wore a possibles bag off his shoulder and a rifle that looked like something Amanda’s grandfather had used.

  His erect bearing and long stride indicated a strong man.

  Amanda felt the heat rush to her cheeks. He couldn’t have seen her—could he? No, she was sure she’d have seen him. She had looked for men in the direction of camp and wild animals in the other and would surely have seen a man nearby.

  He walked toward Mr. Smith and seemed not to notice Amanda. Oh, please, she thought. And then, at the last moment, he looked at her and one corner of his mouth crooked in a hint of a smile. His eyes—blue—told her what she’d feared. Yes, he had seen her and he was laughing at her. How mortifying!

  * * *

  Even as Cal shook hands with Smitty, he could feel the heat washing off the face of the pretty young woman. She looked fit to be tied. He’d only caught a glimpse of her in the woods and turned away, but clearly, she imagined a peeping Tom following her every move. Years in the wilderness had taught him to walk as silently as he could, and he’d become even more cautious when he heard rustling ahead of him.

  He wondered why she hadn’t had her husband or father, or whoever she was traveling with, keep an eye out for her.

  “Good to see you, Smitty,” he said. “Scamp.” Cal greeted the boy, perhaps fifteen now, with a handshake and saw his narrow shoulders pull back when he realized he was being greeted as a man.

  “I was up there,” he gestured up to an overlook on the mountain, “and saw your pack line last evening. I’m surprised you made it through with such a small group though. But glad.” He only saw Smitty, Scamp, the pretty woman, and three other men. No wagons to circle, no one who looked particularly strong with guns. “Maybe you haven’t heard all the news.”

  Smitty glanced at Scamp and the girl and nodded. Cal could tell he understood the message: I saw you, and others did and will, too. It was risky enough following John Bozeman’s new trail, but with the attacks between the whites and the Blackfoot Indians up by Fort Benton, relations with the Indians were particularly difficult.

  “See anything else up there? Crow? Blackfoot?” Smitty asked as he checked the ropes tying his pack mules in a line. Cal knew the ropes were always tied right, but that’s why Smitty was good at what he did.

  “No, though I ran across some white men a couple of days ago that seemed out of place.”

  Smit
ty nodded and said nothing. There were problems with Indians who didn’t like the influx of whites that came along with the discovery of gold. And groups like this, ones that crossed Indian Territory to shorten their long journey, were taking an extra risk. But there was an equal, if usually not quite so deadly, problem with whites who gave up their dreams of mining their fortunes in Bannack or Virginia City and turned to thievery instead. These were the ones who’d come West to make their fortune, but not to earn it.

  “What brings you out this way?”

  “I was checking for signs of animals, seeing where I’d lay traps this winter. I thought I might come east a little farther than usual and find you on your way in. Some news you might like to hear.” Cal smiled. “And even a mountain man needs a little human company occasionally.”

  At that, he turned to the hovering Scamp, grabbed him in his arms, and began an awkward dance that caused a rush of red across the boy’s face and a loud laugh from Smitty.

  The pretty gal, on the other hand, was viewing him with a scrunched-up nose. She didn’t seem to approve of dancing in the warm morning sun.

  “So, what kind of news are you bringing?” asked Smitty.

  Cal stopped spinning but kept his arm around Scamp’s shoulders, amused as the kid tried to tug away. Strong and wiry, he was, but not as strong as Cal. “Some action up by Fort Benton. A new Territorial Secretary—an Irishman. That kind of news.”

  Smitty nodded. “Where’s your horse? You can ride with us and fill me in.” Smitty turned to the pretty girl, also hovering nearby. Cal thought she was hoping stillness would make him forget she was there.

  “Miss Amanda Hildreth, this here is Calvin Ayers. Let Cal help you up on Pony. Scamp, check Cotton’s pack there. You still haven’t got the hang of balancing the weight. Everyone,” his voice rose, “mount up!” Scamp spun himself out of Cal’s arm with a grin and high-tailed it over to the mule.

  Cal nodded. Smitty knew him well enough to know his horse and mule were tied up behind the trees. He didn’t like to draw attention to his animals or what they packed. He turned to Amanda. She looked him in the eye and blushed anew.

  “Smitty is letting you ride Pony? He must have a soft spot for you.”

  “He isn’t ‘letting’ me ride Pony,” she said, squaring her shoulders. “I’m earning my way and Pony is part of the deal.”

  Cal was tempted to tease her and see if her face could get any redder.

  He raised his eyebrows to her and she gasped.

  “Cooking! Mending!” she hissed.

  Smitty had mounted up and started hawing his mules.

  “No time to waste,” said Cal. He grabbed her about the waist and lifted her onto the small pinto horse. The black and white of the horse contrasted with the blond of the girl and made her stand out more than she already did, which was quite a bit in his mind. He put the reins into her hands, grabbed her feet and put them in the stirrups, and smacked the horse on the rear. Pony began walking alongside the pack mules.

  Cal turned to find himself face to face with a thin man in a cleric’s collar. The man’s voice was trailing off, “I will help…” but it was clearly too late. Cal could tell by the man’s alarmed eyes that a mountain man was both scary and worthy of disdain. Not worthy, at least, to touch the pretty blond Amanda. Cal looked him up and down.

  The man was decent but heading toward threadbare, appropriate for a small mid-west town, but not a long hard ride over the plains and mountains. His hair was a greasy yellow and Cal suspected the Yellowstone River had been too cold for this man to bathe in. He laughed to himself…it didn’t get much warmer than it was now, but it got a whole lot colder.

  Amanda was riding off and the two men were staring at each other. It felt like a pissing contest, but Cal could see Amanda wasn’t paying this man any attention, and he himself had only just been introduced, so why this man was threatened by Cal… it was absurd. Admittedly, there were few white women in the area, and virtually none unencumbered by a husband or father, which this gal seemed to be.

  And she was young and handsome, too.

  Having been alone in the forest for weeks, Cal knew how to be quiet. He simply stood and looked. The man shifted, looked away and back, shifted again. He had something to say, it seemed. Cal waited, and finally said, “You’re going to miss your train.” Though the last horse in line was a mere ten paces away, the man jumped with widened eyes. He turned to his horse, turned back to Cal, gave him his second glare of the morning, and scurried to his bow-legged steed and heaved himself up.

  With a hmmmpf, he and his horse followed on the line. Horses were herd animals and wouldn’t want to be left behind, but clearly, the skinny pastor didn’t know it.

  Cal strode back toward the trees. He’d gather his horse and mule and cut across the hill, catching up with Smitty’s group directly. As he walked through the golden grass, he caught a glimpse of a bright shine out the corner of his eye, a reflection of the sun off a gun barrel in the distance.

  Chapter 2

  “Miss Amanda! Miss Amanda!”

  Ugh, she thought. Pastor Frank was bumping along on his horse in her direction. They were all headed the same way so it would be directly toward her anyway, but she knew he was headed to her specifically. The young pastor—really, he was probably a couple of years older than her but seemed as young and annoying as some of the boys she’d grown up with—had made it his mission to save her. She wondered why he didn’t focus on Scamp, clearly growing up without the Lord… or on Richard and Dick, the twin brothers on their way to mine their fortune if they didn’t drink themselves to death first. Of course, with parents who named them such, it wasn’t a wonder they weren’t too swift themselves.

  “Miss Amanda!” Pastor Frank blew out with a breath. He seemed to get out of breath just riding slowly, which was a trick, Amanda thought. “Are you alright?”

  “Should I not be?”

  “I’m so sorry I wasn’t in time to stop that mountain man from accosting you.” He looked so concerned, so contrite.

  She’d been mortified, knowing Mr. Ayers had seen her in the trees, but the man had actually not done anything beyond express amusement at her expense. Perhaps more importantly, she disliked the pastor’s claim of protector. He had introduced her to Mr. Smith and thus enabled her to change plans after Geraldine died and Amanda’s situation had become unbearable, but she didn’t need him guarding her from a mere lift onto a horse. She had taken care of herself in Lowell, and she could do so here… mostly.

  Perhaps even more importantly, she saw that Mr. Smith liked and respected this man, despite her own impression, and that said a lot. He certainly didn’t have time for the likes of Pastor Frank. In fact, Frank had tried to follow her into the trees once, “for protection.” He had talked over her dismissal, citing bears as a danger and patting the gun that he carried so awkwardly. Finally, Smitty had barked at him.

  “Bears don’t want to meet you any more than you want to meet them. She makes a little noise and she’s fine. Leave the girl to her privacy.”

  “She’ll be dead before she’ll realize you were wrong,” said Pastor Frank. “There are bears everywhere!”

  “You’ve seen some bear scat and now you’re the expert, eh?” Luckily, a distraction arose. “Is that your horse wandering off, Pastor? Do I need to show you a proper knot again?” Frank had run off while Smitty rolled his eyes, grumbling how he’d have been better off if the preacher had gone to that other Virginia City in Nevada; Amanda had run off into the trees grateful of the privacy.

  Pastor Frank continued speaking. “I don’t want to be offensive, but these mountain men live in the woods alone—without a woman—for months at a time. The first one they see… is in danger. I don’t know how else to say that to you.”

  Amanda knew what he meant. As one of the few women traveling to Montana Territory alone, she’d encountered her share of male attention. It was why she found herself out there, instead of on the southerly wagon route as originall
y intended. But, she couldn’t feel at risk in this particular camp of men that had so far looked out for her. Nor had she felt a sense of danger from that mountain man, Calvin Ayers.

  “Please, Pastor Frank, you mustn’t imagine I was in danger being assisted onto a horse. I am fine.” She tapped her heels to Pony’s sides to encourage a brisker pace. No matter, the pastor and his bowlegged horse followed.

  She tried again. “Really, I am aware of the dangers and will be prepared when necessary. Smitty—I mean, Mr. Smith—knows his business and I am confident in his protection of our train.”

  Frank didn’t like her attempts to get away. “Really, and when you get to Virginia City? What then?”

  “I will find my brother.”

  “Miss Amanda. What if your step-brother doesn’t welcome you, or can’t?”

  She’d made the mistake of revealing to the pastor that she’d left for her new life without either invitation or even acknowledgement from her stepbrother. It had been at Fort Laramie when the pastor had been solicited to say the service for Geraldine and her stillborn twins. He’d been awkward and hesitating, explaining it was his first funeral. But he hadn’t been at all hesitant when she revealed she wanted to leave the wagon train, and the service of Geraldine’s now-widowed husband. Pastor Frank had led her straight to Mr. Smith, and his shepherding had increased from there.

  “I will find the Female Boarding House and I will find work.”

  Frank choked. He fumbled to find words and clasped his hands tightly. “I don’t think you’re that kind of woman,” he said.

  So many men were against women working or living away from their families. In Lowell, where so many women worked in the mills, it wasn’t so shocking, but even there…

  “I will.” I have done so already, she thought.

  “You wouldn’t,” he said with his hands still clasped together, though it was hard to say whether in frustration or prayer.

  “Yes,” said Amanda proudly. “I would. I will do what it takes to make my fortune and my new life out West.”