Chapter 3 - The Woman in the Red Hat
The visitor arrived before noon.
Her carriage was too elegant for the ranch road, and her red hat was too fashionable for dust.
Her name was Beatrice Whitmore.
She stepped down as if the earth itself had inconvenienced her.
Calder's expression hardened the instant he saw her.
“Ingrid,” he said, “this is Mrs. Whitmore.”
“Widow Whitmore,” Beatrice corrected.
Her eyes moved over Ingrid.
Slowly.
Politely.
Cruelly.
“So you're the bride.”
“Not yet,” Ingrid said.
Beatrice smiled.
“How interesting.”
Calder stepped between them.
“What do you want?”
“Business.”
“You don't have business here.”
“Oh, Calder. We both know that's not true.”
She handed him an envelope.
His face changed when he opened it.
Ingrid noticed.
Beatrice noticed her noticing.
“I suppose he hasn't told you.”
“Beatrice.”
The warning in Calder's voice was unmistakable.
She ignored it.
“This ranch is carrying debt.”
Ingrid looked at Calder.
“How much?”
“That is between Calder and the bank.”
Beatrice smiled.
“For now.”
Calder folded the paper.
“Leave.”
Beatrice turned toward Ingrid.
“You traveled a very long way believing you'd married a wealthy rancher, didn't you?”
“I traveled here knowing very little except what Mr. Hale told me.”
“And what did he tell you?”
“That he needed a wife.”
Beatrice's smile became almost sympathetic.
“Poor woman.”
Calder's hand tightened around the letter.
“Enough.”
Beatrice climbed into her carriage.
Before leaving, she looked directly at Ingrid.
“Ask him why he selected you.”
Then she drove away.
Ingrid waited until the carriage disappeared.
“What did she mean?”
Calder walked toward the barn.
Ingrid followed.
“Calder.”
He stopped.
It was the first time she had used his given name.
He turned.
“Why me?”
“You asked me that yesterday.”
“And you didn't answer.”
“I read your letters.”
“So did other women write?”
His silence answered.
“How many?”
“Several.”
“And you chose me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Calder looked exhausted.
“Because you were honest.”
“About what?”
“Everything.”
“That isn't an answer.”
He looked toward the hills.
“You wrote that people had judged you your entire life. You wrote that you didn't expect romance. You wanted a home where your work mattered.”
Ingrid remembered every humiliating word she'd written.
“I chose you because I thought you understood what it was to live with something you couldn't bring yourself to talk about.”
She stared at him.
“You wanted someone broken.”
“No.”
His answer was immediate.
“I wanted someone who wouldn't be frightened by broken things.”
That silenced her.
But only briefly.
“And the debt?”
Calder's jaw tightened.
“The ranch isn't lost.”
“Yet.”
“No.”
“How bad?”
“Bad enough.”
Ingrid folded her arms.
“And you thought a wife would solve it?”
“No.”
“Then what aren't you telling me?”
Calder stared at her.
For one second, Ingrid thought he might finally answer.
Instead, a horse screamed from the corral.
Both turned.
Eli came running.
“Boss!”
Smoke rose beyond the barn.
The hay shed was burning.
Men raced with buckets.
Calder ran toward the flames.
Ingrid gathered her skirts and followed.
“Stay back!” Calder shouted.
She ignored him.
Buckets moved from hand to hand.
Smoke stung her eyes.
A burning beam collapsed.
One of the ranch hands stumbled.
Ingrid seized his bucket and joined the line.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Her lungs burned.
Her dress became soaked.
Nobody laughed at her size now.
Nobody mocked her strength.
When a barrel needed moving, Ingrid pushed beside Tom.
Together they rolled it clear.
Eventually the fire died.
The hay shed was ruined.
Calder stood blackened with soot.
He looked at the wreckage.
“This wasn't an accident.”
Ingrid froze.
“How do you know?”
He bent and picked something from the dirt.
A rag.
It smelled sharply of kerosene.
Someone had deliberately set the fire.
That night Calder checked every lock twice.
Ingrid watched from the porch.
“Beatrice?”
“No.”
“You're certain?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Calder looked into the darkness.
“I have enemies.”
“You might have mentioned that before inviting a woman across the country.”
“You're right.”
Ingrid blinked.
She hadn't expected agreement.
Calder faced her.
“If you want to leave, I'll pay your fare.”
She looked at the burned shed.
Then at the house.
Then at him.
“Is that what you want?”
“No.”
The answer was barely louder than the wind.
“Then I am staying.”
Calder's eyes met hers.
Something passed between them.
Not love.
Not yet.
Trust, perhaps.
The beginning of it.
Then a gunshot exploded from the darkness.
Calder threw Ingrid to the porch floor.
A bullet buried itself in the wooden post exactly where her head had been.
And suddenly the question was no longer why Calder had chosen Ingrid.
May you like
It was who wanted her gone badly enough to kill her.
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