Davis vanished before sunrise.
Cora woke to find his blanket empty.
The door stood partly open.
Cold air poured inside.
"Elias!"
He dropped from the loft.
They searched outside.
Tracks led toward the road.
Two sets of horse prints waited beneath the trees.
Davis had not left voluntarily.
Elias examined the ground.
"Struggle."
Cora saw a dark spot in the snow.
Blood.
Her stomach turned.
"Pike took him."
"Probably."
"We need the magistrate."
Elias shook his head.
"By the time Vance does anything, Davis could be dead."
"You cannot go storming into Pike's mill."
"I'm not."
Cora stared.
"Then what?"
Elias looked toward the valley.
"We're going to make sure half the town comes with us."
Within three hours they reached Oak Haven.
Cora entered the mercantile first.
Martha Hale was there.
So was the shopkeeper.
Within minutes, word spread.
Davis had disappeared.
There had been blood outside Boone's cabin.
Pike had motive to silence him.
Elias stood in the street while people gathered.
Nobody mocked him now.
Magistrate Vance arrived furious.
"You have no proof Pike took anyone."
Cora held up a torn piece of cloth.
"This was caught on our fence."
It had come from Davis's coat.
Vance examined it.
"Still not proof."
Elias stepped forward.
Vance recoiled slightly.
Elias noticed.
His expression changed.
He deliberately took one step backward.
"I am not asking you to arrest Pike without evidence."
Vance looked surprised.
"I'm asking you to search the mill for a missing man."
That was harder to dismiss.
Especially with twenty townspeople listening.
Vance organized a group.
Elias insisted Cora remain in town.
Cora refused.
Their argument lasted thirty seconds.
She won.
"You are impossible," Elias muttered.
"You advertised for sturdy."
"One day I'm burning that advertisement."
"You'll have to find it first."
Despite everything, he smiled.
The group reached Pike's mill shortly before noon.
The saws were silent.
Workers stood outside.
Harlan Pike appeared on the office porch.
"What's this?"
Vance stepped forward.
"Davis is missing."
Pike's face remained calm.
"And?"
"He was last seen near Boone's property."
"What does that have to do with me?"
Cora watched his hands.
One was tightly clenched.
"You employ Silas Trent," she said.
Pike looked at her.
"Unfortunately."
Several workers exchanged glances.
Cora noticed.
"Where is Trent?"
Nobody answered.
Pike smiled.
"Mrs. Boone, perhaps you should return to your kitchen."
Elias moved.
Cora caught his sleeve.
He stopped.
Then something remarkable happened.
Elias smiled.
Not pleasantly.
"Pike."
Harlan looked at him.
"You still think insulting my wife makes me easier to control."
The smile left Pike's face.
"You're not as smart as she is."
Murmurs moved through the workers.
Elias continued.
"But I'm smart enough to learn."
Cora felt a surge of pride.
Vance demanded permission to search.
Pike refused.
Then Martha Hale's husband stepped forward.
His name was Jacob.
His face was white.
"Search the old drying shed."
Pike spun around.
"Go back to work."
Jacob didn't move.
Vance looked at him.
"Why?"
Jacob swallowed.
"Trent took somebody there before dawn."
Everything erupted at once.
Vance drew his revolver.
Workers shouted.
Pike bolted toward the office.
Elias chased him.
Cora screamed his name.
But Elias wasn't attacking.
He was trying to stop Pike from reaching the desk.
A gunshot exploded.
Wood splintered beside Elias's head.
Pike fired again.
Elias dove behind stacked lumber.
Vance shouted.
"Drop the weapon!"
Pike ran through the rear door.
Elias followed.
Cora wanted to chase him.
Instead she went with the men searching the drying shed.
They found Davis bound to a chair.
Alive.
Blood covered one side of his face.
Cora rushed toward him.
"Davis!"
He opened one eye.
"Knew you'd come."
"You're an idiot."
"Probably."
They cut him loose.
Outside, gunfire echoed from the woods.
Cora's heart stopped.
"Elias."
She ran.
Behind her, Vance shouted.
She ignored him.
Tracks crossed the snow toward the river.
Cora followed.
Branches tore at her shawl.
Her breath became ragged.
Then she heard voices.
"You ruined everything!"
Pike.
Cora slowed.
Through the trees, she saw them.
Pike stood near the edge of the frozen river.
His revolver was aimed at Elias.
Elias's rifle lay in the snow several feet away.
Blood darkened his shoulder.
Cora covered her mouth.
He had been shot.
Pike laughed.
"All I needed was for you to act like the animal everybody knows you are."
Elias stood still.
"Sorry to disappoint you."
"You think that woman changed you?"
"No."
Pike's expression twisted.
Elias continued.
"She reminded me I could change myself."
Pike raised the revolver.
Cora looked around.
No weapon.
Nothing.
Then she saw a fallen branch.
She picked it up.
Pike heard the movement.
He turned.
"Cora!"
Elias moved instantly.
He struck Pike's gun arm.
The revolver fired.
The bullet disappeared into the trees.
Both men crashed into the snow.
Pike hit Elias's wounded shoulder.
Elias roared.
For one second, Cora saw the mountain devil.
Elias rolled on top.
His fist rose.
Pike laughed through blood.
"Do it."
Elias froze.
"Do it!" Pike shouted. "Show her what you are!"
Cora stopped several yards away.
She knew what Pike wanted.
Everyone did.
Elias's fist trembled.
All the humiliation.
All the destruction.
The bullets.
The stable.
Davis.
The threat against Cora.
Years of anger seemed concentrated inside that raised hand.
Pike grinned.
Then Elias slowly lowered it.
"No."
The word was quiet.
Pike's smile vanished.
Elias stood.
"You don't get to decide what I am."
Magistrate Vance and several workers arrived seconds later.
They arrested Pike.
Silas Trent was found hiding in a storage loft.
Davis testified.
So did Jacob Hale.
The mercantile owner produced records proving Pike purchased the kerosene.
A search of Pike's office uncovered the original assay report and letters discussing plans to acquire Elias's ridge before publicly announcing the silver discovery.
More damaging still, investigators found notes outlining efforts to provoke Elias into violence.
The plan was breathtakingly simple.
Create trouble.
Trigger the mountain devil.
Have him jailed.
Challenge ownership of the property while he was unable to defend it.
It might have worked.
Had Cora never arrived.
The newspapers loved the story.
But Cora hated the headline.
MOUNTAIN DEVIL CLEARED IN LAND CONSPIRACY
She threw the paper onto the table.
Elias looked up.
"What's wrong?"
"They still call you that."
"Always have."
"They shouldn't."
He shrugged.
"I don't care."
"I do."
Elias smiled.
"You care about everything."
"Someone has to."
His shoulder was healing.
The bullet had passed through muscle without striking bone.
Cora changed the bandage every morning.
He complained every morning.
She ignored him every morning.
Pike's trial took place in late spring.
He was convicted of arson, conspiracy, kidnapping and attempted murder.
Trent accepted a lesser sentence in exchange for testimony.
Davis received leniency after cooperating.
The silver claim belonged to Elias.
Legally.
Completely.
When the ruling came, people congratulated him.
Elias looked miserable.
Cora laughed.
"You won."
"Too many people."
"You hate being congratulated?"
"I hate rooms."
She took his hand.
"Then let's go home."
Outside the courthouse, Davis waited.
Cora almost didn't recognize him.
He had lost weight.
The arrogance was gone.
"Mrs. Boone."
"Davis."
He removed his hat.
"I owe you an apology."
"For which part?"
He winced.
"The depot."
"That's a start."
"I was cruel."
"Yes."
"I thought making someone else smaller made people notice me less."
Cora studied him.
"Did it work?"
"No."
She nodded.
"Good lesson."
He hesitated.
"Can you forgive me?"
Cora thought about the humiliation.
Then about the frightened man who had come to their cabin.
"I already gave you a second chance."
Davis smiled faintly.
"Doesn't mean you have to like me."
"I don't."
Elias laughed.
Even Davis smiled.
They returned to the ridge.
Spring transformed the mountain.
Snow melted into silver streams.
Wildflowers appeared along the lower slopes.
The black skeleton of the stable remained.
One morning Cora found Elias studying it.
"Ready?"
"For what?"
"To rebuild."
He had already stacked lumber nearby.
Cora smiled.
"Bigger?"
"Apparently my wife insists."
"She sounds intelligent."
"Terrifying."
They rebuilt.
Not alone.
Jacob Hale came.
Then two mill workers.
Then the shopkeeper.
Even Davis arrived carrying tools.
By sunset, the new frame stood taller than the old one.
Cora served stew and bread to everyone.
She looked around the crowded yard in amazement.
When she arrived in Oak Haven, strangers had laughed at her.
Now those same mountains echoed with voices of people helping build her home.
Elias came beside her.
"Tired?"
"Very."
"Happy?"
Cora looked at him.
"Very."
His arm moved around her waist.
Once she would have worried whether he could reach far enough.
Whether her body embarrassed him.
Whether someone was watching.
Now she leaned against him.
"The silver," she said.
"What about it?"
"What will you do?"
"Nothing yet."
"Nothing?"
"Don't need it."
Cora laughed.
"You may be the only man in Wyoming who discovers silver and complains about the inconvenience."
"I like trapping."
"You complain about that too."
"I like complaining."
"I noticed."
He kissed her temple.
Then became serious.
"Cora."
"Hmm?"
"There's something I want."
She looked up.
His pale eyes held hers.
"A family."
Cora stopped breathing.
Elias hurried.
"Doesn't have to mean children. Doesn't have to mean anything you don't want. I just—"
She kissed him.
When she pulled away, he looked stunned.
"Was that yes?"
"That was stop talking."
"Good."
She smiled.
"You really are terrible with women."
"Only one matters."
The words struck her heart.
Cora looked at the new stable.
At the mountains.
At the cabin.
At the man everyone had told her to fear.
For the first time, she could imagine years ahead.
Not surviving.
Living.
Yet one shadow remained.
The mountain had changed Elias.
But there was still one place on the ridge he never visited.
His mother's grave.
And when Cora finally asked why, she discovered the last wound Elias Boone had never allowed to heal.