Wanted: Young, skinny, wiry fellows. Not over eighteen. Must be expert riders. Willing to face death daily. Orphans preferred.
With the death of her Aunt Hilda, Samantha Hughes is desperate to find a way to escape her Uncle Jack. The wanted poster for Pony Express riders just may be her way to freedom—death would be preferable to what Uncle Jack has planned for her! But can she pose as a man long enough to reach her eighteenth birthday a few months away?
Valerian Fitzpatrick is ready to be his own man—as a Pony Express rider! The weight of responsibility in the family business is not for him—a Pony Express rider will give him the freedom he craves. When he befriends fellow employee “Sam” Hughes, he figures out her secret, and friendship quickly turns to much more between them.
With Samantha still in terrible danger from her uncle, Val vows to protect her. But Samantha is determined to keep Val safe as well, and she’s on the run again. Can Val find her before it’s too late? And once he does, will he give up his life of freedom for the sake of Samantha’s love?
EXCERPT
The ceremony at the cemetery
was hardly long enough to be called a service. The minister quoted a Bible
passage and said some nice things about her aunt, but her casket was lowered
into the ground within a matter of minutes. Samantha hesitated at the gravesite,
tossing a handful of earth on the crude casket as the graveyard worker pierced
the mound of dirt beside the site with his shovel, and began filling the hole
he had created the previous evening The scraping of a shovel in the dirt and
the scent of freshly turned earth would forever remind her of Aunt Hilda.
Jack wasted no time at the
gravesite and hurried to the tavern with his pouch of coins.
Samantha took the letter
containing Aunt Hilda’s dying words to the post office. She would accomplish
this final act for her aunt, however futile it may be, since she fully expected
her aunt and her grandmother to meet at heaven’s door at the same time. And
then she’d be off, leaving this small town, and Uncle Jack, behind. But she
still didn’t have a clue where she might head, with little money and no means
of transportation.
A sign at the post office
caught Samantha’s eye. She feigned disinterest as she snuck sidelong glances at
the poster about the new Pony Express, reading one line at a time.
Wanted:
Young, skinny, wiry fellows.
She tore her glance from the
sign and studied the customers queued up in front of her.
Another quick look.
Not
over eighteen.
She posted her letter and
turned away from the window, catching the last of the poster’s message.
Must
be expert riders. Willing to face death daily. Orphans preferred.
