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little better. She could move her jaw without pain and her teeth didn’t appear to be loose.
    Going back up to the tents she put on a pot of coffee and made some cornmeal mush for breakfast. She wouldn’t have eaten at all but knew she needed to if she was going to get in a full day panning. There was the gold that Billy took to replace, after all. She had to keep a little hidden where he could find it or he’d get suspicious. Luckily for her, he didn’t stick around to see just how much she got out of the creek bed every day. She’d bide her time. She could withstand anything for the freedom she saw down the road. There was light at the end of her tunnel and she was closer to it than ever.

CHAPTER 3

    Jake hadn’t slept a wink, even after he heard Billy go past on his way to Deadwood, to get drunk. He couldn’t help but worry about Becky. Had Billy left her alone after he’d left them? Or had he taken out his anger at Jake on Becky?
    Learning to control his temper was a constant struggle for Jake. Growing up mostly alone and angry at his brothers for leaving him behind when they joined the army, hadn’t helped. He was too young, they said. Someone needs to help Mom and Dad, they said. He knew it was true, but that didn’t keep him from being angry at the situation.
    But he thought he’d gotten it under control until last night. He’d been right to defend Becky, but he probably could have done it without violence. Except, people like Billy didn’t seem to understand anything but violence. He didn’t believe he’d have Billy’s attention if he hadn’t laid him out by the campfire.
    Unable to stop worrying, he threw down his gold pan by his tent and went to check on Becky. His imagination gave him fits with all sorts of bad scenarios. He walked upstream to her claim. She was standing with her back to him in knee high water, panning the soil from the river bottom for nuggets and flakes of gold. He watched her as he approached. She concentrated on her pan as she walked to the bank, set the pan down, and then turned toward him, gun drawn. When she saw who it was, she holstered the weapon.
    “That’s a good way to get shot,” she admonished him.
    He ignored her scolding. He grabbed her by the shoulders and stared at her face. “I’m going to kill the son of a bitch.”
    He saw the moment she realized what he’d said and why. Her hand flew to her cheek and she turned away from him.
    “It’s nothing.”
    He turned her back to face him. “Nothing! Your jaw is swollen, black and blue and your lip is split. That didn’t happen from the slap I saw him give you last night. He beat you after I left.”
    “Leave it be, Jake.”
    “No. This can’t be allowed to continue. I’ll teach the son of a bitch about beating up women.”
    “And then what?” She put her hands on her hips and shouted at him, “You can’t protect me all the time.”
    “The hell I can’t,” he threw back at her.
    “You can’t. There’s plenty of times Billy and I are alone.”
    “The hell I can’t,” he repeated. “I’m moving my things here. You’re not going to be alone with that bastard anymore.”
    “I don’t need your protection from Billy. I told you, he was just testy last night.”
    He wasn’t going to win this and she was right, he really didn’t know what he was doing. He didn’t know her or her situation. Last night might have been the exception rather than the rule, but that still didn’t make it acceptable. He barely knew her and was making noises like she belonged to him. High handed or not, he wasn’t going to let what happened to Elizabeth happen to Becky. Another woman would not die because of him.
    “Will you at least let me—”
    “Let you what? Take over my life. A life you know nothing about. You don’t know me at all. We just met for gosh sakes.” She turned her back to him and picked up her pan, sifting her fingers through the sludge at the bottom, pulling out a couple of tiny nuggets that