Lauri Robinson Read Online Free PDF

hats as she attempted to gather those near her toes. “I—I bumped the table.”
    “Here, I’ll get them. I do apologize. I just didn’t hear you with Christina Marks crying so.” Short, plump and overly efficient, the shop owner had all the hats back on their hooks in record time.
    “Why is Mrs. Marks crying?” Stacy asked, though her gut—always aware even when her mind wasn’t—already knew.
    Clicking her tongue, Helen replied, “Chester lost their farm in a poker game with that gambling man this afternoon.”
    Precisely what her gut said, and that was enough to send Stacy’s fury into full-blown rage. Chester’s big toe gambling aside, Ratcliff was hurting too many people. And messing with her plan.
    “Miss Blackwell?”
    A wave of frustration, knowing what was about to come, made Stacy shiver.
    “Do you think you could help her out? Like you helped me when my Elmer lost my shop?”
    A growl formed in her throat. She owned five Founder’s Creek businesses because men had gambled them away. She’d won the first one back and given it to the wife to manage—with the agreement that a small portion of the profits were to be paid to her—she knew people didn’t learn from their mistakes if those mistakes didn’t cost something. It had all started as a way to demonstrate she wasn’t like her family, but now it felt like a heavy burden. Correcting half the town’s foolishness took away time from her own gambling.
    “Do you, dear?” the woman repeated.
    Men. Not one of them was worth the air they breathed. Including Sheriff Jake McCrery with his you’re not a good kisser idiocy.
    Mad enough to bite through one of Ratcliff’s plugged coins, Stacy stood. Snatching the parasol still caught on the door frame, she marched out the doorway.
    As if he expected her, Winston Ratcliff stepped out of the hotel, shining a pocket watch on the lapel of his black suit coat. “Miss Blackwell.”
    There wasn’t an ounce of pleasantry left inside her. Never without funds, Stacy dug in the tiny pocket sewn into the seam of her skirt. “One coin flip. The Marks farm against my house.”
    The man had the gall to question her. “Your house?”
    “Yes,” she growled, not giving a rat’s tooth if she lost the big house on the edge of town or not. “Heads or tails?”
    “I’ll flip, you call,” he answered, pulling out his own coin.
    “I won’t be taken with one of your plugged quarters.” She tossed his in the street and slapped her gold piece in his hand. “Flip.”
    He tossed the coin in the air, and a brief bout of panic seized her vocal cords. Burying the fear amongst a thick coat of anger, she snapped “Heads” moments before the coin bounced off the boardwalk.
    Balanced on its side, the coin spun for several feet, and her interest dulled with each revolution. Oh, there was some, because she loved to gamble, but in all actuality, the sour taste in her mouth told her she didn’t love it as much as she used to.
    Ratcliff stopped the spinning coin with one boot. “You’re sure about this?”
    “Yes,” she answered as an odd coldness settled in her stomach.
    When he lifted his toe, the sigh that left her chest made her wonder if she’d hoped for a different outcome. Chin up, she held out her hand, and when Ratcliff set the coin in her palm, she said, “The promissory note.”
    He dug in his pocket, handed her a piece of paper. Without even checking that it held Chester Marks’s signature, she turned and marched toward the hat shop.
    Pappy better hurry up. At this rate she’d own the entire Dakota Territory by the time he arrived. A place she couldn’t wait to leave.

Chapter Five
    “Why aren’t you playing checkers?”
    Herman shrugged. “Don’t feel up to it.”
    With his elbows on his checkerboard and his chin in his palms, the old man looked as browbeaten as a homesick dog. Nine-tenths of the population of Founder’s Creek looked about the same. Jake could relate, He didn’t have the same