“Give Me The FAT One!” Mountain Man SAID After Being Offered 10 Mail-Order Brides

Chapter 2

I was standing in that crowd. I saw Jeremiah Stone take that woman away, and I’ve held my tongue about what I know for too long. But reading this story, I can’t stay silent anymore.

Jeremiah Stone wasn’t always a beast. Most of you don’t remember him before Thunder Peak, but I do. I grew up in these parts. I remember when Jeremiah was just a quiet young man who traded furs in town twice a year and never raised his voice to anyone.

He had a wife, Mary. She was tiny—barely five feet—with wild red hair and a laugh that could fill a canyon. He built that cabin for her, every log by hand, because she wanted to live close to the sky. He carved her a wooden comb once, spent months on it, etching tiny wildflowers into the spine. She wore it in her hair every single day, even when she was just mending clothes by the fire. He was *gentle* with her in a way that made the other women envious and the men uncomfortable.

Mary died in childbed four winters ago. The baby, Thomas, died with her. Jeremiah found them when he came back from hunting. They say he sat in that cabin with their bodies for three days before anyone thought to check on him. He buried them himself, up on the ridge where the wildflowers bloom in spring. And he didn’t speak a word to anyone for a year after.

That’s the part this story gets right—the grief.

But here’s what none of you know:

My husband works at Crawford’s Mercantile. He overheard Crawford talking to Weatherbe before the bride auction. They *planned* this. All of it. Weatherbe brought ten brides because he knew Jeremiah would come to town for supplies that day. They wanted to see *which* woman he’d choose. They wanted to test him.

Because Crawford knows about the silver.

There’s a vein up there, rich beyond anything this territory has seen. Jeremiah found it years ago, before Mary died. He never worked it. Never told a soul. But gold and silver have a way of leaking secrets, and Crawford’s been piecing it together from old prospectors’ stories and a map he bought for three dollars and a bottle of whiskey.

Now he has a plan. He’s gathering men. He’s got papers from Weatherbe claiming Dileia’s still property of the bride company—legal papers, with a judge’s stamp. He’s going to ride up to Thunder Peak and “rescue” her, and when he does, he’ll take everything Jeremiah has.

The mountain man doesn’t know what’s coming.

And God help that poor woman if Crawford gets his hands on her first.