Chapter 3

It took Seb a few more months until July to get his head out of the clouds from the happy event and the busy aftermath.

July and the constant sound of babies crying.

Then he started wanting to get away again.

The snow had receded enough that he thought he could get his horse through the canyon's entrance. The days were hot, the sun stayed up for long hours, and still the pass had a pile of snow.

But much less formidable. He figured he could make it.

Everyone, and that meant literally everyone, was exhausted from tending the newborn babies. Seb had taken his turns, right along with the Collins brothers. He wasn't much with babies, but Oscar was a good hand and showed him the way of it.

Oscar would go early every morning to make breakfast for all those in the household. As he walked over, they heard the crying. None of the folks in the cabin were getting much sleep, not with two hungry, growing babies around—Jake Jr., who they called Jacob, and Marie, which was Eugenia's middle name. The cabin was small enough that no one could escape the crying.

Oscar would feed them all. Then, with Ginny's help, he'd bring Jacob and Marie to the cave. He and Joseph had built cradles for the babies, a pair of them for the cave and a pair for the house. But the twins rarely slept; they cried instead. One or the other, or often both at a time. The babies would be walked and bounced, talked to and cajoled. If a person did that really well and never stopped, sometimes the crying would fall silent for a bit.

Heaven help the person if they tried to sit down.

After the babies were brought to the cave house, Ginny went back to her cabin while Oscar, Joseph, and Seb would care for the twins most of the morning while the folks in the house slept. There was a midmorning break to feed the little tykes, and then one at a time was taken to the cabin. They were bald and cross-eyed and so cute, Seb couldn't look at either of them without smiling.

When one twin came back, the other went over, until finally they had them both back in the cave house, which meant more sleep for the cabin. Oscar and Joseph would feed everyone a noon meal. By that time, Jake and sometimes Kat would emerge, groggy but rested enough to get by for another day. Seb had seen Beth briefly when he got to carry a baby over to her. But only for a brief moment since the day the babies were born.

This had gone on for nearly two months. Then last night, wonder of wonders, one of the little ones had slept through the night.

Beth had to get up with the other baby only once.

Seb saw the light at the end of the tunnel. An exhausting, noisy tunnel.

Now he had time to check the canyon entrance, and sure enough the snow had shrunk and hardened enough that he was going to be able to ride right over it. He'd need a horse to get to the train, so he'd approached Oscar and offered to buy one of his. Oscar seemed to think there'd be no problem. Except the problem of Seb saying the wrong thing to someone outside the canyon about where they all were.

Kat drew his attention as she walked up the sloping sides of the canyon to stand beside him.

"Is it wrong to go?" She sounded urgent. "I don't think they need my help. But when the babies are awake at night, we're all awake. Still, either Ginny or Jake walks with the one Beth isn't feeding. Sometimes I help—I'm always willing and wide awake—but mostly we're a pair of hands too many."

Seb looked at those blue eyes of hers, thinking about how they'd shone when she'd held little Marie in her arms for the first time. How more and more he'd been thinking about having those eyes fixed on him.

"Have you thought more about marrying me, Kat? I think we'd make a likely pair. We can go wrestle your money from your uncle, or we can just slip away, find a place for my work, and leave all of that behind. As my wife, he can't touch you. And if you've got ownership of something, with me beside you, we can take control of it."

Kat began shaking her head before he'd finished talking.

"Is that a no to the proposal or a no to taking a fight straight to your uncle?"

"It's about the uncle." A smile crept over Kat's face.

Seb's heart sped up. He wanted that smile for himself. He wanted to see how it tasted.

The snow had receded enough for him to draw Kat into the entrance, out of sight of the cabin. He drew her in right close to himself and kissed her. It was nice. More than nice.

With her arms around his neck, she whispered, "I-I'd like to marry you, Sebastian. Leaving here, well, I have just got to get out. I'm not sure anymore why except I can't draw in a deep breath when the entrance is snowed in. But leaving and striking out in the world on my own feels terrifying. I can't stay, and I'm afraid to leave." She glanced at his lips. "Those seem like very selfish reasons to force a man to chain himself to me for life."

"I'm doing the same thing. A man striking out on his own isn't so dangerous as a woman maybe, but I'm dreading it. I've spent most of my life alone. I was a straggler child in my family, and my older sisters and brothers, five in all, were grown and moved away from Independence almost from my first memory. Three of them, both sisters and one brother, married before I was born, and one at a time they headed west on the Oregon Trail. We never heard from them again. Ma always said the West swallowed them up.

"The two brothers closest to me in age, but still twelve and fifteen years older, are the only ones I ever met. They fought in the Civil War for the South, which Pa and Ma didn't approve of. They both died in battle. I lived a quiet life with my aging parents in a modest home. Lots of books. My father was a schoolmaster in Independence and encouraged my inventions. I had four patents by the time I got done with high school. Then I got five more during college in St. Louis. Ma died while I was away. After college I moved back to Independence and spent my pa's last years caring for him and inventing."

Frowning, he said, "I need to find a way to get the money that is no doubt sitting in my bank account in Independence from those patents." He shook the distracting thought aside and continued, "After my folks died, I stayed at their house alone. I never had much of a family besides those two. I've enjoyed being part of this Rutledge-Collins clan for the last year. I don't relish being on my own again. Having you along sounds good except I might face danger, and you'll be chained to me for life. There are men who want my inventions—the same ones who shot me in Independence, and others. I need to be careful, discreet, set up a lab and work. We can get my money wired to a bank near where we settle, but will there be men who can find out where I am through that?"

Kat shook her head. Though she looked concerned, she was still standing with her arms around his neck.

"What if we get married, then hop on the train and head east?"

Kat gasped. "Not Chicago."

"No, not that far. I was thinking maybe Cheyenne, Wyoming. It's along the train route, big enough for me to get the materials I need. We could homestead around there, out of town far enough that we can see trouble coming. In the city, trouble can sneak up on you."

"Can we build a cabin?"

"Oscar made us help build the barn, but I'm not sure if I can build a cabin by myself."

Kat remembered how Oscar had always pushed them to learn. He left a lot to each of them to handle on their own. He was a wise man and a good leader. "I think I could build one maybe, but I'd need help with heavy things—although Oscar showed me how to use the horse to move logs, use pulleys and such. And you want to invent, not build."

They stared at each other.

Sebastian nodded. "We'll figure it out. Laramie is closer, but Cheyenne is the territorial capital so it might have better law and order. If we moved to a big city like San Francisco, the men searching for me might be better able to find me. Anyway, I'd like to stay close enough we could come here and visit the twins once in a while."

Kat smiled. "Jake said it took five days to ride here in the wagons from where we turned off the Oregon Trail. But it's only a day's horseback ride to the nearest train station. It wouldn't be a hardship to come visit."

"With the train we can reach most anywhere in a day or two. In a week we could be in New York City if you wanted that."

Nodding silently for too long, Kat said, "I am a wealthy woman, and yet I have access to nothing. So that's what I bring to this marriage. But you're saving me because to be married puts me out of the reach of my uncle. At least to the extent he obeys the law."

"You're bringing something." Sebastian met her gaze, then leaned closer.

Kat touched his chest to stop him. A few things needed to be said. "We'll get married in the first town we reach, ride the train to Cheyenne, homestead some land, build a house, get a milk cow and some chickens, plant a garden. I'll keep you fed while you invent. You're right—I am bringing something. And you're right—we will figure it out. I wish now I hadn't kept my past such a secret all through the winter. Ginny felt she had no choice but to admit what had brought her here. She said what I'd been through was my story to tell, and she wouldn't speak of it unless I did. It was easy to keep quiet about such a humiliating experience."

"But now," Sebastian said, as if he understood exactly what she was trying to say, "here we are. More strangers than we should be after a year's acquaintance. Getting married is, I think, a good idea. I can promise to treat you with respect and be faithful to you. Even so, let's take our time getting to know each other better before we ... well, before we are fully married."

Kat felt a lot of the tension ease from her heart. This was what she wanted to say and didn't do well. "I like that idea, Sebastian." She stopped holding him away from her and leaned toward him to meet his lips with hers. To seal their promises with a kiss.

One of the babies started crying in the cabin. Even across the valley they heard it. Then the second one joined in, a little chorus of bawling.

Kat flinched. The kiss ended. Their eyes met, and they laughed.