PART 2: THE SECRET SHE HAD TRIED TO BURY
When Cora awoke, Harlan was sitting beside her bed with a cup of warm broth.

“Where am I?” she asked.

“My cabin. You’re safe.”

She began crying. “You shouldn’t have brought me here. Arthur will come looking for me.”

Harlan leaned forward.

“Who is Arthur?”

Cora hesitated before revealing that Arthur Whitmore was the man who had arranged her journey from Chicago. He had promised to deliver her safely to her future husband, but after receiving Harlan’s money, he demanded another payment.

When she refused, Arthur stole her remaining savings and accused her of being dishonest. During the journey, he struck her repeatedly and eventually abandoned her near the relay station.

But there was something worse.

Cora reached beneath her pillow and pulled out a small, bloodstained envelope.

“Your marriage agency never told you the truth,” she whispered.

Inside were letters bearing the agency’s seal. Harlan read them twice, his expression growing darker with every sentence.

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Arthur had been intercepting correspondence between Harlan and Cora. He had deliberately delayed her arrival, hoping to convince Harlan that she had disappeared. Meanwhile, he had been using the agency to collect money from lonely ranchers and selling false promises to desperate women.

Then Harlan noticed one final letter.

It contained Cora’s original marriage contract, but beneath her signature was another man’s name.

Arthur Whitmore had already arranged to sell her marriage agreement to someone else.

Cora began trembling.

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“He said if I survived, he’d come back and finish what he started.”

Harlan folded the letter carefully.

“Then he’ll have to come through me.”

Three days later, while the storm still covered the mountain, three riders appeared outside the cabin.

Cora recognized the man leading them.

Arthur.

He dismounted, smiled at Harlan, and demanded that Cora be handed over because she supposedly belonged to him.

But Harlan stepped onto the porch, holding the original contract and the letters.

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“You made one mistake, Arthur,” he said quietly. “You left evidence behind.”

Arthur’s smile disappeared.

And when the second rider removed his scarf, Cora recognized him too.

He was the stage driver who had claimed she was abandoned.

The two men had been working together all along.

Harlan reached for the rifle beside the door.

This time, Cora was no longer alone.

And the truth about to emerge would reveal that her journey to Idaho had never been an accident.