The Wildflowers at the Edge of the World Read online

  Sophia blinked, not understanding. “Umm…nice watch?”

  “Open it.”

  She reached out to touch the cold metal. The ornate bezel bore an engraved fleur-de-lis.

  This is probably worth more than I am.

  The watch felt heavier than it looked, but when she clicked open the case, thoughts of its value fled. Tucked inside the bezel’s frame was a printed sketch of a woman’s face. Though much smaller than her postcard, the likeness was nearly identical.

  Sophia drew an astonished breath. “Blessed Margaret of Castello.”

  He nodded. “Like you, I’m not religious. Quite the opposite, in fact. Yet I’ve considered Margaret my talisman for many years, for precisely the same reasons you do. I was a lost soul, once, too. One of the abandoned.” In the deepening twilight, his eyes glimmered with curious wonder. “What, do you suppose, are the chances of you and I meeting like this?”

  Slim, indeed, but Sophia’s surprise at seeing another Blessed Margaret gave way to wariness. The way the stranger had lingered over the words “you and I” echoed in the chill air.

  “I could offer you shelter for the night,” he said, eyeing her. “I ask nothing in return. I have—”

  “It’s getting late.” Sophia snapped the pocket watch shut. Once, she would’ve been drawn in by the mystery of an angel who hid kindness and compassion beneath an aloof exterior. Once, she would’ve ached to know how his story matched hers. But no longer. “I can find that hotel on my own.”

  “My quarters are close by. You needn’t brave the cold tonight. Allow me to buy you dinner, at the very least.”

  Tempted by the offer of warmth and food, she wavered. The moment stretched out, unfurling like a question awaiting an answer.

  As night stole across the sky, Sophia watched her future fracture into two diverging paths. On one hand, she could go with him, and begin again the endless cycle of allowing herself to hope. To care. She could open herself up and pour herself out and bleed for it afterward.

  Or she could retreat, into the cold, armored with her new mission.

  The stranger stepped in. “I’d be—”

  “I’m here for gold.” She tossed the priceless pocket watch into the dirt at his feet, though he didn’t spare it a glance. “Not to make friends.”

  Before he could reply, she spun and marched away. She’d made her choice, back in San Francisco. She would cloak herself in ice and distance and make enough money that she’d never need anyone else again.

  As the night’s chill welcomed her with a sigh of recognition, Sophia folded her postcard of Blessed Margaret and tore it into pieces. When she opened her fist, the bits lifted on the frigid breeze and melted into the darkness like snowflakes.

  The hole in her chest remained silent.

  “You might reconsider,” the stranger called after her. “The nights here are terribly cold, and you’ll find Caribou Crossing’s welcome colder still.”

  She tossed a few clipped words over her shoulder. “I’ll take my chances.”

  To her deep satisfaction, she didn’t have the urge to look back. Instead, she set her sights forward, on the cold unknown.

  3. Sophia.

  In the muddy mire of the more salacious end of Caribou Crossing, Sophia hurried through the freezing night. The chill kept her moving, even as it sharpened the hollow stab in her stomach. Already, she’d tried the saloons and dancehalls, but the barmen had looked askance when she’d asked what she could buy for five cents. One had even laughed in her face before ushering her out the door.

  In Caribou Crossing, a nickel got you nowhere, it seemed.

  She pulled her coat tighter, refusing to dwell on the angel-stranger or the undoubted warmth of his accommodations. In the end, despite his claim, he probably would’ve wanted something, anyway.

  She’d made the right choice, despite the way her fingertips tingled from the cold.

  As she neared the river, the saloons grew louder and the passersby rougher. Even at this lonely hour, men huddled along the shore, drinking and throwing dice. With their muddy lean-tos and muddier clothes, they made a motley lot—too broke to mine, too broke to go home.

  A burly fellow with a thick red beard winked as she passed. “How much for a poke, there, lass?”

  Revolted, Sophia shrugged off his thick Scottish brogue and reversed direction, exhaling into her hands for warmth. Turning a corner, she found herself in a wide street lined with more saloons. Drunken miners stumbled through open doors, while the gauzy silk curtains in every window glowed red. Between the ruby light and exuberant men, Sophia could guess exactly which district she’d wandered into.

  “How much, lass?”

  Whirling, she found the Scotsman looming. He’d followed her. She turned away again, rushing down the red-lit street.

  Behind her, heavy boots thumped on the boardwalk, spurring her faster. The Scot made no effort to conceal his pursuit, but though she was clearly fleeing, no one paid any mind.

  Help would not be forthcoming.

  Icy dread, colder than the surrounding night, closed around her as she ducked into a narrow alley between two saloons. She fumbled with her rucksack, her fingers stiff as she grappled for her revolvers.

  The darkness expanded, the Scot’s massive body blocking the alley’s mouth. In the muted red glow, he looked a rough sort, with heavy brows and fingers like swollen sausages. Dirt caked him from head to toe.

  “Get away from me,” she growled, scrabbling with the rucksack’s drawstring. Why had she tied it shut?

  He laughed, loud and unfeeling. “Tell me, what’s a pretty wee thing like you doing in a rotten place like this?”

  Sophia backed away, retreating into the shadows. Finally, the rucksack surrendered. She thrust both hands in, rejoicing at the frosty burn of cold metal. As she straightened, the bag fell at her feet.

  With her Colt revolvers held tight, fear ebbed from her veins. In its place, a strange and tenuous courage stirred. The bite of the frigid gun grips anchored her while the empty abyss in her chest offered a silent, wintry strength.

  “Piss off,” she said, her tone arctic.

  The Scot paused.

  Ensconced in shadows, Sophia smiled. She might look harmless, but the helpless girl who’d let people hurt her was gone. In her stead stood a gunslinger, a woman of frigid mettle—an acrobat who trusted her own strength and agility and who allowed no one to stand in her way.

  She lunged, knocking the Scot off balance. He crashed against the clapboard and stared down at the gun barrels pressed into his belly.

  “I told you,” she said evenly, “to get away from me. Are your ears broken?”

  Whiskey-laced breath blasted her face. “I’m just after a poke, ye ken? That’s all.”

  “How about this?” She dug the Colts deeper. “Is this the kind of poke you wanted?”

  His lips clamped shut as he lifted his hands in surrender.

  Sophia slid a barrel up between his eyes. Whatever the Scot saw in her expression sent the blood draining from his face.

  She cocked a hammer. “If you ever corner me, or any other woman in this town, again, I’ll make sure you regret it. Now, if you aren’t gone in three seconds, I shoot.”

  “But—”

  “One.”

  He didn’t wait to hear more. Frantic steps receded down the alley. He disappeared into the ruddy glow of the street beyond.

  Sophia lowered her guns, marveling at the steel calm that embraced her. She’d never threatened anyone before, had never even considered it. She’d only ever used her guns for showmanship in the ring. But the elation of defending herself buzzed through her veins, an intoxicating elixir, and she found she wanted…more.

  “What terrific entertainment,” came a low voice from the shadows.

  Sophia whirled to find a figure emerging from the darkness. A tall woman with elegantly coiffed curls and penetrating green eyes stepped into the pool of ruby light. Wry amusement, or maybe the subtle artistry of her cosm
etics, obscured her age. She might have been thirty or fifty—impossible to say.

  “I’m only halfway glad you saved me the trouble of shooting him.” The woman stashed a small pistol in the pocket of her expensive dress. “I don’t take too kindly to men threatening ladies.”

  “Who’re you?” Immediately, Sophia wished she’d chosen friendlier words. This woman had everything she wanted—money practically dripped from her skin. Luxury sighed in the rustle of her lilac gown and sparked from the jewels on her fingers. What a debutante like her was doing in a muddy alley on the wrong end of Caribou Crossing—with a gun, no less—was an utter mystery.

  The woman chuckled, seemingly unbothered. Despite the cold, she wore no coat. “The name’s Irene Blumen. And you are?”

  As Sophia tucked her revolvers away, exhaustion hit. The high that had buoyed her abruptly vanished, leaving her defenseless against her gnawing hunger and the relentless cold. “Freezing,” she said. “Starving. Broke. And quickly learning that this town is nothing like what the newspapers described.”

  Irene’s laugh came again, warm and friendly. “You’re fresh off the boat, then.”

  Sophia nodded, resolutely ignoring the way Irene’s words echoed the angelic stranger’s.

  “You came alone?”

  She nodded again, too tired to pretend.

  “So you’re here for money.” Irene studied her. “If it’s gold you’re after, I can help you.”

  Sophia drew a hopeful breath. She didn’t want this woman’s charity any more than the stranger’s, but Irene’s tone had shifted, becoming businesslike. Maybe she knew of an opportunity. Clearly, she’d made her fortune in Caribou Crossing, so she must understand a thing or two about mining. “I’m not looking to work your husband’s mine for him. But if you’ve got something else in mind, I’m listening.”

  Irene lifted an eyebrow, then burst out laughing. “Oh, sweetheart. I’m no miner, and I’m certainly no one’s wife.”

  Sophia blinked, her gaze lingering on the priceless hairpins and lavish silks. “Well, what are you, then?”

  Irene smiled gently. “I’m a whore.”

  ***

  Sophia followed Irene through the saloon’s back door—only steps away, which explained her lack of outerwear—and through a cramped kitchen. They entered an expansive parlor, where men of every ilk gambled and drank. Cigar smoke and uninhibited laughter permeated the air.

  Irene made her way to a table in the corner. When Sophia sat, warm air cascaded against her skin and caressed her bones, soothing her deep-rooted chill.

  Irene sat down across from her. “I didn’t catch your name, sweetheart.”

  “I didn’t offer it.”

  A wry half-smile crooked Irene’s mouth. “Are you always this prickly?”

  Sophia considered. “No. That’s new. I’m just trying it on for size, really.”

  “And are you liking it?”

  “Quite a bit, actually.”

  “I see.” Irene leaned back, her mouth set in a thoughtful line. Amid the smoky, oil-lit bustle, her eyes glimmered like a sunlit field, her hair a shimmer of chocolate silk. With her classic beauty, she looked nothing like a whore and everything like a duchess or a baroness. “I don’t particularly care if you’re friendly. But I’d like to have something to call you. Make it up, if you like. Most of us do.”

  “Oh? Why’s that?”

  “There isn’t much to do here, except mine gold. Or mine the miners, in our case. With so little news from the Outside, the papers print mostly gossip and scandal. All those stories about us’ll make it back to where we’re from, eventually. And some of us don’t want to be found. So up here, we all become someone new.”

  Sophia nodded. She couldn’t care less if anyone knew where she’d gone, and nobody would come looking, anyway. Besides, she’d already reinvented herself once. The name she’d been born with was so cumbersome and ridiculous that she hadn’t used it in years.

  “The name’s Sophia,” she said.

  “All right, then.” Irene snapped her fingers, calling out over the din. “Professor, two whiskeys, please.”

  Moments later, a painfully thin barman with an unfashionably long braid deposited two drinks on the table, then disappeared.

  Irene sampled her whiskey, sighing with pleasure. Her voice grew smokier. “Let me tell you how this would work.”

  Despite herself, Sophia leaned in.

  “Caribou Crossing may not look like much, but you won’t find a more expensive city on Earth.” Irene nursed her drink, relishing each sip. “A single drink costs a dollar, a decent meal twice that. I guess that’s what happens when there’s nothing to buy but half the town has more gold than they know what to do with.”

  Sophia shook her head. The stranger had said as much, and she’d seen the prices for herself, but she still found the reality hard to believe. Caribou Crossing’s rates ventured straight past exorbitant and into the territory of the completely absurd.

  “But that also means,” Irene continued, “that people earn more here than they would anywhere else. And that’s truest in a brothel.”

  Sophia’s question leapt out on its own. “How much?”

  “Fifteen dollars for fifteen minutes.”

  Her eyes went wide. Sixty dollars in a single hour—a month’s salary, back in the circus.

  Irene flashed an indulgent smile. “If you come to work for me, you’ll keep half, I’ll keep half. Plus, I’ll provide a horse, a room, and all you can eat.”

  Sophia hesitated. “A horse?”

  “Do you ride?” Irene glanced down, inspecting the fingers Sophia had tightened around her whiskey glass.

  “Some.” Sophia forced her hands to relax. “But isn’t prostitution illegal in Canada?”

  Irene shrugged. “The Mounties’re too busy to bother.”

  “It’s lawless up here?”

  “No, the lawmen just have their priorities. They’ve got thieves and claim jumpers to worry about. We fade into the background, most of the time.”

  “Okay. You said I’d have my own room. Which means I’d be replacing someone, right? What happened to her?”

  “She sold herself.”

  Sophia blinked.

  “I ask a year of service,” Irene said. “After that, my girls are free to do as they please. When Flora’s year ended, she auctioned herself off. A miner paid twelve thousand dollars to keep her for a season.”

  Sophia spluttered into her drink. “Twelve thousand?”

  “Money’s cheap in Caribou Crossing.” Irene leaned in. “It’s the women that’re priceless.”

  Sophia stared, her mind spinning.

  “But I always ask four questions before I make an offer.”

  She could get up. She could thank Irene for the drink, walk out, and spend the night shivering in a frozen alley. In the morning, she could scrounge and scrape and try to somehow come up with the thousands of dollars it would take to buy a mining outfit. She could.

  She should.

  But that might be impossible in this frozen, hostile place. So she said, “Shoot.” After all, this was her goal—money, and lots of it. Offered on a silver platter, no less.

  “How old are you?” Irene asked.

  “Twenty-four.”

  Irene missed a beat. “Interesting. Most women lie and say sixteen. Are you a virgin?”

  At that, Sophia had to chuckle. “No.”

  “And why’re you here? Everyone’s looking for something.”

  Another easy one. “Gold. Just like you said.”

  “You came of your own free will?”

  Sophia shuddered. Did women sometimes not? “Of course.”

  Irene toyed with her half-empty glass, her expression indecipherable. “Then I’d like you to join us here at the Scarlet Blossom. But, if you’d rather not, I’ll give you five hundred dollars, no strings attached. More than enough to start over someplace new.”

  Sophia leaned back, thunderstruck. “Five hundred dollars? Why?
You don’t even know me.”

  “I make every girl the same offer.” Irene gave a tight smile. “When I became a fairy, it was because I didn’t have a choice. I’d never wish that on another woman. So if you join us, it’ll be because you want to. Not because you have to.”

  “So you’re…what, Robin Hood?”

  Irene shrugged. “Something like that. Any questions?”

  Sophia spun her glass, her thoughts jostling against one another. “How often do women take the money and go?”

  Irene held her gaze. “About half the time.”

  The five-hundred-dollar offer stared Sophia in the face. It was almost too good to believe.

  Almost.

  In the end, it would only be a handout, and indignation flared when she considered taking charity. That was one thing she’d never done—even at fourteen, when her mother had turned her out on the street, she’d carved her own path, stood on her own two feet. She’d never resorted to begging or borrowing and didn’t intend to start now. Besides, she’d turned down the stranger’s help, hadn’t she? What made Irene’s offer any different?

  Sophia contemplated the bawdy laughter and smoky haze. The Scarlet Blossom, Irene had called the place, which was strange, considering everything in sight—save for the mahogany wainscoting and red curtains—gleamed a resplendent shade of purple. Carpeted and wallpapered completely in violet, the parlor boasted gambling tables, a fully stocked bar, an aged upright piano, and its very own stage. The crowd consisted entirely of miners. Not a woman in sight.

  “How many girls work here?” Sophia asked.

  “You’d make three. One’s upstairs at the moment.” Irene inclined her head toward a wide staircase leading up to a shadowy hallway. “And there goes Temperance.”

  Sophia followed Irene’s gaze to find a dark-skinned woman emerging from the crowd. Wearing nothing but a gossamer dress of white satin, she sailed among the miners like an African goddess—cool, calm, utterly confident.

  Sophia studied the exquisite harmony of her features. With her hair pulled back from her face in a simple chignon, Temperance was stunning, with high cheekbones, a full mouth, and skin like dark rum. Enormous warm-earth eyes framed a narrow nose, lending her a regal elegance. And she had one thing Sophia had always envied.