Page 3 of Mail-Order Tess (A Mail-Order Mystery #2)

Three

T wo days later, the bell above the mercantile door jingled for the third time in five minutes. Tess nearly dropped the jar of pickled onions in her hands when more customers entered the building.

“Careful, dear!” Martha called from another part of the storefront. She’d been busy wrapping twine around parcels of seed packets. “Those jars are notorious for slipping their lids.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tess said. She studied the jar warily before sliding it onto the shelf behind her with extra care.

She’d only been working at the mercantile for two days, and already her shoulders ached from sweeping, stocking, and wrestling barrels twice her size.

But the work was steady, the pay—while modest—at least meant she wouldn’t starve.

When Martha offered her the job, she’d accepted without hesitation.

She needed the distraction. If she didn’t keep busy, her thoughts circled back to Henry Bonner, and the questions that still had no answers.

Who had killed him? And why? She wasn’t sure why her mind had latched onto the mystery of his death, other than to reassure herself that his passing was for the best.

But even if she didn’t want to think about it, townsfolk came into the store and murmured that it was a tragic accident. But when the four benevolent matchmakers spoke of it, it was murder. So which was it?

The bell jingled again, and Tess looked up. A tall man with a slouch in his hat and a dusty pair of boots stepped through the door. He scanned the store, then glanced her way.

“Can I help you?” Martha asked sweetly from across the store. She wiped her hands on her apron and began to approach him, eyebrows lifting with curiosity. He must be a stranger.

The man didn’t answer right away. He gave Martha a tight nod before he wandered toward the back, past barrels of different goods and penny candy. He headed for a stack of crates that arrived on the train that morning.

Tess made a face. Were they his? She hadn’t thought to ask Martha what they might be. Most locals came in for flour, ribbon, or licorice for their children. Not to linger by crates stored in the back hallway. Especially not the ones marked with a red X.

Tess watched the stranger as he pretended to study a bin of nails, but his eyes kept flicking around the store, as if counting heads, she realized. Was he planning to steal something?

She set down the can of beans she’d been shelving and picked up the broom propped nearby. If she was going to watch him, she needed to look like she was doing something. Tess swept quietly, edging closer.

The man sidestepped to a crate and tapped one side of it with his boot, then bent down and slipped something into his coat pocket…a folded piece of paper, maybe?

He straightened abruptly and looked up, catching her gaze. Tess smiled like a fool and kept sweeping. He didn’t smile back.

Without so much as a tip of his hat, he strode out the door with a haste that wasn’t quite a run but certainly wasn’t casual. The bell above the door jingled as he left.

“Well, he wasn’t very polite,” Martha huffed, already turning to wrap another parcel of seeds.

Tess peeked through one of the mercantile front windows as the man crossed the street and disappeared around the corner of the telegraph office. “Do you know him?”

“No,” Martha replied, handing a parcel to a waiting customer. “And I know everyone in this town. I’ll have to speak to Mrs. Sampson at the hotel and see if he’s staying there.”

Tess’s heart skipped a beat.Good grief, they weren’t going to try and match her up with the stranger, were they?

She shoved that thought aside and returned to her sweeping. As she passed by the crate, she noticed something white peeking out from the gap in the floorboards beneath it. Curious, she crouched down and plucked it free.

Hmm, it was just a scrap of paper. She straightened, intending to toss it in the trash bin beneath the counter. But something made her pause.

She flipped it over. A strange symbol had been drawn in pencil. A crescent shape, or was it a claw? Frowning, Tess closed her fingers around the paper and slipped it into her apron pocket. She wasn’t a Pinkerton agent by any stretch. But her curiosity had a nasty habit of getting the best of her.

She just hoped it wouldn’t get her into any trouble. She was in enough as it was.

Wade leaned against the porch post outside the barbershop, pretending to read a C. I. Sayer dime novel. From where he stood, he had a clear view of Tindle’s Mercantile, and more importantly, its newest employee.

Miss Tess Pendergrass was shorter than he’d expected, now that he’d gotten a good look at her.

He’d seen her the day Martha and her cohorts marched her past him but tried to ignore what they were doing.

But this morning he’d caught her going into the mercantile with all the poise of a woman entering a grand ballroom, not a dusty frontier shop.

Dark hair, big green eyes, and a regal bearing that didn’t match the life of a mail-order bride.

He drummed his fingers against his thigh.

Whatever happened to Henry Bonner, Wade doubted it was the random accident the town sheriff had chalked it up to a drunken fall off the train platform.

Wade suspected Bonner had been watching for something, or someone.

And whatever it was, it likely tied directly to the smuggling ring Wade was here to dismantle.

His real question was: how had the four meddling matrons figured out Bonner was murdered?

He was the only one who actually suspected it.

Were they just being dramatic? Entirely possible, given their flair for theatrics.

Still...maybe they knew something he didn’t.

Every time he tried to speak with them, they tried to shove Miss Pendergrass in his direction instead. Be it verbally or literally.

He shook his head and pushed off the post. Poor Miss Pendergrass was caught up in the middle of something dangerous through no fault of her own.

He could see her now through the mercantile front windows, working on a display.

She was always moving, always doing something.

Earlier, he’d watched her sweep her way toward the back of the store and the stack of crates that had come in on the morning train.

Crates Wade had been meaning to inspect.

He’d noticed one was marked with a red chalk “X”.

He’d love to find out whether it showed up on the official shipping manifest. And he couldn’t help but notice the man who’d just left the mercantile.

He hadn’t tipped his hat to Mrs. Tindle.

He hadn’t made eye contact. And now he was cutting behind the telegraph office, disappearing into the alley.

Wade narrowed his eyes. The man had all the hallmarks of trouble. He’d check him out later. Right now, his gaze drifted back to Tess.

She’d just stepped outside, broom in hand, sweeping the entryway. She paused, looked around, and pulled something from her apron pocket. Studied it. Then turned and went back inside.

Wade’s jaw tightened. The tension in her shoulders, the way she moved…she was scared.

He knew that look. He’d seen it on agents in the field and on women before a mission. Maybe she’d realized she wasn’t just a mail-order bride anymore. Maybe she was a witness.

If the man leaving the mercantile had killed Bonner…did he think Bonner had given Tess something before he died? Either way, she was a target now.

Wade crossed the street, his palm brushing against the grip of the Colt beneath his coat. He had to be patient. He couldn’t blow his cover. But doggone it, the idea that she might be in danger—and that someone might already be watching her—rubbed him the wrong way.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he stepped into the mercantile. Miss Pendergrass stood behind the counter, a feather duster in hand. She looked up, her striking green eyes landing on him. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact,” he said, stepping up to the counter. “I could use a few things.”

“Do you have a list?”

Wade caught Martha watching them from across the store and did his best not to meet her eyes. The last thing he needed was for her to come over and coach the conversation. “Let’s see… a couple cans of beans, one pound of coffee, and…”

As he spoke, Tess grabbed the beans from the shelf behind her and placed them on the counter. “And?” she prompted.

“He’ll take some licorice and some of those lemon drops, dear,” Martha said cheerfully, marching across the store to join them.

Great. Wade rested his hands on the counter, resisting the urge to drum his fingers. “Good afternoon, Mrs. Tindle,” he said, tipping his hat politely.

“Oh, now, we’ll have none of that, Wade Atwood. You know you can call me Martha.” She turned to Tess with a conspiratorial smile. “He often does, you know. Why, he’s like the son I never had.”

“Except you do have a son,” Wade pointed out with a wry smile. “Where is Morgan, by the way?”

Martha had the decency to blush. “He and Daisy have gone to visit the Mullaneys in Oregon City. I’m surprised Mahulda didn’t go with them,” she added, turning back to Tess. “Her daughter Eva lives there, you know.”

“I didn’t, actually,” Tess replied politely.

“Oh, I must’ve forgotten to tell you Eva married someone from there! How silly of me!” Martha gave a lighthearted giggle.

Wade watched them both, amused and suspicious. “Is that why you hired Miss Pendergrass?” he asked.

“One of the reasons,” Martha said. “She needed work, and I needed help with Morgan, Daisy, and Chance gone for at least two weeks.” She turned back to him with a little grin. “And who knows what can happen in two weeks?”

Wade didn’t dignify that with a response.

Martha bustled behind the counter. “Are you filling his order, dear?”

“Yes, Mrs. Tindle,” Tess said, hands steady but her eyes still cautious.

“Oh, call me Martha, dear,” she said, beaming.

Then she turned to Wade again. “Have you two been introduced? How silly of me! Tess, dear, this is Wade Atwood. Carpenter by trade, and a good one. Lord knows I need him, what with my grandson Chance and his friends being so rough on everything around here. Poor Wade is always having to fix that railing out front.”

Wade nodded. That much was true. He looked at Tess and caught the flicker of unease in her gaze. His protective instincts surged again.

She was nervous. And he couldn’t blame her.

He didn’t have answers for her yet. But one thing was clear. Until he did, he was going to make sure no one laid a hand on her.