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took a quick glance, then snapped it shut. “You would have liked her, Rebekah. Daddy says she was a lot like you.”
    Although ten years younger, Dacee June was several inches taller. Rebekah slipped her arm into her sister-in-law’s. “Oh, how’s that?”
    â€œDaddy says you’re both very beautiful and very stubborn.” Rebekah flinched at the description. “He meant that in a good way. He says that’s the only kind that Fortune men marry.”
    Rebekah relaxed and gave Dacee June’s arm a squeeze. “If Daddy Brazos compares me to his Sarah Ruth, I am honored. I’ve never known a widower who still loved his wife as much as your father.”
    Dacee June rocked back on the heels of her tall riding boots. “Yeah, Daddy says love is something you choose, and he gets up every day still choosing to love her.”
    Rebekah gazed over the top of Deadwood at the pines on the far side of the gulch. “I suppose that’s one way to put it.”
    â€œDid you ever choose to love someone before you met Todd?”
    The cheesy grin of Adolphus Conners came to Rebekah’s mind. “Don’t you think that’s a personal question? How about you, Dacee June? Did you ever choose to love someone?”
    The sixteen-year-old dropped her arm and looked up with wide blue eyes. “Yes, but I broke myself of the habit.”
    â€œOh? It wouldn’t happen to be Mr. Carty Toluca, would it?”
    Dacee June paced the covered front porch of the stylish house. “Heavens no! I choose to hate him every day. This was years ago. I was just a kid. Did I ever tell you about the time I rode the steamer up to Fort Pierre by myself in ’75? Well, I really wasn’t completely by myself at that time. The March sisters joined up with me in Kansas City. Anyway, I perched on a coil of big thick rope at the front of the boat with no one else around, and it was so cold my face was turning red. But I didn’t want to go inside the cabin because I was afraid I’d miss Daddy standing along by the shore of the Missouri River. Well, this boy who worked on the boat came up and put his heavy wool coat around me and sort of hugged my shoulder. His arms were really, really strong. He looked in my eyes, and he had the softest blue eyes that made my heart start beating faster and faster and faster. I was really glad my face was already red.”
    Dacee June sucked in a deep gulp of air and rolled her eyes. “He said I could keep the coat until we got to Fort Pierre. He said I reminded him of a girlfriend he used to have. His voice was smooth as the river, and I got this tingly feeling way down deep at the bottom of my stomach. I thought for sure he was going to kiss me.”
    â€œGood heavens, what happened next?” Rebekah asked.
    â€œThe whistle blew,” Dacee June shrugged.
    â€œThe what?”
    â€œThe steam whistle on the stern-wheeler blasted a signal and he said he had to go. And I knew at that very minute if he had kissed me and asked me to marry him, I would have said yes.”
    â€œJust how old were you?”
    â€œTwelve,” Dacee June said.
    â€œAnd how old was he?”
    â€œHe said he was twenty, but I think he was about eighteen.”
    â€œWell, I’m glad you could control yourself.”
    â€œControl myself? I still wonder what would have happened if that ol’ whistle didn’t blow. I cried and cried that night and thought about him for at least a year after that. Every day I’d get up and say to myself, ‘I am in love with Garreth.’”
    â€œHis name was Garreth?”
    â€œI don’t have any idea. But I just couldn’t pine so over a boy with no name. I named him my dear, precious Garreth.”
    â€œDid you see him again?” Rebekah asked. “You know, to give him back his coat?”
    â€œNo, Mrs. Edwards . . . well, she was Mrs. Driver then . . . she insisted that his coat be