A Handful of Heaven

Slowly she opened her eyes. Adventures, she thought grimly, were messy businesses.

Tilting her chin upward, she took her first step toward Mr. MacKenna's trading post.

It was the second step that nearly killed her. She plungi into the mud like a falling boulder. The black goo tonguedi her knees, curling cold and syruplike around her legs. Bits and chunks of it splattered up to her face, mingling with the rain and sliding down her wet cheeks in torrents.

She knotted her fists, fighting the urge to scream in frustration. Gritting her teeth, she plodded through the thigh-deep mud. Her skirts were a deadweight that fought her eve: step.

After what seemed hours, she stopped. Heaving for breath,! wiping the persistent rain from her eyes, she tried to focus. Something loomed in front of her. She blinked hard.

Slowly the blur cleared, and she could see a string of two-inch-by-twelve-inch planks stretched out before her.

"A boardwalk." The word came out in a soft, thankful sigh. She surged forward, stumbling blindly toward the nearest plank. Her foot came down hard on the board's edge, driving it deep in the soggy mud. Beneath her foot the wood shifted and shot forward. With a strangled cry she fell backward, landing flat on her back in the mud.

"Darn it!" she screamed, beating her ice-cold fists in the mud. She wanted to kick the stuffing out of something, anything, she wanted to-

No.

She had to relax, to get control. Taking a deep, shuddering breath, she tried counting. "One . . . two . . . three ..."

She staggered to her feet. Slinging an arm around the nearest post, she held herself upright. Eyes closed, she tried to regain her breath.

Something cold and wet smacked her in the head. She looked up. Hanging above her were the dirtiest, ugliest, biggest pair of denim pants she'd ever seen. Scrawled across the seat were the words: MACKENNA'S POST.

It couldn 't be. Devon's every hope for the future vanished. She eyed the half-finished log cabin at the end of the muddy street, and disappointment settled rock-hard in the pit of her stomach. Her post could at least have been in the cabin.

Reluctantly she brought her gaze back to the filthy, grayed canvas structure in front of her. MacKenna's Post. Her post. The store she'd come halfway across the country and then some to run was housed in a dilapidated tent. A tent.

"Perfect," she said with a groan. "Just perfect."

Shoving through the flaps, she marched inside. Dead center she stopped, her eyes scanning the sorry tent in a heartbeat. About the size of an average dining room, it had sagging gray canvas walls, a mishmash of haphazard shelving, a tiny metal stove, and a filthy wood-plank floor.

Against the far wall a mountainous slab of humanity sat hunched behind the most lopsided, disorganized counter she'd ever seen. The thick, sharp odor of unwashed bodies and old food engulfed her. Her fragile control slipped a notch. This . . . this pigsty was the post she had intended to transform into a fashionable store.

"Mr. MacKenna?" she said stiffly, moving toward the

14

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15

Darwin was right.

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Chapter Two

17

Thick, angry silence encased them. Mr. MacKenna's breathing quickened, punching through the quiet like a fist, spilling across Devon's face in hot, harsh bursts.

"Say something," she demanded. "An apology would not be out of order."