Jericho cared about her too. That much was clear enough. He might even love her and had agreed to think about sticking together. Surely eventually they’d figure out a way to make things work.

“This is all Jericho’s fault.” Flynn’s voice rumbled with frustration.

“The way Greta tells the story, you and Wyatt were the ones pushing him to marry Ivy.”

“Had my reservations. But reckoned if anyone could make her happy, Bliss could.”

Yes, he could make her mighty happy. But she wanted the chance to make him happy too. And she wouldn’t get to if her brothers were forcing Jericho to stay away.

She pried her eyes open. She needed to give them a piece of her mind, tell them to stop interfering with Jericho and her. Things were already hard enough, and she didn’t need her brothers making it worse.

Pushing up on her uninjured arm, she tried to focus on Brody sitting in a chair next to her bedside. But her eyes felt heavy and glassy. Her head ached. And she was as weak as a baby bird just hatched.

His dark brows furrowed, and he shifted a cup toward her mouth. “Hey, darlin’.”

She shook her head and took in Flynn standing at the end of the bed. His thumbs were tucked into his belt, and his anxious eyes peered at her from within the shadows of his battered hat.

“I love Jericho,” she croaked. She began to shake, and her head pounded harder. She wanted to say more, but she fell back onto the mattress, too weak to do anything but give way to oblivion.

Jericho tugged on the handcuffs. The adjustable ratchet was tight against Otis’s wrists.

“You must be getting quite a reward for turning me in.” Otis reclined in the hay-filled wagon bed, claiming to be weak and in pain, even though the doctor had confirmed the gunshot wound was healing well.

Jericho reached for the manacles around Otis’s ankles and rattled them, making sure they were still as secure as they’d been earlier when he’d put them on.

“What are they paying you?” Otis spoke casually, but the outlaw was once again trying to connive his way out of the situation, just as he’d been doing ever since Jericho had captured him.

Jericho had kept Otis manacled and locked up in Fairplay’s makeshift jail for the past three days. And he’d paid a couple of trustworthy cowhands to stand guard while he’d ridden back up to Windy Peak and brought down Hance’s dead body along with the other two accomplices. One of them probably wouldn’t make it. But the other was recuperating. From the information Jericho had gathered from the two, they were simply pawns in a bigger scheme to find the gold.