She tried to imagine desire and couldn't. Her pocket watch read a few minutes past one. Turning away, she walked to the dresser and found, to her surprise, that the pitcher was full. She poured a few inches of tepid water into the tin basin and splashed her face before stripping off the sour shirt. Then she soaked the tail of her shirt and rubbed it over her chest and shoulders before tossing it aside and pulling another from her valise. She also retrieved her holster and Colt .45, the same weapon she had worn throughout the war, and strapped it on.

Silas looked up at the sound of footsteps on the stairs. "Couldn't sleep?"

Vance regarded him impassively. "No. I could."

She walked out, unaware that he stared after her with a mixture of curiosity and unease.

The saloon was still half full, mostly with men drinking at the bar or tables, a few apparently asleep with their heads on their folded arms, and the remainder playing cards. In the far corner a scantily clad woman sat in a man's lap with her head on his shoulder while he fondled her breasts. Vance walked to the bar.

"Help you?" asked a middle-aged man with full sideburns, a barrel chest, and dark eyes that had seen all there was to see.

"Whiskey."

The bartender poured a shot and then set the bottle down next to Vance's right hand. "I'm Frank."

She pushed several coins toward his side of the bar. "Thanks."

"If you want everybody in town to know who you are, you can tell me now and be done with it." Frank shrugged. "If you don't, it might take a little longer, but sooner or later the same thing will happen."

"If I stay here more than a week, word will get around anyhow."

Vance tossed back the shot and poured another one. "And if I don't, it won't matter." She held out her hand. "Vance Phelps. One-time surgeon and, now, Dr. Melbourne's new assistant."

"From back East." He said it as if it were a statement, not a question.

"More or less." Vance sensed someone move up beside her and glanced sideways. A woman with deep green eyes, golden hair, and the purest skin she'd ever seen stood beside her in a deep indigo dress with a low-cut, tight bodice that cradled her breasts like a lover's hands.

Sparkling blue stones set in gold swung lightly from her earlobes, brushing her neck with a mesmerizing caress. Despite the whiskey she'd just drunk, Vance's throat was dry and her mind blank of everything except the tantalizing scent of perfume and the pale perfection of the woman's face. Frank, the other men in the saloon, even the remnants of her dream, vanished.

"Frank talked your ear off yet?" Mae asked, her voice low and sultry.

"Not yet," Vance managed. She downed her whiskey, her nerves jangling. "You must be Mae."

"Now why would you say that?" Mae nodded when Frank held up a bottle of brandy questioningly. She took the glass from him, but did not drink as she studied Vance. There were deep shadows under her eyes, and deeper ones within. She'd seen her come in, a stranger in a well-cut suit who seemed not to care that a woman, even one whose dress and carriage indicated she gave no credence to the opinions of others, might draw unwanted attention in a place like this. Attention that Mae was not certain that a woman with one arm could turn aside.

"Caleb Melbourne said you were the finest-looking thing west of the Mississippi." Vance spoke quietly with neither sarcasm nor insinuation. "He was right."

Mae threw back her head and laughed. "It would appear that both the town's doctors are sweet-talkers, then."

Vance frantically searched for something to say just to hear this woman's full, vibrant voice a little longer. After the cold, dark embrace of her dreams, she found herself inexplicably craving the vitality and warmth that surrounded Mae. "Since I'm speechless, I beg to differ."

"Well," Mae said, sipping her brandy. "Why don't you start with your name."

"Something tells me you might already know that and more."

Mae smiled. "Smart, too. But I imagine a woman wanting to be a doctor would have to be."

"Or stubborn."

"Both, I'll wager." Mae watched Vance pour another shot, saw her hand tremble. "I can't say that I'm not curious. Since I know you're no fool, you have to know folks will want to know your story."

Vance tilted her chin toward the room and the men--drifters, gamblers, trail hands, and businessmen. All had one thing in common.

They were all here in the middle of the night staving off loneliness or simply trying to fill the hours until the habit of their day began again.

One thing was certain, they all had stories. "I'd have thought you'd have heard enough of those by now."

"I expect yours is different."

"Why?" Vance finished her whiskey, contemplated the bottle, and pushed her glass aside. While the temptation to slide inside the bottle was strong, Mae's presence was stronger.

"You're not a man." Mae watched a bitter smile flicker across Vance's face. Even in men's clothing, in a place no decent woman would be seen, drinking whiskey in the middle of a lonely night, no one would ever take her for a man. Her face was strong, with a tightness along her jaw that suggested she wouldn't yield easily to trouble when it came her way. But there was a fineness to her skin, as if it were silk, and a delicate beauty in the elegant curve of her brow and the length of her dark lashes. It was easy to see the woman in her, which made the thinly veiled anger and pain that rode just beneath the surface all the more compelling.

"Maybe not, but my story might be the same."

"Oh," Mae said, sipping her brandy and resting her fingers on the top of Vance's hand where it lay on the bartop. "Are you going to tell me someone stole your stake and cashed in on your claim while you were on your way into town to file the deed?"

The corner of Vance's mouth twitched. "Never got the gold fever."

"Some no-account cheated at cards and won your horse, your saddle, and your last dollar?"

Vance shook her head. "I know when I'm beat, and I know when to fold them."

"I wonder," Mae mused, idly tracing the length of Vance's fingers, one after the other, with a ruby red fingernail. "I'd be willing to bet you don't give up easily."

"Like I said," Vance said roughly. "Stubborn doesn't always mean smart."

"Or," Mae went on, knowing that whatever caused the anguish in Vance's voice was something Vance wasn't going to talk about now.

Maybe never. "You're going to tell me a woman broke your heart and ran off with the lying, yellow-bellied preacher."

"Couldn't be that," Vance replied seriously, aware that Mae was watching her intently. "I make it a point to stay away from church."

Mae smiled. "If you're not worried about the preacher, you might want to attend the services come Sunday. The townsfolk are likely to take to you more if you do."

Vance sighed. "Some things never change no matter how far away you go."

"You been traveling a long time?" Mae asked gently.

"A little more than a year," Vance answered, surprising herself at the admission. "Well, not the whole time. Part of it I spent in a hospital in Richmond."

"How long?"

"Seven months." Vance reached into her watch pocket, tipped out her pocket watch and looked at the time. "The night's pretty well along and I've taken up enough of yours."

"You're not keeping me from anything I'd rather be doing."

"Dr. Melbourne asked me to see to the young ladies here."

"The young ladies." Mae laughed quietly. She heard no hint of censure in Vance's deep, rough-edged voice. Whatever anger lived inside her, it was for herself and not others. "The young ladies and I rarely rise before midafternoon."

"I was counting you among their number," Vance said with a trace of gallantry long unpracticed. "Surely you're no older than your charges."

"It seems you know quite a bit about me, as well, Dr. Phelps."

Vance inclined her head and smiled fleetingly. "No more than what you want anyone to know, I'm sure."

"Come by around six tomorrow and have supper with me. I'll tell you about the girls then."

Vance hesitated. She wasn't in the habit of socializing, even casually. She had nothing to say that others could hear or that she would want to recount. It was enough for her to live with her past without inflicting it upon others.

"You'll not be required to tell me your secrets."

"And what if I should want to?" Vance held her breath, wondering just what she hoped to hear. Despite the circumstances or appearances, Mae was clever and far from the kind of beaten-down, destitute woman who ordinarily turned to prostitution as the last form of survival. Vance had been in enough large cities and desolate frontier towns to know what became of women who had no men to provide for them, no family to support them, and no skills to make their own way. Perhaps it was precisely because Mae defied expectations that she was drawn to her.

Mae closed her fingers around Vance's wrist and leaned close enough that had Vance looked down, she would have been able to see the blush of rouge highlighting the deeper rose of her nipples. "I would be very pleased to listen."

"Then I shall be pleased to attend you tomorrow evening." Vance gently disengaged her wrist from Mae's warm grasp and stepped away.

"Good night, Mae."

"Good night, Vance."

Frank leaned on the bar as Mae watched Vance leave. "I can't say as I've ever seen quite the likes of her before," he said, not unkindly.

"No," Mae said quietly, "neither have I."