Claim (The Homeward Trilogy Book #3)

T. Bergren Lisa

Description

Sent West by their father to make a new life, the St. Clair siblings have done so--but hardly as he'd wished. Beautiful, headstrong Moira, after pursuing a career on the Paris stage, has returned to Colorado Springs--older, wiser, and certainly much poorer--to see if there's anything left of a relationship she'd left behind. Older sister Odessa and her husband, Bryce, are struggling to rebuild their ranch after a devastating winter. And then Nic, the prodigal son, turns up--broken, haunted, and sick about leaving his sisters.At last the family is reunited. But Dominic is still at loose ends, seeking a peace that has always eluded him. Only as he mines an old claim deep in the Rocky Mountains and begins a romance with a local schoolteacher does he begin to understand how passionately he is loved--by God, his family, and a good woman. But even as he relinquishes his fury, Nic discovers there is one last battle to fight . . .

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 01 juin 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781493420674
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

What people are saying about …
CLAIM
“Claim drew me in to the Colorado setting with characters who had much to overcome and the courage to stand up for their beliefs. I laughed and cried, cheered, and held my breath until the very end when I had to pull myself into the twenty-first century. This is clearly a masterful work of fiction with explosive emotive conflict.”
DiAnn Mills, author of Sworn to Protect and A Woman Called Sage
What people are saying about …
BREATHE
“Lisa Bergren’s Breathe is a sweet and sensitive tale of faith, love, and devilry on a raw frontier just coming into its own.”
Kristen Heitzmann, best-selling author of The Edge of Recall and Christy-award winner Secrets
“This book grabbed me from the very first page and kept me reading way past my bedtime—for me, a sure mark of a terrific read. Lisa T. Bergren is an excellent writer. I highly recommend Breathe , and I can’t wait for the next book in the trilogy.”
Cindy Swanson, blogging at Notes in the Key of Life
“ Breathe riveted me with its fascinating peek into Colorado Springs history and well-drawn characters I quickly grew to love. I couldn’t put it down! Bergren is one of my favorite authors.”
Colleen Coble, author of the Rock Harbor series
“Aptly titled, this is a superb historical medical thriller that brings to life victims of consumption (Tuberculosis) as they struggle to BREATHE.”
Harriet Klausner, Genre Go Round Reviews
Also by Lisa T. Bergren:
CHILDREN’S BOOKS:
God Gave Us You
God Gave Us Two
God Gave Us Christmas
God Gave Us Heaven
God Gave Us Love
How Big Is God?
God Found Us You
NONFICTION:
The Busy Mom’s Devotional
What Women Want
Life on Planet Mom
NOVELS:
The Bridge
Christmas Every Morning
The Northern Lights series:
The Captain’s Bride
Deep Harbor
Midnight Sun
The Gifted series:
The Begotten
The Betrayed
The Blessed
The Homeward Trilogy:
Breathe
Sing
Claim

© 2010 Lisa T. Bergren
Published by Bethany House Publishers 11400 Hampshire Avenue South Bloomington, Minnesota 55438 www.bethanyhouse.com
Bethany House Publishers is a division of Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan. www.bakerpublishinggroup.com
Previously published by David C Cook
Ebook edition originally created 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4934-2067-4
This story is a work of fiction. All characters and events are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is coincidental.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version ® . NIV ® . Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.
Cover Design: DogEared Design, Kirk DouPonce
Cover Photos: iStockphoto
For Traci, friend and editor extraordinaire … thank you for all your hard work on this series. I couldn’t have done it without you, sis.
If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. (1 John 1:6)
CONTENTS
Cover
Endorsements
Also by Lisa T Bergren
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Epilogue
Discussion Questions
Chat with the Author
Back Ad
Back Cover
CHAPTER ONE
1 August 1888 Gunnison, Colorado
“Keep doing that you’ll get yourself killed,” Nic said to the boy. Panting, Nic paused and wiped his forehead of sweat. For an hour now, as he moved sacks of grain from a wagon to a wheelbarrow and into the warehouse, he’d glimpsed the boy daring fate as he ran across the busy street, narrowly escaping horse hooves and wagon wheels.
“Where’s your mother?”
The brown-haired boy paused. “Don’t have a mother.”
“Well then, where’s your father?”
The boy cast him an impish grin and shrugged one shoulder. “Around.”
“Is he coming back soon?” Nic persisted.
“Soon enough. You won’t tell ’im, will ya?”
“Tell him what?” Nic tossed back with a small smile. “Long as you stop doing whatever you’re not supposed to be doing.”
The boy wandered closer and climbed up to perch on the wagon’s edge, watching Nic with eyes that were as dark as his hair. Nic relaxed a bit, relieved that the kid wasn’t in imminent danger.
Nic hefted a sack onto his shoulder and carried it to the cart. It felt good to be working again. He liked this sort of heavy labor, the feel of muscles straining, the way he had to suck in his breath to heave a sack, then release it with a long whoosh . A full day of this sort of work allowed him to drop off into dreamless sleep—something he hungered for more than anything else these days.
The boy was silent, but Nic could feel him staring, watching his every move like an artist studying a subject he was about to paint. “How’d you get so strong?” the boy said at last.
“Always been pretty strong,” Nic said, pulling the next sack across the wooden planks of the wagon, positioning it. “How’d you get so fast?”
“Always been pretty fast,” said the boy, in the same measured tone Nic had used.
Nic smiled again, heaved the sack to his shoulder, hauled it five steps to the cart, and then dropped it.
“This your job?” the boy asked.
“For today,” Nic said.
Nic loaded another sack, and the boy was silent for a moment. “My dad’s looking for help. At our mine.”
“Hmm,” Nic said.
“Needs a partner to help haul rock. He’s been asking around here for days.”
“Miner, huh? I don’t care much for mining.”
“Why not? You could be rich.”
“More miners turn out dead than rich.” He winced inwardly, as a shadow crossed the boy’s face. It’d been a while since he’d been around a kid this age. He was maybe ten or eleven max, all wiry muscle and sinew. Reminded him of a boy he knew in Brazil.
Nic carried the next sack over to the wagon, remembering the heat there, so different from what Colorado’s summer held. Here it was bone dry. He was sweating now, after the morning’s work, but not a lot. In Brazil a man soaked his sheets as he slept.
“Listen, kid,” he said, turning back around to the wagon, intending to apologize for upsetting him. But the boy was gone.
Nic sighed and set to finishing his work. As the sun climbed high in the sky, he paused to take a drink from his canteen and eat a hunk of bread and cheese, watching the busy street at the end of the alleyway. He wondered if he’d see the boy again, back to his antics of racing teams of horses. The child was probably letting off steam, just as Nic had done all his life—he’d been about the child’s age when he’d first starting scrapping with others.
But that was in the past. Not since his voyage aboard the Mirabella had Nic indulged the need, succumbed to the desire to enter a fight. Several times now, he’d had the opportunity—and enough cause—to take another man down. But he had walked away. He knew, deep down he knew, that if he was ever to face his sisters, Odessa and Moira, again, if he was to come to them and admit he was penniless, everything would somehow be all right if he was settled inside. If he could come to a place of peace within, the kind of peace Manuel had known. It was the kind of thing that allowed a man to stand up straight, shoulders back, the kind of thing that gave a man’s gut peace. Regardless of what he accomplished, or had in the past. Thing was, he hadn’t found that place of comfort inside, and he didn’t want what Manuel tried to sell him—God.
There had to be another way, another path. Something like this work. Hard manual labor. That might be what he needed most.
Nic heard a man calling, his voice a loud whisper, and his eyes narrowed as the man came limping around the corner, obviously in pain, his arm in a sling. “You, there!” he called to Nic. “Seen a boy around? About yea big?” he said, gesturing to about chest height.
“Yeah, he was here,” Nic called back. He set his canteen inside the empty wagon and walked to the end of the alleyway.
“Where’d he go?” the man said. Nic could see the same widow’s peak in the man’s brown hair that the boy had, the same curve of the eyes … the boy’s father, clearly.
“Not sure. One minute he was watching me at work, the next he was gone.”
“That’s my boy, all right.”
“I’ll help you find him.”
The man glanced back at him and then gave him a small smile. He stuck out his good arm and offered his hand. “I’d appreciate that. Name’s Vaughn. Peter Vaughn.”
“Dominic St. Clair,” he replied. “You can call me Nic.”
Peter smiled. His dimples were in the exact same spot as the boy’s. “Sure you can leave your work?”
“I’m nearly done. Let’s find your boy.”

“Go on,” Moira’s sister urged, gazing out the window. “He’s been waiting on you for a good bit now.”
“I don’t know what he sees in me,” Moira said, wrapping the veil around her head and across her shoulder again. It left most of her face visible but covered the burns at her neck, ear, and scalp. Did it cover them enough? She nervously patted it, making sure it was in place.
Odessa stepped away from washing dishes and joined her. “He might wonder what you see in him. Do you know what his story is? He seems wary.” Their eyes met and Odessa backtracked. “Daniel’s a good man, Moira. I think highly of him. But I’d