From award-winning, best-selling author Kathleen Ball.

A handsome man, Greg Settler, one of the many orphans taken in by Lynn and Smitty Settler, decides to go and make his own mark on the world. He travels to California to try his luck at gold mining. From the first day he realizes he knows nothing about gold mining. Luckily for Greg, his claim is next to Hugo Watkins and his daughter Mercy’s mine.  

Mercy Watkins has grown up traveling from mine to mine. Her father, a dreamer, always believed they’d make it big at the next mine. Unfortunately, her father dies, but not before he asks Greg to take care of his daughter.  

In order to save Greg from hanging, Mercy marries him. Both are stubborn, and it makes for an unconventional marriage as they mine for gold.  

Will they be able to survive, claim jumpers, bushwhackers, and Greg’s family? Can they tell each other what is in their hearts before Mercy goes her own way?