Gold Diggers Books

After five years in the California mountains, Birdie Banks longs to return to civilization. Her father is gone and mining camps are no place for a lady alone. With the help of her Asian manservant, Lin Sing, Birdie hires Jedidiah Evans to escort them down the mountain. Jed is a big man, strong and capable and Birdie knows that God sent him to help get them back to Sacramento and to her fiancé Nelson O’Neil. Nelson is a highly successful California merchant. He’s a bit older than Birdie, but they have been corresponding through letters for the last five years. Now the time as come for them to be together and Birdie can hardly wait. The treacherous trip down the mountain will be more than worth every danger they will face. Making sure a tiny woman and Chinese man get down the mountains safely will be too easy. Jed is almost embarrassed to take her money, but when they are set upon by would-be thieves the truth comes out: Birdie and Lin Sing are transporting a fortune in gold. They need Jed to protect it—and Birdie—as she makes her way back to town. Jed hates everything about gold. He lost his brother on the mountain and the precious time he spent looking for a way to save the family ranch in Texas. Birdie agrees. She lost her father and her health. She may have found a fortune, but she has learned the hard way that wealth can be a curse as well as a blessing. That’s why she’s giving it all to the church as soon as she gets back to town. Once in Sacramento, Birdie gives Jed the money he needs to save his family’s land, though he refuses to take it. How can he take the money from her when he’s fallen in love with her? Yet with a fiancé as perfect as Nelson O’Neil why would she ever fall for a common man like him? Birdie is confused by her feelings, conflicted over the time she spent loving Nelson from afar to the days and nights she spent with Jed, riding, walking, talking, just being. He’s a good man, a godly man. Still how could she fall in love with someone in a matter of days? She couldn’t. Not when she has loved Nelson for the last five years. But like gold, love is strange and treasure is in the eye of the beholder. And she’ll have to choose between the treasure she has always known and the one God sent especially for her.

Her reputation precedes her, whether the bad guys realize it or not. Nancy Harrison has finally stepped out of her prissy box and tried to do something helpful--but did she go overboard in her first self-less act? She can’t ride, she hates horses, and she’s terrified of being alone. What’s a girl to do? Join the Pony Express, of course. When Nancy Harrison’s family receives a tax bill they can’t pay, there’s only one option open to them. Her brother, Lewis, will have to join the Pony Express and earn the money that way. It would have worked, too, if ruffians hadn’t attacked him and broken his leg. She doesn’t want to do it, of course, but what choice is there? Lose everything or ride a stupid, smelly horse for a few weeks? Nancy decides that she’ll chop off her hair, take to the dusty overland trail, and prove that she isn’t a “flighty little thing.” But things go from bad to worse as she discovers that riding astride is worse than sidesaddle—especially when you’re not used to it. Can’t she just go back home to balls, teas, and the hope of a suitor before her twentieth birthday? Sans her hair, of course, because that’ll entice the fellows. Sigh.

Jessie Madsen has her hands full helping her parents run their small farm and boarding house while every fortune-seeker in the country seems to be flocking to her small town in search of gold. It’s bad enough that claim jumpers won’t quit trespassing on her property, but geologist James Kelsey, mildly intriguing and surprisingly handsome for an Easterner, seems more interested in her than the mining business. Jessie is certain she doesn’t have the time or the need for a man, and after getting her heart broken, she has resolved never to fall for an outsider again. Add stolen cash, a fast-talking con man, and a pair of bandits, and Jessie is indeed up to her eyeballs in trouble. Will she soften her rock-hard exterior and let the geologist discover the hidden treasure in her heart?

Grace and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Can a tangled web snare two hearts and point them true north? A Papa’s girl from the start, Jewel Jones remembers all the things he told her. Wealthy, but far from being a snob, she finds Boaz Branson both irritating and intriguing. How can she know if the handsome confidence-man truly turns from his wicked ways, or if his interest only in her gold? Papa said let God’s peace lead her. Only by God’s grace can Boaz escape the deceptions he plans to perpetrate on the beautiful heiress. While his head wants to flee the entanglement, his heart bids him stay. Are Jewel and Boaz building on sinking sand, or have they found the golden nugget they seek?